#and watching her house burn down through little binoculars | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

disturbedbydesign · 3 years

Text

The Widow and the Wolf - Chapter 3

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x dark!exWidow!reader

Summary: After Natasha Romanoff took down the Red Room, the former Widows scattered to the wind. Raised to be a killing machine and released into the world with nothing and no one, you decided to use your newfound autonomy to take down the bad guys of your choosing. But now Natasha is riddled with guilt for leaving you on your own. She wants to recruit you, rehabilitate you, make you part of a team again. But the rest of the squad has reservations, and no one is more against you than Bucky Barnes.

Warnings: Graphic violence; Mentions of domestic violence, rape, pedophilia, human trafficking, child sex trafficking; eventual Dubcon (not Bucky); eventual smut; slow(ish) burn enemies-to-lovers. [More warnings will be added as necessary but these are the Big Bads.] 18+ only, no minors.

If you prefer to read on AO3, you can do so here.

Chapter Three

If you had a home, it would be Bucharest, even though you despise the place. It was the first place you went when you got free, because you know he’s here somewhere, conducting his evil machinations from the shadows, shielded by layer after layer of vile men across the globe doing his dirty work. There are plenty of men out there deserving of your particular brand of justice, but no one more so than the Viper. Sometimes you think that, if you can just find him and take him out, you might be able to move on—try to make a normal life for yourself, whatever that looks like. You don’t allow yourself to think about what will happen if you finally achieve your life’s goal and it’s still not enough for you.

You remember everything about the day you learned of the Viper’s existence. You were just 7 years old, one of many little girls packed into a shipping container. You had no idea how long you’d been in there or how long you would be in there. It smelled rancid, and there was never a moment of quiet. Most of the girls were screaming or crying, but a few (like you) were silent, just observing. You don’t know who sold you from your orphanage and shipped you off to Dreykov and you never will. What you do know is that you had no family to miss and no one to miss you, so you didn’t understand what the others were so upset about. From the very beginning, you adjusted to life as a Widow almost effortlessly, which is its own form of tragedy.

Others, though, they were stolen away from people who loved them. This seemed a foreign concept to you when you heard about it from the tiny, sobbing girl huddled next to you in the shipping container—the girl who told you about the Viper, the girl who would become your first and only friend until Dreykov took control of all of your minds. Once you were given the serum, your memories were locked up inside your own heads—none of you could have talked about your past lives even if you’d wanted to. Your words were not your own. You didn’t know what was real and what was planted there. Sometimes you still don’t, and nothing terrifies you more than that.

You have no idea how many little girls the Viper funneled to Dreykov over the years, but it was probably a decent amount. His real bread and butter had always been sex trafficking, and he’s still doing it—on an even larger scale if your intel is correct (which, of course, it is). But he won’t be operating for much longer, not now that you’re so close you can almost taste the venom. You were barely 8 years old when you decided you would kill him, and now you have your chance. You are so close, closer than you’ve ever been, but he keeps slithering out of your grasp. And so you’re in Bucharest, again, looking for answers, again. But you have other business, too—almost as important, if not more so.

You head to the safehouse on the outskirts of the city. The building doesn’t look like much on the outside, but you’ve made sure the inside is comfortable enough for the women and children who live there. The matron greets you at the door and you hand her this month’s envelope, which contains enough cash to feed everyone for the next two months, keep the lights and the water on, and some extra to fix the plumbing issues that have been plaguing the building since you bought it.

The building can house about 40 people comfortably—it’s not nearly enough, and you’re determined to create as many safe spaces as you can, but it’ll do for now. For now, you have to select your charges according to a very strict criteria: they are all women and children (and the children of women) who have been bought and sold by the Viper. Some of them escaped on their own; some of them had assistance from you and the very few people you trust in the city. But all of them have suffered, and all of them have information that you need. Individually, it’s not much, but the more women you talk to, the more pieces of the puzzle you have to work with.

Besides for the cash drop, today you’re here to see the newest resident: Irina, a 19-year-old beauty your Bucharest contacts had managed to snatch from one of the sex clubs. Irina was delivered to the Viper at 12, and her life since then has been an endless nightmare that you can’t think about for too long without feeling physically ill. She’s sitting by the window in the living room, cupping a steaming mug of tea, when you approach her. You walk towards her slowly, and when Irina looks over at you, there is recognition in her eyes even though you’ve never met.

“You’re the Widow,” she says.

“Not anymore,” you reply. “But if that’s what you’d like to call me, go ahead. May I sit?” She gestures to the seat opposite her and you settle in for a chat. “I’d like to ask you some questions, Irina. Is that ok?”

“The others told me you’d be coming.” She speaks softly, her voice hoarse from screaming or crying or both. “I know what you’re trying to do. You’ll never catch him, you know.”

“I disagree,” you say, “but I need more information.”

“Alright,” she agrees, “if you think it will help,” and you begin the gentlest of interrogations.

Irina tells you that for the first several years after she was taken, she hadn’t heard anyone mention the Viper. She thinks that a lot of the girls probably knew about him or came directly from him, but no one would talk about it because it was too dangerous or traumatizing (or both). Things were different at her last club, though. When you ask her how many of the girls at Delirium knew about him, she tells you that several of them had passed through him somewhere along their journey. One of them—one far too young to be working there—even admitted that she’d been with him only two months earlier.

Finally, after all this time, you’ve got a clear line from point A to point B. You feel it in your bones that Delirium holds the answers, that if you can just get in and poke around a bit, you’ll be able to find him. You take Irina’s hands in yours and thank her for her help, and then you hear it: heavy footsteps coming down the hall. No woman or child in the building weighs enough to make a sound like that, and no men are allowed on the premises. You know who it is before you see him.

*****

Bucky watches you enter the building from his position on the roof across the street. His contact had told him that there were whispers of a Widow safehouse at this address, though no one would dare set foot within 10 blocks of the place to find out. Bucky doesn’t believe the rumor, though. He knows you work alone, that you pride yourself on it. He assumes this is just one of many places where your targets meet their ends, and he knows enough about Bucharest to know that there are a lot of men in this city who fit your modus operandi.

Still, something is off. It’s not an empty building. There have been women and children coming and going all morning, and nearly all the apartments seem occupied. Why would you choose to do your dirty work in a place with so much activity, with so many innocents around? That seems not only impractical but beneath even you. He’s lost in these thoughts, checking each window with his binoculars, when he settles on a beautiful young girl staring out the window, looking desperately sad. She turns to look at someone he can’t see, and then he sees you emerge from the shadows and take a seat opposite her.

There’s a softness to your face—a gentle kindness—that knocks the wind out of him. Bucky can’t take his eyes off of you, analyzing your body language and facial expressions to try to figure out what the hell is going on. This is the last thing he expected to see, and he tells himself that this woman must be hiring you for a job—except the woman is nothing but a broken child and doesn’t look like someone who would be taking out a hit on somebody (and certainly not someone who could pay for one).

It’s unnerving, watching you this way, and Bucky is no longer sure that what he’s doing is right. There’s something about your interaction with this girl that makes him feel like a voyeur, witnessing an intimate moment that he should not be seeing but that fascinates him nonetheless. Still, he’s here, you’re his mission—albeit one he took upon himself—and he needs to finish it. By this time, Natasha and Steve are almost certainly on their way, and Bucky needs to get to you before they show up. He went rogue and committed to this plan; now he just has to execute it. He’ll deal with the consequences later.

Bucky makes his way across the street and around the back, where children’s toys litter the small yard of weeds and dirt. When he gets to the back door, he notices that it isn’t the usual ancient rusted lock that one finds on the old buildings in this neighborhood; it’s brand new tech. There’s a pretty decent security camera setup around the building, too.

What the hell is this place?

Bucky has two choices: he can rip the door off the hinges, or he can scale the building and climb in the open window on the top floor. You’re going to be homicidally pissed either way, so he might as well not destroy any property—you may be a monster, but the other tenants here look like civilians, and he doesn’t want to sacrifice their security in his quest to bring you in.

Bucky makes it into the building and weaves his way through the hallways. Along the way, he runs into a few women, and each one of them freezes when they see him. They are shocked and deathly afraid—a look he knows far too well—and they scurry back to their apartments and lock the doors. With his hair cut short, baseball cap pulled down, and leather jacket and glove hiding his prosthetic, it doesn’t seem possible that all of these women would immediately recognize him as the Winter Soldier. That’s what it feels like to him, though, and it’s a gut-punch sensation he does not like at all.

When he gets to the sitting room, the girl you are with has the same look of terror, and for a moment, so do you. But you snap back to yourself quickly—having gone from soft to terrified to hostile within a span of about 15 seconds. Before he can react, you stomp towards him, grab him by the jacket, and hiss, “Not here.”

Bucky hears you speak to the girl in Romanian, “Don’t be afraid, Irina. He’s a friend,” although he knows you think him anything but.

The second you get him into the hallway, you’ve got your knife to his throat. Even with your cold blade nicking his skin, Bucky fights the impulse to disarm you. He doesn’t want to fight you. He knows that he’s intruded on something here, though he doesn’t know what, and he actually feels guilty. He could break you in half if he wanted to, but he lets you pin him to the wall—lets you feel like you’re in control.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” you growl.

“You know why I’m here,” Bucky replies, but he doesn’t know—not really, not anymore. “What is this place?”

“It’s somewhere safe,” you say, “or it was until you showed up. No boys allowed, Soldat. Time to go.”

You catch him off guard when you flip him around and throw him through the nearest door, and before he can regain his balance, you kick him straight through the window and into the yard two storeys below. The fall is nothing to Bucky, and he knows that you know that, but it certainly made a statement. He looks up at the broken window he’d just crashed through and sees you peering out with a satisfied smile on your face.

Bucky calls up to you, “I just want to talk.”

“Bullshit,” you snap.

“I mean it,” he says, and he actually does. “You can pick the place.”

He watches as you consider his offer, weighing your options—you obviously don’t trust him, but it’s clear that the sanctity of this location is important to you. Now that he’s violated it, you can’t just let him wander off. You agree to meet with him that evening—in public, at a club in Old Town.

“Come alone, Soldat,” you call down to him, “and if you tell anyone about this place, I’ll throw you out a higher window.”

Bucky tries to hide his tiny smile but he knows you see it, just like he sees the little quirk of your lip just before you disappear. He hoists himself off the ground and brushes himself off. When he turns to leave, he sees a little girl holding hands with her mother. He has no idea how long they’ve been standing there, but the girl is pointing and giggling at him.

The little girl asks, “What happened to him, mama?”

“The Widow’s bite,” she replies.

*****

“He’s not going to hurt her, Natasha,” Steve says as he prepares the Quinjet for landing.

“She might not give him a choice,” she replies, strapping herself in. “What the hell was he thinking coming here alone?”

“I don’t know,” Steve says. “There’s something about this girl that’s really gotten under his skin.”

Natasha looks at Steve, asking the question with her eyes she wouldn’t dare say aloud, and he picks up what she’s putting out.

“He’s not the Winter Soldier anymore. All of that programming… it’s gone. You know that. He’s just Bucky now.”

Natasha nods in agreement, but a part of her still has questions—not whether the deprogramming worked, she knows that it did, and she trusts Bucky with her life. No, Natasha’s concern is what is going on inside Bucky’s head. He was doing well, he was adjusting, he was finally ok, but the existence of you seems to have triggered something in him that the words never had. The words made him cold and empty and ready to comply, but you—you make him think, and Natasha knows how dangerous it can be to dwell too much on things you’ve left in the past.

When Steve and Natasha arrive at Bucky’s old apartment, it’s empty, but there are small signs of life—the indent of a head on the pillow on the floor in the corner, an apple core just starting to brown. He’s been there, and recently. Natasha and Steve don’t know who he would still have contact with in Bucharest, so they are left with nothing to go on. Bucky knows how to cover his tracks, and he left them just enough crumbs to get them to Bucharest but not enough that they could find him when they got there.

“He wants us to trust him,” Steve says, “to wait for him to bring her back here.”

“I can’t just sit around waiting for something to happen, Steve. I have a really bad feeling about this.”

“So what do you suggest we do?” Steve asks.

Natasha sighs and looks out the window. “I have no idea,” she replies, and that’s when she sees it: a piece of graffiti spraypainted on the wall of a building down the street—a coiled snake ready to strike.

The memory hits Natasha like a freight train. She knows that symbol. She knows what it means. She knows exactly who you’re looking for and it seems absurd to her now that she hadn’t thought of it before.

“Let me make a call,” she says. “I think I know why she’s here.”

#bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes smut #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes #sebastian stan #dark!reader #dark!fic #the widow and the wolf

105 notes · View notes

pocketfulofrogers · 3 years

Text

To Outlive the Devil

Pairing: Jay Halstead x Reader

Summary: A good save and a case practically solved leads to intelligence almost losing one of their own. Can you get out before it’s too late?

Notes: Canon violence, nothing worse than a typically dark episode. This is a past and present cut together story and it’s just shy of 4k.

Now

Your bleary eyes open up to a cold and damp bedroom. An abandoned… apartment? The peeling wallpaper had given way to yellow stained drywall. From the small window on your left, it appeared as if you were several stories in the air, but there were no distinguishable landmarks that told you if you were even still in Chicago.

As you begin to come to your senses more, you feel the thick rope tied around your wrists and ankles. The rough material burns against you skin and you notice you already have sores.

How long have I been here?

Your memory is fuzzy and your head throbbed violently. It isn’t until you shift uncomfortably that you realize it’s a heavy metal chair you’re tied to.

Slowly your body begins to pick up on the danger your muddled brain had managed to identify and your pulse begins to quicken. As much as you try, your heartbeat continues to pound in your head as you try to twist your arms free.

The pain that responds is only a small price to pay for even the chance of freedom. Desperately, you continue to twist and pull until one of the knots manages to loosen up enough for you to squeeze your hand out. It’s just a short sprint to the front door in front of you.

You will your frozen fingers to work faster as you pinch and tear at each knot and then internally scream at your stiff muscles to carry you forward just a little bit more.

When your hand reaches the doorknob and it isn’t locked, relief floods your system. But when you’re able to wrench the door open, the person behind the door barely registers in your mind before everything goes black once again.

Then

Jay leans against his fist on his desk and tries to keep his frustration at bay. They’d been at this for two days straight and had been on the case for the last three months. “That’s two bodies in as many weeks. Is no one else starting to think…”

“That maybe hunting Chicago’s very own Criminal Minds level serial killer couple is out of our depth?” You interrupt, tilting your head towards him. “Doubt it.”

In fact, over the last two weeks, it’s the only thing you could think about. A younger woman named Madison roped, at least you were hoping she wasn’t a willing participant, into a horrific and violent life by a man you had yet to learn the identity of. You’d spent many nights pacing your bedroom, ranting and theorizing to Jay when all he wanted was just a bit of sleep.

The further you dove into it, however, the less hopeful you became for a quick arrest.

Voight had about ripped your head off when you suggested passing the case to the FBI and got to hear the ‘this is our city’ speech once again. But the truth was you were running out of ideas, running out of leads to chase down the rabbit hole, and running out of time.

“I hate to say it, but Voight’s right.” Antonio almost looks pained, but he continues on before you can question him. “The first time these two surfaced five years ago, CPD went full force. They shut it all down, had every uniform pulling overtime, and tried to smoke them out. Instead, it scared them into hiding.”

“Five girls in three months, Dawson, they’re escalating.” You take a breath before looking him in the eyes. “I can’t keep notifying parents.” There’s a certain pang in your voice only those who have had to watch a parent’s life crumble around them can hear. Jay reaches out to squeeze your forearm for just a bit of comfort and you run your fingers over his.

It’s enough.

“Then we end this.” Voight’s eyeing you, sympathetic to where you’re coming from, but not willing to give up yet. “Let’s find these monsters and make them pay.”

Pinching the bridge of your nose, you nod and turn to Adam. “Ok, let’s go over everything together, see if we can find something we missed.”

“Since it’s all we have, let’s revisit the address on Madison’s unemployment file.” Jay suggests.

Adam looks confused. “The house was condemned last year, torn down in the spring.”

“I know, but what about the name on the house, did anyone look into it?”

“Figured it was a stolen identity.” Kevin pipes up. “Clara Knight, died in 2012 of a heart attack at 66. No other properties in her name.”

“Knight?” Mouse perks up and starts shifting through his files. “I found a few erased emails from a Robert Knight, but I couldn’t find any relation or connection.”

Adam is already typing ferociously. “Got a death certificate for a Robert Knight, 68, died a few months ago. Seems like the guy barely existed.”

“Any children?”

“A daughter.” His face is grim. “Murdered in 99, she was 16.”

The hairs on the back of your neck prickle. “Pull up a picture of her.” You don’t need to see it to confirm what you already feared, but still the image of her face churns your stomach. A beautiful blonde girl with the hope of the whole world in her smile. “He’s been at this a lot longer than anyone thought.”

“Any property still in his name?” Voight asks.

Anxiety rippling through your chest, it feels like an eternity before Mouse nods. “His nephew Isaac put his house in Roseland on a tax form.”

Now

When you come to, the first thing you notice is that your restraints have been changed to zip ties and for a moment you’re concerned about your circulation. You’re worry is cut short by the cup of water on a table to your right, the plastic straw close enough for you to reach it.

The sudden realization of the searing pain in your throat and the cracked skin on your lips lets you know it’s probably been about two days. It’s the dryness of your tongue that overrides every single rational thought of concern that maybe the glass beside you isn’t safe to drink. But, fifteen minutes pass with no incident so whoever it is probably wants to keep you alive.

The thought sends ice down your back.

Alive for what?

“What do you want from me?” You scream into the empty apartment.

Then

“We need a vacation after this.” Jay declares as he leans the seat of the car back a little. “Somewhere warm with water so I can look at you in a tiny bathing suit all day.”

You roll your eyes, but he doesn’t miss the small smile you give before bringing the binoculars up again. “We’ll see what we can do about that.”

“Hey lovebirds.” Adam calls over the radio from the car down the street from yours. “Have you seen anything yet or are you too busy staring into each other’s eyes again?”

It’s Jay’s turn to roll his eyes. “Didn’t you just take your third piss break?”

“Hydration is very important.” He defends.

“I told him to wear the diapers.” Alvin adds. Adam tries to defend himself, but you can barely hear him over Kevin’s laughter next to him.

Just then, out of the corner of your eye, you see the movement of a curtain, the flash of blonde hair, and the air shifts. Jay immediately catches the tense set of your shoulders and starts asking questions.

“They’ve got a girl up there.” You tell him through gritted teeth.

“Are you sure? I didn’t see anything.”

You nod and get out of the car despite the hushed protests from Jay as he follows you. To do what? You weren’t sure yet but you had felt so powerless these last few months that maybe you weren’t being the most rational right now.

The curtain moves again and, rather than getting caught, you quickly spin around and push Jay against the car before crashing your lips to his. Other than a noise of shock sounding from the back of his throat, he doesn’t miss a beat.

“North corner window.” You mumble against his lips and slide your hands up his chest, tilting your head to the side to give him a better angle.

When he pulls away, he brings his phone up and looks you in the eye. “We’ve got confirmation on the nephew Isaac, but he’s got another girl up there. If we bust in, he might get spooked and hurt her.”

It’s quiet longer than either of you would like.

“What should we do, boss?” Adam asks for you.

“Do you think you can get in quietly?” Voight asks.

Jay waits for your nod. “We’re on it. Going silent.”

Picking the lock was nothing. Sneaking around a house you know nothing about except for a quick glance at a blueprint from 2005 was the difficult part. Jay splits the two of you up, sending you upstairs while he clears the lower level. Circumstance didn’t allow you the option to argue with him that splitting up in a situation like this is the worst thing to do.

He was your partner and it was your job to always have his back, as difficult as he makes it, but he’s rounded a corner into the living room before you get the chance to cuff him to you.

Your breath catches in your throat when a step on the stairs creak, but you keep moving until you find a girl in the second room you clear. She’s blind folded with on leg tied to the bed. She tenses when you approach, but relaxes once you’ve gotten close enough to whisper who you are.

“Tracey.” She says he name with a whimper and your heart breaks as you cut the rope and take off her blindfold.

When she sees you’re really who you say you are, she throws herself into your arms and begins to cry. There’s nothing more you want to do than to sit here and comfort her, but your ears picks up on a man’s voice you don’t recognize.

“Ok, Tracey, I know you’re so scared, and I can’t imagine what you’ve been through, but I need you to be brave a little longer.” You pull back and look her in the eyes. “My partner and I came in here alone. I need you to tell me where the man and woman who took you are.”

She nods. “I don’t know where she went, she left a while ago. He’s here, downstairs I think, in his office.”

There’s a crash downstairs, the sound of broken glass and your blood runs cold. Immediately, you look for any other way out, but there’s nothing. No balcony, no window, nothing. Voight’s on the radio already, but you silence him.

“Stay directly behind me.” There’s a kind of urgency in your voice that puts her even more on edge.

Creeping down the stairs, you can hear Jay struggling in the kitchen, but it sounds like he’s holding his own.

“Bringing the girl out.” You whisper into your radio and glance back at Tracey. “As soon as we get down, I want you to run to the door. Do not stop. When you get across the street there are people who will help you.” She nods but she looks terrified. “I swear I won’t let him get anywhere near you.”

It’s the door opening that alerts Isaac that something else is going on. You round the corner with your gun drawn and the scene before you makes your knees weak.

Jay is bruised and cut up, struggling against the man behind him, the arm around his neck, the gun pointed at his head.

“She said you were cops, but I told her she was paranoid.” Isaac snarls.

“Madison? Is she here?” You ask, your voice as level as your gun trained on his head. Voight is yelling over the radio, but you tune him out. “I’d love to meet her.”

He snickers and smiles wickedly. “Even if she could be caught, neither of you will be alive long enough to see it.”

He only manages a twitch before you pull the trigger and land a shot right between his eyes.

Jay falls forward, breathing heavy and you rush towards him. “Jay’s hurt!” You call out when the door is broken down. Adam kicks the gun away from the obviously dead suspect and you let them handle the scene.

“Where does it hurt? Did you get hit? I told you it was stupid to split us up! How’s your breathing?” Your hands are frantically searching every inch of his body. He has to grab your hand and grip it tight in his to stop the assault of questions rapid firing from your lips.

He sits up with a groan and kisses your knuckles when he sees the panic on your face. “I’m okay. Because of you it’s just a few cuts and bruises.” He manages a smile and you almost cry right there.

Voight places a hand on your shoulder. “Tracey is on her way to Med. Medics said she’s going to be okay. We’ve got another bus on the way for you. Nice work you two.”

Now

The creak from the front door opening pulls you from a daze and you wince at the sunlight flooding the room. A blonde woman stands before you with a duffle in her left hand and a gun in her right.

She tilts her head to the side. “You’re still alive. What a shame.”

You struggle to focus your eyes from the concussion you’re assuming she must’ve given you. “Maddison.” You croak out. “What are you doing?”

She drops the duffle next to you and grips your hair to pull your head back, pushing the barrel of the gun into your temple.

“I’m going to make you suffer.” She hisses and roughly lets you go. “I tried to warn him that you were watching us, but he wouldn’t listen.”

“Isaac?”

“Don’t say his name!” She screams and the sound cracks through your skull. “He told me to get some supplies, but when I cam back, I watched from the back window as you murdered him.”

You shake your head and try to reason with her. “Maddison, he was hurting people. He was going to kill my partner.”

“Partner.” She repeats sarcastically. “You mean Jay Halstead, your boyfriend of 3 years?” Maddison moves in front of you to revel in the fear that has filled your eyes and smiles sinisterly. “Yeah, I know who he is.”

You start quickly, the panic in your voice betraying the training you were struggling to hold onto. “If you want to kill me fine, do it. But don’t hurt him, Maddison. Please, he’s done nothing.”

She tsks as she opens the duffle and begins to pull out long metal pieces until finally, a long-barreled shot gun. “Why would I kill you when the alternative is so much better?”

You begin to struggle against the restraints as your mind starts to put together scenario after scenario of awful images. Maddison pays no mind to you begging and pleading to see reason. Instead, she pauses from building some contraption to walk over to you and jam a needle in your neck.

When you come too again, she’s sat casually in front of you. “I thought hitting you in the head again might actually kill you, and that’s not what I’m going for, so… you’re welcome.”

You glance around again and notice the barrel of the shotgun behind you just to the left of your shoulder. “Yeah, thanks.” You deadpan looking back at her. “What’s with the ‘Saw’ set up?”

She raises a brow. “Hold onto that strength while you can.” She points out the wires and hooks running along the floor and ceiling to trace it back to the door in front of you. “I used to be a STEM major. Did you know that?” She doesn’t stop long enough for you to respond. “Turns out I still remember a few things.”

You stare past her towards the door and then look quickly back to the gun, beginning to piece together her plan.

“Yes.” She coos. “It’s exactly what you’re thinking. The first person that opens that door, if he happens to be the right height, will get a life ending shot to the face. And I’d like to ask you what the chances are that anyone other than your boyfriend will be the first through the door.”

None.

For the first time you feel utterly defeated, hopeless. Madison watches closely, soaking in every moment of your anguish.

“Now you’ll know what it feels like.”

Then

You phone buzzes for the fourth time in the last hour. “Yes?”

“He’s actually insufferable, where are you?” Will speaks quickly, his tone seeping in irritation.

You laugh. “April already sent me out to get him food because he was whining so much. I am in route with a burger and some other stuff from his favorite place. Should be there in 15.”

“Thank god.” He says quietly. “Would you give it a rest? She’s 15 out with enough food to hopefully put you in a coma so I don’t have to.” You laugh as Will continues to yell at his brother.

“I almost died! Where’s your compassion?” You hear Jay yell back and only laugh harder

“You have ONE bruised rib and a concussion. I’ve seen high school football players handle worse with less complaining!”

“If it’s not so bad, why won’t you let me leave?!”

“I’m stepping up the pace, be there soon.” You laugh and hang up.

The Chicago night was chilly, but something else causes the hairs on the back of your neck begin to prickle. You don’t stop walking, don’t even pause a single step. Instead, you glance in a shop window and catch the reflection of a woman, a flash of blonde, not too far behind you.

Casually, you switch the bag of food to your other hand, but before you’re able to grab your gun, there’s a pinch in your neck and everything goes black.

Now

Jay had forced his way back to work sooner than anyone recommended. You’d been missing for 5 days. Disappeared with no trace other than your cell phone and a bag of cold diner food spilt on the sidewalk. If it were up to him, he would’ve been at his desk the moment 30 minutes hit and you weren’t there.

Alvin called two hours later telling him what they found and Adam and Antonio had to physically restrain him, Will almost sedated him. Voight promised him that they’d find you, and Jay knew they’d do everything they could, but he needed to be a part of the search.

“Did she have any enemies?” Alvin asks and he doesn’t flinch when Jay begins to laugh sarcastically.

“Any enemies? Do you hear yourself? She had tons. We all do. But let’s stop pretending like her being taken the day we closed that case isn’t connected.”

Alvin tries to sympathize with him. “We have to ask. You know the drill.”

He throws his hands up in exasperation. “Are you seriously going to treat this like any other missing person? It’s Y/N, Al! Y/N!”

“We know.” Voight says from his office door. “I made a few calls, Jay, we know where she is.” For a fraction of a second, Jay is frozen, but the thought of what you could be going through right now moves him. He’s grabbed his jacket and is in the car before anyone else has moved.

“I thought only the CIA had access to things like that.” Adam whispers lowly in the car into Kevin’s ear.

He shrugs. “Do think it’s out of the question that he’d break several constitutional laws to save any one of us?”

Adam sits back in his seat with pursed lips, nodding.

You struggle against the restraints long after Madison leaves you with only a gag in your mouth. The multiple cars pulling up and all the people shouting told you that you were running out of time. As of this very moment, you were locked into your fate of watching the man you loved die.

This was not an option.

The hard plastic digs into your ankles and wrists, your movements quickening with each door you hear them break down. You try to scream, to warn whoever was on this floor that there was a danger they couldn’t possibly see, but your muffled cries wouldn’t carry.

Tears soak the bandana shoved in in your mouth and you try to scream again.

No! Stop! It isn’t safe!

You hear Voight’s voice a few doors down and begin to try and rock the chair back and forth. It was considered heavy for a good day, and today was not that. Having not eaten or really moved in so long had left you weak and foggy. The adrenaline coursing through you veins only aiding a little in your efforts.

The sound of the front door breaking down sends a jolt of energy through you and you send yourself flying in front of the gun just as the bedroom door opens.

Jay raises his weapon at the sound before his brain can register what has happened. His wide eyes find yours just before you’ve hit the ground.

“Y/N!” He screams and rushes towards you. Frantic, shaky hands move quickly to remove the bandana and zip ties before applying pressure to your shoulder. “I need a medic!” He calls franticly over his shoulder, but when he turns back to you, he has to shut down the thought that you might not make it that long.

“You found me.” You try to say, but instead sputter blood onto your cheek.

“Oh, God.” He gasps. “You’re okay, you’re going to be fine.” But the more he says, the less you hear him.

“I love you.” You try to reach out to his face and graze his cheek, but your fingers won’t cooperate and only leave smudges of blood across his skin.

When your breathing starts to quicken and become more raged, he knows time is running out. So, in defiance of the orders and suggestions coming in through his ear piece, he lifts you up to cradle you to him and runs.

An annoying, incessant beeping is the only thing you can hear, but when you move to reach for it, a shooting pain stops you cold. You groan softly and pry your eyes open only to see both Will and Antonio hovering too close to your face.

Will starts to wave a flashlight in your eyes and you push him away. “When was the last time you guys brushed your teeth?”

Antonio chuckles softly and places his hand atop your head, his thumb brushing softly. “We got her.” He says quietly. “She couldn’t help herself. She stayed close to the scene to see the fallout and Kim caught her.”

Will nods his head towards Jay who was sleeping soundly in what you had to imagine was a very uncomfortable position. “We’ve been keeping an eye on him as well as you. Do you want me to wake him?”

You look back over at him and smile before turning back. “Better not. These are the last few moments of peace I’ll get for the next year at least. You would think someone would be a little more grateful towards you for saving their life, but I can already hear how mad he’s going to be.” Only a small part of you is joking.

“Well, I’ll get shot next time and we’ll see how you feel.” Jay’s sleep riddled voice carries from the corner, but he hasn’t opened his eyes yet. “I’ll give you an hour.” He adds before settling back in.

Now that’s the love of my life.

#jay halstead #jay halstead x reader #jay halstead imagine #Chicago PD #hank voight #antonio dawson #alvin olinsky #Adam Ruzek #kevin atwater

234 notes · View notes

dccomicsimagines · 4 years

Text

Date Trap - Kaldur x Reader

Requested by Anon - Hi, would you write something fluffy with Kaldur please? If you need a plot then maybe where they flirt constantly and the team ships them and tries to get them together? If you don’t need a plot then ignore that haha. Thanks :)

Author’s Note - I made this one Halloweenish too. Sorry.

***

“Kaldur, let me help you with that,” you said shyly, coming over to help him adjust the collar of his shirt. He smiled, blushing slightly.

“Thank you.” Your touch lingered on his collar before pulling away. Artemis snorted at the sight. You jumped, forgetting the rest of the team had been watching. All of you were by the zeta tubes at the cave.

Robin laughed his creepy little laugh. “Are you two ready? Remember you’re supposed to be on a date.”

“We know.” You adjusted your own outfit. “Why does it have to be us again? I mean M’gann and Conner are actually dating in real life.”

“Supes is too scary. The date stalker won’t come after him,” Wally said, coming into the room with a camera. “Besides, he wouldn’t handle the fancy dinner and everything.” Conner growled in response. Wally smirked at him before holding up the camera. “Smile, lovebirds.”

You and Kaldur froze like deer in headlights. The camera flashed, blinding both of you for a second. “I do not understand why you all seem to be enjoying this so much,” Kaldur whispered in Robin’s ear once he recovered.

“Because it’s fun.” Robin laughed again. He pushed Kaldur toward the zeta tube. “Stay whelmed. It’s going to be great.”

Kaldur cleared his throat. He glanced over at you to see you getting a jacket from M’gann. You waved, putting it on as you joined him. “Are we ready to go?”

“Yes, it appears so.” Kaldur looked back at Robin and Wally. Both of them gestured for Kaldur to offer you his arm. He frowned, confused by the gesture.

“Okay then.” You walked off to the zeta tube. Kaldur shook his head at Wally and Dick before running to catch up with you.

“I don’t know if this is going to work,” M’gann said through the mindlink. “They both don’t even realize their feelings for each other. How are they going to fall in love and be convincing to the Date Stalker?”

Artemis shook her head. “Kaldur is not that dense. He knows he likes (Y/N). I mean he blushes every time he looks at them. If we can tell they like each other, the Date Stalker will fall for it too.”

“But what if they don’t notice that they like each other? What if it’s just as awkward as them leaving was?” M’gann bit her lip. “Maybe it should have been Conner and I as bait?”

“Nah, they’ll be fine. This will spark their romance. Kaldur isn’t a completely fool. I mean he won’t sweep (Y/N) off their feet like I could, but he can be charming when he wants to be.” Wally smirked, striking a proud pose. Artemis flicked him in the forehead. He winced, pouting.

“Shouldn’t we be going? I mean we’re supposed to be backing them up.” Conner crossed his arms, glancing at the clock. Wolf barked impatiently as well.

The rest of the team snapped to attention, and hurried to the zeta tube eagerly. “Remember pizza for a week if this has them dating afterwards,” Robin teased. Artemis smacked him across the head. “Ouch.”

***

You poked at the food on your plate. What if you chewed too loudly? What if you spilled on yourself? Would Kaldur think you were a pig? You found you couldn’t take a bite.

Little did you know, Kaldur had the same thoughts going through his head on top of wondering what his food was. Surface food was strange to say the least. He poked at his food, copying you.

The silence weighed heavily on the two of you. You wished M’gann and Conner had done this part of the mission instead.

“Are you enjoying your food?” The waiter asked, stopping by when he noticed neither of you had taken a bite.

“We are fine. Thank you.” Kaldur gave him a tight smile. The waiter glanced at you. You nodded hurriedly, bumping the bottom of the table with your leg. Everything on the table jumped. Kaldur barely caught his water in time before it tipped over.

“Sorry.” Your face burned. The waiter shook his head, mumbling something about kids as he walked away. “Sorry.” You kept your eyes on your plate.

Kaldur cleared his throat. “It is fine.” He bit his lip. “Are you enjoying your food?”

“Yes.” Your stomach growled. Tensing, you hoped Kaldur didn’t hear. You took a dainty bite of your food. It took you a second to swallow. “How’s yours?”

Kaldur studied his plate. “Interesting.” He took a bite, encouraged by the sight of you eating. “I have never had something like this before.”

You smiled, relaxing slightly. He was probably as out of his element as you were. “Well, do you like it?”

“It has an different taste to be sure.” Kaldur took another bite. He glanced out the window, frowning when he saw a group of kids walk by in Halloween costumes. “I thought Halloween was in a few days?”

“It is. They must be doing something early.” You shrugged. Finally, you relaxed enough to eat normally. “Have you celebrated Halloween before?”

“No.” He smiled at you. “I was invited to join M’gann and Conner’s school dance, but I declined. The idea of Halloween as a holiday concerns me.”

“Really? Why?” You tilted your head at him.

Kaldur blushed. He loved when you looked at him like he was the only one in the room. “People dressing up in costumes and pretending to be people other than themselves is worrisome. In Atlantis, we would only do such a thing for plays or ceremonies.” He pursed his lips. “Not to mention, I have concerns about strangers giving candy to children.”

You hummed, thinking about it. “I guess it would be strange to someone who didn’t grow up with it, but Halloween is mostly about having fun.” You smiled. “Maybe after dinner, we could go see what’s around to do for Halloween? I mean we’re just supposed to keep pretending to be on a date until the Date Stalker attacks us, right?”

“Hush.” Kaldur looked around. “Remember we are undercover.”

You laughed. Kaldur chuckled along with you. The two of you enjoyed the rest of your dinner without any interruption.

***

“Well at least they are finally looking like they are on a date,” Artemis said, shaking her head as she put down her binoculars. “But no sign of the Date Stalker yet.”

“Of course not. He’s not going to attack them in the restaurant. That goes against his MO.” Robin perched on the edge of the roof. Artemis stood next to him, both on the roof across from the restaurant. “Anything on street level, Miss M?”

M’gann was quiet for a second. Her voice came over the mind link. “Nothing here. Kaldur and (Y/N) are paying for their meal. Kid Flash is already moving to the park.” Out of the corner of Artemis’ eye, she saw M’gann in camouflage mode in the alley next to the restaurant.

“Why couldn’t we just have Kaldur and (Y/N) walk around right away? This is a waste of time.” Conner grunted through the mind link. He and Wolf were on the bioship, hiding in the park. The rest of the team deemed them too outlandish to be outside with them.

“Because then they wouldn’t discover that they are perfect for each other,” Wally retorted. “Park is clear. Perfect for the love birds. Ready to get us that pizza, Rob?”

Robin snorted. “I’m going to have to order it by the truckload for you, aren’t I?”

“Hello Megan,” M’gann said. “They’re leaving the restaurant, but they got stopped by kids in Halloween costumes.”

The team watched as Kaldur and you talked to the kids. One of the kids handled you a flyer. You talked to Kaldur excitedly. He smiled, love sick. Eventually, you both started walking in the opposite direction of the park.

“Wait, where are they going?” Robin snapped. “Miss M, connect them to the mind link.”

“No!” Wally’s voice echoed through the mind link. Artemis covered her ears on reflex. “It will ruin the date magic.”

“That doesn’t matter right now.” Robin tensed, running to jump across roofs to catch up with you and Kaldur. Artemis struggled to keep up.

“Robin, slow down. Not all of us are good at this height, okay?” Artemis panted, almost stumbling over the edge of one of the roofs. Robin slowed once he came to the street.

M’gann giggled. “It’s okay. (Y/N) dropped the flyer so I could get it. They’re going to a haunted house.”

Wally laughed over the mindlink. “Shut up, Kid Flash,” Conner growled.

“See? It’s not bad.” Artemis leaned on her knees, still catching her breath. “How do you move that fast?”

“Miss M, what’s the address? We need to move into position.” Robin ran a hand through his hair, taking a deep breath.

“At least they aren’t going off to make out somewhere,” Wally teased, sensing Robin’s tension.

“Pervert.” Conner grunted. Wally gasped before starting in on how he was not a pervert. Artemis laughed, nudging Robin. A smile crept onto Robin’s lips.

***

Kaldur bit his lip, eyeing you as you both walked down the street into an neighborhood. “Do you know where we are going, (Y/N)?”

“Yeah, the kids said the haunted house was over here. Apparently, it’s a local thing.” A trash can banged behind you. You jumped, grabbing Kaldur’s hand.

Kaldur blushed. His hand stayed limp in your grasp for a moment before his fingers tightened around yours. Your hand was cold. “Are you cold? Your hand is freezing.”

“I’m fine.” You smiled at him sheepishly, but you didn’t pull your hand away. “The others should know we changed plans and adapted.”

“We should not have changed plans.” Kaldur glanced around. “This may get dangerous.”

You waved your free hand. “Stop looking so nervous. Besides, it’s more natural for us to change out plans if we were really on a date.” You bit your lip. Kaldur realized at the moment that he had been staring at your lips for quite some time. He looked away quickly. “It’s kinda weird those kids only seemed to talk to us though, isn’t it?”

“Strange, yes.” Kaldur tightened his fingers around yours. “It was like they were waiting for us.”

You shivered. “Well, at least I’m showing you something to do on Halloween. Haunted houses are fun, even if this is just one in someone’s garage.” The two of you turned a corner to find a nicely decorated house with a line of people outside. “You’ve never been to a haunted house before, have you?”

Kaldur blinked, taking in the surroundings. “No, but I do understand the concept.” You pulled Kaldur to get in line. When you got to the table, you dug into your pocket for a few dollars to donate as admission. He frowned when he noticed a suspicious figure in the shadows. “(Y/N), I think we may have gotten some attention.”

“Good.” You led him toward the haunted house, joining the line to go in. From your pocket, you removed two glowstick bracelets. You cracked one and put it around Kaldur’s wrist. “Hope the team can see these.” You put the other one on your wrist.

“Interesting.” Kaldur stared at the bracelet. “I do not know why we could not use comlink or at the very least the mind link.”

You shrugged. “Honestly, it confuses me too.” A smile grew on your lips. “At least we’ll have a souvenir from the mission.”

“Kid will be jealous.” Kaldur smiled back at you. “(Y/N), I am...pleased I was put on this mission with you.”

Your eyes sparkled. Kaldur’s heart skipped a beat. “Me too.” You pressed a quick kiss to his cheek. Kaldur froze. “Come on, it’s our turn.” You took his hand and pulled him inside the creepy, dark haunted house.

***

“Oh my god. (Y/N) just kissed Kaldur’s cheek.” Artemis almost dropped her binoculars.

“And they put on the glowsticks, so the Date Stalker is onto them,” Conner said bluntly. Artemis was on the roof of the house next door. Conner joined her as it had been decided he could finally leave the bio ship.

M’gann squealed. “They kissed!”

“Pizza here we come!” Wally cheered.

“I knew they would feel the aster.” Robin laughed, swinging onto the roof of the garage. “Any visual of the Date Stalker?”

“No, but (Y/N) and Kaldur entered the haunted house.” Artemis frowned. The team waited for about five minutes, but you and Kaldur didn’t exit the haunted house.

Conner tensed. “I heard (Y/N) scream.”

“Move in,” Robin ordered, sobering. “Miss M, connect Kaldur and (Y/N) to the mind link. I don’t care if we mess with their date.” The team moved in.

***

“Sorry,” you said as Kaldur groaned beneath you.

“It is alright.” The pressure of your weight on him lit his entire body on fire. He swallowed hard. “Are you alright?”

You rolled off him, rubbing your head. “I think I bumped my head.” The room was only lit with the glow from your bracelets. “Did the floor just give out or something?”

Kaldur sat up. His back ached from the fall. “It appears so.” He glanced around. “The reports said the Date Stalker tries to isolate their victims. This could be one of their tactics. Lure people into the haunted house and trap the ones they want.”

“Crap.” You hissed, rubbing your temple. “I don’t feel good at all.”

Kaldur reached to touch your temple, but stopped when lights suddenly came on the room. Both of you were blind. “One short sleep past, we wake eternally And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die,” a voice echoed into the room.

Suddenly, gas filled the room. “Stay close to the floor.” You pushed Kaldur back down, half laying on him. “The gas should rise first.”

Kaldur’s eyes adjusted. He caught a seam of the trap door that dropped the both of you in here. “I have an idea.” He took out his water-bearers that were hidden in his shirt.

“Kaldur, (Y/N), where are you?” M’gann asked over the mindlink.

“We fell through a trap door. (Y/N) is injured and toxic gas is filling the room.” Kaldur activated his water-bearers into a whip and threw it at the trap door in the ceiling. It broke through the wooden door easily.

“I’m fine.” You tried to get to your feet, but stumbled, holding your head.

“They are not fine.” Kaldur wrapped his arm around you. “We need an extraction now.”

Robin’s creepy laugh filled the room. “You two seem comfortable.” The gas disappeared out of the broken trapdoor. He appeared beside you and Kaldur.

“Miss Martian, Superboy, use your abilities, find the Date Stalker. Artemis, call the authorities. Robin, help me get (Y/N) out of here.” Kaldur took charge. His arm stayed around you. Robin took your other arm. He smiled cheekily.

“What are you smiling about?” You blinked several times, unable to keep your balance.

Robin nodded to Kaldur’s arm. You blushed. “And it’s nice to have Kaldur in charge again.”

Kaldur hummed, taking Robin’s grapple gun from him to use it to help you up. Throughout the escape and the capture of the Date Stalker, Kaldur never left your side.

***

“It’s just a minor concussion, Kaldur. I’m fine.” You walked to your room at the cave. Kaldur hovered beside you, his hand holding yours.

“I do not want you to fall again, (Y/N).” Kaldur studied you worriedly. He helped you into your room and sat you down on your bed. His face burned when he saw your messy bedroom.

You smiled shyly, laying down. “I enjoyed myself today before...you know, falling and getting a concussion.”

Kaldur bit his lip. “I did as well.” He stood awkwardly beside your bed. Part of him knew he should leave, but the other part wouldn’t let him.

“I still am going to take you to celebrate Halloween with me. We’ll go to a real haunted house where we won’t walk into a death trap, maybe carve a pumpkin or two.” You closed your eyes, smiling lazily.

“I would enjoy that.” He slowly sat down on the edge of your bed. You reached out to take his hand.

“Thank you.” You whispered before your hand relaxed, going limp in his.

Kaldur’s heart skipped a beat, staying where he was. He squeezed your hand. “You are welcome, (Y/N).” He leaned down to kiss your cheek before pulling away and leaving your room.

Noise from the kitchen brought him there, he frowned in confusion at the sight of what was happening inside. Boxes of pizza were piled on the kitchen table. The rest of the team were sitting around, pigging out. “What is this?” Kaldur asked, stepping into the room.

“Rob just kept his promise,” Wally said with his mouth full. Artemis elbowed him, glaring.

“So you and (Y/N), huh?” M’gann giggled, leaning into Conner’s side.

Kaldur blinked. “You all planned this to occur, did you not?”

Robin snorted, getting another slice of pizza. “Well, we had to do something. You two weren’t going to get together on your own and there is only so much we can take.”

The rest of the team laughed. Kaldur shook his head before joining them. He knew he should be mad, but he had to admit, he was grateful for their interference.

#kaldur #kaldur x reader #kaldur imagine #kaldur'ahm #kaldur'ahm x reader #kaldur'ahm imagine #aqualad #aqualad x reader #aqualad imagine #dc comics imagines #dc reader insert #young justice #young justice imagines #yj imagines #halloween

362 notes · View notes

nanoland · 3 years

Text

new chapter (lucifer fic)

(earlier parts are here; whole thing is here)

Ponder on the Narrow House, part 3

Mazikeen + Eve + Michael, gen fic (for now), warning for gun violence

Along the California coastline, the cruise ship Illustrious Voyager bore four thousand three hundred and ten passengers, one thousand two hundred and ninety-six crewmembers, and two guide dogs.

Five thousand six hundred and eight souls, in total.

At around 4pm, without anyone noticing, that number became five thousand six hundred and nine.

Hands clasped behind her back, Eve strolled down the promenade, admiring the vessel’s size and beauty. This fresh new millennium’s wealth astonished her. Sickened, sometimes. Entranced, sometimes. But always astonished.

Back in the garden, they’d slept on and under rocks. When it rained, they got wet. When large animals came by, they hid. No weapons. No shelter. No blankets. The only resource they’d had in abundance was food. Good grief – so much food. God had been so proud of all the different fruits and nuts and mushrooms he’d made available to them, and Adam had been so grateful. Eve supposed she had been, too.

It hadn’t stopped her from one day approaching her husband and the plump rabbits resting in his lap – two of several dozen pets – and asking if he didn’t think the cold nights would be much more endurable if they each had a warm pair of fur slippers.

Then she’d met Lucifer. Fallen in love. Bitten the apple. Learned how powerful he and his Father truly were. That was when the real questions, the sticky, prickly questions, had come bubbling up.

If Lucifer has such a vast family, with so many siblings, why can’t I have even one? she’d asked the sky. Why is Adam all I get?

And later: If You can simply bring people into existence, why must I scream and bleed and shit myself in order to have children? Am I doing it wrong? Is there another way? If there isn’t, why not?

And later: Why is nothing fair?

And, most recently, after meeting Mazikeen: Why isn’t everything at least equally unfair? Why do humans get a world of options while Maze and her family are expected to serve angels from birth to death? Why isn’t Maze allowed into Heaven, even after an eternity of loyalty and hard work?

“Sorry,” she said, flashing white teeth at a passing crewmember. “I’m trying to find a friend of mine. Can you tell me how to get to Room 835?”

Half an hour later, there was a splash and the ship’s population dropped to five thousand six hundred and seven.

Before binding his arms and legs, Eve had secured Andrew Bismarck’s lifejacket and gagged him. Furious and helpless, he bobbed alongside her as the ship moved on and Mazikeen rowed up in her inflatable raft, wearing a sunset-orange swimsuit.

“Should I be worried about those, babe?” she asked as she gripped Bismarck’s lifejacket and hauled him out of the water.

Eve smiled at the dolphin pod swimming in playful loops around her, and patted the nearest one’s nose. “No. They’re my friends.”

The inflatable wasn’t big enough for three people, so Eve held on to a friend’s dorsal fin and let him drag her back to The Choronzon.

Michael stood on the deck, looking bored. As they climbed aboard, their prisoner slung over Mazikeen’s shoulder, he drawled, “Seriously? This sad specimen’s worth two million dollars?”

“Actually, his net worth is eight hundred million,” said Mazikeen, dumping him down. “Two million is just what his ex-wife is willing and able to pay.”

Wringing out her hair, Eve added, “She took half his money in the divorce but she gave almost all of it to a chimpanzee shelter. I really like her!”

His lip curled. “How delightfully sordid. Isn’t this all a little beneath you, Ms Mazikeen? I mean, you’re a big deal in Hell. High Commander of Lucifer’s legions, head advisor to the king himself. Aren’t you worried taking jobs like this diminishes you?”

Busy handcuffing Bismarck to the railing, Mazikeen said, “Eve, honey? Do me a favour?”

“Boop!” Eve chirped, having already snuck up behind Michael, and pushed him overboard.

“I know it’s your whole gimmick,” Mazikeen called down as he splashed and spluttered, his face red with princely indignation. “And I know you don’t have a lot else going for you. But the next time you try that on me, I will stop being nice. Kapish?”

“Kapish,” he muttered.

The Choronzon had barely travelled a mile before Eve spotted Bismarck’s henchmen coming after them.

“Someone gimme details!” shouted Mazikeen, busy putting a bulletproof vest on over her bikini and opening up the box she’d told Dan contained a fishing rod, not a halberd.

Eve peered through her binoculars. “Two speedboats. Twelve guys on jet skis. Guns everywhere.”

“Heh. Awesome. Mickey – move that tight ass to the front and make like a nice juicy target.”

“Wait, what about-…” Michael began, trailing off as Mazikeen dove gracefully into the sea.

Bouncing from foot to foot, Eve shot him a grin. “Don’t look so glum, sourpuss. This is the fun part.”

She’d never spoken to Michael in Heaven, despite the millennia they’d both resided only two miles apart, her in a lakeside cottage on the outskirts of the Silver City, him in the crystal palace in its centre.

Granted, she’d not exactly had a warm and fuzzy relationship with any of Lucifer’s siblings. They all knew what had happened in the garden. Some had been nice – Amenadiel had visited often, even though he’d never had much to say and they’d spent their time together skipping stones across the lake’s surface. But the others had kept her at a distance. She was a bad influence.

Michael, however, was the only angel she’d not ever said one word to.

She’d seen him, now and then, in the early days, when she was the only human in Heaven and, as such, grudgingly invited to divine family get-togethers. On those occasions, she’d spent too much time feeling awkward and out-of-place to pay attention to the sullen figure lurking in whatever shadows were available. The one time she’d glanced his way, it had been to marvel at the stories of people getting the twins mixed up; beyond the raw basics of bone structure, Michael couldn’t have looked less like her old lover.

Bullets sprayed across the hull. Humming, Eve stepped daintily into Michael’s shadow, seconds before they started bouncing off his shoulders and chest.

“It is beneath her,” he muttered.

She made an ambiguous noise. “How d’you figure?”

There came a shout and a splash from the nearest jet ski. The bullets stopped.

“C’mon. She’s Mazikeen. Everyone in the Silver City knows about Mazikeen. Ordinarily, we couldn’t give two dry shits about Lucifer’s minions, but her? She’s a minor celebrity. The power behind Hell’s throne. Christ, it’s no secret my beloved twin couldn’t govern his way out of a paper bag.”

“Yeah,” she said, smiling fondly. “He’s kind of bad at everything. Except music. He’s a great musician.”

More shouting. More shooting. More bullets bouncing off Michael’s torso. Mazikeen rode by, one hand gripping her newly-acquired jet ski’s throttle lever, the other clutching her bloodstained halberd. Watching her circle the enemy, Eve was reminded of a sheep dog.

Michael went on: “And then there’s the fact that for a while, everyone thought Lucifer was going to marry her. It was all anyone could talk about. Jophiel was taking bets on when the proposal would happen. She’d have been High Commander and the Queen of Hell. Instead? All of a sudden, Lucifer takes an indefinite vacay to the mortal realm, drags her with him, and next thing anyone knows, she’s working behind a bar.”

The remaining jet skis and their terrified, wounded riders had been neatly rounded up, which meant it was time for Eve to open her purse.

“Um – how long have those been in there?” asked Michael, watching her take out three grenades.

“You want one?” she offered. “Don’t forget to take the pin out before you throw it. I did that my first time.”

One thing to be said for millions of dull, dull years spent sitting next to God’s Greatest Warrior, skipping stones across a lake; your aim got good.

The first blast was a warning, not close enough to actually kill any of Bismarck’s men, though the resultant waves did knock several into the water. They tried to retreat, turning their vehicles around, only to remember Mazikeen, corralling them single-handed and now armed with machine guns she’d confiscated from those already bested.

When they saw the second and third grenade incoming, they gave up and abandoned the jet skis, jumping into the sea and swimming for their lives.

“Fuck!” Michael yelped, blocking his ears at the concomitant explosions.

Gazing past the debris and smoke, Eve saw Mazikeen head for the nearest of the two speedboats. Its occupants, preoccupied with aiming a rocket launcher at The Choronzon, saw her coming far too late.

“I get your point,” said Eve, as her girlfriend and her halberd made short work of the crew. “But that’s a really… how can I put this? It’s a really angelic way of looking at things. Maze doesn’t consider anything ‘beneath her’.”

“Wow. Sick burn. You’re basically admitting she has no pride.”

“Oh, she’s got pride. Tons of pride. Her pride’s just dependant on how well she does a job, not on the type of job she has. She wasn’t happy working at Lux, but that wasn’t because she thought bartending was ‘beneath her’; it was because she prefers doing things she’s good at. Customer service isn’t really one of her strengths.”

The second speedboat was abandoned by its crew mere seconds before Mazikeen rammed the first speedboat into it, cackling victoriously.

“Actually,” Eve said, moving from Michael’s shadow to where Mazikeen had earlier set a crate of peach soda – her favourite – out on the deck, “now that you mention it, I guess I’m the one with no pride. Haven’t really ever had anything to be proud of. Your Dad never gave me the chance. I was never meant to do things. I was just meant to be.”

Michael snorted. “Lucky you. Trust me; he may have softened in his later years, but back in the day he never, ever stopped riding our asses. You think Lucy really rebelled because he had better plans for how the universe should be run? Because he was an innovator? Nope. Lazy dick just hated being told to do his chores.”

By the time Mazikeen swam back to them, saltwater had washed off the blood and her ponytail had come loose.

“Oh, hey,” said Eve, gripping her hand and pulling her up. “A mermaid.”

After pressing a rough kiss to her cheek and taking a swig of peach soda, Mazikeen asked, “You okay? He did his job?”

Eve patted the angel’s shoulder – the one that wouldn’t hurt. “He was terrific! Awesome addition to the team.”

“I didn’t do anything,” Michael mumbled.

Ignoring him, Mazikeen snatched up a towel to dry her hair. “Glad to hear it. Alright! Let’s get Bismarck back to shore, get paid, and find a place to have dinner so we can toast Team Hellrazor’s first successful mission.”

“R-A-Z-O-R,” Eve informed Michael. “To make it cooler.”

#lucifer #mazikeen #eve #michael demiurgos #demons #lucifer morningstar #amenadiel #michael #fanfic #my fic

9 notes · View notes

platypanthewriter · 3 years

Text

Rollerskates

For the Harringrove April prompt month! What if someone else encountered the mindflayer...I don’t know what this is, have some silly horror I guess

Hawkins was the worst. Billy knew this--he’d known from the time they drove through the two-street town, he’d guessed when his dad praised the damn place and its down home American values--but he’d never guessed some sludgemonster would try to drag him into the ironworks, and he’d definitely never guessed whatever the fuck it was, it would send spies.

He glowered over from his lifeguard station at the row of rats outside the chainlink fence of the pool. They were brave, knowing, somehow, that he couldn’t take his eyes off the pool for more than a few seconds to hose them down. Billy glared back at them every few seconds--these huge rats, lined up like bowling pins, staring. He’d started carrying a notebook to jot things down, not because he thought a goddamned soul would believe him, but to check that at least if he was hallucinating, it was consistent.

A kid hollered, splashing, and he yanked his gaze back to the pool.

Sometimes they switched, he was fairly sure, watching them with binoculars. There was a light grey one that hadn’t been there before, and a really fat one he was sure he’d have remembered. He counted them, and made a note. They were spying on him in shifts, because it was goddamn Hawkins, and the rats--and the steelworks, apparently--were possessed.

He was vaguely tempted to go back, or ask around town if the old factory was haunted, but every time he thought about it, he broke out in a cold sweat.

Every time he left the pool--every time he went anywhere--he could hear the soft squeaks of the mice, and the dragging sound of their piper. She looked younger than Max, with overalls and rattling dark braids, but she swooped around on her rollerskates, playing her recorder, and the rats obeyed her.

Billy’d tried chasing her, once, but he could hardly catch up to rollerskates, and she skated backwards away, staring him in the eye. He chased her two blocks, then rolled after her in his car, as she looped through driveways and through garages, an endless maze of shortcuts where he couldn’t follow, and he finally realized she was leading him back to the Steelworks. He spun the wheel, leaving skid marks on the road as he sped back home, and laid awake, with his pillow over his head, listening to the rats in the walls.

After a week of the dragging sound of rollerskates in the street outside at night, the sounds of the off-key recorder warbling over the fence at the pool, and the gnawing rats in the walls, he tried cornering Max. She just squinted at him, blinking slowly with huge dark circles under her eyes, and suggested blearily that he stop leaving food in his room.

“They’re not normal rats,” he hissed at her, and she stopped, glared at him, and then shook her head and walked off.

It wasn’t just Billy, either. The front page of the Sunday paper--read in Neil Hargrove’s voice, because he wasn’t letting anybody else read it, even though he was taking forever settling himself--was about a guy running around Main Street with a shotgun, screaming about rats and rollerskates. He’d finally tried to shoot the cops trying to get him to drop the gun, and been hit by a car, and when it revealed he was already under investigation for burning crosses in a local family’s yard, even Neil hissed. His autopsy revealed his toes and fingers had been gnawed on by rats.

“What a nice town,” Max said dryly.

There was an interview on TV with a guy’s wife--she’d called the police because her husband had stormed out in the middle of the night, screaming about rats. She had bruises all up the left side of her face, and something deep in Billy shivered as he wondered about the darkness around her wrists, whether her husband had left bruises there too. She flinched away from the reporter every time he moved, and he lowered his voice, grimacing.

“We’d been fighting,” she whispered, and Susan put her hands over her mouth, glancing at Billy. “We kept hearing rollerskates,” said the woman on he news, crying. “I-I hope he didn’t hurt that little girl.”

Neil Hargrove stared out the window for hours that night, between glaring at Billy, and putting out poison for the rats.

Billy went to get in his car that night, and there were rats, rats on his seats and dashboard, and he yelled, slammed the door, and walked out to where there were people, stalking as fast as he could down the street. He realized he was walking away from home, but he didn’t want to stop, so he just headed wherever he saw a group of people. He elbowed his way into a crowd of people loitering around the drug store, and came face to face with Steve Harrington and his loud, curly-haired shadow.

They stared at him, their mouths sucked in on soda straws, but Billy was on his last nerve. “You fucking grew up here,” he hissed, stepping closer, “--right? What the fuck, Harrington. What the shit is with these goddamn rats?! Why do they want me to go to the Steelworks--who the goddamn is the shitbird on roller skates—”

Harrington just blinked his big stupid cow eyes and frowned, but his sidekick said “Wait, what? The Steelworks?”

“The fucking Steelworks,” Billy repeated, his eyes flicking between them as they exchanged an obvious glance.

“That makes sense,” the kid said, digging out a map, and Billy growled.

“What fucking makes sense,” he asked, through his teeth, as Harrington leaned in to see the map, slurping his soda.

“Lot of sightings around there,” the kid said, glaring up at Billy.

“Sightings of what,” Billy hissed, and Harrington shot him a glower.

They didn’t really answer, but they let him follow them to a payphone, and Harrington called the sheriff.

“You can’t call the police on rats,” Billy bit out, feeling like a moron, kind of, for not trying it himself.

“Shut your face,” Harrington told him, and then proceeded to ask for the sheriff himself, and Billy couldn’t help himself, craning over Steve’s shoulder.

“My car’s full of rats, my walls’re full of rats, I never stop hearing the roller skates—” he yelled at the phone, and Harrington elbowed him off.

“Maybe you shouldn’t’ve been such a shithead to Lucas Sinclair,” the kid said, sounding pleased.

“Fuck you,” Billy spat back, pretending his voice hadn’t cracked. “Who the fuck even is Lucas Sinclair?!”

“Sir,” Harrington said. “Uh, Hopper. Billy Hargrove thinks it’s out at the Steelworks. Yeah. Oh, um.” He turned to frown at Billy. “Are you sure you don’t need--we can help, we’ve—” he sighed. “...I guess we can keep an eye on him.”

“I mean, do we need to?” the kid asked. “The rats can have him, far as I’m—”

“We’ll make sure nothing happens to him,” Harrington gritted out. “As long as he lets us.”

Billy snarled at him, but he let them bundle him into Harrington’s car, and curled up on Harrington’s couch, while Harrington himself stalked around his house shooting the occasional glare in Billy’s direction.

“...was Lucas Sinclair the kid...that night,” Billy asked hoarsely. “Max’s friend.”

“Yeah,” Harrington said, sarcastically. “Nice how it only goes after the shittiest people, right?”

“Fuck,” Billy whispered, swallowing. “Fuck.”

After a while, Harrington sank down on the couch next to him, and Billy flinched, then tried to pretend he hadn’t, growling. “They’ll take care of it tonight,” Steve told him, sighing. “With flamethrowers.”

“Holy shit,” Billy said, staring at him.

It was true--Billy woke up the next morning on Harrington’s couch, thanked him awkwardly, and went home to find his father had left during the night, chasing a girl on roller skates.

He didn’t return.

But, as Harrington had said, there were no more rats. Billy still saw the girl, occasionally, her glare pointed, but she didn’t come near. He considered trying to apologize to Lucas Sinclair, and finally asked Max, reluctantly, whether she thought the kid would even want to hear it.

“What,” she said, flatly.

“Maybe I should just stay away,” Billy muttered, as they maneuvered around each other, doing the dishes. Billy couldn’t quite get over the thought that everybody had acted like the three people taken hadn’t deserved to live, and the rats had not been outside Billy’s house for his father. Neil had deserved better, Billy couldn’t help thinking--he’d been right about Billy, after all--but on the other hand, he’d definitely charged out trying to murder a little girl on roller skates with his bare hands, so Billy felt a little bit vindicated, after all the things he’d muttered about his dad.

When he saw the little girl again, he yelled out, “D’you think your brother would want me to say sorry?!”, and she skated to a stop, turning to glare at him.

“Would you mean it?” she hollered back, her hands cupped, and Billy nodded.

“I’ll tell him,” she shouted back, and skated off.

Max started bringing Lucas around, after that, and Billy always got them whatever takeout they wanted, and stayed the hell away. Lucas nodded to him, after a while, and Billy’s spine loosened.

Billy nodded to Harrington, too, when he saw him, and after a while, Harrington started nodding back, until Billy let the uneasy squirm in his guts every time they met eyes guilt him into saying, “Sorry.”

“What,” said Harrington, looking weirded out. The mall was barely open, and he glanced around, like he might need backup.

“Sorry for that night,” Billy said. “And--and for...helping me. Sorry I ended up your problem.”

Harrington just stared back at him. He laughed, though, when he found Billy in his driveway, grimly cleaning rat shit out of every surface of his Camaro.

The little girl just made him buy her ice cream, which he was fine with--she’d hop in his car, and they’d drive over to buy ice cream from Steve Harrington.

“I wasn’t possessed, god,” she groaned. “I was doing God’s work.”

“It promised you ice cream, didn’t it,” Steve asked, raising his eyebrows, and she sighed.

“I was possessed by capitalism,” she sighed dramatically.

After Steve got off work, he climbed in Billy’s car, and they’d drive out to the quarry and talk. Billy watched him the way he had at first--stupid Steve Harrington, with his stupid hair, and his stupid fucking smile--until he’d realize Harrington was talking again, and Billy was missing it, again.

“The hell d’you keep staring at,” Steve asked, laughing, and Billy groaned, rubbing his face, but Harrington didn’t seem pissed, so Billy just kept running up whenever he saw him, and Harrington started putting an arm aorund his shoulders. The like, sixteenth time Billy almost forgot himself and kissed him, watching Steve’s lips from inches away, Steve smiled, a little crookedly, and pulled him back as he stepped away. They stared at each other, and then Billy scrambled away, swearing and kicking at rocks.

Billy had his first gay kiss in the ice cream shop, with the scary little rollerskater wolf-whistling, and Harrington’s chocolate-sticky fingers in his hair. It tasted like waffle cones.

The other Harringrove April prompts I’ve done

#Harringrove #harringrove april #Erica Sinclair does not get mind-flayed #She's a vigilante for justice #On roller skates

14 notes · View notes

hawks-is-kinda-chicken-little · 4 years

Text

Voicemail: pt 2

Hawks X Reader

Summary: Commitment is sometimes scary, especially when Keigo already has so much on his plate. So instead of communicating that to his lover, he grows distant.

PART 1

-PART 2-

PART 3

PART 4

Key:

[F/n]= Friend’s name

[F/h]= Friend’s height

—————————————————-

That night wasn’t easy for anyone. There was no sleep, no rest, no breaks. A whole day had gone by and the investigation had gotten nowhere.

No one was out that early in the morning. However, a couple of people reported seeing some sort of black van near the back of the alleyway the day prior. But, that is the only thing they knew.

Keigo was getting desperate, he ended up using all his assets to find out anything that might get him some sort of lead.

He even went as far as contacting people in the league of villains. That didn’t get him even the slightest clue. But, due to his affiliation with the league they offered to poke around since they thought of Keigo as part of their cause, making him family. And you don’t mess with family.

Some of the villains had met the woman before, and some had only heard stories of her.

Dabi was one of the first to see her, but not because of Keigo. He had actually seen her years before they even started dating.

Dabi always kept an eye on his siblings from a distance, but never let himself be seen by any of them. Sometimes, he would even use binoculars to peer through the window of his mother's hospital room just to make sure she was alright.

One day, while he was checking up on his mother, he spotted a young woman he had never seen before walk into the room with a bouquet of flowers. He wasn’t one to trust other people, so he kept watching. And while doing so, he saw how happy his mother was while the young woman was there. Soon, his sister came along, a surprised face present at the sight of the other woman, before seeming to giggle and tackle her into a hug. The mysterious woman squeezed her back, rocking them both side to side as they laughed.

The next time he saw her was when he was walking down the street in a disguise. She was on the other side of the road. But, to her side was the youngest of the Todoroki’s. Shoto looked relaxed and happy, as he talked to her. Talking was so rare for Shoto. He was like a completely different person. Dabi could not wrap his head around this strange woman.

The more he watched her, the more amazed he was. He learned her name, (y/n). She was so motherly to Dabi’s sibling, it was not the fake kind of love though. She showed them true unconditional love and care, she gave them a place to escape to when their father became too much.

It truly brought tears to his eyes. She listened to them, cared for them, and loved them. Someone was there for his family, when he couldn’t be, and he thanked god for her and everything she was. She did not know it at the time, but she had gained a guardian. She was family now, and Dabi would look out for her like he did his mother and siblings.

It wasn’t until she started dating Keigo that Dabi actually got to meet her. Keigo was drunk out of his mind with some of the other villains at the bar of the league’s hideout. It was 2 in the morning and Shigaraki was absolutely done with everyone’s shit, wanting to kick them all out. Keigo was in no position to walk or even fly home. So Kurogiri, being the one sober person out of all the idiots, grabbed Keigo’s phone and called the first number, which also seemed to be the most recurring number on his recents list.

Dabi might have not been the most sober out of all the drunkards at the bar, but his mind was still mostly present. He could make out the panicked feminine voice coming from the speaker of the phone. Poor thing, she sounded so tired, like she just woke up.

Thirty or so minutes later, and a person came through the front doors of the building. Dabi eyes fell onto the figure as time stilled. It was her. It was (y/n). It was the woman who looked after his family. She was right there in front of him.

His thoughts were shattered by a high pitched squeal from an overgrown bird man who tackled the poor woman in a bone crushing hug. (Y/n) quickly apologized for him, hoping that he had not caused them too much trouble, all while Keigo clung to her like a child. She was nothing but polite and sincere as she thanked Kurogiri wishing him a nice night as she ushered Keigo out the door and to the car.

After that night Toga asked that she come around more. Keigo was skeptical, not really trusting any of us. But, Toga was very persistent, even going as far as saying she was going to find the sweet lady herself. Keigo finally gave in and brought (y/n) one night.

It was strange actually talking to her, he could see why his family loved her so much. It was a calm night. The league loved her. She became like his second little sister.

So when Dabi was told the news, he was livid to say the least. They all were. Dabi was also disappointed in not just Keigo, but in himself for not looking after her.

The whole league was on a look out. Toga was ready to slit throats, Shigaraki wanted to disintegrate everyone, Twice was a mix of depression and rage, everyone was on edge.

Keigo appreciated all the help. It was not hard to tell that the hero was falling apart with every second that ticked by. Eyes droopy and red, almost resembling those of the underground hero Eraserhead. Dark bags formed under his eyes

Everyone around could see just how much of a wreck he was from miles away. Especially Endeavor, who was already having to explain to his family what happened to their beloved friend/ family that morning, after the crime. His children looked up to her and he knew it. It had been a long time since he talked to Rei, but he knew that (y/n) was important to her. She was like one of Rei’s children, heck even Endeavor was starting to think of her as his kid.

Each of his children had a different reaction. Fuyumi was the one who he told first, knowing that she could break the news to the rest better than he could. She had always been good at talking to the rest of the boys. But of course, no matter how hard Fuyumi tried to hold herself together, she just couldn’t. She fell to her knees in front of Endeavor crying out.

Little did Endeavor know that she wouldn’t have to tell the other two, because Shoto and Natsuo were in the room right beside them sitting at a table. The walls were thin and all that could be heard was Endeavor’s voice and Fuyumi's cries. Neither of the boys could move, both looking at each other trying to process the words of their father. It hit Natsuo first, as he stormed out the room and left the house. Shoto just sat there, alone. Even when Endeavor stopped talking, Fuyumi’s cries could still be heard. Endeavor tried his best to comfort them, but he had no clue how.

He couldn’t even imagine telling his wife of (y/n) disappearance. Hopefully, he wouldn’t have to as he prayed that (y/n) would soon be found.

Rumi wasn’t doing much better, she couldn’t calm down last night. Switching from cries of rage to cries of desperation. Some of her anger pointed towards Keigo, but some pointed herself.

When the investigators were looking through her phone, they found an unsent text that was meant for Rumi. The text read:

Heyyy, so i need to crash somewhere tonight. I can't really go into much detail because i might start crying again and I don't want to wake people up this early in the morning because of my loud ugly crying. I’ll explain when

It stopped there. The text was never finished. Rumi wishes she would have known, she feels responsible for not being there. It did not help when she was informed that (y/n) was also pregnant. She just wants her family back. (Y/n) was always there for her no matter what.

No matter how much anyone else may try and take some blame, Keigo knows that it's his fault that she left the house. He was to blame, but he’s going to fix it. He’s going to find his angel.

Hours went by with no news, but the edgy tension never ceased to suffocate everyone. More heroes were out on patrol, keeping an eye out for any suspicious activity. The villains were snooping around the shadier parts of japan. Everyone was getting drowsy due to the lack of sleep.

Miles away, that's all she knew. They had driven for hours. Or at least that's what it felt like. But then again, things always seem a little warped when you have lost tremendous amounts. Everything felt so numb, only feeling dull aches resonating from wounds inflicted by her tormentors all over her tired body. They might have hurt her less, but she wasn't going down without a fight. Even when she had begged them to not hurt her and her baby they just kept coming at her. Completely merciless. Dragging her beaten unconscious form into a black van at the end of the alley.

She almost missed the van, it was so much warmer than the unforgiving cold spikes of the concrete nipping at her skin. The poor girl had no idea what was going on. They had tossed her into a rusty cell, damp and frigid, no source of light to be found. Her hungs burned from the musty air breaching her nostrils.

Heavy footsteps clattered from the ceiling above causing tiny dewey water drops to fall onto her dirt crusted face. She couldn’t move her hand to wipe them away. No muscle could obey the command of the mind, all she could do was force her blurry eyes to slightly crack open. Cloudy vision made it hard to focus on her surroundings, but she could sort of make out what seemed to be another cell directly across from her. Something that looked like the outline of a small person sat with their back against the wall, with something laying oh it's lap. All her energy was worn out moving her squinted eyes around, leading her vision to go black. The last thing she heard before passing out was the creaky opening of rusty hinges.

A man rushed through the office corridors, panting as though he ran a marathon, papers bunched up in a death grip by his arms. He kept going until he got to his destination. A golden name plate hung from the door, ‘Boss Bird’. The man didn’t even bother to knock, he just barged in falling through the giant door. The person on the other side of the desk abruptly stood from their seat now on high alert. Slightly slouching forward the man sucked in a couple loads of air before looking up at the person before him.

“We have some possible leads,” He huffed.

The man only saw a flash of red before the person was right before him, wings protruding outwards from their back as razor sharp eyes pierced into his own. His tongue was stuck to the roof of his mouth, rendering him speechless.

“What! What do you know!” The man opened his mouth but nothing came out.

All the papers were snatched from his grasp as the other filed through them hoping the papers would tell them something the man couldn’t.

“Call the others.”

“But, Hawks we still ne-”

“That’s a fucking order.” The man was too shocked to move.

“NOW!”

Jumping from his spot he was shuffled out of the door, slamming it behind him, leaving the person inside shaking as rage coursed through their veins.

Endeavor was the first to arrive. Standing right on the other side of the door where he heard a frustrated scream before a heavy thud. He opened the door to see Hawks leaning over his desk, one hand clawing into the wood of the desk, while the other grasped his golden locking, giving them a harty tug.

“What’s the news?” So trapped in his own thoughts, Hawk did not even acknowledge Endeavor.

“Hawks!” Now Endeavor has attention.

The said hero snapped his head to face him, eyes forming deadly thin slits, as if staring at their next kill. But, after Hawks snapped out of his fit and composed himself, he handed the papers to Endeavor. Hawks started pacing as Endeavor studied them. The first was an old report of a case put aside, but never to rest as it was left unsolved.

The headline read: Seven year old girl, reported missing after running away from home. Family said she snuck out at night. A search party was formed by the family and neighbors, but there was no sign of the girl anywhere. When asking around the town over, two separate witnesses claim to have seen a strange black van rushing out of an alleyway late at night when they were heading home from work.

With a frown Endeavor flipped to the next page.

Thirteen year old boy was reported missing by teachers after a school field trip to the downtown park. One person reported seeing a suspicious looking van at the end of the town limits near the park at 12 am, but had no other information.

Then he went to the next page

Five year old girl found mutilated in the back of an alleyway after being reported missing by parents. No evidence could be collected at site. Black van was reported being in the same alleyway prior to finding the girl, but was not there at the time she was found.

Endeavor skipped the next one.

Twenty-five year old woman found dead in a city dumpster.

Next one.

Nineteen year old boy found dead in the alleyway-

All brutal. All unsolved. Four more pages remained but Endeavor couldn’t read anymore. Endeavor looked up from the papers, he couldn't suppress the worry clearly painting his face. Rumi then burst through the door, demanding answers only for Endeavor to shove the papers in her face. Hawk’s pacing only quickened as he watched his friends' reactions. Rumi’s ears folded back flat against her skull as horror washed over her expression.

Lowering the papers she spoke “please tell me that this- this has nothing to do with (y/n)’s case.”

Neither dared to speak, instead opting to let the silence speak for them. Papers swayed to the ground as her hands shot up to grab her hair. She squatted to the ground letting out a string of harsh curses; towards the world, towards hawks, and towards herself.

There was not much information on the reports, but they all had one thing in common. One vital piece. The black van. It was mentioned in each report. Hawks had all his subordinates search all databases for any more information that might get them some more information, but not much was found. He also asked them to make copies of each report, stating that multiple copies meant more people could examine them at the same time. Honestly, Hawks couldn’t believe everyone bought that lame excuse. His real motive was sending copies to the league, having them look into the reports as well.

More surveillance was posted around surrounding cities. Keeping an eye out for any suspicious looking van lurking around. Even police were informed of the situation at hand. So far nothing has come up.

Suddenly Hawks came up with an idea, a set up. Lure the assholes into a trap. Have an seemingly unsuspecting person walk down a couple of streets to bait the criminals out of their stake out. It might be a stretch, but it was worth a shot. The issue was that none of the heroes themselves could play victim, it had to be someone outside of the spotlight. But that was quickly solved when a [f/h] person came walking into the building, demanding to see Hawks so that they may slap the shit out of him. It took awhile for them to calm down once they saw him, but they were quick to jump on the train, offering to play the victim. Hawks was familiar with [f/n]. Rumi and them were the closest thing to family his angel had. He knew he didn’t really have a say in letting [f/n] in on the plan because they would fight tooth and nail had they been denied to position.

Breath whimpers bounced off the walls of the cells. The sound was enough to finally bring [y/n] back to a semi-conscious state. She opened her blurry eyes, bringing a sore shaky hand to her face to rub away the film blocking her vision. While it was still dark she could somewhat make out her surroundings. In a weak attempt to sit upright, her arms gave way making elbows collide with the hard concrete. A pained hiss passed her busted lips as her upper body pounded back to the ground.

“You have to be quiet” [y/n] froze looking towards the direction of the small broken voice.

A tiny frail girl sitting in the cell across the room, huddled in the arms on what looked to be a slightly older boy. Both hunched over in the corner, faces showing nothing but fear. Tattered clothes hung by threads on their bodies, dirt and grime lathering their bodies. Judging by how they looked and acted, they weren’t in the best of conditions, but then again she probably wasn’t either. [Y/n] moved up to sit in slow motions so as to not startle the petrified children. So many questions raced through her mind, thoughts and worries, but for now she had to keep them to herself.

“Hello.” Her voice came out a little scratchy, yet it was still soft and gentle.

Neither child could muster a response. But, the frail girl gave a small wave with her shaky hand. The boy on the other hand only pulled the girl closer to his frame in a defensive manner. It was obvious they didn’t want to talk, be it out of fear or distrust.

Clanking of boots alerted all three of them, growing louder with each harsh smack to the ground. The children cowered further into corner walls, trying to make themselves as small as humanly possible. [Y/n] narrowed her eyes towards the entrance doors. Clank-clank-clank-clank. Only ceasing when they were right on the other side of the door. A hand jangled the knob, causing the hinges to screech apart as the door opened. The girl whimpered, making the boy slap his hand over her mouth. Three men walked into the holding room, all wearing similar attire. Armored vests with white undershirts, brown cargo pants accompanied by black boots sleek with fresh wax.

“Sleeping beauty lives another day,” One of the men said.

“For a second there I thought the boy had surely ruffered her up past the point of return,” another responded.

“Boss would have killed us for sure,” The third pointed out.

All three shared a hearty cackle. Talking about her as if she was some sort of pet. [Y/n] was about to snark back at them until she saw the boy’s panicked expression behind the legs of the men as he held up a quivering finger to his busted lips. Heeding his warning, she bit her tongue as they continued their taunting.

“When is the big guy picking her up?”

“I think he wants her delivered.”

“The hell? Who does he think we are? Fedex? How are we supposed to ship her to America?” [Y/n]’s eyes shot up, panic filling her system.

“Watch ya self bud, hate to end up like the last guy who pissed him off,” They all shuddered.

Adrenaline was overriding her reason, part of her wanting to curse them out and part of her wanting to break down.

One of the men picked up on her panicked state and shook his head. Each one of them giving her some sort of pitiful stare. “Sorry about this dollface. We would have just kept ya here and made you a worker, but ya caught the boss’s eyes. No god can save ya now.”

She doesn’t need a god, she needs Keigo. Every attempt to blink away the tears proved useless as the salty drops fell from her chin. All she could think of was Keigo, her friends, and her unborn child. She felt so weak, so sick.

“Poor thing, doesn’t even know what's coming.”

“Hopefully this one will last longer than the rest.”

“The boys going back out scouting tonight?”

“I think so, but i'm not sure. Anybody heard what we are supposed to do with those two?”

A muffled whimper came through the boy's hand as the girl shook. One of the men turned and slammed his hand on the metal poles of the cell making both kids jump.

The men were still talking, but she couldn’t hear them anymore, the chatter blurred out by the buzzing in her head. Body swaying slightly as her vision began blotting with black patches. Thud. She hit the ground giving into exhaustion and stress swarming her whole being.

Keigo just couldn't settle down, constantly moving some part of his body. This had to work, he didn’t know what he would do if it didn’t. The heroes were working to make the set up seamless and fool proof. However, behind the scenes, the League was hiding in the shadow’s ready to grab any perp trying to flee.

Things really started to fall into place when the moon rose to take the sun’s spotlight. Hawks watched [f/n] walk the dark streets from a roof a couple buildings away. Rumi watched as well, ready to pounce at the first sign of danger. [F/n] strode along the dimly lit pavement, hands in pockets, faking an ignorant facade as they made their way around. It was hard to put up such a front in this kind of situation, but they were going to do their best for [y/n].

Everything seemed pointless until a hand shot out, pulling them into a pitch black alleyway. Go time. Heroes swarmed the alley for every entry point. Nothing was left uncovered. The kidnappers were clearly caught off guard, a total of seven of them; six surrounding [f/n] and one in the drivers side of the black van. They put up quite the fight, but they knew they wouldn’t win so they fled. Only two got back into the van before the driver hit the petal, leaving the rest to fend for themselves. The four that had been left covered the other’s escape. Making it quite difficult for the heroes to give chase, Hawks sent feathers accelerating towards the van. They just weren’t fast enough to all catch the vehicle, but lucky for him a single small feather was able to sneak into the hatch of the back doors. Just as the can was reaching out of sight, Hawks spotted a second vehicle tailing the first. The League was enroute. Turning his back to the villains at hand, they grew tired, reaching their limits making it easier to take the criminals down. Two heroes had to pry Rumi off one of them since she was yelling bloody murder while smashing his head into the ground with brute force. All four were arrested, shoving them in cop cars that were to bring them to the station for question immediately. Not waiting around, Hawks took to the sky flying towards the station. On his way he focused his attention to the single feather that snuck into the van.

Blasts of bright blue flames bursted towards the escaping van. The League practically kissed their bumper. Hawks could hear the yelling between both vehicles. Using the feather, Hawks maneuvered so that it unlatched the doors, making them swing open. Exposing them to Dabi’s flames and Spinner’s bad driving. The two in the back, should have buckled in because they went flying onto the window of the Leagues vehicle causing them to swerve from one side to the other, losing the van and its driver in the process. The driver escaped, but he was completely unaware of the feather that now lay hidden under the left back seat.

Both pests that flew onto the windshield were knockout cold upon impact. Hauling them into the truck, arms and legs tried, the League headed back to their hideout where they planned on doing their own sort of investigation. Notifying Hawks of their catch, and the one that got away.

There was no good cop, bad cop in these interrogations. Absolutely everyone was done playing nice. Back at the station Rumi had already broken one of the criminal’s hands after they idiotically refused to talk. Snap. And there goes the other hand.

“TELL ME!”

Crunch.

“W-we weren’t the ones who picked up ya gi-girl, I swear!”

Hawks threw the other reports on the table. “What about any of them, huh?” He leaned over one of the men, eyes piercing through theirs.

The man's eyes darted to the papers, widening just enough to show some sort of recognition. A cold sweat washed over his features, failing to retain the panic coursing his veins.

“Something you want to share with the room bud?”

The man swallowed thickly eyes glancing at his colleagues for some sort of sign. But, they were just as frightened as him. Hawks could tell the man’s resolve was crumbling, he just needed a little nudge. All attention was zeroed in on the man. Guards came in taking the three other men away, leaving the just him and some pretty pissed heroes.

Squatting down so that Hawks was just below eye level of the man. Plucking a medium sized feather from his wings,Hawks twiddled it around his fingers before the shallow shaft found purchase between his thumb and pointer finger.

“I didn’t get my title for nothin ya know” The lacerating edge of the dangerous weapon now centimeters away from the bridge of the man’s nose. “Wanna find out how I got it?”

As expected, the League was ruthless to their captives. Using all kinds of tortuous methods to get their two to talk. Pulling nails, unhealable burns, Shagiraki even disintegrated the pinky finger of one of them. There was a point where they were begging for sweet death to take them from their cruel unrelenting captors. But, the League was far from done with them. Death couldn’t help them now, their lives belonged to the League. That which could use a couple of new Nomu’s.

Both heroes and villains wracked the kidnappers minds for all they were worth. Diving into every sick bend of their twisted operations. Confessing all of their abductions and murders on top of the ones presented before them. The two kids that are currently being kept at their hideout, as well as [y/n], who they beat unconscious before dragging her away. Hearing that from their respective captives nearly made the heroes and villains go feral. Hawks wanted to scream until his cords bled raw. The only explanation that the captives could muster was that it was their job. They collected the people, and then those people either got put to work as a slave or sent to an affiliate who would use them as lab rats. They didn’t hunt for specific people, just people who they could easily snatch. The whole thing was run by some kind of corporation, originating from America where they have their headquarters.

That’s where [y/n] was being shipped off to. [Y/n] and his baby. America. Miles and Miles away. Red seeped down Hawks vision. One of the men was suicidal enough to comment that Hawks wouldn’t find her in time, since she was probably being packaged and shipped as they spoke, jokingly mentioning she was in no condition to survive that kind of transportation. The man’s neck had to be pried from Hawk’s talons. Red slashes marked the sides of his neck as he was pulled from the room before it was too late.

All the heroes prisoner’s were placed in holding cells for the moment being, but Hawks disabled some of the security of their specific cell and tipped Dabi off on how to slip in there undetected. Hawks wanted the League to collect all of them so he could have his proper turn cutting them up without being restricted by the law.

For right now though he needed to focus on the task at hand. The feather that he sent with the retreating van was so far that it was hard to pinpoint where it was. He could barely sense it enough to move it around, let alone sense its surroundings. But he needed to scope out the place. Hawks sat himself down in a quiet room, isolated from the havoc raining outside, putting all his being into that single feather. It's times like this where he is almost thankful for the grueling training the heroes commission put him through.

The van was empty, but he still needed to be cautious. Keep it out of sight. The one who escaped most likely alarmed everyone of the incident, leaving the inhabitants on look out for any sign of trouble. Little did they know the hell that was about to doom them all. The feather made its way around, maneuvering around right under their feet. On its way it passed by a much more armored vehicle where some of the men were loading cargo into its trunk. Hawks scrunched his closed eyes, trying to decipher the words passing between the men. The voices were hazy and blotchy, letting him only make out every couple of words. Hearing something about the ‘big boss’ and a private jet. As the feather continued to map out the hideout, he heard someone talk about a woman not doing too well in one of the cells. [Y/n], Hawks thought. The feather flew from one place to the next until it came to a giant metal door. A guard stationed at the table to the left of the door, oblivious to the feather trying to slither through the small space between the heavy door and concrete.

Bards twisted and broke from the feather’s shaft. The tight squeeze shredded the feather, but it made it through nonetheless. Due to the condition of the feather, Hawks could only drag it across the concrete. Slowly, but steadily. Halting when it approached two cells, one holding the two missing children, and the other caging his poor dove. All three sleeping upon the cold ground. The feather made its way to his doves cell, approaching her sleeping form. Tears welled in Hawks eyes, gently guiding the feather to caress her grimy cheek. Hoping to provide some comfort and reassurance to her, but also to himself. Oh, how he wished it was his hands cradling her face, instead of that one measly feather. Hawks would give anything just to hold her in his arms, encasing them both in his bright red plumage.

Creeeaak. Hawks shot up eyes darting to the now open door of his isolated space. It was just Rumi, Hawks sighed in relief.

“Get your shit, we head out in 10.”

He nodded, a gesture which she returned before closing the door on her way out. Hawks brought his attention back to the feather, giving her cheek one last tender stoke. After he tucked it within her shirt, slipping it under the side of her bra strap to hide it from prying eyes.

No time was wasted, the heroes were suited up ready to go. The top three hero agencies unified were not a force to reckon with. All fueled by determination and blinding rage.

Since Hawks had the one breaching feather in their base, he led the way. They had been on the move for two hours already. The feather pulsed as they got closer. Feathers on his back twitched in anticipation. It seemed like it was taking forever to reach it, like the pulse was fading with every inch he flew. Hawks couldn’t quite focus that one feather. But, something wasn't right.

Narrowing his eyes, he could see a wrecked black van in the distance. Sitting wasted outside an isolated group of buildings in the middle of nowhere. After reporting this to the squad, they halted, letting Hawks survey from above.

As he looked around, he remembered the other vehicle that the feather came across. But, didn’t see it. Infact, the entire outside seemed empty. That didn’t sit well with him. All the luggage that the men were packing into that other vehicle were gone.

“Not seeing anything from the sky.”

“Roger that. Rumi is heading in from the side entrance.”

“I can speak for myself, Endeavor. Screw off.”

Hawks heard Endeavor sign in annoyance. “I'm gonna go in from the roof, meet ya in Rumi.” She gave an affirmative. Wings soundlessly swooped through the air, bringing him right on the roof of one of the bigger buildings. Something was definitely wrong, he couldn’t feel the feather anywhere in the facility.

“Got some goons on the lower floors” Rumi whispered into the comm.

Relief washed over him. This base wasn’t abandoned. Hawks sent a couple of feathers every which way into the building. He himself climbed into one of the windows on the top. Lucky for him, the room was vacant of life, only a stone table with chipped wooden chairs in the middle of the room occupied the space. Soft footsteps carried him to the door. A door which was slightly cracked open, making it easier for Hawks to peer outside the room. Three guys stood with their backs facing him, all leaning over the rails on the stairwell. Nasty fumes of tabaco wafted into Hawk’s nose, making it scrunch in displeasure. Hawks cracked the door open just a little more to allow two feathers through. Flying just above the men’s heads. Positioning themselves so that they were on the outsides of the men on the end. Before swiftly slamming their heads together. Efficiently knocking them all unconscious without causing a big scene. Feathers returned to their owner who made his way out of the room, guard never dropping as he made his way down the stairs.

Comotions ensued as more heroes, not even very stealthily, broke their way in. Hawks spotted Rumi bashing heads, even smashing chairs into the skulls of the hell bound souls. Rumi met his gaze, shouting out to him over the loud ruckus.

“Go find [y/n] and the kids,” Smash “We’ll handle the rest.”

With a curt nod Hawks scouted through the halls, adrenaline pumping through his veins. Eyes sharp and deadly, like the true avian he was. Wrecking all in his path, hunting for the heavy metal door that held his dove captive. Once it was in view, he darted to it like a bullet, ripping it from the hinges, not even bothering to use the door handle. There were only two words that could describe him at that moment, feral predator.

Two terrified screeches pulled him for his trance. Guilt leaked into his heavy heart, eyes softening as they looked upon two little kids huddled into eachothers arms, fearfully shaking in the farthest corner away from him in the cell to his left. He shifted his gaze to the right, scanning over the dark cell. A blanket covering a human sized lump in the corner opposite to him.

Anxiety clawed at the fear inside of him. He called her name, startling the kids even more. The lump stayed deathly still. Not budging even as he broke open the cell. Shakey steps brought him closer, falling to his feet inches away from the covered figure. His hand moved to grasp the edge of the blanket, but he couldn’t do it. His breath swallowed as the beating of his heart dangerously slowed. Hawks couldn’t bring himself to see what his failures had done to her. He couldn’t bring himself to see her dead. Rotting out before him.

“They took her.” Had Hawks not had such a heightened sense of hearing, he would have never had heard the small voice at all. Nor would he have picked up the grieving tone that laced those words.

But even though he heard them, he didn’t immediately register them. When he did though, his hand yanked at the blanket. Making carefully arranged pillows shift in the process. Confusion washed over him. Standing up, Hawks kicked the pillows to the wall, causing some to tear on the spikey ridden edges of the wall.

However, he stopped after one of the pillows uncovered a blood stained phone set atop the remains of a seared feather cut into pieces. Cautiously, Hawks picked up the device, examining the outside, before tapping the screen. As he was scanning the phone, Rumi and a couple other heroes came in. Rumi went to him while the others went to help the children. The phone came to life, a notification bubble popped up. Informing him that there was one unopened voicemail. Hawks completely ignored Rumi as she questioned him. She even screamed right in his ear, which definitely caught the attention of those around her, but Hawks was too invested in the device that all attempts proved useless.

Hawks pressed on the notification, instantly unlocking it without a password, bringing him straight to the awaiting voicemail. His thumb paused right above the play button.

“Press it already,” Rumi huffed, earning her a side glare from the birdman himself. Her spine gave the slightest shutter at the emotions brewing within those ruby orbs. It was dangerous, threatening, ready to snap at any moment. Those same eyes went back to glaring holes into the screen as his thumb finally tapped on the play button.

“Christ, ya’ll really giv’n me a run for my money. Nice feathers by th’way. Thought ye could just sneak one by my men? They might be dumb enough to get caught, but they ain’t that dumb. It's nothin personal, kid. Just business,”

There was a slight pause and a muffled scream coming from the background, “Will someone shut that bitch up already. God she’s given me a headache.”

A loud smack erupted throughout the speaker, the screaming came to a stop. The man in the recording let out a long sigh. In a more sympathetic tone he said “I left the two rascals, but Boss wants this one. Afraid ye ain’t gett’n her back.”

Hawks grit his teeth, dropping the phone, bolting out of the facility in hopes that might be able to find some kind of sign as to where she could have been taken. Tire marks or streaks of torn clouds in the sky, god just something. Frantically, he continued to circle the sky.

Rumi picked up the phone after he stormed out. A noise on the speaker told her the audio wasn’t done. But, the man’s next words made her wish it was.

“Not alive at least. They never come back alive.”

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

Soooooooooooooooo i will make another part because my dumb ADHD having ass keeps getting side tracked. Also thank yall for the love, honestly I feel like this is horrible an so confusing, I’m so sorry XC. I won’t be offended if you tell me this is absolute garbage.

Some people were asking to be tagged so why not, if you want to be added to the tag list for the rest of whatever this is just let me know

Tags @assassinslittlesister @anxiousgoddest

#hawks x reader #bnha hawks #bnha fanfiction #boku no hero academia #my hero academia #keigo takami x reader #keigo takami #mha hawks

133 notes · View notes

angelaiswriting · 4 years

Text

Closer | Hugo Stiglitz x fem!reader

✏️ Pairing: Hugo Stiglitz x fem!reader

✏️ Summary: stranded in a spooky village, Stiglitz confesses his feelings, but she’s caught off-guard and panics. Back at the base, though, she’d like to see where the future takes them. (Requested by my new and unexpected love for this man)

✏️ Prompts by peaskyblonders (link below): # 4, 5, 7, 19, 20

✏️ A/N: the truth is, I should write more blowjobs instead of fearing new fandoms. HAHA. Italics are supposed to be German (unless it’s for emphasis). Prompts used are in bold. Kudos to @kind-wolf for throwing this new obsession at me without warning 💛 Also, please, for the love of all that is holy, listen to Closer by Kings of Leon (it probably has close to nothing to do with this story, but I had it on loop as I wrote and it’s absolutely stunning – and it did give me a title in a time of need).

✏️ Warnings: 18+ ONLY (oral m/r, sex... haha + mentions of a bullet wound and of someone who’s not a pro poking around in it + plot... eh, kinda there, kinda a decoration lol)

✏️ Word-count: 4,785

“Stop whining, it’s just a bullet!”

The voices in the room gradually quiet down to a churchyard silence when Y/N groans, surgical pliers still poking around in the hole in Smithson Utivich’s leg and face set into a frown. English sounds weird on her tongue, almost cut down with the wrong kind of knife, and there’s no safe hiding place for her German origins.

‘It’s just a bullet’ in my fucking leg – they all know those are the words Utivich was about to spit out like burning venom before he opts for the safest solution, the one that lies in silence. There’s a reason if her German accent keeps on being so prominent when she speaks English and that’s because she just does not speak English unless she absolutely has to. She’s more similar to Stiglitz in this than anyone would ever dare express out loud – she either speaks German or French, or she doesn’t speak at all.

“I should leave it in here,” she mutters again when Utivich’s leg jolts up and someone – Andy – has to step forward and keep it pushed down on the table. “You’d deserve it, stupid idiot.”

“It was an accident,” Smithson mumbles, voice low and full of embarrassment. Just half an hour ago he had been outside by a fire, drinking with the guys, until Donny convinced him to play some trick with what should have been an unloaded gun. “And you don’t have to take it out, we can wait for Wicki.”

When the door opens, everybody turns into its direction holding their breath, but it’s not Wicki.

“What happened here?” Aldo asks, brows set into an unconvinced frown as his gaze lands on Utivich first and then Y/N.

“Stupid Americans, that’s what happened.” But then she sighs, shrugs her shoulders, and pulls the bullet out of the man’s wound. “Children shouldn’t play with guns,” she glares. “Someone get off their ass and go call a fucking nurse.”

When half the men in the room scramble out, almost stepping on each other’s feet, Aldo Raine steps forward. He’s expression is set and unreadable as he examines Smith’s leg and a couple of minutes go by before he speaks again. “I need you and Stiglitz on a mission. I have an informer down south that says there’s a couple of Nazis you two might have the pleasure to take out.”

“How’s our exit?” Stiglitz asks, crouching down next to Y/N and taking the binoculars she’s passing him. She’s tense and he can see right through her façade, right through that ‘I don’t fear this has all gone to shit’ mask she’s been wearing for the past few days.

“Still no sign of our guy,” comes her whisper when he finally brings the field glasses to his face and stares off into the distance. “I’m scared, Stiglitz,” she confesses right after, before that temporary bravery stops her from opening up like that. “I have a bad feeling about this. It’s the same I had the day we got arrested.”

He says nothing to that, just stares at the horizon for another minute before he hands her back the binoculars and moves to sit down, his back against the wall of the abandoned house. It’s a spooky village, the one they’re using as their hideout, and the temperature during the day has already started to scratch like an angry cat. Winter is approaching quickly and right there, in the skeleton of what was once somebody’s home, there’s no running away from it.

“I should have gone myself,” she goes on as she scoots closer to him in search of some warmth. “Raine doesn’t know how these people work. You just can’t trust them. He thinks he can, but…” Her rambling dies down and he knows she’s thinking back to that night she’s had to take a bullet out of Utivich’s leg. He doesn’t know how he knows, he just does. He’s worked with her long enough to just be able to understand how her mind works.

“We’ll get back.” It sounds like a promise on his lips and whether he means it as such or not, it’s met with a soft sigh as she relaxes against his side, her head falling back in surrender against the wall. We’ll get back, the words echo in his mind and he does his best to believe them like she at least pretends to.

Neither of them says it out loud, but that’s why they’ve always worked solo – or just with each other after they met back in Bavaria. They’re good at this, good at driving Nazis out, and even better at taking them out. Not as good as the Basterds consider them, but they get the job done and move on to the next name on the list. They jump from name to name and never collab with anyone – or so it used to be before their arrest. Now they’re made to trust other people and that’s just not what they’re used to. You don’t go trust the next person; you don’t lay your life in their hands if you don’t know who they are and what they’ve done to survive.

“You should try and get some sleep,” he says when her stomach complains. Had they known how things would go, they would have packed more food. But they’ve had to ration what little they managed to stash into their backpacks before fleeing the town Raine had sent them to, and now they have to face the consequences. “I’ll keep watch, wake you up in a few hours.”

The old boards of the parquet creak under his boots when he stands up but it almost feels like those are his bones, turned cold and brittle by the still young winter. It’s surely not that long, but the last time he’s laid down feels like it belongs to a past life. A split second before he takes the first step forward, toward one of the rifles they left in a corner of the room with their stuff, her fingers wrap around his wrist and he’s rooted to the spot.

“How long has it been since you slept?” She tugs his arm when she stands up, inhaling sharply when half of her weight comes to rest on the foot she sprained the day before. And even though she’s been trying to shrug it off – because that’s what she does: she clenches her jaw and moves forward, that’s how it’s always been and probably how it always will be – he knows it’s been bothering her every time they move.

And much like her, he shrugs his shoulders once, frees his hand from her gentle grasp, and moves to pick his rifle up. It’s always a comforting weight in his arms but as he peeks from the empty hole that had once been a window, the heavy clouds in the sky make it feel like some sick kind of doom.

“Don’t do this, Stiglitz. Don’t close me off again.”

He doesn’t turn around when he corrects her – Hugo, not Stiglitz.

You never let anyone call you that – that’s what the look in her eyes tells when he eventually turns around and finds her staring at him. He’s been with her long enough and after a while, you just start reading people. All the unspoken words are paint strokes on a face that’s better than an open book; on a face that’s more like a canvas.

“Hugo.” The smile that stretches her lips is the tired shadow of what he knows could fool Nazis before he stepped in, his weapon of choice in his hands. “You go to sleep. I’m fine, really. By the looks of it,” she continues, hinting at the sky with a movement of her head as she stretches her arm out for him to hand her the rifle, “no one will come: it’s going to start snowing soon.”

He wakes up to a snow-clad scenery outside the open window – and to snowflakes dancing in the chilly air a few meters from him, in that opening (one of many) nobody’s stuck around long enough to fix. The snowflakes flutter as they fall, and it almost looks like white flour. It’s been a while since he last saw flour with his own eyes and that’s what tears him from the cozy embrace of slumber and brings him back to reality.

The smoky tendrils of a past life still alive in his dreams are still caressing the edges of his mind, though, faint echoes that mix together into unintelligible whispers. They stuff him with cotton and he needs a few minutes to feel the hard floor underneath his back, the chilly air biting at his cheekbones and nose.

There’s enough light for it to be day already and as that realization dawns down on him, wrapped as he is in his cold blanket, he jolts up to sitting.

“No one came, I told you.”

His head turns to the side so quickly he gets whiplash.

“And it snowed all night.” Her eyes are sunken in, her eyelids heavy with missed sleep and the constant worries that are gnawing at her from the inside and from which he still hasn’t managed to distract her. Shoulders weighed down by an invisible weight, she looks smaller and less dangerous than she really is.

“You didn’t wake me up.” His voice is still drowsy; the words don’t roll as freely on his tongue, so the accusation comes out as a simple observation.

She smiles. I never said I would, the faint twinkle in her eyes seems to say. “We’re waiting one more day,” she decides as she comes to a stand, stiffened hands still holding onto the rifle she’s hugged to her chest like a child the whole night. “But tomorrow at dawn we’re leaving, I don’t care about Raine’s spy.”

Silence settles again between them when she sits down next to him, in the corner further away from the chilly winds outside. They share her last chocolate bar, something she’s clung on to ever since she won it at poker more than two weeks ago. He stares at her as she eats, her head resting against the wall and her eyes closed. There’s a tear trickling down her cheek and it takes the dust that has settled on her skin away.

“I think I might be falling in love with you.” His confession hangs in the air, in the closed space between them. And all he can do is stare as that tear slowly rolls down her cheekbone. He can’t even remember when the last time he ate chocolate was and now that he has a piece in his hands, he can’t even chew on it.

Her eyes open slowly and she looks at him almost from underneath her lashes, her head still tilted back and at an angle. For the first time, he can’t read them as they focus on him, bore right into him.

He’s a man of few words. He opens up, but only with the right people and only so much. And he knows she’s just the same – bad at opening up, but not at talking – she talks maybe too much at times and while it would annoy him if it were someone else, he’s alright with her babbling on and on. About the weather, about the next target, about how stupid people are, how hungry she is, but never about before. Who she was, what she did, where she lived, whom she loved – those are still well-guarded secrets, and Stiglitz is not one to pry.

“Don’t.” She swallows hard eventually, almost as though she’s trying to swallow down her voice – or his confession. “There’s a war out there.” Her eyes move to his right, to the blown-open window behind him on the opposite side of the room. “People are dying.” Her jaw clenches and as she swallows, he sees her struggle, her attempt at not crying. “If something happens…”

He sits in silence, eyes set on her as hers try to avoid him. They do their best but ‘their best’ doesn’t seem to cut it, not this time.

“We fuck, that’s it. Just… fuck, from time to time.” It’s a whisper and her lower lip quivers as his words still shake her bones. When did war stop being scary? When did love become something to fear? Neither of them knows. Was it the first time they killed? The first time they enjoyed it? The moment they understood they had to keep on doing it in order to survive?

When she turns to look at him, it’s a desperate animal the one sitting in front of him. Her eyes beg him to stop, to take it all back, because they both know where that if something happens is bound to end. And it’s not six feet under, but rather, somewhere up there, on the surface; face up or face down into the mud, it doesn’t really matter. Maybe that’s what brought her to murder, he reasons for a second; maybe she’s lost someone she loved and that turned her into a spy and a murderer that knows no mercy.

Her hand is trembling as it digs into the pocket of his jacket, the one where she keeps cigarettes – they’re usually for him, but she never turns down a smoke, either. He knows it’s empty, for they smoked their last one two days ago, a crumpled up cigarette that seemed to last less than a minute that day.

“I’ll check the perimeter,” he eventually says, laying the last of his chocolate bar in her hands. He doesn’t meet her eyes, doesn’t utter another word as he takes the revolver from his pallet and leaves the room.

Three days later they’re both back at the camp base – no resentment between them, just the usual, content silence of two people that don’t always need to talk to work just fine. But while everything seems normal on the surface and they both enjoy the welcome-back celebrations at the tavern, they’re both lost in their own thoughts.

Hugo has stopped thinking about the fact that maybe he made a mistake when he confessed his feelings to her. Because she was right – there is a war out there, and it’s not even that far away, no matter how distracting the passing of shots of alcohol might now be. He stopped being a sentimentalist years ago, but if there’s a conclusion he’s come to, it’s that it’s better to spend your last days next to the people you love than running away from them.

There’s a couple of occasions in which he almost told her that.

The first was when they found a working telephone. Clothes soaked by snow and weapons now heavier than their backpacks, they sat in that empty house for hours, after calling one of Raine’s safe numbers, some French family collaborating with the Allies on the other end of the line. He had fixed the makeshift splint keeping her ankle in place and had reasoned, for the first time, that she shouldn’t have come, not this time.

The second was when they got back and the nurse managed to take her in only after the debriefing. She had smiled a I’ll find you later as Wicki dragged him away and the first thought his mind could form had been that he was glad that she seemed to always be able to find him anywhere.

But even though they’re sitting right next to each other now, shoulder pressed against shoulder as everyone seems like they want to sit at the same table, he can’t turn around and shake her awake. Why would he, though?

“We thought we’d never see the two of you again!” Donowitz is tipsy already and he doesn’t seem to notice how his drink sloshes out of his glass every time he moves his arm to gesticulate as he speaks. “Fucking bastards! You have nine lives, just like cats!”

Wicki’s laughter seems to drown out the roaring of the celebrations when he laughs. “I told them you’d both come back on your legs, still breathing,” he chuckles in German.

Y/N joins Wilhelm’s burst of laughter and then turns to her left and smiles up at him. It’s a weird thing, it reaches her eyes more than it does her lips and she seems on the verge of saying something before she shakes her head once and finishes her beer.

It’s midnight when she knocks at his door. Her knocking seems to echo through the whole once-abandoned house the Basterds converted into a place to stay, at least temporarily, for everyone’s still out drinking the winter away.

“I didn’t mean to turn you down,” are the words that greet him when he opens the door. He’s still only half-dressed after the bath he’s finally managed to take. “Back in that house. I got scared at the idea of something that might not even happen and I’ve spent the past few days thinking about what a gigantic fool I’ve been when I said those things. You took me off-guard because I thought I’d never love again, but…” She breathes in sharply and looks up at him, stares right into his eyes for the first time as she realizes she’s been rambling again. “Can I come in?”

Hugo nods and takes a step to the side before closing the door behind her. “You don’t have to say anything. I understand.”

“Oh, you and Wicki have a heater.” It’s soft and he almost misses it, but it’s gone before he can reply and she’s already back on the topic she’s most likely come to discuss. “I don’t know what I feel for you.” She doesn’t turn around when she speaks. Instead, she holds her hands close to the stove and sighs under her breath before she squares her shoulders again. “But I would like to find out, when we win this war. A while after you left, Raine started talking about how we’re all going to America when we take out the High Command and I realized that I could leave all of them behind but I couldn’t leave you.”

“I never considered the idea of leaving before.” He moves to stand next to her and hangs the towel he’s used on one of the hangers above the heater. “But we could,” he nods, turning towards her.

She’s looking at him this time, tired eyes staring at him from an even more tired face. But before she can add anything, he pulls her in and kisses her. He’s always preferred actions over words – words can be misinterpreted, but some actions…

Her hands are trembling when they move over his hips and then up his back, over the scars ridging his skin. She’s one of the few who’ve seen them – he’s not ashamed of them, but he does feel weird at the idea of showing them to others. It felt natural with her, though, almost as though they weren’t even there to begin with, the first time they slept together fully naked. It just, happened, it fell into place like anything else about her. She just fits in his arms, to his side, and when he’s inside her, his hips grinding against hers as they both lose themselves into each other and forget for a few precious moments what their survival revolves around.

“How’s your foot?” he asks in between kisses when he picks her up to lay her down onto his bed.

“Foot’s fine, don’t worry about it,” she laughs, her tone getting louder when he just drops her onto the mattress. Her laughter dies down when he settles between her legs, props himself up above her, his nose barely brushing hers. She smiles as he observes her, swipes his gaze across her features and breathes her in.

He contemplates saying something, but whatever innocence he had left at the beginning of his story has been swept away with his words by the things he’s done. He only moves when she speaks again – Kiss me, Hugo. That he does; he leans down and presses his lips against hers for a moment before his tongue comes out to swipe along her lower lip.

Her knuckles brush against his chest every time her hands move as they unbutton her shirt, a too-big garment she’s been given by God knows who. By the time she’s reached the last button and his mouth has moved down along her jaw and her neck to kiss her chest, she’s panting lightly, her hands wrapped around his biceps as he smiles against her skin.

She’s warm and smooth, even though there are irregular scars marking her skin. Just like his, they never matter, and even less when they get into bed together. His fingers just caress her and she this close to him is the only thing that truly matters in this moment. He kisses her collarbones, nudges his nose against the side of a breast before he allows himself to close his eyes and take a nipple into his mouth.

He feels the moan more than he hears it, it vibrates deep into her chest and almost buzzes against his lips as her fingers rake upward through his short hair. There’s a breathy moan of his name before his kisses and licks move lower down.

“I know for sure that I’m falling in love with you.” He’s serious when he says it, fingers fumbling with the button and zipper of her pants. Then, as he drags them down her legs with her underwear, he smiles at her. Sometimes he thinks that he only remembers how to smile when she’s around, almost as though she’s always able to swap his grimace with an actual sign of happiness.

She smiles back at him – at his words, at how caringly he removes her left boot, almost as though his only priority is not to revive the dull pain in her ankle. And then at how he covers her body once again, at how he looks down at her with that unreadable expression of his that just makes her fall for him a bit more every time.

It’s not love – she doesn’t want to call it love, but it sure does make her feel all warm inside as it tugs at the corners of her mouth even now, with her fingertips lightly tracing the lines of his face. Forehead, cheekbones, jaws, and then his lips, and he smirks when she outlines them.

When she pushes him onto his back and she moves over him, straddles his thighs, it’s sudden and unexpected, but surely not unwelcome, and he lets her do. His hands move up her thighs and hold onto her hips, and her bare body above him somehow makes his heart swell with pride. A thought crosses his mind, but it lasts only for a fraction of second before she leans down and pecks his lips once, and then once more – yeah, he could do this all day every day, even in America, if it means staying by her side.

Her lips trail down the column of his throat, then, before moving to the crook of his neck. She kisses and suckles as she grinds down against him, and he doesn’t care if he’ll have marks tomorrow – he won’t, because they’re both careful, but one day he’s sure he will – and she will as well.

She says something then, something he doesn’t catch, before she takes his hands in hers and moves further down his body, leaves kisses all over his chest and belly. For a moment, they both giggle, and she looks up at him with those eyes of hers that just, make him forget about the war and the Basterds and anything in-between.

She’s quick at unbuttoning his pants, but not so much at taking them off his body. She takes her time, and the lower she pulls them, the more kisses she leaves on his navel and then thighs. It’s funny and sexy at the same time, and when he’s fully naked and she’s kneeling between his legs again, that’s truly all he craves for at the moment.

“Come here,” he says, but she shakes her head, a smirk tugging at her lips, and bends down towards him.

He’s hard in her hands and when her lips press a kiss to the underside of his dick, he groans in the back of his throat. The muscles in his thighs tense when she takes him in her mouth, and his exhale is shaky as he does his best not to move his hands over her head.

It’s slow and slippery as she focuses on the head of his dick – suckles and kisses and licks, before taking him deeper every now and then, her hand slowly working the rest of his erection. Hugo Stiglitz is rarely ever vocal in the bedroom, but when someone – when she – is going down on him…

“Fuck.” Quick and breathy, almost like a half-formed word, that ‘fuck’ leaves his lips when she moans around him.

His breath almost hitches in his throat when she pulls up and smiles at him while repositioning to straddle his thighs again. He’s still in her hand and no matter how hard he tries, he can’t bring himself to look away from that sight. It lasts less than he thinks it does, though, because before he has the time to move his hands over her hips again, she’s sinking down on him.

She’s warm, and wet, and when she rests her left hand on his chest to balance herself as she takes all of him into her, her hands are wet.

His hips thrust up at the mental picture of her fingering herself and as he does so, she almost loses her balance. They both giggle, but when he moves to sit up, she pushes him back down and grinds her hips against his.

“Stay down,” she whispers against his skin, lips brushing right next to his left nipple before she leaves a kiss there.

The rhythm she sets is slow and sensual, something neither of them is used to – or has been used to for a while, now. It’s a nice change compared to the usual, almost-too-quick routine that’s just hunger and desperate, desperate need. It’s good, and Hugo Stiglitz finds himself relaxing underneath her, for once, hands moving from her hips to her back when she presses herself down against him. His hips start thrusting up into her, and he does his utmost best to keep it just as slow, but the feel of her around him just drives him delirious.

Her lips latch onto his pulse point again and when she starts licking and sucking, he swears his temperature spikes up. His head leans back into the pillows, neck almost arching, and his thrusts get quicker and snappier the tighter he holds her against himself. Her breathing grows shorter and every time he thrusts up, he can hear as her moans get stuck in her throat.

It’s a while later that the door creaks open and Wicki slurs Stiglitz’s name in his drunken, post-celebratory state. Hugo hums in acknowledgment, but his eyes are closed and there’s still a smile on his lips.

“Hugo,” Y/N whispers against the side of his neck, still naked and still laying between his arms, one leg thrown over his hips as his own leg rests between hers.

He nods his head against hers, but she knows he’s already falling asleep. They went at it again as soon as he flipped their positions over, and she should have known better than to agree on spending the night.

She whispers his name again when Wicki starts fumbling over the words of a song she doesn’t recognize, too distorted by his drunkenness. “Please, Hugo, you know he can’t hold his liquor!”

“Y/N!” Wicki almost yells her name when he finally switches on the light and finds her in his friend’s bed. “‘S good to see you again.”

She’s quick at turning back around, pulling the blanket over herself to cover her body from the other man’s eyes. “Stiglitz, come on! You need to wake up. I can’t do this without you.” But when she tilts her head up on the pillow and her eyes land on Hugo and that faint smile of his still plastered to his lips, she knows there’s no way in hell he’s waking up again soon.

Feel free to leave feedback xo I hope Stiglitz wasn’t too OOC but the truth is, idgaf, I just had to write about the man of my dreams haha

Links: prompts by peaskyblonders https://peaskyblonders.tumblr.com/post/622451655662845952/random-prompt-list // photo used for the banner https://www.pexels.com/it-it/foto/albero-freddo-ghiacciato-innevato-909016/

TAGS (to be added to or to be removed from any list, shoot me an ASK)

Everything: @idhrenniel @saibh29 @fuckthatfeeling @aya-fay @pebblesz892 @mblaqgi @becs-bunker

#angelaiswriting #inglourious basterds #hugo stiglitz #hugo stiglitz imagine #hugo stiglitz fanfic #hugo stiglitz smut #hugo stiglitz x reader

132 notes · View notes

guigz1-coldwar · 3 years

Text

'Mind the Gap': New chapter for "Redemption in a Spirit in a Cold War" is out!

"Mind the Gap"

"Above all, Yiri, stay frosty!"

Chapter Summary: The time has come for Yirina, Park & the SAS to terminate the Perseus threat in London by launching an attack on their main hideout at Canary's Wharf but things can escalate quickly...

Link of the Picrew here!

To read it on AO3, click here!

Words : +3900

Taglist : @snowgoldwaylon , @clxudtea , @efingart

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

Stay frosty...seems like a new expression for me to say coming from Park and originated from the SAS, meaning to stay calm, and that before we got ourselves prepared for the mission at Canary's Wharf. I know that I shouldn't stress because I wasn't put on the same team as Park but I was stressing, there was Zasha with me along with their friends, Soap, Roach & Ghost but was it enough for me? I guess that I have to get along with it, I don't want to put myself into an argument with Park over her choices with Price, there was a Perseus hideout to raid.

Once that the preparation order was issued, I thought that we will have to do this without any equipment but thankfully, the team I was on took some better equipment for us than just our pistols: tactical vests, military outfit, gas mask...now looking like a true SAS soldier, and once that we were fully geared up and ready, it was time for us to leave Century House as the evening was falling on London, teams in their respective vans and the organization were pretty clear and well for my opinion.

Instead of two teams, there was a third one that goes with Park & Price one. This team was mainly composed of snipers but Zasha wasn't in it, staying with me instead and it was Portnova who put herself in it. I think that she did this to not let herself be captured if the mission goes wrong but it wasn't the moment to think about a mission going wrong...let's just hope that it wasn't going to happen...we're going to make this done and terminate that Perseus threat in London and soon...for good. Bellamy Petrov, Ingo Beck, Lukas Ritter & Harry Stone are our targets tonight, their capture is primordial but I don't think they will go down easily...

We arrived at Canary's Wharf at the beginning of the evening where Soap was the one driving the van before he parked it inside a hidden alley that was by luck just separating us by a grilled fence from the construction site and now, we were waiting for the right moment and until the signal to start the operation was given by Price, the leader of that operation with Park.

"Anyone's ready?" I decided to ask that question to everyone as I was checking up my watch at my wrist, the MP5 I was given on my lap.

"Yes, ma'am," Soap was the first one to reply to me, turning his head at me through the middle mirror of the van as the driving part and the transport bay weren't separated.

"All clear," Roach spoke with a low voice, giving me a nod as he was sit in front of me, his hands around the rifle that was an 'EM2' at what he said to us during the preparation time.

"Good to go," Ghost said with his muffled voice behind his skull-patterned balaclava, the same rifle as Roach between his legs. "Wallcroft, Griffin, good on your side?" He asked the two guys near him.

"I'm okay," It was Wallcroft, having a gas mask covering his face while his friend Griffin nodded at Ghost.

"I'm ready, Yirina," Zasha then told me in a more personal way as they were at my side, checking up the MP5 they were given to by the others, a gas mask on the crown of their head. "Between us, those uniforms are feeling great," They whispered at me discreetly, both of us dressed like SAS soldiers.

"I know, those are very cool," I exclaimed with a relaxed voice, looking at the blue sleeves of the jacket I was using, having let my former jacket back at our office in Century House, and the gloves, covering my both hands and that burn mark on my left hand. "Very cool," I repeated in a lower voice.

"What's very cool?" Ghost caught me saying that despite my lower voice, his head looking in my direction and unable to see his eyes hidden behind some dark red sunglasses.

"The outfits," Zasha answered at my place, not even letting me open up my lips to talk. "Didn't know that you guys are having good outfits," They explained.

"Yeah but we're getting hot with them sometimes," Soap declared, turning fully around on his seat to have a better look at us. "And...wait, why are you guys talking about our outfits? You want to join up the SAS?" He asked in a funny tone, a smile along with it.

"No, not at all," I commented, trying to not offend the guys to talk about it. "We were just saying that the uniforms that you're using are like...very good to look at," I revealed, having now everyone's look except Zasha on me. "It's been some time that I didn't get into something like that...and...it didn't end well," I added, my voice going down at the end of my sentence.

"Didn't end well?" I thought that no one will hear my remark but in fact, it was the farthest soldier from me that did hear me, it was this Griffin.

"Bad things, very bad things," I decided to tell it anyway but as I thought at first that I will have to explain myself about it, the sound of a radio buzzing in interrupted me to say more.

"Soap, do you copy?" That's the first thing we heard from the radio that was Soap's radio on his vest making noises. "Soap, do you copy?" The voice repeated, it was Price.

"Yes, sir, we're listening," Soap spoke up, his left hand over his radio as everyone stayed silent to hear perfectly, not any noises was made.

"Charlie team is in their position overlooking the site, you are clear to go," Price announced in a clear voice, launching the beginning of the operation. "We're waiting for you to enter the place," He added before the radio went off for the moment.

"Okay, everyone's ready?" I asked again and this time, everyone prefer to nod at me, checking in their moves everything on them: radio, smoke grenades, and our guns.

"Let's do this," Ghost exclaimed, taking his EM2 in his hands before Griffin opened up the back doors of the van, giving already on the grilled fence, him & Wallcroft going out first before we followed them behind, the rain that has been falling on the city since we left the MI6's building.

The fence was separating us from another alley that was small but having a perfect back entrance for us, me knowing a little bit of the site layout's but at least knowing it well. As I was the leader, I needed to be the one to take the lead but Soap who was the highest-ranked member of the SAS in the group proposed to help me in case during the drive to get here and I gladly accepted, me having trouble to find myself to lead a group of armed soldiers...

Our first step was to climb up that fence, going into a group of two while the others were looking at the surroundings to make sure that we weren't going to be jumped by Perseus in case. I did go with Zasha where I advised them to stay with me, no matter what will happen, that mission was dangerous and I needed to be there with them, not wanting to have them get hurt or worse...killed...no, Yirina, don't think about it...just...don't!

We passed the fence as Wallcroft and Griffin were the last to do it after Ghost & Roach, and then, we could proceed on the mission, me taking the lead towards the door that we're going to get us inside, Soap staying near me with Zasha behind me, followed by Ghost, Roach, Wallcroft & Griffin. I then opened the door discreetly, my silenced MP5 pointing in front of me inside my right hand and the door was opened, I could hear the sound of a TV, some people dressed up like Perseus's agent sat on a sofa, looking at it.

"Take them out," I ordered silently to Soap, aiming my MP5 towards one of the guy's heads, and in two seconds, I pulled out the trigger, hitting the man I was aiming in the back of his head, Soap following in a second to shoot a burst to the two other guys that were still alive, not letting them any seconds to react. "Nice shot," I complimented.

"Thanks," He simply said in a discreet voice as we got inside deeper the room, discovering that we were in the room at the back of the warehouse, seeing some lockers on the walls but we know that now, Perseus' agent was hiding here by looking at the guys that I & Soap killed. "We should get closer to the site," Soap suggested as we arrived near the door that was going to take us in the loading part of the warehouse.

"Sure," I agreed, trying to think of a plan to stay discreet in case there were people to greet us in that part of the warehouse. "Let's get in, prepare yourself in case," I warned everyone, my left hand going on the door handle, taking a deep breath before I open it.

I slowly get the door open, my MP5 in my right hand, ready to act as if a bullet was the first thing I could hear in here but instead, this was the big silence except for the rain falling on the rusty roof when my feet hit the floor inside the loading bay, this part of the warehouse looking more desert than the room at the back and not used at all, that was an advantage for us for the moment. My eyes looked around the place, seeing some stairs going up to some windows that could give us a viewpoint over the site.

"Ghost, Wallcroft, Roach, Griffin, you're staying down near the garage doors," I pointed out at the semi-opened doors at our level before I turned around, seeing Ghost nodding. "Zasha, Soap, follow me to the bridge," I ordered, gesturing at me to follow me to the squeaky metal stairs, prompting us to walk discreetly on it and the metal bridge before we reach the windows.

"Shit, that's looking more protected than I thought," Zasha exclaimed in a surprised voice, seeing through the windows the construction site...and its unusual armed workers, a part of it protecting the place while a little part of the others were loading things some white truck. "Wait, what are you loading?" They demanded.

"Let me see," Soap said, taking out some binoculars from his vest to look at the scene, seeing some hooded men putting some crates inside a truck. "Explosives, guns and..." He started before his voice went shut as if something caught his attention. "Shit, that's Stone, right here," He revealed in a shocked voice, making me take his binoculars as he was giving them to me.

"Fuck...that's him," I muttered, seeing the man supervising the loading before I could perceive next to him a man with a black leather jacket and some glasses as I could see. "Could it be this Beck?" I tried to guess but no one respond. "Take it back, I'm bringing the news," I handed back the binoculars to Soap before taking my radio in my hands. "Park, do you copy?" I started.

"I hear you, Yirina," Park's voice right now was like relieving me to hear it even in that situation. "What's the situation?" She asked.

"We got a view on the site, protected as we thought..." I started, my eyes focusing on the white truck with Stone near it. "Stone is here, should we proceed?" I demanded in a clear voice, not having any response in the few seconds that follow.

"Do it, Portnova's team is ready to act up," She replied, making her voice fully audible for me & the two.

"They're closing the door of the truck, it's looking ready to leave," Soap remarked as the truck's lights goes on, starting its loud engine that we could hear from our position.

"We can't let it go away, it will be too risky to chase it down in London," Zasha suggested and they were right, we were busy here and we couldn't separate the teams to chase a Perseus truck.

"Park, a truck is going to leave soon, your team should act now at the main entrance, it can't leave the site" I proposed, my voice sounding high to make sure that it was important to not let it go.

"Understood," She said before the radio went off, leaving us to get ourselves ready for the action.

"Okay, okay, okay," I breathed, taking some quick breaths before I look at Zasha & Soap. "On my mark, we blitz them," I got myself ready, aiming my MP5 through one of the broken parts of the window, and then, once the truck passed through our position, it was time. "Open fire!" I yelled at the highest I could do, hearing in the two-second, the garage doors below us getting fully opened and me, starting to pull the trigger...

I could see that our presence was a total surprise for the Perseus' agents, opening fire at them from the warehouse and killing in the first set of bullets from us, more than 8 guys as the truck that was going to left the site at full speed was suddenly greeted by a car getting in front of it, seeing some SAS soldiers on it blast their guns on the occupants of the truck as some of them were going out to enter the site but as we thought, resistance has to be made...

Once the first SAS soldiers from Park & Price team got inside that the first bullets coming from Perseus arrived, starting the real fight here, more soldiers of them coming out of another building on the other side of the place while few of them were coming from the underground access that was at our view from the warehouse.

"We should get out, the other team needs us," I suggested to Zasha & Soap as the three of us stayed on the metal bridge to provide some cover for the other team. "Come on," I then got up from my spot to start running, getting down the stairs to join the others, still in cover behind the walls near the garage doors.

"Time to bring up the fight," That was Ghost scoffing when he saw me arrive at high speed at his spot, the garage doors already fully opened to let us out and that what we did, me being the first one to get out, blasting some bullets towards two soldiers that were trying to run towards the entrance to stop the other team.

"Changing mags," Roach said as he step out of his cover to join another one outside, reloading his gun in a fast move that I could do before resuming fire.

"Shit, they're not joking," Soap complained, trying to peek his head out of the cover I was with him...some sort of concrete block but he quickly resigned to do it, some bullets flying over his head. "Not joking," He added, reloading his gun.

"Hey, hey, hey!" I suddenly heard Ghost's voice almost yelling, pointing towards a direction, to the underground access. "Stone is trying to leave with his buddies inside the Tube," He exclaimed, making me peek my head to the side of the cover, able to see Stone from afar, back turned against us, along with some people near him.

"We can't let him escape now," I reminded them before I took one of the smoke grenades off my vest to throw it on the main road of the site. "Follow me," I ordered to the others in the case before I start to run towards a little side path with a big container as a cover for us while I was providing support to the others that were joining in me as the smoke that I threw was going away.

"Hey, isn't that a train?" Roach said as his head was looking at the underground access, getting my attention as I saw a train stopped near the underground entrance. "Wait...shit, they're going to use a train to escape!" He yelled, everyone quickly realizing that we could have a bitter victory if Stone & co goes away.

"Fuck," I cursed, trying to find something until I saw a white pick-up parked in the direction of the underground entrance, big enough to let a pick-up or even a truck in. "I've got something," I started, turning around to the others. "Zasha, Roach, Griffin, you stay with me, we're stopping that train,"

"And us?" Soap demanded in a serious & curious voice, staying in cover.

"Help Park & Price's team to get inside, we'll come back with the others," I responded with all the seriousness I could bring.

"But..."

"There's no but, Soap, I'm serious," I cut him straight, knowing that he was going to protest against my order. "We need to stop Stone and the others but we also need to make sure that no one in here escape, me & the ones I said are going to stop that goddamn train," I continued, trying to not make me angry against him. "Do it now, I'm not allowing this to happen," I exclaimed before I looked up to Zasha.

"I'm good with that," They said, giving me a nod, same for Roach & Griffin.

"Good, so let's do this," I took a deep breath just seconds before we saw the train starting slowly to get away from us. "GO!" I shouted, making the four of us run towards the white pick-up we see earlier. "Griffin, you're driving, Roach & Zasha with me," I directed as I was climbing inside the back of the pick-up, waiting for the others.

"Buckle up, here we go!" Griffin stated as he was getting inside, Zasha & Roach were already near me starting the pick-up engine and drove away to enter the tunnel.

I was now finding myself on the back of a pick-up with Zasha & Roach while Griffin was driving it and pursuing a tube train that was going west of Canary's Wharf just behind it as we were trying to find a way to stop the train, our guns getting soon low on bullets as I was having only two mags remaining...that train needs to be stopped right now, no escape was allowed for Stone, not again...

"That train is on its way to Westminster, we have to stop it," Roach spoke, getting his voice higher because of the speed and the noises of the train in front of us. "Get down," He shouted when we saw an armed guy at the back of the train, trying to shoot at us. "Griffin, get us away from that guy,"

"Or shoot at him instead," Griffin suggested in a rather complaining voice, surely focused to drive while under fire and pursue a tube train.

"On it," Zasha said before they aimed in a second their MP5 towards the guy that was shooting at us and in a few bullets, despite the whole situation, they managed to hit the man perfectly, "He's down,"

"Yeah...but that train is still going away," Roach complained.

"We need to get to the first wagon and shoot the driver, that's our only chance," I told them, moving my head to get next to Griffin, his head looking in front of him. "You heard me? Try to get us near the leading wagon," I explained in a loud but clear voice to him.

"On it, ma'am," He replied with a nod before he got the speed of the pick-up faster, reaching the last wagon before he decided to get on the other tracks, the only way for us to get a clear shot on the driver and only a minute after we told him that, he was already reaching the left side of the first wagon but we didn't see Stone or any of his friends along the way, maybe there were hiding from us for the moment...

"I'm on it, let me do it," Zasha proposed themselves to shoot at the driver, having him at the sight of their MP5 but then...

"Fuck, I'm hit!" We heard Griffin shout in pain from his spot before the pick-up changed its path to go hit the first wagon at full-speed.

"Oh fuck, it's going to crash," Zasha said in a scared voice before the front of the pick-up hit the middle of the first wagon, hearing the first signs of something bad that will happen but then...it's all go black for me when the pick-up move on its side...

It was all black but my ears were still able to hear...and what I hear was the sounds of the pick-up crashing along with the train, louder but hearing Zasha & Roach's screaming at the same time terrified me at my highest point, sending the biggest scare I could have at the moment, did my decisions...killed them...no...please...I don't want to think about that...I just need to...open my eyes...and save them...

It took me a few moments before my eyes finally opened up again, finding myself with my chest against the ground and feeling a big pain inside of it, a taste of blood in my mouth before my head look up, seeing at a few meters from me, Zasha, back on the ground with behind them, the train that was completely crashed, flames taking over the wreck as a silence of death were taking over the accident.

I tried to get up to reach Zasha, impossible for me to see Griffin or Roach around me but the pain inside my chest avoided me to get up, causing me to reach Zasha on my fours, my breath going louder at each step I was making to get to them, fearing the worst...

"My head...fuck..." I heard them in a low tone, their left hand moving to get to the side of the head. "Yi-Yirina...where..." They tried to say as I arrive near them, having no blood on their clothes except on their face, some cuts, and bruises on it.

"It's okay, Zed, we..." I was going to say entirely before I suddenly got my shoulder grabbed behind me, throwing me away from Zasha and finding myself back at my spot I was when I got my eyes back before I got my head up..."Stone..." I muttered, his name going through my teeth as I saw him stand between me & Zasha in the same clothes I always saw him in pictures, a green hood over his head.

"Wrong answer, Grigoriev," I was surprised when...I heard him talk...it...it wasn't Stone but a woman...a woman that was dressing up in Stone's clothes...a familiar voice but I couldn't react that I suddenly felt something hitting me at the right side of my neck...

"No...not...again," I whispered, realizing that there was someone behind me that got something at my neck...not again...I couldn't resist that I fall on my knees, looking in front of me at 'Stone', hands getting on the mask and taking it off, revealing..."Sarah?" My eyes went wide at seeing her...the woman that was in Zasha's team...standing in front of me...

"Surprise, shithead," She scoffed before she landed to me right a punch to the left side of my face, causing me to get back on the ground, their thing taking effect as my mind was slowly drifting into sleeping and feeling myself getting dragged away...

"Let's get out of here, we got what we came for...Krypto...and Bell!"

#cod bocw #cod cold war #cod black ops cold war #cod cw #call of duty cold war #cod #call of duty #cod bell #black ops cold war #fem!bell #yirina grigoriev #helen park #soap mactavish #simon ghost riley #bell x park

2 notes · View notes

allthefilmsiveseenforfree · 4 years

Text

What Lies Beneath

So my wife is incredibly supportive of my movie-watching goals. She helped me set up my blog and my Patreon, she was my very first patron, and she watches at least half the movies with me. As my patron, she has the right to request one movie per calendar year for me to review just for her. But sometimes she tries to skirt the rules by insinuating, nay, cajoling nonstop in her goal for me to watch a movie she wants me to see without it counting as her “official” selection. And because I love her, I (sometimes) allow it. Such was the case with What Lies Beneath, a twisty psychological haunted house thriller that stars two middle-aged, serious actors (Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer), and that I shockingly wasn’t lining up at the megaplex for when I was 13. What did my preteen self miss? Well...

A fucking GREAT movie is what I missed. I won’t sugarcoat it - this was a huge surprise in the best way. I won’t spoil the ending at all, because this is one film I think you really need to watch unfold for the first time without knowing exactly what’s going on. Basically, Claire and Norman Spencer are new empty-nesters, and in their gorgeous Vermont home all to themselves, strange things start happening. Is it something to do with the mysterious new neighbors? Or maybe some past traumas that are dug up over the course of the movie? Could their house be actually haunted by some malevolent spirit? All of these are distinct, and delicious, possibilities, and it’s a hell of a lot of fun figuring out what exactly is going on.

Some thoughts:

A VERY GOOD DOG at the very beginning! I was so concerned for the dog at a few points in the film, but the dog (Cooper) is absolutely fine and remains happy and carefree all the way to the end of the film.

I have always had a thing for Harrison Ford, and that is not diminishing at all as I watch him shirtless in bed while writing a paper about science. Unf.

Very into the way this exposition is handled - Claire (Pfeiffer) missing her daughter and finding the Julliard tank top in her dresser, then looking through photo albums where we see the daughter wearing it, then see Claire studying at Julliard, then see HER wearing the tank top, plus some articles about Norman’s father dying and photos from a car accident in which I think her first husband died. It’s all tiny pieces of exposition, just little bits of information that you, the viewer, have to put together and remember, and I love that.

Don’t love Norman (Ford) gaslighting her about what to do about the neighbors. If you mind your own business and never reach out when people sound like they need help, that’s how people get hurt. Makes me think he has something to hide or maybe some kind of connection to the neighbors?

Loving the Rear Window vibes of spying on the neighbors, thinking you’ve witnessed a murder, complete with binocular surveillance.

There’s a lot of wind in this movie. Wind is basically like another character.

The layering of dialogue - Norman and his friend are talking about a colleague who got fired for stalking an intern, and Claire and her old friend are catching up. The two conversations are overlapping, and I think they’re both important but we’re so wrapped up in Claire and her friend that that stalking conversation gets buried. This is really well-thought-out character development and building of backstory and motivation. I haven’t watched a movie this skillfully thought out in quite awhile.

I hate the way Norman diminishes her. Like he’s charming and he’s Harrison Ford, but he kind of implies that she’s hysterical or silly for the things she’s been experiencing, and laughs at her expense.

She didn’t say goodbye after playing with the Ouija board. ROOKIE MISTAKE, everything that happens afterward is clearly a result of poor Ouija etiquette.

Oh interesting, so she was in a terrible car accident a year ago, which is part of why everyone is worried about her mental state and fragility. We don’t discover this until HALFWAY THROUGH THE FILM. This is storytelling like prestige television does it, and it’s so unusual to see in a film now that it keeps bowling me over.

Their water bill is gonna be sky high after this. These completely full tubs? The rates are astronomical.

Oh no things have escalated so quickly - I feel like I’m trying to outsmart the twist at every turn and I can’t quite grasp it, which is good because I actually think this is an incredibly plotted movie that’s so purposefully and carefully crafted. I can’t help but feel that we are missing so much now, because we just don’t get mid-level budget domestic dramas with A-list actors like this anymore. I think their era might have completely passed, and that’s a damn shame because the nuance and care here makes this such a delightful and surprising ride to take.

A huge part of that is Ford and Pfeiffer just absolutely nailing how they play every single scene. Their chemistry is great, and watching them play off each other, you can sense all the layers of their relationship, all the past traumas and the lies and the reconciliations.

He says “I know you’re going through something I don’t understand and I’ve tried to be there for you” but like...have you, Norman? You’re always working, you shut her down every time she wants to talk.

The brilliance here is that you don’t know if something supernatural is actually going on or if there’s a rational explanation, and I’m so here for the ambiguity. We simply don’t get enough ambiguity (that’s purposeful) in mainstream Hollywood films anymore. It’s all in the indies, which are great, don’t get me wrong! But I want more audiences to see how it could be done.

I know I just keep going on about it but every new scene reveals a detail that feeds into the overarching mystery in such a natural way. For example, this NICE callback to the key, which I had totally forgotten about. This honestly is a fantastic slow burn of a film, really well done.

I’m so enjoying Harrison Ford using his charm and his looks and his general Harrison Ford-ness to play a not very nice guy. He’s not a lovable rogue like Han Solo or a stubborn adventurer with a heart of gold like Indiana Jones, he’s just a guy who thinks he deserves to have what he wants at any cost. He’s worked hard, he’s a “good guy” and he thinks that he’s entitled to have things go his way just because.

Holy shit the symmetry with the first scene of the film to the big climax - that’s just some damn good writing, that is.

I’m so pleased that there’s no music at all during this final sequence - the score had been a bit overbearing at times, but this eerie silence with just the water running is, frankly, terrifying.

One slight critique - the movie has almost as many endings as Lord of the Rings. You think it’s done, and then there’s another whole section that you think is gonna be the last, and then everything’s underwater again and it’s STILL NOT DONE. But in a good way, I didn’t get nearly as pissed as I do at the end of LOTR.

Holy fucking shit, Clark Gregg wrote this?????? Agent Coulson Clark Gregg?? This is my absolute favorite bit of movie trivia I’ve learned all year.

Did I Cry? No.

I am never going to stop talking about this movie. Wife was right, and I will say it loudly and publicly - I am so glad she cajoled me into watching this film. If you haven’t seen it, watch it immediately. It’s smart, it’s well-paced, it keeps you guessing, and it boils over into an absolutely bonkers climax in the best way. I will be thinking about this for aaaages and missing the way movies outside of the “Disney/Pixar/Marvel vs. teeny independent Spirit Award winner” machine used to get made.

If you liked this review, please consider reblogging or subscribing to my Patreon! For as low as $1, you can access bonus content and movie reviews, or even request that I review any movie of your choice.

#121in2021 #what lies beneath #what lies beneath review #harrison ford #michelle pfeiffer #clark gregg #movie reviews #film reviews

13 notes · View notes

thewalkingdead-fan101 · 4 years

Text

In This Hell Daryl Dixon x Reader part 8/??

Hey guys! I’m so excited to post part 8! I’m sorry about such a large gap in between parts, I'm currently trying to figure out a schedule for posting parts. I hope you're all safe and well. Thank you for being patient and so lovely!

Warnings- Slow burn, Light smut?, General Walking Dead stuff, Blood, Gore, Swearing, Shane being sus.

The drive home seemed shorter than the drive there, passing the familiar mailboxes and other run down buildings.

The minute we arrived back, Shane left to speak with Rick, furthering their search for Sophia.

I started grabbing the Medical supplies that we had found scattered throughout the houses and took them into the farm house.

I knocked on the wooden doorframe, waiting for someone to answer, Patricia’s head popping around the corner.

“Good morning (Y/n).” “Morning, I just thought that since we’re all low on supplies that I would bring you some stuff. Shane and I went out this morning and came across all of this medical stuff, even found a full first aid kit.” I chuckled as she opened the door, stepping aside for me.

“Oh thank you, just sit it all on the dining table.” She smiled, grabbing one of the bags from me, leading the way through the house into the dining room.

“Did you guys find much?” “We found some things, a bunch of medical stuff as you can see, some food, which is in that green bad, and some gardening stuff that ill take out to the barn now.” I smiled.

“No!” She paused, my head turning to look at her. She cleared her throat before continuing.

“Don’t take them to the barn.”

I opened my mouth to speak, but not before she cut me off again.

“It’s too far from the house, not to mention the barn needs some repairs. I’d feel absolutely horrible if I let you go up there and get hurt. We have a little garden shed out back I can put them in.” She stated, walking with me to the car, grabbing the equipment out, briefly making eye contact and sharing a soft smile.

“Are you sure? I honestly don’t mind.”

“I’m sure, now it’s best if you go sit down for a bit.”

“Pat-“

“Go on, get away.” She swatted softly.

I shook my head as I backed away.

“It’s hardly fair that you guys do everything around here.” I try to argue.

“If you doing nothing around here protects gods little miracle, I do not mind. Now, go sit down and relax for a couple of hours.” She gave me a warning glare that had reminded me of my 5th grade teacher Ms. Gabel.

“Yes Ma’am.” I nodded, turning away from her and made my way towards the RV.

As the majority of the group were discussing the upcoming gun practice at the rear of the RV, I noticed Carl and Shane talking.

Shane looked Carl up and down, as if questioning him, and nodded his head.

I noticed the small movement and my breath stopped.

He had slightly raised his shirt, Shane’s eyes doubling in size.

And that’s when it hit me.

This is a new world we live in.

A world in which to survive we have to fight.

Fight for yourself, your friends, your family, your people.

Shane barely even blinked.

I picked up speed, my legs carrying me as fast as they could to the RV.

“Give me that now.” Shane firmly stated.

Once the gun was handed to Shane, he stormed off to the others, no doubt taking it to Rick.

Carl stood, staring at the ground.

“Hey, Carl..” I spoke softly, placing my hand on his shoulder.

“Let’s sit down, you can talk to me.”

He nodded his head as he walked with me to where the camping chairs were set out.

I took the seat next to him, slightly turning to face him. “What was that about?” “What?” “Carl.. why did you have a gun.” “I just wanted to help..” “I understand, but guns are dangerous.. You shouldn’t have had it.” “I know.” “You do know that your parents are going to flip?.”

He nodded his head and resumed staring at the dirt beneath his feet.

I looked up to see Shane, Dale and Rick staring at Carl, making their way to the boy.

“(Y/n), can you get Lori for me? We need to speak to Carl.” Rick asked, nodding in my direction.

“Yeah.. of course.” I nodded, turning and starting the search for Lori.

The first place I had checked, the fire pit where she and Glenn were earlier showed no results.

I made my way to where the chicken coop was, to be met with the clucking of the hens, but again no Lori.

I checked her tent, to see her sitting on the mattress, head in her hands.

“Hey.” I spoke, moving the door to the side.

“Oh, Hey Honey.” She smiled. “Are you okay?” “Yeah, Im fine, just a little tired. Whats up?”

“It’s Carl.”

She stood quickly, worry present in her eyes.

“What? What’s wrong? Where is my boy?”

“He is okay, he isn’t hurt.. Rick asked me to come get you..” “What? Rick asked you to get me? Whats going on?” “Carl had a gun.”

Her eyes widened, her left hand going to her mouth.

“Oh God… im going to be sick.” She shook her head

She paused briefly.

“Where are they?”

“”They’re at the RV.”

“Let’s go.” She stated, grabbing my wrist and dragging me behind her.

She cleared the distance between the tents and the RV in no time.

Letting my wrist go when she got within earshot of everyone, walking straight over to Carl, taking the gun from Shane and showing it to Carl.

“Where did you get this?” She asked sternly as she kneeled in front of the boy.

She waited for an answer.

“Carl Grimes. You answer me.”

She stood up, turning to us.

“How the hell did this happen?” She asked, tucking the gun into the back of her jeans.

“Well, It's my fault.” Dale began, slightly pausing as Lori’s attention snapped to the older man.

“I let him into the RV. He said he wanted a walkie, that you sent him for one.” Dale continued.

“So on top of everything else, he lied.” She began.

“What was he thinking?”

“He wants to learn how to shoot. He asked me to teach him.” Shane started, earning an ice filled glare from Lori.

“Now It's none of my business, but I'm happy to do it. It's your call.” He nodded, sensing the tension.

“I'm not comfortable with it.” Lori looked towards Rick, who tried to avert his gaze.

“Oh, don't make me out to be the unreasonable one here. Rick?”

“I know. I have my concerns too, but-“

“There's no but. He was just shot. He's just back on his feet and he wants a gun?”

“Better than him being afraid of 'em. There are guns in camp for a reason. He should learn to handle them safely.” Rick responded to his wife’s worries.

“I don't want my kid walking around with a gun.” She shook her head.

“But how can you defend that? You can't let him go around without protection.”

“He is as safe as he'll ever be right now.” She started.

“Look, everything you're saying makes perfect sense. It feels wrong. I mean I didn't feel good about him following you out into the woods. And I wish I'd said something. I should've gone with my gut.” She argued.

“He's growing up, thank god. We've got to start treating him more like an adult.” Rick tried to reason.

“Then he needs to act like one. He's not mature enough to handle a gun.”

“I'm not gonna play with it, mom. It's not a toy. I'm sorry I disappointed you, but I want to look for Sophia and I want to defend our camp. I can't do that without a gun.” Carl stood and walked toward us.

“Shane's the best instructor I know. I've seen him teach kids younger than Carl.”

“He will be with Shane. He loves that boy and wouldn’t let him get hurt.”

Lori looked at me and I could tell that even though the thought of Carl having this gun terrifies her, but him not having one in this world terrifies her even more.

She waited a few moments and walked to Carl, resting her hand under his chin, making him look up at her.

“You will take this seriously and you will behave responsibly. And if I hear from anyone in this camp that you're not living up to our expectations-“

“He won't let you down.” Rick stated clearly behind her.

Carl nodded at Rick and answered with a “yeah.”

The sound of the old blue truck pulled up next to us, Beth, Patricia and Jimmy all inside.

“Now if you're gonna do this, you listen to Shane.”

“Okay, dad.”

“All right? You two be careful.” Rick pointed at Shane and Carl.

“You coming?” Shane asked Glenn.

Glenn shook his head.

“I gotta help Dale clean the spark plugs on the RV. He said he's gonna teach me mechanics. I should probably go look for him.”

“You found me.” Dale called out from two metres behind him, startling Glenn.

Shane nodded and got in the car, starting it.

“He's a good learner.” Dale called out.

I moved towards the car, getting in with Shane, watching as Lori, Rick, Carol, Carl and Andrea piled into the Cherokee.

T-dog jumping in wi†h Shane and I, as we made our way to a neighbouring farm’s paddock, distancing the gunshots from the Greene farm.

The sound of breaking glass, and the metallic ricochet of bullets hitting the tins and bottles that were sitting in a perfect row on the boundary fence line.

The loud echoes of the gunshots leaving my ears ringing, the slight scent of gunpowder present in the air.

Rick and Shane pacing behind us all, ensuring that we were all practicing gun safety.

T-dog, partnered with Jimmy, who needs as much help as he can get.

Jimmy was holding his gun as if he had just come from a bad adaption of a 90’s gangsta movie.

“Hey, come on, man. Don't give me that gangsta shit.” T-dog stated.

Jimmy, stood up, straightening his posture, moving his free hand to help support the gun, shooting and finally hitting his target.

His face lighting up as if he had just won an award, a participation award, but an award none the less.

Shane gave him a pat on the back as he passed him.

“Did you see that? I hit it!” He exclaimed turning to T.

I watched as my brother zoned in on Andrea, stopping next to her and looking to where she was shooting, through his binoculars.

Helping her change her posture before letting her shoot again, which she hit the target perfectly.

Shane and Rick shared a laugh, and some small talk before continuing the pacing.

Lori was planted a metre behind Carl, watching him shoot, hitting the tin off the fence.

“Got it.” Carl smiled widely.

“That's a great shot!” Rick smiled back at him.

I look over to where Beth was aiming at her target, slightly missing it.

“Hey.” “Oh hey.” “Would you like some help?” “Um, I think im not doing it right.” “Oh, no, it’s fine, here.”

I moved to where she was and helped position her arms.

“Dont be scared, of the gun. You’re in control.” I paused.

“Just breathe, take your time. There’s nothing to be nervous about.”

She visibly relaxed and pulled the trigger, the glass bottle exploding.

I looked over to see her eyes closed.

“Beth. You did it. You hit the bottle.” “What? I did?” She asked opening her eyes and looking to where the bottle once sat.

“I hit it! I actually hit it!” She beamed.

“Thank you!” She jumped on me, hugging me tightly.

“You’re welcome.” I laughed.

“What about you (Y/n)? You a good shot?” Rick asked.

“I was once.” I nodded.

“She had the best teacher.” Shane smiled.

“Yeah. Grandma.” I jeered.

“Oh really? Mind showing us?” Lori laughed. “No-“ “She wasn’t the strongest shooter, she probably forgot.” Shane shook his head laughing.

I grabbed the gun from Shane’s holster and shot three targets in a row, the sound of shattering glass echoing beyond the gun.

“Where’d that come from?” Shane asked as I handed him the gun back. “I told you. Grandma.” I smiled as Lori held in a small chuckle.

“Yeah, Yeah. Let’s go then.” Shane shook his head.

“Sure showed him.” Lori chuckled.

“Shane needs to be put in his place. I never had a strong shooting arm when I was a kid. Shane never tried to teach me after he realised. Grandma took it upon herself to teach me. Always said that a woman should always know how to defend herself.” “Well, your grandma was a smart woman.” Rick smiled, leading his wife and son to the car.

Everyone following in pursuit, getting into the same vehicles that had transported them from the Greene farm.

I got in the car, and looked at Shane.

“Is there any other things that Grandma showed you?”

“The secret recipe of her butternut squash pie.”

“Is that all?” He laughed.

“Yeah.. yeah I think thats pretty much it.”

“That pie sounds good right about now.” T-dog chuckled.

“Maybe Hershel might let me commandeer the kitchen.”

Shane had pulled the car over.

T-dog, jumping straight out in search for Dale and Glenn.

“Get out.” “What?” “Get out. Andrea and I are going for some more target practice.” “Oh is that what we’re calling it now? Target practice?” “Shut it. Now get out.”

“Alright. But please please please make sure that you wrap it before you tap it.” “(Y/n)-“

“No glove, no love.” “Seriously-“

“Plug your funnel then enter the tunnel.” “What does that one even mean?”

“If im being honest I don’t even know. But It’s on the same line as the others.”

“Seriously get out now.”

“Alright, alright. Calm down.” I raised my hands and opened the door, sliding out and closing it, putting my head through the open window. “Shane.” “What?”

“Love is cleaner with a packaged Weiner.” I laughed.

“Goodbye.” He muttered through his teeth.

I took a step back from the car, watching as he moved to where Andrea was waiting, letting her hop in and then taking off down the dirt road towards the gate again.

I laughed to myself as I made my way towards the RV and the others.

“Whats so funny?” Carol asked smiling.

“Nothing, just thought of a joke. Do you need a hand?” I chuckled.

“Sure, sit down and I’ll show you how.” She smiled.

I knelt next to her, watching as she continued patching holes in clothes for us.

Her work perfect.

“How did you get it to look so good?” “Years of practice. Ed used to come home after going to the bar in a mess, clothes torn and bloody from fighting earlier in the night.”

She paused, taking a breath.

“He used to say that it was my job to fix the mess and clean it.”

“Carol-“ “Oh no honey, im fine.” She smiled once more.

I nodded.

Carol and I sat for an hour and a half, her teaching me different stitches and when the best use for each one.

“Alright guys, foods ready.” Dale called out.

I stood up, and walked over to Dale, who had two plates set aside, handing them to me.

“I figured that you’d be hungry, Daryl would be too.” “Thank you Dale.” “Go on, go eat. Make sure He eats too or we will all be insufferable.”

I nodded my head and chuckled, turning around and heading towards the farm house.

“Hey (Y/n).” Maggie smiled as she walked down the front steps.

“Hey.” “Glenn and I are going for a supply run, im going to keep an eye out for any pre-natal vitamins for you. Is there anything you’re after?” “Oh thank you, not that I can think of.” “Okay, well, Daryls upstairs, I think he might be asleep, but head on up.” She smiled.

“Thank you.” I smiled as she continued past me.

I made my way up and into the Greene family home, and up those familiar steps that lead me to Daryls room.

I softly pushed the door open and walked in, smiling as I see Daryl sit himself up.

“Where have ya’ been all day?” He asked

“I, have been everywhere today it seems, Shane and I went on a supply run this morning.”

“Ya’ did what?”

“Daryl-“ “I don’t want ya’ out there. Why would he take ya’ out?” “He didn’t take me, I took him. Technically. But it was smooth, no near death experiences to report.” I smiled softly.

“Dale cooked whatever, this is for us. It smells good though.” I chuckled handing him a plate.

He took the plate and picked up the food, biting away at it.

“Quit ya’ starin’.” He spoke through a mouthful.

“Or what?” I challenged, taking a bite from the food.

He shook his head as a light pink blush rose on his cheeks.

“Are you blushing?” I grinned, watching as he finished eating.

He grabbed his plate and moved it to the side, grabbing mine from my hand and placing it on his own.

“Hey! I wasn’t finished- “

“C’mere.” He muttered, reaching over, pulling me onto his lap.

“Daryl.. what are you trying to do?” “I’m tryin’ to finish what ya’ started.” “Oh, what I started?” I grinned, my hands resting on his shoulders.

“Mhmm” he nodded.

“If I remember correctly, it was you, that initiated this.” “Was it?” He smirked.

I nodded my head.

“Guess im gonna finish it too.” He stated, bringing his hand to the back of my neck, pulling me in for a kiss.

I smiled into the kiss, both of my hands made their way to the sides of his face, cupping his stubbled cheeks.

His hands moving down to my thighs, picking me up and laying me back.

I pulled away from his lips and smiled up at him.

“What?” He muttered.

“Nothing.” I shook my head softly, bringing his face back down to mine.

Daryl’s hands roamed freely over my body, sending shivers coursing down my spine.

I shivered against Daryl, earning a low chuckle from him.

Once Daryl had fallen asleep, I got dressed and took the plates downstairs for cleaning.

I left the farm house, making my way to our little camp.

Washing up the two plates in the tub we had set aside I left the two to air dry.

“I was wondering where you’d run off to.” Lori spoke up as she exited her tent.

“I just gave Daryl his lunch.” I smiled, getting off the ground.

“Thats not all you gave him.” I could hear the smirk in her voice without even turning to look at her.

I smiled and turned to face her.

“I don’t know what it is you’re implying Lori.”

“Sure you don’t.” She grinned.

“How else would your shirt be inside out.”

I looked down and laughed, quickly stripping my shirt off and flipping it the right way in.

“Lucky it was only me.” She laughed, patting my back.

“Ill give you a hand.” I smiled motioning to the laundry that needed folding.

We laughed and joked for about 15 minutes as we folded, the clothes.

The creak of the side paddock gate gained the attention of both Lori and I.

We looked up to see Maggie storming through, Glenn hot on her heels.

“Hey! We got your stuff.” Maggie called out.

“Maggie, hang on, please.” Glenn called after her.

Lori looked around, seeing who else was out.

Then she looked at me.

“Come on in here.” Lori tried softly, gesturing to her tent.

“Why? Nothing to hide. We got your special delivery right here.” Maggie started.

“We got your lotion, got your conditioner, your soap opera digest.” She named each item before throwing it to the floor.

“Maggie..” Lori tried.

“Hey, Maggie, calm down. What-“ I tried to reason.

“Next time you want something, get it your damn self. We're not your errand boys.”

“Honey, I-“

“And here's your abortion pills.” She threw a small blue box at Lori, storming off, Glenn and Lori sharing a look before he followed Maggie.

“Lori?” I asked softly as she stood there in silence.

“Honey, I can explain.” “You don’t need to explain anything to me.” I stated bringing her in for a hug.

“I just wish you’d have told me.. we could’ve talked about it.” I rubbed her back.

“I just don’t know what to do. I haven’t told Rick yet. I’m not going to until I know what I’m going to do.” She paused.

“Does that make me a bad wife?” She asked.

“No. It makes you a cautious one, and thats not a bad thing considering what’s happened in the last few months.”

“You have no idea how good it feels now that you know.” She softly laughed.

“I’d say it’d be a whole lot less stressful.” I laughed with her as we sat on the small stools near the table in the tent.

The little blue box holding the attention of both Lori and myself.

“Whatever you decide to, I’m here to support you.” I whispered placing my hand on her own.

She grabbed my hand and looked over to me, a thankful smile on her face.

A slight movement from the corner of my eye caught my attention, to see Glenn appear at the tents doorway.

“I’ll leave you guys to it.. just come get me if you need anything.”

“Thank you honey.” She hugged me.

“I’ll see you later Glenn.” I smiled, softly patting him on the back.

“Yeah, see you.” He nodded as I made my way through the tents door.

The familiar green car came into view and pulled up by the RV.

I couldn’t help but chuckle as I noticed the light flush on Andrea’s face as she climbed out of the car.

I made eye contact with Shane, him rolling his eyes as he noticed the small smirk on my face, continuing his walk to Carol and Dale.

“Anything?” Carol was the first to speak.

“Not today.” Shane shook his head.

“I’m so sorry. We'll cover more ground tomorrow.” Andrea sympathised with her at least.

Andrea was covered in more grime and dirt than what she had left in, signalling that they’d run into some sort of trouble whilst out.

“What happened out there?” Dale asked looking her up and down.

“Um, I-“ Andrea was cut off before she could even finish her sentence.

“The place was overrun.” Shane said far too quickly.

“Yeah.” Andrea agreed, sharing a look with my brother.

“Let's go get you clean up.” Carol motioned towards Andrea, pulling me along with them.

“(Y/n), you coming?” “Yeah, i’ll catch up, just got to grab Andrea a towel.” I smiled running into the small share tent, grabbing one of the towels.

I turned to leave, but overheard Dale call out to Shane.

“Shane.” “Shane, I was thinking, you've got that nice new ride of yours, plenty of fuel, more than enough for you to get far from here.” Dale began.

I furrowed my brows, not understanding where Dale is coming from.

“What, you telling me to leave?” Shane asked, annoyance clear in his voice.

“I know you've been planning to. Maybe now is a good time.” Dale responded.

Shane scoffed before laughing.

“Is this about Andrea?” He asked.

“I’m looking out for the group.”

“You think the group would be better off without me, Dale? My sister would be better off? Why don't you tell that to Rick or Lori? Their boy would be dead if I hadn't put my ass on the line.” Shane argued.

“And Otis's. You've been vague about that night, about what happened.”

“Otis died a hero.” Shane stated smugly.

“So you've said.”

“A little boy lived because of what went down that night. I think you ought to show some gratitude.” Shane sneered

“I wasn't there.” Dale responded.

“No, man, you weren’t.” Shane agreed, clearly angry.

“But I was the time that you raised your gun on Rick.” My hand instantly covered my mouth as I had heard what Dale had said.

“Come on. Jesus.”

“You had him in your sights and you held him there. I know what kind of man you are.” Dale continued.

I heard a sigh, the same one that I’ve heard my entire life, the one that Shane used to use when he was caught in something.

Shane stayed silent for a moment before speaking once more.

“You think I'd shoot Rick? That is my best friend. That's the man that I love. I love him like he's my brother. You think that's the kind of man I am?”

“That's right.” Dale answered.

“Well, maybe we ought to just think that through. Say I'm the kind of man who'd gun down his own best friend. What do you think I'd do to some guy that I don't even like when he starts throwing accusations my way? What do you think?” Shane threatened before retreating.

My stomach was in knots, knowing that my brother isn’t the man I knew.

I heard the footsteps retreat and decided to give myself a moment.

I took a deep breath, and shook my head softly.

As I took a step out of the tent, gasping when someone spoke.

“How much of that did you hear?”

Series Masterlist Next Part

#daryl x you #daryl dixion imagine #daryl fanfiction #daryl x reader #daryl dixon #The Walking Dead #twd #x reader

41 notes · View notes

medeafive · 4 years

Text

Blood and Stone - 25

Masterpost

"Are you sure?" Clint asks as she makes her bed. "I can come with you."

Natasha snorts, fluffing up the pillow she won't sleep on soon, or ever. "No thanks. Don't need you fighting with Bobbi every day."

"I'm serious," Clint insists, playing with an arrow at his belt.

"So am I," Natasha replies, holding her belly. "Nothing you can do. It's gonna be fine, don't worry."

Clint pulls a face, clearly disagreeing but biting his tongue. "I'll pray for you. Seriously."

He hasn't prayed since he fled the war, as far as she knows, so she smiles at him sadly. "Thank you. Really."

There's nothing more to say after that. The room's largely empty. Not like she ever had much personal possessions anyway. She looks around, weird floating feeling. It's true, she's in between, removed from the world of hunting but not yet in… she doesn't know yet. Motherhood? A strange thought. She hasn't really thought about what this is going to be . If it's going to be at all.

Downstairs, everyone is waiting in the lobby, blinds pulled for James' sake. The bags are already in the car, as far as she knows. Pepper hugs her, a tear in the corner of her eye. “You’re going to be fine, Nat. We’re all going to be fine.”

Sharon hugs her next and by the time it’s Sam’s turn, Natasha herself is teary-eyed. She might just never see them again. “I’ll see you soon,” Sam mutters into her hair.

“I hope it’ll go well,” Bruce says. “Bobbi will look after you.”

“Oh, come on,” Tony says. “Like this would take you down. You, of all people.”

Clint is gritting his teeth, muscles of his jaw working. It looks aggressive but she knows he’s just trying not to show his emotions. “Stay strong. Don’t give up.”

“You’ll be back soon,” Fury says. “Can’t lose my best tracker.”

James is the last in line and she can’t really look at him, after the fight yesterday. It is what it is. As Bobbi said, the rest is between her and God, if that guy’s even out there somewhere. The only thing left to believe in is herself. James steps forward and kisses her forehead with his cold lips. It is what it is. She notices everyone else looking uncomfortable or looking away. “Good luck, Natalia. Good luck.”

That’s what it comes down to in the end, isn’t it? Sheer dumb luck. Life and death, happiness and misery, stability and societal collapse from a vampire epidemic. Nobody is ever really in control. Certainly not James and her. And she knows it's all downhill from here, whatever happens, James will always be a vampire, Schmidt will be out there until they kill him, she will always be on the run until she's dead or undead. It's all fleeting, unstoppable, out of control, and only getting worse. She smiles at him, thinking she might never see him again. "I'll be fine."

"Your stuff's in the truck," Bobbi remarks, staring at the claws against Natasha's red hair. "It's all ready to leave."

The silence is tense and uncomfortable. "We'll call you," Pepper hurries to say. "At least that much."

Natasha spots an unusually bulky figure in the background, hunching slightly, too heavy for his own liking. Looks like Steve's up. "Hey, you. I know you don't remember me but… You'll figure it out. I hope they take care of you."

"Sure will," Sharon mutters, blushing pink.

Natasha squeezes James' hand, still cold- well, that's just how it is, and it doesn't really matter. The baby kicks slightly and her mouth drops open but it's not that bad. She lets go, takes Bobbi's arm and lets herself be led outside.

It's really a small truck more than a car, plenty of space in the back, rusty but actually not in all that bad shape. Not like the Soviet car industry. Bobbi leads her to the passenger side.

"Morse?"

They both turn their heads. Fury is standing outside, beckoning. "Come over, I got something for you."

"Just a sec," Bobbi replies, helping Natasha up into the truck. "You okay?"

Natasha breathes heavily at the slight exertion, holding her belly. At least she didn't burn in the sunlight. "Yeah. It's fine."

"Just a second then, be right back." Bobbi walks to the back of the truck. Natasha closes her eyes, heart drumming in her ears. Oh, she's really not doing well. Stairs are hard, even when it's just one step. She hopes this is over soon. Little over a week now. Also, she hasn't been out in the daylight in what feels like years and it's awfully bright. Somebody opens the door at the back of the truck.

"Oh. Oh, I see."

"I think you're going to find that very useful."

"Sure thing. Where'd'ya get this beauty?"

"Had it for a while. Don't tell the others."

"Won't, boss."

"Well. Do your best."

The doors are slammed shut again. "Will do. Good luck with the vampires."

Bobbi comes around, climbing into the driver's seat. "What did he give you?" Natasha asks.

Bobbi grins, starting the car. "Oh, I'll tell you sometime later."

They drive for about an hour and a half, or maybe two. It's really been forever that Natasha was outside the city, in broad daylight no less. And she's so exhausted that she nods off several times, only to be rattled awake by a bump in the road.

It's quite deserted. The vampires may have hit the big cities the hardest but the countryside wasn't exactly spared. Most of all, people do not trust each other anymore and they avoid congregating, as if that would attract the monsters. In some ways, it does. Only about half of the fields are actually being farmed.

The house is half tucked away into a little forest, built out of broad wood planks, many gables. Bobbi tells her to wait, climbing out alone. Natasha leans forward, trying to get a better view. Not a person in sight, let alone another house. This is quite literally the end of the road.

However, before Bobbi reaches the house, a woman appears between the trees, rifle slung around her shoulder. She's rather tall, though not as tall as Bobbi, brown hair, and rather not up for a chat. Thick brown coat with what looks like fox fur around the neck. Bobbi raises her hands as she approaches her, though the woman shows no signs of reaching for a weapon.

The baby kicks hard and Natasha groans, slumping over, holding her belly for fear that it'll break. She wonders whether Tony meant that literally, with the baby breaking through her stomach and crawling out, or just- the tight skin holds for now and that’s all she’s going to think about.

The two women are still exchanging tense words. Natasha notices their host has binoculars around her neck, as if she just came back from the hunt. Animal hunt. Probably the only way to get food around here. Thinking about meat makes-

The baby kicks again, this time longer, even harder, and Natasha gasps and bends over, slumping onto the dashboard, moaning in pain as her belly's pushed out from inside repeatedly. She can almost feel the shape. The car door is being opened. "Hey, are you okay? Come on, let's get you inside so you can lay down."

She can't breathe. "Is she okay?" the other voice asks.

"Under the given circumstances," Bobbi replies, unfastening her seatbelt and reaching around. "But I'm gonna need a hand."

Natasha can't remember or imagine how they got from the car to her lying on a couch, under a blanket, with a hot bowl of soup. The kicking has subsided for now but she still feels the soreness from the last time.

The house is quite dark inside with all the wood and so few windows. There are antlers on the walls, stuffed pheasants, at least one set of vampire fangs. Trophies. A shudder goes down her spine, despite the warm blanket and the chimney fire. The cold winter wind rattles the tiny windows, cuts around the edges, trying to claw its way in. The room is lit solely with candles, probably no electricity in the house.

“Hey.”

The brown-haired woman is sitting behind a big wooden table, face bright against the wooden wall, candle light dancing over her skin. There’s meat on the table, cooked meat. Natasha’s belly contracts almost painfully. Bobbi is nowhere to be seen.

“You’re Russian, aren’t you,” the woman remarks.

Natasha snorts, staring at the ceiling that’s so dark she can’t really see it. “Is that the first thing you ask?”

The woman shrugs, opening a flask of liquor with a biting smell escaping immediately. “I don’t mind.”

She sounds Czech which means she most likely speaks Russian but, like Pepper, clearly does not want to. “Where’s Bobbi?”

“Toilet’s outside,” the woman replies briefly, taking a sip from the flask. “You hungry?”

The smell of the meat is overwhelming, to a degree it shouldn’t be. Natasha tucks the blanket up to her chin. “Yeah.”

The woman makes her way out from behind the table, bumping into it or the bench several times. The rifle is hanging on the wall behind the door, as Natasha notices. The vampire fangs are right over the fireplace. “You killed a vampire?”

The woman nods, grabbing the plate with the meat and sitting down on the couch table, also made of heavy wood, holding out the plate. “You mind?”

The meat is cooked but it still smells of blood. Natasha can’t resist grabbing a piece with her bare hands and stuffing it in her mouth, shaking her head. She’s a hunter. She’s always been a hunter. She- She needs to devour all of this bloody meat right now.

The woman merely raises an eyebrow as Natasha rips the plate from her hands and starts wolfing it down, barely taking the time to chew, tasting the flesh, the blood, the dead life of it. She inhales it so fast that she gags, coughs, spits it out and shoves it in her mouth again, unable to stop. When she’s done, the plate entirely empty, fingers greasy and dirty, she leans back, exhausted. The woman is still watching her quietly. Natasha clears her throat, uncomfortable. “Do you live here alone?”

The woman shrugs, not moving otherwise. “Less people to worry about.”

She feels that. “I’m Natasha.”

“Maria,” the woman replies. “Maria Kopecká.”

The door opens, cold rush of air, then closes quickly behind Bobbi who’s stamping her feet to get rid of the mud. “Phew. Gotta say, taking a dump outside in the dark is quite the adrenaline boost.”

The woman- Maria gets up and pours water from a bucket into a big bowl. “Here. To wash your hands.”

“Thanks.” Bobbi rolls her sleeves up, looking towards Natasha. “Hey. Feeling better?”

She must have grease around her mouth, probably, with how fast she was devouring the meat. Embarrassing. She wipes it with the back of her hand quickly, which is not exactly clean either. “Mhm. Yeah.”

Bobbi dips her hands in the water, then grabs the bar of soap. “I see you already got something to eat.”

Maria makes her way around to the back of the hut, opening a cupboard. “She’s quite hungry. I’ll open a can.”

Her stomach growls at the mention of more food. “She needs to eat a lot,” Bobbi remarks. drying her hands off. “I hope you’re stocked.”

Maria huffs, pulling a can opener from a drawer. “Always.”

Bobbi turns, crossing her arms. “So, how do you know Fury, if I may ask?”

The can opener cuts through the metal deftly. “Work,” Maria replies. “Before.”

“Oh, I see.” Bobbi’s eyes drift to the vampire fangs over the fireplace, placed prominently. “Do lots of vampires come by here?”

“Few,” Maria states, grabbing a pot and pouring the content of the can into it. “Last one I shot was two months ago.”

“Huh.” Bobbi walks over to the couch, making space for her to narrowly sit, reaching for Natasha’s wrist. “Let me take your pulse.”

It feels rather quick but she’ll let Bobbi decide. Maria hangs the pot over the fireplace. It smells of sour tomatoes. The fiery light accentuates the harsh lines of her face. Bobbi checks her watch. "Mhm. Better give you a dose. Have you tried getting up?"

Her fingers are really greasy. "No."

"How did you come to be with that vampire thing?" Maria asks, peering out through the window.

Well, that. "I'm going to inject another dose," Bobbi announces, letting go of her wrist and getting up.

Natasha clears her throat, tucking the greasy hands under the blanket. "Just… just how anyone else comes to be with child."

Maria turns around, seeming unconvinced. "Really."

It would be great if she could disappear into the couch never to be seen again. "Gimme your arm, darling," Bobbi asks, sitting down on the couch table.

"And what's that?" Maria asks, crossing her arms.

"Vampire blood," Bobbi replies, looking for a vein. "Not from that guy. It helps with cell regeneration, healing and strength and… I really don't know how it works, but it works."

"You're a weird bunch," Maria remarks, crouching down in front of the fireplace and stirring the pot.

Natasha gets the empty feeling in her arm as the vampire blood floods in. "Do we really have everything here? No offense, but Fury said it would have more… equipment."

Maria straightens, walking across the room and pulling open a floor hatch Natasha hadn't noticed. "Oh, don't worry, it's all downstairs."

"Electricity, too?" Bobbi asks.

"There's a generator outside," Maria explains, peering down. "I don't run it usually because it might attract vampires, but it should work."

"Let's hope it does," Bobbi says. "Not that I haven't worked under candlelight but it'd be better if I didn't have to."

"It'll work," Maria states.

Bobbi sighs. "Okay. So, Nat, I… we haven't talked about this yet but I would like to induce early."

Natasha is too tired for this. "What does that mean?"

"Induce birth," Bobbi adds. "Basically, you take a pill and then the contractions start. I'd check again that the baby is big enough but I think it already is."

"Why, though?" Natasha asks. "Why not wait?"

"Every day of pregnancy brings more risk," Bobbi replies. "And the birth will be easier if the baby is not that big yet, so less complications. And we might just not have the time, depending on whatever else happens."

"And you're sure that's not bad for the baby?" Natasha questions.

Bobbi snorts. "Trust me, that thing has the most solid vitals I've ever seen."

"I wouldn't worry about that thing ," Maria interjects, holding the hatch open. "So, do you want to go down or can I close it?"

"I'll check it out," Bobbi replies, standing. "Natasha, just stay here for now."

Maria holds the hatch open dutifully and hands her a candle. "You need my help down there?"

"Should be fine," Bobbi replies, carefully climbing down the creaking wood. "Is that- oh."

"The hatch opens from inside," Maria states and closes it promptly.

The food over the fireplace smells quite strongly, tomato and something like pasta. Maria crosses over and stirs it again. "So. You fucked a vampire."

When Natasha doesn't reply immediately, Maria adds: "Or did a vampire fuck you?"

Natasha sighs. Jesus Christ. Why is all of this so complicated? "No, no, I… I fucked a vampire."

"Huh." Maria pulls her sleeves over her hands and lifts the pot off the fire. "Why?"

"I liked him," Natasha replies, immediately worrying about the past tense that came out so naturally. Why does it matter to her so much? Maybe she's never going to see him again, and… she's already lost so much, and there's nothing he can do to really change her situation, and she's doing this for herself anyway, they're not going to be a family - but she hasn't worried about dying since she got to know him, knew he wouldn't let anything happen to her- at least until she turned out pregnant. Does she really love the monster because he's strong enough to protect her?

Maria is watching her attentively, not clear whether she said anything or not. Natasha rubs her eyes demonstratively. "Sorry. I'm very tired."

"You can sleep on the couch," Maria states. "I usually sleep on the bench. Or on the floor."

Natasha nods, closing her eyes and crawling further under the blanket until she's lying almost flat, pretending to be already out. Bobbi is doing something downstairs, though it's very hard to hear, and Maria starts eating out of the pot, by the sound of it. The wind is very loud once it's silent.

After some time, the hatch creaks open and Bobbi climbs up again. "Good equipment, I gotta say."

She walks right past Natasha, even stops to look. Maria is quiet. "I thought that was for her."

"She wanted to sleep."

"Oh well. Let's not let it go to waste, then."

Bobbi finally walks away and Natasha can breathe normally again. The floor creaks, and the bench creaks. Everything in this house is dead and alive at the same time.

"So, all this stuff… is that from when you worked with Fury? It's not exactly new."

"Yes."

"Huh. So you're a doctor?"

"No."

"There was someone else?"

"Not… everyone is still here."

"Oh, I see. Emigration or vampires?"

"Both."

"I actually immigrated pre-vampires. Because everyone else emigrated."

Maria laughs, barely distinguishable from the rattling wind. "Bad choice, if you ask me."

"Oh, well. It's certainly very folksy, with the antlers and all."

"Rusty beyond repair."

"You're quite pessimistic. I thought there was quite a spirit of… I mean, after the stagnation of the 70s and 80s, and with Havel… of course, that was before the vampires."

"I think you're the one with the rosy eyes."

"The rosy glasses, yeah! It's probably nostalgia on my part, really."

"Nostalgia is fair. We had barely gotten back to where we were… and now this, of course. Best to resign to it."

"You certainly seem to have adapted to it. In your own way."

Maria snorts. "I'm not going to run around trying to stop something that cannot be stopped, fix something that cannot be fixed. Get my hopes up and have them crushed."

"That's absolutely fine. I mean, you're still helping us."

"Ah, well. I owe someone a favor."

#blood and stone #buckynat #vampire au #natasha romanoff #black widow #bucky barnes #winter soldier #bobbi morse #mockingbird #maria hill #in case you didn't figure it out #my writing #fanfic

9 notes · View notes

kangaracha · 4 years

Note

Prompt: Zed and Eliza deep friendship that shows their dependency on each other? (Also platonic cuddling and touches)

Zed finds her on the roof, twenty minutes after the end of the world.

She’s sitting on the apex, her face turned firmly eastwards and her eyes trained on the horizon, watching the sea – the calm, glassy ocean, reflecting the moonlight like a pool of shining silver. Seabrook sits like a postcard between her and it, silent cul-de-sacs stretching across the impossible distance between her and the water. She doesn’t move as Zed settles silently in the space beside her, nor does she acknowledge him when he tries to ask what she’s doing up here, or why she’d come up here instead of going home after…after…

It should be a cold, clear night, the moon full and winter drawing on, but it is hot as a summer afternoon out here, thick black clouds slowly shifting across the sky to obscure the moon while they sit on the roof and sweat. The air is acrid and stiff, rasping at his throat as he breathes in and out; he wishes he was back downstairs, inside the relative safety of the house.

“Do you ever watch those monster movies they play on TV on Friday nights?” Eliza asks after an age, her voice deceptively calm.

Perched uncomfortably beside her, Zed frowns and pokes at a loose shingle underneath him, trying to shove it into a more secure position. “I thought you hated those,” he says carefully, as if this might be a trick.

Eliza’s lip curls in disgust. “I don’t,” she claims. “They’re anti-zombie propaganda. Bonzo…Bonzo likes watching them.”

Zed gives her a look that says he doesn’t believe her, but all he asks is, “So?”

Eliza shifts restlessly, her fingers digging along the edge of a shingle like she’s trying to pry it from the roof. “Most of those movies end with an angry mob coming to kill the monster, you know.”

Zed shifts his shoulders – rolling the tension from his body or shrugging in disregard, she can’t tell. “The monster wins in some of the though, don’t they? What about like, Frankenstein? Or Beauty And The Beast? Zoey loves that movie, you can’t tell me the beast doesn’t-”

“Frankenstein’s monster kills himself,” she points out. “An angry mob almost kills the beast, until he turns into a human. That’s not winning.”

“Okay,” Zed says slowly, searching for another example. “What about that werewolf one last week? Bonzo said that one was a good one.”

Eliza hesitates. “I don’t know,” she admits. “I told…I told Bonzo it was stupid and I was busy when he tried to tell me about it the other day. And now-”

She stops short, her breath caught in her throat before she can say it out loud. Her hands clutch at the roof; she feels kind of unsteady suddenly, her stomach churning at the thought of it, the fear clutching at her backbone, the regret-

“The point is,” she snaps instead, trying to fill up her empty lungs with something that tastes less like ash in her throat. “Stories about monsters only ever end one way.”

She almost looks behind her, the punctuation to her statement, but fear paralyses her, and all she can look at is the ocean, so close and yet so far from her reach.

“He’ll be alright, Eliza,” Zed says, deceptively calm. She can see him in the corner of her eye, watching her, but her eyes won’t focus on him properly, won’t turn far enough to see anything else in the middle distance.

Behind them, there is an explosion that punctuates his words, loud enough that the house shivers beneath them. Zed jumps. Eliza grows still, her knuckles turning white against the shingles.

“Will he?” she asks in response, quieter than anything she’s said before.

“Yes,” Zed says firmly, and chances a look behind them, towards the cacophony of noise that carries across town, the shouts and the screams, the sirens and the crack of guns, rebounding off the pavement. “He’ll be over in the 400’s painting something and back by morning, bet you anything.”

Eliza turns her head, just far enough that she can see the edge of the 400’s. The streets are pitch-black, just like theirs, and clouded in smoke, so thick that she can barely see the rows of rundown houses amidst it. The flames grow in the corner of her eye, brighter than she remembers them being (or maybe her eyes have just gotten used to the dark…but the sound is getting louder too, the roar of the blaze, the screams of the people that flood the streets, and Bonzo ran towards the-).

She turns back to the sea. “What about us?” she asks, quieter again still, so that she thinks maybe he won’t hear her speak at all.

Zed looks behind them again. In the dark space between them, his hand finds hers, warm fingers prying hers up from their death grip on the peak of the roof. “I don’t know,” he says slowly, every word drawn out like they might be enough to keep the mob at bay. “I can’t see which way…”

“Is it bad?”

Zed looks again, pulls a face, but doesn’t answer, just grips her hand tighter, like a lifeline he can’t let go of. Eliza’s not sure she could let go either, for fear that she might lose him forever.

They used to sit up here until midnight, she remembers, watching the lights of Zombietown flicker in and out as intermittent power rolled through the lines, or tracing the streets of Seabrook from the centre of town out. Once, Zed had found a pair of binoculars, and with those they could see everything in Seabrook – the school, the shops, the sweeping green parklands and crystal-clear pools glittering in their backyards, like they couldn’t just walk down and swim in the ocean at any given moment. It was their tradition – on sleepless nights, they come to Zed’s roof, and they whisper about what it would be like to live in Seabrook.

Privately, Eliza wonders if this is the last time they will ever sit here.

“We should go inside,” Zed says instead, when the silence has stretched too long and the shouting behind them has grown too loud. “It isn’t safe up here.”

“We can stay one more minute,” Eliza replies. She’s still looking at the sea, tracing the faint lines of waves as they roll into shore; a whole different world, so close it feels like she could step off the roof and into the soft sand, and yet so impossibly out of reach too.

“Eliza,” Zed says, a little more urgently – his eyes stray too far behind them again, and then downward. He has a sister to worry about, of course, and a father. He shouldn’t be out here on the roof with her, who has nothing, not even her mum anymore (the thought settles like a stone in her throat; hard to spit out, and even harder to swallow down). He should be inside, trying to help them, as close to his family as he can be.

“Okay,” she acquiesces and gets carefully to her feet. She has to let go of his hand to do so – her fingers feel cold and empty in the space that is left, detached from something far too important to lose. “Okay, let’s go.”

“We’ll be okay, Eliza,” Zed says, like a promise, and she tries not to meet his eye. He is open, earnest and honest, and she is…cynical, already sure in her heart that they have nowhere to go, whether they try to disappear into the streets or hide up here on the roof and wait for the humans to find them.

She should reply to him, should try, for her friend, who has risked leaving his family to come up and sit with her here while the world falls down around them. She should thank him, at least. But instead, she says nothing at all; just climbs down from the roof and into his bedroom, where the smoke is thinner and the air marginally cooler, where the noise from outside is slightly dimmed. He follows her without question or argument; the guilt settles deeper in her stomach, a knife so deeply embedded so doesn’t know if she will ever be able to get it out.

Behind them, Zombietown burns on, the flames and the people that light them spreading street by street, until nothing is left in the morning light.

#disney zombies #zombies 2 #z-o-m-b-i-e-s #zed zombies #zed necropolis #eliza zambie #eliza zombies #zombiedadfics

21 notes · View notes

holylulusworld · 4 years

Text

The queen of Lebanon - Part 13 – The others will burn

Summary: Your father died years ago, all men in the business believed you are too weak to take over his Empire – they were wrong. Anyone trying to get into your hair will feel your wrath. What happens when a cocky mobster tries not only to steal your empire but your heart too?

Pairing: Mobster!Dean x Mobster!Reader, Sam Winchester, Dick Roman, Jimmy Novak, Arthur Ketch, Mick Davies, Charlie Bradbury, Gadreel, Crowley (Fergus McCleod), Garth, Gabriel

Warnings: angst, ‘the family business’, blood, characters death, explosions, language

The queen of Lebanon Masterlist

You’re on the edge as you wait for the teams to head out. Dick Roman agreed to meet up with you, of course you know he won’t come, it’s a trap but he’ll send enough men to make sure you die. This way he’ll be more vulnerable and may have a chance to finally take him down.

“Team one is on its way. Jimmy called; they are ready to storm the mansion. They count five enemies outside and assume at least five more inside if not more.” Charlie explains as you check on your gun once again.

“It’s loaded and ready, Sweetheart. I checked it twice too.” Dean rubs your back gently as Charlie checks on team two.

“Team two in position. Sam reported they set the trap and will make sure all of Roman’s men will go down. The explosives will blow the house. Sam and Gadreel will stay put till they are sure no one survived.”

Charlie is switching between two monitors, checking on the body cams of Sam and Jimmy. Charlie looks like she’s in the zone. Her teeth pressed into a pencil she let her fingers fly over the keyboard.

“Good. Ketch is your friend ready for our part?” Dean looks over Charlie's shoulder, watching Sam and his team sneak toward their hideout to wait for Dick’s men to arrive.

“Mick waits for us at the gate. He hates to wait so we should get going, Dean. We need to strike right before Dick’s team gets the chance to report you and Y/N are not at the agreed meeting point.”

Clapping his hands Dean nods at Ketch before he walks toward you to hand you a bulletproof vest.

“Charlie, you will stay here along with Garth and his family. I don’t want you to leave this house. No one gets in and no one goes out until we or Sam are back.”

“If anything happens, call us Charlie. The house is safe but…” Placing a gun onto the desk Dean gives Charlie a curt nod.

“Only three men remain here. The gates stay closed, the door to my office is bulletproof so…stay inside.” Nodding Charlie looks at the monitors. She won’t risk getting killed, as much as she likes you and Dean, Charlie is not suicidal.

“I leave the fights to you, boss.” Smirking you pat her shoulder. “I will stay here, promised. Maybe Garth and his family should stay in this room too.”

“Good idea, Charlie. I’ll send them here before we go. There’s a tiny fridge in the corner with snacks and soft drinks.” Dean smirks as Charlie’s eyes lit up. “I got sweets in the right drawer of my desk too.”

“Alright. Stop talking and get ready Dean. I know you are the boss and all, but small talk won’t bring Roman down. I’ll be downstairs, waiting for you and Y/N. Be prepared for everything. Dick Roman is the devil.” Ketch smirks at Charlie before he walks out of the room.

“We are no angels, Arthur.” Securing your gun, you grab your shotgun, nodding at Charlie as you follow Ketch.

“Dick Roman will wish we were angels as we will come over him like the sword that he fears.” Dean pecks your cheek, checking on your bulletproof vest while you snicker at his words.

“The Bible? You recite the Bible now, Baby?” Humming Dean leads you out of the room glancing one last time at your vest.

“If I say it would be better for you to stay here…” Your glare let Dean falls silent. “It was worth the try, Sweetheart. Now let’s hunt a dick down…”

“Terrible wordplay Dean…” Ketch snickers as you pat Dean’s cheek. “We have to work on this for sure when we are back. Now let’s roll and hunt Dick down…”

“Ready?” Glancing at the gate Jimmy raises his fist as his team checks out the mansion from their hidden position. “We need to strike when this team goes in. There’s a timeframe of sixty seconds before the next team arrives.”

“We’ve got this boss. You will go with me and George. The others will take the side entrance. According to our information, Crowley must be in the nice dungeon he has to interrogate his enemies.” Gabriel points toward the door as the guards walk into the house.

“Showtime, Gabe. Let’s get the tiny bastard and head back.”

“Are you sure that this is not too much, Gadreel? I don’t want you to overexert yourself. You can stay in the van with Mark.” Sam uses his binoculars to watch the building, concerned Gadreel is not ready to get back to business.

“I am fine, Sam. Don’t worry – I’ve got this. Cole only hurt my pride, not my body.” Smirking Gadreel checks the detonator. “We will wait here, call the phone we left and lure them into the building. Once inside they will attend a nice roast.”

“You have way too much fun blowing up things, Gade. I will have to keep an eye on you.” Sam snickers as Gadreel watches Dick Roman’s men sneak toward the building. “Little bastards are sneaking toward the building.”

“I guess they will love our surprise, Sam. Nothing says better ‘welcome to the party’ than a nice bomb to blow the house.” Gadreel smirks as the men break through the entrance.

“Welcome to the barbecue…”

“Now, strike…” Using the battering ram George breaks through the gate, Jimmy and Gabriel hot on his heels.

“We need to get to the dungeon and get Crowley. Let’s make sure that little bastard will make it out alive.” Jimmy follows George inside as the rest of your team uses the side entrance.

Checking the blueprints on his phone Jimmy leads the others toward the staircase.

“We need to be quick. Gabe, follow me. George join the others and make sure to secure our retreat.”

“Got it, boss. We will make sure to get out of here quickly…”

“Still time for you to stay in the car, Sweetheart.” Glancing at Dick’s hideout Dean grazes his fingertips over your cheek. “I know you want to avenge your family, but I could do this for you.”

“No Dean, I have to do this. Everything that happened over the last years lead me to this point. Let me do it and we can start to rule this town as you wanted us to.”

Checking your weapon one last time you nod at Mick who gives you a wink before he hits the accelerator pedal to break through Dick’s gate.

“Where did you get these armored vehicles?” Dean looks around the car, humming as he would like to have one too. “I like it.”

“Let’s say a friend of a friend owes me a lot of shit and agreed to lend me this nice vehicle and his combat team. We will storm this house and get us a dick.” Rolling your eyes at the next bad ‘dick’ joke glance at Dean.

He seems to be nervous and you know it because you insisted on coming with team three but this is your life, this is the moment you waited for so long and you will be damned if you do not witness Dick Roman’s fall.

“Hello, boys,” grunting Crowley spits blood onto the floor as Jimmy and Gabriel storm into the room. Azazel drops his knife to grasp for his gun, but Jimmy is faster.

Shooting Azazel’s knee, he grunts as Crowley won’t stop muttering as they didn’t free him sooner.

“Shut up, Crowley. We are here to save your sorry as, little bastard. Now let us handle this asshole and get the fuck out of here.” Cutting the ropes holding Crowley restraint to a chair Gabriel sighs as he still won’t stop talking.

“If I were you, I wouldn’t free Crowley. I would run and try to keep my pitiful life. You’ve got no clue what you got yourself into. Dick Roman will rip you apart.” Azazel snarls through gritted teeth as he holds his bleeding knee.

“Good thing you are not one of us.” Without hesitation, Jimmy shoots Azazel’s face before he checks the door. “Get the little bastard and we can get out of here…”

“Bon voyage…” Using the detonator Gadreel snickers as the house explodes. Flames burst through the windows and the alert of the car Dick’s men hid behind the house goes off.

“Good job Gadreel. I take back what I said. You’re a genius with your explosives. Let get out of here and call Charlie on our way back. Our job is done.”

Nodding Gadreel checks the building using his binoculars. “Looks good, boss. No one got out and it will burn down without causing trouble to its surroundings.”

“Perfect. Let’s head back, Gade. I don’t want to spend more time in this deserted place.”

“Team one and two are on their way back. Everything went according to plan. Relax, Sheriff. They will be back in no time. How about a snack for the kids?” Charlie tries to calm Garth who is nervously pacing around Dean’s office.

“I should be out there and help them taking him down. I need to help them bring the monster down. I am the Sheriff of Lebanon and not a clown.” Garth waves his hands, not wanting to sit back and wait for Dean and the others free his hometown of Dick Roman.

“Garth, calm. Y/N and Dean are already on their way, or rather at Dick’s house. There’s nothing you can do right now than sit and wait. Calm your kids and do not bug me while I must check on Dean’s body cam.”

“Sorry, Charlie. It’s just…frustrating…” Garth moves his fingers through his hair, sighing heavily.

While Mick’s tag team storms into Dick’s house, taking most of his men down Dean, Ketch and you run after them. Mick prefers to wait in the car. He’s someone pulling the strings, not a fighter.

“Search the house. Split into two teams. Tell us when you found Roman. Do not kill him – Y/N wants him alive.” Ketch orders and the men follow his orders.

“You are a drill instructor for sure, Arthur.” Dean snickers as you turn to follow team one.

“In another life, I was one. It seems like ages since I gave orders and was on the other side of the law. Must say, I was a bastard back then too.” Snickering Ketch raises his fist hearing a noise coming from the room they wanted to pass.

Kicking the door open the tag team aims their guns at the man sitting behind his desk. He's not moving a muscle, still, there is a smirk on his lips.

“Ah, the lost daughter comes to me, and she brought her king. Let’s talk about the deal…” Dick is full business, not giving away his heart thunders in his chest.

“Well…talk is cheap…” Without warning you plant a bullet to his forehead. “So much about a deal…”

“What about the others?” Ketch points toward the men thetag team two pushes into the room as you step closer to Dick Roman to kick him off his chair.

“The others…will burn…”

Tags will be added to the reblog.

95 notes · View notes

usual-day-dreamer · 4 years

Text

Let Me Touch Your Fire (Steve Harrington x Henderson!Reader) Chapter Four

MASTERLIST

"I've been having really weird dreams lately"

Robin was on her break and you were sitting at the farthest table so you could talk and relax a little before you started figuring out how to get inside the elevator.

"What kind of dreams?" She asked you

"I don't really know, I just remember this guy I've never seen before, he repeats over and over 'save them' but I don't know what he's talking about"

"You dreamt that last night?" She asked you

"No, probably because I slept with Steve"

"Oh" you missed her disappointed tone and eyes as you clarified

"Not like that, we just shared a bed" you blushed

Robin kept quiet, looking down at her sandwich

"I hope you figure out what the dream means" she said and as she looked at you, you noticed his saddened look.

"Robin are you okay?"

She nodded "Totally" but her eyes said otherwise

"Maybe later you could-"

She interrupted you abruptly by standing up and running towards the tip jar

"Hey! Half of it is mine!" Steve said

"Sorry, I'll be back in 20!"

And she was gone

Steve looked at you with a frown

"Where is she going?" He asked

"I have no idea"

"The best things is to wait" he agreed, and you walked next to him hitting him playfully with your elbow. He smiled at you and you smiled back.

Dustin frowned looking at your interaction, that was new. He looked at you deep in thought as Steve gave you an ice cream. Suddenly it clicked

"You two had sex!" He exclaimed. The costumers on the tables turned to look at him with weirded faces, Dustin ignored them.

"What?" You asked and looked at Steve

"You guys have been acting weird since we left Steve's house and I figured that you two had sex last night"

"Woah woah" Steve said "What's gotten into you, Henderson?"

You were blushing madly now completely uncomfortable

"It's just that you-"

"I forgot I had to buy some stuff for later, I'll be back" you walked hurriedly out of Scoops Ahoy and soon disappeared into the crowd.

"Congratulations genius, you scared her away" Steve said with a scoff, turning back to cleaning the counter.

"You totally have feelings for my sister"

"I told I don't, you should really drop it Dustin I don't want her to feel uncomfortable or something, I mean, she literally ran away just now"

"She went to the record store; she loves it and she told me she was looking for a new album or something"

"Whatever"

A costumer ended their argument

"Welcome to Scoops Ahoy, I'm Steve and I'll- what the he'll are you doing here?"

"Hello Steve"

Dustin couldn't remember the name of the guy but he knew who he was, he was part of the basketball team and if he remember correctly, it was the guy that Steve was complaining about because he kind of stole his role with the ladies even though he never actually played on any basketball match.

"Working here seems pretty cool" his sarcastic tone made Steve glare at him.

"Yeah, it's cool because I have a perfect view of how you lie to all the girls telling them what an awesome basketball player you are even though you don't actually played" Steve ended his comment with a smirk.

"Anyways, I'm looking for a girl that seems to hang around here a lot" he ignored Steve's comment completely

"You mean Robin?"

"No, not your coworker" he said walking closer "It's a really cute girl with Y/H/C not wearing a stupid sailor costume"

"Y/N?" Steve said confused

"So that's her name" he was smirking now

Dustin looked at Steve trying to hide his smile at the sight, Steve was beyond furious.

"Hey Steve, can I- oh..." you were back, a plastic bag hanging from your wrist

You paused, the tension in the room unbearable.

"I was just asking for you"

"Really?" You looked quizzically at the guy in front of Steve.

"Yeah I'm-"

"You want to leave those at the car babe?"

The nickname made you froze, you looked at Steve and nodded slowly, you face showed how confused you were but decided to play along. He walked out of behind the counter and handed you the keys to his car

"Okay... I guess I'll get going" you said and kissed Steve's cheek "Goodbye" you waved at them with a smile and walked away. Steve felt his cheek burning in the spot where your lips touched, he cleared his throat and looked at the guy.

"She really isn't interested, and now that that's settled, bye" Steve made a small gesture with his hand and the guy walked away angrily.

As soon as he was out of sight Dustin laughed loudly

"What?"

"You should've seen your face; you were beyond pissed" he laughed once more, and Steve scoffed

"What the hell was that all about?" You walked inside Scoops Ahoy again, you needed answers.

Steve jumped and looked at you "He's an asshole not worthy of your time"

You eyed him suspiciously and looked at Dustin, he just shrugged his shoulders and smiled

"I'll decide if he's worthy or not" you said and looked at Steve crossing your arms across your chest

Steve looked at you and opened his mouth, then closed it again.

"You'll be surprised what 20 bucks can do" Robin's voice brought you out of your conversation and you followed her to the back room.

"So" she placed the blueprints on the table "Turns out, that mysterious room beds ventilation like every other room here"

"This is Scoops" she circled the spot with a red marker "We just need to get inside the air vents and move from here to here" she drew a line from one spot to another "We just need someone to do it"

"I'll do it" your gaze moved to Dustin "Are you sure?"

He nodded

"I can fit anywhere, I'm like jelly"

A few minutes later, Dustin was trying to get inside the vents

"Push me harder Steve!"

"I'm trying" Steve grunted

"What did you said he had again?" Robin asked you

"Cleidocranial Dysplasia, he has no clavicles"

Robin nodded with a small oh, her mouth slightly open.

"You'll have to touch my butt" Dustin said

"I don't want to do that!" Steve exclaimed and you laughed

"Touch my butt!"

Steve pushed Dustin harder but failed

"You don't fit in there Dusty" you said, and he sighed.

The bell made you turn away from them. A little girl was impatiently touching it

Robin and you looked at each other, thinking the same thing.

Erica hummed checking inside the air vent with a lantern.

"Yeah, I don't know" she said coming down the ladder. Steve, Robin, Dustin and you were watching her every move.

"You don't know if you can fit in?" Dustin said

"Oh, I can fit. I just don't know if I want to" she answered.

"Are you claustrophobic?" Robin asked

"I don't have any phobias" She snickered.

"Then what's the problem?" You asked

"The problem is" she said "I still haven't heard what's in this for Erica" her sassy tone almost made you laugh.

A few seconds later you were all sitting on a table, all kinds and flavors of ice cream filled the table as Steve handed her one.

"More fudge please" she handed it back to Steve and he hesitated "Go on" she ushered him with her hands and Steve walked back with the ice cream in hand.

As he walked away Robin grabbed the blueprints again

"Okay, you see this? This is the route you are going to take" she pointed at the line she made a few minutes before.

"Then we just wait for the last delivery to go out tonight" you added.

"Then you knock out the grate, jump down, open the door" Robin said, her tone making it sound like the easiest thing in the world.

"Then you find out what's in those boxes?" Erica said playing with the spoon.

"Exactly"

"Mh-mmm, and you say this guard is armed"

"Yes, but he won't be there" Dustin quickly answered

"And booby traps?"

"Booby traps?" You asked. Robin, Dustin and you exchanged looks.

"Lasers, spikes in the wall?" Erica said it as if it was the most obvious thing.

"What?" Robin said

"You know what this half-baked plan of yours sounds like to me?" Erica looked directly at Dustin "Child Endangerment"

"We'll be in radio contact with you the whole time-" you said

"Ah, ah, ah!" she said with the sassiest tone ever "Child Endangerment"

Robin rolled her eyes annoyed, honestly, you were starting to lose your patience too.

"Erica? Hi, uh" Dustin looked at her "We think this Russians want to do harm to our country, great harm. Don't you love your country?"

"You can't spell America without Erica" she answered and took a long sip of her float.

"Uh, Yeah, yeah" Dustin looked confused but you decided not to interrupt him "Oddly, that's totally true, so don't do this for us, do it for your country, do this for your fellow man"

She continued to sip loudly

"Do this for America... Erica" Dustin ended the speech with a smile, you almost melted, he's so cute.

"Ooh!" Erica exclaimed "I just got the chills... oh yeah, from this float, not your speech"

Dustin's smile disappeared

"Know what I love most about this country?" Erica continued "Capitalism" she looked towards Dustin.

"Do you know what Capitalism is?"

"Yeah" Dustin answered

"Yeah" you and Robin answers in unison

"It means this is a free market system. Which means, people get paid for their services, depending on how valuable their contributions are. And it seems to me, my ability to fit into that little vent is very, very valuable to you all. So, you want my help? This USS Butterscotch better be the first of many, and I'm talking free ice cream for life" she ended her speech eating the cherry looking at Robin.

"We have to agree, it's our only chance" you said

Robin sighed "Okay Erica, you'll have your free ice cream"

Erica smiled triumphantly.

Steve finally came back "What did I miss?" He asked sitting down next to you.

"Erica agreed" you said with a laugh, Steve smiled at you.

"Great! Now what?"

"We wait" Robin said.

___

Closing time came faster than you expected and honestly you were anxious to see how the plan would turn out.

"Erica, do you copy?" Robin said through the radio

"Mh-mm, I copy" she answered "You nerds in position or what?"

"Yes, we are in position. It's all quiet here so you've got the green light" Robin answered.

Dustin has the binoculars, you and Steve next to him.

"Roger that, commence operation Child Endangerment"

You rolled your eyes and smiled at her comment.

"Can we not call it that?" Robin said and Steve nodded.

"See you on the other side nerds"

Steve and you looked at each other, worry adorning your faces.

The next few minutes felt like hours, your hands were starting to sweat, and a weird feeling settled in your stomach. You tried to push it away and wait.

"All right nerds, I'm there"

Erica's voice made you relax; you closed your eyes with a sigh and waited for the next step.

"Do you see anything?" Robin asked

"Yeah, I see those boring boxes you're so excited about"

"Any guards?"

"Negative"

"Booby traps?"

"If I could see them, they'd be pretty shit traps, wouldn't they?

You smiled, relaxing more at her comment

"Thank you for that" Robin sounded a little annoyed.

Steve looked at you with a small smile and you returned trying to contain your laughter.

"I'm in"

"Oh, god" Steve said covering his face with his hands. He was just as nervous as you were and that made you smile a little, he was really cute.

A novice came from the door and Erica walked out

"Free ice cream, for life" she said.

You quickly stood up and made your way towards her. Your heart beating loudly, excitement running through your body.

Once you stepped inside the room Steve quickly made his way towards a box and opened it, inside there was another metal box with a lever in the middle, he turned it around and pulled it opening the box.

You looked inside and found four round things with levers

"That's definitely not Chinese food" Steve said looking down at the contents of the metallic box.

He grabbed one and looked at us "Maybe you should, you know, stand back"

Erica and Robin did, and you hesitated. Steve gave you a nod and you did the same. Dustin didn't move.

"Come on Dustin, do as he says" you said

"No"

"Just stand back"

"No"

"Step back, seriously" Steve said placing and arm in front of Dustin

"No! No!" He said "If you die, I die"

"Okay" Steve said, and you looked at them with widened eyes but before you could move again Steve turned the lever and pulled out a container with a green liquid inside.

"What the hell?" He said

"What is that?" Robin asked staring at the container

Suddenly the room started to shake violently, and you looked around

"Booby traps" Erica whispered

"Let's just grab that and go" Robin took the container out of Steve's hands and walked towards the entrance.

Dustin presses the button, but it didn't work

"Which one do I press Erica?" He said

"Just press the damn button nerd" she answered

"Which one?"

"Press open door!"

"I'm pressing open door!"

Everyone started talking, giving solutions and commands, Steve walked towards the panel and tried to help Dustin while Robin was trying to move them away so Erica could press the right button.

Your head was spinning thinking of what to do as your heart hammered inside your chest.

Another door closed and you froze.

The room started moving faster, it felt as if you were falling.

Robin screamed

"Dustin!" You screamed and ran towards Dustin holding him as the room continued to fall.

"Shit" you heard Steve said as you closed your eyes holding Dustin tighter.

#steve harrington #steve harrington x reader #stranger things

31 notes · View notes