#anyway i would just really like to be able to like somebody without constantly questioning if it's real and not feeling physically sick 24

[lith-myathar]

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[morganwrites-starwars]

Evaar’la Yaim pt. 1

Summary: Obi-wan's home was barely made to fit one person, much less three. But since they are all outlaws, buying a new home isn't really an option. Obi-wan suggests an idea and reveals a lot of hidden guilt in the process.

Set after the event of ‘I Stand Here Right Beside You’ and ‘Tome tug’yc’

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─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

          Obi-wan’s home was cozy. And most certainly not made for three people. Cody and Obi-wan had turned the small basement into their bedroom, giving the old upstairs bedroom to Luke. Still, they were constantly running into each other. Having Cody’s vod’e, Leia, and Ahsoka visit only exasperated the issue. Plus, Obi-wan didn’t have enough evaporators to make enough water for three people to use. And, of course, Luke was a teenage boy and needed his privacy. All in all, their current living situation was bound to end in disaster. So, Cody and Obi-wan had their heads bent over the coffee table.

           “I don’t think we have enough credits to build any addition,” Cody said. “And you would be the only one able to work to get more. Luke and I are too recognizable, especially to the Imperials.”

           Obi-wan stroked his beard. “Yes, and there isn’t much room for more additions on this plateau anyway.”

           “A temporary solution would be to get another water evaporator, but that also has the same credit issue.” Cody was getting a little frustrated. Who would’ve guessed that he had an easier time planning battles than home renovations?

           “The Jawas would likely be cheaper, but the quality might be an issue,” Obi-wan mused. Cody grimaced at the thought of the furry little beasts. Obi-wan chuckled. “Or not. Besides, they likely would only have bits and pieces.”

           “Would give Luke something to do,” Cody said, smiling as he thought of his energetic teen. It was nice seeing Luke be able to express himself and not have to hold a decorum nearly everywhere. “But we’d still have space issues.”

           “We could always move,” Obi-wan suggested after a moment.

           Cody sighed. That would be the simplest solution. “That still has the credits issue. Plus, we’d have to find someone willing to sell to us without asking for ID, and it couldn’t be in any settlement.”

           Life as fugitives was so difficult, Cody lamented to himself. Once again, Cody missed the simplicity of war. Thought, he thought as he gazed adoringly at Obi-wan, this way of life had its benefits.

           “What if there was an abandoned homestead that was in decent condition?” Obi-wan asked in the tone of voice, signaling it was more than just an offhanded question. “Perhaps even an old moisture farm.”

           “That would work,” Cody said slowly. Obi-wan was frowning at the table. “Do you happen to know where one is?”

           Obi-wan sighed, still looking away. “Yes. In the Jundland Wastes.”

           Cody shuffled closer to his riduur. “Obi-wan?” Obi-wan hummed. “What is it?”

           Obi-wan’s hands were fidgeting nervously in his lap. Cody gently grabbed his hands, holding them in his own. Obi-wan took in a breath, releasing it in a sigh. “It is the Lars homestead.”

           Lars? That sounded vaguely familiar. Cody racked his brain, trying to figure out where he’d heard that name before. Perhaps it was somebody Obi-wan had mentioned in passing. Cody didn’t know anyone on Tatooine except one or two vendors in Anchorhead that were friendly enough. They were both older women who seemed to adore the fact that Cody would brave shopping on the occasion that Obi-wan wasn’t up to it. Obi-wan said they had crushes on him. Cody disagreed, mainly because the thought made him a little creeped out.

           “Lars?” Cody asked after he was unable to come up with the connection. “Old friends of yours?”

           Obi-wan grimaced. “Not quite. They are- they were Luke’s aunt and uncle.”

           Oh shit. Now that Cody thought on it, he did remember reading something about moisture farmers in Luke’s file. And he definitely remembered the occasion when Luke, while missing his aunt and uncle, declared Cody his aliit and called him buir for the first time. Cody had always meant to follow up and see what had become of Beru and Owen, so he could tell Luke when he was older. But Cody had forgotten, and Luke had never brought them up again.

           Cody mentally said a small apology to the Lars family. To let a loved one’s memory be forgotten was a shameful thing between the Vod’e.

           “Ah, right,” Cody said. He did a quick mental subtraction. “It’s been over a decade, though; how good of a condition could their farm be in?” Obi-wan was fidgeting with his hands again. “Cyare, what is it? You can tell me.”

           “I have, well, it didn’t seem right to let their home fall into disrepair when it was my fault they-“ Obi-wan cut himself off with a deep inhale. The exhale was shaky, and Cody could see the self-loathing and tears in his riduur’s eyes.

           Cody pulled Obi-wan into a hug, securely wrapping his arms around his riduur and resting their heads together.

           “What happened to them was not your fault, cyare, Cody muttered. “I imagine they knew the risks of taking Luke in.”

           “I was meant to protect him,” Obi-wan whimpered. “I was only in town for a few hours, but when I came back to check on them, their home had been ransacked, and they, they were-“ Obi-wan let out a sob and collapsed into Cody’s chest. “I wasn’t there in time to save them.”

           Cody had a feeling this wasn’t just about the Lars anymore, but he filed that away for another time. Cody tubbed Obi-wan’s back and pressed a kiss to the top of his head.

           “There was nothing more you could’ve done,” Cody muttered. “It was not your fault.”

           “Buir?” Luke called from his room. Cody heard him approaching. “O’buir, what’s wrong?”

           Luke stopped short when he entered the room and saw Cody cradling Obi-wan. Obi-wan sniffed and sat up, trying to rub away the tears on his face. Cody held onto Obi-wan tightly, not letting his riduur move far.

           “Nothing is wrong, dear one,” Obi-wan said with a fake smile.

           “You’re crying!” Luke exclaimed, rushing over to Obi-wan. Cody shuffled over so there was room on Obi-wan’s other side for Luke to sit. Luke stopped in front of the couch; hands held out awkwardly in front of him. “Wha- what happened? Are you ok?”

           Obi-wan reached out and grabbed one of Luke’s hands with his own. “Yes, I am. Just remembering old hurts.”

           Luke frowned, perceptive as ever. “There’s more to that. You can tell me I’m not an ad’ika anymore.”

           “You will always be an ad’ika,” Cody chimed in, releasing Obi-wan so he could sit up fully. “Our ad’ika.”          

           Luke huffed and pouted, even if he would deny doing so. Obi-wan gently pulled Luke so he sat and was squished between Cody and Obi-wan.

           “You’re deflecting,” Luke muttered. Cody chuckled and wrapped an arm around Luke.

           “I’m just reminding you of your place,” Cody teased before humming. “O’buir might be deflecting.”

           Obi-wan sighed as Luke turned to glare at him. But his riduur was smiling again, so Cody counted as a win. “I wouldn’t call it deflecting as much as a tactical redirect.”

           Luke scoffed. “Just tell me what is wrong. I want to help.”

           Obi-wan softened and placed a kiss on Luke’s temple. “I know you do, dear. It is just- well, I have gone over a decade repressing it and to say it out loud hurts as if it just happened.”

           Luke was frowning and shuffling into Obi-wan. Cody’s heart warmed at the kindness his ad was displaying. “I- ok. Can you tell me what you guys were talking about before, then?”

           “We’re thinking about moving,” Cody said, groaning as he shifted to be more comfortable on their small couch. “We’re a bit short on room here.”

           “I don’t mind,” Luke responded, looking around their home. “Do we have to move?”

           “We don’t have to move, but I believe in the future you will want more personal space,” Obi-wan told Luke gently. Luke clearly didn’t like the idea of moving their home, having become attached to the space. Cody remembered the first time they stayed in their room on the Imperial Center; Luke cried himself to sleep because he wanted to go back to the Executor.

           “And we could use more evaporators, but we don’t have room for that here,” Cody added, knowing that Luke would have a harder time disagreeing with that.

           Luke stammered as he tried to come up with a counterpoint that wasn’t “I don’t want to,” and eventually gave up with a huffed. Instead, he asked, “Fine. Ok. Do you have an idea where to go? It’s not like we can just get a house in any city.”

           Cody shot Obi-wan a look. Obi-wan frowned but nodded. Looking back at his ad, Cody gently said, “There is an old moisture farm in that Jundland Wastes. The old owners- week they don’t live there anymore,”

           Luke’s eyes narrowed, annoyingly perceptive. Cody would’ve been annoyed at that if it hadn’t been his fault for teaching Luke to be perceptive. At least he could take pride in knowing that Luke listened to him.

           “And?” Luke asked. “There’s more to it.”

           Obi-wan sighed, and Cody could see the years weighing on his riduur. “It used to be the Lars homestead. It is where you grew up before-”

           Obi-wan cut himself off, looking to the side in a feeble attempt to hide his watering eyes. Cody’s gaze darted between Luke and Obi-wan, and an uneasy silence settled in the room.

           “Oh.” Luke’s quiet sound broke the silence.

           “Yes. I kept it in good condition, perhaps in some feeble hope they, and you, would return,” Obi-wan admitted weakly.

           “And I did,” Luke declared, gaining the glint in his eye that meant he was on a roll. Cody was content to sit back and watch his ad’ika pull Obi-wan out of his self-induced misery. “So it wasn’t just a feeble hope. Like you said, O’buir, ‘there are no coincidences-“

           “’Just the will of the Force,’” Obi-wan finished with a small smile. He looked at Cody with a fond glance. “Why is it that children only listen to me just to quote my teaching back at me?”

           Cody shrugged and remembered all of the mocking ‘this lightsaber is your life’ he listened to during the war. “At least they listen.”

           Luke lightly kicked Cody’s shin. “Anyways-“ Luke stressed. “If the home is there, we might as well use it, right? It’d be wasteful not to.”

           “Are you sure?” Obi-wan asked. “I don’t want you to have to deal with any unpleasant memories.”

           “O’buir, I don’t remember much from when I was younger,” Luke admitted. “It’s just feelings mostly- the majority of which are good ones. I’ll be ok. Will, uh, will you be ok?”

           Obi-wan smiled slightly and stroked a hand down Luke’s hair. “I think with you two at my side, I will be.”

           “Well then,” Cody said, leaning his weight into Luke, so he was fully squished between the two adults. Cody took a second to revel in Luke’s laughter. “It’s a good thing we’re not planning on leaving.”

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

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Mando’s Translations:

riduur- spouse Cyare- beloved O'biur- buir is parent. O'buir denotes that Luke is addressing Obi-wan. ad'ika- child, affectionate

[ywwwniee]

who even am i

I did some reflecting the other day while watching a YouTube video about how to converse better—don't get me started on why I was watching that type of video—and I realized I haven't really been embracing my authenticity because (for some reason) I've devalued myself as a person over the years, so why would I embrace myself...you know? During the summer, I was going to therapy and I talked about my (and the rest of Gen Z's) obsession with being "mysterious". It's some type of phenomenon specific to Gen Z IMO because nobody who's part of a later generation is constantly self-conscious about running their mouth too much. I think our obsession with being secretive and elusive is a direct result of having direct access to others, both as someone sharing (often oversharing) and as someone consuming. Anyway, I've developed this obsession with presenting only a curated version of myself to people I interact with, given that they don't know me well, over time. I think it's in my nature to share a lot of my thoughts, have conversations that jump all over the place, and be quite energetic, but I gradually wanted to become the opposite of that more and more as I matured. I've definitely muted myself a lot since middle school, which is as far as I can remember. Now, whenever I meet new people, I try as hard as I can to resist every urge to "be random" (as countless people have described me) and just be normal and quiet like everybody else. I don't think I've ever left a conversation or interaction, however, feeling like I successfully did that. I always feel like I've talked too much and said too many weird things or shared too many random thoughts. Conversations also feel really awkward for me because I'm so focused on presenting myself in a certain manner and controlling the way I'm perceived that I completely forget to focus on the other person and actually take interest in who they are and what they're sharing. Whenever I ask somebody a question, for example, it's probably not because I actually want to hear the answer, but rather because I want that question to give the impression that I'm a "really good listener" which defeats the whole purpose! After reflecting, I realized that the root of this problem lies in the fact that I don't like who I am now and, frankly, don't know myself very well either. On one hand, when I talk to people I don't know well, I get in my head about how they see me and what they think of me. On the other hand, if I'm confident in myself and who I am then that'll be less of an issue for me, and I'll be able to devote my attention to the other person. This perception that I cannot be my whole self without imposing on the space others can and should take up is so detrimental to my ability to connect, and getting so wrapped up in trying to be someone I'm not will do more harm than good. I'm entering a new season, both literally and personally in my life, and with it I welcome growth and my authenticity. If people don't mess with who I am then that's not for me to worry about!

[titoist]

i've been trying for so long to explain the mania but even after all this time it's just something that feels so impossible, so self-evident that words simply fail. grammar ceases making sense. it feels like something so fundamental that it would be cruel & unusual to expect a sensical explanation out of anyone, like it would amount only to demanding them to carve out their own insides & howl meaninglessly. because of it, i nurture an anger towards language. but i will write down the following thought anyway in hope that it's only the arbitrary vehicle for a relief that will come by anyway; that will come by inevitably. if nothing else it is an aspect of the mania, & through description i am slowly assembling it's taxonomy.

i think something so important is the act of getting lost in another person. what i mean is love, what i mean is wonder. getting lost is necessarily constructive. you take the objects that compose their being, & litter your own table with them. you are not actually lost at all, because you are where you were supposed to be the entire time. i can't elaborate on this. the past 3 years have been for absolutely nothing, they turn to dust against the solid wall of this reality. the project of my writing is a failure; i am a failure. i can only accept this and continue

there are people for whom getting lost in seems like a distinct possibility. yes, there are. they are full of things to get lost in. they are machines that constantly create objects. they are engines of matter. it is dizzying. they hold themselves in their arms. this, their thoughts, their past. holding parts of somebody when you love them is transcendental. i hold no self-awareness about using the adjective 'transcendental', i don't care if it sounds dramatic. it is essential. people couldn't survive without it

the point

i constantly ask myself whether someone could get lost inside of me. whether it is possible. and not in the cloying emotional sense where someone might insecurely ask themselves if they are 'unlovable', this is independent of romantic love, i mean: is there enough of me for somebody to get lost in? physically, would they be able to? whether they would feel compelled to isn't the right question to ask, since possibility is enough to guarantee it's happening. would there be enough of myself expressed & collated into objects for them to sate themselves? are the objects carved neatly enough for comprehension? i take the objects of others & curiously reverse-engineer them for answers. i really don't know. i ultimately feel like a paper-thin sliding door. i do not feel multi-dimensional, like i am developed enough for the world contains my traces. on the best days i tell myself that i was born empty, yes, but that i don't have to die that way. but it doesn't feel like something that can be learned. i don't care if this doesn't make sense to you

[girltomboy]

Tonight's movie was M3gan, finally. It had been on my watchlist ever since it was first announced; in fact it was the very first movie I put on my watchlist in my notes app. And once it got released I only saw praise and good reviews for it, so I've been extremely curious to watch it.

Altogether it was a good movie, but I wasn't really blown away by it, it's probably because I'm unimpressed by sci-fi in general. What I mean by this is that it was highly enjoyable but not scary - I did expect it to be scarier, but I suppose the threat of murderous technology is chilling enough without additional horror. It did address some relevant themes, such as trauma, loss, children's relationship with technology, and of course artificial intelligence. We always hear AI will replace this and that, but this movie asks if it will ever replace something only humans are capable of. Interpersonal relationships based on empathy and love. I recognized Gemma from Get Out (because I watched it last week lol) and I also liked M3gan's design; not too robot-like but not hyperrealistic either. The acting was a bit off here and there but I won't be overly critical of that because it's the movie that it is.

I also liked the question mark it put next to the concepts of profit and innovation. It pretty much outed them, as well as capitalism overall, as soulless and devoid of empathy. Exploitative, sterile, and cold-blooded. I think that was the main bad guy in the whole movie: profit-driven capitalism. M3gan was just a robot after all, no concept of right or wrong, created precisely to satisfy a market constantly on the hunt for innovation, something fresh, new, different, more expensive. In fairness, Gemma's boss didn't get to find out that there was something wrong with M3gan, but even if he had, I personally imagine he would've pushed the release anyway, for the sake of all the people that had already gathered. Moreover, Gemma's overwhelming deadlines were the main reason for the distance between her and Cady. That, and technology.

The ending was really satisfying too. M3gan identified Cady as trusting of her, while Cady was bluffing and about to introduce her to Bruce. People are often bad at reading others' emotions too, you would think a robot would be better at pinpointing somebody's real intentions/ feelings? Too soon, maybe. Or maybe she read Cady's face just fine, because she was confident that she'd take M3gan down with the other robot. In the end, Gemma's home robot, Elsie, turns on by itself. It could be that M3gan transplanted her own data into Elsie, since it was unresponsive when Gemma called for the hall light. That she became able to control Elsie, or to become Elsie. Or, it could be that Elsie itself had its own awakening and got M3ganified in the meantime. But does it even need to be like M3gan in order to be evil?

[twenytwenytwo]

Dec 14 2022 (6:15pm)

I want to live my life in a fashion that’s enthusiastic and unhesitating, full of passion and fun, and is just full and whole. I’m afraid of living any other way because I’m afraid of looking back on life and feeling like I wasted my chance to do what was worthwhile.

Funny enough, it’s the decision that living like X is worthwhile is what would cause me negative feelings in the future. It’s like I’ve vowed to torment myself if I don’t live a colourful life. I’m afraid of judgement from my future self… the self who has less time, less inhibition, less fucks to give because time has taken them. I’ve created this very judgemental, unforgiving, and frankly exhaustingly unreasonable… superego? that is constantly judging me.

What if I didn’t care? What if I lived a normal modest life; job, house, wife, kids, weekend fun, vacation, etc, and my future self didn’t mind or really care at all. What if it just said, “that’s life, good job”? What if I did an average job, lived an average life, and it’s okay. Not just okay, but good?

I vaguely remember as a kid being stressed out about underperforming, or not doing so good that my mom would be impressed. I had to do better than good. I had to do great, at least. I remember our report cards in elementary school; 4’s were the best. If I got 4’s all the way down, I could relax. Once I saw the 3’s, it was a sign that something might be wrong. If I saw a 2 (not sure that ever happened), that’d be it.

So, that may have been the beginning of me only being able to relax if I’m overachieving. If I’m doing great, not just good.

Doing great made me stand out from the crowd. Doing good just kept me out of the troubled kids crowd.

Doing great made me feel like somebody worth talking to, or thinking about, or considering in the most basic way. It made me feel like I had a positive existence.

Just being good just felt like nothing. Being great felt like something.

Being great, amazing made me feel safe in society, like I wouldn’t be forgotten about, or lost in the crowd. Yeah, it made me feel safe and certain.

As I progressed through life, I remember avoiding doing things that I wasn’t the best at. Baseball. Sprinting. I was a fast kid, but as soon as I encountered kids that were faster, I quit. I made excuses to stop. I found something else.

Then I found music. These rockstars were idolized. They were great. I liked that. They were huge and distinguished. People loved them.

I got good at guitar. Years went by and I started Zilch. We were great. That filled me, it completed me. It was perfect. The rest of the story is easy to figure out.

I could not imagine not being exceptionally good at something. I don’t know what I would be, who I would be, what I would do… it’s strange what a large part of my personality that seems to make.

I can’t stand being okay at anything, or being mediocre, or being seen as sub-par in anyway at all. I’ve got to be smart, socially adept, handsome, unique… so many things I do… just to stand out from the crowd… just because being good wasn’t good enough.

I should balance this out by acknowledging how susceptible any ordinary human is to this. Better at something than someone else? Boom, you like that thing more. Vice versa. What is it about me that seems to be particularly sensitive and aware of those things?

Perhaps I’m naturally good at learning things, but also particularly insecure about myself?

What if I was an ordinary guy with a short hair cut, a job at the mill who drive a truck? I’d likely just find something else to be particular about. Money. biggest truck, biggest muscles?

What am I without being great? What I am without my guitar? I guess that was the question I got asked this past year, the one I’ve been working on lately.

I guess I’m just a guy who likes to have fun, likes art and beauty, likes hanging out with friends, who likes boobs and pretty girls, beautiful places, hanging out in the sun, complex ideas, philosophy, nice clothes…

I would really love to be free from the insecurity toward being “mediocre”. Mediocre isn’t inherently bad, it’s bad if you think it’s bad. Mediocre can be peaceful, simple, minimalistic, sufficient, non-excessive, elegant. Mediocre can be sitting on the couch, going for a walk, taking a shower. Mediocre can be relaxing and normal, mediocre can be low-stress. If those things — by some higher standard — can be considered mediocre… I like mediocre.

So, relating this back to me. I don’t need to do everything great, amazingly in order to be happy. There is enough happiness, satisfaction, fun, meaning, laughs, friends, for those who are just good. Good is good. Good is plenty.

Another aspect of being great, was this sort of peacocking I would do in order to kinda butter people up to being friends, and being pleasant around me/toward me. It’s likely a feedback loop sort of thing. This made it so I felt like I didn’t need to earn people liking toward me which… is obviously not superb long term because that’s important. Feeling like people like you from the get-go makes it so you don’t put in enough work into the relationships. This is another thing I’ve learned this year and am working on.

Being very caring and mindful with my relationships, and myself is a big goal for me in life. That would be an amazing life achievement, to really take care of the people around you, and build a strong healthy community of great friends and people.

So, to summarize: performing decent, okay, average in life is perfectly good, totally fun, is full of colour and passion, and is worthwhile. You need not be afraid of not doing amazing at everything you do. Pick a few important things to do amazingly, do the rest good, do it with love, you need not break records.

You don’t need to stand out in order for people to like you, to see good in you, to appreciate and admire you, to love you. You’re enough as you are, you’re worth being friends with, you’re worth chatting up, you’re worth hanging out with, you’re fun and nice and interesting. You’re cool enough, even when you’re not that cool.

[wicked-mind]

Once More With Feeling

Summary: When Steve brings an enhanced human with the ability to sense and manipulate emotions/feelings to join the team, she has an immediate interest in the puzzle known as James Bucky Barnes. And Bucky can’t help but be infatuated with her abilities and eventually her.

Word Count: 7.8k

Warnings: Swearing, drinking, mentions of torture.

Italics are used for flashbacks/memories.

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As always, any likes, comments, or reblogs are deeply appreciated (:

*gifs not mine

“Who’s that?” Y/N asked Sam with a smile, nodding over towards the man sitting on the patio with a beer bottle in his hand, staring off into the distance with a grim look on his features. He wore a black leather jacket that was zipped up to the collar, dark pants, boots tied perfectly, and black gloves on his hands.

“Ah that’s James. His friends get to call him Bucky.” Sam told her, tucking his hands in his pocket, “It’s a very exclusive group though. Consists of just Steve.”

Y/N looked up at Sam, raising an eyebrow, “Is that a bit of… can I call it annoyed jealousy?” She asks with a teasing smile, nudging him with her shoulder slightly, “What, you jealous you’re not Cap’s bestie or annoyed that James won’t let you be his?”

Sam looked down at her shaking his head, “Can you not do the whole reading thing right now?” He asked with a small chuckle escaping his lips.

“Sorry, it’s just radiating off of you.” Y/N said with a small laugh before looking back out the glass door to the man referred to as James sat alone, “I’m going to go talk to him.”

Sam raised his eyebrows at her, “Good luck with that, Y/N. He’s a man of little to no words. Or emotions. He also doesn’t blink very much.”

Y/N was already headed towards the door with a small smile on her lips, turning her head over her shoulder to look at Sam, “That’s alright. I love staring contests.” She told him before walking out the glass door, shutting it behind her. Y/N walked over to the small metal table Bucky was sitting at, plopping herself on the chair across from him silently. She allowed her eyes to study him. He had longer hair, almost brushing his shoulders. There was stubble covering his cheeks and chin and he constantly looked like he was deep in thought, so much so in fact that little crease between his furrowed eyebrows could be permanent. She didn’t say anything, just sat silently in the chair as she stared into his eyes.

Bucky watched the woman. He had heard they were getting a new team member but didn’t bother to get to know much about her. It was somebody Steve had found and thought could be useful to the team but he didn’t know much more than that. He looked her over as she sat, she was wearing a long sleeved black shirt with blue jeans and combat boots. He was curious about the red leather gloves she wore though, he’d never really seen anybody else besides him wearing gloves constantly. He stared into her eyes, watching her closely. What was she doing? Why did she come to sit by him when there were so many other places to be? Bucky had came out here to be alone as he always did. He liked to be alone, in his own personal bubble lost in his thoughts. There was something about sitting outside alone and night where he felt peace. Maybe being under the stairs with the breeze on his face reminded him of his time in Wakanda, he didn’t know what it was but it was his favorite moment of the day. And now there was this new team member just staring at him. When her eyebrow twitched upwards slightly as if to challenge him, he narrowed his blue eyes at her and placed the beer bottle on the table never breaking eye contact. Bucky places his gloved hands on the table intertwined and leans slightly forward, staring, almost glaring, into her eyes. But the more he just stared the more he felt… what was that? Comfort? His irritation was fading away as he stared into those eyes, almost feeling lost and mesmerized in them at this point. Once he couldn’t take the staring anymore he sighs and leans back in his chair, looking away from her and out into the distance again, “What are you doing?”

Steve had found Y/N after she accidentally helped on a mission. She had a special ability that he thought could be very useful not only on missions but just in general so he asked her to join the team or at least give it a try. Y/N had agreed and now here she was, across from the dark haired, constantly in pain looking man having a staring contest. She knew exactly what she was doing. Her ability consisted of being able to read emotions and feelings of those around her and also manipulate them if she touched them, hence why she wore the gloves. She never wanted to touch someone and manipulate their feelings without their consent because she believed everybody was entitled to how they feel and there were reasons people felt the way they do. But that all broke off when Steve offered her the job. She would be helpful on missions, being able to get enemies to cooperate with the good guys instead of being all nasty and evil. Y/N could feel the pain, the anger, the lostness but she could see that plain as day in his eyes. When he broke the staring off and asked the question, she leaned back in the chair, “Did you know there’s multiple studies that show that staring into someone’s eyes can show their true intentions to you and show if you can trust them? They also say eyes are the window to the soul, able to process other’s emotions and what they’re feeling deep inside.”

Bucky’s lips curved slightly downwards at her words. She had stared at him to get information about him, was that it? He took a sip of his beer and looked back over to her, “You could’ve just asked instead of treating me like a study. I’ve had enough of that for one lifetime.” He spat out at her but almost immediately felt bad. She wasn’t wrong, he stared into her eyes and saw nothing but openness. Even now she was being open with him, truthful. God dammit, all it took was a damn staring contest for him to have a spark of trust for her, “Who are you anyway?”

“I’m Y/N.” She told him, a small smile curving to her lips, “I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings.” She said as she stared into his eyes, letting him know she was truly sorry if she offended him, “Sam said you like to stare and I’m pretty kick-ass at staring contests. Couldn’t help myself.”

Bucky narrowed his eyes slightly again at her as she apologized to him, then looks away again as he took another sip of his beer, letting out a slight sigh, “So you’re the one Steve brought back. Why would he do that?” He said almost coldly thought he didn’t mean for it to come across that way.

Y/N shrugs, “He thought I could be helpful here and on certain missions given my abilities.” She told him, watching him even though he wasn’t looking at her.

“And what are your abilities?” Bucky asked, looking over towards her curiously before looking down to her gloved hands, “Are you missing an arm too? Did he think we could bond about it?”

Y/N almost chuckled at his words then shook her head at him with a small smile, “No, I have both arms in tact. Which now would be a good time to tell you I’m sorry about yours, must’ve been a big loss that I’m sure you’re still dealing with everyday.” She watched as Bucky looked at her almost shocked for a slight second at her words. She figured nobody must’ve told him they were sorry for what happened to his arm, or acknowledge the loss he still felt of his left arm even though it had been replaced with a vibranium arm, “I like to call myself a reader. I can sense the emotions and feelings of those around me and if I touch you, I can manipulate those feelings. For example, I can make someone feel more cooperative with a single touch. I can provide happiness. Love. There is the darker side to it though. I can also make people feel pain, feel like their drowning, feel like they’re on fire or in the deepest pit of despair.” She said, looking down at her gloved hands, “Sometimes when I touch people, I can’t help but try and make them feel better. Touching people lets me feel their emotions more personally than just sensing them. It’s an automatic response to try and help fix it but I believe that everybody has a reason for feeling how they do and they can choose need to sort through their own emotions on their own.”

Bucky swallowed hard at her words. Only one question came into his mind of her and he was halfway worried to ask it. As if she knew he was dancing around the question, she smiled over to him encouragingly and the question just sort of slipped out, “Can you make someone feel relief? Feel…. less guilty?”

Y/N bit her lip at his question, watching him for a moment before pulling off one of her red gloves and setting her hand in the middle of the table outstretched towards him, palm face up to give him the choice to touch her.

Bucky looked down at her hand, hesitating whether he should touch her or not but curiosity got the best of him. He wanted to feel some sort of relief. Sure, he had made all his amends in the notebook but that didn’t mean he felt any sort of relief, any sort of happiness or hope. He slowly took the glove off of his right flesh hand, reaching out and hovering his hand over her’s for a moment before looking into her eyes and resting his fingertips into her palm. Immediately at the touch of her skin, a slow sense of relief filled his body and he closed his eyes at the feeling. He tilted his head back slightly and his lips parted the smallest bit at the feeling he had longed to feel. It was relief and hope with no guilt anywhere in his body or mind. He wanted to stay like this forever, keep this feeling inside him even if it wasn’t truly real. He didn’t notice his hand had moved to hold her’s, gripping tightly not wanting to let go. After a few minutes, he opened his eyes to look down at their hands and quickly pulled away, “I’m sorry.. for lingering… I shouldn’t have…”

Y/N shook her head at him, pulling her hand back and putting the glove back on, “Don’t worry about it, I’m happy to help anytime you need it. I’ll help you until you don’t need me to feel relief, hope. Although, if you do come to me to for help, you do have to teach me some self defense. I pretty much know nothing and Steve says you know everything about it.”

Bucky’s lips twitched into a small smile and he nodded slowly, “Alright. You have a deal.”

Bucky stood outside the landing pad, his arms crossed as he watched the quinjet touch down. There had been a new organization that had made themselves known called the Peace Keepers. They had a mission to capture all known people with any type of superhuman abilities or those they deemed posed a threat to the rest of the ‘normal’ population. They were ruthless, kidnapping any type of enhanced human and either making an example out of them or the person was never seen again. They didn’t have very many leads so when Steve got word that a local police department in Seattle had captured one of the Peace Keepers, he immediately took Y/N and Sam with him to try and confront him. Bucky always worried when Y/N went on missions even though he had trained her well in offense and defense, she was still a human and could get hurt easily. As the quinjet bay doors opened, Bucky’s arms uncrossed at the sight. Sam and Steve were walking out shaking their heads at each other with grim looks on their faces. Bucky immediately started walking towards them at a brisk pace, his eyes scanning for any sign of Y/N. When he didn’t see her, he looked to Steve, “Where is she? What happened?” But the look in Steve’s eyes was all he needed to confirm the fear he had.

Steve sighed and shook his head slightly, a defeated look written all over his face, “It was a set up, Buck. I’m sorry, the Peace Keepers took her.”

It’s been a few months since Bucky met Y/N. He hated to admit it but he liked being around her. She could sense his emotions and knew when he just needed to sit in silence or when he needed to talk and it was comforting to know someone had some sort of understanding of what he was going through. She helped him whenever he needed whether it be someone to talk to, to sit with, or even using her ability to help him when he was feeling the worst. Y/N seemed so pure to him, like a ray of sunshine in the dark world that surrounded him. He always felt at his best when she was in his presence even if she wasn’t using her ability. He loved training with her, even if he was a little tough on her at times she never held it against him. She was a quick learner and even asked him to teach her some knife tricks after he showed her his extensive knife collection.

Tonight was a bad night for Bucky though. Every time he closed his eyes the nightmares of the Winter Soldier took over his mind. He was waking up what seemed like every ten minutes dripping in sweat and he could feel himself slowly breaking due to the lack of sleep and anxiety that riddled his body. He pulled himself out of his bed, pulling on some grey sweatpants and a black t-shirt before walking out of his room. It was early in the morning hours and he thought nobody would be up, but as if Y/N knew he needed some help, she was sitting outside where they usually sat every night waiting for him with a twelve pack of beer sitting on the table. Bucky couldn’t help but smile a little at the sight before taking a seat in the chair next to her, grabbing a beer and opening it before taking a long swig, “You waiting for me?” He asks her after putting the bottle back on the table. He had never seen so much skin exposed on her. She was wearing a tank top, no gloves, and long black pajama pants with red roses on them. He had never seen her arms before and just now he noticed she had small tattoos littering both arms, but they weren’t so much a sleeve as just randomly placed across her skin like she just closed her eyes and picked a spot.

Y/N shrugs over to him, taking a sip of her already open beer, “I figured I’d meet you out here eventually. I’m three beers in, Barnes. You got some catching up to do.”

“Bucky.” He said to her and when she looked at him sort of confused he quickly added, “Call me Bucky, that’s what I meant.”

Y/N smiles and nods, “Alright, Bucky. Does this mean I’m part of the super exclusive Bucky Barnes friend group?”

“That sounds like something Sam told you.” Bucky responds with a small smile, bringing the bottle up to his lips again for a drink.

“Oh yeah, he very much told me that.” She responded with a soft laugh, “But I am extremely honored to be accepted into the group.”

Bucky chuckles over to her, finishing the rest of his beer and setting the empty bottle on the table before grabbing another one, “One down, two to go.” He told her, cracking open the next bottle. His eyes lingered over her tattoos, wondering what they all meant to her, “I didn’t know you had tattoos.”

Y/N shrugs slightly, looking down at her own arms at the scattered ink, “Oh yeah, I mostly keep them covered up so nobody accidentally brushes my skin and gets feelings they aren’t ready to feel.”

Bucky nods, “What do they mean to you?” He asks curiously, wanting to know more about her.

Y/N looks down and points at three butterflies that were placed above her wrist, looking like they were flying up her arms, “This one reminds me that I’m free.” She moves to point to another one that was a purple iris with a date in the stem, “This is for my mom. She passed away from cancer a few years ago. She was the only one that loved me unconditionally.” She moved to one that was just the number thirteen in a fancy font, “This is my lucky number.” She looked at her other arm and pointed to a small yellow sunflower, “My favorite flower. My mom used to send me to pick wild sunflowers when my dad was home. He wasn’t a very good man.” Her eyes flickered to Bucky who was nodding each time she explained, entranced with her tattooed skin so she continued, pointing to one that looked like a human heart, “This one is to remember to wear my heart on my sleeve because I’m cheesy like that. I have a lot more but they’re all covered up right now.”

Bucky nodded, slightly smiling at the last one before noticing one she hadn’t pointed out yet. It was in the crook of her elbow where someone would put an IV but it had the red cursive words ‘fuck you’ around a large circular scar, “And that one?” He asks, pointing towards it and raising an eyebrow. All her other tattoos were cute but this one had a curse word plastered right on her skin.

Y/N looked down at it, biting her lip gently before looking up towards him and taking a sip of her beer before she spoke, “That one is for my dad. Like I said, he wasn’t a good man. He put out a cigar there, hence the scar and I decided to tattoo fuck you on it.” She said, and even though the story of her childhood wasn’t one she liked to share, she would always be honest with Bucky. Her father was a very abusive man and eventually the abuse went from only on her mother to her until she and her mom ran away to get away from him.

Bucky looked at her sadly for a moment, wondering what her childhood was like. Her father sounded evil from the bits she shared, but yet here she was all sunshine and smiles through her pain. He felt a small bit of jealousy for the way she was able to handle trauma, but mostly just sadness for her and a need to protect her from those things, “I’m sorry, Y/N.”

Y/N shrugs at him, “It’s alright. It’s a part of me that made me who I am even if it is a dark and twisted part. I like who I am now, and even if I don’t like how I got here, the best I can do is keep moving forward.” She watched him for a moment before tilting her head, “So what has you coming out here at this hour looking for me?”

Bucky swallowed dryly, bringing his beer bottle up to his lips and taking a long drink before answering her, “Nightmares have been bad tonight.” He said quietly, almost as if ashamed to seem weak as he looked down at his ungloved hands, “Every time I get to sleep I just see him. The things he did. I didn’t want to bother you so I was coming out here to find some peace.” He looked over to her, “But here you are, waiting for me.”

Y/N smiled gently over to him, reaching her hand across the table for him to touch if he’d like. As she watched him reach out his flesh hand to touch her’s, she pulled back a little, “Answer me this first, Bucky.” She said, “How are you feeling right now?”

Bucky’s brow furrowed at her words, blinking a little as he thought about it. How did he feel? Certainly better than when he first trudged out here. Talking to Y/N calmed him, just being in her presence made the anxiety and panic he felt in his body melt away. He slowly looked at her, “I feel… Better.”

“No, Bucky.” Y/N told him, shaking her head gently, “I know exactly what you feel, remember? You feel relieved. You feel hopeful. All on your own without needing my touch.” She said with a smile over towards him, watching his lips curve into a small smile at her words, “My ability may be a quick cheat to getting you what you need to feel, but what is even better is when you can feel that all by yourself without my touch.”

“I like your touch though.” Bucky blurted out before flinching at his own words.God he must’ve sounded like an idiot, “I… uhm…” He said, scanning his brain for anyway to cover that up.

Y/N chuckles and smiles at him, reaching over and taking his hand in her’s, “That’s alright. I like your touch too.” She said, “We’ve done this enough times I’ve figured out how to keep myself from messing with your emotions when I touch you. So whatever you’re feeling right now, that’s all you buddy. You’re stronger than you know.”

Bucky smiled over at her, immediately feeling something at her touch. He didn’t know what it was but he believed her when she said he wasn’t toying with his emotions at her touch. He felt warm but his stomach was also twisting. No, not twisting. He didn’t know what the feeling in his stomach was, but all he knew was that he liked it. Could this be happiness he was feeling? Happiness that wasn’t given to him by her ability, but by the way she spoke to him and touched him.

Bucky immediately lost his temper, punching his vibranium arm into a wall that easily collapsed around it and formed a large hole. Y/N had been taken. His safe place had been taken from him. He should’ve gone with them on the mission, he had tried but Steve told him they had it handled. He felt lost in guilt and anger, wondering if Y/N was one of the bodies they would find days later or if she was going to be one of the enhanced humans that were taken only to never be seen again.

“We’ll get her back,” Sam said, placing a comforting hand on Bucky’s shoulder which was quickly shrugged away, “I got redwing trying to track down the trucks they escaped in.”

Bucky turned to look at Sam, an angry vein popping out of his neck, “Oh, we are just going to rely on your stupid little mechanical bird then? Hope that it can figure shit out?”

“Calm down, Buck.” Steve said, folding his arms across his chest and stepping to stand between the two, “It’s not his fault, he’s trying to help.”

“No, you’re right Steve.” Bucky said, turning his angry glare to his best friend, “It’s yours. If you would’ve just let me come maybe none of this would’ve happened. I wouldn’t have let them take her. I would’ve protected her.”

Steve raised an eyebrow at Bucky at his choice of words, looking at Sam and giving him a nod as if to tell him that they needed a minute. Once Sam was out of earshot, he turned his attention back to Bucky, “We didn’t let her get taken. We were ambushed. It was a set up, Buck.” He said sternly, “What’s gotten into you?” His gaze softened a little bit at the look in Bucky’s eyes, “She has, hasn’t she?”

Bucky looked around, anywhere but meeting Steve’s gaze because he was right. He had developed feelings for Y/N and now that she was out of his grasp, taken away from him he was realizing everything he felt for her. It wasn’t just friendship. The night he talked to her when she showed him her tattoos and held his hand that feeling in his stomach was butterflies, a crush forming and he didn’t get the chance to tell her. Now he didn’t know if he would see her again, “She has, Steve…” Bucky finally softly said, “She’s like an angel that just came into my life and showed me how to process through things. Showed me what it’s like to have hope, happiness. Relief.” His flesh hand came up to run through his long hair, “And now she’s gone, taken. And we don’t know where or what is happening to her and I’ve never told her how important she is to me.”

Steve put a hand on Bucky’s shoulder, trying not to smile at the fact Bucky had found someone because the circumstances wouldn’t allow it. But he was genuinely happy that Bucky was doing better and vowed to himself that he would do everything to get Y/N back for Bucky, “Y/N can read your emotions as soon as she enters the same room as you. She knows, Bucky.” He told him, squeezing his shoulder gently, “And we will get her back so you can tell her. I promise.”

“I know why you’re always eating those plums.” Y/N said, looking at Bucky who had pulled a plum out to snack on after training with her.

Bucky raised an eyebrow at her, throwing the plum up in the air before catching it, a small grin on his lips, “Oh yeah? Why’s that?”

Y/N smiles, reaching out and taking the plum from him in her gloved hand and looking at it, “Plums have antioxidants to protect the brain from cell degeneration and also help with memory. I would actually be surprised if you didn’t eat them constantly.” She told him, holding the plum back to him to take.

Bucky shook his head and couldn’t help but chuckle a little at her correct answer. When he was regaining his memory, he did extensive study on foods that helped your brain and memory and plums happened to be his favorite, “You’re smart, Y/N.”

“I know.” Y/N said with a smile.

Y/N opened her eyes slowly, groaning to herself. The last thing she remembered is that she was trying to get a read on the Peace Keeper in custody before the station they were in was ambushed by many more minions of the Peace Keepers. As Sam and Steve fought them off, a man came face to face with her. They fought for a little bit before the man pressed a syringe into her neck, causing the world to fade to darkness around her. Now, as she looked around the room she was in, she noticed she was strapped to a chair with duct tape in a small cement room almost like a cell. Her attention was caught when a man entered through the steel door in front of her, tilting her head slightly. She could feel his emotions and all he exuded was dominance and power.

“Welcome, Y/N.” He said towards her, his long blonde hair was pulled back into a bun, “I’m so excited you’re here. I have such great plans for you.”

“What are you thinking about, Bucky?” Y/N asks, laying on the grass next to him as they looked up at the stars. She didn’t wear her gloves around him anymore or hide her skin which made her feel more comfortable, more herself.

Bucky’s arms were stretched behind his head, his eyes glued to the dark sky that was littered with twinkling stars, “My amends. After I came back from the blip, Steve and Sam helped me get pardoned by the government except I had to do these therapy sessions. I had a list of everybody that either used the Winter Soldier or those the Winter Soldier wronged, wanting to make amends.”

Y/N turned onto her side to look at him, studying his face, “Did you finish your list?”

Bucky tilted his head over to look at her, “I did. Feels like I didn’t though.” He told her honestly. He was always honest with Y/N. She was the only other person that was easy to talk to besides Steve.

Y/N narrowed her eyes at him as if trying to figure something out just by looking at him, “Maybe it’s because you didn’t put your own name on the list. The Winter Soldier wronged you too, Buck. Maybe it’s time to start making amends to yourself so you can truly finish your amends list. Tell yourself that you are James Bucky Barnes, not the Winter Soldier anymore, and that you would like to make amends. Maybe it’ll make you feel like it’s complete.”

Bucky stared at her in awe. How did Y/N do that? How did she saw all the right things at the right time to him like she knew what he needed to hear? He moved his right hand to reach over and grip onto her’s, intertwining their fingers with a smile before looking up at the stars, “I think you’re right.”

“Well I don’t want to brag, but I usually am.”

Redwing returned to Sam after two weeks and losing track of where the Peace Keepers and Y/N were taken which only irritated Bucky more. He wanted to go to Seattle immediately and look for her himself but just when he was arguing with Steve and Sam about it, all the monitors in the briefing room suddenly turned on and started flashing imagines of the Peace Keeper’s symbol before footage of Y/N appeared on the screen. There were people holding her and making her touch a wall over and over again, holding her up even though she looked like she was asleep and collapsing. A voice started speaking on the screens though it seemed like it had been disguised because it was so deep, “As you can see and already know, we have taken one of your team. Y/N Y/L/N. We may not have the technology or methods used to create the obedience the Winter Soldier had, but we have our own methods.” The screen changed to show Y/N being tortured in different ways, breaking down her psyche by forcing her to do things and if she refused, she was either struck or was forced into freezing cold water. They were breaking her down and turning her submissive to their will. Bucky flinched at the images, he had trained her to fight and defend herself but not how to stay strong under torture, “Breaking down the mind, spirit and soul of a being is messy, but our methods are effective. Within one week of continuous strain on her mind due to no sleep and our training, Y/N has become submissive to simple commands. By week two, she has completely bent to our will and we unlocked her abilities to make it so she doesn’t have to touch people to manipulate them. With her, we will be able to bend anybody to our will.” The images changed from Y/N being tortured to her causing them to scream in pain that they felt like they were on fire and scratch at their skin until they were ripping their own skin off, “Let this be a warning to all enhanced beings. We will find you. We will bend you to our will. We will make you our soldiers. You are dangerous and the Peace Keepers will keep you in line.” Then the screens turned off.

Bucky shook his head, “I’ve read everything on brainwashing when I got my memories back. They’re using old soviet methods as well as methods L. Ron Hubbard used.”

“The scientology guy?” Sam asks confused as to what he had to do with anything.

Bucky nodded over to him, folding his arms tightly across his chest, “They believed that if you could make someone do something as simple like only touching a wall over and over again for days without sleep, food, or water, they could break your will and psyche. Make you do anything. That’s what they did to her, making her believe her only purpose is to do what they say or there will be punishment.” Steve ran his hand through his blonde hair slowly processing the information, “So she’s basically brainwashed. Not only can she manipulate emotions but she can make people feel pain instantly without touching them now, make them feel like they’re on fire until their bodies just give out.” He looked over to Sam and Bucky, “They’re going to find more enhanced humans to do this to, use her to make them comply with their orders.”

Bucky nodded, trying his best to get the images of Y/N being tortured out of his mind and remember her as she really is. He felt anger but going on a rampage wasn’t going to help at this point, “And where do we know of that they keep a bunch of enhanced beings?” “The Raft prison.” Sam said with a sigh. He’d been locked up there before until Steve broke them out. It was an awful place but if Steve could break his team members out, the Peace Keepers and their followers sure as hell could with the help of Y/N/

“Tell me about yourself, Bucky. Not the things I know…” Y/N said as they walked along the grass, twirling a wildflower between her fingers, “Who you really were in the forties.”

Bucky had his hands tucked in his jean pockets as they walked, “Oh, darlin, you would’ve loved me.” He said looking over to her with a grin, “All the girls did. I was kind of a player.”

Y/N laughs a little, “A player, huh? I don’t think I could picture that. So you used to be cocky and confident then?”

“Hell yeah.” Bucky said to her, “I had ladies lining up just to dance with Sergeant James Barnes. Always had my arms over at least two women’s shoulders.”

Y/N rolls her eyes at him with a smile, “Alright, I get it. You were the ladies man of the 1940’s.” She said, glancing up at him, “So, ladies man, were you ever in love? A lucky lady waiting for the handsome Sergeant Barnes back home?”

Bucky squinted his eyes into the distance at the question before looking over at her with that crooked smile only she could bring out of him, “Nah, nobody waiting for me except my family. But I once spent all my money trying to win a girl named Dot a prize at Cooney Island. Does that count as love?” He asks before stopping in his spot and tilting his head down at her, “Wait, you think I’m handsome?”

“I don’t think spending all your money on a woman counts. I think that’s just called being a Sugar Daddy.” Y/N stopped her steps when he did, turning and looking at him with a smirk, “Oh like you didn’t already know how handsome you are Mr. Cocky and Confident Ladies Man.”

When Sam, Steve, and Bucky arrived at the Raft prison on the quinjet, they were already under attack by the Peace Keepers. The only thing they had on their side was the element of surprise. They had discussed a plan on the way. Sam and Steve would keep the Peace Keepers busy while Bucky tried to get to Y/N. They infiltrated quickly, taking down the vast amount of the Peace Keeper followers until the got to the detention level where the enhanced beings were kept. That was where Y/N and the leaders of the Peace Keepers were, unlocking cells one by one and using Y/N to cause them pain or make them complicit to be captured. Steve and Sam immediately went to fighting the leaders of the Peace Keepers, pushing them into cells and slamming them shut to seal them in.

One of the Peace Keeper leaders stood next to Y/N. He turned to her, “Take them out.” He ordered.

Y/N looked at him with what could be considered dead, emotionless eyes before looking to Sam and Steve, “Pain.” Was all she said and instantly, Sam and Steve fell to the floor screaming and writhing on the floor.

“Y/N!” Bucky said, kicking one of the Peace Keeper leaders into the cell before turning his full attention on her, “Stop, you don’t want to do this.”

Y/N tilted her head at him and his words, her facial features unchanging. She then looked towards the Peace Keeper leader as it to ask for permission and he nodded toward her. Y/N returns her eyes on Bucky, “Pain.” Bucky winced at the sudden pain that erupted through his whole body besides his left vibranium arm. He clenched his teeth tightly, trying to resist as every point of his body felt like it was on fire and he was being stabbed in every pore at the same time, “Y/N…” He growled out, taking slow steps towards her, “C’mon doll, it’s me, Bucky.” He groaned out, managing to get closer to her even though his body wanted to give out, join Sam and Steve who were still on the floor shaking. He managed to close the distance, using his vibranium arm to land a hard punch to the Peace Keeper leader next to Y/N, knocking him back into an open cell that slammed shut.

Y/N watched Bucky stand in front of her. His skin was covered with thick beads of sweat as he tried to resist the pain she was making him feel, “Paralyze.” She muttered out, watching his body fall to the floor.

Bucky laid on the floor, he couldn’t feel any part of his flesh body. But luckily, his vibranium arm didn’t seem to be affected by Y/N’s abilities. He reached out his vibranium arm, latching onto her ankle and pulling her down on top of him so her hands touched his skin. He needed to let her feel what he did, show her the emotions he felt hoping to ground her, “Y/N, listen to me.” He whispers out to her, feeling the paralysis start to fade when she made contact with his skin, “It’s me, Bucky. Mr. Cocky and Confident Ladies Man, remember?” Feeling his right flesh hand regain feeling, he reached a hand up to touch her cheek, “You are Y/N. Not a pawn for the Peace Keepers. You are everything good and you are as free as the butterflies on tattooed on your skin.”

Y/N shook her head at him, “No. I belong to the Peace Keepers.” She said to him softly. She was about to open her mouth again to cause him pain, but when her focus broke so did the hold she had on Steve and Sam. Sam quickly came flying in and kicked her off of Bucky, slamming her back against a wall hard enough to knock her out and fall to the floor.

Bucky was at her side immediately, glaring over at Sam, “I had it, birdbrain.” He spat out before his features softened as he brushed some hair from Y/N’s unconscious face.

“Yeah. You had all of that handled perfectly, Buck.” Sam said rolling his eyes, “She was about to twist you inside out. I saved you, man.”

Steve was busy informing the back up guards of the Raft prison on what had happened, helping them secure the Peace Keepers and the rest of the enhanced humans who weren’t in their cells.

Bucky lifts Y/N up from the cold floor gently, looking down at her, “I got you, doll. Don’t worry, I’ll take you home.”

“I like this place.” Y/N said, once again sitting with Bucky outside in the darkness of the night sharing a pack of beer as she stared up at the stars.

Bucky looked over at her curiously, wondering what she liked specifically about living at the facility. Their chairs were almost touching with how close they were sitting next to each other, “What do you like about it?”

Y/N turned her head to meet his gaze, “It just feels like home. Haven’t had that feeling in a long time.” A teasing smirk appeared on her lips suddenly towards him, “Plus I get to be a part of this really exclusive group, the Bucky Barnes friend group. Maybe you’ve heard of it? I keep suggesting we get matching jackets or something but nobody seems to agree.”

Bucky let out a laugh at her comment, “God, I’m never living that down. Thanks, Sam.” He said with a roll of his eyes and another swig of his beer, “And I wasn’t apposed to the matching jacket idea. Steve was. He said it would make Sam feel left out.”

Y/N laughed and shook her head, “Couldn’t have that.” She replies, “You may be able to fool everybody else, but I know he’s secretly your other other best friend. First best friend being Steve and the other being myself, then Sam.”

“It’s like being friends with a pigeon.” Bucky snorted, “Yeah, he isn’t all bad. Just sometimes his face does this thing that makes me mad. And he has that stupid RedWing robot he treats like a pet.”

“That thing with his face? That’s emotions, Bucky.” Y/N laughed again, “Emotions are normal. You and Steve are good at hiding your feelings, able to be stoic. But Sam wears all his feelings plain as day on his face. You can’t let that offend you, it’s just him being honest. But RedWing, yeah, I don’t understand why he treats it like a pet. That’s sort of weird.”

Bucky nodded to agree, drinking the rest of his beer he held in his left hand while his right hand subconsciously found Y/N’s intertwining their fingers and giving it a light squeeze.

Bucky looked down at Y/N who laid on the medical table. She seemed a little malnourished from being held captive for two weeks so Dr. Cho had an IV in her arm providing fluids and nutrition her body badly needed. Bucky was by her side constantly while she was under the light sedation Steve had suggested since they didn’t know if she would attack them or not. It had been days since Y/N had been brought back and Bucky was there at every moment he could be, holding onto her hand as they had done many times before. He was hoping, praying that Y/N was feeling all of the emotions he was just by his touch. He cared deeply for her, emotions he hadn’t felt in a long time since before World War II. He hoped she could feel his hope, the relief of her being here with him, the happiness just touching her made him feel… And the love he had been denying he felt for her. Bucky stood from his chair when he saw Y/N’s brow furrow as if she was about to wake up, squeezing her hand gently, “Y/N.” He breathed out to her, “Doll, you with me?”

Y/N opened her eyes lazily to look up at him, sensing his worry when she just stared at him. Slowly a smile came across her lips and she felt the relief instantly flood his body, “Bucky…” She managed to draw out though the sort of slurred from the sedation, “You love me.”

Bucky shook his head and chuckles down to her, “You felt that, huh?”

Y/N nodded slowly, her eyes slowly and lazily blinking, “I feel everything.” She murmurs out, squeezing his hand gently, “I feel honored…. Does this mean you’re gonna spend all your money trying to win me a prize?”

Bucky leans down and presses a soft kiss to her forehead, “Whatever you want, darlin. I’m pretty sure I can win those prizes first try now though.” He grinned down to her, “Rest, doll. I’ll get Dr. Cho to wean you off of the sedation.”

A Week Later

Y/N was pretty much back to normal. She had a few nightmares that kept lingering due to the torture she endured and the things she was forced to do. Bucky helped her through it, knowing himself what it felt like to forced to be a pawn and go through the haunting nightmares. He made an open invitation to his bedroom towards her, allowing her to come and snuggle up next to him so she didn’t feel alone. They hadn’t discussed what was said when Y/N came out of sedation, the whole Bucky loves her thing which made him worry and panic that she didn’t feel the same way.

Y/N and Bucky sat outside in their normal spot, sharing this time a bottle of whiskey. Their hand were interlocked and they were laughing about some story about how Steve used to have to wear newspapers in his shoes prior to being all super soldier. Then it got quiet and Bucky was staring over at Y/N, examine every feature on her face. Y/N looked over and met his gaze, “What you worrying about?”

Bucky smiles slightly, of course she felt his worry. He looked down at the whiskey glass in his hand before placing it on the table in front of them. He stood up, pulling her up with him while his other hand grabbed her glass and put it next to his on the table. Bucky kept his flesh hand interlocked with her’s, bringing his vibranium one up to gently stroke the skin on her cheek with his finger tips, “I love you.” He breathed out to her.

Y/N smiles and tilts her head at him, “I know.” She told him, squeezing his hand lightly and taking a step closer. She licks her lips, narrowing her eyes at him.

Bucky tilted his head at her, suddenly feeling overwhelming feelings of warmth flooded his body. It felt like electricity was running through his bones, enough to power cities. It was pure happiness like he'd never felt before. It was so powerful, it felt like magic, "What're you doing, sweetheart?"

Y/N's eyes flickered between his eyes and his lips, "I'm showing you how you make me feel, Bucky." She said softly to him, "Because I love you too." Bucky grinned down at her at the sound of her reciprocation of love, moving his vibranium hand to the back of her neck and pulling her face towards his, connecting their lips in a deep kiss. His tongue traced her bottom lip until her lips parted, allowing his tongue access to intertwine with hers. After a few moments, he pulled away and looked down at her with nothing but happy eyes, “You’re my girl.”

Y/N smiled at him brightly, slightly breathless from the kiss between them, “And you’re my home, Bucky Barnes.”

_____________________________________________________________

Taglist: @buckypops @stcrryslibrary @bibliophilewednesday

[ericspinkhair]

dirty thoughts from a distance

pairing: dom!changmin x virgin!reader, best friends to lovers, college au!

synopsis: you masturbate while thinking of your best friend and he catches you moan out his name

word count: 3.8k

warnings: maybe slight angst, (getting caught) masturbating, mutual masturbation, sex in general ig

a/n: y'all are crazyy! it has barely been 19 days and I have already hit 100 followers🤧 thank you guys so much for your support and sending in requests!!! everytime I see leave me nice messages I feel so encouraged to keep on writing even though there is still a lot of room to improve and I am not always completely satisfied with what I create. I wish all of you a great day and hope that you stay happy and healthy!!

this chapter is especially dedicated to @bangcrispychannie​ and anon who requested this kind of scenario ❤️

masterlist + requests

for three years you wondered why you hadn't lost your virginity yet. it's not like you didn't have enough opportunities since you had been in two relationships so far, both lasted about five to seven months.

the feelings in your first relationship were been mostly one-sided however.

when a guy in your biology class named Minho confessed his crush for you, you thought that the only logical next step was to become a couple. you were quite flattered that he had taken such an interest in you and believed and hoped you would eventually develop feelings for him as well. the problem was you didn't. after not being able to be emotionally let alone physically intimate with him for a few months into your relationship, he finally confronted you and you confessed that you just couldn't bring yourself to see him that way. your relationship came to an end just before becoming a senior in high school.

in your last year, you got close with Seonghwa. you were seat neighbors in your english class and you'd chat all the time. he was perfectly sweet, smart and funny and you instantly got along just fine. you developed an interest in him and he seemed to feel the same way. he asked you out with a beautiful bouquet of flowers and some chocolate and you agreed to being his girlfriend without much thought. you caught yourself falling in love with this boy and didn't shy away from physical affection such as kissing and holding hands. you were convinced you were ready to give yourself to him during prom night but when it came to it you chickened out. a couple of hours before, you had found out that your best friend changmin had broken up with his girlfriend of six months.

for a long time you hadn't been able to decipher why you hadn't slept with Seonghwa then. as time passed, the unpleasant answer became clearer and clearer: you had brought up your hopes.

you had been best friends with changmin basically since you started elementary school. on the first day, he scared you with a stupid horror mask he had sneaked in from home and made you cry. he felt so guilty and was determined to make it up to you and to become friends. you had been inseparable ever since.

when he got his first girlfriend in junior year you were devastated. you convinced yourself that the reason for that was that you had been scared he was going to replace you as his best friend but in reality you had felt jealousy.

you were suppressing your feelings because if you confessed, things might become awkward. there was no way changmin could ever like you the same way.

all of this became more difficult as you moved in together for college. you were sharing an apartment now and every day, it became harder to avoid your growing and troublesome feelings. your heart would beat faster whenever he walked around shirtless (which was most of the time) and you decided to try to ignore him. this was especially difficult since you wanted to appreciate his physique. when had he become this handsome? changmin had been dancing all his life so he had always been fit but now that he was majoring in it and training most of the time, his body had developed and he had become super toned and his abs were more prominent.

he'd often make his way into your dreams and you'd let him do inappropriate things with you. you'd wake up wet and needy and even more confused. you were ashamed of seeing him this way. this was not how one normally thought about their best friend.

it was a wednesday morning and you were eating breakfast when changmin joined you in the kitchen. he flashed you a big smile, making his pretty dimples appear which you didn't see as you did not look at him.

'good morning, y/n!' he greeted you in a good mood. you just grunted in response, intensely staring at the cereal swimming in your bowl.

the fact that you couldn't even spare him a glance hurt changmin but he tried to not let it show. he wanted to get you to talk to him.

'do you want to watch a movie and play some board games today after class?' he proposed. you hadn't spent a lot of time together ever since you had become aware of your feelings.

'I have an essay due tomorrow,' you quickly made up as an excuse. the corners of changmin's mouth twitched but you didn't notice as you were too preoccupied with doing anything that didn't include looking at him.

'then maybe on the weekend. or next-' 'I'll be busy,' you interjected. 'I have lots to do.' you stressed the lots to emphasize there was absolutely no way you would be able to hang out with him any time soon.

'umm… okay. I'll be going to class.' he told you dejected. your heart sank but you didn't respond. he was wondering whether he had done anything to make you upset but he couldn't wrap his mind around it. this had been going on for a while and he was starting to become desperate.

when you first got the apartment you spent every free minute of the day together, happy that you finally moved out and could be with each other 24/7, but then you stopped talking to him completely out of nowhere. from one day to the other, you would avoid leaving your room when he was outside and barely talked to him anymore. at first, changmin thought you were just stressed and that you'd eventually warm up again when exam season came to an end but a few months had passed and, if anything, the situation was even worse than before.

you were watching the time and after ten minutes you decided to leave for classes as well. you had started doing this so you couldn't possibly catch up to him and risk having a conversation.

'hey, y/n, what's up!' your friend chanhee hugged you when you arrived on campus. you were both majoring in fashion design and were getting along on well since the beginning of the first semester.

you sighed exasperatedly. 'changmin's up.' you puffed your cheeks and pouted. chanhee nodded knowingly. he was the only person who was aware of your little secret and that was only because you had accidentally drunk confessed the whole story to him at your first college party.

'you know maybe you should tell him. this whole thing is clearly not making you happy and I saw changmin walk by a few minutes ago. if I had to guess I'd say he was in an even worse mood than you. someone accidentally ran into him and he pushed them hard and called them names. it's not like him to overreact like this. he's usually super collected. I think you finally managed to break his spirit,' chanhee reported to you.

this had never been what you intended. why did everything have to be so difficult? you didn't want to be the cause of your best friend's unhappiness.

'he must feel like I despise him. but I cannot confess to him, that would be the end of our friendship!' you were constantly torn apart by this dilemma.

'well, if you're not gonna act on your feelings, maybe try to move on? find something casual or serious with someone new? then you'd forget all about changmin and you'd be able to go back to acting normal around him' he suggested.

chanhee's advice didn't sound too bad. if you couldn't get with changmin then you had to de-crush yourself and find somebody different to focus your emotional energy on. but on who?

'is there anyone you could think of?' you ask chanhee. he had great taste in practically everything so you highly valued his opinion.

'hmm, you could potentially try younghoon hyung? I've seen him eyeing you for weeks now and he even told me thinks your gorgeous.' he wiggled his eyebrows teasingly.

younghoon was a pretty art student, whom chanhee knew from high school. you didn't talk to him often, mostly at parties and he wasn't exactly your type but you tried to remember shouldn't judge him by his first impression when you haven't even got to know him.

chanhee pulled out his phone and soon you felt yours vibrate in your back pocket. you looked at him questioningly.

'I sent you his number in case you're interested,' he explained proudly. he put his hand on your shoulder and you could see the concern in his eyes. 'you really need to get over changmin if don't want to confess,' he insisted firmly.

so you decided to text younghoon during class. he was very polite and you thought he was cute as he seemed excited to talk to you. you agreed to hang out sometime to get to know each other and decided to meet up friday for dinner.

after the end of your classes, you walked home to warm up yesterday's leftovers. to your dismay, changmin had also decided to come home for once. since you began acting all weird and refused to eat with him, he usually spent lunch time with his dance mates as they had practice after anyway. why had he decided to come here today? your question was answered when he ran up to you, smiling from ear to ear and you noticed he was hiding something behind his back.

'you know how there is a blackpink concert downtown on friday? guess what!' he held up two tickets. surely you would at least agree to spend time with him if it meant being able to see your favorite group, right?

he must have gone through so much trouble to get tickets for you and since blackpink were your favorite music artists you were actually contemplating on going but then you remembered you had made plans.

'I can't. I'm going out with younghoon friday night.'

'kim younghoon?' he raised an eyebrow skeptically.

'why would you to be spending time together? I didn't know he was even talking to you,' he questioned you. anger was boiling inside of you.

'maybe it's because you don't know everything about me,' you snapped at him. you were aware that you were being harsh but somehow his words hurt you. why did he doubt you? did he think you weren't able to get with someone as awesome and popular as younghoon? did he not consider you pretty enough?

the microwave beeped, indicating your food was ready, making you snap out of your thoughts.

'y/n, I swear, that's not what I meant.' he stepped directly in front of you so you were forced to look at him. you stared deep into his pleading eyes as you closed the microwave door, turned your back to him, stomped to your room and slammed the door shut, leaving changmin behind in the kitchen.

your whole body was tense as you listened closely to any sounds coming from outside and felt relieved when you heard the front door close. feeling sad and depressed always made you feel tired so you decided to take a nap to forget about all the negative feelings.

when you woke up you were horny af. you had a dream about changmin taking you on the kitchen counter and now your panties were completely soaked with your arousal.

desperate, you pulled them down and tossed them somewhere to the side. it didn't matter. you needed relief now.

you closed your eyes as you slowly started rubbing your clit, imagining it was changmin's slender fingers touching you instead. your imagination was running wild and you sped up the tempo.

eventually, you plunged your middle finger and then your index finger inside you, pretending that changmin was stretching your walls with his cock.

you moaned loudly and picked up the pace, chasing your high. oh, how much you wished he was the one making you come.

'yes?' you opened your eyes and gasped loudly as you saw changmin watching you from the doorway. you hecticly pulled up your blankets to your chest to cover your naked lower body. for how fucking long had he been standing there?

'oh fuck, changmin...' you cursed out loud.

to your surpise he laughed. 'oh, is this why you have been so distant? were you embarrassed about imagining doing dirty things with me?' your cheeks were burning red and you were unable to move a muscle.

'you know, if you had told me you were thinking of me while doing it then I could've helped you out already. that would have spared both of us a lot of frustration.' he stepped into the room and pulled the sheets away, his hungry eyes fixed on your desperately dripping pussy. you tried to hide it with your hands.

'n-no… what are you saying? aren't we best friends? ' you couldn't comprehend what was happening right now. the way he was acting was so unexpected that you didn't know how to react or what to say. he brushed his hand over your burning cheeks. his eyes were conveying disparity.

'but what if I told you I don't care? that I like you? that I see you as more than just my best friend?'

'wait, you like me?' you couldn't believe your ears. was he actually reciprocating your feelings?

he groaned in exasperation. 'y/n, why did you think I ended things with my ex out of the blue?' you shrugged your shoulders as you weren't sure. you had thought it was because she had lost interest in him, at least that's what changmin had told you back then.

'because I realized I was in love you, you dumbass. how could I be together with someone if I had feelings for someone else?'

'I actually ruined my chances of having sex with seonghwa for the first time for the same reason. it was just after I had found out about the breakup,' you confessed, relieved that you were finally beginning to make sense of everything.

he climbed onto the mattress and positioned his knees next to your closed legs, leaning his hands on the wall behind you so that he was hovering above you.

'I'm sorry that you lost that opportunity. let me make it up to you,' he whispered with his face mere inches from yours and then kissed you. losing all self-restraint, you immediately pulled his body closer so that he was straddling you. after all these months filled with sexual frustration and just frustration in general, you were desperate for his touch. your hands wandered under his dance shirt and you were finally able to touch those abs you had been secretly admiring for so long.

you broke the kiss to take off both of your shirts and changmin skillfully unclasped your bra.

while his tongue was exploring the insides of your mouth, his hands were kneading your breasts, occasionally rubbing and pinching your hardened nipples. you felt his hard dick press against your lower abdomen as he grinded himself into you to get friction.

after having dreamt about this moment for so long, you felt impatient. this was too good to be true and you were scared that if you didn't act quick, your bubble would bust.

without thinking twice about it, you pulled down the hem of his sweatpants and boxers just far enough so you could easily reach inside and whip out his dick. you stopped for a moment to admire his length. it looked even better than you had ever imagined in any of your wildest dreams.

he sat upright, leaning on the wall behind you, while you stroked his cock. he was sensitive to your touch and not shy to show you how well you were doing by responding with moans.

'fuck, y/n. you're doing amazing.' his praise made you eager to show him just how good you could make him feel. your lack of experience was barely noticeable as the adrenaline flowing through your veins was guiding you.

you tapped his thighs to signalize him to inch closer. that way your mouth had easier access to his dick. you hesitantly licked up his length and were fascinated by how he tasted. wanting to have more of it, you swirl your tongue around his pink tip. changmin eventually became impatient and forced more of his dick inside your mouth so you tried to take as much of him as you could but your gag reflex made it difficult for you. instead, you worked your hands where your mouth couldn't do its job.

not wanting you to feel neglected, changmin reached behind him to stimulate your clit. he skillfully started rubbing all the right places and you moaned around him, sending vibrations through his cock.

he couldn't take this stimulation for much longer before he had to force himself to pull out of your mouth.

'wow, you almost made me come there.' he panted heavily. 'but I want to be inside you first.' you got lost in his touch as he placed a long kiss on your lips but a sudden thought brought you back to reality.

'wait, I don't have a condom,' you informed him embarrassed. you hadn't planned to lose your virginity any time soon so you hadn't bought any. did that mean the end of this wonderful dream?

but changmin laughed light heartedly. 'no need to worry. hold up, let me get some from my room.' you relaxed again as he disappeared and came back shortly with a condom wrapper in his hand.

you were prepared for him to start right away and took a deep breath in preparation but he didn't do anything.

'I don't think it's a good idea to start yet since I haven't even prepared you. the last thing I would want to do is hurt you so just lay back.'

he positioned your legs over his shoulders so your hips were hovering in the air. you felt his warm breath against your vagina before he drove his tongue inside you, seeing for himself how wet he had made you and tasting your arousal. you clasped your hands over your mouth to stop yourself from releasing any sounds.

'don't do that. I want to hear how good I make you feel,' changmin complained.

when he slid two fingers inside you, you couldn't hold it in anymore and let out some kind of aroused squeal. you felt self-conscious but it seemed like changmin was only more eager to please you.

at the same time, his tongue was abusing your swollen clit and it was impossible for you to hold back the curses that were spilling out of your mouth. the pleasure he was making you feel was a whole different sensation from anything else you've experienced before.

'more please, changmin!' you begged. you wanted more. you needed more. you needed him.

he carefully lowered your hips back down. 'are you sure you want this?' he asked you, waiting for you to clearly consent to having sex with him.

'I want you. you, and only you,' you reassured him and brought his face closer to kiss him. changmin's typical bright smile formed and you felt the butterflies in your stomach go crazy.

he positioned himself at your entrance, swiping his dick between your folds like a credit card to coat it with your juices.

you gripped his arms tightly as he pushed in. he slowly continued until all of him was buried deep inside you before stopping. the feeling of a whole penis inside of you was very different from your or changmin's fingers. it filled you up to the brim and was rubbing all the good spots. while it initially caused you a bit of discomfort, it wasn't overwhelming and it also felt good in a weird way.

when your walls finished adjusting to his length, he began to steadily move his dick in and out.

changmin intensely studied your face. he couldn't believe that after all those years you were finally close to being his. he wanted to savor every single expression you made while he was inside you.

you wrapped your legs around his torso, trying to push him deeper. he slammed his cock back inside you.

'you are mine,' he declared and started going harder and faster.

'I am yours,' you confirmed and wrapped your arms around his neck to pull him in for a kiss.

because of the extensive foreplay and your own masturbation prior to this, it didn't take long until your walls were tightening around his dick and you felt an orgasm approaching.

driven wild by you clenching around his cock, he thrusted into you even faster. you rested your sweaty foreheads against each other as both of you almost came simultaneously.

changmin kissed the top of your head before he pulled out and threw away the used condom. you opened your arms and he let himself fall right into your embrace.

'I know this might be kind of weird to talk about right now but do you want to be my girlfriend?' Changmin asked you. he still wasn't too sure what all of this meant for your relationship and he desperately needed to know where your mind was at.

'after having liked you for all this time I'd be an idiot to say no.' 'you're an idiot anyway,' he teased. you slapped his arm.

'hey! I'm not the one who ignored you for a couple of months because my hormones are out of control.' you hid your face in the crook of his neck, too embarrassed face him.

'I'm really sorry for that. you just mean so much to me and I didn't want my feelings to get in the way of our friendship.' he stroked your hair.

'I do understand that. if I hadn't heard you moan my name today I wouldn't have acted on my feelings either. but all is good now, right?' 'right.' you smiled and placed a small kiss below his ear.

'there is still one thing you need to do,' changmin tried to remind you. you looked at him, puzzled.

'what do you mean?' 'younghoon,' he hinted. you immediately started looking for your phone. that date was definitely going to have to be cancelled. there was no need for you to find a distraction anymore since you had been granted your wish after all.

[iambilliejeanok]

Omg can I plz plz plzzzz get a Dom!Kisame x Sub!Fem!reader? Where the reader and Kisame are constantly bickering back and forth and don’t like each other but one day an argument they have leads into some rough sex? I hope this makes sense. I really enjoy your writing by the way!!

I like this one. I like it alot. 😏thank you anon💜

Warnings: 18+. Unedited. NSFW. Language, slight overstimulation and violence.

“Not today Kisame! I’ve had enough stinky!”, you yelled, irritated beyond belief at the mere sight of the shark boy, let alone the mean words coming out of his fowl mouth. You huffed, crossing your arms and cocking your hip in a way that Kisame admired. He didn’t like that he thought you were very attractive and sought to squash any and every thought he had about you by being mean. “Get yourself together y/n”, he spoke in a very demeaning way, despite the fact that he was clearly aggravating you with his patronizing taunts. “I thought you could handle a little criticism. You’re weak and you ought to train a little more to at least compensate for your failures y/n”. That was it. He reached the boiling point. Why would he say that considering the fact that you were alone, on a mission to capture the four tails. Unlike like you, everyone else had a partner to help them succeed. The four tails was strong, forcing you to back out of the fight before you’d needlessly hurt yourself. Your taijutsu was neat, but you lacked the physical strength to inflict any serious harm, your strength being the ability to absorb chakra and return it to the user in five fold. Also that you were abnormally intelligent, making you a crucial member of the akatsuki as you played a role in managing the group, sometimes helping pick out the right teams for the right tasks. And your main focus was to collect information about the jinchuriki to share with Pein, who would use that information to select an actual team to hunt down the host. Kisame was happy you failed. There was just something about seeing you so miserable that he couldn’t help but take pleasure in. “Are you gonna let him talk to you like that y/n?”, Hidan deviously questioned, successfully riling you up. You literally pounced on him, not caring that you were in the midst of all the other members, taking him down by complete surprise. You both fell to the ground with a loud thud, Kisame completely taking the hit as you landed on top of him. He was rather stunned that you were able to easily take him down. “Yes y/n, get him!” Hidan cheered, enjoying the view of your ass as you hovered above your new opponent, earning himself a glare from Kakuzu. You certainly weren’t tiny. You were packing in all the right places, standing at 5’8, your curvy body showing in all its glory because your clothes burnt off in certain areas after escaping the four tails brutal lava release, making you look all the more fucking sexy to the swordsman, as well as every other member in the room. But even then, he was way too big and bulky for you to manage bringing him down to the ground in a spilt second all by yourself. You brought your fist up, ready to wipe away that smug look on his face with a nice and hard blow, infuriated at how he calmly waited for you to hit. Your fist connected with his cheek, Kisame quickly flipping you over so he was now on top of you, blood dripping out his nose and falling on your cheek as he easily pinned your wrists on either side of your head, his solid, muscly frame dominantly hovering above you. “Are you trying to kill yourself?”, he growled, angered by how you took him down in front of everyone, but also more than happy to fight you, to see what you’re really capable of. You brought your knee up between his legs, a loud grunt leaving his mouth as you landed a hard blow on his crotch. You used the opportunity to head butt him hard before flipping him over so you were right back on top of him. He was obviously holding back, but today you were in the mood to really fight. “Enough!”. You both snapped your heads in the direction of the familiar voice. Pein looked down at both of you, his purple eyes piercing your own, his expression stoic as always. You quickly got off of Kisame, dusting yourself off as you walked off to your room. He really underestimated you, but next time Pein wasn’t around, you would certainly give him a big taste of the strength he didn’t know you had.

The next morning you felt somewhat better, dragging yourself out of bed to start your day with the rest of the miserable human beings in the hideout. You finished up your breakfast, washing only your dishes, drying them and packing them away, growling at anyone who dared to near you with their dirty dishes. You would die before you washed somebody else’s dishes in this hideout. No one was worthy. Except maybe Itachi. You dried your hands off, walking back to your room to meditate, shower and change before you’d go out and train a little. Not because Kisame said so, you reminded yourself, now debating whether or not you should train, so Kisame wouldn’t think you were training because of his rude remark last night. You walked with your eyes glued to the floor, not watching where you were going as you sped walked the rest of the way in deep thought. You bumped into something hard, the impact throwing you off balance, causing you to stumble backwards and land hard on your bottom. “Ow!” , you whined, looking up to see Kisame. He didn’t have his cloak on, just a skin tight black turtle neck shirt with a pair of black pants. Barefoot. The shirt he wore hugged his muscular chest in such a sinful way. His beefy arms flexing as he gazed at you. This might of been the first time you’d seen him without a cloak. He wasn’t just a big shark. He was a tall, muscular, sexy shark. He reached down to grab your arm, pulling you up a little too fast, causing you to stumble once again, but this time, he held you until you were able to stand on your own. You were pretty much gawking at this point, gulping away your arousal as you immediately looked at the ground, embarrassed that he caught you. “Watch where you’re going little girl”, he said, ignoring how cute you looked still dressed in your pijamas. The pink, spaghetti strap shirt hugging your ample bosom, your nipples confidently introducing themselves through the thin cotton material. The shirt ended just beneath your natural waist, revealing your pierced belly button and a whole lot of smooth skin before your navy blue with white polka dots pants took over, a drawstring keeping them around your hips as they draped all the way down to your ankles, folded twice so you wouldn’t step on them. You both stood in the middle of the long passage, awkward silence surrounding the two of you as you shyly checked each other out. “If you were watching where you were going you wouldn’t of let me walk right into you”, you started, trying to distract yourself from the 6’4 hunk of sexiness standing in front of you. Quickly overcoming your shame you looked up at him, clearing your throat as his eyes were glued to your chest for a good few seconds before he lift them up to look at your face. Unlike you he wasn’t embarrassed at all, his eyes continuing their journey down your body as he nonchalantly replied, “Yeah whatever little girl, I don’t have time for this today”. Your eye twitched. “I’m not a little girl”, you spoke, trying to stay as nonchalant as he was. “Is that so?”, he challenged. “Yes. I’m much more than you could ever handle Kisame. But anyways, I’m not going to to stand here and argue with an angry fish, so bye”, you retorted, starting to walk past him and to your room. His large hand found your neck, causing you to stumble as he dragged you back in front of him, pushing you against the wall all in one swift movement. You gasped out as your back hit the wall, knocking a little air out of your restricted windpipe. Kisame eyes met yours, his teeth showing in his devious smile. He didn’t know whether to laugh at your confidence or respond to your smart remarks. Whatever it was he was feeling made his dick twitch. If only you weren’t so damn cute gasping for air in his hold he would’ve ignored you and continued on about his day. But today he reached his limit. He was going to teach you a very good lesson.

He leaned forward to whisper in your ear, “Much more than I could ever handle?”, he questioned. “Are you sure about that little girl?”. At that he let go of you, watching you greedily suck in air before easily picking you up and throwing you over his shoulder. You blushed at how strong he was. “I’m guessing you don’t know how to be gentle”, you remarked, only further triggering his irritation. “For once you’re actually right about me. I do not know how to be gentle and I hope you learn from this”, he responded. You could hear the seriousness in his tone, hoping he meant to do what you thought he was going to do and not actually kill you this morning. Uncertainty travelled through your veins, making you nervous as you tightened your grip on his shirt, trying to keep your balance. His arm sat between your thighs, the grip on your upper thigh just below your ass the only support you had on his shoulder. You were genuinely concerned. Trying to think of a plan to escape or fight back if you needed to. He entered a room, shutting the door behind him. A few steps later he threw you onto his unmade bed. You could smell his musky scent all around you, spiking up your arousal as you sat up on your elbows, looking around you before concluding you were in fact, in his room. You looked up at him, gulping away your nerves as he lifted his shirt over his head. Holy fuck. At this point his sexiness would surely kill you before he got the chance to. You could only watch him in silence, as he crawled onto the bed, slowly making his way to you, like an animal sneaking up on it’s prey, forcing you to lie on your back. He spread your legs open to settle between them. You felt so little beneath him, actually nervous about what was currently taking place. Kisame stopped just above you, sensing your nerves building up. “Where did the cocky girl run off to?”, he chuckled. You felt rather embarrassed that he was right, all your confidence left your body when he threw you onto his bed, suggesting that he was going to fuck you. As aware as you were you couldn’t find any words to retort. A smile appearing on his face, showing his sharp white teeth as he waited for a reaction. “Did you forget how to talk?”, he asked, before planting a small kiss on your soft lips. He pulled away, looking at your face before coming back down to plant another kiss in the crook of your neck. You lifted your chin up to give him more access. His hand rubbed your thigh, slowly coming up to your hips, then your waist, your abdomen and finally your breasts, not ceasing the kisses that slowly turned into sucks and bites, his sharp teeth piercing your skin, making you moan out before his tongue lapped at the blood, soothing the pain he caused you. His big hand squeezed your boob, causing him to groan at the feel of the soft mound. His fingers pinched your nipple hard enough that you squealed. “Answer me y/n”, his tone serious as he continued his attack on your neck. You complied, “Yes I can talk, I’m just a little surprised”. You figured you should be honest about how you felt right now. He ceased his marking, coming up to look at your face. “I hate to admit it but I find myself very attracted to you, annoying as you are. Right now though, I want nothing more than to fuck you, hard and fast”, he confessed, emphasizing his last words with a buck of his hips, grinding into you, smiling at the way you bit your lip, trying to stifle a moan. “I’m sure I can handle you just right”, he continued, deciding to slowly roll his hips into yours, roughly dry humping you. “I’m just not sure if you could keep up”. At that you snapped your eyes open, a small moan escaping your lips as his erection rubbed your lady parts just the right way. “I can keep up Kisame. You’re not all that”, you quickly retorted. Kisame chuckled, watching you slightly squirm beneath him, enjoying the way he rubbed against you.

His lips smashed into yours in a bruising kiss, his tongue forcing its way into your mouth, making you squeal in delight. His hands immediately worked on undressing you, quickly pulling your shirt over your head and dragging your pants off along with your underwear. In less than a minute you were bare beneath him, your legs spread out as he pressed kisses onto your inner thighs, slowly nearing your wet and aching heat. You brought a finger to your mouth, bracing yourself for what was to come. Kisame looked up at you, waiting for a thumbs up. You looked back into his eyes, whining as you bucked your hips up. Without further ado he drove right in, greedily lapping up your juices, spreading your lips apart before sucking on your throbbing nub, forcing you into a fit of long, breathy moans. You buried your hand into his hair, the other tugging on one of your nipples as you neared an intense orgasm. His large hands kept your thighs spread apart for him, purple nails digging into them as he ferociously ate you out. His mouth found your clit once again, sucking hard on it, the pleasure almost painful as you screamed out in ecstasy. You legs shook in his hold, juices spilling everywhere as he kept at it, making sure you let it all out before he pulled away from you. He got off of the bed, watching you squirm around in pleasure as he pulled his pants off, his boxers following, revealing his thick, long, glorious member. He crawled right back on the bed, flipping you over so you were on your tummy. “I’m sure you feel just as good as you taste sweet girl”, he teased, watching your fat ass jiggle as he slapped it, hard enough to pull out rough moans from you. He snaked his arm under your chest, wrapping his hand around your neck, your breasts snuggling his forearm. “Kisame!”, you moaned out, desperate to feel him inside of you. “What is it?”, he asked, biting his lip as he rubbed his dick along your slick folds, lubricating it and stimulating you at the same time. “Oooh please!”, you moaned, pushing your ass back against him. “You’re going to be begging me to stop soon little girl. Be patient”, he reprimanded, focusing on lubricating his dick in your juices, making you whine out in sweet frustration. Your legs were tucked underneath his own, your thighs pressed together, waiting for him to fuck you.

After what felt like forever he finally pushed the tip into you, slowly stretching you out. He watched you barely manage to take him, squirming beneath him as he sunk into your tight cunt. He couldn’t hold back a moan of his own, sinking his sharp teeth into the back of your neck as he pushed himself all the way into you, your tight pussy snugly swallowing him in. “Kisame! Fuck!”, you moaned out in pain and pleasure as he lapped up the blood dripping from your new wound. He didn’t give you anytime to adjust to the overwhelming stretch. “Mmm fuck! Here we go baby”. He immediately set to a fast and hard pace, his strong hips pushing you up the bed with every thrust, his hand on your neck keeping you in place as he pounded you into the sheets. You couldn’t speak, struggling to catch your breath as your screams took over. His dick was so big, hitting a spot inside of you that made you wonder if he was actually trying to kill you with pleasure. Your eyes rolled to the back of your head, drool falling down your chin as he roughly fucked you. Your whole body was now violently convulsing beneath him and you hadn’t even reached your climax yet. Heavy pants fell from Kisame’s mouth as he brutally fucked you, enjoying the way your tight pussy threatened to milk him dry. “You feel way too fucking good baby. Come now”, he spoke through gritted teeth, the demand in your ear sending you over the edge as you came hard. All you could do was scream as the pleasure brutally consumed you, leaving you a complete mess as your grip on the sheets failed to anchor you through this one. Your walls clenched hard around him and he couldn’t hold back, grunting your name out in your ear as he came after you. It took everything in him to not bite you again as his orgasm ripped right through him. Sparing your skin from any more nasty marks.

His weight on top of you crushed you but also anchored you as you both rode your orgasms out. He calming himself before did, pulling you into him as he rolled onto his back. “That was quite intense. Are you okay?”, he asked, holding you tight against him as he kissed your face. His hands ran along your back, to help sooth you down, your whimpers muffled into his chest as you gradually caught your breath. “Y/n, are you okay? Answer me”, he asked again, slightly worried that he might of been a little too rough. He was sure it wasn’t your first time, considering how well you took him when he sunk into you. Maybe he was way too rough. He panicked, slightly tugging your head back to see your face. “Y/n. Answer me”. “K-Kisame. I’m f-fine”, you tiredly whimpered, snuggling into him to find sleep. He finally breathed out, kissing your forehead in relief. So this was all it took to get you to behave? He was hoping you’d be open to doing this again sometime soon, letting sleep take over as he relaxed onto the bed, feeling very satisfied with how things turned out.

[kirishimaswife2819]

Hi! Could I request headcanons with the boys who have an s/o with a very powerful close-ranged quirk, but they're really kind and also a dumbass? Like the boys see the reader use their quirk for the first time and they're all at least a bit intimidated, but over time they fall in love for a very friendly, bubbly clutz. Thank you :D

Them with a S/o That Has a Really Powerful Close-ranged Quirk But is Also a Dumbass || Midoriya, Bakugou, Kirishima, and Todoroki

Masterlist 1 || Masterlist 2

↠Author’s Note: Hi! Sorry, I couldn’t think of anything for Denki. But thank you for requesting! I hope that these are fine! Also, this is probably the only thing I’m going to upload tonight, I’m pretty tired -Danielle <3

↠Characters: Izuku Midoriya, Katsuki Bakugou, Eijiro Kirishima, and Shoto Todoroki

↠Summary: Them with a s/o that has a pretty powerful quirk and is intimidating because of it, but they turn out to be very friendly, bubbly, and a dumbass

↠Genre: Fluff

↠Word Count: 1.3k

↠Warnings: None

↠Notes: None

Izuku Midoriya:

This won’t come as a surprise, but Izuku is so interested in your quirk, the first time he sees you use it, and immediately after he gets a chance, he’s asking you a million questions about it

And he’s actually pretty surprised at how nice you are in return, and how eager you are to tell him all about it and how it works

Just based on your quirk and the way he saw you use it, he has assumed you were either loud, mean, or just a pretty stoic person, but no you were so friendly and you seemed so happy

He immediately fell for you, and there was no going back after that

After the first time you two talked, he constantly used your quirk as an excuse to talk to you, either claiming that he had questions about it or suggestions for you and then he would purposely “accidentally” get totally off topic

And throughout all of these conversations, he learned a lot about you and one of the things that he learned was that you were a bit dumb

But that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, just not a good thing either. It wasn’t like you were completely stupid, you just didn’t get things sometimes and had a hard time remembering certain things, but you were still absolutely perfect in Izuku’s eyes 

Anyways, so eventually y’all ended up together, and then you started training together and learned that you two made a pretty good team

You weren’t the best at coming up with plans or strategies, but you were powerful, and since Izuku was good at coming up with plans, he did that part and you helped him fight

He literally thinks that you’re the cutest thing to ever exist, personality wise and looks wise, just the very thought of you has his face turning ten different shades of red

Katsuki Bakugou:

Like Izuku, he was intimidated by you at first, so he went ahead and threatened you, telling you that you better not get in his way or try to be better than him

And he had expected you to reply with some snappy comeback, but instead you were all cheery and just replied with something along the lines of, “Oh, don’t worry! I’m not trying to beat you, I’m just trying to be a good hero! Anyways, what’s your name? Did you want to train together some time?”

Then, he gets annoyed by you, or is he annoyed by the fact that he oddly loves how bubbly and happy you are?

He liked to go with the first option, even though the second one was way more accurate, and was the actual reason that he was “annoyed” by you 

He still didn’t object to training with you or doing group work with you, he complained about it, but rejected any offers to switch partners or do it with somebody else

But somehow he got to the point where he couldn’t deny it any longer, he liked you and there was nothing he could do about it

So, then he tried avoiding you, hoping to forget about his dumb crush on you

But he couldn’t stand to do it any longer when you walked up to him, asking if you had done something wrong and why he was avoiding you all of the sudden

And then he accidentally let the truth slip out and you two ended up getting together

He doesn’t like to admit it but he actually loves how bubbly you are, and even the fact that you’re a little dumb, and he won’t hesitate to call you a dumbass, but he does it out of love, not out of hate, so don’t be insulted when he does

Eijiro Kirishima:

He wasn’t necessarily intimidated by you, but he did think that your quirk was really cool and decided to go ahead and tell you that he thought so

Like the others, he hadn’t expected you to be so nice and friendly, but he wasn’t complaining, he was just glad to be making a friend so quickly, especially since it was one of the first times that you two had met

He actually looks up to you in a way, he thinks you’re so cool and powerful, plus you have a great personality as well and in his eyes, you’re going to be an amazing hero

Kirishima absolutely loves watching you use your quirk, so this means that he greatly enjoys training with you as well. Plus since you’re powerful, you make a pretty good training partner, and you won’t throw a fit or get unnecessarily mad if you lose against him for whatever reason

Eventually he comes to the conclusion that he likes you and he tells you immediately after he realizes, not wanting to waste any time, if you liked him back then that would be amazing, but if you didn’t then that was fine too, you two could just be friends (and it wouldn’t be that he wasn’t heartbroken over you, but he wouldn’t want to lose what you two had, since it was a pretty good friendship)

But he didn’t have to worry about that, because you returned his feelings and you two got together

He absolutely refuses to be mean to you for being a little dumb, he might playfully tease you a little bit but not very often and not for too long since he doesn’t want to unintentionally hurt your feelings or make you think that he didn’t really liked you, because he really did like you. But if you are being a little dumb, he’ll just gently explain whatever it was to you, making sure that you understood

Anyways, he absolutely loves your personality and everything about it, you were just so cheerful and happy all the time and he loved that, he hated being sad, and you clearly did too, so you two got along pretty well and made an amazing couple

Shoto Todoroki:

Like Bakugou he saw you as nothing more than a rival at first, but he didn’t go and threaten you or anything, he just programmed into his brain that you were an enemy and somebody that he had to beat

He didn’t pay any special attention to you, although he always pretty amazed by how easily you used your quirk and you were able to be so powerful without even doing too much (although he was sure that must of been the result of a lot of training and hard work)

But eventually he was forced to work with you on something and he got to know you and he quickly fell for you

You were just so happy, positive, cheerful, kind, just the kind of person that he needed in his life. You were somebody that would love him regardless of his flaws and without expecting much out of him in return

He kept his feelings a secret for a long time, not really realizing what they were at first, but then eventually he figured it out, but then he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do about it

So, he came to you with his problem, explaining that he liked you a lot, he just wasn’t sure where he was supposed to go from there

And then you explained that you didn’t really know what to do either, but you were willing to figure it out with him if he would give you the chance to

He, of course, agreed, and you two got together

Shoto’s a bit dense sometimes, so if you’re dumb in that sense, you’re both going to be sitting there not understanding jokes or what’s being implied during certain situations

But overall, y’all make a pretty cute and happy couple, a lot of people are surprised that somebody as bubbly and outgoing as you got together with somebody so quiet and calm like Todoroki, but they still think you two are a cute couple

[pedropascalunofficial]

Pedro Pascal and Lena Headey

Head to head interview

Hunger Magazine, Issue 6. Released December 28, 2014. Photoshoot October 15, 2013.

Thirteen million. That's the number of people, on average, who tuned into each episode of the third season of Game of Thrones. Among them was Chilean actor Pedro Pascal, who was as enthralled by the sex and slaughter as the rest of us. But little did he know that within a few months he'd be pitching up on the shores of Belfast to join the cast as Oberyn Martell, affectionately known as the Red Viper. Sound ominous? It is. The Red Viper is GoTs newest anti-hero, “sexy and charming but driven by hate”. Sounds like he'll be right at home.

Pedro, on the other hand, though he looks good on paper, wasn't the obvious choice for the role. Expecting a big name to ride into King’s Landing, the show's fans took to forums to express their concerns as soon as the news broke. So is he worried? Like hell he is. “The fans had the part cast in their minds already. They knew who they wanted and it certainly was not me. But I'm not stupid, | presumed that people were going to say ‘who the fuck is this guy’. Since I anticipated the reaction it didn't throw me off.”

“There are so many different ways to go into battle with yourself when you're trying to get a job. I felt a certain amount of pressure because I wanted to make everyone happy. The fan base is so specific and, as a fan myself, I understand the relationship that they have with the show. The Red Viper is the best part I've ever played, and in season four shocks come at the most unexpected times. You might think you know, but you have no idea,” he explains.

Looks like the Red Viper could be in line to fill a Walter-White-sized-hole in television, but to test the theory we pit Pascal against Lena Headey, aka the Queen. Because if you can come away from Cersei unscathed, you can handle anything.

LH: So, Pedro, you come into Game of Thrones in season four, playing a pretty major character. Does that fill you with joy or dread?

PP: I'd say it fills me with joy because it’s a really fucking fun part. He’s a badass. He comes up against a lot of the main characters in the show. I'm very aware of the show. I watch it like a fan.

LH: Were you a fan before you arrived in Belfast?

PP: Yeah, I was a proper fan. I was caught up in the drama of it before I even auditioned for the part. I was already up to speed.

LH: I remember meeting you and thinking, “he fucking loves the show’.

PP: I kissed your ass.

LH: Well, it worked. We're friends now.

PP: I was like a tourist visiting the set, and yet I had to act with you and be in a scene with the characters that I had such a specific association with already.

LH: So you’re saying it’s boring?

PP: No, it wasn’t boring at all. It was extremely, relentlessly surreal.

LH: And who were your favourite characters up until that point?

PP: Not you.

LH: I realise that!

PP: There are too many characters to have a favourite, but I was fascinated by the Lannisters because they're so frightening. They scared me and then you would come in and pull sympathy from your audience somehow, and I found that rather fascinating. The Northerners were so easy to like or get behind, but it was quite something to see people sympathise with a Lannister, after you made people see things from their perspective.

LH: Speaking of being slightly ambiguous as a character, you come in as a major player and a very well-loved character in the eyes of people who read the books, and he’s somewhat of an anti-hero. Did you base him on anyone?

PP: What does an anti-hero mean exactly?

LH: It means he doesn't wear deodorant, doesn't it? [Laughs]. Someone you shouldn't champion, but you do, like Walter White in Breaking Bad.

PP: No, | didn’t really base him on anyone.

LH: Did you take anything from classic movies that you thought you could use and spin to your advantage playing the Red Viper?

PP: God, that’s a good question. I probably did subconsciously. Now I feel under the spotlight because I need to think of somebody, and I have so many in my mind! I think that’s something that is happening a lot in TV today: the anti-heroes are central to these television shows, and people are really getting behind them, even though they're not necessarily the most moral characters. So I'd say that ‘ve become more familiar with the character who's obviously very flawed but gets you on their side — you have complicated feelings about them. But I think I saw the story too much from this character's perspective to perceive any flaws.

LH: He has some.

PP: I know, from the outside. But I don't see any of them. What are his flaws?

LH: His flaws? He's a dirty bastard!

PP: Why is he a dirty bastard? He likes to fucking fight, for sure.

LH: Back to you as an actor. You've done it for a long time and, as we all know, the path is not always golden, and sometimes you think, “fuck it” and you want to leave it and do something else. Have there been moments where you wanted to give up?

PP: Yes, there have been moments where I came very close to giving up. But I never had anything to fall back on. I think you can understand that.

LH: Because were stupid?

PP: We're stupid.

LH: I can't even make pizza!

PP: We don’t have any other skills.

LH: None at all!

PP: And that’s the odd conundrum. You get to a point where you think, “This isn’t going to happen. This isn’t sustainable. I'm too exhausted, and it can't be good for me.” There were moments where I truly did try to formulate an idea of what I'd do. I thought I'd go back to school, start pre-med again and go to medical school or something like that.

LH: But that didn't happen, you just thought about it?

PP: Yes, I'd have thoughts, but it was still fantasy really. But at the time it felt like a practical life plan. Do you know what I mean?

LH: Yeah of course, you need to pay the fucking rent.

PP: Exactly. You just try to escape from the chaos of what you're feeling by trying to create order in your life. Order seems like a solution to save you from the pain of acting!

LH: It's a mental pain. Who was the first person you called when you got the role?

PP: My sister.

LH: Does she watch the show?

PP: Yes, she does.

LH: Pedro Pascal... or Pablo as I called you when I had too much wine, which was deeply insulting.

PP: Even family members have done that to me! Do I look more like a Pablo? Because it happens with about ninety-five percent of the people I meet.

LH: No, I think I’m just an ignorant drunk person.

PP: No, you were an ignorant drunk person that night is what you're saying.

LH: And now I’m educated.

PP: [Whispers] But | want you to call me Pablo.

LH: Ok, Pablo! When you first arrived on set in Northern Ireland, what was your feeling showing up to a bunch of British actors? Did it feel different to doing an American project?

PP: Yes, but I loved it. It wasn’t intimidating. I found it surreal because I’d watched and loved the show. I hadn't had the opportunity to work on something that I was really familiar with before, so it was overwhelming. But it was far more delightful than intimidating. Also you guys were really cool. Everyone was friendly.

LH: Oh, that’s just fake.

PP: Well, you guys were good at it!

LH: We know Game of Thrones is very popular obviously. Do you have any thoughts, or fears, about what this is going to bring you in terms of exposure?

PP: I have hope.

LH: Oh, God. I don’t mean to shatter that, but give it up.

PP: I don’t know really. It’s all been filmed, and now I'm back to my normal routine, so I haven't really thought about it. I remember when we finished filming and we were on our way to the airport, you asked me, “How does it feel you're all done?” and I couldn't really answer.

LH: You were quite emotional that day.

PP: I was very emotional because I’d had such an amazing time doing the part. Also just being there immersed in the experience... You described it to me best. You told me how I'd be feeling.

LH: We don't know your character's backstory when you enter the show, and you have some rather brutal scenes. Anyone who has read the books will know what I’m talking about.

PP: My character comes in, he stirs a bunch of shit up, and then he makes this fucking enormous exit. Now can | ask you a question?

LH: What is it? I’m not going to sleep with you. Give it up.

PP: Oh, come on! This has gone to shit and it’s your fault, so good luck to whoever has to edit it! But anyway, sometimes I'd hang out with the cast members and we'd go to dinner and they would get stopped constantly. There was no denying who they played because they were so recognisable, but you got away with it because you have this beautiful blonde wig on in the show, and in real life you are...

LH: Grey?

PP: {Laughs] No! You have beautiful chestnut hair! Is it liberating to not be recognised the way some of the other cast members are?

LH: Yes, it is liberating.

PP: Liberating being able to walk down an alley in Dubrovnik without being stopped?

LH: Yes, except sometimes | get recognised in the weirdest places. A woman was emptying my bag at Heathrow Airport's security gates and just went, “Are you the Queen?” while rummaging through my underwear. It was so fucking weird.

PP: It seems they're more respectful to you?

LH: Because they're frightened. Wait until they meet the Viper.

PP: Well, that covers it.

LH: I think we're going to get our own show out of this, you know

Interested in learning more about Pedro? Check out Pedro Pascal Unofficial on Pinterest!

[mirkosintern]

Crawlin’ back to you

pairing: dabi x fem!reader

genre: smut with a lil angst and fluff if you squint

notes: reader is a member of the lov, set in the meta liberation army arc (before the war!), possessive dabi, wowee this is my first work!! I never expected myself to be able to write a piece but here we are ehehe this was inspired by a certain tiktok actually. U may have already noticed but the title is from the song do I wanna know? by the arctic monkeys<3

warnings: 18+, unprotected sex, breeding, cum play, dubcon-ish?, toxic relationship, degradation, vulgar language, alcohol

word count: 3k

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That the nights were mainly made for saying things that you can't say tomorrow day Crawlin’ back to you Ever thought of callin’ when you've had a few? 'Cause I always do Maybe I'm too busy bein’ yours to fall for somebody new Now I've thought it through

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Dabi wasn’t one to do feelings. He’s screwed numerous women, but they were nothing more than some toys to fulfill his sexual needs. Neither did he want to have feelings, nor did he need to. Afterall, his side hoes who begged to stay with him even after all the degradation he’s given them disgusted him the most. He would snicker at their pathetic attempts and cut them off ruthlessly.

However, you were an only exception.

No, he did not have feelings for you, he swears he never did and never will. But you were different from his other disposable sluts--he kept you around. He didn’t ghost you, instead, he kept coming back. It is only because you’re a member of the lov as well, he thinks. You are easy to access since you’re always around the lov base, and he doesn’t even have to worry about getting caught by civilians or stupid bitches who suddenly decide to turn him into the police. You guys were practically co-workers with benefits, fuck buddies where the “buddies” part is questionable.

Dabi didn’t mind that he made an exception for you until that night. That very night where you sleepily decided to crawl into his arms after a rough round and whispered him how you loved the rough texture of his skin against yours. That very night where you pressed delicate kisses beneath his jaw. The moment of intimacy—making his heart pound and warmth spread beneath his cold skin—was threatening. You were threatening.

That’s where he cut you off completely. He did not knock on your bedroom door located in the lov base anymore. He stopped sending those “you up?” texts at 3am. He didn’t even lock eyes with you or talk to you anymore.

It feels as if something heavy dropped inside you, squashing your heart to the point where it’s painful. You try your best to ignore the pang in your chest and remind yourself that you guys were nothing more than co-workers with benefits. However, the enduring heartburn only functions to make you realize how attached you were to him. He’s Dabi, the biggest scumbag you will ever meet, what did you expect? What were you thinking? It should be no surprise this happened, right? But having to encounter his stupidly handsome face every day was not doing any help. You are a girl with dignity, you tell yourself, trying your best to ignore his strong scent of campfire and cologne drowning you every time you guys are in the same room.

The pain is suffocating you for weeks, and you finally decide to completely get over him. The night Dabi brings a bimbo to his room and fucks her loud enough for everyone in the lov to hear—for you to hear—you’re done with everything. You step outside, get drunk, do anything to numbify the pain the raven-haired guy has caused you, and even meet a nice-looking guy who seems to be interested in you.

You are doing good without Dabi.

You don’t need Dabi anymore.

You are not letting him get to your head.

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A party.

League of villains is all about privacy, but they also started having some fun after uniting with the meta liberation army. Now they had sufficient money, people and place to throw parties every now and then without the danger of getting caught by civilians. Afterall, a number of heroes were in their side as well.

“Not gonna lie, you guys do know how to host parties.” Keigo smirks, picking up a glass of bourbon whiskey. “It’s fuckin’ lame,” Dabi answers as he downs a glass of liquor.

“So, what happened with y/n?” Keigo throws a suggestive smile.

“The hell you mean what happened with her?” Dabi frowns.

“Y’know, didn’t you guys used to be a thing or something?”

“Nah, she was an occasional fuck and that’s it.”

“Oh really? The Dabi I know never fucks a same bitch twice though. I thought she was something special.”

“Special?”

“Yeah, thought maybe you actually wanted her.”

A smug grin appears on Dabi’s face. “Never even liked her.”

“Have you seen her and her new boyfriend?”

The smile is quick to vanish from his face after hearing the word boyfriend. Dabi’s eyes widen, immediately glaring at Keigo. Before he could say anything, Keigo tilts his chin to point something.

“There they are.”

Dabi turns his head only to find you clinging onto some guy’s arm. Your cheeks are flushed –a pretty, pink glow on your face—as you bat your eyelashes at the guy. Bubbly giggles escape from your lips while you stare at him through half-lidded eyes. The guy’s arm is secured around your waists, pulling you closer to him.

Dabi sees red.

His entire body freezes as his grip around the liquor glass tighten. Dabi doesn’t say anything for a moment, but there is no way Keigo wouldn’t pick up how his cerulean eyes are flaming at the sight. “Well, I thought you knew.” Keigo pats Dabi’s shoulder. “Wouldn’t matter anyways right? You never liked her.”

“…Right.” Dabi takes another sip from the liquor, his eyes still fixed to you.

Keigo’s words are true; at least they are supposed to be true. Dabi didn’t have feelings for you. He doesn’t do romance. No feelings were ever involved with any of the women he’s slept with, and he made sure of it. It was so clear for Dabi without a question.

But why is it unable for him to erase the sight of you with some guy as he forces himself to sleep that night? Why are your sweet giggles echoing his head? Why can’t he get rid of the thought of you in that tight, black dress that perfectly complements the curves of your body? Why is the moment where the guy places his hand on your inner thigh replaying in his head? Why are thoughts of you messing with his mind?

“Fucking hell.”

Dabi gets up. This was fucking annoying. You were truly fucking annoying.

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You tilt your head to check the glowing digits of your digital clock on the nightstand. 2:15am. It’s late, and you haven’t even taken off the dress you wore to the party. You are too tired both physically and emotionally. You’ve done quite a decent job in entertaining the man who’s accompanied you through the whole party, but it was truly an energy-consuming task. You and him walked around as if you guys were the happiest couple in the party; but the truth is that you guys aren’t even properly dating yet. Solely because you have constantly been refusing to properly answer him asking you to be his girlfriend. It’s not that he’s bad looking or anything, but the idea of being with him just doesn’t sit right with you. Ever since you’ve met him, he couldn’t keep his hands off you without asking you anything about consent. You always had to pull his hand away with an uncomfortable smile, yet he never took a hint. However, when a dating rumor about you and him started and spread quickly, you didn’t try to correct anything. Maybe it was because you wanted to pull out a reaction from a certain villain. Maybe your unusual actions at today’s party; clinging onto the guy and laughing at every single word he spoke; was to make Dabi witness how happy you were.

 Truthfully, you were dying inside.

 What was even worse was that none of your attempts seemed to bring an ounce of reaction from Dabi. When have you become so pathetic and desperate? You feel tears welling up in your eyes, hot and burning, but you don’t want to cry. Not for an asshole like him. You take out your phone, find the guy’s name, and text him that you don’t want to see him anymore. You feel a little guilty, thinking that you may have used him to provoke something from Dabi, but your thoughts are too worn out for you to comprehend anything. You flop onto your bed and bury your face in your pillow. You huff out a deep sigh, and the soft texture of your cotton pillow feels warm on your cheeks. In all honesty, you were thinking about Dabi the whole time you were at the party. Whenever the guy’s hand creeped up your thighs or gripped on your ass, you imagined it was Dabi’s, trying your hardest to feel something from the contact.

 You weren’t over Dabi. You never were. Realization hurts, leaving a sour feeling in your mouth.

 Your body shoots up at the sudden, loud slamming sound emerged from your door. Your teary eyes widen at the lean man slamming the door shut. “Dabi?” You ask, not believing your eyes. “What the hell are you doing here?” Without an answer, Dabi’s one hand reaches for your throat as his other hand grips your wrist. His large body is towering over you, and you feel your bed shift as he dips one knee in the mattress. His sapphire eyes pierce through your soul, and you can feel his raging anger just from looking at him.

“You’re such a pain in the ass, y’know that?”

“Dabi, what are you-“

He doesn’t let you finish the sentence, pulling you in for a heated kiss. Your lips open reflexively, enabling him to deepen the kiss. The kiss is aggressive, and he doesn’t know whether it is because of his anger or his pent-up desires towards you that he has been suppressing. The kiss gets sloppier over time, hot and wet with saliva and tongue. He lets go of the grip on your wrist and starts tracing your inner thigh with his thumb, and you let out a soft moan. You finally pull away from the kiss to catch your breath, but he doesn’t cease to caress your thigh. Instead, he lowers himself to your ear. “You seem to really love thigh touches, don’t you?” His low voice and hot breath brushing the shell of your ear sends chills down your spine.

“Huh?”

“I always knew you were a slut, but never knew you were this much of a whore. You would bend over any guy who offers you some touches, right?”

Tears swell in your eyes again at his vile words, but it’s hard to talk when his knuckles are repeatedly brushing your clit.

“I’m… not a slut…nngh.” Suppressed moans escape your lips.

“Yeah? Why are you making those sounds then?”

“Dabi…”

He yanks your dress up and dips two fingers inside your lace panties, making you let out a weak yelp. Dabi raises his brows with a smug grin on his face.

“Oh, so she indeed is a slut huh? You get this fucking wet from a kiss?”

His two digits start pumping inside you, and you grip on his white shirt at the sudden sensation. Your gasps and moans get louder, and you suddenly feel his wet lips against your neck. Dabi sucks hard, making sure to leave dark purple marks from your jaw to your neck and shoulder, as he repeats the step of curling his fingers and pulling them inside and out your hole. “Dabi…too fast.” You whine out. “Yeah?” A sadistic grin appears on Dabi’s face. “Be a good slut and take what I give you.” His thumb reaches for your clit, making your legs shiver.

“Nngh…stop, I’m gonna… Dabi I’m gonna cum.”

“Stop? You want me to stop?”

“No!”

“Do you deserve it though?” he slows his pace while teasing your clit. “Beg.”

It’s humiliating, really—but do you have any other choice when you are this close?

“Please, Dabi… I’ll be your good slut. Please let me cum!” Your desperate cries have him pumping his fingers fast again, and soon you’re seeing white. Hot drops of release coat Dabi’s fingers as he pulls out.

“Say ah.”

“A-ah.”

You obey, and Dabi sticks his digits inside your mouth. Your mouth wraps around them immediately, sucking as if it’s a pacifier. “Good girl,” Dabi says as he pats your head, and it makes your stomach swoop with sick pride.

The bulge in his pants is becoming painful, and he contemplates on fucking your mouth. But he’s too impatient; He feels the need to abuse your cunt right now. He wants to hear your screams and cries as he proves who you belong to.

“Take that off.” Dabi gestures at your dress, and you start undressing as he demands. Dabi pulls down his sweatpants and boxers, causing his cock to spring out. It’s so pretty, you think, and you can’t help but admire his red tip, glistening with precum. He pumps his length a few times and lines it up with your entrance. You inhale a sharp gasp as you feel his whole length inside you. It feels so full; it feels as if he’s gonna split you in half if he starts moving.

“Ah, too big.”

“I know.” Dabi looks down on you. “Take it like a little slut you are.”

Before you could even talk back, he is moving inside you. Your moans blend with the noise of the bed creaking; a perfectly harmonized orchestra to Dabi’s ears.

You knew Dabi wasn’t one to prep you or go slow, but you feel like he’s going way rougher than usual. His wild thrusts have your head lolling backwards, and Dabi does not miss the chance to take a hard bite on your neck. You scream out of both pain and pleasure, and you feel two hot streams of tears on your flushed cheeks.

“Aww, she’s crying.” Dabi says in a mocking tone. “Bet you love the pain.”

Humiliation fills your chest and you turn your head away, but Dabi quickly grabs your chin with one hand, forcing you to directly face him.

“Who’s the one making you feel this full?” he asks.

“Y-you.”

“Did he ever make you feel this way?”

Wait, he? Who does he mean by he? Your alleged boyfriend? Could it be possible that Dabi was doing this out of jealousy? You try to comprehend, but it’s impossible for you to think clearly, not when Dabi is fucking you stupid. “No!” You shout.

Dabi’s free hand reaches for your clit and starts rubbing circles. “Tell me, who does this pussy belong to?”

“You…” You try to answer, but he suddenly lifts up your lower body and slams into your cervix in the right angle. It has you moaning even louder, your insides spasming around his cock.

“I can’t hear you.” He smirks sadistically.

“You, Dabi, it belongs to you! I belong to you!” You’re screaming his name like it’s the only word you know, making his cock twitch. “That’s right. You are all for me, all for me to use. Just a pathetic little slut for my cock.” A satisfactory grin appears on Dabi’s face.

Dabi lowers his body down and grunts directly into your ear as he thrusts even faster. The sound of his skin slamming into yours is so erotic, and you can feel how close you are.

“You wanna cum huh?” His words have you nodding frantically, babbling incoherent words. Yes Dabi—wanna cum so bad—wanna be yours—wanna be your good girl—please, dabi.

“Then do it. Make a mess on my cock.”

“Nngh, Dabi!” You scream out his name as euphoria washes down your body. His release follows you soon enough, painting your walls white. You feel warmth filling your belly while his groans echo in your ear. You’re still sobbing and panting after he pulls out, without any energy left to move. As your blurry vision starts getting clearer, you feel his warm skin and the sting of his cold staples against your back. His long arms wrap around your oversensitive body, pulling you closer to him.

“You’re messing with my head.” Dabi rests his forehead on the back of your shoulder.

“Huh?”

You’re confused, but Dabi doesn’t elaborate. His ego doesn’t let him do such thing.

“When you said you belonged to me, did you mean it?”

You bite your lower lip, not knowing how to respond to his sudden question. Millions of unspoken words and feelings are hanging in the back of your throat, creating a huge lump. You swallow them all and spit out a question instead. “Do you want me to belong to you?”

“Yeah.” Your eyes widen at his unexpected response, butterflies fluttering inside your chest. “Be mine.” His low voice vibrates against your soft skin. Your heart melts at his words, and you cannot stop your feelings from overspilling anymore. At that moment you both realize; you and Dabi were meant to crawl back to each other, no matter how hard you both try and struggle.

“I’m yours.” You smile, “I’m all yours.”

[letarasstuff]

Breaking Protocol

(A/N): This was requested by an anon. I hope you like it, I really enjoyed writing for JJ for the first time :)

Summary: What will happen, if JJ isn't technically allowed to tell her family about the Anthrax Attack, but tries to do it anyways?

Warnings: Mentions of a sick child, Spencer eats Jell-O, so food

Wordcount: 1.8k

✨Masterlist✨ __________________________________

JJ always says that even though she is a communication liaison for the FBI, she is a mother first. This is something she promised her daughter when she first began to work there. And she is set on keeping that promise.

But today it turns out to be more difficult than ever. Hotch’s strict instruction to keep the information about the Anthrax Attack in the circle of the BAU and the military forbids the mother to say anything to her family. Still, her family is constantly on her mind.

If she is right, Will planned a trip with one year old Henry and 14 years old (Y/N) to the park. JJ can’t think about anything but her most important people in the world laying in the ER, coughing their lungs out and spluttering blood, while she is stuck at the office with the power to warn them.

Spencer comes into her office, asking for a certain file. “Spence, what would you do if your family is in potential danger?” He stops for a second to think about it: “Given the fact that my mother is in a sanctorium with guards and medical staff, I consider her pretty low risk and can’t put myself in a situation where she is in real danger. So I take all of you and since I see you as my family and the people that keep me going I think I would do anything to keep you safe.”

She looks up at him with her blue eyes. “Even if it means to break protocol?” “Especially if it means to break protocol”, he answers her firmly, exactly knowing what she means. Spencer knows that her little family means the world and more to her. If anything happens to them she would never be the same.

Meanwhile JJ sits there contemplating putting her job on the line for an eventually that maybe isn’t even true, Will runs around the house frantically.

“Maybe I can go and get some? I’m sure we can’t disturb mom at work”, (Y/N) suggests as she tries to console the crying Henry in her arms. Her stepdad considers the offer. They originally wanted to go to the park to have a small picnic and maybe even invite JJ to meet them there on her lunch break. But Henry caught something overnight and the only thing he does is crying and puking.

Will is looking for any kind of medicine, but he can’t find anything appropriate for children. “I guess you are right. Do you know which one we need? I’ll try to get him to sleep or calm down at least. Thank you so much, (Y/N), you are a lifesaver.”

“Of course, I do anything. When I get lost or something at the pharmacy I can still call you, right?” He nods while taking his son out of her arms in order for her to be able to put on her shoes. “Good, then see you soon. I’ll hurry up.”

(Y/N) takes her bike and decides to use the shortcut through the park. It’s a nice sunny day with a warm soft breeze going through the bushes. In moments like these the teenager knows that the world is alright. That somehow everything will be good. Always.

Buying the needed medicine for her baby brother takes place without any complications and soon she is back on track with her bike. Shortly before reaching her house, the teenager’s phone is ringing.

In case that Will needs something else (Y/N) has turned her ringtone on. Surprisingly it’s her mother, she sees after descending her bike and looks at the caller ID.

“Hey Mom, is everything ok? Did something happen?” As sad as this may sound, but in 90% it’s the case that she was hurt on her job or anybody else when she calls (Y/N) during her workday.

But JJ is relieved to hear her daughter safe and sound. “(Y/N), honey. Everything is fine. Did you go to the park with Henry and Will?” Slowly the girl continues her way back, pushing her bike. “No, we didn’t. Henry got sick overnight, so there is no way we could have taken him. I think it’s just a stomach bug. Will and I couldn’t find any medicine for him, so I did a quick run to the pharmacy. I’m actually on my way back right now. Why are you calling?”

Once again the mother tries to not answer her question. “Aw, poor Henry. Can you tell him that Mommy will be home soo- Wait, to which pharmacy did you go?”

Puzzled by her mother’s sudden harsh tone (Y/N) stops in her tracks. “Mom, what’s the problem? You never call me during work except when something happens. Is anybody in the hospital? Did you get kidnapped? Is this your last call to a loved one? Mom, answer me!” Panic sets in as the silence grows from JJ’s side.

“Honey, please tell me you didn’t go to the one on West Street. Please.” Her begging tone alarms the teenager further. Is this a clue?

“I did, Mom. I took my bike, went through the park to West Street. It’s the closest one and Henry really doesn’t feel good, so I had to hurry up. Can you please tell me what’s going on?!” But her mother stays quiet for several moments, as if she is calculating something.

Being finally fed up with her, (Y/N) speaks again: “If you don’t want to tell me anything, don’t bother call-” She is suddenly cut off by a huge coughing fit.

“(Y/N)? Honey, are you ok?” The agent’s mind goes into momma bear mode, completely ignoring any protocol in the world. But her daughter isn’t able to answer. Too stunned is she by the fact that she just coughed up blood. How is that poss-

“(Y/N), please answer me”, she begs again. “M-mom, I just c-coughed blood.” JJ feels like her heart stops. This can’t be happening.

“Stay calm, (Y/N). I- There- I’ll send people to you. They will come and get you. They will explain to you what this is, they know more about it than I do. I’ll call Will and tell him that you are not coming home. Penelope will ping your phone, just don’t move.”

After a few more reassuring words JJ hangs up and bolts into Hotch’s office. “Hotch, (Y/N) got infected, she rode her bike through the park and back to get medicine for Henry and I told her to stay where she is. That somebody is going to get he-”

Aaron stops her rambling by putting both hands on her shoulder. “I’ll let Doctor Kimura know. Meet them at the hospital.” “Bu-” Again he cuts the blonde off. “No buts. You always say that you are a mother first. Your family, especially your daughter, needs you now more than ever. Go and be a mother.”

Encouraged by her boss’ words she makes her way to her car, simultaneously calling Will to let him know what’s happening.

Shortly after this the small family sits in a hospital room. (Y/N) lays passed out on the bed, paler than anybody has her ever seen. JJ grasps her hand, mentally kicking herself for not calling sooner. For letting regulations destroy her family. Will holds Henry, who finally is asleep, in his arms and tries to console his girlfriend.

“You weren’t allowed to say anything. Also, I wanted to go to another park if Henry wasn’t sick. There was absolutely nothing you could have done differently.” His accent is thicker than ever.

Before she is able to respond, a nurse enters the room with an inhaler in hand. “What is this?” Ever since (Y/N) was admitted to the hospital, the mother is careful to know what they give her and what not.

“This is a cure for this strand, Doktor Reid found it in Nichol’s office. We already tested it and it’s 100% effective.” More or less convinced JJ let’s the nurse do her job, watching her every move like a hawk.

And then they wait again. And wait. And wait for the cure to kick in. For (Y/N) to open her eyes. To be able to form a sentence. A coherent sentence without being interrupted by a coughing fit.

Once JJ leaves her bed reluctantly, Will forces her to take a walk and get a coffee from the cafeteria. On her way back she visits Spencer’s room, who is already awake.

“Hey Spence”, she smiles softly at him. He stops shoving a cup of Jell-O into his mouth to smile back. “Hi. How is (Y/N) doing?” A frown quickly spreads onto her face. “Still not awake. But the doctors say she will be fine. I wanted to thank you. If you wouldn’t have put your life on the line, none of the others would be alive. Thank you, for saving my daughter”, at the end the blonde’s voice breaks. She can’t imagine a life without her oldest child. Without anyone of her family.

“Hey, it’s alright. (Y/N) is fine. I’m fine. Everybody got their own happy end. Now go back to her, I’m sure she’ll wake up in no time.” She nods and gives him a hug before going back to (Y/N)’s room. There she sits back in her seat, handing her boyfriend his own cup of coffee.

A few minutes later a small groan is heard. “Can anybody turn off the sun? It’s unbelievably bright today.” Not registering what’s really happening, the teenager finds herself in a big family hug with Henry on her chest. “Woah, did I fall asleep during our picnic or something?”

JJ smiles through her tears of relief, seeing her daughter being her confused self again. “No, I’ll explain it to you later. Get some more rest, we’ll stay with you.” “Rest, this sounds nice.” Just a few minutes later (Y/N) is asleep again.

Luckily both she and Spencer make a quick recovery and even get a “Welcome Back to the Living” Party (organized by the one and only Penelope Garcia). From this moment on JJ makes sure to warn her family one way or another. Hotch generously lets it slip, acting like he doesn’t know about it after this close of a call.

In the end the only thing that matters is that they all are back to being healthy and make up for the missed picnic.

Taglist:

All works:

@dindjarinsspouse

Criminal Minds:

@averyhotchner @mggsprettygirl @herecomesthewriterwitch

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

Could you talk about the Statute of Secrecy? Or the Ministry’s corruption in General :)

Well, those are two different things. Given that I believe I have an ask floating somewhere in my inbox on the Statute, I suppose we’ll talk about the Ministry of Magic today.

I feel like this is such a broad topic though that I’m not quite sure where to start. I guess I’ll just throw spaghetti at the internet wall and see what sticks.

The Ministry is a Reflection of Society Who Never Admitted They Were the Death Eaters

In the ministry of Harry Potter’s era the Ministry is hopelessly corrupt and filled to the brim with spies (more on this in a later section). Lucius Malfoy, very high up in an unofficial capacity in the Ministry and owner of the Ministry’s mouth piece: The Daily Prophet, was a known Death Eater with a very flimsy excuse.

How is he even able to wield so much influence, you ask? Well, I think it’s not just because of Fudge picking the wrong friends.

I think most the population probably does believe Lucius Malfoy is innocent the way Fudge does. I think it’s a very small subsection, i.e. Dumbledore’s lackies, who go “Nah, ain’t buying it.” I think that, in 1981, when it came time to reveal just how many were Death Eaters and how far this went many people just couldn’t handle it.

Because it was to the point where the nation wasn’t battling Death Eaters, Death Eaters were the nation. Look at the members, these are and were the most influential and prominent families in the country, who combined hold a non-small minority of seats in the Wizengamot. More, these were only the participants, combine those who given anti-muggle and muggleborn sentiment (which I believe are pervasive even among those who claim they fight for the rights of muggles and muggleborns) and you get a nation that is suddenly facing a huge cultural issue that was never previously acknowledged.

We’re talking an entire purge of the Wizengamot, of the Ministry, of the major families and cornerstones of this society. The Black family is completely and utterly destroyed.

People were and remain throughout the 1990′s, desperate to believe it was not as bad as it was or isn’t as bad as it is. If Lucius Malfoy says he was never really a Death Eater then he was never really a Death Eater.

The Ministry is Lousy With Corruption and Spies

What’s hilarious to me is not only is the Ministry incompetent. It is positively flooded with spies. Given the ministry’s overbloated, it’s not even a sizeable minority of employees, but nonetheless every major department has at least one person (if not more) who works for somebody else.

Most work for Tom Riddle. He seems to have intelligence in every department. Through Lucius, who is working pretty much as an unofficial aide to Fudge, he has access to Fudge, complete control of the Daily Prophet, and a voice on the Hogwarts’ board of governors.

Through Rockwood, Tom has direct access to the Department of Mysteries which Lucius is then able to take full advantage of.

Lucius is able to set up an ambush in the Department of Mysteries, getting escaped convicts into the building with the none the wiser, and, had his sole purpose not been a prophecy that only Harry Potter and the Dark Lord can touch, he would have been able to take what he liked. (Though it was always odd to me that the plan was to get Harry Potter to do it, when the better solution would have been to polyjuice Tom Riddle into someone else, set up a tour with the department, and then Tom wanders off conveniently to pick up the prophecy. My theory, I suppose, is that chasing after the prophecy was mostly an exercise in punishing Lucius. And then Lucius fucked up.)

And of course, in book seven, Tom Riddle makes a puppet minister. Point being, to me, it always said a lot that in Book Seven Tom just sort of walks into the building and says, “I’m in charge now” and everyone says “okay”. There was no second Wizarding War, it was a bloodless coup that met zero resistance from anyone but angry school children. 

But that’s Tom’s spies, we also have other spies. Who am I talking about, Dumbledore’s folks of course.

Shacklebolt, Moody, Tonks, and Arthur Weasley are all spies, they just don’t have the introspection to even realize it (which really tells you something about the state of corruption in the ministry). They all work for the ministry, yes, but they in fact pass on information to and serve another master, whose goals do not always align with the government and was a hop skip and a jump away from overthrowing the government at any given moment.

And they don’t even really realize they’re doing this! There doesn’t even seem to be a thought of “I’m doing this for the greater good”, they don’t seem to acknowledge that what they’re doing is very very very bad. Arthur, in fact, is appalled when Percy refuses to do this (well, he’s upset for a lot of reasons, such as that he thinks Percy is spying on Arthur for the minister, but in there is also that Percy refuses to help out with the Order or follow Dumbledore without question). 

Harry paints the Dumbledore’s Army threat that Umbridge saw as something utterly ridiculous, but honestly if I was the ministry I would be worried about this. Dumbledore’s people have infiltrated the ministry just as deeply and badly as the Death Eaters, Dumbledore’s known for recruiting children into his vigilante organization, I don’t know what he’s doing with an army of schoolchildren but I can smell a coup coming.

Anyway, I’m getting off track, point being though that corruption is not only expected and accepted by the ministry, they cannot recognize what it even is. They’re at the point where paying bribes is allocated in their budget.

I Don’t Blame the Ministry For Not Thinking Tom Riddle Was Anti-Jesus

Fudge is designed to get a lot of flack for his outright denial that Voldemort had returned from the dead. He, and other denier characters, are meant to be fools with their heads in the sand who can’t see the obvious.

I ask what about it was obvious?

The only witness to Tom Riddle’s resurrection, Harry Potter, has a known history of erratic behavior.

The previous year, he’d performed illegal magic on his muggle aunt and run away from home. During the previous school year, Harry was revealed to be a parselmouth in a time when the Chamber of Secrets was presumably opened and the mystery was never fully solved (remember, that it was a possessed Ginny never comes to light for more than a few people.) Beyond that, since his first day of school, Harry is routinely in and out of detention, constantly out after curfew, and only seems to not be in serious trouble because he’s openly favored by Dumbledore (who gives him hundreds of points for breaking one of his school rules, during the Philosopher’s Stone fiasco in first year). In 1994, Harry is entered into the Tri-Wizard Tournament under very suspicious circumstances.

We know why all this happens to Harry but from the outside he looks like a delinquent. In fact, he kind of is a delinquent. 

Point being, the only witness is not only Harry Potter (who is already sketch) but it’s Harry Potter holding a dead body of a rival in the tournament.

And he’s claiming that a man who has been nearly fifteen years dead, a man who held the nation in terror and Harry Potter is beloved for destroying, has returned from the grave and conveniently murdered Cedric.

Why is Cedric dead? Well, you see, he and Harry both touched the goblet at the same time because they were going to share the reward. The goblet, a national treasure, was turned into a portkey so that Voldemort could kidnap him.

Why didn’t Voldemort just kidnap him at any other point during the year where he’s guaranteed not to get tag a longs or the wrong kid? Uh... VOLDEMORT IS BACK (for the record, I think it’s because Barty got hung up on the goblet scheme and was determined to ruin his father’s day.)

Where is Voldemort at this very moment? Being evil, somewhere, that is not right here. No, Harry has zero evidence this happened.

Frankly, I wouldn’t believe Harry either.

And when Dumbledore goes about promoting this as sound evidence that Tom Riddle has in fact returned, it starts to get even sketchier. Rather than sounding the alarm, Dumbledore is using this boy’s madness to stir the public into a panic that he, perhaps, plans to take advantage of.

After Dumbledore does that, I would suspect that, even if Harry does give me a memory of the graveyard scene that his head had been tampered with by Dumbledore.

And it’s so convenient that, of all the names Harry picked, it’s Voldemort who killed Cedric. It seems like a ploy to not only deflect the fact that he murdered Cedric but 

Harry’s very upset when some don’t take him at his word but Harry’s also a dumbass and a psychopath. He hates everyone who doesn’t agree with him.

More importantly, necromancy isn’t a thing in the Harry Potter universe. People don’t rise from the dead. Horcruxes exist, but they’re extremely rare, and it seems like no one ever really makes use of them.

So, yeah, not unreasonable that Fudge didn’t immediately go, “My god, Voldemort has risen from the dead! LIGHT THE BEACONS AND SUMMON ROHAN!”

So yeah, it’d take me seeing Voldemort waltzing through the Department Mysteries to go “... Goddammit, this man is more unkillable than Sheev Palpatine.”

After the Epilogue, I am Certain It’s Still the Same Damn Ministry

People hate the epilogue, but in a way, I love it, because it confirms many of my headcanons: these people don’t learn a goddamn thing.

Nothing in their society seems to have changed. Instead of one set of families holding all the power it’s now a new set of families and friends holding all the power. The difference being that they are now all in some way connected to Harry Potter.

Nepotism’s still the name of the game, we still see only human children boarding the Hogwarts Express so you know shit hasn’t changed for the goblins, Draco Malfoy’s alive and well and holds a position in the Ministry that Kingsly graciously allows him to have, it’s just now you have Hermione writing all your laws for you.

The Wizarding World is still the Wizarding World in every single capacity. The only difference is that Voldemort is dead again. Hooray.

Harry and friends simply don’t have the introspection to even realize it.

[heliads]

Heartbeats (Part Two)

Based on this request: “Jesper x reader where she was in the first army and grew up with mal and Alina, but then when stuff goes down in the fold she ends up in ketterdam (maybe she’s grisha too) and teams up with the crows but her and Jesper end up falling for each other?”

part one / masterlist

As much as you’d like to avoid it, though, the battle on the sand skiff rages on. In the end, despite all of your complaints about Kerch sharpshooters and their unusually quick wits, there’s nothing you can do about the present situation except fight your way out of it. You’ve been a soldier for a long time now, a tracker and a fighter through the First Army. This isn’t your first brawl, and it likely won’t be your last.

It is, however, your first one where you’re actively attacking the grotesque flying monsters known affectionately as volcra. There are also several Grisha on board, and despite your silent protests, you can hear your power almost calling out to them, as if it can recognize those of its own kind. You try to reel it back in, collect it and calm it and force it away, but in a life and death situation like this, your control is weak. If you used it now, you could probably save yourself. The only issue is that by revealing yourself, you might damn yourself to a worse fate than a quick death at the claws of a volcra.

So, you ignore the thrum of heartbeats echoing out around you, electing instead to fire your pistols again and again. You’re not the only shooter here- Jesper Fahey is at your back, the two of you surrounded by a cloud of smoke issuing from the barrels of your respective guns. You could almost fool yourself into thinking that you might make a good team. Clearly, the stress of the battle is getting to you.

Then, just when you’re sure that you’re going to make it out of here alive, you slip up. You took too long in taking down a volcra and forgot about the Darkling’s oprichniki guards still on board the ship. You sense them before you see them, and whip around to see one seconds away from shooting you full of bullets. Your own arm rises involuntarily, as if pulling the string of a marionette. The oprichnik’s body rises in turn, his face turning ashy as his heart is yanked apart under your watch.

The moment is over almost as quickly as it happens. The guard’s body slams to the ground beneath him, head lolling. He’s dead, no question of that. What have you done now? You quickly force your hand back to your side, pretending as if you’d shot the guard and nothing more. Alina and Mal are still busy with the Darkling on the other side of the skiff, so you think you’ve managed to keep your secret intact for a little longer. Saints, you’d sworn to yourself that you wouldn’t let this happen. Grisha are constantly on the run for their lives, and you can only imagine that it will get worse now that word of the Darkling’s treachery has come out. You can’t afford for this to happen.

When you look up, though, you’re met with a pair of eyes. Jesper Fahey watches you from his place a few paces away from you. There’s no doubt in your mind that he’s seen everything, that he knows exactly what you are. Strangely enough, though, he doesn’t seem angry or surprised or even afraid. Instead, he just looks understanding, like he knows exactly what you’re going through. He nods his head once, a sharp motion, then moves away again.

You try to redirect your attention back to the fight at hand, but your thoughts keep straying to that one moment over and over again. What will Jesper do with this information? He’s used to being a canal rat running the streets of the Barrel, where any piece of knowledge should be taken and sold to the highest bidder. There’s no doubt in your mind that he’ll tell somebody- why would he ever keep your secret? 

However, he gives you no suspicious looks, and when you and your friends finally make it out of the Shadow Fold and into the dim gray sunlight of the ruins of Novokribirsk, he simply walks over to stand with his own group once again. He doesn’t say a word to Alina or Mal or anyone else. 

Your stomach is still in knots over the potential of your secret being revealed, and you find that you can’t sit quietly, even when you’re exhausted from the fight on board the sand skiff. Instead, there’s a strange buzzing in your chest, as if you could run a hundred miles and never tire. It occurs to you that this might be because you finally used your Grisha abilities and didn’t keep them tied up for once. Regardless, you can’t be content with a place by Alina and Mal in the long and broken grass, so you stand up, walking to pace back and forth overlooking the ruins of the city.

To your surprise, you’re soon joined by Jesper. He walks with you for a few yards, then turns back to you. “Why do you keep the fact that you’re a Grisha a secret?” Your feet stall in place, and you quickly check around you to make sure that no one can hear the conversation. Alina and Mal are a ways away, so they probably won’t be able to tell what you’re saying, but you can never be too sure.

“It means I can stay with them. It means that my friends don’t look at me like I’m an enemy, one of the Darkling’s men. They don’t trust Heartrenders that well. I cannot have them think that of me.” Jesper nods, but doesn’t speak. You glance over at him. “Aren’t you going to do something? Make a joke about how I’m too afraid of my friends?” He shrugs. “You’re not the only one with secrets to keep.”

Before you can think more on this and what the seemingly open Jesper Fahey could possibly have to hide, he’s turning his attention back towards the ruins of Novokribirsk below you. At the sight of it, the wind drifting through clouds of smoke and dust, he whistles softly, the low note hanging in the silent air. “Are you looking for anyone down there?” You shake your head. “I have no one anywhere.” Jesper regards you for a moment longer, a strange look in his eyes, then turns and walks back to his Kerch friends without another word.

As you watch, he speaks to them in low voices. Although you cannot make out a single word, you swear that their gazes lock on you several times. Later, after everyone has had time to recover and start to think about moving forward, Jesper’s friend Kaz steps forward. “We’ll be heading back to Ketterdam soon. You should either run or find a place to hide. They’ll be looking for you soon enough.” Alina nods, giving Mal’s hand a comforting squeeze. “We plan on going to Novyi Zem.”

It hurts you a little, this quiet intimacy. They’ve clearly discussed this, although you weren’t in on their plans. You’ve known that it would be like this for a while, that the two of them would always need each other a little more than you. Truth be told, you’re largely alright with it, although it does sting a little to know that you will forever be on the outside of their happy pairing.

Kaz now turns to you. “If they’re going to Novyi Zem, where does that leave you? We have a position in our ranks, if you’re interested in taking it. You appear to have a skill set that we could use, and it would probably be best for your Sun Summoner if you split up into smaller groups.” You look between him and Jesper, who appears to be doing his best to remain nonchalant. Was this what they had been talking about- offering you a job?

Before you can talk yourself out of it, you step forward. “I’ll go with you to Ketterdam.” Alina stares at you. “Really?” You nod, clasping her hands. “I’ll miss you, Alina. You too, Mal. But he’s right- you too need your best chance at staying hidden from him if he comes looking. It’ll be safest if we split up. Besides,” you try for a laugh, “I’d probably get really bored in Novyi Zem anyways.” You might just be kidding yourself, but you swear that Jesper’s looking at you with an honest smile now.

This is how you end up boarding a ship to Kerch, how you end up saying goodbye to Alina and Mal with tearful hugs and farewell waves, how you end up staring with a smile at the cobblestoned streets and grimy alleys of Ketterdam. Jesper laughs at your awestruck expression. “It’s just the Barrel, darling, not the Grand Palace. No need to drop your jaw quite so low.” He dodges out of the way when you try to hit him, unfortunately. “Compared to the endless hills in Ravka, I’d say it’s pretty good.” If you didn’t know better, you’d swear that Jesper’s smile looks almost proud now.

Ketterdam is surprisingly good. Sure, you’re on the run for your life practically all of the time, whether it’s because of Kaz’s mad schemes or because some gang boss or another has decided that they’ve got it out for you, but you’d be lying to say that you didn’t do it all with a smile on your face. You might be risking your life all of the time, but at least you feel like you actually have a life to risk now, instead of just another place as just another tracker in the First Army.

You also spend a lot more time with Jesper. At first, you had rolled your eyes and questioned your Saints as to why they seemed determined to damn you with one of the most insufferable sharpshooters known to man, but in all honesty, he’s starting to grow on you. It’s just the way that the two of you get to have neverending competitions to see who can shoot the farthest and the best and the quickest, who can come up with the wittiest retort or steal the best object from a store in the least amount of time possible. It’s just that he seems to click with you in every way. Maybe a life as his rival was something you’ve been waiting on for a long time.

You keep waiting for the shoe to drop, for him to reveal to Kaz or Inej or any one of the numerous information seekers in the Barrel that you’re a Grisha. He never does, though. Instead, he waits for you late at night, when everyone else is asleep, and lets you practice your gifts on him. At first, you’re just monitoring his heart rate and trying to sense where he is in the room with your eyes closed, then you’re carefully adjusting his consciousness and the flow of his blood through his veins. It’s nothing major, certainly not enough to hurt him, but it’s practice nonetheless, and you always walk out of each session with a smile, skin practically glowing with exertion and the thrill of using your powers.

The first time he’d dropped by your room, offering such a thing, you’d practically laughed in his face. “Sure, you want me to Heartrend you. Aren’t you worried that I’m going to mess something up and kill you?” He’d just given you one of his textbook smirks. “If I was worried about you stopping my heart, love, it happened the first time I saw you. Plus, ‘Heartrend’ isn’t a verb.” You’d had no troubles with helping him into unconsciousness after that.

Now, when you sit across from him, both of you cross-legged on your bed with your hands on his wrist to sense his pulse, you can’t help but wonder why he’s there. Jesper, as if sensing that there’s some deliberation going on in the head of someone also trying their best not to kill him, tilts his head to the side questioningly. “What’s wrong?” You shrug. “Nothing. I just don’t know why you’re doing all of this. I mean, you could have turned me in at any point, but instead you’re here, letting me mess around with your heartbeat. Why go all this way?”

Jesper leans back against the wall, considering this. “You’re not the only one who wants to hide their Grisha heritage, Y/N. If one of us can have at least a little time to use their gifts, I’d want you to have it.” You can sense that there’s something in his words when he mentions his Grisha heritage, that even if he’s brought it up he doesn’t quite want to talk about it. So, you focus instead on the second part of what he’d said, the part about his attention to you.

“Why, though? What’s worth it about some orphan from Ravka?” He chuckles now. “Y/N, if I thought for a second you were just an orphan from Ravka, I’d pawn off my revolvers to the next person to walk through the door. Not everything has to be for an angle. Maybe I just wanted to spend time with you.” For a second, you almost think that your focus lessened, that you messed something up with your gifts. There’s no reason why his pulse would seem to jump as he said that, why his heart rate always seems to increase whenever he looks at you as he looks at you now.

You decide to take a chance. “I want to spend time with you too, Jesper. Even if I didn’t have Grisha abilities to hone.” His smile is genuine this time. “I’m glad to hear it.” Jesper’s hand slips slightly in yours, moving your fingers away from his wrist so he can link them around his. When he looks back at you, his eyes hold an unspoken question. You nod. An instant later, he’s kissing you, hand slipping from yours to guide you closer to him. You can’t seem to sense anything except an overwhelming rush that might be his heartbeat or yours or everyone in this entire Saintsforsaken city. To be honest, you’re fairly sure that you’d be fine with questioning it until the day your own pulse runs out.

grishaverse tag list: <3 @underc0vercryptid​, @darlinggbrekker, @cameronsails​, @aleksanderwh0r3​, @story-scribbler​

[meichenxi]

Hey, could I ask you how you do shadowing? Like the different ways you do it? You mentioned in your tag that shadowing is good and I'd love to hear how you do it! I do not attempt shadowing much so I don't really know what helps, etc. ToT (my studyblr is rigelmejo)

Hellooo! Thank you for the interesting question!

Tbh I think I do it fairly basically - I don’t use any particularly fancy software, but software like Language Learning with Netflix has certainly made it easier. There’s a whole video on how to get the most of it here: [on mobile, link didn't work - How to study Chinese with Netflix! by Chinese Zero To Hero] (I’d recommend checking out all of their videos actually, they’ve done a bunch of livestreams recently and they place a lot of emphasis on shadowing + the course they are trying to sell you is…actually phenomenally good)

(Also, I have to preface this by saying that I have been very lucky in terms of pronunciation: I learnt about 80% of my current vocabulary by ear without characters or pinyin. I have been in China for eight months in total, and while I didn’t speak Chinese for all of that, I was constantly soaking in info on natural sentence intonation. I still often don’t know officially what the tone of a vocabulary item is, especially if it changes tone like 教, 为 or 相, but I don’t get yelled at so I have definitely internalised a lot of those changes. I definitely would have more trouble with this if I hadn’t had that experience - my other areas are waaaay weaker because of this though- my reading SUCKS lmao and I can literally handwrite about ten characters)

Anyway. How I shadow:

1) Quite simply by playing the line, and repeating it with all the emotion it has!! I usually use Netflix or Viki for this. I try to do it as fast as possible, and if I can’t do the whole thing, I ‘chunk’ it: if I were doing the sentence 我们还不知道他会不会来, I would start from the end with 他会不会来, then 不知道他会不会来, and then the whole sentence. Notice that this isn’t breaking it down into words or even grammatical phrases, but intonational phrases: it would be perfectly sensible to just do 会不会来 without the 他 but realistically, since this is a question, it’s likely that a strong stress will be placed on the first 会, and you wouldn’t be able to replicate that without also included the more weakly stressed syllable before.

2) I locate (intentionally or subconsciously) the main locus of stress within the sentence, and I focus on that accordingly. Tones may become less extreme if they are not stressed, and may become more exaggerated if stressed. This is always a good exercise. I accompany this with physical actions - I throw my hands down, I sigh, I groan!

3) I put away the text, and don’t look at the tones or even my computer screen - more on this below.

4) Finally, when I think I’ve got it reasonably accurate, I’ll record them speaking the line into my phone with an appropriate pause for copying and play it back to myself at various points throughout the day.

5) I then go and find other words with the same tone contour to slot in, and copy it again. After that, I find words that are slightly different tonally and pop them in too.

6) I finally do fun things like hold a conversation with myself. This can be really simple phrases imbued with some kind of emotion - 这个女子到底是谁呀？为什么不认识我？应该是新手吧。You can do this either really informally, or very formally, or both - trying to speak in the latter way is very fun! So then it’d be idk something more like: 那位姑娘是何人，来自何处？This is fun because you can really slow down your speech and sound as elegant as you like!! (this will sound stilted if you do it for modern speech, but it’s a very fun exercise)

Choosing your media!!

1) Don’t use donghuas. Seriously. The voice actors usually speak at a ridiculous pace and not with the same range of ‘normal’ intonation

2) Your Chinese is definitely good enough to recognise when anyone is quoting poetry or speaking in a paricularly sexy literary way so, uh…don’t do that. That rules dramas like Nirvana in Fire OUT.

3) Modern dramas and reality TV shows CAN be great, but they can also be quite intimidatingly quick and almost too mushy at times. I’d recommend informal speech in guzhuang dramas more, because they have professional voice actors and extensive sound editing, meaning that although it might be fast and the vocabulary harder, it’s actually much more accessible and easier to copy. You don’t want to be stuck with the awfulness of 50% failed foreigner and 50% 12 year old boy who can’t enunciate properly!!

4) CHOOSE YOUR WEAPON WISELY. I try to find characters that speak in a dramatic, whiny or childish way. This is so important! There’s literally no use copying Lan Wangji unless you want to be able to have that particular cadence and tone of voice you get reciting poetry. Childish/whiny/dramatic characters on the other hand stress some words very strongly, and rush others together - this is great for hearing what actual real speech sounds like. Whininess wins. In The Untamed, characters like Wei Wuxian (not yllz!wwx but just…regular wwx), 一问三不知 Nie Huaisang, Jin Ling, and Jingyi are all great. Also Jiggy, who is just very extra constantly and speaks much slower as well, which really helps. In SHL characters like Gu Xiang are good.

5) CHOOSE YOUR VOICE WISELY! If you are really aiming to copy them 100% (which you should try at least sometimes), you want somebody with your pitch range to sound normal. I have a sort of party trick in Chinese that because I’ve spent so much time listening to women in guzhuang dramas I can change my voice and sound like a) a scheming concubine with honeyed words, or b) the voice of the Beijing metro. My teacher found it hysterically funny. But it’s not my natural voice, and if I speak like that for too long it hurts. The women usually are too high for me, and the big burly manly men too low - so I’d recommend finding a man with a higher voice, or an older woman (like some of the female characters in Nirvana in Fire). Again, sorry that this is mostly the Untamed (I’m just most familiar with it) but the voice actors for Wei Wuxian and some of the juniors (+jiggy) has a higher voice. Likewise Chengling in Word of Honour.

On intonation in general:

- The thing is that whilst shadowing is useful it requires prior ability in a whole bunch of other skills that you can train - it relies on your ability to accurately mimic pitch, emotion and other contrasts. Training this in ANY language, including your native one, will help your ability to do this in Chinese - so I’d recommend spending a fair amount of time practicing shadowing (or speaking just after somebody whilst listening to a string of text, like monolingual simultaneous interpreting) in your native language too. Any training copying accents or mimicking other people is going to similarly help, regardless of the language.

So, with that in mind, further tips:

1) Hum / try to copy the intonation without any words. What this does is force you to pay attention to what the intonation actually is, versus what you may think it should be.

2) Don’t look at the text! Do! Not! Look! At! The! Text! If you look at the characters or pinyin you’re telling yourself ‘ok this is a third tone here’ etc, but you want to override the part of your brain that has gotten into bad habits and is supremely self-confident in how you’re pronouncing the third tone, and actually just go straight back to mimicking.

3) Don’t be afraid to do it with vocabulary that is way beyond your level. Actually, I find this can sometimes be helpful, because you don’t have a prior idea about how a particular tone pair should be useful - and you don’t know which tone you should be producing.

4) Learn vocabulary by ear - listen to a vocab podcast or even make one yourself (I often do this; I record my daily Anki and listen back to it through headphones copying throughout the day - if you’re not confident in your pronunciation you can get Google Translate to do it). Similarly, pick unknown vocabulary out of a longer segment and remember it, trying to internalise the tones instead of figuring out which tone it is.

5) Find emotional sentences, and copy them with emotion. This is SO CRUCIAL!!! We remember things when we relate to them, and when we imbue them with emotion - and it also helps in hearing exactly how an angry second tone sounds, for instance.

6) When you’re copying, look up, and imagine you are having an actual conversation. Carry yourself with conviction and poise!! Really try to whine like wwx or slime like jgy. After a couple of turns copying them, try to turn off the audio and keep delivering it in the same manner.

7) Swap individual words out. Once you have a line properly figured out, swap a word or two that has a different tone pair, and focus on delivering it with the same pattern of stress.

8) Finally, practice doing this in your native language too!! It’s a skill that we don’t use often, and it can be trained. Some people are terrible at it at first go even in their native language, but you can work on it!

About intonation in general:

1) I think a lot of pronunciation problems with people sounding unnatural or stiff ultimately come down to a fundamental misunderstanding of what intonation looks like across different languages. In English we mark it by pitch: and we are so used to the rhetoric that Chinese has ‘tone’ and not ‘intonation’ that we try and focus on blindly copying every single word textbook perfect without listening to how it actually sounds.

2) Chinese does have intonation!!! Except that, unlike English, when you stress a word, the pitch doesn’t change, but the tone contour is exaggerated - basically the only time you will ever hear a full third tone is in isolated or very exaggerated speech. If you have a Chinese friend, get them to record a sentence like the English ‘I didn’t ask her to steal his rucksack’, and put stress on the different elements of it - I didn’t ask, I didn’t ask, I didn’t ask, and so on. Notice and copy how the tones change. When shadowing, you should always be paying attention to where the stress is in the sentence: when you speak by yourself, practicing saying a sentence neutrally, and then with stress on one component, the next, and so on. If it feels unnatural, it’s because you might not have practicised like this before - it’ll get better!

Hope that’s somewhat helpful / interesting!

- 梅晨曦