#and then I DROP KICK THEM VIOLENTLY with THE HORRORS.

[ratcandy]

posting something edgy is so scary like AUUGUH they're gonna find out I like BLOOD and GORE and HORROR and MACABRE and DEATH being depicted in WORKS OF ART . they're going to personally escort me straight to HELL

[prentissluvr]

dead eyes — sam winchester

cw : gn!reader, hurt/comfort, established relationship, canon typical violence, blood, death, weapons, and monsters (shifter), reader has a panic attack, character death (in a dream), nightmares, crying, kisses, unedited, 2.4K words. requested !

summary : killing a shifter with sam's appearance scares you to the point of a panic attack.

his dead eyes. you shouldn’t have looked.

when you do, it feels like you’re being tilted on your axis, and your vision swims for a moment. his voice, though distant, brings you out of it. we should go find dean, he says, voice gentle like he caught a glimpse of the horror that flashes over your features. horror because they’re his dead eyes.

but it’s not over yet. there’s still another shifter in the house, and the adrenaline of an active hunt doesn’t let you dwell on it.

you had gotten separated, just like you said you wouldn’t, and when sam showed back up, you had to point your gun at him, you had to keep him at a distance. this proved smart when another sam walks in. your sam, you think, because he’s carrying the silver knife he took on the hunt today… and because it feels like him. but you couldn’t be sure.

so you kept your gun up and ready to turn on either one at a moment's notice, even when the mere idea of shooting sam, even a fake one, made you sick to your stomach. what if i shoot the real sam? you had thought to yourself in a terrified moment before your insincts kicked in.

you offered to test yourself first, slipping out your silver knife and cutting a thin line to prove to the real sam that you can be trusted. the shifter and sam stare each other down, and the one that you think is your real sam offers to test himself with his own knife. right as he brings the blade to his forearm, the other lunges towards sam, pulling out a long dagger and aiming right for the heart.

two shots rang out through the air before you could even think about it, and the shift dropped dead at sam’s feet.

now, as you find dean, just barely having killed the last shifter, you know that your instincts served you well, and saved both you and sam. but it had all happened so fast. the realization that there was more than one shifter, getting separated from the brothers, then the confrontation with both sams. your sam, who was calm and collected, but didn’t try to worm his way into getting you to trust him. and the shifter, who wore sam’s face and played with you.

he had insisted he was the real sam, he had chosen to confuse you. sure, to buy himself some time… but you think it was for the pure entertainment of it too. that’s exactly what the shifters had done to their previous victims; posed as their loved ones, but turned violent and angry until the victims tried to hurt or even kill them in self-defense. then they'd guilt their victim for trying to hurt someone they love. and then of course they’d kill them, with their loved one’s face as the last thing they see. they were a violent, messed up pair of monsters, and you’re glad to be rid of them.

but they got to you too. maybe you are their final victim, because sam’s voice saying please don’t hurt me keeps replaying in your head. then there’s sam’s body falling to the ground, blood pooling under him so fast and his eyes open in death. 

it wasn’t sam. you know it wasn’t sam. but in the car ride back to the motel you’re overwhelmed with images of his dead body anyway. and the fact that you had to point that gun at the real sam because you couldn’t be too sure. looking down the barrel of a gun and sam being at the end of it… it just about kills you.

from his seat in the front of the car, sam knows that you’re struggling. he can feel it. your eyes on the back of his head, looking haunted when he glances back with a silent smile of reassurance. and he can’t even see your hands where they are, tucked into your lap, but he knows you well enough that it’s like he can physically feel the way they’re shaking. he wishes he could wrap his solid hands around your trembling fingers and rub your back to soothe your breathing.

he’ll have to wait until you get to the motel, and he’s thankful the drive is almost over. the silence of the car isn’t a comfortable one.

dean reads the room easily and takes to the shower the moment you arrive. before the door to the bathroom is even shut, sam pulls you into his arms, one hand wrapped around your shoulders and the other planted on the back of your head to keep you close.

“it’s okay,” he murmurs, pressing his cheek against you. “i know you’d never hurt me. you don’t have to worry about that.”

the way that he hand picks words and tone and volume for you, with ease and purpose and a complete knowledge of you, your heart, and your mind makes you melt into his hold. you mold to his body, you hug him back so tight, and you cry a few tears. just a few, because his arms around you are grounding and real and better than anything else you could ever ask for. you thought you might fall into a panic, let your anxieties and tendency to overthink things get the better of you. he fixes it all with a hug.

a hug and a love for you that compares to nothing at all. it’s like the way that he holds you and the way that he knows you, gently close the gaps where worry and fear and tears slip through. no stitches, no needle and thread, just soft bandages that hold you together.

⟢⟢⟢

you kill sam in your dreams. you don’t remember anything else. just what it’s like to point your gun at him and shoot with intent. what it’s like to press your hands to the bleeding wounds you made and see his eyes go still. you wake before you can close them with bloody hands.

you’re trembling and you don’t think you’re breathing quite right.

it’s just a dream. it was just a dream. none of it is real. you would never hurt sam, never on purpose. 

with a sharp twist of your neck, you look over at his sleeping form from your spot on the pullout couch. 

you share a bed much more often than not, but this motel is out of rooms with queen beds. last time you slept in a twin bed with him you almost fell to the floor even with him holding you close. that thought brings you out of it for a moment. but seeing him so still in bed is too scary for you to stay calm for any longer than that.

he’s fine, you think desperately. he’s just sleeping. if you could take the time to let your eyes adjust to the dark or see through the tears in your eyes, you’d be able to catch the rise and fall of his breathing. but you can’t.

you can’t even keep track of your own breathing as you stumble out of bed and towards him before realizing at the last moment that you don’t want to wake him.

so you put a hand to your chest and try to breathe as you turn around and make your way to the motel room door on shaky legs. the tears run and run like they can outpace the fear, maybe drown it, and you don’t realize how much noise you’re making as you fumble with the lock and the handle and the door that wasn’t this heavy earlier today.

you’re looking for the cold. the wind, maybe rain if you’re lucky. you’re looking for something to feel that’s not a phantom of your nightmares or suffocating guilt and terror. how could you even dream that? how could you?

and you can’t breathe, you don’t think that you can breathe as your knees buckle and you sit down hard on the concrete outside. it would hurt if you could feel it.

you squeeze your eyes shut and drop your head between your knees because you know somewhere in the back of your mind that you’re having a panic attack. but from your position on the ground and the intensity of your anxiety, it’s not enough. you gasp and gasp and can’t hear sam’s footsteps or your name falling from his lips until he’s right in front of you.

he doesn’t touch you for fear of startling you, but he says your name so soft and steady and worried.

“please look at me, honey,” he asks. sleep tints his voice, love colors it. “it’s alright. you’re alright. i’m alright.”

looking at him is hard because he’s already there, behind your eyelids and bleeding out. but he’s alright. that was his voice saying it, his voice calling you honey and maybe if you open your eyes and look up, he won’t sound so distant the next time he talks.

he’s in front of you. the sight of him sways a little, but he’s there and if you’re seeing well enough, he looks so concerned. so sorry and worried and a little helpless because he wants to bring you out of it and isn’t sure if it’s working yet.

but you hear him and you listen, and when he can see your eyes, it’s a little bit better. when you can see his eyes, it’s a little bit better. they are not open in death. they are alive and feeling and looking at you with love and pain and softness and sorrow. he’s so sorry that you’re so scared of hurting him.

“can you focus on me, love?” he asks, noting your distant eyes and faraway mind and wanting more than anything to bring you back to him.

like a miracle, you find out that you can. you can focus on his eyes, and then his voice, and then you see him holding a hand out in case you want something physical to ground yourself with. it’s instinct to grab his hand, to grip it and steady yourself with it like you have a million times before for a million different reasons. like when you got tipsy and wobbly or when you wanted to go home but you didn’t have one. when you missed him or when you twisted your ankle or fell in love. when you killed him in your dreams.

you still gasp for air and you still cry. but sam is there and that means you’re going to be okay. that means he’s okay, at least for now. he makes for now enough, and you’ll make sure that it’s always. i’ll protect him, you tell yourself. you’ll protect him.

but for now he’ll be the one to protect you; tonight it’s from your fears and the cruel tricks of your mind. he pulls your shaky form into him. he rubs your back and kisses your forehead and your breathing slows down. the air comes into your lungs and it stays there long enough to make a difference. you feel the cold and the breeze on your skin. there’s no rain, but the moon can be seen and it hangs over sam’s head. the moon reminds you of sam.

you walk yourself out of the panic attack without even needing him to ask you for five things you see or four things you can feel. he’s proud of you for it. of course, it’s his being there that helps you more than anything.

“that’s it,” he murmurs, “there you go. i got you.” he smooths his hand over the back of your head, soft and slow and sturdy. when your eyes flutter closed, the only thing you see is the imprint of the bright moon against your eyelids for a moment. the rest is dark and calm.

the fabric of his sleep shirt gets all bunched up in your weak hands. the t-shirt is soft and thin from wear and it feels familiar in between your sleepy fingers. it’s october. he’s probably cold.

i’ll protect him, you remember. your fingers loosen and the fabric falls away from your hold. it rides up and exposes his skin to the wind when you rub up his back. it falls back over the hem of his jeans when you rub down. you’re trying to warm him, but your hands are shaky and small compared to the expanse of his back, even smaller compared to the expanse of the sky.

for a moment sam isn’t sure what you're doing, but he smiles so sadly when he realizes. his heart aches with love and adoration.

“let’s get inside,” he whispers. you nod against his chest. he’ll be warmer inside. so will you. you might be shivering. he hoists you to your feet with steady care. your knees feel weak, but you hold his hand tight and walk back into the room. sam closes and locks the door, the guides you to his bed. he sits you down on the edge and crouches in front of you, wiping softly at your tears. then he leans forward and up to press a kiss to your cheek, then another to the spot between your eyebrows.

you fall into him, wrapping your arms around his neck, and he accepts you happily. he rubs your back soothingly, lets you tuck your head into the crook of his neck. he holds you there until you sit up. he lets his legs go sore and doesn’t care about it one bit. you heave out a huff of breath and he cups your face, thumbing softly at your cheekbone. your hand slowly wraps around his wrist, then you turn your head to kiss the heel of his palm.

“let’s sleep,” you mumble against his skin. with a soft heart, sam obliges, climbing into the small bed after you. he bundles you up into his arms before pulling the covers over your warming bodies. he kisses the top of your head, letting his lips linger for a long moment before he rests his cheek against the same spot.

“goodnight, sam,” you whisper softly, voice still holding a hint of its earlier shakiness.

“goodnight, honey,” he echoes, voice just as soft and prettily hushed. he wants to say more, maybe another ‘it’s okay’ or sweet reassurance. he wants to make sure you know that he’s not afraid of you hurting him, that he trusts you and that loves you all the way. but he thinks you already know, and that you’re better suited for silence now.

he’ll tell you tomorrow.

[tenjikufag]

ejejsjwjwjsjejejsn I need a part 2 of pantaloons x male reader where reader eventually does end up leaving and dies or smth idk I just need da angst

(U can ignore if you want!)

Rotten

Pantalone x Male Reader

part two to Spoiled

-angst, runaway reader, Pantalone break down, physical abuse (by reader)

-thank you for the req, unfortunately you don’t die in this *sigh

“I can’t do this anymore. I told you, no more gifts, no more pampering.. just leave me alone!”

Thoughts flurried in an erratic pattern, your head felt as if was going to explode at his touch- you wanted nothing more than to shove him off of your legs, kick him down and beat him.

After all of this time, it’s become too much. It was no longer indifference and tolerance- all you felt was visceral hatred towards your ‘partner’..

“My dear.. please.. I will do better, don’t leave. Break me down if that’s what you need- just don’t leave..”

His gloves hands clutched your ankles, keeping you from moving even if it was frail and pathetic grip. The both of you knew this was inevitable, but he just loved you so much.. this wasn’t the way it was going to go- not if he had a say, but he physically cannot move himself to possibly hurt you. So he begged, like he always had.

“Get off of me. I want nothing more to do with you.”

Pantalone shook beneath you, he wasn’t a person who could cry but if he could he would be nothing but a tear stained blabbering child at your feet.

The pleas, the whining, the false promises he made.. you gripped his hair and pulled it harshly so he would look up at you.

“Let go. I’m leaving. I don’t love you anymore.”

His eyes widened in horror, still on the floor he tried to scramble up to hold you once more only to be kicked down as soon as he got close.

It continued, he tried to get close.

You got more violent.

Until he was beaten, bruised and bloodied from your heavy hands and stained boots. He laid there, curled up and gasping for air.

A pathetic display for a harbinger, really.

Scowling down at him, he still plead to you his case.

Even sitting with blood running down his face, the crimson leaking from his chapped lips, bruises under his clothing and tattered clothes now with rips and dirt on them. Glasses tossed aside and cracked.

He still begged. Begged to deaf ears, begged to someone who didn’t care, a person who would have killed him if it didn’t mean signing his own death certificate.

“I’m leaving.”

“Please! Y/n, we can fix this. I can’t be alone, you can’t leave me! I did everything for you! I gave you everything! How could you do this to me?!”

The man’s body shook, the weak body of his trembling with every word leaving his mouth.

“I’ve sacrificed too much for you to leave me! You are indebted to me you bastard! You’re mine!”

You slung a bag over your shoulder.. approaching him a final time.. it gave him a false hope of you changing your mind- he look up at you with a soft smile, holding out his hand towards you.

“I never asked for all this. You disgust me, Pantalone.”

His heart dropped, too shocked to say a word back to you.. he watched as you exited his quarters, passing by all of his guards and agents who only looked at you in fear- they had heard everything, assuming you were stronger than their harbinger.

Of course you were.

You’ve always been stronger than him.

He’s a fickle minded, arrogant, selfish, and greedy man.

But now he was alone, left without his grounding beneath him- money could never buy the love he craved.

It could never be enough for your love.

[grayson1996]

"Will you ever love me for who I am and not who I was?"

The question was almost violently quiet, unbelievably at odds with the non-stop verbal sparring match the two had been doing since they came back into the cave. Fury in their eyes and spite on their tounges.

The question was desperate but resigned. Like Dick already knew the answer but also needed to be wrong.

It zapped any remaining ire within Bruce in an instant, leaving him feeling shallow with guilt and a little bit of horror.

"Of course, I love you, Dick."

"That's not what I was asking B."

Words, words words.

Dick always needed words and Bruce could seldom give them, even when things had been easier between the two. Before death, and pain, and mantels being passed down that should have died with their owners.

Bruce couldn't seem to find them now, couldn't remember how to even begin forming them.

Dick for his part looked disappointed at the silence but not surprised. With a heavy breath, he stretched out his shoulder, uncrossed his arms, and put on a smile meant to disarm.

"Forget I said anything Bruce, I'm just tired."

It was an out that Bruce would normally take, which is why he wasn't sure why instead his hand darted out to stop Dick as he turned around to the showers.

Dick stopped at the hold, though it wasn't a firm one, and gave Bruce an expectant look, eyebrow raised in waiting.

"I do love you Dick, not just the memory of you."

It was the answer he thought his oldest wanted, it was also the truth. So Bruce wasn't sure why it caused Dick to flinch, slipping his arm out of his hold. Smile dropping.

"You don't know me."

"I know you."

"You did. But we don't talk anymore unless it's about the others or the mission." Bruce opened his mouth to argue but shut it almost immediately when he realized Dick was right.

"But I know you."

"Then tell me one fact about my life, that has nothing to do with Nightwing or anyone else. Tell me one thing that isn't a residual from a decade ago."

Dick waited patiently, giving Bruce the opportunity to fix this like he always did. Bruce rolled through his mind looking for a tidbit about his sons personal life and blanched when he realized he couldn't find one.

Batman knew Nightwings patrol schedule, what cases he had been working on and the last time Wing had been on loan to the League. Bruce even knew when Dick came to the Manor for Family Dinner, the weekends he would host Damian, and the sibling dates he had instigated with Duke once the boy joined their fold.

He didn't know if Dick was seeing anyone, or even when the last time his son had a serious relationship was. He couldn't recall what job Dick had picked up to fill his time after quitting WI upon Bruce's return. He didn't know if Dick still read math textbooks like they were fiction, if his son still listened to Indie Pop, or if he still watched horror movies with a glee that Bruce used to find unnerving.

They didn't talk about those things anymore. Bruce hadn't thought it was important. Hadn't since their first fallout years ago, when their whole dynamic shifted and never resettled.

Dick could see the realization on Bruce's face and gave him another smile.

"Jason said once that every time you looked at him it was like you were seeing a ghost. And Bruce... I've felt like a ghost ever since you kicked me out... I'm tired of not feeling real"

"You are real."

"I'm a Brand," Dick said with a bitter laugh. "I'm a marketing ploy whose only depth is surface level. I am always who you need me to be Bruce. You don't have to pretend I'm anything different."

Bruce didn't like how self-deprecating Dick sounded, and in his own bout of desperation, he pulled his son into a hug. One of a nature that the two hadn't shared for years.

"You're my son. I'm sorry I don't know you anymore, at least as well as I should. But I'm going to work on it. I promise."

Bruce could feel Dick fighting the instinct to trust like he didn't want to be let down again. He could also feel the moment Dick decided to give him another chance. His body relaxing into Bruce's hug like a puppet whose strings have been cut.

"We'll see."

[callofdudes]

Can I request TF141 x Reader where they’re on a mission til suddenly Y/n got into a fight by the enemy. Til she went trigger bringing out the savage beast and started to kill the enemy who get into her way. TF141 are shock what they’re seeing. They try to calm Y/n but she lost control and about to attack them. Price brought out a record tape that Lasewell give it to him and told him to play it for Y/n calm down just in case. Once Y/n hear the lullaby song the voice from her mother she started to cry and passed out.

Take all the time you need. No need to rush. Btw I love your work. I read all of them.

Ah, thank you for the request. I'm glad you enjoy my writing @silverwolf-108 I realized that you'd sent in a second and third request so I thought I needed to hop to it and finish this one for you!

A/n: I made the tape an ipod instead, I hope you don't mind, it's a bit easier to play quickly in a frantic situation.

Also thank you for being so patient with me, you are an angel 😊😅

The battle had gone on long and hard. Bullets sprayed across the field, wind whipping around you and the boys. Ghost was hidden back against a shed, practically pinned down and unable to move while Johnny bled out. He cupped the sergeants cheek to try and keep him awake, his heart beating out of his chest.

"Y/n!! Find cover!" Simon urges.

He turns back to Johnny, trying to keep him awake.

Your heart pounds out of your chest. Everything is a blur and it's way too much for you. Too stimulating. A bullet whizzes by your hair, blood rushing through your ears.

Your fingers start to itch on your gun, wanting to pull the trigger on these motherfuckers and give them a piece of your fucking mind.

You look back at your team, trying to hide for cover as well. Gaz is tucked into Price's shoulder, hiding against the ground to try and survive the bullet spray.

"Johnny!! Open your eyes sergeant!! We're not done here!"

You see Simon in desperation and Johnny's limp body. It's all too much. Your heart lurches in your chest and you feel like you're going to puke.

Blood drips from Johnny's chest and you lose it. Seeing his blood makes you violent. Animalistic.

You regrip your gun and run from your hiding spot.

"Soldier!!" Price yells at you.

You can't hear, blood rushes in your ears. You throw a smoke grenade one way and take out the two soldiers closest to you. You disregard their fallen bodies and run into the smoke.

You raise the stock of your gun and hit another man upside the head and send him down to the ground.

You drop your gun and grab your knife, grabbing another man by the throat and carving it out and up his jaw. Blood spilled across your face and you kick his body away.

They try to shoot you through the smoke, bullets whizzing and whipping by you but never touching.

You shoot two more men and advance on the others.

Everything is red. Murder and blood was all too much. Too stimulating. Your fingers itch as the smoke clears. Another soldier attempts to take hold of you, your blade meeting him first, followed by you snapping his neck before he has the chance to bleed out.

Another soldier grabs you but you sink your blade into his shoulder, chopping and hacking away at the spot before drawing a deep line across the expanse of his chest.

You don't stop to catch your breath, throwing your knife into the forehead of another man.

Two men grab you and pull you back. You snarl, kicking in the dirt and grab another knife, slicing it into one of the men's wrists and pulling him around and swinging him into the other men.

"I will not let you touch my family." You growl before sinking your blade into his chest and twisting it around in the cavity. The second man tries to get up and run but you slice his leg and slam your blade into the back of his head, blood spilling and splattering across the ground.

The 141 watches in horror and shock. The men that just moments ago were about the kill them all were now being demolished by you. What had happened.

Simon watches, honestly impressed. Though he'd kick your butt for pulling such a stunt and putting yourself in the way like that.

He clutches Johnny tightly to his chest, another bullet whipping past his head before you rip the man's gun from his hands and smash the side right into his face.

Another bullet whizzes by and Price pulls Gaz against his chest, breathing heavy. "It'll be ok, it'll be ok." He reminds Gaz, watching you from where they were hiding with shock and is just as impressed as Simon. Although he sees where your safety is in immediate danger.

Your heart is still beating out of your chest even when things slow and the soldiers are gone.

Using the soldiers gun you shoot down more of the soldiers until the troops begin to slow in numbers.

The last of the soldiers run at you and you hit him with the stock, slamming him on the ground and stomping on his head, cracking it and splattering more blood across the ground.

Price sits up and looks at you, he's not sure if he should congratulate you or slap you over the head.

You just stand there, hunched over and breathing heavily. Your fingers itch, bloody blade still clutched in your hand while you try to recover some semblance of thought.

Gaz gets up from his spot and rushes out to see if you're ok. "Y/n, wh-what was that??"

His footsteps make your head twitch. His hand grazes your shoulder and you push him back, throwing him into the dirt.

Price grabs you and pulls you into a roll with him, ripping you away from Gaz. Your blade drops from your hands and narrowly misses Gaz's eye, slicing a cut against his forehead.

Price is already reacting when he sees you climb on top of Gaz and raise your blade. Gaz tries to kick you off, trying to get away.

You snarl at him, your eyes are dark and he can see that you're not in there, not fully present right now. His heart lurches when the blade starts to come down and he scrunches his eyes tightly.

Price tries to hold you down while you scream and kick and squirm. You hit him with all your might, trying to take him down but he's just so much stronger than you.

Price firmly but lovingly holds you against him, shielding you from the world.

"I'll bloody murder you!!" You scream, trying to bite him.

You grew distressed and uncomfortable in his arms. Too tight, tol restricting, to unsafe. You scream again, trying to kick and punch and spit.

"It's ok y/n, it's ok, it's just us. It's just us." He tries to soothe you with his voice but it's not affective.

You continue to kick and squirm, hitting him in the shoulder and trying to bite his arm.

And then he remembers protocol. He'd been given a rundown on this when you'd joined the 141.

"Gaz, check my bag!"

Gaz whines, clutching his bleeding forehead but rushes to complete the task and searches Price's bag. "When you find and old ipod let me know."

Gaz keeps digging until he finds the phone at 100 percent. "Got it."

"Play the first song, now!"

"Is now the time for songs, captain??"

"Kyle Garrick do it now!!"

Gaz is shaking as he presses play and a soft moldy starts. He holds it's closer to you and your fighting starts to slow. Your nails dig into Price's forearm and your bottom lip quivers.

You go limp and burst into sobs. Hot, wet tears flow down your face and your breathing gets faster. You cling to Price now instead of trying to fight him.

You clutch his gear, trying to breath through heavy tears.

Price runs his hand over your head. "It's ok sergeant, take a deep breath soldier. Take a deep breath."

You whimper and exhaustion floods your body, and your eyes close.

Gaz pauses the music as you fall asleep in Price's arms, curled up in his safety and his warmth.

"What... Just happened??"

"Classified sergeant. But it's over now." He strokes your hair gently. "Now we need to get both Y/n and Johnny out of here now."

Simon comes over, still a little stunned with a shivering, weak Johnny in his arms.

They all move to the evac site where they meet medical. They take both of you and fly their soldiers back to base.

Price is nervous for you to wake up, but he sits the boys down for a chat to try and explain what happened as much as he can. it brings a bit of light to the subject, but doesn't change the fact that Ghost and Gaz didn't see it coming and are a stunned.

Ghost had never seen anything like it. The absolute rage that drove you into that battle like a madwoman.

Nonetheless they were all happy that they survived, it was all thanks to you.

You woke up a day later, exhausted and tired, but alive. You didn't all remember what happened. You remember you were fighting, and then you were cradled in Price's arms. Looking back on it felt like a mindless blur.

You slowly sat up, seeing small wounds of yours patched and stitched.

In the next bed lay Johnny, out cold with bandages tightly wrapped around his chest.

The door opened and you snapped up to look as Price, Ghost and Gaz come in.

"Guys!" You smile and hold your arms out for hugs. Price hugs you tightly, kissing your forehead. "I'm so glad you're alright."

Ghost pats your head and Gaz also hugs you.

You notice the bandage on his forehead and brush your thumb over it. You don't like to see them hurt.

"Who did this to you, Gaz?"

Gaz smiles awkwardly. "Just some guy on the field, but with how you were hacking around I think you got him."

You clutched your head when you felt a sharp headache come on. "I... I don't remember much... I'm sorry."

Price takes your hand and squeezes it. "You were very brave y/n, you saved our asses back there. You don't have to remember it for it to have happened."

You look up at him and nod. "Thank you."

Ghost moves closer to you and grumbles under his breath. "I don't know what the bloody fuck you were doin', but you could have gotten yourself killed!!" He sighs and squeezes you in a tight hug, surprising you.

"So bloody glad you're alive. You hear me??"

You hug him back and smile. "I hear you lieutenant."

He pulls away and leans over the other bed, clutching Johnny's limp hand in his own.

"What about Johnny??" You ask.

They all look over at Johnny who is still unconscious and breathing quietly. The heartbeat monitor near his bedside plays in soft smooth rhythms.

"Johnny is alright. Lost a lot of blood and needs rest, but he is doing ok."

You sigh in relief. Price helps you off your bedside and you shake out your sore limbs. "I think I'm gonna go rest in my room for a bit... Thank you."

"Of course sergeant, call us if you need us."

"Will do Captain."

You headed down to your room, still with a headache you crawled into your nice warm bed, and drifted asleep. The anxiety and overstimulation got to you sometimes on the field, reminding you of things and sending you into overdrive fight mode.

But I guess this time it really did save your asses. Johnny doesn't remember anything, but he'll thank you for saving them regardless.

And they all lived happily ever after, I hope you like it 😊

[zh-lele]

Oasis Part 1

In a hostile environment or in a sequence of unpleasant situations, an oasis provides pleasure.

▪︎Pairing: vampire!Doyoung x club dancer!fem reader x vampire!Johnny

▪︎Genres: supernatural, horror, smut, romance if you want to call it like that (it's not).

▪︎Warnings: mature themes; explicit sexual content, drugs and alcohol involved, guns, violence, death scenes and mentions of it, and some gore scenes. MINORS PLEASE DO NOT INTERACT!

▪︎Wordcount for Part 1: ~16.8k words.

Author's note: hey everyone 👀 it's been ages. Writing this fic got out of hand lol so I split it into parts. This is all plot building 😭 more is coming. Also, the characters are sick to their heads so none of this is alright ofc and it's a twisted fic so if you are uncomfy don't read it! I rlly don't wanna bother anyone. Read pairings, genre and warnings before proceeding. And enjoy this first part! More is coming your way. Here's a playlist to kinda set the mood if you'd like. Tysm!!! 🖤

Who sees them walking around the city if they are all blind? They hold hands; something speaks between their fingers, sweet tongues lick the moist palm, run through the phalanges, and above is the night full of eyes.

01: words that will satisfy me

Lightning split the sky as the rain lashed the roof of the old bus, the drops seeping through the leaks, wetting the worn leather of its seats and spreading on the floor. You were lucky that public transportation was running that night and under those conditions, even more so considering that you had to be on time for your show at the casino—you couldn't afford to lose another night of work to torrential rains, even if it meant walking for forty minutes under the water from your house to the luxurious building.

The dirty streets of Seoul were already empty by the time you got off the bus, except for the old man you couldn't escape from even a single night arriving at the casino. While he wasn't inside, spending what was probably his last life savings on alcohol, drugs, and women (like most of the men you saw every night), he was living on the outskirts; under the big billboard of neon lights and on the fine and cold marble of the entrance serving as his refuge, along with a bed made of cardboard and an old, dirty mattress. Yuta kicked him out every night, especially the moment you arrived and he remembered the old man's presence due to the nasty comments he would give you, as you started up the stairs and toward the big golden doors.

Tonight was no different. Yuta left his position at the entrance as fast as he saw you coming and felt the old man open his mouth—although he didn't have a chance to say anything. As if Yuta could guess his intentions, he was in charge of throwing him in the hands of two high-security guards to the street and under that torrential rain; the homeless man's few belongings getting completely drenched, and causing the man to wail as he wandered off in search of a different place to spend the night. Only a series of what you assumed were complaints and curses came out of Yuta's mouth, in his native tongue.

Yuta lit a cigarette and didn't bother to return to his position. A quick wave of his hands was enough to have another man replace him, while he smoked under the cover of the water, resting momentarily from another night enriching his pockets in the largest casino in the city.

The look he gave you as you waited for this other man to read your work card was hostile as if Yuta could guess your intentions too. And he put you on alert for a moment.

He opened his mouth to speak. A cold ran through your whole body at the same time that lightning struck right on the building across the street, highlighting the silhouette of the Japanese above the violent discharge. He squeezed then opened his eyes, already too irritated by all the interruption, to continue:

"Go upstairs. Dry yourself up and put on some other clothes. Doyoung wants to see you."

"But my show starts at two o'clock."

"Just do as I say."

When the man at the entrance returned your card indicating that you could now enter, you hurried to walk on the red carpet, passing between round tables and banquettes padded with burgundy velvet. The smell of alcohol mingled with that of fine perfumes and that of the money, scattered on each table among glasses, cards, and chips, and also kept in the pockets and wallets of the rich.

The back pocket of your black imitation of leather pants buzzed, so you reached for an old phone, its broken screen showing a message from Soyeon where she attached a picture of a ladder; the red neon lights of a "V.I.P." sign shone above it. You wondered why she was at the entrance to the third floor—an exclusive place that humans like you and Soyeon rarely frequented. So you quickly typed a message questioning what that photo meant before going downstairs.

The club was located below the casino and just above the parking lot. The stairs were marked with neon green arrows indicating floor -1 if you went down—your designated place of work. It was a very different world from the casino. While above the gold metal-edged bars gleamed in the warm light of huge chandeliers, below the place could barely be defined; cigarette smoke obscured what little vision the red lights dangling from the ceiling provided, and the confines of the club were lost in darkness, making it easy to get lost in that dive for hours.

The floor was slippery from the amount of alcohol that had already been spilled throughout the night, and you had to be careful not to trip or injure yourself on a dropped glass bottle. It was hard to move through the bodies that wouldn't stop dancing and pushing and gasping for breath as the club got more and more crowded. But still, you made it backstage and to the dressing rooms where you and the dancers were getting ready for the shows every night.

You got inside in a hurry, making one of the boys that shared the stage with you get up from an old black leather couch and offer his help. "Girl, you need me to do something for you?"

"Please," you begged while looking at him through the mirror. "Can you get my suit and my boots?"

Without wasting a second, you started working on your makeup. Red and black eyeshadow that accentuated your gaze, and a lipstick that was about to run out after so many nights of shared use—bloody red is what said on the side of its cover.

The boy returned shortly after with your clothes in one hand and a glass of liquor in the other. He lit a cigarette inside the small space while you changed, his eyes following your every move. Only the music coming from the club filled your ears until you opened the door ready to go out and he questioned you.

"Where are you going? There's still five until the show starts."

"Yeah, I know but…" you hesitated on telling him. It wasn't a secret amongst the human workers that you and Doyoung kind of had a thing—they knew you fucked from time to time, but you had no clue why he wanted to see you at that moment.

Doyoung managed everything and everyone at the club and knew your schedule like the palm of his hand. Work had always been his top priority as well, so you knew for sure he wasn't going to make you show up late on stage. Still, you didn't want to raise suspicions about anything, didn't want people to talk too much.

The boy—that was named Ten and was the second nicest person you knew as soon as you started working at the club—raised his brows at you, growing impatient, making gestures with both his hands for you to keep talking.

"Doyoung wants to see me," you finally concluded. "I don't know what he wants, but it'll be quick."

Ten only hummed and reached inside of his platforms, taking out a small blade and putting it in front of your face. His breath, which smelled like mint and whiskey, brushed your face while he talked. "Be careful." And he hid the blade inside one of your boots.

Ten had been working at the club for years and knew vampires very well. Even though none of the vamps in charge had ever harmed him, he couldn't say the same for the customers who came from the outside. For this reason, he didn't trust them, and he always reminded you to handle yourself with special care, especially when he found out about you and Doyoung.

You gave him a nod along with a sympathetic smile and closed the door behind you on your way to Doyoung's office.

A long corridor connected the backstage dressing room to a mezzanine at the other end of the club. Suspended in the air from one side to the other, its tinted glass walls stretched to the roof of the club. Doyoung kept his office lit to a minimum, and the red lights outside it blocked all vision through the glass and into his office. This allowed him to have absolute control of everything that happened in his club, and to give orders without even having to get up from his chair.

You knocked on his door and looked above, at the corner of the corridor, letting the camera focus on your face. The door buzzed, indicating you were good to come inside.

Doyoung was sitting in his green velvet upholstered chair, facing the glass walls. A suit almost as pale as his skin accentuated his defined figure, even in that position. He turned to you, a welcoming smile adorning his face, and extended his left hand, the one not occupied with a glass feeding his vampire tendencies, inviting you to get closer.

He called your name before holding your hand and bringing it to his lips. A soft kiss on your knuckles, which left them stained with a slightly thick red liquid. "I'll be brief since I don't want to delay us in our tasks, but I had to tell you this in person."

He set his glass down on his desk and moved you even closer, positioning yourself between his legs. He looked over your body with his gaze and dared to open the fine, shiny cloth robe that covered it. He caressed the curves of your hip and passed the palms of his hands over the micro tulle that covered your abdomen until he stopped below your breasts.

"You will dance on the third-floor stage tonight, along with Soyeon," he finally said, his clear eyes piercing your dark gaze. "Whatever happens there, you must tell me. Don't forget who you work for."

You swallowed dry. So Soyeon was at the entrance to the third floor because the two of you would be working there that night. Dancing for the vampires. Anxiety quickly took over your body, and you felt your hands and feet start to sweat. You were lucky Doyoung couldn't notice that temperature change, or he would have given you away.

"Won't you be there with the rest of them?"

This was not going according to your plan.

He denied it with his head. His hands began to move again, caressing your back and reaching the edge of your see-through dress. He lifted it, you felt the cold on your skin, and he squeezed both buttcheeks, awakening the lust within you.

He took a breath of air that inflated his chest, causing the emeralds that hung rimmed in gold around his neck to rise and fall. He moved you at his will until you were sitting on top of him, your sex barely covered by a thong that resembled black leather in contact with his bulge, and you had to make an enormous effort not to forget the plan and take him right then and there. Getting rid of Doyoung would be much more difficult than you had imagined.

"Don't forget who you must be loyal to."

02: this is not a threat

It is important to create eye contact with the audience when you are performing. That was never a problem at the club, with its stage right in front of Doyoung's office. And while you couldn't see him from your place, you knew that he was always watching you from above, so your gaze was directed most of the time towards his tinted windows. He helped your concentration and allowed you to focus on the dance. On the third floor stage, however, you felt quite lost; too many things happened there.

In the club, just a large group of mortals huddled under the smoke and red lights, paying little attention to what was happening onstage. In the vampires' cave, distractions were everywhere. The white lights that illuminated the stage blinded you from time to time but still allowed you to make out the scenes. Vampires sipping drinks at the bars, smoking around a game of poker, passing through heavy velvet curtains, going in and out of small cabins with humans who had a job other than yours. Some came staggering out of there, like drunk on something and wiping their lips, while others just came out arranging their clothes to resume their activities around a table or on the small dance floor.

But despite everything that was distracting, you were forced to make eye contact. You felt a presence, someone's gaze heavy on your figure, hidden in a dark corner of that exclusive area. The lights spun illuminating him for a split second, but it was long enough for his amber eyes to finally find yours. From that moment on, you felt attracted to the man as if you were magnets. You went down the stairs of the stage and walked between the chairs and tables, making some of the vampires who hadn't paid attention to you yet turn to look at you. Not for a second could you lower your gaze from his or focus on anything other than dancing for that man.

He was sitting in the middle of the round table smoking a cigarette, looking a little too relaxed for your liking. His white shirt was slightly ripped, revealing a barbed wire tattoo that stretched from clavicle to clavicle on his chest; below, on his right pectoral, a spider tattoo. Resting the weight of his body on a semi-extended arm holding a cane, looking too vampire-like under your eyes. His tattoos seemed to end on his hands: a floral engraving on the back that contrasted with the phrase on his fingers: be afraid.

You got on that rounded table on your hands and knees, not caring about whatever game was going on between the rest of the men and the women who sat with him. You wanted to seduce him, that you knew. And he didn't seem to mind, because when a tall, blonde guy got up to protest, this man silenced him with a simple gesture of his hand. You thought it had to be a common thing amongst these vampires—they held so much power they didn't even need to use many words. So you danced the rest of your choreography for him, felt and touched your body as if your hands were his until the music ended and the lights turned on again.

Reality came down to you as if you were descending from the sky at miles per hour, and you landed on the ground in your black platforms after getting off the table. You felt incredibly out of place, yet an incessant throbbing between your naked legs and this man's gaze on you was sending your mind into a spiral. You had no idea what just had happened.

His deep voice cut through the air in that cave—like lightning from the storm outside the casino. A chill ran down your back for the second time that night.

"No one tells Doyoung about this."

But he didn't mean it for the rest of the people seated with him—he knew they would remain silent.

He meant it for you.

Soyeon appeared next to you with her hands full of bills, and she began to push you in the opposite direction while addressing this man very politely.

"Please excuse us, sir." But it sounded highly strange to you, she didn't talk like that to any of the vampires, not even to Doyoung. "Thank you very much, sir. Ladies, gentlemen." She bowed and you followed automatically before the two of you started walking behind the stage.

"Who was that?" you asked once the two of you were alone, inside the luxurious dressing room of the third floor.

"Are you out of your mind?"

You saw her undress hurriedly and change into her regular clothes, leaving the little dress–the same one you were wearing—inside her backpack, then starting whipping out all her makeup to re-do it into something different, more relaxed.

"I kinda felt like it, yeah," you finally replied, after processing how you unashamedly danced in front of that man and all of his friends, being so evident that you wanted him—as if you didn't have a thing with Doyoung. As if you weren't the little dumb human fucking the man in charge and everyone knew about it. "Who was that man?" you insisted.

"Seo Youngho," she hissed and looked at you with narrowed eyes as if it weren't obvious. "He owns the casino. He owns like, ninety percent of the clubs left in Seoul, actually. Friends call him Johnny."

Your plan was to become one of them, then kill them all and keep the fortune. Survive the fate that seemed inevitable. Defeat the decay of the world and humanity through that eternal immortality, as the vampires had done through each of the crises in history.

You were shocked, your face losing all color and your legs almost giving out when you realized that all this time you were after the wrong man.

When Doyoung hired you, he made it seem like he was the real leader. And everything seemed to indicate that he was. Because you knew Yuta, you knew how the rest treated that vampire—but it wasn't half the respect they had for Doyoung. From the countless nights you'd spent with him and been woken by his phone at any hour of the morning, you knew that most of the responsibilities fell on him as well. The fact that it was the first time you were hearing about this Seo Youngho after almost half a year working at the casino only made the situation more unbelievable.

"And you danced for him," Soyeon continued, her expression between a mixture of shock and amusement. "Holy shit. You literally felt all of yourself in front of his eyes."

"I know," you recognized with difficulty, taking your head in your hands while you sat in the chair; soft and padded compared to the garbage where you sat every night, in the dressing room on floor -1 "Please stop reminding me, it was embarrassing."

"It wasn't embarrassing!" she contradicted, "It was fucking hot. You never do that shit when we dance at the club."

"Of course not!" You straightened your back to look at her and denied with a disgusted face. "I don't want to seduce any of the bodies that frequent the club. Those are disgusting."

"Right, you want to seduce vampires." She pointed one of her makeup brushes at you, and golden dust flew across the room. A complicit smile adorned her face. "You want to seduce handsome, sexy, and rich vampires. You'll be collecting them? I know you have one already."

There wasn't any malice in her voice, none that you could notice. She left it there and went back to stand in front of the mirror to apply a clear lip gloss that made her face even more attractive. She wasn't looking for an explicit answer. Even if she only wanted to mess with you, you still weren't convinced you could trust her—or anyone inside that casino.

And that's why you were scared. Scared to death that she or anyone else could tell Doyoung what happened earlier. Because yes, he wasn't the most powerful of them, yet he could still do whatever he wanted to you and no one would even go looking after you. That's how the dynamic worked. That's why it could be a vampire's world.

Youngho's words resonated inside your head as if he was whispering in your ear.

"Youngho said something when our number ended," you decided to confess. Maybe out of fear, to test your luck and try moving in this new direction, or to risk your plan along with your life. Soyeon turned around and raised his brows at you, expectant of your next words. "He said not to tell Doyoung."

A knock on the door exalted the both of you. Soyeon looked in the direction of the sound, then down at you, same spot on the couch. She smiled with her lips sealed together, the tips of her thumb and forefinger joined and moving from left to right over her smile. She winked at you after walking to open the dressing room's door.

A rather young man leaned out from the other side, a bottle of champagne in a cooler and two glasses in hand. His bright red eyes quickly scanned the room and settled on your figure. "Youngho wants you at his table," he said. "Both of you." And he moved his eyes to Soyeon, who quickly looked at you with an excited smile, then turned back to the boy. "He also sends this. Says to enjoy yourself and get there whenever you feel ready."

The young vampire left the champagne and the glasses in Soyeon's hands after she greeted him with a polite 'thank you', and closed the door.

"Very good," she turned to you, ready to open the bottle. "I also want to go hunting for some handsome, sexy, and rich vampires."

—

Sitting on the velvety cushions and sharing a table with the vampires you learned that everything you thought you knew about them was actually nothing. Only two of them were the most talkative: Donghyuck, the young vampire they sent with the champagne bottle to get you and your friend, and Taeyong, a slightly older-looking vampire you often saw with Yuta or Doyoung. While Donghyuck concentrated mostly in annoying his superiors and catching Soyeon's attention, Taeyong was surprisingly kind to you, trying to engage conversation about various topics.

"I was studying in Tokyo to be a designer when I met Yuta," Taeyong said while pouring himself another glass of blood. "We met at a fashion exhibition. I remember he was wearing a three piece suit that looked very expensive. He introduced himself, Nakamoto Yuta," Taeyong made his own impression of the Japanese vampire you knew from greeting him every day at the casino's entrance. And it was on point, his deep voice and accent rolling out of Taeyong's lips as if he had been observing the vampire for an eternity now. "He liked my work and said he wanted to support me financially. You can imagine what I thought it was about."

"Thought he was offering to be some kind of sugar daddy?" You asked him, taking a drag from a joint and passing it back to Taeyong.

Taeyong nodded his head. "I thought I had to sacrifice my body for it," he said, then paused for a moment to reflect on his words. "I mean, it's not like I didn't like him. He was actually really hot," he finished in a whisper meant for your human ears only.

The white haired vampire laughed it off, looking a bit nervous after such a confession. Yet Taeyong's laugh was adorable and contagious, much so that it distracted you from his red-stained lips and teeth every time you saw his mouth open to a big smile.

"But I was really, really wrong about him–"

"I could hear you talking shit about me all the way from the first floor."

That deep voice characteristic of Yuta cut off Taeyong's story. His eyes found the Japanese approaching the vampire table, behind your field of vision. However, his presence sent a shiver down your spine—the idea that any of them could be listening to what you were talking about when you least expected it horrified you, and it was enough to bring you back to reality.

You weren't there because they were nice and wanted you to know more about them, to become close. They must have been using you somehow, and you had to find out their true intentions as quickly as possible so that they couldn't take advantage of you, but you could take advantage of them.

"Yuta, you're so nosy!" Taeyong accused him, pointing his index finger at him and then crossing his arms, half indignant. "I was just telling my new friend the story of how I met you and the guys."

The Japanese vampire collapsed into the free space on Taeyong's other side. He sighed heavily and ran his hand through his long red hair before fixing his gaze on you: his brow furrowed, and his eyes full of judgment on your figure at the table. "Doyoung's human?" he asked, sounding slightly confused.

Taeyong opened his mouth to reply, yet it wasn't his voice that gave the answer to Yuta's question.

"She's my new favorite."

It was Youngho's.

He got up from his place and walked around the table until he was positioned next to your figure. He bent down until he could whisper in your ear—a proposition to come back with him, to his apartment, right in front of everyone but especially in front of Yuta, who was still judging you from afar with those furrowed brows.

You feared Yuta didn't trust you like the rest of the vampires seemed to do. You feared he could smell your true intentions, somehow get in your head and know you were doubting every move, every decision. You were ashamed because you knew he could definitely hear your conversation with your boss and his leader even if you were whispering to each other. And you were expecting he wouldn't tell Doyoung you actually said yes to Youngho, that you'd love to go back to his apartment that night.

The night at the vampires cave seemed to come to an end when you found yourself in the passenger seat of Youngho's luxury car. Since your friend Soyeon and Donghyuck left in his own car seconds before, it was only you and Taeyong in the private parking lot, waiting for his boyfriend, for Yuta, and Youngho to get in.

Contrary to your experience with Doyoung or even with Yuta, you never had the pleasure of getting to know Taeyong in depth, and that was because you didn't really have a chance to interact despite a formal greeting when you passed him in the casino. But you were left both alone and drunk on many substances in the car, and you found out you definitely enjoyed his presence way more when he's not wearing a serious and intimidating expression, and when his huge eyes turn bright and he laughs at everything you say.

Taeyong made you feel like, if you were given the chance, you could form a beautiful friendship.

"You don't seem like the other girls."

"What do you mean?" You asked Taeyong, who was sitting behind and across from the passenger seat, stretching your neck to the side and resting it on the headrest so you could face him more comfortably.

"Every girl Johnny has been with has only wanted one thing," Taeyong answered. He took a deep breath and there was again, the serious, almost scary expression on his face that you knew him from. You gulped dryly, hoping it could go unnoticed before he continued. "To take advantage of him and what he owns. And my friend is a good guy, he really just wants to love someone before the end of this fucking cursed world, so he just lets them in, you know?"

The sensation of being exposed drained your face from all its blood, probably making you look pale even under a thick layer of makeup. You felt embarrassed thinking Taeyong had read you and figured you out perfectly, so much that you couldn't look him in the eye anymore. Nonetheless, Taeyong kept telling you how good he felt around you while you tried to believe that he was being honest with you, and not actually trying to induce you in some sort of manipulative game.

When fighting against an organized group, you don't need to attack them nor defeat them all at once. It will take one of the parts—only one of them to be the weakest and the beginning of their own downfall.

You wanted to believe Taeyong was the weakness.

Beneath all the beauty and luxuries that Taeyong carried around, his hard expressions but also his sparkling eyes, and most importantly all the substances that were dancing inside his body that night, your drunken mind considered there could be a soft heart that spoke the truth. And you didn't want to get carried away with that sweet, biased best friend talk and forget about what you really planned to do tonight—which was for sure not to fall for any vampire.

So as much as he would let you get closer to them, you would let him believe your connection was genuine.

"I don’t want you to do the same to my friend." He smiled at you.

You were about to reply, to reassure him you're not like the rest of the girls, when he turned his head to the window at the sight of a tall and very handsome guy walking in your direction, followed by Yuta and Youngho. Taeyong's smile didn't fade. In fact, it only grew bigger when the tall boy opened the door, ready to climb into the back of the car.

"Please don't get scared if you see my boyfriend or any of my friends snorting a line in front of you," Taeyong turned to warn you.  "They're just weird like that."

"Tae, we don't do that in Johnny's car," the guy scolded him as the car was getting crowded. He held a bottle of vodka in his hand that he hurriedly wanted to finish before you got on the road and to Youngho's place. A long drink and he tossed it to Taeyong, who took a sip, squeezing his eyes shut at the burning feeling down his throat and then he handed it to you.

"It's fine with me, anyway," you inform Taeyong, accepting the bottle with a subtle smile. "It's what I usually see around the club…"

"Yeah, of course she's fine with it." The tall guy laughed and gave Taeyong a knowing look that you caught through the rear view mirror. "Stop putting on an act, Tae."

"Shut up, Jaehyun! You're the one acting. I just don't want to scare her away, I like her!"

"You won't like her more than you like me, though." The tall guy—who's name you learned was Jaehyun—got a serious expression sending Taeyong that warning, with only a small hint of mischief in his tone, very hard to catch if you didn't pay enough attention.

But Taeyong must have known him very well, because he laughed awkwardly at Jaehyun's comment which made him smile pretty lovingly, dimples showing and eyes going into the shape of two crescent moons in Taeyong's direction.

"You two make me want to throw up," Yuta said as he closed the door, squeezing Taeyong, Jaehyun, and himself up in the backseat and only confirming Jaehyun had to be the boyfriend Taeyong was talking about earlier.

"It's not us what makes you want to throw up, Yuta." You heard Jaehyun's voice while he spoke facing the windshield. "It's all the blood you mixed up and drank tonight."

The bottle of vodka was almost empty in your hands when Youngho arrived, occupying the last empty space behind the steering wheel. One second he was turning on the engines, and the other you were tasting the iron of a quick, chaste kiss he planted on your lips and in front of everyone inside the car. He bit your lip before breaking the contact, and your blood mixed with the remains of what Youngho had been sipping all night that managed to transfer to your mouth. Then he turned around to ask, "Are we all continuing this at mine?"

"Drop me near my place on your way," Yuta was the only one to speak, his tone colder than his looks and the lack of temperature around the vampires. "I don't want to be part of any of this."

03: chaos

Soyeon and Donghyuck didn't waste a second from the moment they walked through the front door of that luxurious apartment. Kissing violently and obstructing their way into what seemed like a room, they moved without separating from each other to breathe, attached as if they were feeding on each other. In contrast, Taeyong and Jaehyun walked in completely relaxed; Taeyong with his arm around Jaehyun's shoulders, and intertwining their fingers in a way that almost moved you. You remembered Taeyong's words in the parking lot and wondered if love could really exist inside such cursed creatures.

Youngho looked tired after collapsing into the big leather couch in the living room, bottle of whiskey in hand. He opened it and poured four glasses, which you took as an invitation to join him and circle around the small table, along with the other couple.

There was a golden tray covered in white dust that looked ready to be used at any time. The first was Taeyong. He set up the line, brought his face close to the tray, and you heard him inhale the cocaine. After that, it didn't take more than a split second for him to finish his glass of whiskey in one gulp. And even though you knew it took a lot to intoxicate a vampire or alter their senses with some mundane substance made for human consumption, you were surprised how Taeyong didn't even flinch; not a sign of a slight dizziness, nothing. Jaehyun asked Youngho for a refill for his glass, and when he finished it, he and Taeyong said a hearty goodbye before retiring to the second floor.

Youngho was a man of few words, you had learned in the hours you had spent with him that night—even though you had already lost track of time. Your old cell phone had been left behind in the dressing room at the club, long before you saw Doyoung, and long before you met Youngho and your whole plan was completely ruined. Looking outside couldn't give you any clues as to what time it was either, since the sun hadn't shone in weeks.

The sound of the incessant storm was barely drowned out by the music from a vinyl that Youngho had just put on. He returned to your side on the couch and, again, he didn't need to say much: the vampire handed you the tray of cocaine, you inhaled a line, and he finished the whiskey straight from the bottle. That tired expression he wore before was suddenly gone; as he watched you recover from the dizziness, it had been replaced by one that could be mistaken for euphoria, or maybe desire.

Your head felt extremely light, and your body was on the verge of losing control and letting yourself be carried away by the melody playing in the common area of that huge, cold, and dark apartment.

As if Youngho had been reading your thoughts, he asked:

"Dance for me."

His throat, probably irritated by all the alcohol consumed, made his voice reach your ears deep and attractive, awakening chills throughout all your skin. And you obeyed, of course—it was your job, and he was your actual boss. On top of all that, there was the possibility of desperately wanting to dance for Youngho once again.

Youngho pushed the small wooden table away, moving it with his leather boot on it without a care, making room for you to dance right in front of where he was sitting. Arms and legs outstretched as if he were in paradise, Youngho made you feel that if looks could kill you would probably already be dead—eaten alive, drained from all your blood. And in some twisted way, you couldn't help but enjoying it: the feeling that even though they could have whoever they wanted, there were two the vampires who continued to choose you over the others—who had you as the object of their desires. Doyoung did it regularly. And you had to find a way to make Youngho want to do it too without getting killed.

You could hear the sound of the fire burning the paper that wraps the tobacco, and the room quickly filled with its white smoke coming out of Youngho's lungs. The music that was making you dance wasn't particularly sensual—the melody and the sounds made the situation of being in the vampire's house even more macabre. Still, you tried your best to impress Youngho, who was huffing and running his hand through his hair restlessly, as he watched you with the same eyes that had mesmerized you in the casino. They looked brown, normal one second, and bloodshot red the next. You thought it was a consequence of your drunken state that it altered your perception of things, or of the desire that you felt existed between you.

Your outfit that night left nothing to the imagination. You were still wearing your performing clothes—a see-through dress and the set of faux-leather underwear that you assumed had been tempting the vampire in front of you all night. He wasn't leaving much to the imagination either. The tent on his dressing pants were giving you enough confidence to take it a step further.

You turned around, trying to follow the beat of the music. The hem of your dress rolled up the curve of your ass when you squatted down in front of him. You heard him groan over the music, and the sound of ruffling against the black leather couch. It made you smile when you turned your head to the side and saw him out of the corner of your eye, struggling a little with his hard-on. So you got your knees and the side of your head to touch the cold, white marbled floor, while maintaining that eye contact that was so mesmerizing to you. You opened your knees and broke your back to have your ass moving up and down in front of Youngho a couple of times, then straightened your back to finally get rid of the thin and shiny tulle that caressed your skin.

It was when Youngho lost it, grabbing you by the arm and turning your body around to sit you on his lap. "Keep dancing," his voice came out raspy and desperate.

The tension, the strange beat of the music and all the smoke accumulated in the room squeezed your chest, making it difficult for you to breathe, and if something didn't happen in the next few seconds you felt like your heart might explode. Even when you tried to remind yourself to not fully give in to him and lose control, you couldn't really concentrate on what you were actually there for. You felt like you had accepted leaving with Youngho for a different reason, far, very far away from fucking him. Nonetheless, that seemed like the only thing you could really think of at that moment.

A whine came out from your mouth when you felt his hands touching you for the first time and pushing you even closer to him. And when he squeezed your ass to place your clothed sex right above his bulge you gasped, your lungs purified with clean air, as if something had been restricting them all this time.

It was that feeling again—a downforce pulling your body down, feeling as if you were descending from the sky at miles per hour, and your brain processing reality way too fast for your drunken state. An incessant throbbing between your legs, extremely turned on by the vampire under you, and you having no clue of how you actually ended up in that position.

Because yes, of course you remember what happened that night. You remember going to talk to them at their table, then getting into one of their cars and talking with Taeyong, accepting the drugs from Youngho and wanting to dance for him… But you didn't work like this. You've never worked like this. Every move and interaction had to be absolutely thought out and premeditated and this—it just felt totally wild, like you were out of it when you were in front of Youngho. Just the way you felt when you saw him at the vampires cave, back at the casino.

Despite looking the most young and fresh above the majority of them, given his position amongst the vampires at the club, you assumed Youngho was probably one of the oldest, if not the oldest of them all. You wondered if he was really that powerful; there was the possibility that he was messing with your head, you'd read older vampires were able to do so even to humans.

You thought he was absolutely insane when you felt the cold air hit your nipples and then his warm mouth attached to them. He let you grind on top of him, while you tried to contain your moans and to concentrate on what you actually had to do, that was getting out of there before you were food for vampires.

Your plan was screwed. Youngho being the leader of them changed everything you had been working on for months, even before you got your job at the strip club. You thought you had him, but there was a high chance that he was just using you to benefit from you somehow. Either it was getting on Doyoung's nerves, feeding from you, or just to get his dick wet—this wasn't about you. You needed to make it about you.

You needed to have control over the situation again. Change the plan and keep moving as soon as possible, without being suspicious. But Doyoung was already too involved and, fuck—he wasn't the vampire you had to get with, and you knew he was already kind of attached. You could said he had feelings, you knew that was possible for immature vampires, so you had to deal with that too and–

"Care to explain what this is for?"

You felt the blade pressing into the skin of your neck, threatening to cut just above your jugular if you made even the slightest movement. Youngho shook your head and tightened his grip on the nape of your neck even more, the force he exerted there beginning to ache and the sharpness of the weapon demanding a response from you more than the fear and adrenaline you knew were giving you away, no matter how hard you tried to stay calm.

You closed your eyes and silently cursed Ten for giving you the stupid razor, and yourself for accepting it even when you knew a little blade would be a waste of time when it came to vampires. You cursed yourself for being so careless after months working to get to this point—not in the way you really wanted, though.

"Five seconds to explain yourself before I kill you," he talked from under you once again.

Your eyes met his, no longer changing from brown to red but fully bloodshot now, and looking more scary than ever. You gulped one time and decided to speak—it's not like you had another choice anyway.

"It's because I work at the club," you managed to get your voice out. "I'm not sure if you know, but most of the men there are nasty." The words came out as fast as you could, but the anger on his face was telling you he wasn't having any of your bullshit. You concluded your lie struggling to maintain eye contact. "Wouldn't be the first time someone has to defend themselves from them."

Youngho loosened his grip on the back of your head and lowered the razor from your neck, only to caress your body with its sharp tip, tickling your skin as he ran it across your chest, the curve of your breasts, and your abdomen.

"Nobody dares to enter my house with weapons, you know that?" He applied more force to the blade against your skin. "Who the fuck you think you are?"

"It wasn't to hurt you," you dared to say, chest breathing heavy under the movement of the blade. "I swear I'd never think of using it on anyone. It's just to scare the guys from the club away if things get ugly."

The blade stopped on the flesh above your left clavicle, right besides where a scar was placed. Doyoung wasn't used to feeding on you, saying he didn't like it and that it wasn't what your relationship was about. But sometimes you would let him, when the moment would get too intense and you noticed that he was fighting too hard to control his tendencies. He was happy getting drunk on your blood from time to time, and he rewarded you with amazing sex and aftercare. All that was left was a little scar in that spot. Youngho laughed looking at it, and you felt the sting of the edge cutting the skin, then his tongue licking the blood that emanated from the superficial cut.

He hummed satisfied after getting a taste from you, and his fangs rubbled the zone before he spoke.

"I don't believe shit you're saying, my darling."

Even though you had imagined a moment like this before, with the most important vampire of all making you his in every way, you prepared yourself for the worst outcome. There was no chance you were getting out of there the way you wanted it.

Yet the surprise of a door being opened violently interrupted Youngho, who was about to open your chest in two, and his gaze focused on a scene behind you. His face deformed rapidly, and his expressions were no longer covered with desire and hunger but full of fury and anger. Even though you had no idea what was going on at your back, you were internally grateful that you weren't the cause of the sudden outburst of the vampire.

"Johnny, I think I messed up."

Donghyuck's voice managed to get to your ears when Youngho got you off his lap and shoved you to the other side of the couch. He got up in a rage, and you took care of calming your breathing in silence before he could remember that he was literally about to kill you. You heard Youngho start to mutter to Donghyuck, but you were too busy checking the small cut on your skin that kept bleeding, staining your fingertips every time you touched it.

"The fuck have you done?!" You heard the older vampire scream this time, and when you looked up he was pushing a Donghyuck completely covered in red back, causing the boy to hit the wall and become unbalanced. "You know we don't do this here, it's strictly forbidden."

Donghyuck stood outside the room he locked himself up earlier. Barefoot, only wearing a pair of briefs and the blood dripping from his mouth, painting his neck and chest a deep red. He was trying to explain something to Youngho, yet your mind couldn't concentrate on anything different than the scene inside of the bedroom.

Soyeon's body was on the bed. Her neck hanging off the edge with her eyes open, a terrified look penetrating right into yours. She must have been full of fear, is what you thought as you saw the fresh blood covering her neck and the champagne-colored bed sheets—now stained in red. An open wound on its left side that had stopped bleeding. Donghyuck must have sucked her dry.

"I damn Mia for turning you, Donghyuck, I really do. You're nothing more than a pain in the ass," Youngho said, and you watched him start to dial a phone number from your place on the couch.

Donghyuck seemed like he didn't care much as he started heading towards where you were sitting. You tried to move back even further in place by drawing your legs to your chest, clearly scared of what he might do to you. This was not the way you thought you'd die. But he simply stopped at the small wooden table and took out a cigarette.

"Relax, I'm not going to do anything to you," his mouth barely opened to speak, as he tried to hold the cigarette between his lips. He lit it up, inhaled all the tobacco smoke, then let it out to mix with the heavy, tense atmosphere. His lips left the filter painted with your co-worker's blood. "Yet." He finished talking with a macabre smile, and even dared to wink at you.

He quickly scanned you up and down, suddenly reminding you of the situation you were in with Youngho before he showed up and making you feel utterly exposed, so you crossed your arms over your chest in the best attempt to shield yourself from the hungry eyes of the young vampire.

"You're not doing shit more than taking care of this mess," Youngho spoke to Donghyuck as approached the scene. "I called Mia, you'll do it together. And be fucking reasonable while doing it. I don't want to see her on the news tomorrow because she was found laying in an alley."

"And what do we do about her?" Donghyuck asked while pointing at you with the cigarette. "Can't you make her forget? 'Cause I doubt you really wanna deal with another dead body."

Youngho stared at your body for a few seconds, thinking. Donghyuck waited for an answer, shifting his gaze from his boss to you, and you could feel Soyeon's eyes, dead but full of fear on you all the way from inside the bedroom. The smell of blood emanating from there and from Donghyuck's dripping mouth was beginning to be nauseating and the music playing from the vinyl threatened to drive you crazy.

"She doesn't need to forget," he finally said. Then he pulled your blade out of the back pocket of his pants and threw it forward, the little weapon landing on the couch right next to you. "You don't fuck with vampires. Consider this a lesson."

04: through the storm

Check the window. Watch the raindrops fall. Take your hand out and feel the water in your skin. Wipe the humidity with your clothes. Check the time—it's been twenty-six hours and thirteen minutes since you left Youngho's house; twenty-five hours and two minutes since you left Kun's apartment with your hands stained with blood. And try not to lose your mind. Check the time only one more time just to make sure you're not disconnecting from reality.

Not even a minute had passed since the last time you unlocked your phone to do that.

The wind from the storm that had been going on for days suddenly became more violent, whipping your face and forcing you to close the windows of the house, leaving you in the dark after the candles have gone out. The dim firelight between your trembling hands lighting cigarette after cigarette was the only tangible evidence of your emotions at that moment. The room quickly filled with smoke as the wax burned back onto the table, and that poor light allowed you to summarize what you were doing.

Your eyes scanned the thick paper, reading the information that had been kept from you over and over again. National Intelligence Service, printed in blue ink, and a 'classified' red stamp just below it.

Serial 090295-127. Name: Seo Youngho - Alias "Johnny".

A voice resonated inside your head, almost torturing you, and you feared closing your eyes in case you'd be reminded of the events of the past hours.

"Did you really think you'd be able to do this alone? Are you that naive?"

Address: Unknown. Jurisdiction: Seoul. Additional info/scars/tattoos/weapons/etc.: tattoos of a barbed wire on his chest; hummingbird, beast, and wild leaves on his left shoulder (colored), spider on his right pectoral, flower arrangement in his right hand, letters on his fingers. Master hand-to-hand combatant. Masters various supernatural powers (includes supernatural strength, speed, super bionic hearing and vision, telekinesis, mind control.)

Two checked boxes under that information:

Suspect. Previously arrested.

The rage would make you tremble and break a cold sweat that dropped down the sides of your body. You closed the blue folder violently and you piled it on top of the rest of the documents carelessly. Yuta's, Taeyong's, Jaehyun's, Doyoung's—all of them—and tossed them across the room to somehow deal with the irritation. The papers that keep track of the vampire organization's crimes up to a year ago, before Qian Kun was fired for not agreeing to stop investigating them, flew through the air and landed next to the pile of clothes you took off just a couple of hours ago. The candlelight hardly reached that area of the house. Still, it was enough to illuminate the red stains on your white fur coat, and remind you of the scene you left behind at the retired cop's house.

You can't really say that it was premeditated, although you can't really say that you simply acted out of a violent impulse, or a nervous one, or whatever. You wanted to finish off the bastard, just not under those circumstances. After finding out that he had only been lying to you and using you to catch the vampires first, and that by hiding information as important as who their true leader is, he ruined the whole damn plan you were carrying out. You thought the bastard deserved nothing more than to die right away.

Kun's apartment, in a crumbling building just a couple of streets from the casino, had become an exact replica of the Seoul police investigation office after he was kicked out. Target pictures pasted on the walls, phone numbers, bank account aliases, contacts from all around the world, photos from outside and inside the casino—you name it. The man studied the vampires who ruled the casino day and night.

When Kun arrived in Korea from China, he was a newly recruited police officer hungry for justice in a dirty, corrupt, and dying world. He had followed the vampires who had their illegal businesses in China and, frustrated by all the obstacles the authorities put to judge them, he decided to go in search of the root of the problem. Kim Doyoung, was what he told you the night you met him in the old bar where you worked and where Kun often went to drown his sorrows.

Kim Doyoung was supposedly the man in charge of the biggest chain of clubs and casinos in cities like New York, Los Angeles, Beijing, Tokyo and, of course, Seoul. Kim Doyoung, a rich, powerful, attractive, timeless man. A vampire. Someone who would survive the supposed last of humanity's crises, filling his pockets exponentially and living peacefully for all eternity. Absolutely everything you were looking for. 

You were going to kill Kun after you had become what you wanted and rid yourself of the vampires, but that evening he left you no choice.

The morning after the night you met Youngho and your life suddenly got upside down, you went to Kun's apartment for explanations.

You squeeze your eyes shut, trying to keep the memory from creeping into your mind.

"I didn't lie to you," he had the nerve to say. "I just kept information from you, for your own safety."

"Bullshit!" you almost spit in his face. All the anger generated by the situation you found yourself in with Youngho, Soyeon's unnecessary death, and Doyoung's strange attitudes, you were unloading on the police officer. If your plan took a one hundred and eighty degrees turn it was his fault, and you were going to let him know. "If you cared about my safety you would've told me the truth from the start. And I would've been dealing with the right vampire from the beginning. Wouldn't have gotten my mind fucked, maybe my co-worker wouldn't be fucking dead!"

"You could never have dealt with the situation on your own."

"I would have planned it differently! I thought I had Doyoung eating from the palm of my hand."

"You have Doyoung eating from your hands, though," he shot back, maintaining an incredibly calm composure even though you had been yelling at him for about ten minutes.

"But he's not the right guy, for fuck's sake!"

Kun left the room leaving you shaken, your chest rising and falling rapidly, and your throat closing more and more in response to all your accumulated anger. After a couple of seconds he returned with a file box in his hands and begun to search inside it, until he pulled out a blue folder and opened it with the intention of reading its contents to you.

"Okay, listen. This is how we're going to proceed."

"Hell no. I'm not doing this with you anymore." Your face contorted in disgust as you looked at him, and you pointed an accusing finger at him to speak, "You think I can trust you after you lied like this to me?"

"Did you really think you'd be able to do this alone?" Kun asked once more, but this time with a much more incredulous tone, his eyes narrowed and a nasty smirk on his lips. "Are you that naive? Look at you."

He motioned to you with his head and you followed his gaze all the way down to your own self. You were still wearing your outfit of the previous night—your performance clothes, only covered by a fur coat you managed to take before leaving the casino that barely reached your thighs. You hadn't had the energy to shower nor change clothes since you came back from Youngho's apartment, so your makeup from the previous night was trying to survive the water from the bathroom sink and the rain, almost completely smudged off your face now. To be quite honest, you were a disaster.

"You're nothing more than a whore who makes men horny for fucking money, and you're going to die as that, nothing else," he stated disgustingly. "There's no chance you can fool Youngho and run away with his money. It's not happening. Be fucking realistic."

You felt your eyes burn and fill with tears. A lump settled in your throat, and you couldn't warn him at all. When Kun turned around and had his back to you, you just saw the perfect opportunity to vent all your pent up rage.

The knife you were hiding in your boots felt incredibly heavy in your right hand. Kun's hair was soft to the touch as you took hold of him to angle his neck to the edge of the blade. A clean cut from left to right was all it took for your skin to feel the heat of his blood, and the floor began to turn red—a dark and stinking red, like the one you often see Doyoung drink from his fine glass bottles.

You let out a cry of exhaustion watching the body fall limp to the wooden floor and hearing the retired officer struggle to maintain his life.

"¡Fuuuuuck! ¡Fuck, fuck, fucking shit!"

The pool of blood didn't manage to reach the sole of your shoes, as you walked away and busied yourself with taking the file box that Kun had just revealed to you, along with some other photographs and bank account numbers. You didn't take all the items that were hanging on his walls, because whoever entered, found his lifeless dead body, and then saw how he had been following the vampires for years, would only think that the crime was their own doing—that they discovered him and wanted him out of the way. Nobody would ever suspect you, because you always made sure there were no traces left of your relationship with Kun that could incriminate you. There was a high chance that the case wouldn't even get investigated, as no one dared to touch the vampire organization and Kun didn't have family in Seoul that could worry about him, anyway.

The old plan to get to the vampires was completely screwed, so you needed to think about a new one as soon as possible.

You opened your eyes and you found yourself sitting at home again, by candlelight, this time with a joint in your hands. You turned it on, took a puff, checked the time through the broken screen of your phone. Only a minute had passed since you last did the same, but in your head it felt like an hour. 

Nothing coherent would emerge under that state of mind, so finally, after approximately more than thirty-five hours awake, you went to sleep trying to convince yourself that you were not losing your sanity.

05: every splendid thing gathered as if to tempt me

You weren't asked to go to the vampire's cave again after what happened with Soyeon. When you went back to work at the club alone though, Ten was the first to suspect something had happened either when you were there or after. He asked if you knew the reason why she was absent, but you weren't gonna tell him the truth–you couldn't imagine what would happen if your coworkers found out their bosses didn't mind killing his employees only because they couldn't control their thirst for human blood. You were afraid that, if you said a word, they'd find out and get you killed too.

Your answer did not convince Ten at all, who questioned you, crossing his arms and frowning.

"You think she's sick?"

You just shrugged, looking at him through the reflection in the mirror of the club's dressing room.

"It's been a week since she's absent," he remarked. "You think she's gonna miss a week of work, considering how shitty the pay is, just because she's sick? She doesn't have any more income."

You swallowed dryly and couldn't stand his gaze any longer. If Ten noticed how guilt took over your senses, he chose not to say anything about it. Only his footsteps could be heard, the sole of his white platforms sinking into the wood as he walked away from you to collapse on the old leather couch.

Your phone vibrated and the screen turned on, showing a text indicating to be at the private parking lot in five minutes. Doyoung explained he had a busy week and that he couldn't make much time to contact you, but that he admired you from his office every night that you were dancing at the club's stage, and it made him miss you even more. He wanted to compensate you for all the time you couldn't be together.

"Doyoung might know something," you finally tried to reassure Ten, even though you knew Doyoung wouldn't have a clue . "I could ask him about her."

His long, thin legs crossed while he lit a cigarette up and drank whiskey as if it were water. "Please do," he said, exhaling a large cloud of smoke. "I'm worried sick about her."

—

You thought it would be easier to deal with the situation, however the image of Soyeon dead in Youngho's bed haunted you day and night, just like the tail of your lies. The sound of the flush filled the bathroom right after the conversation with Ten made your stomach turn. You opened the sink, rinsed your mouth, touched up the red color of your lipstick and bit into a mint.

Five minutes later, you found Doyoung waiting for you at the side of his white sports car. He was busy on his phone, a frown on his brows as he discussed with someone in a low tone you couldn't catch anything of what he was saying. Even though he looked frustrated, his eyes relaxed as soon as he saw you approaching his spot. He did that characteristic gesture of him, extending his arm to you to get you closer, and you intertwined your fingers as he ended his call on the phone.

"I'll have an answer tonight, Johnny."

Your stomach flipped for the second time that day as soon as you heard the name leave Doyoung's lips. He frowned once again, maybe sensing a change in your mood, but only smiled at you and caressed the back of your palm with his thumb. You thought Doyoung might not have known what happened, but somehow he could've been trying to comfort you.

"Alright, see you tomorrow." Doyoung ended the call.

He cupped your face with his hands locking eyes with you. He had a tender look, and it made you wonder if Doyoung might see it through you—all the sleepless hours, the crying, the fear, the stains of blood, the lies. Yet he only pushed your head closer to his, locking your mouths with a soft kiss. His lips were cold to the touch, but after what felt like the most chaotic and stressful days of your entire life, you found some kind of comfort in them. His gentle manners disconnected you from reality, so you stuck to that kiss like your life depended on it, deepening it more and more as time passed.

You tugged Doyoung closer, his perfectly white shirt wrinkling in your fists while you felt his body adapt perfectly to yours and his expensive cologne filled your senses. It reminded you of the reason why you started seeing Doyoung in the first place—you liked him. You liked his body, you liked his face and the way it seemed like he only had eyes for you. You loved how he smelled, how he always kissed your cheeks, how his silk shirts felt on your skin after he got you naked. Then you got used to the rides on his expensive cars, the delicious meals and the comfort of the king sized beds he would fuck you over everytime you were together.

Maybe you liked all that a little too much, got ambitious, wanted it all only for you. And you wanted it forever.

He broke the kiss and laughed when he saw you chasing his lips for more. His hands moved up to hug your waist and you opened your eyes to find his slightly bloodshot red, his irises slowly going back to its normal yellowish as you both struggled with your breath.

A lopsided smile was plastered on his face.

"Let's go home."

And maybe, only this last time, you didn't want to think of following plans, of keeping secrets and fearing betrayals. Maybe you wanted to have a moment with Doyoung, only a moment, like it was when it all started.

After weeks of torrential rains, all that was left in Seoul was empty streets under an eternal starry night. The wind that entered through the apartment’s open windows made the black curtains dance around a king-sized bed where Doyoung laid naked. Through the gold-ornamented mirror he observed you fix your hair, then put your panties on and add some more lipstick after it transferred all to your lover’s skin.

Against popular belief, you were able to catch his silhouette through the reflection coming close to you. His body was illuminated by the moonlight only, yet it was enough to admire all the muscle and the ink that adorned his body. It was just as they described it on the documents you got from Kun’s house, each tattoo placed in the exact place, and it made you wonder if those previous investigators had gotten the information the same way. How many lovers could Doyoung and the rest of the vampires possibly have had that were not their lovers, but some desperate humans trying to make something out of this miserable world? How many other girls have touched Doyoung’s velvety skin under the moonlight, over those same sheets, and how many more would if you’re not the last one?

His touch was cold over your shoulders, even when he placed his soft lips on your naked skin it felt terribly cold. From behind you, his right hand traveled past your navel until it reached the only trace of fabric you were wearing. The other hand over your neck applied the right amount of pressure to get your entire body pressed to his, and he whispered in your ear.

“There’s something you need to understand very clearly, my dear.”

The coldness reached your insides. Doyoung started rubbing on your sex very gently, enough for you to pay attention to what he was saying.

“Even if you start dancing occasionally for other vampires at the cave, you’re my human.”

He added a finger as he finished the sentence, making you throw your head back over his shoulder.

“You can’t be with anyone else.” When he sensed you were ready, a second finger came in alongside a tight grip on your neck. “Understood?”

But a moan got caught in your throat. You had to open your eyes to check your reflection in the mirror because you couldn’t believe what your ears heard.

That wasn’t Doyoung’s voice asking the question, nor was it his figure behind you and with his hand between your pussy.

It was Johnny’s.

The older vampire let go of the grip on your neck before putting your panties down in one go. The contact on your skin no longer felt cold, but it was incredibly hot, almost burning the places he was grabbing you from. With both hands behind your back locked between his, he started fucking you. You looked for Doyoung around the room, wondering where had he gone and if he was okay with it. It was hard to understand how one second he was telling you you’re his, and the other he was letting his superior have his way with you.

“What are you doing?!” You asked the vampire behind you, while he was restlessly going in and out of you and you were fighting not to scream his name.

“This is lesson number two,” Johnny said between breaths. “You can’t play both ends.”

It’s hard to explain what truly happened that night, because you couldn’t decipher it yourself.

When you started to fight the pleasure, he seemed to have no other option than to let you go. After quickly putting all your clothes on and apparently coming down from the high, you ran out of Doyoung’s room, full of embarrassment and in fear of encountering him and got him questioning your state.

But you couldn’t avoid him.

His hand on your forearm stopped you from getting through the front door.

“What happened?” He asked a little out of breath, only wearing a pair of briefs and a confused expression.

“Where is he?”

“Where’s who?” Doyoung returned the question.

“Sorry, I'm sorry,” you apologized as you fought to get rid of his grip, rotating your gaze wildly between his body and the bedroom door, hoping that Johnny would simply disappear from there. “I just need to go.”

“Did I hurt you?”

“No, no.”

“Did you not like it?”

And what were you supposed to say? You couldn’t quite wrap your head around the idea of Doyoung letting Johnny fuck you. In his own house, right after himself. It just wasn’t part of Doyoung’s nature, you knew that. So, to say you were extremely confused once again, was an understatement. Doyoung was still looking at you expecting an answer.

The problem was, you liked what Johnny did to you a little too much.

“Are you scared of me?” Doyoung asked after not getting a word from you. “Is this because of Soyeon?”

“No.” You furrowed your brows. Doyoung knew something and was clearly keeping it from you. But how much did he know was the real problem; he better not have an idea you were with Johnny the night she died, or it would be all screwed. Doyoung simply couldn’t know you saw his boss, or you would lose your job and contact with the casino, completely. That’s why you got a little defensive and started questioning him, even when you already got all the answers. “What does she have to do with this?”

“Uhm, no, it doesn't have to do anything–”

“What do you know, Doyoung?” You demanded with a firmer tone. He remained silent, perhaps debating whether to confess or not. So you feigned a little more concern.

“She’s missing! Don’t act all dumb Doyoung, I know something happened to her!”

“One of the vampires of the cave, Donghyuck,” he finally started. “Well, he can’t control his impulses too well.”

“What the fuck does that mean?”

“He’s young! Like, very recently turned and… Apparently he impulsively sucked all the blood out of her–”

But it was impossible for him to finish the sentence because you started gagging. Not because of what he was saying, but because of the mental image you had of Soyeon’s dead body, and Donghyuck all covered in her blood in front of you. You even remember the nauseous smell, and your eyes filled up with tears because of the disgust.

“I know she was your friend. I’m sorry for not telling you, I just didn’t want to scare you.” His voice came out desperate as his touch sought to comfort you, through caresses on your arms and your cheeks. “I know I get possesive sometimes telling you you’re just mine, but it’s because I’m afraid you might get involved with them and end up like that.”

“I already got involved with you. What makes you different?” You countered a little defensively, dodging his hands.

Doyoung had always been very respectful of your boundaries and your emotions, so you weren't surprised when he brought his hands to his chest, guarding himself against the desire to come into contact with you after you avoided it. His murmur still echoed in that huge, dark living room of his apartment.

“That I… I really care for you. You’re more than a good fuck to me. You know that, right?”

The empty look of a defeated body was all you gave back to him, as if you no longer had the strength to deal with the situation.

He approached you very slowly, still in a state of alert that you could feel. “I care for you.” He repeated. “A lot.”

“You vampires can’t develop feelings and shit,” you finally spoke. “Don’t try to lie to me.”

The vampire shrugged with his head down, an attitude you have never witnessed before. That level of vulnerability he was showing was completely new; deeper than the sex, even deeper than sharing your blood with him.

“I can,” he confessed, looking back into your eyes. “I’m not that old, you know? To completely dissociate myself from my feelings.”

While you remained silent, you let him close the space between the two of you once again. Doyoung’s fingertips were soft caressing your cheeks, yet his lips felt even softer. He wore yellow clear eyes full of worry, far from those arrogant or lustful looks he gave you most of the time. On his naked chest, right above where his heart should’ve been beating, a perfect shape of your lips in the color of red.

The gears were turning inside your head trying to think of how to use this to your advantage and put the plan into motion with Johnny.

“I need some time alone to process all this.”

“Yeah, it’s fine,” Doyoung was quick to reassure you. “Whatever you need, you know I’m just one call away.”

You nodded your head yes and were out of the vampire’s place.

Once on the street, you searched your small bag for the cigarettes you had taken from Doyoung's nightstand and lit one. In a reflex act, you looked up in the direction of his balcony, where its black curtains still fluttered due to the unusual wind and blended with the darkness of the night in a decaying Seoul. Suddenly, the windows closed. You exhaled the smoke from your cigarette smiling.

"Stupid vampires."

And you stopped the bus that would take you back to the Oasis.

06: tell me how you want to keep me for eternity

Multiple murmurs from came to your ears as you opened the doors to the red room. The waitresses opened bottles of champagne and filled the mortals’ glasses as the vampires sucked on their blood cocktails. There was some jazz playing in the back while you were opening your way to that particular table that caught your attention so much on the first day you were at the vampire’s cave.

That night, however, you noticed there were a few missing faces as you performed on the stage.

When you encountered Yuta at the casino’s main entrance and he told you you were back at the third floor, of course you were expecting to dance for Johnny. Yet he was nowhere to be seen. You didn’t even feel his presence like you did the first time you were there, and you thought it was strange. Why would he call you to dance if he wasn’t going to be watching? And why would you bother dancing if you were going to do it for other people?

The call of your name startled you, making you realize you had already walked by the vampire’s designated table during your train of thought. Taeyong's friendly tone made it quite difficult to hide the reality that you weren't interested in stopping at the table unless Johnny was there.

“Come have a drink with us.” 

You nodded your head politely and sat down at the rounded table. Taeyong and his boyfriend were attached at the hips as in every situation you had shared with them. On their side, a rather young looking man with a perfectly defined nose and plump lips with an unnatural red. The remains on his glass made you think you couldn't make up his age based on his looks because he was also drinking from the blood cocktail. Between him and Yuta, some girls you had never seen before. Lastly, Donghyuck was sitting on your side with a cocky smile that you started to think was characteristic of him.

“You and the dancers were amazing tonight,” Taeyong said as he offered you a bubbly glass that you drowned in one go.

“It was a new show,” you responded with a smile. “A different one we haven’t presented in the club, so we didn’t have much rehearsal before this.”

“You work at the club?” One of the girls asked, arching a brow and getting a laugh out of her friend.

You confirmed with a nod of your head and a slightly embarrassed smile, yet the rage was already bubbling up inside you. She only added, “Must be hard dealing with all the shit that goes down there.”

That made both of them laugh and you scoffed in response.

“Why don’t you go down there and see if you can deal with it,” your face frowned as you challenged them with the same impudence. “I’m sure you won’t act all tough once you’re outside your little privileged bubble.”

Yuta was the only one that dared to show a reaction to your response. He laughed and poured another glass of champagne before handing it to you as some kind of reward. “You won’t want to mess with this one, girls,” the japanese said and he got up in his place, not looking them in the eyes even once but rather concentrated in the rest of the cave, as if looking for someone.

“Yeah, I can see,” the girl that remained silent and only laughing until then, spoke. “You can’t hide where you come from. It always shows.”

And with that they left the table, leaving you alone with the vampires.

“I think you’re one of our best dancers,” Jaehyun said. “But not the best.”

As the sensual tone of an electric guitar came to your senses, he stood up and asked his boyfriend for his hand. “Would the best dancer in the building give me the honour of sharing this piece?”

Taeyong laughed out of nervousness, asking ‘what?’ as he laced his fingers between his lover’s. But his expression turned quickly as he recognized the song. “Wait, is this our song?” He asked getting up.

“I paid the musicians to play it for us.”

Jaehyun dragged his partner to the center of the dance floor, attracting everyone's attention except for one person. It seemed like Yuta had finally found what he was looking for, and you saw him smile for what you think was the first time in your life. A genuine smile formed on his lips and forced him to leave the table in search of an infernal woman who was entering the cave. He kissed her knuckles almost hidden by a huge fur coat, and the tip of her stilettos echoed across the floor as they both left through the red curtains she had just entered.

A few seconds passed by with Jaehyun and Taeyong swinging to the music, before you were startled by the last person setting at the table with you.

“Just you and me, huh?” Donghyuck asked and you hummed. “Should we go dance too?”

“No, thanks.”

“What?” He laughed, sounding like he was a little shocked by the quick denial. “I thought you enjoyed dancing for the vampires a little too much,” he added with a disgusting tone eyeing you up and down.

His wandering looks you caught from the corner of your eye obliged you to cover up a little, uncomfortable. But it wasn't enough for Donghyuck to catch the signal, or maybe he decided he couldn't care less, hence the young vampire moved his right hand to your knee and started squeezing there, feeling your skin through the red stockings you were wearing.

“Red’s my favorite colour,” he whispered getting closer to your side.

Your trembly hands tried to pour another glass of champagne but failed once you noticed the bottle was empty. Beyond Donghyuck’s spot on the table there was a bottle of whiskey, so you tried to reach for it but couldn’t when you felt his hand go further up your knee.

You stopped him right there and looked him in his blood-shot eyes. A wicked smile took over his features and he licked his lips after squeezing your thight once more. “What?” He asked after your silence.

From his being emanated a mix of whiskey and that nauseating smell that reminded you of the night Donghyuck had appeared before you covered in blood, and of the floor of Kun's apartment covered in the same red.

“You scared of me?” Donghyuck whispers once again. “Scared you might end up like that pretty friend of yours?”

You held your breath, trying to endure the nausea that the young man caused you. You knew he meant you were scared of ending up dead.

“Trying to be fucked by you?” A laugh made your entire body shake. “Not even in your wildest dreams,” you finished to get his hand off your skin and up from the table.

As the loverboys still danced slowly at the center of the floor and in front of the musicians, you fixed your clothes and went a little over him to finally reach for the bottle of Black Label.

“I need to go see your boss.”

—

“Ten,” you called his name as soon as you heard the boy on the other side of the phone.

Since Soyeon wasn’t around anymore, you decided you had to trust someone else. You had been working at the casino for a few months only, so it was needed to keep in contact with someone who knew the interns and could give you quick information.

Ten showed himself trustworthy since the very first moment you met. He was the nicest coworker you had too, along with Soyeon. During your first rehearsal at the club it was only him and you; he spent hours teaching you all the choreographies and showing you around so you wouldn’t feel so lost on your first day of shows. Later that same day, after he drowned glass of whiskey after glass of whiskey, the confessions came to you while you two sat on the rusty couch of the changing room.

“I fell for them too,” he said, head thrown back on the couch, getting his eyes lost on the dirt of the ceiling.

You rolled the tobacco between your fingers with some difficulty and passed it to Ten. “How did that happen?”

“Honestly,” the boy lit the tobacco up and it struggled to burn due to your poor arming skills, but he didn’t seem to mind. “They’re intriguing, I don’t know. And they’re handsome and hot despite all that coldness they carry around. But there was this particularly nice vampire that came to the club one night,” he confessed while pouring another two glasses of liquor and passing one to you. “That’s unusual. You’ll never see them around here, not even Doyoung, he’s always observing but only up from his office.

But this one was there. He came to see the show and then I encountered him in the bathroom.”

“In the bathroom?” 

“He was doing coke,” Ten laughed in disbelief. “But he was so nice,” a sigh came out of him remembering the moment. “The most defined jaw I’ve seen in my life, nose and lips carved by the Gods, a soft pastel pink hair that reminded me of how the beautiful afternoon sky looked before all this world went to shit.”

That made you wonder. Ten looked ratherly young, maybe around your age or just a couple of years older, yet you had no memories of how the initial world was. You had only lived during the beginning of the end. “How long have you been around here, Ten?”

“Many years,” he said, calling your name. He stood up from his place and went to look in front of the changing room’s mirror. “I got beside him like this, only looking at him through the mirror but I could see him eyeing me up and down with a dopey smile.”

It looked like nostalgia took over his body, a sad smile adorning his face when he turned around to finish his sentence.

“Taeyong has always been easy like that.”

“You fell in love with one of them?”

“Mhm.” Ten walked on his platforms until he was sitting on your side once again. He put the tobacco down in the ashtray and took the black, thick choker he was wearing around his neck. “We got close like this.”

A slightly visible scar of what looked like a pair of fangs was there on his skin.

“I think it can happen to most of us.” Ten searched for something in between his tight clothes until he took out a tiny bag of powder. “I do wish to feel that high again, everyday of my life.” Opened it, collected a little on the inside of his long nails and inhaled. “But I don’t wish for anyone else to experience it at the same time.”

“Girl,” he said through the line. “You good? Are you done with your number?”

“Yeah, everything’s fine,” you replied and hesitated for a moment on asking what you really wanted to know. “Do you know where I can find Johnny?”

A moment of silence, then Ten’s voice finally came back to your ears. “Last floor. His office is the only room you’ll find there.”

—

A gold painted door read Seo Youngho in front of your eyes. Under your black platforms, a petrol-colored carpet that combined perfectly with the dark walls of the hallway. You knocked on the door and checked above it and around the corners of the hallway to see if there were any cameras announcing your arrival, but opposite what you were used to in Doyoung’s office, there wasn’t a single one. You only heard a disturbed ‘come in’ from inside, and the voice made your stomach turn upside down.

The room behind the golden door was giant, covered in dark wood and black-out windows that reached the meters-long ceiling. Adorned in a typical gothic style, the office of your boss was what you would call a vampire's refuge, with thick blue curtains, and ornate armchairs sporting matching velvet. To your left, shelves that covered the walls full of books and boxes with files. To the right, a giant frame holding the most horrible canvas you've ever seen of Saturn devouring his son.

The voice of the boss himself made you turn your head to the center of the room.

Far from where you were, towards the end of the room and sitting behind a huge wooden desk covered in papers and candle wax was Johnny. He called your name a little surprised and made you feel stupid with a half empty whiskey bottle in your hand.

“Seems like you finally made a choice,” he said standing up from his place and coming in front of the desk.

You smiled with your lips sealed and started walking towards him. It was only a few steps, yet it felt like eternity. The room was incredibly cold, so much so that it gave you goosebumps and you had to fight a shiver once you were in front of the vampire. He looked down at you and laughed, taking the bottle out of your hand to pour two glasses of the liquor.

“The right one,” Johnny finished clinking his glass with yours.

The vampire went back to his place behind the desk, placing himself on his big wooden chair and inviting you to sit in front of him. “What brings you here?”

He was acting extremely weird, as if he wasn’t moved by your presence despite the initial surprise, not even after he fucked you in Doyoung’s bedroom what felt like hours ago. And when you saw him manspread as he lit up a cigarette, all you could think of was those same furrowed brows while he took you from behind in front of the mirror. You couldn't take him off of your mind. But he was unfazed.

“I expected to see you at the cave today.”

“I had a lot of work to do, as you can see.” He extended a hand showing you all the papers on his desk. “But luckily for you, I'm almost done.” That sparkled something inside you. A little bit of interest shown, enough for you to squeeze your legs together in excitement. Johnny looked down to your red stockings and lace and gifted you a lopsided smile. “I suppose you're still interested in seeing me?”

He took out another cigarette and lit it up, its black end burning while he handed the golden filter in your direction. When you put it between your lips, it was slightly humid.

“Yeah. Yes, of course.”

“Good then. I just need to go run some errands. It's gonna be quick. You can come with and then we’ll be heading home.”

It made you smile inevitably. You let the smoke come out of your mouth before agreeing to the plan. “Sounds perfect to me.”

Johnny stopped the car in front of a building you were too familiar with. It wasn’t your apartment, nor it was too far the casino to be Doyoung’s place. It was the entrance to Kun’s rusty apartment what made your blood run cold. He didn’t come out of the car immediately, only looking through the driver's window until two figures appeared through the front door. It was Yuta and that stunning female you saw him leave with earlier in the cave.

“What are we doing here?” You tried not to show the desperation in your voice.

“You stay in the car.”

The harsh sound of the closing door surprised you as Johnny went out to his encounter with Yuta and the female. You didn’t want to look suspicious, but you were dying to know what they were talking about and what they were doing in front of the building where the man you killed days ago used to live. So you tried your best to at least read the lips of the vampires and make out a little of what they were talking about. But it was all in vain, with Johnny showing his back to you and covering the figure of this intriguing female.

Shortly after, an old man came through the front door and greeted the vampires. His black suit and the police ID hanging from his neck left you frozen. They exchanged a few more words, an incredibly serious expression never leaving Yuta's face–the only one you could really see from your angle–, and then they parted ways.

Yuta and the female in the fur coat walked right in front of Johnny's car, and the japanese didn't miss the chance to suck the soul out of your body with his look. It took you back to what he said to the people sitting in the cave with you. You won't want to mess with this one.

What did he mean by that? What did Yuta know about you and how much did Johnny?

The closing of the driver’s door catched your attention and Johnny was sitting behind the steering wheel once again. Like a habit, the vampire caught your lips in a quick kiss after starting the car engine.

He looked at you fondly through his red irises. “Pretty little girls like you shouldn’t be playin’ with dead things, huh?” He asked with a smile. “Yet here we are.”

—

Johnny’s place looked nothing like the first and last time you were here, not with the curtains open and the dim lights of the streets finding their way through the windows. You checked the time on your phone screen and it was almost six in the morning. The sun was supposed to be showing behind the horizon already and warming up the world, but that was a scenario that didn’t take place anymore, and you had grown accustomed to it, to the darkness and the cold that surrounded and followed you every step since you had use of reason. You also noticed on top of your screen there was no service inside there.

You thought, in case something happened to you, at least Ten knew Johnny was the last person you were meant to see from that call you had with him earlier.

It was incredibly warm inside Johnny's house, and all the previous hours you had spent sleep deprived began to hit you one by one. You let out a big yawn as your arms relaxed on each side of your body, surrendered and exhausted.

A pair of lips came in contact with your cheek as your view got completely blocked by a tall and defined figure. Johnny kissed your skin softly while he caressed your arms up and down.

You couldn't help but think about how similar it felt to Doyoung's touch, and you avoided closing your eyes in fear that something strange would happen again. At that moment, you were suspicious of your desires, which seemed to confuse you to the point of imagining things.

“You’re pretty tired,” he noticed. “The boys told me you did really great today.”

“I really wanted you to see the new show.”

“Sorry I couldn’t be there.”

You nodded with a smile yet chased for his lips, what made Johnny laugh a little. “I’ll run a bath for the both of us.” Then he took your hand in his and started dragging you towards the bathroom.

Unsurprisingly, the room was painted in all dark colors and adorned in gold pieces. A wall decorated with what looked like figures of religious hearts was what caught the most attention. At its feet, a magnificent bathtub that could definitely fit more than two people, which Johnny quickly set about filling with hot water, and the image of the bathroom began to dissipate due to the steam. Among all that cloud, his hands invited you to take off his clothes, and he did the same to you with delicacy.

Johnny's body was incredible, even more toned than Doyoung's. Soft to the touch but firm under your grab, it made you want to tangle yourself between his arms and legs forever. And as if he was reading your mind, he put a foot inside the bathtub and extended a hand to you, inviting you in. The vampire laid his back to the end of it and placed your body between his long legs. You got so close to him that you were sure that, if he happened to be alive, you’d feel his heartbeat through his chest.

You allowed yourself to relax into his caresses as you fought to keep sleep from completely taking over you.

He massaged your scalp with shampoo, then moved his hands to release some of the tension in your shoulders. A sigh escaped your lips out of the satisfaction, and Johnny’s laugh resonated throughout your entire body due to the contact. His touch was quick but careful to explore the rest of your body, and when you felt it reaching the end of your stomach you had to make a confession.

“Johnny.”

He hummed at your call, so you continued talking.

“I don’t think I can fight it any more.”

“Fight what?” A curious tone reached your ears.

Then you felt his right hand traveling further down, and further down. The sensation of his fingers between your lips made you spread your legs wider and lay even more on his chest. And he started rubbing there, carefully, with no rush in his movements.

The stimulation of your clit made you moan out in pleasure and you heard him ask again.

“Fight what?”

You were wet and warm just like all the bathwater that surrounded you two, so it wasn’t difficult when he introduced one of his fingers to you. In fact, it felt so good you were no longer fighting the sleep that was taking over you a minute ago. What you actually meant earlier was that you couldn’t keep awake anymore, the bath becoming too relaxing for your exhausted self. But as you felt Johnny grow hard against your back you also felt all the sleepiness going away.

“Johnny,” you said once again between agitated breaths. Not once did he stop his finger from going in and out of you and from making you moan along with his movements.

“What?” He laughed as you kept calling his name and telling nothing to him. “Want another one?”

So he did introduce another finger without waiting for an answer. The steam from the water combined with the heat your body was radiating started to suffocate you, but it wasn’t enough for you to get out of there. You were finally having what you wanted, after all. Johnny grabbed one of your tits to alternate between squeezing and pinching on your nipple, as his fingers kept stimulating you all the way from your clit to deep inside your hole.

You clenched around his fingers as you felt the pleasure build up every second it passed. His long strands of hair, humid in your hand when you brought one of your arms up to pull on them. And you couldn’t wait to finally have Johnny inside of you once again. At that point, after experiencing how good he was with his hands only, you were dying to sit on top of him and to be under his body for hours and hours.

As your hand reached for him behind your back and you felt all the worries leave your mind, you finally spoke to him. “I want you, hurry up.”

“Hey, no need to rush,” he said while leaving sweet kisses on your neck and getting your hand out of the way. You were getting closer and closer, feeling like you were either about to explode or pass out once you were done.

All worries gone, except one.

The problem was that you felt like you had your days counted before something bad happened to you. You needed a vampire to turn you, to get the fuck out of Seoul with a ton of money as soon as possible, and you had been expecting that vampire to be Johnny. But once again, he didn’t seem to mind.

Johnny ignored your plea as he whispered in your ear:

“I have all the time in the world.”

Taglist: @doiefy @neonc1tylights @hoshitaro

[eatmeandbirthmeagain]

Another fanfic idea : the king raids a village and a girl tells him that if he lets them live she could cure his leprosy because she’s the chosen one and she healed others before but she can’t tell because she knows people would think her a witch and kill her and they fall in love eventually

♧ The Chosen One - King Baldwin x Reader ♧

♧ Angst ♧

A/N: Hello Anon, thank you for this beautiful request. This was a really fun one to make! I hope it is what you had in mind. As always, this is based on the film Kingdom Of Heaven, not the real historical figures. Also this is set pre-film. Enjoy!

TW: Leprosy, mentions of death

It was evening when the army of Jeruslum arrived in the small village where y/n lived.

The army was led by Baldwin the fourth, whose knights needed supplies for the war. At just sixteen yesrs old, he knew the full extent of the consequences of war. This village was the nearest they could find and he needed desperately to feed his army.

Panic surrounded the village, people ran in all directions as the army filled the streets. This was the consequence of war. Bodies fell left and right. Amongst the chaos, young y/n sprinted through the streets, dodging people and lifeless bodies of people she once knew.

With tears streaming down her cheeks, she hid inside a small house that had been abandoned in the chaos. Shutting the door, she desperately searched for a place to hide. Finding a place behind a large wooden box, she ducked down. Cupping her hand over her mouth to muffle her heavy panting, she peeked over the top of the box, just as the door was kicked open.

“Check every inch of this building, I want every item of importance stripped from the village” she heard a male voice yell, as the room filled with men, turning the place upside down looking for anything of use.

That was when the box she was hiding behind was violently shoved to the side. Standing before her, was single handedly the most beautiful man she had ever seen. Even in a moment of abject horror, his beauty could not go un-noticed.

His curled blonde hair hung around his dirty and bloodied face which was wrapped in bandages from his nose to his cheeks. His face wore an expression of pain and determination. He carried a sword in one hand and a shield with the sign of the cross. He was young, about her age.

He raised his sword, preparing to strike her in a rush of adrenaline. Y/n covered her face with her arms “spare me sir, I am a healer!” she yelled, loud enough for him to hear her over the commotion. He stopped suddenly, “excuse me?” he replied, a look of confusion replacing the blind rage he previously had.

“My name is y/n, I was chosen by an unknown God to be a healer. I have cured many and I hear that your king has a disease, I can cure him if you spare me” she sobbed out, taking her arms away from her head to look at him.

The man laughed, “I am no fool you witch, I myself am the king of Jeruslum. You cannot heal me” he raised his sword again, preparing to strike. Y/n lunged forward, in a second she grabbed the hand that held the sword. A deep orange light filled the room, covering the king's hand.

Y/n squeezed her eyes shut to avoid the bright light until it was over. The king stumbled back in shock. “What was that? How did you-? What did you-?” he stammered out, breathing heavily. He dropped the sword and pulled off the glove that covered his hand.

His hand, previously covered in deep sores, was now replaced with smooth, soft skin. The king froze, staring at his hand, eyes wide. Outside, the chaos went on and the few knights that were still in the room stared in awe.

The king's gaze shifted from his hand to y/n who was still knelt on the floor in front of him. “Do you believe me now?” she asked, tears still staining her cheeks. “Madame, you must return to the castle with me” he turned to one of the knights that were still in the room. “The raid is over, we return to the castle immediately. And not a word of this to anyone or you shall be exicuted".

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

No less that twenty minnutes later, y/n found herself seated on the back of the king's horse with her arms around his waist as the army rode quickly through the desert, fast approaching the city.

She did not know how to feel about this. As much as she did want to heal the young king, she did not want to be taken as prisoner. She wondered if the king would lock her up, so many questions flooded her mind. She was so unsure.

When the army arrived in Jerusalem, it was already dark. The king dismounted his horse and offered a hand out to y/n, helping her down also. 

The two were greeted by a few royal officials as the army of knights entered a different area. Baldwin offered his arm for her to hold as they prepared to enter the castle. She took it with hesitation and gratitude.

They made their way to the king's chambers, with no questions asked. A few comments of speculation were shared amongst the royal officials but no words of denial. 

Entering the king's chambers, they were finally alone. Baldwin sat down on an armchair slowly. His body was in so much pain. Y/n’s heart ached for him despite the destruction of her village. “Y/n?” she heard him mumble quietly. “Yes, your highness?”

“Please, take the pain away. Please” she could have sworn she saw a tear run down his cheek, being absorbed into the bandage that covered the middle of his face.

Y/n approached the king slowly, kneeling down beside him, placing a hand on his arm. “It takes time, your majesty. To completely rid a man of disease will take a few days, but just know that I shall not rest until you are healed” she smiled softly at him. Baldwin was taken aback by her kindness. He had not expected her to be so genuinely sweet, especially after what he had done to her village. “Why don't you lay down hm? I can work on your body far easier if you are resting” she offered. Baldwin smiled sadly and nodded.

Once y/n helped him to his bed, he looked far more comfortable. She removed his shoes for him and knelt down beside his bed. Very gently she stroked his forehead, it was a wonderful feeling that Baldwin relished in. He groaned quietly and closed his eyes, the soft touch slowly lulling him to sleep.

Once y/n heard him snoring a little, she took away her hand and began to work. She began on his arms. Meticulously healing every single painful looking wound, it took a while but eventually his arm was restored to soft pink flesh, disease free.

Y/n smiled at her work and took a moment to admire his sleeping face. Being a healer meant that her empathy for people was strong, especially for the sick. As much as she wanted to hate him for hurting the people of her village, she could not feel a single negative emotion towards him. All she saw was a strong yet tired king who needed to rest.

She decided to stay by his bedside the whole night. Stroking his forehead softly, occasionally humming a pretty song when he shifted, about to wake, to put him back to sleep. It worked very quickly.

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

When it reached morning, Baldwin was in complete shock at the state of his arm. He was so beyond grateful for her actions. She was saving him. He felt better as well, his body ached less and he felt as if he had grown stronger.

For a whole week the two followed this routine. The king would tend to his royal duties during the day, continuing to lead his army through war from the castle. And by night, he would retire to his chambers to see y/n who would put him to sleep and begin her work.

By the end of the week, every single sore on his body was gone. It was truly a miracle. Every person in the castle was in absolute awe. When the royal officials broke the news to the public that the king had been miraculously healed, the people were divided. Some were overjoyed at their lord's recovery, but some were skeptical at the possible use of witchcraft.

Nobody knew the reason y/n had been brought to the castle, and they were not permitted to ask questions on the matter. It was so serious that if anyone were to question her, they would be executed. Y/n could not be found guilty of witchcraft. She had grown far too important to Baldwin. He had taken a liking to her and the intimate experience they had shared over the days as she healed him had only strengthened this.

Y/n had taken a liking to him also. He was very sweet and returned her kindness with the utmost respect. She forgave him for the invasion of her village, understanding why he had to do it.

She told him that she was not angry in the slightest.

It was late one night where he confessed his strong feelings for her. At that moment, Baldwin felt completely right. Healthy and normal. Not like a king nor a leper, but just a young man with a crush. He was not even twenty yet.

Still so young, yet so much hardship. Hardship that was finally over, thanks to her. He could not thank her enough. He was completely indebted to her, he would do whatever it took to repay her. And he told her as such that night on the balcony.

“Then marry me Baldwin. Make me your wife. I would be honored, not for the title of queen, but for having such an incredible and strong husband” she had said to him.

He grinned with tears in his eyes. “Yes, of course. Be my wife y/n” he took her hands in his and they shared a kiss under the moonlight.

[guess-my-next-obsession]

Breaking Up Slowly: Chapter One

pairing: joel miller x f!reader

rating: M (breakups, angst, mentions of death/loss, love triangle sort of (tess is dead in this but still), closed off!joel)

word count: 2.8k

series masterlist

Relationships are hard.

Breakups are harder.

Especially in an apocalypse.

Especially when you’re still traveling with your ex-boyfriend and his newfound teenage ward.

You and Joel had been through hell and back together in Boston over the last five or so years, and you credited yourself for getting him out of the hunter life and into the less violent, though nowhere near wholesome, life of smuggling.

You spent five years beside him, a couple of them as a distant acquaintance, one of them as a good friend, but the last two were spent in a far more complicated relationship.

Everyone in the quarantine zone knew that you and Joel had something going on, however vaguely defined it was. He was yours and you were his, and for a while that was all that mattered. But over time, his ever-growing closeness to Tess had started to get to you. Both of them swore that nothing had gone down between them, but no one could deny their unspoken connection, including you.

Not wanting to lose him and not wanting to be betrayed by him, you offered him the freedom and space to pursue her, secretly praying that he would decline your offer and finally tell you those three words that you had practically been begging to hear from him for the last year, but to your shock and horror, he agreed to the break.

So, here you found yourself a couple months later, caught up in Joel and Tess’s mess, smuggling an allegedly immune fourteen-year old out of the city with your ex-boyfriend mourning the very recent loss of the woman he left you for.

Sound like a good time, right?

“It’s dead ‘round here. Might as well sleep here tonight,” Joel announced artlessly as the three of you entered an abandoned motel on the side of the highway.

The three of you carefully inspected the tiny motel for infected or spores, most of the rooms too destroyed to sleep soundly in, but no trace of anything dangerous.

“Alright, kid,” Joel pointed at the inside of the casino themed room he’d just cleared. “You can stay there tonight. Looks like you might even have some pillows and blankets.”

“Hell yeah.” She smiled as she ran past you and into the room, her approval loud enough to hear from outside in the parking lot where you stood kicking rocks.

“Hey.” Joel’s voice was both a balm and a dagger to your heart.

“Yeah?” You turned your head to look at him. His head was tilted, brows creased with concern, thumbs tucked into his backpack straps, looking at you as though he was disappointed. “What, Joel?”

“I just…just wanted to check on ya,” his eyes dropped to the pavement beneath his feet, a clear tell of his deceit. “Make sure you’re okay.”

“Joel,” you sighed, your entire body filled with an emotion that felt closest to hatred, though you longed for him too much to hate him. “We don’t have to be friends. It doesn’t…take away from whatever it was we used to be.” He lifted his eyes to meet yours, the crease between his brows deepening. “It’s not about us anymore, it’s about Ellie. So…let’s just do what we have to do to keep her safe and not worry about whatever—“

“You keep sayin’ that damn word. Whatever. Nothin’ you and I have been through has been whatever.” You were shocked by his outrage and your face didn’t shy away from showing it. You weren’t sure you’d ever seen him visibly emote this way before—that had also been a major point of contention on your relationship.

“Okay…I’m just saying we don’t have to try and force this—“

“Right, you wanna talk about forcin’ people into things…that’s rich.” You narrowed your eyes at his scoff, wondering what on earth he was talking about. “You’re right. I won’t force you to talk to me anymore. You do what you want.”

Leaving you stunned, Joel walked off into his own room, slamming the door behind him. You had no idea what had gotten into him to make him act this way. He’d always been so level headed in your relationship, rarely giving into the little fights you liked to pick, but here he was throwing a tantrum because you didn’t want to talk to him?

Whatever was going on with him didn’t matter to you any longer. He’d made his choice the day he agreed to end your relationship so that he could pursue one with someone else.

Walking into the only half-decent room left, you let out a chuckle at the sheer irony of landing on the motel’s honeymoon suite.

The bed was shaped into a heart, the red satin sheets now tattered and dusty but still in decent enough condition to look like a paradise compared to what you’d been sleeping on before. Setting your bag down by the door, you kept your pistol in hand as you double and then triple checked the room for any signs of spores, the room clean as far as your thorough eyes could tell. Allowing yourself a moment to catch your breath, you laid down on the dusty mattress and let out a sigh.

It had been a hasty decision, deciding to join Joel and Tess’s mission. You’d bumped into them on accident while trying to find Robert for yourself, the man having owed you a hefty amount of supplies. It was an awkward meeting, your eyes unable to meet either of theirs knowing that everything you ever wanted was right in front of you but you couldn’t have him because he wanted someone else more.

Getting roped into their business was a complete misstep by you, the allure of some of their guns and ammo in return for your help too good to pass up. It wasn’t until the three of you discovered Ellie’s secret that you really started to panic, the stakes now higher than you could’ve ever prepared yourself for. But then everything at the capitol happened, and as much as you didn’t want to stay here with the man you loved who didn’t love you back, you felt an obligation to both the little girl he was tasked with protecting and the woman that gave her life for Ellie’s cause.

“Hey,” the fourteen year old interrupted your thinking, knocking on your door. “We’re heating up some beans if you want any.”

“Yeah,” you cleared your throat, sitting up and rubbing your palms over your face in an attempt to rid yourself of the stress brought on by that beautiful man a few doors down. “I’ll be right out.”

With one last moment to sulk over the yearning in your heart mixed with the resentment you held for the choice he had made, you stood up and tucked your pistol into the back of your jeans, rolling your neck before opening your door.

Ellie was leaning up against the outside of the motel, spooning a can of warmed up pinto beans into her mouth while Joel sat on a curb, hunched over an open flame heating up another can. You swallowed your feelings and approached him, sitting down on the opposite side of the fire.

“I can make my own,” you offered, hoping that the gesture would be seen as one of kindness, but the scowl on his face as he looked at you proved otherwise.

“Don’t wanna talk, don’t want me to cook your damn food…” He mumbled to himself, your eyes rolling at the sound of his gruff tone—the same one that used to part your legs and make you drip with need.

“Joel,” you sighed, rubbing your temples. “I was just trying to be polite.”

“Polite?” He snapped, as though it was the most offensive thing in the world.

“Yes! Polite. Something you could strive to be every now and again.” You snapped back, instantly transported to your relationship, the constant bickering and back and forth. You suddenly felt dizzy, your mind and body split into two different moments in time and leaving you nauseous. Standing up, you decided you’d starve before continuing to put yourself through this sort of cruelty, his mere existence too much for your fragile heart to handle.

“Damn it, hold on now,” Joel stood up and left the fire, following you into your room before you had the chance to tell him to fuck off. “Why are you bein’ like this?”

“Why am I being like this? Are you kidding me?” You turned around and shouted, the door wide open with Ellie right outside listening in on the drama. “Joel, why do you think I’m being like this? I was in love with you and you left me for someone else!”

“You told me to leave!” He shouted back, his voice booming. “You were so goddamned convinced that I didn’t want you. You never even gave me the choice to stay, not when you were already pushin’ me away.”

“You…you didn’t love Tess?” You asked, your voice closer to a whisper. Joel rolled his eyes and sighed at your question.

“What the hell does that matter?” You scoffed, waving your hand at him. You could understand his loving two people at the same time, but his refusal to admit that Tess meant a lot to him was insulting to not only her, but you too.

Would he be so cavalier if you were to die in front of him? Would he struggle to admit that he loved you like he struggles to admit he loved her?

“Joel, it’s late. We’ve been running all fucking day. Can we please just try and get some rest?” You pled, knowing the chance of sleep coming easily to you tonight was slim but needing a bit of reprieve from his presence.

“Sure. Whatever you want. Always whatever you want.” He huffed, waving his hand at you as he turned to walk out of your room, Ellie not subtle in her eavesdropping. “Come on, Ellie. Go get some rest. The queen demands it.”

You rolled your eyes and shut the door, not that it offered an insane amount of privacy given the shattered windows, but still, you needed a fucking moment. Just one.

One moment of necessary seclusion turned into a few hours of good rest, your body and mind more exhausted than you realized.

You woke up in the middle of the heart shaped bed, the moon high in the sky, the night peaceful until a soft rustle outside forced your body into fight or flight, your heart racing as you reached for your pistol. You cocked the gun, holding it out as you pressed your back against the wall by the broken window, carefully turning your head to scan the dark scene around you.

Seeing nothing but a lit campfire and your ex sitting down in front of it, you allowed yourself to breathe out your panic, the safety of your pistol being switched back on before you tucked it into the back of your jeans. You took in a slow inhale as you debated whether or not to go back to bed or to join him, the quietness of the night promising a less hostile interaction. With a bit of necessary courage, you opened your door and watched as his head whipped over in the direction of the scraping sound, his hand gripping his shotgun instinctively until he locked his eyes on yours.

“Didn’t know you were awake,” he mumbled, his eyes returning to the burning orange of the fire. You said nothing as you approached it, sitting down beside him, giving the two of you a foot of space between your bodies.

A few minutes of silence washed over the two of you, the only sounds being the crackling of the fire and some faint cricket chirping in the distance. It almost felt peaceful, but one glance over to Joel’s profile reminded you that things couldn’t be further from.

You wanted to reach out, stroke his jaw like you used to, maybe rest your head on his shoulder and ask him to distract you with a song, but he wasn’t that man anymore—not to you, at least. This man…this body of ice and chill and anger…you didn’t know him. You had no right to act as though you did.

“You were the first person I ever let myself forget myself with,” he confessed as though he could read your mind. Your lips parted as you watched him clench his jaw, his head shaking and eyes pointed at the flames as though they were his enemy. “Let myself forget too much about this world when I was with you.”

“That was the part I liked best,” you added, voice small like a child. Joel turned his pointed glare to you, his eyes softening as he took in the way the shadows played upon your face.

“I did love Tess. Wanted to love her more than I loved you. She…didn’t want me soft. It was easier.” You felt your eyes welling with tears as he continued looking deep into them, as though he was trying to speak directly to your soul. “You needed me to be the kind of soft that gets people killed out here. And for a while, I let it happen. I guess I started pullin’ away because I knew how it would all end. I’ve seen it a thousand times over. People get comfortable and people die. But sometimes I think…if I could do it all over again…I think I woulda never left you. Woulda fought for you, woulda…woulda been soft like you needed me to be. Because losing Tess…that hurt ain’t nothin’ compared to sittin’ here havin’ you look at me like I’m a stranger.”

“I only look at you like that because I don’t recognize…the way you look at me. I don’t recognize it.” You gestured to him. “I was used to something so much…more tender, I guess.”

“I know,” he sighed and nodded his head, finally taking his eyes off you. “I don’t…don’t feel any different about you than I used to, but…it ain’t smart to do this all over again. Especially now that we got Ellie to look out for. I can’t—I won’t risk all our lives over me and you.”

“You’ve always been better at shutting off your feelings than me,” you let out a breathy chuckle, not amused in the slightest but needing to hide the fact that you actually wanted to sob until you couldn’t breathe anymore.

With a sharp inhale and a sigh, you stood up, swallowing the lump in your throat at you mumbled a “good night”. Before you could leave the warmth surrounding the fire, Joel stood up and grabbed your wrist with just enough force to stop you, your eyes locked on the contact before slowly lifting to his. You could see the need in them, the desire to fuck his feelings away, but it only made you sadder.

“Joel, I can’t…” Your strong exterior crumbled a bit under his dark, needy gaze. “You may be able to separate everything…to shut your feelings off, but I…” You choked on your emotions, your throat swelling so much that your voice grew deeper, raspier. “I love you.”

He froze for a moment, his hazel eyes studying the sincerity in yours until it became to much for him to take.

“Alright,” he pulled his hand away swiftly, his eyes dropping to the gravel beneath your feet. “I’ll, uh, see you in the mornin’.”

Your chest ached with the desire to have him fight for you, to rewire his brain into loving you the way you needed him to.

“Just…you don’t have to say it, you don’t need to become soft for me and risk your fucking survival, Joel, but just, please…I need to know that I’m not crazy. That I didn’t fucking make this all up in my head. I need to know that you loved me.” You pled in a broken whisper, tears streaming down your face regardless of how hard you tried to will them not to. Joel lifted his eyes back up to yours, taking a moment before parting his lips.

You could see the old Joel somewhere in the soft green of his irises, the affection he used to freely pour over you distant, but not absent. You allowed yourself to imagine things from his perspective, to lose so much so long ago, for survival to be the only thing he’s known, to have someone come along and threaten to disrupt that. For a split second, not even long enough to be considered a moment in time, you no longer ached. You understood him, understood why he couldn’t love you like you wanted him to—like you needed him to. You didn’t hate him anymore, you weren’t jealous or yearning, you simply understood.

“Course I loved you,” he finally confessed, almost angry with you. “I love you everyday. I love you…right now. But…love will only get us killed out here.”

Joel walked back to his fire after that, not bothering to offer something soft to help cushion the blow of his harsh truths. You bit your quivering lip and nodded, your eyes flickering up to the moon hanging up in the sky.

You almost felt embarrassed that it had to witness your rejection, but something about that white ball in the sky looking down at you offered you a comfort nothing else in this world could. You wished it a goodnight instead of Joel out of spite before retiring to your room, determined to get at least a few more hours of rest before the sun rose and you had to face reality again, this time in brutal daylight.

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[beatcroc]

on the peppinos, postgame

i like to think the peppinos are pretty good friends now, but that certainly wasn't always the case. in fact i think they were both pretty terrified of eachother for a good couple months or so after the tower's fall. here's a moderately-sized ramble on how they went from one end to the other, with some extra thoughts on their current dynamic.

peppino's deal here is pretty obvious. being anxious and afraid of everything all the time is like his main character trait, but frankly he has every reason to be terrified of fake pep even aside from that, given the... you know. the everything. everything that went down in and around their fights, and just the nature of what fake peppino is-both as a general horror creature and also, specifically, as some kind of fucked up parody of himself that exists for reasons unknown to anybody. the only reason peppino let fp hang around in the first place was out of fear of pissing him off and getting attacked if he did try to take some action to Remove him. he tries his best not to invoke that, and stays far away from fake pep.

but fake peppino is also pretty terrified of peppino for the same reasons- he's really only ever seen peppino at his most violent, he's already gotten his ass kicked twice, and what's more he's acutely aware that he's on borrowed land and borrowed time out here. he only went to pizzeria in the first place out of instinct and because he didn't really have anywhere else to go without the tower, but he knows damn well that this is not his turf to be hanging out on, and that peppino has every right to defend it if he wants. he tries his best not to invoke that, and stays far away from peppino.

unfortunately, neither of them are perfect at that, and both of them are peppinos, so...

their paths do tend to cross on occasion. fortunately, neither of them actually want to fight again, so these run-ins never escalate to conflict, and end with them both scrambling away as quickly as they spot the other.

as it goes, time passes and they get more used to eachother at a distance; fake pep being naturally curious and poking around despite his reservations, and peppino sorta noticing fp is skittish whenever he ventures a bit past his usual boundaries. with that and the fact they've never actually had any violent encounters with eachother, peppino eventually catches the vibe that "oh maybe this thing isn't just here to menace me''. there is definitely still the aspect of "why the fuck is this freak here and what does it want" to deal with, so he doesn't drop his guard entirely, but he does go from ardent avoidance to more a... neutral observation.

and it's a bit of a positive feedback loop; fp seeing peppino being less Reactive about him means he's less worried about being Retaliated Upon & thus a bit more venturous still. perhaps even enough to be seen Inside the restaurant...?

from here it doesn't take long for peppino to start seeing fake's, uh, utilitarian benefits. he eats the rats so it's free pest control, and noise seems really afraid of him too which is funny as hell, so pep just kinda starts going lik ''oh lmao ok maybe this is kind of cool''.

for fake pep i think it was just... the first time peppino showed him any kind of thanks or congratulations for such. a moment of "??? does he like that?? does he like me?? do i not need to be afraid of this guy???" and so this is where fp starts trying to Deliberately interact with peppino a bit, and things just kinda grew from there.

i think it's neat because while peppino may have been the first to get over his fear and technically 'be accepting' of fp [shockingly???], it still takes the both of them because without fp trying to Initiate something, i really don't think pep would have ever gone out of his way to Give A Shit or achieve anything besides a mutual tolerance.

it is also so funny because like. i think peppino still is not seeing his end as anything more than a tolerance. sure, by now he knows fake pep likes him a lot, but as far as he's concerned he still only keeps fp around because he's '"'useful''", and because he thinks "ohhh i guess this guy is just never gonna leave ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ i guess there is nothing i can do about this ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯" when in reality it would take very little to drive fake pep off, and also, i need to reiterate, peppino has very much already beat fp's ass twice [when fp actually WAS trying to fight no less!], and could very much do it again if he actually wanted to. he just doesn't want to. he isn't actually any more stingy towards fp for all this, but it also means like, he's never going to give fp an actual "name" because that would be waaaaaay too direct an admission.

i wouldn't call peppino emotionally Stupid or immature, but i like to think he is often very....oblivious of his own actual state even when LITERALLY everyone else knows otherwise.

fp knows bc peppino lets him get away A Lot Of Shit and even openly solicit affections, gus knows bc peppino actually defending fp and/or making an effort to work him with is an insane leap of faith/trust for this man to have made, every random customer who sees the two buddying around knows, hell even noise knows [and is terrified of it] bc why the hell would the most panicky man on earth casually have a freak fucking beast around in the first place?

and nobody really tries to press peppino on this because he is stubborn. it's a good bit of denial, but it's also partially him thinking he's just being logical; "why would i be mean or try to chase him off if he's beneficial?"

if you asked him whether he was gonna give fp a name he'd get all defensive and probably straight up say some shit like ''noo you know how they say if you name it you'll get attached'.' dumbass. you are already attached.

we all know peppino is a nervous animal but really i think they are both nervous animals. pep is a nervous prey animal who's mostly stressed out and afraid for like, self-preservation reasons; and fake pep is a nervous predator animal like a cheetah who needs constant companionship and reassurance or else he's Also going to be very stressed. and they're like weirdly good at covering this for eachother & so trust the other way more than they probably realize.

for peppino it's as simple as "if this guy was going to hurt me he already would have", perhaps with a bit of extra "if this big scary thing is on my side maybe i'll have less to worry about in general" [i mean this mostly in the powerful allies "oh he can kill things for me" sense, but i'd like to think there's a bit of a confidence boost in the sense of "if i can overcome/make peace with this maybe i can overcome other things too" somewhere in there as well]

for fake pep I think a lot of it is that peppino is like completely incapable of hiding his emotions. it makes him very easy to trust in that regard, and for a guy as Unsure about everything as fp is it's very good for him to have that kind of straightforwardness. there's never any guesswork with peppino; if you are doing something he doesn't like or makes him uncomfortable...you will know it. and for the same, on the rare chances he's showing approval, you can be sure that's genuine too.

[serickswrites]

Allowed

Warnings: captivity, torture, restraints, forced to watch, drowning, infection, rescue, mcd, hurt/no comfort

"Whumpee, you're never allowed to die," Caretaker said as they wrapped their arms around Whumpee. The two of them had crawled into bed after a long day of soft, gentle moments together.

Whumpee smiled and leaned into Caretaker's touch. "I'm never going to leave you, Caretaker. I promise. I love you."

Caretaker kissed Whumpee fiercely. "I love you. And that's why you're never allowed to die. You have to live forever."

"Forever sounds good with you, Caretaker."

The conversation played in Caretaker's mind over and over again in the time that Whumper had them. Whumper had, unfortunately, gotten the drop on both them and Whumpee. Caretaker had fought back more once they saw Whumpee being hauled away as well. They couldn't let Whumper take Whumpee.

"Hurt me," Whumpee offered as Whumper chained them both to opposite walls. "Hurt me instead of them, and I won't fight back."

Whumper stared at Whumpee, their head cocked. "You would do that? Offer yourself up in their place. Why?"

Whumpee's eyes flashed. "It doesn't matter why. I just promise I won't make your life hell if you hurt me instead of them. I'll do everything you want me to do. Just don't hurt Caretaker."

Caretaker screamed their protests, but Whumper only had eyes for Whumpee. "You have yourself a deal."

And so Caretaker had to endure days and days of watching Whumper torture Whumpee. Days and days of watching Whumper drown Whumpee in a filthy tub. Days and days of begging Whumper to stop. Days and days of being shot down. And days and days of watching Whumpee grow weaker and weaker.

"S-S-Someone-one-one isssss b-b-b-ound tttttooooo f-f-f-find ussss," Whumpee said as they lay in the damp heap Whumper had left them in. Caretaker knew without having to ask that Whumpee felt like crap. They suspected that the infection that Whumpee had told them about two days ago was much worse than Whumpee led them to believe. They knew Whumpee's fever hadn't broken--Whumpee sweated profusely despite the cool temperature of the room and their eyes were fever bright.

"Someone has to be looking for us. You just need to hold on a bit longer."

Whumpee opened their mouth to speak, but a violent coughing fit left them trembling and breathless. They closed their eyes and nodded their head.

"I wish you would let me take your pace. I can take it, Whumpee. Please. You need your rest."

Whumpee shook their head. "Nnnnnn," was all they managed as they started to cough again.

Caretaker opened their mouth to protest, but the door banging open had them shutting their mouth as they watched Whumper stalk towards Whumpee. "We have very little time left, I'm afraid. I'd like to get all of the enjoyment I can before I leave."

"Me! Hurt me! I'll be so good for you. I promise!" The words tumbled out of Caretaker's mouth in a jumble. Their time was almost up? Someone had found them. Someone was coming for them. Whumpee just had to hold on a bit longer.

Whumper smirked. "But where's the fun in that?" They kicked out at Whumpee, their foot connecting with Whumpee's ribs. Whumpee let out a breathless cry. "This one is so much more fun to watch. They have such a pretty face under the water, don't you think?"

Caretaker let out a wordless yell, trying to draw attention to where they were. Whumpee began to slowly move, their eyes meeting Caretaker's. They nodded. Caretaker just needed to distract Whumper. Whumpee wasn't restrained any longer like Caretaker was. They could, in theory, fight back. Whumper had taken them at their word. And now Whumper was going to pay.

"WHY DID YOU--" Whumper froze as they heard the sounds of someone somewhere in the compound. "Fuck."

"WE ARE IN HERE! HELP!" Caretaker screeched.

Whumper took two steps towards Caretaker, "I am going to--"

But they never finished speaking. Whumpee threw themself at Whumper, arms flailing at Whumper's face. Caretaker watched in horror as Whumpee struggled against Whumper, their fist connecting with Whumper's jaw.

"HELP!" Caretaker shouted once more as the sounds of someone came close. "WE ARE IN HERE! HELP US!"

Whumpee gave a yelp of pain that had Caretaker freezing. Caretaker looked up to see Whumpee fall back into the filthy tub, landing with a loud clank, Whumper smirking as they slowly rose. They moved like they were hurting, and Caretaker couldn't help but be pleased with Whumpee.

The door banged open as Whumper took a step towards the tub. "FREEZE! PUT YOUR HANDS UP!" Multiple voices shouted from the doorway.

Whumper started forward and the world erupted into sound, light, and smoke as the rescue team surged in to fight back against Whumper. Caretaker shrunk back against the wall trying to stay out of the fight. They were sure Whumpee was safe in the tub. They had to be safe.

And just as suddenly as the chaos began, it ended. Whumper was on the ground, hands cuffed behind their back, and the rescue team entered the room. "Uncuff that one on the wall. Get a medic in here for Whumper." The leader ordered.

"Whumpee, Whumpee needs help! They're sick." Caretaker said quickly. "Please. They need a medic."

The leader nodded. "Prioritize the victims first." Their team quickly dispersed, leaving Caretaker with only one rescuer.

Caretaker was quickly freed and they stumbled towards the tub. Whumpee's legs hung over the edge, their pants dripping with water. There was still water in the tub? "Whumpee?" Caretaker called.

Whumpee's legs didn't stir. Their legs hung limply and the only sound was the dripping of the water. Caretaker's mouth went dry as they could finally see the tub in its entirety. "Whumpee!"

Whumpee lay face up, their upper body and face completely submerged in the dingy water. Their eyes were closed, their hair floating in the water around them. "No! Whumpee! No....not like this!" Caretaker shouted as they hauled Whumpee out of the water. Whumpee's limbs flopped bonelessly in Caretaker's arms as Caretaker lay them flat on the ground. "Come on, Whumpee. They found us. They found us! Open your eyes. Whumpee!"

Whumpee's skin was cool, cooler than Caretaker would have expected given how sick they were. Caretaker pressed their fingers to Whumpee's throat, hoping that they were wrong, hoping that this was all some trick. Caretaker's heart sunk as they realized Whumpee had no pulse. "No. No. NO." They began to perform CPR. "Somebody help me, please!" They sobbed as they pumped Whumpee's chest. "Come on, Whumpee. You promised. You can't die. You promised. You can't leave me. Not like this." Their vision became blurry as they sobbed harder and harder.

Caretaker felt two strong hands on their shoulders. They fought against the pull. They couldn't stop. Whumpee wasn't dead. Whumpee couldn't be dead. Whumpee wasn't allowed to die. But as the pull became stronger, more hands appeared. Hands on Whumpee's throat. Hands on Whumpee's chest. More hands on their back.

"You have to let them go, Caretaker. You have to let them go, we can't help them if you're doing all of this." The words in Caretaker's ear made sense. But didn't. If Caretaker stopped, if Caretaker let go, Whumpee might die. And Whumpee wasn't allowed to die.

"I can't," they sobbed. "I can't. They'll die. Please. I can't."

"They're already gone, Caretaker. There's nothing you can do. They hit their head on the side of the tub when they fell. They weren't awake when they went under water. They're gone. Let them go, Caretaker. You have to let them go."

Caretaker stared down at Whumpee's lax face. Their lips were pale with a blue tint. Their body only moved with Caretaker's movement. Otherwise Whumpee was deathly still. No. It couldn't be. "Whumpee's not dead! They're not, you'll see!"

The hands squeezed their shoulders tightly. "Whumpee is dead, Caretaker. I am very sorry. We were all too late. Whumpee is dead."

At the last words, Caretaker collapsed forward, sobbing harder than before. They pressed their face into the crook of Whumpee's neck as they sobbed. They had failed Whumpee. Everyone had failed Whumpee. Whumpee was alive when help arrived. But help wasn't fast enough. "Oh, God. Whumpee. Please."

Whumpee didn't move. Didn't breathe. They lay there, sopping and cold. They lay there beneath Caretaker and they didn't respond. Because death had claimed them. Caretaker sobbed harder as they realized Whumpee was well and truly gone.

[thebottomfromhell]

my request does not have much to do with the upper moons directly, but rather with their partners. Imagine that one of the hashiras, any one of them, discovers the human partner of the upper moons and captures them to question why the reader chooses demons over humanity.

I imagine this could turn into something along the lines of "no, not the demons, just my partner" or "I don't care about humanity in general", etc, with the hashira in question feeling confused and depending on who it is, even outraged and disgusted at the idea of ​​a human with a demon (Sanemi would be most likely the latter reaction, I believe). I know this can be a little confusing, but it's just an excuse for the reader to give the reasons why he/she chose to be with such a superior moon, even knowing what they are and what they do with human beings.

And I would like to thank you for write my previous request. You are amazing!

This is pretty nice ask, specially considering how bad most of them were to Tanjiro (I understand attacking Nezuko, but Tanjiro was only a child wanting to protect his last family member alive, to voach for his death and physically try to harm him more than strictly necesary to be able to do the job... really says a lot about moral standing).

Besides, I wanted to do something of them for a while. Let's see how this goes, and sorry for the wait.

GN Human Reader being an Uppermoon's (could be any) S/O is interrogated by the Hashira. This is before the Hashira Meeting with Tanjiro and Nezuko, but after Tomioka met them already.

Warnings: Referenced cannibalism, Mentioned torture, Use of violence, Implied sexual content, Reader losing sanity (and hating Hashira, making harsh judgements with the information they get), and Implied Hashira death (Alternate Universe, Muzan wins). I warn Hashira fans, this might be NOT for you.

You are tied up under the sun, and you can, for once, feel a grasp of the fear your beloved feels about it. Sun means pain, Sun means danger, Sun means death... As a human you were never meant to face that part of the day, you should have been afraid of the night, of the monsters and shadows lurking in the dark, there was a time you did. Then, inside the darkness, you did found fangs, eyes that shine in the dark, man-eating creatures just like the ones that you find in the folklore horror stories. The ones that you can hear people talk and lie about in taberns, showing scars and animal skeletons.

You have felt those fangs against your skin, bloodied hands, been gazed with those eyes as the only source of life in such a gentle ways. Loving, tender, sweet and kind touch. The opposite of the touch you have recieved just now, a kick in the stomach, making you relieved you haven't eating anything since you got taken here yesterdey... you would have thrown up, you swear as you cough... blood. More blood. It wasn't enough every drop you lost last night, at this point they are going to kill you. "Ara ara, Shinazugawa-san. Don't you think you are getting too far? We won't be getting any answers if you kill our prisioner." This people are crazy, you feel the violent one, Shinazugawa, grab the back of your neck and force you to look up. It hurts.

"I don't give two shits! This demon sucker wants to side them? Then we might just treat it as those monsters." Look who is talking. "I think Shinazugawa is right. We haven't reacieve any answers until now. If Kosho in one night was not able to make this freak talk, then why should we try anymore?" Says the freak who brings his snake pet to the job, job which includes torturing people, it seems. The giant one also adds his opinion. "It would probably be mercifull to end their suffering, decieved by a demon into believing they can love a human. Namu Amida Butsu."

The small woman, the doctor, found you at daylight as you were buying groceries, asked you for a private talk, saying she needed your help finding her older sister. She said that sister has been missing for a while and that she was asking people around for clues, even if they were not directly in the scene. You recognized the uniform of the slayers from the corpses your beloved tends to bring home, but you didn't think much of it. You thought that maybe she was looking for a demon in town, and you thought not answering would be more suspicious, confident that she would not rival an Uppermoon if it was about your beloved, if it was another demon you didn't know about, then you had no reason to care. You did not expect to be knocked up and wake up in a place infested with wysteria scent.

You hate it, you hate wysteria, poison, in makes you feel sick. But it also makes you feel sick. Is this why nobody has found the slayer's base? Because is surrounded by poison? It obviously doesn't harm you, but... the more you breath this cursed scent the more you know there is no hoping you will be rescued.

Now you fear for your life, you can see the Shinazugawa one raise his sword. Is this it? You didn't even get to say goodbye! There is someone waiting for you at home! You can not die here, surrpunded by enemies, your beloved forever ignorant of what happened to you... you can't leave like that, you can't! Thankfully, the young man with divided haori takes his hand before the sword can stab you... in the leg... was this all just to scare you into talking? You should not trust that. "Let me try." Says with a soft voice, finally something non-menacing since you woke up.

The spike haired man pulls his arm harshly to take it back from the other's grip. "What the hell, Tomioka?! Do you think you will be able to the something put of this mother fucker better than the rest?!" Tomioka, the gentle one, doesn't answer, just looks at Shinazugawa, unmoved by his violence, and knees in front of you, staying at your eye level. "Why?" Is the only thing he asks. "Is he an idiot or he really thinks he will be answered like that?" And just for that you are willing to talk, because this is the first one around who is actually nice with you without having to fake having human decency.

""Why" what?" You ask, because ir could be several things. "Why don't you answer?" "Why are you in a relationship with a demon?" "Why are you in this situation?" "Why do you love-" "Why is that Uppermoon different?" He frowns harder at each word, you can tell he is angry, but also trying, genuinely trying, to be understanding. He is the only one doing so right here and now, even though his mind seems more focused on something else. Maybe someone? Also the way he worded it... "different".

You know that special person, because demons might not be humans but you still believe they are people, is always different to others. That is why they are special, and that is why the bond you have with them is different to bonds you have with other. You know. But... what is different? What is so special it managed to get you in this situation?

You remember the they you met your beloved, just like today you felt you would die, but that feeling was burried with the sensation of being spellbound. You were not afraid, you were attracted, and those feelings were reciprocated. With time, which is a nothing compared with the amount of years your beloved has lived, has bringed you both close. Has given you good and bad memories, good and bad feelings, good and bad moments... you have felt happiness, frustration, empathy, sympathy, anger, sadness, pleasure, disgust, impotency, pain, LOVE... so much love you would not change any of those things. ""That Uppermoon".... is home." You can't think of other way to say it. "Is home", you have been picturing the face, the voice, the touch, the smell, even the damn taste of that special someone every second of fear and pain, thinking "I want to go home".

You hear a small squeal as everyone turns to see the woman of the pink hair and revealing clothes. She looks very shy the second she realizes all the attention is on her, covering her face with her hands, eyes close and you can see some blushing as she shakes her shoulders in uneasiness. "I'm sorry! It's just that... it's so romantic, cute and sooo heartwarming how this love is so deep to the point it's home. I never thought I would find someone with a love like this." You are... so confused right now. While she doesn't really look that threatening she was quiet the whole time until now, and to finally hear her thoughts after everything... it's so confusing. But well, confusion is better than fear.

"Huh? I think it's lame, the fact that this idiot thinks a creature like a demon can love a human. I bet those things are just into vore or something, so they date their food. Not gonna lie, as much as it's weird and disgusting, it's very unique! I think a dumb shit like this deserves such an ending! Direct karma!" Says the guy with jewlery and what the fuck?! And this people call you a freak?! You have never met a demon that has been into things... well... Douma is... whatever, you don't care. You are more than a flashy type of dinner, and you know it. "Don't project your kinks into my love-life, you sick pervert!" Ok, that was a bad idea.

You feel pain as Shinazugawa stamps your head against the floor, you can feel your nose break, making it hard to breath. "I would appreciate if you didn't speak of such obscenities. There is a child here." We all turn to the kid, almost at the corner, he doesn't seem to be paying attention... honestly, you forgot he was there, and as incredible as it sounds, you have the feeling he also forgot you are here. "I think we should not lose focus! No offense, Tomioka-san, but I don't think your question is relevant! Thos person is still intimating with a demon, an Uppermoon no less! We should have no consideration, since it's obvious this individual doesn't have it for the victim's of demon's!" Says the loud blonde, he is not screaming but still talks as if he was speaking over another loud noise. Between everything, it becomes irritating how he speaks so polite but is so decided into making your relationship as something... vile.

"OF COURSE I DON'T GIVE TWO SHITS! DON'T ACT AS IF YOU CARED FOR OTHER HUMANS BEYOND KILLING DEMONS! WHAT YOU ARE DOING TO ME ARE NOT THE ACTIONS OF SOMEONE WHO WANTS TO SAVE OTHERS!" You are also loud, and your voice is now weird from the broken nose. It hurts to breath through it, so you have to take air with your mouth between shouts. "TAKING ADVANTAGE THAT I'M WEAKER THAN YOU TO DO AS YOU PLEASE! AND YOU THINK YOU ARE BETTER THAN ME?! BETTER THAN DEMONS?!" The blonde, the Tomioka guy and the pink haired girl have the decency to flinch, the others just look annoyed by you comments. Now it's a hit in the back that you recieve, you feel the snake freak press his elbow against your spine, thankfully not breaking it, the the bones are cracking a bit and you jave some spams because of it and the pain.

Again, thankfully, the Tomioka guy grabs his wrist and to stop him from doing more harm. "Remember humans can die from things like this. Stop." You only focus on breathing for a while, everything hurts so much. Your gaze becomes dizzy as some tears form in your eyes, but you refuse to let them fall. You are going to die here. This fucking freaks are going to kill you, whenever it's accidental or delibarate, this people are not going to let you live. "Shut up, you freak. Why are you so keen on defending them? What, you you also love a demon?" Tomioka frowns very hard at that, actually looking angry. "I don't need to love someone for not wanting others to suffer an excess of cruelty or to die. People love... and people protect those one love. But loving someone doesn't make you worse! Love make people do stupid but brave things! Why is that wrong for you?!" He even started shouting at the end, he has been so quiet before, just saying the minimun he needed to communicate and maybe even less. This seems personal.

"Tomioka-san. You must consider this person considers that demon victims are not concerning, to the point of siding them. This is nothing but a pitiful soul." There they go again, trying to decide what is right and wrong. Thryng to condemd your being a fucking human that loves someone. "I don't love everyone... People I don't know, that I have never met and never will... what does that has to do with me? Don't think you are better that me because you kill man-eating beings... if you wouldn't drop everything for your beloved ones... then you must have such a pathetic bonds with people...." you start laughing, everyone (or almost everyone) here is pathetic as a human being. They probably think that their job is enough good deed for humanity, so don't even try to actually be good for people and those around them. How else could they be such a group of disgusting-

"Oyakata-sama is here." You hear a soft voice, the child speak. Everyone kneels in front of a man who, like everyone else here, is young, but he is blind. He looks so fragile, sick, a white haired young woman needs to help him to move. This... is what Kibutsuji is looking for?! This?! This is not a threat! Just killing every damn slayer that spans should be enough, then you wouldn't be here! You can only laugh as your body hurts, tears finally falling from your eyes. Everything is so ridiculous.... damn... you are going to die. Everything is so stupid, and you will die. You will die only because you were buying groceries at daylight. You will die and you beloved will not know what happened. You will die here, because of this.

Fuck it! You will die anyway! Don't give a shit anymore! "I can't believe this is what Kibutsuji Muzan was afraid of!" You laugh and cry, laugh and cry, your head hurts, your back hurts, your face hurts, your stomach hurts, your knees hurt, your arms hurt, your heart hurts. IT ALL HURTS! You can see half of the Hashira ready to drop hands, or swords, at you, but hell! You already don't have any damn to give. You were ready to recieve another impact, any other impact, more pain but...

The sound of a biwa resonates with an echo, there is no more sun, but candle lights. You, the Hashira, "Oyakata-sama" and the woman besides him... you all are in "The Infinity Castle...." everyone else looks around, definetely more confused than you. But... What happened? How did they found you? Who found you? "Very well done, Y/N. You did much better than I expected, but you were kept around for something, after all. After all, I didn't let my cells transform you nor kill you as you taked small amounts of blood in those love-bites." The voice is familiar, even if you have only ever heard it thrice at most, there is no way of not knowing who this is. You tremble as if you were a demon in front of him, even if you are doing it more because you are emotionally exhausted, physically in a lot of pain and spiritually relieved... you are safe now. Away from the sun, under the light and comfort of the bloodied moon that you relate to home.

Everyone in your floor, the one of the humans apperently, look up to see Kibutsuji Muzan upside down in what from your perspective looks like a ceiling, but is clearly another floor. Nakime is right besides him, holding her biwa as she shifts her attention from you to the others. "I knew were you were the second you called me, I just had to send the information to Nakime and she brought you here with our guests." You can hear all the Hashira taking out their weapons, and then another note of the biwa sounds as a door appears and open behind you. As weak as you are you turn around.

Kokushibou, Douma, Akaza, Urami (that means Hantengu is inside), Sekido, Karaku, Urogi, Aizetsu, Gyokko and Gyutaro are on the other side of the door. The fact Daki is not there and that Hantengu is already divided and protected speaks in volumes. "Now that everyone is here, I think this is the perfect timing to finish our conflict with the slayers... Permanently." This one is the real one, and you can feel your beloved's anger... Game Over.

[i-luvsang]

protection — song mingi

gn!reader , sniper!mingi , ateez lore inspired , angst & fluff , cw: violence, guns, bombs, injuries (not described at all!), totally unedited (you can yell at me for super bad mistakes if you so with i'll be grateful) , wc: 1.8K , HERE YOU GO @luvhyun3 kana thank you for planting this in my head i hope you enjoy <3

“i’m in position.” the sound of his deep voice in your ear is crisp, transmitted cleanly by the tiny speaker of your earpiece.

“copy that.” your own voice is taught and stern, as if to compensate for the erratic beating of your heart. despite the now familiar weight of the gun in your hand, you continue wishing you’d stop being so nervous for every mission. you know exactly what you’re doing, your hand is steady, and mingi’s is steadier. his presence is always the most confusing mash-up of comfort and absolute horror—you know he always has you covered, but the fact that he’s there at all means that he could be hurt in the process. you can picture him, perched in the high window of an abandoned building, covered in his black protective gear and his sharp eye peering through the scope of his long sniper.

but you don’t have time to dwell on your fear, his striking appearance, or anything at all when hongjoong’s voice patches in from his own position. “alright. move in.”

with that, your gun is pointed up in front of you the moment you silently slip from your hidden position, right into the open for the enemy forces to see. immediately eyes are trained on you, and not even seconds later, so is their gunfire. you save your bullets, sprinting to and dropping down behind the corner of a building while letting mingi pick off those who pose the most danger to you with his impressive effectiveness.

for today, your role is dangerous; you’re the distraction, and your one job is to draw their fire for as long as you can. you dart closer and closer to the enemy base, always searching for an open shot between cover and allowing mingi to thin the lines of the gunsman for you. only the last few stand when you hear another voice in your ear.

“we’re in.” san confirms he and wooyoung have made it inside the core of the base, about to begin their search for enemy plans and destroy anything potentially harmful.

but that doesn’t mean you’re done quite yet. the more to help them the better, so you make the last dart up to the guards and engage in hand to hand combat in order to get inside from the main entrance. especially with the help of mingi, your fight to the door goes without you receiving any wounds worse than a fist to your face or gut. sure, those hurt, but they’re easy to shake off when you could be feeling the unforgiving sting of a bullet.

just as you place a hand on the door, you hear a shout in your ear. it’s his voice, calling your name frantically.

“run!” 

your instincts kick in, and you know fully well to trust him. you sprint to the side, trying to reach cover around the corner of the building, but mingi’s desperate warning is swallowed up by the deafening boom of a hand-thrown bomb, it's blidingly bright flash, and the following darkness.

—

your ears are ringing like literal hell, and that’s all you can process for a long, long moment. next is a blur in front of you and a distant voice calling out to you. your name, maybe?

“m-mingi?” you can’t hear yourself, but you hope he can.

“i’m here, i’m right here. just keep looking at me, okay? you’ll be fine.” his words still sound as if he’s speaking to you from above water, and you’re the one drowning. then the pain hits and you wince almost violently when he tucks an arm under your shoulders and pulls you up into his chest. “sorry, i’m sorry, but i gotta get you out of here.” his other arm hooks under your knees and he stands with you tucked securely into his arms.

with the pain and the constant ringing in your ears, you’re unaware of anything around you but the sight of mingi’s determined face, inches away from your own. his brows are furrowed with worry and a tight frown is cemented in his features as he runs to get you to safety. you wonder if you’re making things up when you notice a glisten in his sharp eyes, as if so afraid for you he’s teared up.

“i’m alright,” you mumble, trying your best in your dazed state to comfort him. he shifts his gaze down to meet your eyes for just a split second, his face softening infinitely in that moment.

“you are alright,” he repeats, a confirmation for you and himself. in the periphery of your senses, you hear shouting, maybe the screeching of tires. your head falls from mingi’s chest in your effort to see around you and you catch sight of a familiar black van, just meters away.

“hurry!” the large door of the van on the side facing you is thrown open, and jongho’s voice meets your ears just before the sounds of gunshots resume, coming from above. the moment you’re right by the van, jongho takes you from mingi’s arms, pulling you inside so mingi can scramble in after you.

the car begins moving before the door is even closed, and this time it’s yunho’s voice that you register coming from the driver’s seat as jongho sets you down on your side in the wide bed of the back of the van.

“we’re going back around to get san and wooyoung,” yunho informs.

mingi just nods, keeping all of his attention on you. he says your name softly, barely audible over the gunshots that follow the van. he tucks a hand under your head to keep it from knocking against the hard floor as jongho assesses the wounds littering your body. mingi’s other hand gently strokes your hair.

from behind you jongho lets out a sigh of relief. “they were far enough away from the explosion, i think our biggest issue is the shrapnel. the medic will know better, but i think they’ll be fine. we just have to get back soon.”

everything’s still a bit of a blur when the van screeches to a stop and wooyoung and san pile in. finally, the car speeds away and the gunshots following you cease.

“i’m alright,” you mumble when san worriedly asks about your condition, and you let jongho give a more detailed answer. the rest of the car ride is mostly quiet after the nearly botched mission (wooyoung and san still managed to steal some enemy plans).

all that you hear are the comforting words and constant apologies that fall from mingi’s mouth. this time you’re sure you’re not imagining the sight of tears in the man’s eyes when he apologizes for the millionth time for not seeing the enemy who threw the bomb beforehand. you do what you can to ease his guilt, but you can’t say half as much as what you want to say when there’s so much pain coursing through you.

it’s only until the next day, as you lay frustrated and ansty, but patched up and on pain meds in the infirmary bed that you get to say to him what you want.

you wake up with him by your side after sleeping through the night, his hand holding yours and his eyes suspiciously red and puffy.

“mingi…” your voice is gravelly and dry, but his name on your lips still sounds like a song to him.

“yeah, yeah, i’m here. you’re awake, are you okay?” his voice chokes up and he looks down at the floor like it’s got something to offer him.

“yeah, i’m okay,” your voice breaks, and quickly, he stands and brings you water. once you feel as though you can talk longer, you continue. “i’m alright mingi, it’s all fine. don’t– don’t cry, please. don’t cry over me. i'm fine, you see?” seeing him so vulnerable breaks your heart, and in that moment you’d do anything to comfort him. it’s odd to see him this way, always so strong and precise in his work. emotionless, even.

“but i should have seen him, i should have prevented this from happening to you. i could have! i got him afterwards, all of them afterwards, but i was too late and you got hurt, and god, i just–”

“mingi, stop it. stop it please. you still saved me! i’m right here and i’m gonna be just fine. they would’ve gotten me if you hadn’t stopped them first and then you came down and you saved me again, you got me into the van and you got me here and because of that, i’m gonna be fine. you’ve saved my life countless times, i want you to remember that.”

“but you still got hurt,” he refutes.

“none of that, mingi, please! i’m okay. i’m still alive, that’s what matters. what matters is that i’m still here and i can still keep fighting for this, we can keep fighting for this.”

“but i want you safe,” his voice is pleading as he takes hold of your hand once again.

you sigh. “i know. and i want you to be safe too. but we have to risk ourselves for this, and you know it. you know we can’t just stop to be safe, because we won’t be either way. we won’t be safe if they get to us, so we have to fight.” you pause, afraid to say the next sentence that rests on your tongue. but memories that flood your heart in just a split second pull it out of you. first comes the moment you met him and you thought he was terrifying. then he smiled and your heart skipped a beat. you think of the way his expression always softens, lights up when you’re around. the time he fell asleep on your shoulder after a long meeting with the crew or the time he pulled you into a hug after your first mission, admitting he was scared watching you from up there. the way he cried while you slept because he just wanted to protect you. so you have to hope he feels the same as you and that you’re right when you say, “we have to fight so we can keep loving each other, right?”

he lets out a surprised breath. “yeah,” and it sounds like maybe he’s as breathless as you. “yeah, i love you. i wanna keep loving you. just scared. i can’t kiss you and hold you if you’re gone.”

“but i’m not. i’m right here and i love you too.”

he’s silent for a moment, battling with his guilt and fear. but he tightens his grip on your hands and gifts you a small smile.

“does that mean i can kiss you now?”

you just nod, smiling back as he leans down. his lips are soft against yours, a stark contrast to the professional side of him that’s sharp and unforgiving. but his hand brushing lightly over your jaw is gentle and the movement of his lips is full of love. he moves away just slightly, resting his forehead against yours.

“never gonna stop kissing you,” he mumbles, still so close you can feel his lips brush against yours.

“good.”

[joeythefrog]

newsies as things said during rehersal

Spot: who are you- GET OUT OF MY HOUSE! Race: nuh uh, I'm serving Davey: Race that's not your line-

Race: *cunty walk, getting on the floor, giggling and kicking his legs* maybe if we remember it like that then he's still alive. In memory if nothing else

Race: you know when you kill an innocent russian child and you're so distraught that you have to hit a ra-ra-rusputine

Crutchie: *playing careless whisper during the kiss scene*

Davey: shakespear didn't die for this Jack: yes he did, I killed him

Race: petition to use a spray bottle instead of a fake gun so that whenever people piss me off I can give them a light misting Race: *violent shaking and sobbing* wait I forgot my line

Spot: Physch horror but it's me yelling 'no more spray bottle' until you combust

Davey: *giving Race a pep talk after Spot rejects him for the fiftieth time*

Jack: Sometimes cowboys get sad Albert: Sometimes cowboys forget their fucking lines and stare at me for five minutes straight as if I'm supposed to say something Jack: Sometimes cowboys get sad

Everyone storing cough drops in the props: drugs, everywhere

Les: mommy milkers but it's just the box of milk the school offers on friday that my mom gave me money for Davey: what in the fresh fuck

Davey: Race no deepthroating the props -no, no do not seduce the props. Stop it, the table didn't consent

Albert: I run on an hour of sleep and a dream. The dream is Race shutting the fuck up

[morningstargirl666]

SNEAK PEAK

Not actually wip wednesday lol but I've just been writing this and HAD to share. Comes from the same chapter as this sneak peak, which is centered around Rebekah and flashbacks of the past. Trigger warning for scenes of child abuse.

“Father! STOP!” Elijah yelled, lunging forward and grabbing their father’s hand, trying to wrestle the whip out of his grip. Mikael snarled, staggering, but held steadfast. With a wild, violent movement, he had thrust his arm out, hitting Elijah across the face and sending him flying to the ground. She watched as her brother blinked sluggishly at the blood between his fingers, touching his brow.

Mikael paid him no heed, already turning around and bringing the whip down on Niklaus’ back all over again. This time, their brother couldn’t hold back his scream.

“He’s going to kill him,” Kol breathed beside her.

Wide-eyed, Rebekah looked across at him, the dawning horror on his face matching her own. She didn’t think he was speaking to her. She wasn’t even sure he had registered that she was there, his eyes fixed solely on their father and the bloody whip being brought down on their brother’s back. He was frozen, feet rooted to the floor, petrified by fear. Rebekah’s eyes trailed down, landing on the sword sheathed at his waist. Then she looked back over at their father, just as he brought the whip down again. It wasn’t even a choice.

She lurched forward, drawing her brother’s sword from his waist. Kol’s head whipped toward her at the sound, eyes widening at the sight of his sister wielding his blade but it was already too late. She was already heading straight for Mikael.

“REBEKAH!”

Hearing Kol’s shout, Mikael stopped and turned his head, just in time to see his daughter gracefully swing Kol’s sword into a reverse grip and slam the pommel into his face, instantly breaking his nose. Mikael staggered back, dropping the whip, shock flooding his features as suddenly his legs were kicked out from under him, sending him crashing onto his back. Blood spurting from his nose, lips red where he’d bitten his tongue, he blinked his dazed eyes open to the sight of a tip of a blade pointed at his neck.

“Lay another hand on him and I’ll kill you,” Rebekah warned, face flickering with a hundred different emotions. Her hands shook, so she tightened her grip on the sword, poised with it in both hands.

The entire room froze.

“Rebekah,” Mikael said eventually. He held up his hands, gesturing for her to lower the sword. “Don’t be stupid, child. Put the blade down.”

“You think I wouldn’t do it?” she snarled, eyes suddenly blazing with fury. The sword jumped forward several inches, kissing Mikael’s jugular. A small bead of blood welled at the tip of the blade where skin had been cut. Mikael gulped. “I won’t let you hurt him anymore.” 

Out of the corner of her eye, she could feel Niklaus’ eyes on her, his expression an emotional mix of awe and terror.

Mikael’s face twisted with rage. “You wouldn’t dare,” he ground out, eyes challenging her to do it.

“This is no mercy for the weak.” She lifted her chin, staring down at him ruthlessly. “Isn't that right, father?”

The snarl on his face died, eyes widening as he finally saw her for the first time. When Niklaus had started laying hunting traps for the rabbits, it wasn’t him that slit the bunnies' throats. It wasn’t him that gutted them after, not even fazed by all the blood drenching her hands and smeared across her face where she’d wiped sweat from her brow. Rebekah had grown up with five brothers and although she spent her days helping their mother, weaving flowers into her braids, it wasn’t like she was short of sparring partners when she decided to pick up a blade. Nor did she lack the stomach for it.

Rebekah Mikaelsdottir was not some weak-willed girl that sat beside the fire while men died for her.

Quite the opposite.

[dreamersbcll]

What if chad doesn't stop tara from opening quinn's door in the apartment scene? Let's suppose that ghostface was right behind it, waiting for someone to do something. Maybe when tara opens it, ghostface pulls her inside and locks the door... please, if you decide to write this, make it angsty <3

so, i did a mashup of au’s. here’s the other inspo post….

“Guess”

————————————————————————

The fucked-up part of the whole night was that Tara genuinely thought they would eat dinner together until the screaming started. The newly coined Core-Four gets one nice moment together, which again is ruined by some death wish. Once the screaming began, the facade of a good life was stripped away, and the kids ran toward the source.

Tara didn’t know why she went to open the door. Every fiber in her being begged her to back away from the door, but naturally, she ignored her instincts. She instead reached for the door handle, feeling the electricity crackle between her fingertips and the knob. She knew deep down that something was wrong.

But she twisted it anyway.

The second she did so, she looked up and made eye contact with Sam, dread swallowing her up whole. As if Sam could read her mind, her expression quickly changed from confusion to horror. Her big sister reached out, trying to get her away from the door, and that’s when Tara was snatched.

The door violently swung open, and a gloved hand wrapped around her shoulder, yanking her inside. She could see the moment that the other kids knew- that Tara wasn’t coming out unscathed. She could feel her stomach drop, her hands instantly shaking. The door slammed shut behind her, and the noise of something being shoved in front of it made her ears ache.

As she was thrown to the bedroom floor, she saw Quinn’s dead body strewn across her bed. Blood spattered the walls and sheets, and she cried out as she fell into a puddle. Hot and sticky, and her head throbbing, she stared at Ghostface, a sneer across her face.

Though every part of her was terrified, she put on her brave face, snarling back at her latest assailant.

“You better make it fucking hurt. My sister will tear you apart, limb by limb!” she growled, ignoring the throbbing in her panicked chest.

Ghostface tilted his head at Tara, and she swore she saw him smile.

“I hope she does, Tara,” he sneered back, raising the knife.

Before she could react, she kicked her square in the head, knocking her out cold.

——

Turning around towards the sound of screaming, Ghostface stared at the door, watching it shake. He could hear the bitchy sister beg for Tara, and the conceited asshole Chad threw his body against the door. It didn’t matter what they prayed for or who they begged. He was in control now.

Making his way to the shaking door, he pulled out his knife, tapping the blade against the door. Immediately the pounding stopped, the screaming dying to a bated breath.

This was too fucking easy.

Scraping the blade against the door, he spoke quietly, just above a whisper.

“Hey, Sam. Let’s play a game,” he taunted, goosebumps rising as the shrill knife scraped against the old wood.

A gasp could be heard, and someone stumbled back across the hardwood floor onto the couch. He grinned, knowing that he had them all wrapped around his finger.

Her voice, low and controlled, broke the silence.

“Try me, motherfucker,” she hissed back, her voice strained.

Without warning, he slapped his free hand against the door hard enough to make the ground jump and shriek in fear. God, did this feel fucking good. He didn’t care if he was going off-script. This was what he wanted. It was his game, and they had to play it.

How delightful.

Leaning against the door, he let his mask touch the wood, relishing how he could hear Sam breathing fast. The bitch may be a stone-cold murderer, but behind that, she was still a scared little girl.

And he was about to teach her what happens when you kill his brother.

“Question game. Three questions, to be exact. Each time you’re wrong, I get to stab your sister. If you get them right, she lives with minimal brain damage. If you don’t decide in the next ten seconds, I’m gutting her like a pig on Quinn’s bedroom floor,” he snarled, slapping his hand against the door again.

It took a few moments of frantic whispers and soft cries of Don’t do it, Sam, but he eventually heard the words he was waiting for.

“Fine. You lose, and I get to tear you apart,” she gritted back, slamming her hand against the wall.

He grinned and picked up the crumpled girl by the hair.

This was too easy.

——

Sam doesn’t know why she decided to play into this asshole’s delusions. Nothing good was going to come of it. She knew deep down that she was doing the wrong thing, but what could she do? She was damned if she did and damned if she didn’t.

Tara was going to bleed either way. Whether or not Sam burst into the door armed and ready to fight, Tara would get hurt. It didn’t matter what she did.

It didn’t fucking matter.

Digging her nails into the soft wood, she could feel the twins flanking her side. Annika was behind her, pressing gently against the small of her back. Taking a deep breath, she shuddered, the twins holding her upright.

“Okay. Now fucking get on with it, you sorry sack of shit,” she blurted out, trying to sound intimidating. But her shaky voice gave her away.

She could hear someone dragged across the floor, presumably her little sister—dead weight. Tara sounded like dead weight. She could feel her stomach churn and twist, knowing that her baby sister was in the hands of a butcher with a knife.

“Sam?” a confused Tara slurred out, yelping as she was slapped again.

Sam punched the door in a rage. “Don’t fucking touch her!”

After what seemed to be an eternity, he finally answered her, laughing at her pain. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to control her breathing. If she broke focus, Tara would die, and she couldn’t have that. They had just reunited.

They had just reunited.

“Question one, Sam. No freebies,” he drawled, Tara whimpering at his feet.

The twins sniffled, Anika, rubbing Mindy’s back. Sam could feel her hands trembling, and she took a deep breath, trying to control it. The kids needed her to stay upright. The kids needed her to be strong.

Fuck, Tara needed her to be solid and correct.

“How many people have you killed?”

Sam felt her mouth go dry, her hands limp at her side. This wasn’t a trick question, just one she wasn’t expecting. But she knew she was right because she had killed zero people. She smiled to herself, knowing that Tara would be safe this round. Mindy breathed a sigh of relief, Chad putting his face into his hands.

“None. I’ve killed none. Fuck you!” she spat, curling her hands into fists.

“Wrong answer!” he taunted, and before she could react, Tara screamed in pain.

A guttural scream of torment and the sound of skin torn apart by a knife. Chad stumbled backward, turning green, while Mindy fell to her knees, dragging Anika down.

Sam stood there, swaying slightly on her feet. She could hear Tara crying, the type of cry she had when she was in distress. It had been a while since Sam had heard that, that cry of despair. She should’ve known that this asshole had some fucked-up vendetta against her. Another conspiracy theorist who couldn’t accept that she wasn’t guilty.

“Let her go! Take me! Let her go!” she screamed, throwing her shoulder into the door. She felt it splinter under her touch, but before she could throw her body against the door again, she heard Tara wail in pain again.

“Careful, Sam. That’s against the rules—quick follow-up question for you. How many times can I stab your little sister before she bleeds out?” he gloated, laughing maniacally at his words.

She tugged at her hair hard. “That’s not fair! That’s not a real fucking question! Fuck you! Let her go!” Sam wailed, slamming her hands against the door.

Tara coughed a wet, sticky cough. “Sam, please,” she begged softly, coughing again.

There wasn’t anything Sam could do. She was stuck in hell, and she couldn’t do a goddamn thing to claw her way out. Tara was begging for her to help, but the game was rigged. No matter what, her baby sister would bleed- and Sam couldn’t control how much.

She slammed her hand against the door again, pathetically.

“Please,” she whimpered, tears welling up in her eyes as she heard Tara take a ragged breath in and out.

“Answer the question, Sam. How many people have you killed?”

Tara whimpered, and the twins behind her sobbed. Sam could feel every part of her body fighting the answer that sat on her tongue, but she had to give in. There wasn’t a backup plan. This was it- this was the end.

And she had to play into it.

“One. I’ve killed one,” she whispered, digging her nails into the door.

Ghostface laughed, a loud, mocking sound. The twins flinched, and Sam nearly stumbled back from the noise. It was an unnerving sound echoing throughout their apartment, one that wouldn’t ever be forgotten.

After a bit, he collected himself, clearing his throat.

“Do you know what it’s like to lose a sibling, Sam?”

Her stomach bottomed out, and her knees hit the floor. She pressed her forehead against the door, her nails digging into the wood, blood oozing down the wood.

“Please. Please don’t do this,” she begged, tears flowing down her face.

She could hear her baby sister crying, mumbling through her anguish and tears. He slapped Tara, the sound making Sam flinch in pain.

“I know what it’s like. You killed my sibling. I think it’s only fair if I kill yours. A life for a life,”.

“Richie was your sibling?” she stuttered incredulously, Mindy gasping behind her.

He laughed again, plunging his knife into Tara, who cried out in pain.

“She has a brain, ladies and gentlemen! The killer, the cold-blooded murderer, Sam Carpenter, has a brain!” he crowed, stabbing Tara again.

Ghostface dragged Tara towards the door, pressing her against it. Sam could practically feel Tara’s breathing, and she pressed a shaky palm against the door, trying to soothe her little girl.

It didn’t matter. This was the end. She could feel Tara's blood ooze under the door, soaking into her jeans. Tara breathed raggedly, her voice thick with blood.

“Sam. It’s Ethan. He’s the killer,” she softly whispered, her voice barely registering in Sam’s mind.

“Ethan?” she replied incredulously.

If she were wiser, she would’ve kept her mouth shut. But she wasn’t.

“Hi, Sam. Goodbye Tara!” he triumphantly yelled.

The screams of the group echoed throughout the building, Tara’s blood covering their floors.

[littlebunnywitch]

Fictional Agere Challenge Day 6

Day 6: an “unfitting” character (a villain, someone from horror, etc) that you hc as a regressor

Being a little self indulgent Imma go with Billy Hargrove from Stranger Things - one of my higher comfort characters~!

🩵 💙 🩵 ~ 💙 🦈 💙 ~ 🩵 💙 🩵 (Icon made by me) I first want to mention I choose Billy for day six not because i see him as a villain but rather because his show is light Horror IMO. I also HC Billy as Nonbinary Fem Leaning - who mainly uses He/him and but uses female titles by people Billy trusts.

AGERE Billy Headcanons

He's a premaregressor of 9 to 13 year old

He's also a Trauma & Vent Regressor of Baby to 5 year old

A lot of his drops are involuntary.

Pron to becoming semi or fully nonverbal when stressed or scared. But also not a huge talker most of the time when feeling little.

Gets VERY clingy when feeling on the younger side but is also pron to hiding when he first drops. He struggles a lot with touch though and should be the one to make first content or at least be asked first to before touching him.

Billy loves aquariums - Could spend hours there and one of the few places that doesn't trigger his anxiety. Aquarium and in the ocean videos can help calm him down. Beaches and sealife is a big special interest for him.

Struggles playing with toys after having all his toys thrown out when his mom left but does enjoy drawing. He also loves playing in water when little.

Secretly (Not really) has an oral fixation that he normally uses cigarettes (even not lit) or lollipops to keep it at bay but tends to need to be pacified when regressed because he'll suck his fingers or random items.

Billy barley had any little items before his CG takes him in. And he struggles a lot with being bought things because everything comes with strings attached in his world and it takes him time to get comfortable with things. He also feel guilty or bad when others spend money on him. Surprise gifts are not a positive for him and can lead to distress. It is a bit better when a Cg has him "work" towards an item.

Billy is rather hard to punish due to being physically abused, neglected, and having his things taken or broken - it can be a rather sensitive topic. CGs make it a point not to physically punish Billy because he already automatically assumes he'll be hit or kicked out for doing wrong. Time out don't really work well because it worsens his anxiety. Time-ins work the best because they help him calm down and being guided on how his behavior was wrong - rather then letting him stew in it by himself.

My preferred CGs for Billy (In order from the Best to Okay)

Joyce Byers~!!!! She would have taken one look at Billy and seen past his masks and see the abused hurt little kid he secretly is. And if he flirted with her - She would def not act on it and i don't know give him a cookie instead. I do feel like she could easily become the mother figure that Billy desperately wants. She also would be very accepting and understanding of Billy both his regression and more feminine traits.

'El' Jane Hopper, Billy and her have a rather interesting little/older sibling relationship were El takes on a big sisterly role to Billy when regressed but Billy also shows and teaches El a lot of stuff when not fully regressed and views her as a little sister.

Jonathan Byers, the two develop a oddly good relationship both when Billy is regressed and not. Joanthan keeps a kinda older brother role to Billy at all times - often removing Billy from situations that might end badly for Billy or others. Billy doesn't get violent towards Joanathan most of the time but Joanathan is able to deal with Billy without either of them getting to hurt if he has to.

Will Byers, the two were rather neutral to each other until Will found out that Billy was a rather talented artist in his own respect. The two draw alot and get into really painful conversations about their together more then Billy talks to Jonathan about it because the two just have more in common. The two don't really have defined role of which is the older sibling. Sometimes Billy feels rather jealous and envious of Will though because he had an older brother to protect him and a mom that didn't abandoned him and people who cared him when he was possessed. But this doesn't effect their relationship much - its more something that Joyce has to deal with.

Eddie Munson, Billy's favorite babysitter. The two were friendly before everything happened. Billy often bought from Eddie. Was at first disappointed at how tame the teen was when he first met Eddie based on the rumors. The two however get alone really well (and Eddie is the closest thing Billy has to as a real friend in hawkins before Joyce takes him in). Eddie also lets Billy paint his nails much to Billy's pleasure.

Jim Hopper, at first they were not close. In fact Billy was activily scared of him and would often "bark" at the man. But Joyce and El loves him so Billy didn't lash out to much. Jim often needs to make sure he doesn't take the bait when Billy tests and push him but the more he doesn't react in anger - the more comfortable Billy becomes around Jim. It takes much longer then his quick acceptance of Joyce as a mother figure but Billy does end up accepting Hopper as a replacement (and better) father figure.

Steve Harrington, it takes a good while before Billy or Steve gets comfortable near eachother. Billy still has a tendacey to stay away when Steve is around but is more likely to join the group if Eddie is also there. The two mange to come to a understanding about the fight with Eddie and Joyce's help. Both apologize for their parts.