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#apparently i’m stupidly obsessed with how this whole thing went down
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”I talked to Southgate yesterday.”
The sun is not yet up; Jamie is dutifully stretching his legs in the cold yellow of a streetlight when Roy suddenly speaks. It’s the first thing he’s said all morning, except for gruff commands of run and ten more and fucking higher, Tartt. 
“Yeah?” Switching legs to work on his other calf, Jamie tries for a casual tone, fails, and doesn’t much care. “What about?” 
Roy gives him a look: the fuck do you think? There’s no heat in it, though. Rarely is these days, and that thought is a glowing ember in Jamie’s chest, equal parts joy and amazement.  
For a moment, Roy doesn’t say anything else. Jamie completes his stretches and straightens. Waits, with heart hammering hard, hard beneath his hoodie. 
“He got in touch two years ago,” Roy finally offers, seemingly adressing the streetlight. “Before the Euros. Asked about you, what sort of player you were.” He glances at Jamie then, face carefully blank. “I told him the truth.” 
That… hurts, unexpectedly. Not because Jamie is surprised, really, or because it is unfair, because he isn’t and it’s not, but still. It stings, though not as bad as it had back then, and for different reasons. 
He wants to make a joke, say something glib to chase the taste of resigned dismay and shame away: he opens his mouth; closes it again. Looks away from Roy and is grateful that the other man seems content to leave it at that rather than going into the details of just what he’d told Southgate. Fair or not, Jamie thinks he can do without hearing it. He can imagine it well enough. 
Roy is studying him, like he’s expecting Jamie to protest or complain. It feels a little bit like a test, maybe. Jamie remains quiet. Fiddles with his sleeves for something to do with his hands as the silence grows longer and the morning colder around him.   
And perhaps it is a test after all, because after a moment Roy nods slowly before starting to talk again. “Anyway, yesterday I called him up to let him know that those things I said two years ago weren’t true anymore, and that I didn’t want any of that to be held against you now.” 
Jamie’s eyes snap to Roy’s face and he opens his mouth to speak, but Roy holds his hand up, forestalling him. “Now, I have no idea what’s going to happen so I don’t want you getting your hopes up, but I’m telling you this because if he calls I want you to be prepared, because he’ll be asking about that stupid shit you pulled, what the fuck you thought you were doing, and I need you to be on your best fucking behaviour, okay? Don’t grovel, but none of that fucking cocky bravado or defensive bullshit either. You were a prick, you understand that now, and you’ve worked fucking hard at being better. Got it?” 
Jamie nods, quickly, eagerly, because yeah, yeah, he can do that. Would probably be up for a bit of grovelling too, if it increased his chances of being called up. Fuck, he’ll say whatever he has to say, spill his whole fucking heart if need be to prove that he can be the best fucking— 
Suddenly, he frowns. Roy notices and raises his eyebrows. “What?”
“Should I… “ Jamie pauses, uncertain. “Should I tell him, you know, about me dad? I mean, if he asks why I left City to do a TV show, what do I say?” 
Roy considers that for a bit. It occurs to Jamie that Roy probably doesn’t actually know why Jamie ran out on City the way he did; Jamie certainly never told him, and he doubts Ted did either. But he can probably guess the rough shape of it anyway.
“Gareth’s a good man,” Roy offers at long last. “You want to tell him the truth, you tell him the truth, he won’t say a word. Don’t try to use it as an excuse though.” 
“I won’t,” Jamie says with a small scowl and a flash of annoyance, because when has he ever? 
Maybe Roy realizes as much, because his face softens into something almost apologetic. “I’m just saying, because I don’t want any of that old stuff getting in the way of you being called up now.“ He pauses, like he’s hesitating over whether to keep on talking or not. Settles for keep on talking, apparently, because he adds, without looking at Jamie, “You deserve it.”
Three words, and enough for the ember in his chest to roar into open flame. Jamie can feel the heat of it reach his face; gentle warmth in the February chill. “Thanks, Coach.”
--- 
The call comes two days later. Taking it has Jamie running late for training and when he finally rushes into the dressing room Roy lays into him with enough venom to make the other players carefully back away from them. Still, Jamie can’t do a thing to quell the grin on his face.
“What the fuck are you smiling at?” Roy snaps. 
“Southgate called.” He’s a little surprised to hear how dazed he sounds. Feels like he could fucking fly, but the words come out almost hushed. 
Roy immediately stills. “And?”
He should savour it, perhaps, the triumph of this moment. Take a second to marvel at the sight of Roy – Roy fucking Kent – holding his breath as he waits for an answer, but he can’t, he can’t, it’s too big, to happy, too fucking good, and he can’t hold it in. “He’s calling me up.”
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bylightofdawn · 2 years
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My work decided randomly at the end of last year that they were going to move the cap for PTO from 100 hours to 80.
I am a very dedicated (read stupidly obsessed with being dependable and diligent worker bee) Capricorn that exudes so much Capricorn energy you can prolly read it from orbit so suffice to it so say I have over 100 hours of banked PTO and was at risk of losing 20 some odd-hours. This is after I took two vacations last year so yeah I was kinda not happy with this new policy.
Soooooo I requested that time off before it expires on the 15th and ya girl now has 5 whole days back to back off starting tomorrow.
I'd originally planned to make a trip to Houston but sadly, I can't afford it thanks to getting the plague after my last mini vacation in December and my check on the 31st wasn't what I was expecting it to me.
Which, eh no big deal I'll just enjoy this time and do a staycation instead for the next 5 days.
I'm going to do some spring cleaning and rearranging of my apartment. My mother has been trying to fob some furniture off on me for years so I've decided to get rid of this 96 inch metal baker's rack that was housing all of my dvds and various fandom crap like lose figures and the like.
On Sunday, i went through all my DVD's BluRays etc, took them all out of the boxes and recycled them and started to put them into a binder. I had to buy a BIGGER one because 270 something wasn'r enough. All together with some DVD's being doubled up like bluray/dvs combos. I filled up a 400 space binder.
What. The. Fuck.
And that's not counting the things I didn't get rid of because it was specialty cases or things like my Red vs Blue and Star Wars stuff or ANY Of my many, many TV shows. I think I'm going to get a separate binder for those and then keep the cases but put them in a box to free up space so I can hopefully get shit down to one book shelf so I can get a small couch or love seat in my living room.
That ain't happening tomorrow though. Tomorrow is me time, I am going to play video games, read and write and then start cracking on that stuff on Monday.
The only thing that could make this vacation better was if I could get a massage or something stupidly self-indulgent like that.
So here's crossing my fingers and hoping I make some head-way in my new JasPlo fic. I'm debating breaking my own rules and posting things as I write rather than once I've finished just to see if the stress of keeping people waiting would be enough to motivate hibernating motivation or if the stress would just make me not want to write at all.
I mean is it really the end of the world if I have a WIP that hasn't been touched in six months? I dunno. I feel like my own innate sense of guilt would eat at me and I'd prolly crater like a house of cards the first time I get some shithead self-entitled comment asking why I haven't updated.
Which, LBR prolly won't happen cause how many people are going to be reading some super rarepair fic to begin with and I don't think I attract that sort of attention so no way that would even happen.
Most of the time I just feel like I'm putting stuff out into the void. Which, I'm not complaining about but I just really doubt that sort of scenario would happen.
But....you tell that to my guilt complex. I was definitely catholic in another life and have apparently carried said guilt into my next life.
Useless Edit: I ended up getting 90% of my tv series in the binder that held 270 something dvds. When did I buy all this shit that realistically I will never watch again because I own a chunk of them on digital now anyway.
I’m going to see if I can sell the random Smallvile seasons 4-10 and random Naruto seasons at Half Priced books since I’m well past my Naruto phase and what’s her faces sexual assault scandals kinda ruined the show for me forever. Same reason I got rid of all of my Kevin Spacey dvds when I was going through my dvds. But I forgot I bought both seasons do BBC’s Musketeers and I lowkey kinda want to rewatch it now. I also forgot I had seasons 1-4 of Scrubs which is one of my lowkey favorite series ever. I’m kinda excited by the things that got kinda lost in my collection. I found my Dark Angel series and kinda want to add that to the list as well
So series wise I’m pretty set. I don’t know if I’ll be watching any of my dvd or blu rays though. I plan on taking my binder of movies over to my moms house since she doesn’t know how to run Netflix ffs so the know she will get some use out of them. Or at least more than me.
I guess this semi counts as a declutter, yes? Pffft
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babesonly · 3 years
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fic recs 2.0!
hello kings (gn) ive got significantly more fic than last time which means this is gonna be a little more organized than the last post bc it is much longer <3 categories in order are non casefic canonverse, casefic/roadtrip fic, finale fixits, endverse, non supernatural aus, and then non destiel ones. titles will be in bold for my favs! also within each category they’re in order from shortest to longest
Canonverse
I’m a tulip in a cup by godtiering (1.2k)
I worry that I never really came back from hell. I wonder why, if I got remade by heaven, I’m still the same screwed up kid that I always was.
Sometimes I worry I’m not into women at all.
"Guess not,” he looks at his shoes.
a REALLY good fic that’s basically just a look inside dean’s head during my bloody valentine do not read this looking for a fun time but please do read it
on vessels by flightsofangels (1.9k)
“You know,” Cas mutters into Dean’s bare skin. “When I was still… an angel, I used to dream that I would take you as my vessel.”
hello consumehimnatural fans!!!!! read newt’s fic right now its incredible
dean winchester is not a nicholas sparks protagonist by microcomets (1.9k)
Dean fell in love with Cas the way you fall asleep--slowly, and then all at once. Or some other hackneyed and trite bullshit. God, this is embarrassing.
dean is in LOVE. he’s also a disaster who keeps staring at cas’ hands. sigh
Stay by aeli_kindara (2.5k)
Coda to 13.06 (Tombstone). In which Castiel reckons with the aftermath of Dean's grief.
hello fellow widow arc fans <3 click here to see cas find out abt the events of advanced thanatology !
walking on a string by swordfishtrombones (2.7k)
Between the doomed offensive at the Firmament and the impending retreat from the ravaged northeast border, Castiel left camp long enough to answer one of Dean Winchester's prayers.
S6 DEAN IS A WAR WIFE. been really into early seasons deancas lately and this one is very good. god
the flesh of the mighty by Mudprophet (2.7k)
Ezekiel 39:17 "you shall eat the flesh of the mighty and drink the blood of the princes of the earth."
MY GOD. anyone who saw the @autisticandroids​ purgatory cannibalism talk and was interested read this right now. also anyone who enjoyed nbc hannibal OR raw (2016). if romantic cannibalism is remotely aligned with your interests read this right now. god
Sam Winchester, Ally At Law by alittleduck (3.3k)
Sam was pretty sure he could read every single gay friendly guide to coming out or supporting queer family members ever written and literally none of them would even imply that arguing with gay people that they were actually just homophobic constituted as "ally behavior". However, Sam was equally sure that none of those book authors had found themselves accidentally watching their brother get pounded by an Angel of the Lord at 9 am on Tuesday, so Sam was pretty sure he might actually still have the higher ground. Now, if only Jack would stop trying to bond with Dean using gay slurs long enough for Sam to convince everyone of that, he might just be able to cobble together some remnant of sanity or, failing that, dignity.
Or, the one where Sam desperately wants to invent PFLAG but Dean won't stop teaching Jack gay slurs
JACK VOICE HEY COCKSUCKERS. 
hummed low by microcomets (3.3k)
Dean pulls the Impala over at a cider barn about thirty miles out; doesn't really think about it, just sees the hokey orange lettering off the roadside and lets his hands guide the Impala off the interstate with gravel spitting under the wheels.
they get a nice day out together and dean has a gay crisis and it’s written beautifully mwah
Vena Amoris and Other Old-Fashioned Bullshit by pyrebi (3.9k)
In which angelic marriage bonds are apparently stupidly easy to trigger, Cas wages multidimensional war in Heaven, Dean can't catch a break like ever, Sam rather enjoys being a dick, love saves the day, and nobody consummates anything.
sometimes i think about this fic and it hits that at this point dean and cas would have been married for more than a year. cas my beloved...
an exploration of gender; angelic by sometimeswelose (4k)
Castiel's true form is made of electromagnetic radiation. He has spent the majority of his life, if you really want to add it all up and average the whole thing out, as a wavelength of celestial intent.
The thing about being made of light: it's light in the physics sense of the word. Castiel's waves are gamma, x-ray, micro, and radio. He's visible light too, of course, a visible light so intense that it is blinding to most humans.
hello trans cas community <3 he’s literally trans he was assigned genderless and then went hm actually i will be a man! love of my life
Some Boys are Sleeping Alone by prosopopeya (4.2k)
This isn't something that's okay, not for him, but it chases him through the years until it turns into something he can't -- doesn't want to deny. 
ohhh deans tenuous relationship with his sexuality my beloved...
love. worship. consummation. consumption. by redeyedwrath (4.3k)
ConsumehimNatural (copyright marcusantonius) the Series!
These are all snapshots centered around the idea of you know. Hunger in Supernatural. Both carnal hunger and other kinds. Fics are shown in semi-chronological order but this series is generally nebulously early seasons.
for ANYONE who is a consumehimnaturual this is required reading it is INCREDIBLE and gorgeous and very visceral and i am so very obsessed with it. thank you redeyedwrath for enabling my brainrot
the reach of human sense by perilously (4.5k)
“You know what Jimmy Novak looked like. You think he was beautiful—gorgeous, hot, all of it. It’s him. Not me. This isn’t my face.”
“But,” Dean says. He doesn’t know where he’s going with it. Just that Cas’ face is right there, brows drawn together and cheekbones gleaming in the lamplight. It’s a face that’s made his heart skip probably a couple hundred beats collectively since they met.
And it used to belong to someone else.
this one is just very nice <3 cas gets uncomfortable w dean calling him attractive since dean has never seen his trueform and they work it out
Down in the River by Ias (4.7k)
Alone in Purgatory and hunted by Leviathans, Castiel finds himself praying to the one person who can't hear him.
cas i love you <3 cas alone in purgatory praying to dean bc dean is the only thing he still worships i love you so much
Creature of Habit by trinityofone (5.1k)
The more you love someone, the more you want to kill them. Or: How Cas developed some bad habits, and Dean coped surprisingly well.
written in s5 when cas was depowered and completely nails the later seasons bitchy husbands dynamic it’s very good and fun <3
sink by crackers4jenn (5.4k)
"Where to?" A 9.06 coda.
very bittersweet very well written and also canon compliant so do not go into this one looking for a happy ending but i DO recommend it it’s very good
Sensational by castiowl (6.1k)
“When I first came to earth, it was advised that we temper the senses bound to our vessels. They were a distraction, we were told. An antiquated form of experiencing existence that would hinder our ability to complete our missions, whatever that may be. My true form can better facilitate these experiences. What you would recognize as heightened senses of sight and sound, among other things.”
Or, how Dean helps Cas experience all five human senses for the first time in one night.
early seasons deancas man. i love the sound part i love dean being so worried about doing a good job with this. god. read this please
Something to Protect by Sass_Master (6.2k)
Dean’s violent reaction to being unexpectedly woken has become something of a running joke among them, but Castiel can’t help but look past it to the underlying cause. It makes him ache to think that Dean feels so unsafe, so persecuted, before he’s even fully conscious.
Secretly, Castiel has been determined to work on that, to ease Dean into awareness in a less jarring way, smooth away one of the many stresses that follow him even in sleep. Now’s as good a time as any to try.
oh to sleep more soundly in the presence of someone you love...this fic is very nice i enjoyed it a lot
all this and heaven too by ftmsteverogers (7k)
“Hey,” Dean said. “I’m not ashamed of you, okay?”
Cas raised skeptical eyes to meet his.
“I mean it,” Dean insisted.
“I understand you mean it,” Cas said. “But I don’t think it’s any better if you’re only ashamed of yourself.”
hello trans dean community here is 7k of trans dean having to deal with his internalized homophobia now that he’s sleeping with cas <3 it is SO good
The wilderness. by orange_crushed (8k)
He takes a shower and the pressure is not especially good, but it doesn’t matter. It’s warm and he stands under the spray a long time. Human skin, he knows, constantly renews itself, shedding the dead cells of the epidermis. He wonders how long it will take until he is an entirely new person, until every cell on his surface is a new one. He looks at his hands under the water. It might take less than a month.
this might be the only post 9x03 fic on here with a happy ending actually? plenty of good melancholy leading up to it though <3 canon divergent after 9x03 though which means no 9x06 fanfiction gap but it is absolutely worth reading
till the juice runs by deathbanjo (8.4k)
Apparently whoever drew up the venn diagram of Dean’s sex life decided the circle labelled ‘good sex’ and the one labelled ‘sex with men’ should be kept far apart.
hello this one is SO funny dean finally gets comfortable enough with his bisexuality to start having sex with men and it goes so very bad every time so sorry about your shitty choices beloved </3
First Date by aeli_kindara (8.9k)
“We should go on a date. You and me.”
Castiel wishes he could see Dean’s face. He wishes he had any idea what to say.
“I’m asking you out, Cas.”
this one is very sweet i liked it a lot <3 good refreshing little fic where they just get to have a nice evening together
Entertaining Strangers by cadignan (9k)
Dean settles on to his side, lying in the bed facing Castiel. “So you had sex without me and you bit all my moves. I think I deserve to hear about it, at least. What was her name?”
op im in love with you. premise is established relationship deancas and cas mentions he did have sex before dean and not only that it was a threesome. good for him <3 this fic is cas describing the story of what led up to the threesome and what happened during it while dean interrupts regularly. incredible
the shape you take by noviembre (10k)
“What?” Dean says, fake-offended. “I’d be hot as a girl, you know I would.”
And this is when he really, really should have stopped talking. When he shouldn't have whipped back around and asked, “Cas, if I was a woman, you’d fuck me, right?”
Because if he hadn’t said that, then he wouldn’t have had to deal with this:
Cas, meeting his eyes, forehead wrinkles all smoothed out like there’s nothing to be confused about anymore. Cas with something at the corner of his mouth that might barely be called a smile.
Cas saying, calmly and without hesitation, “Yes, Dean.”
--
Dean Winchester fucks around and, with the inadvertent help of some witches, Finds Out.
dean winchester your gender is diabolical. this fic is insane and its the only thing that matters actually. dean fully convinced its normal and straight to think about being a woman so you can fuck your male friend. incredible. op im proposing to you
Sinnerman by a_good_soldier (10k)
Dean listens to Nina Simone, reads Anne Carson, and makes out with a dude (sort of).
yall want to read about dean realizing he’s in love with a man as a direct result of learning to better respect women right?
you’re fooling yourself by cowboydeanwinchester (13k)
Dean Winchester and Castiel retire from hunting to raise baby Jack. Dean struggles to allow himself the things he truly wants.
Jack is two, Castiel and Dean are idiots, and Sam's gotta solve everyone's problems.
love a married couple who doesn’t know they’re married <3 everyone say thank you sam for bullying dean 
The Girlfriend Experience by rageprufrock (15k)
While it's not like Dean hasn't had a couple of truly regrettable hit-and-runs in his sexual history, this is probably the saddest fucking thing that has ever happened to him.
a classic for good fucking reason. we’ve all talked about dean thinking holding hands is too gay after having just had gay sex but my personal favorite was sam accusing dean of cheating on cas because dean bought condoms. incredible
No Kingdom To Come by domesticadventures (16k)
“We should fuck,” Dean says.
Cas looks up from where he sits on his bed, hair still damp from the shower, frowning as he places a finger on the page of his book to mark where he left off.
There are a million things Cas could say here; Dean has rehearsed them. After lunch, his restlessness had given way to a vague panic, a dread that matched his every step and crept along with him from room to room. Eventually, he had returned to his bedroom and spent the rest of the afternoon pacing back and forth, playing out all the possible scenarios. When Cas asks him Why? or Are you being serious? or when he sighs and says, in that way he has, Dean, he knows exactly what he’s going to do. He’s going to shrug casually, like he isn’t invested in the answer, like he isn’t desperate for an outlet, and say, Why not? He’s going to raise an eyebrow and say, What, are you not interested? He’s going to crowd into Cas’ personal space, he’s going to shove himself right up in there and whisper Cas against his ear.
Instead, Cas says, carefully, “Okay.”
literally the only quarantine fic i’ve ever bothered to read in any fandom and completely worth it it’s SO good. they become fwb and dean has an existential crisis and he keeps bringing up meaninglessness and death during sex
Bodies by Speary (18k)
It was a secret they never acknowledged even with each other. It would change everything, end everything if either of them ever dropped the act. So they became very good at acting, at keeping up the lie that gave them what they wanted. Even if that lie involved constantly seeking out temporary, consenting female vessels, Cas would do it. He told himself it was worth it for Dean. He just hoped that he could stop wanting more, or maybe one day Dean might stop pretending that he wasn't really sleeping with Cas every time.
i don’t even have anything to add tbh if that summary did not immediately make you click we are very different this fic is incredible. god. fellas do you ever make yourself a woman so you can fuck the man you love without him having to talk about it or confront his sexuality
it’s such a mystery (the way you know me) by fleeceframe (20k)
So the man crouching in front of Castiel is named Dean. He wonders if that’s supposed to mean something to him.
“Cas must’ve got hit with something earlier. He just dropped like a sack of fucking potatoes a minute ago. By the time I was checking on him, he had already woken up again, but now he doesn’t fucking know who we are.”
“I’m right here you know,” Castiel says testily.
Sam’s eyes are wide even as his eyebrows are furrowed, and he looks between Dean and Castiel again.
“What do you remember, Cas?”
“Firstly, that I’m not Cas. I don’t know who Cas is, but it’s not me. I don’t know who either of you are, either."
or the one where castiel is hit with a memory curse that makes him forget the winchester brothers and is stunned to find out he has a family... also why can't he stop thinking about dean?
BEST amnesia fic oh my god. cas my beloved you deserve the world. everyone read this that is not a request.
More Than Ever by Sass_Master (20k)
Dean’s getting some pancakes together for breakfast when Cas saunters in after a run.
He’s trying to focus on whisking batter, unfairly distracted by Cas a few feet away, breathing heavily and shining with perspiration. Dean’s been painfully aware for a long time that Cas is pretty easy on the eyes, but he’s used to seeing Cas buttoned-up and unflappable, looking straight-laced in a stiff oxford and an unflattering trenchcoat.
Now Cas is sweating, Dean’s borrowed t-shirt clinging to his skin, flushed from exertion and Dean really can’t deal with that in his kitchen right now.
this entire series is really good i enjoyed it a lot, i’m just putting this one specifically on the list bc the rest of the series is very explicit and this is really good as a standalone for anyone who wouldn’t be into the rest of the series!!
Being Dean Winchester by Anonymous (20k)
"You should show me some respect. I dragged you out of hell. I can throw you back in."
Who the fuck was this bitchy "warrior of God" doing talking to him like that? Fuck Cas-tee-el and his dumbass trench coat and abrasive motherfucking attitude.
Dean was done with this shit.
***
Wherein a monster of the week steals the essence of Castiel's vessel, so he must use Dean, recently raised from hell, as a vessel instead.
it is at this point i realize that there are more fics than i expected there to be on this list that involves a threesome with only two people/using the presence of a female body to act like what’s happening is heterosexual. deangirlism is a disease 
I Shall Not Want by domesticadventures (20k)
His grace is burning out, and the wasteland it leaves inside him becomes an echo chamber for all the memories, all the fear and doubt and self-loathing he's collected over the years. Things said and done hound him on endless repeat until he's convinced they’ll break through his skin and fill the silence of the bunker.
His head is killing him, and he sits hunched over an open book, not really reading, just digging his fingers into his skull and praying nothing slips through the cracks.
this one is GORGEOUS i love it so so much. dean and cas are both struggling so much to get by and they’re trying to support each other but fucking it up and they have to grow together and learn to cope with the fact that this is where their lives are and they fall in love i need everyone to read this
To Boldly Go by 8daysuntiltheapocalypseiguess (24k)
Title: Just One of Those Things Author: Impala67 Series: TOS Rating: M Summary: Four years into their five-year mission, and all the planets start to look the same.
In which Dean is not Gene Roddenberry, but he does write Star Trek fanfiction.
mx winchester writing star trek fanfiction to process his own trauma <3 this is a wip but it’s SO good and i also have not consumed a single piece of star trek media so it IS definitely readable to anyone who isn’t a star trek fan. please read this
where the weeds take root by deathbanjo (30k)
“Are you happy? Y’know. Just—being here,” Dean says, gesturing to the yard with his beer bottle. “Being with—I mean, you used to fight in celestial wars and—and save the world. Now you’re growing vegetables and talking about chickens.”
this is on here just for the 1.5 people who were putting off this one like i did for no reason. it’s extremely good and it is just gentle. i enjoyed it a lot
Heroes for Ghosts by pantheon_of_discord (42k)
After Sam and Dean are arrested, Castiel is left alone and scrambling to find them. He knows they’re locked away in a government facility, and he’s still able to hear their prayers, but no matter how he tries Castiel can’t seem to track them. He chases leads and even attempts to hunt on his own, but Mary is AWOL, Crowley refuses to help, and Castiel’s options are running out.
Weeks pass, Castiel’s hope dwindles, and through it all Dean prays, keeping them connected. His voice is comforting, frustrating, and occasionally annoying, but in his solitude Castiel comes to cherish it. But then one day, without warning, Dean stops praying, and Castiel is forced to confront some uncomfortable truths about his feelings.
yall ever wonder what it would’ve been like if the sam and dean arrest storyline in s12 was interesting? yeah <3
Teaching Poetry to Fish by aeli_kindara (52k)
In which Castiel teaches poetry to fish. Also, himself. Also, eventually, Dean.
(A series-long story, diverging slightly from canon after S14.)
cas learning about humanity through poetry before dean and thats what led to him developing enough emotion to be lobotomized....cas i love you so much
Emergence by ellispark (58k)
Something’s been missing from Dean’s life for the past three years, a void left after a hunt gone terribly wrong. He often feels a sense of longing with no discernible cause, a need to talk to someone who isn’t there.
A call from an acquaintance leads Dean to James Novak, a man who disappeared more than a decade ago, and suddenly Dean gets the feeling he’s found what he’s been missing. But James isn’t really James — he’s the angel Castiel, who’s wanted by angels, demons and hunters alike. And he may be at the center of the storm that wrecked Dean’s life all those years ago.
another cool amnesia fic!! for unknown reasons everyone forgot cas three years ago but cas didn’t forget anything. cas deserves so much love and support. god
a turn of the earth by microcomets (95k)
Dean’s your typical half-orphaned, monster-killing 22-year-old until a trenchcoated stranger crashes into his back windshield one September night, claiming he’s an angel that knows him from the future and that he’s on the run.
Frigging fantastic.
(Or, in which Castiel gets stuck in Dean’s timeline preseries and Dean kind of hates it—until he doesn’t.)
cas getting to meet and fall in love with pre hell dean just as much as he loves the dean he already knows oh my GOD. i love this fic so much. turn of the earth my beloved
Crossing Lines by sometimeswelose (122k)
Two Deans, one Cas - it's not as sexy as it sounds
Or
An ethics lesson from Hell
Or
The one where Dean from the past meets Dean in the present. They're not sure they like each other very much.
deans intense self hatred vs cas’ unwavering love for every version of dean oh my GOD also this is a wip fair warning but it’s so worth waiting for updates i’m having such a great time with this one i cannot wait to see how it gets ended
Plot Holes by saltyfeathers (160k)
Of course it wasn’t over after the apocalypse.
There was season six. Then there was season seven. Against all expectations, there was season eight. There were the alphas and purgatory, and then the Leviathans, and then the angels fell. Enter season nine. Loose threads Metatron, Abaddon, and Crowley have to be tied up. Sam, Dean, and Cas have to try to tie them while at the same time dealing with their evolving relationships and newfound graceless states.
Amidst all the chaos, someone has started publishing the Supernatural novels again. Convinced there’s something amiss in the pages, Charlie starts her own quest to suss out the truth behind the Winchester Gospels.
With the help of various faces, old and new, they must now not only deal with the typical runs of demons and recently fallen angels, but also reconcile the battles raging inside themselves, as the fate of the world, once again, quite literally lays in the palm of their hands.
saltyfeathers said i WILL make the plot holes in this show mean something because the showrunners are sure as shit never gonna adress them ! and i thank them for it bc this was a really cool read
Casefic/Roadtrip Fic
Deprived Of Every Planet by KelpietheThundergod (9k)
Dean's breathing is audible in the scant space between them, irregular. The motel room is dark, pale blue shadows falling in through the gaps in the blinds. Throwing a pattern of uneven white stripes over the bunched up covers. Over Dean's fingers twisted in the sheets. One half of him in shadow, softened by the dark. The heat of his skin. The tremble of him under Castiel's touch.
He caresses a hand over Dean's chest, slowly. Dean's mouth falls open, his body arching into Castiel's touch. Castiel stops over Dean's heart. Through the fever of his desire, he rejoices about the wonder of experiencing another's heartbeat through one's own senses.
Dean gasps, but then he turns his face away and towards the dark. Eyes closed tight and brows furrowed like something is hurting him.
Castiel stills.
“Dean?”
the case is background on this one but it Does take place over the course of a case so im putting it here. god touchstarved dean trying so hard to work through his shit for cas head in my hands i love this fic so much
before and after breakfast by spocklee (10k)
The monster of the week is a ghost who hates meat, alcohol, and feeling yourself. Guess who it is during the commercials.
chapter 2 of this one.....god. dean and cas you are both so unwell <3 i love everything abt this fic everyone read it now
we shovel all the ashes out by xylodemon (15k)
Dean’s always known things were headed this way. He just figured getting dragged under would be cleaner and easier than jumping in feet-first.
fics that make you go Oh they love each other...also there’s lesbians in it literally what else could you want.
thunder road by dothraki_shieldmaiden (20k)
After Chuck is defeated and the Winchesters settle into life without God, Dean Winchester is bored.
OR: Dean and Cas take a road trip and figure out some stuff along the way.
this fic is just like. it’s kind! this fic is kind it’s just a pleasant experience and i enjoyed it thoroughly. they’re in love and it’s good
Suck It, Judy Garland by GlitterDwarf, midrashic (20k)
It had to be St. Louis. Or, the one where Sam and Cas get fake married for a case, and Dean loses his mind.
actually im gonna defend dean here imagine youre dean and cas gives what definitely sounded like a deathbed love confession while making eye contact with you and then immediately afterwards fake dates your brother. who among us would not have been a bitch about this
best friends without benefits by lizbobjones (20k)
It’s nearing three a.m. and they’ve been on the road a long time. Sam’s been asleep in the back seat since eleven. Giving up and handing the wheel over to Cas and letting the guy who doesn’t sleep drive had seemed like a good idea.
the premise of this fic is so funny. cas voice dean you want to fuck me so bad it makes you look stupid. everyone read this
the taste of gravel in the mouth by deathbanjo (22k)
This is what Cas gave up Heaven for: greasy diner food, shitty motel rooms with even shittier cable, long car rides spent in complete silence except for the same six tapes playing over and over again, and a burnt-out husk of a man who can barely hold a conversation anymore.
alt version of getting rid of the mark of cain, the darkness never happens. this one is VERY heavy but it’s so good and it has a hopeful ending. ive read this one twice and loved it both times
Someone Who’s Feeling For Me by ellispark (45k)
Dean sees her for the first time in nearly six years in some no-name town in Idaho, and it's panic at first sight.
Lisa Braeden, the one woman Dean ever actually had a shot at a real life with, back from where he buried her in his mind. And her hand is on Cas's arm like it's no big deal, like it belongs there. Cas, Dean's dorky, sweet, badass, angelic best friend, and he's just standing there next to Lisa and not moving her hand away.
Dean feels the jealousy rising, and it's not directed where he expected it to be. Because it takes this exact moment for Dean to realize he's in love with his best friend. He's in love with his best friend, and Lisa is looking at Cas like he's the best thing since automatic rifles, and Dean is utterly fucked.
hello op please contact me. please contact me and let me see the inside of your brain. this fic was an unparalleled experience and everyone should also go through it. i love it so very much
Bumper Cars by mansikka (111k)
Two teenagers are missing from an abandoned carnival, and there’s enough to raise suspicion that their disappearance involves a ghost. Dean, Sam, and Cas arrive in town to investigate, though what they find leads them away from those teenagers, and on the trail of a ghost story that churns up things from their past.
Can newly-human Cas, and Dean, with the help of shipper!Sam, work out the mystery behind the abandoned carnival and its ghost, and along the way, figure out the riddle that is them?
one of my absolute fav case fics it forces dean to confront some aspects of johns parenting and work through some shit and also him and cas fall in love and it’s really well done. love this one a lot <3
Finale Fix-its/Finale Denial
Sorry Jimmy by K_K_TiBal (2.1k)
Based on the tumblr textpost:
jellydeans: so are cas and jimmy novak just up in heaven existing at the same time katebushstandean: #jimmy moves to heaven timbuku so that dean stops trying to make out with him every time they run into each other at the heaven grocery store
this one is just extremely funny. local midwestern heterosexual man is forced to play relationship counselor to the dumbest gay people in existence because one of them wore his face
Dean Winchester Really Needs To Make Some Gay Friends by AreYouReady (2.2k)
“Like, I’m trying to think if I’ve had, I don’t know, crushes. If I ever had a gay thing before you came along and just didn’t notice,” Dean said.
Cas suddenly looked down, and away from Dean. If Dean didn’t know better, he would swear Cas looked guilty.
“What is it, Cas?”
“You have had several… gay things before.” Cas still wouldn’t look at him.
“What? When? How come you know this better than I do?”
There was no way the answer to this question wasn’t funny as hell.
dean learning about gay ppl via the memories of dean smith...incredible.
tiny difference (between ending and starting to begin) by sunforgrace (2.4k)
Sometimes Dean catches Cas staring at the sky.
It doesn’t happen often. Not when Dean’s around to tell, anyway. But often enough that he starts to notice.
Eventually Dean starts to recognize the pattern.
Cas just doesn’t watch the sky. He watches the birds.
Chuck is gone, Cas is human, and the world is safe. In the quiet aftermath Dean and Castiel find each other again.
i really don’t have much to say abt this one it is just very good and they love each other so much
Bring Home by cenotaphy (3.8k)
Dean's phone doesn't ring on the drive back to the Bunker, but that's okay. Because—well, maybe Cas lost his cell, what with getting shuffled back and forth between a cosmic void dimension and all. And anyway, Dean doesn't want this conversation to happen over the phone, he wants to—he wants to talk to Cas face-to-face. They should talk face-to-face.
Dean will tell him—
Dean doesn't know what he'll tell Cas. Dean is, in fact, terrified by how utterly and completely he does not know what he'll say to Cas.
cas being forced to face the consequences of sending the risky text that was despair <3
dean’s coworkers vs the heteronormative agenda by cowboydeanwinchester (4.1k)
Dean started working at a local auto repair shop in Lebanon, Kansas about a year ago. His coworkers don't know much about him. Except that he has a wife. Or maybe he doesn't. But he has a kid. Who is either a toddler or a high schooler. Who is either named Jack or Sammy. He also might have a best friend named Cas, but that also might be his wife.
Truth is nobody knows what to make of Dean.
obsessed w people not knowing a single fucking thing about dean because he talks so much and never explains anything. this fic is SO funny
Enhanced Extraction Techniques by goldenraeofsun (5.8k)
The Empty takes Meg’s shape, Samandriel’s, Duma’s, every one of the thousands of angels Cas killed up in heaven. But in the middle of lecturing Cas in the form of Balthazar, it explodes in a burst of light and sound.
Dean Winchester stands in the aftermath.
the empty playing mind games on an awake cas bc it can’t put him to sleep is a thing i like a lot and this is very very good 
Speak Silence No More by rea_sunshine (8.1k)
When Dean imagined this moment, it went like this:
Dean bursts into the Empty—guns blazing, chin high, righteous anger coursing through him. No matter what form his plans and fantasies and whiskey-drunk-whispered-promises took, he is always, always successful. When he imagined it, he was finally the hero Cas deserved.
The reality of the moment is this:
It’s fucking cold.
dean and cas STILL managing to not communicate with each other properly after the confession is so funny to me and this fic does it really well. also i like that a human being in the empty, where humans do NOT belong, had some like. consequences
my heart is a compass by lagaudiere (10k)
“There you are,” the Empty says, in Dean’s voice. It’s cold, like Dean’s eyes are cold, his expression set in contempt. It’s the expression Cas feared, he realizes, all the times he thought about saying it. Revulsion. It makes him feel sick in the way that goes beyond physical, here where there is nothing physical left.
The moment before it happened had been so sweet it covered up all the hurt. For years, Cas had been holding back those words, biting down on his tongue to keep from saying them. And now he had said it, and he knew that it was good, knew that it was worth it. But on the other side there is only this.
--
In the Empty, Cas dreams of his regrets, until someone comes looking for him.
one of thee best dean rescues cas from the empty fics out there i love the way his memories are written i love how many of them were ones that this fic came up with to give me new things to have brainworms over instead of just making me more fixated on He Watched Him Rake Leaves than i already am
killing time by orestespdf (11k)
It's been four years since Dean saved Cas from the Empty and confessed his feelings in return, and in their Vermont lakehouse, the retired couple is now learning how to heal. One morning, Dean gives Cas a haircut.
(A character study of Castiel.)
perfect fic perfect fic no notes no complaints they love each other so much and now dean is giving cas a haircut and they’re spending the day together. god.
and every time we kiss, i swear i can fly by knameless (14k)
Every time, Dean tells himself it’s the last.
--
aka, twelve times dean and cas kiss.
a just boy best friends kiss for every season <3 mwah
for which no words exist by MediaWhore (14k)
'a prayer for which no words exist' // richard siken
"Dear Cas who art in my bathtub, give me the strength to be honest about how I feel. For your sake and for mine. Forgive me all the times I wasn’t in the past, all the words I should have said but didn’t. And please stay. Please stay with me when all is said and done. Amen. "
Dean rescues a newly human Cas from the Empty. That's the easy step.
mediawhore i am in LOVE with you oh my god this fic. this fic. dean taking care of cas after rescuing him dean wrapping cas in a blanket oh my GOD
swimming with the fish pond fish by februyuri (17k)
Some time between Dean bleeding out on a makeshift hook in a barn in Ohio and Sam making marshmallows on his funeral pyre, Dean was brought back to life. By Castiel. Again. Dean agreed to it if only to give Jack time to work out the glitches up top. So, now Dean’s back in the land of the living and things are ... actually good, for once.
Or, as good as they can be when demons are attacking Earth, Dean’s failing to get over why he died in the first place, and Cas is suddenly, inexplicably taking every opportunity to casually tell Dean that he loves him.
this is a wip! but it is so good and so worth the read i love it a lot and am very excited for the last chapter. it IS pretty heavy though dean has a LOT to work through
looking like a true survivor (feeling like a little kid) by courfeyrac (20k)
"Jack’s a clever kid—has been ever since he was born, maybe even before that—but Dean’s pretty sure he hasn’t figured out where they’re going yet. And Dean’s… Dean’s excited about it. He remembers planning surprises for Sammy when they were little—saving up quarters and sneaking off to the arcade the year he turned seven, or slipping a book Dean had seen Sammy admiring into his jacket before sprinting out of the store the year he turned twelve. There was only so much Dean could give him back then, hindered by lack of finances and transportation and a father who paid attention. Now, though, Dean’s got a wallet full of cash, a tank full of gas, and the freedom to give his kid the kind of birthday he deserves."
Or, it's Jack's fourth birthday, and the kid wants to go to Build-A-Bear.
EVERYONE READ THIS RIGHT NOW. that is not a request this fic undid me. oh my god. oh my god. they’re a family and they’re going to build a bear and they love each other. oh my god. also no it isn’t a baby jack fic he is 4 and he is also alcal
what’s missing is found (our souls can exhale now) by sobsicles (27k)
It's not the first time Claire has ever gone missing. It is, however, the first time Kaia panics about it. Dean's dragged into the mess, but he soon finds that it's the best thing that could have happened to him.
~~~
"But have you ever just met someone and maybe it wasn't from the first moment, maybe it was after all these other moments that meant more than you ever expected them to, and it seems like your soul just—just—" Kaia makes a helpless gesture with her hands, pushing out, and she breathes out loudly. "Like it can finally exhale. And that person isn't guaranteed to make you happy, but they're—they're important. You just know it, you can't even escape it, you can't let them go. Ever met someone like that, Dean?"
"I—" Dean halts, his mouth hanging open. He's looking at Kaia, who's looking at him, and his heart is fluttering in his throat like a caged bird aching to soar again. His mind threatens to spiral out of control, but he focuses, swallowing hard. "Yeah. Um. I—yeah, I have."
deancas AND dreamhunter we love to see it also dean DOES smoke weed with kaia and apologizes for pulling a gun on her what more could you want in a fic
Command Me To Be Well by prospopeya (28k)
Dean did a lot of thinking about when and how he would get Cas back. Months of it, actually, stretching into a year, because while Sam and Eileen were settling into their new lives, Dean was stuck. He was stuck in a faraway corner of the bunker, dark and empty and hollow, ringing with the sound of a vibrating phone.
So when he falls to his knees in that same room, exhausted, hurting, breathless, and he feels a hand on his shoulder and looks up to see Cas, he realizes that he doesn't have a single clue about what to do now. Getting Cas out had been easy--actually, it'd been the opposite of that--but the planning of it, the methodical desperation of one attempt after the other had been a familiar rhythm. It'd been soothing almost, solid, something to focus on that wasn't Cas's eyes, watery and jubilant in a way Dean hadn't ever seen that up close on anyone, let alone Cas.
And now Cas is pulling him to his feet, and Dean's stumbling, and he instinctually grabs Cas's arm, and his hand lights up with a fire that he isn't prepared for.
"Hello, Dean."
oh post despair lack of communication....oh dean refusing to work through his feelings...this fic is incredible i love it everyone who enjoys dean doing everything in his power to avoid talking about feelings up to and including having sex with the guy who’s in love with him multiple times should read this
break the skin (to break the barriers) by sobsicles (29k)
The first time she meets him, he's nothing more than an almost-missed appointment.
SOBSICLES TATTOO FIC MY BELOVED. dean grieving and getting tattoos and it turns into tattoo therapy. im SO in love with mitzi it’s insane. requires some suspension of disbelief for how long a tattoo takes but it’s an incredible fic and an unparalleled experience. sobsicles does not miss
ascend by quiettewandering (53k)
Something in the world is wrong.
Demon activity is rising where mysterious black substance oozes and unusual ecological events are shaking the world. Dean, grief hanging on his shoulders, restlessly searches for answers that might lead him to the Empty… and to Cas.
But what Chuck wrote can’t be undone. The narrative thread pulls Dean along, forcing him to comply. Because once a story already has an ending, it can’t be rewritten.
Or can it?
SUPER cool concept i liked this a lot i’m pretty sure everyone’s read it already but just in case someone hasn’t you absolutely should
oh sooner or later it all comes down to faith by sobsicles (62k)
Getting used to Heaven is something of a marvel. It ain't perfect, and Dean thinks he'd hate it if it was, which is probably why it isn't.
~~~
"You don't understand," Dean whispers, exhaling shakily. "I know you don't, because even I don't. The instant you were gone, I wanted you back. Cas, I wanted you back. I wanted—I wanted—"
Cas stares at him, searching his face. After a moment, his own face falls slack, eyes widening just so. "Oh," he breathes out.
Dean wants to be furious that Cas has figured it out before he has—whatever it is—but he's not even that surprised. Cas knows him too well, always has, even more than Dean knows himself. He's been kicking Dean in the goddamn teeth with how deeply he understands him, even about the things Dean doesn't, ever since they first met. You don't think you deserve to be saved, that's what Cas had said. All bundled up in impossibilities and power, this being that looked at Dean Winchester and knew every single inch of him, as if he had a right to each part.
"What?" Dean grits out.
"I love you, too."
the ONLY heaven fic. i do not read heaven fics bc i refuse to budge in my finale denialism i refuse to read fic where it is accepted that dean dies. i was hesitant to read this but god im glad i did it was so good. literally the best possible outcome of dean dying
Endverse
final fantasy. by orange_crushed (1.9k)
“If I’d actually been born human, would I have gotten sick like everyone else? Would I be running around gnawing on the neighbors?” Castiel tilts his head up and even from here Dean can see the black ring of his pupils, wide and dark as dead stars. He’s high as fuck and he’s been loading the guns for forty-five minutes. He stares into the space where Dean is. He smiles and shows his teeth. “Maybe you’d have already put a bullet in my head.”
"This is why you don’t lead storytime anymore," Dean says. "This kind of shit."
endverse last night on earth fics are something that can be so personal actually. god
The Last Song by Moorishflower (3.5k)
The very last song is the Song of Solomon, and Castiel sings it only for Dean. Set in "The End."
this is like. pre endverse and the tone is so like. wistful? is the best word ive got? it’s gorgeous i love it but fair warning there is graphic description of like. viscera and infected wounds
to think that we could stay the same by cipherwriter (6.5k)
cas has all he needs; himself, his creation, and enough power to continue this cycle for a long time. he's fine. dean wants to take care of him anyway.
oh my GOD this one is good it’s based off the thing of how originally endverse cas was supposed to be just sitting in a room killing and resurrecting the same cockroach over and over. very bittersweet at some points i love it a lot, do not read it if youre looking for something happy though lmao
the first church at the end of the world by withbloodstainedclothingon (11k)
The angels don’t eat the brain. Only Croats do that.
this one is fucked but it’s incredible it contains very heavy and violent subject matter and cas is an Actual cult leader he doesn’t just have orgies it is SO well done and i had a great time reading it i recommend it very highly if the warnings sound like something you can stomach
Down to Agincourt by seperis (1.1 million. i know. yes it’s a wip)
There is no such thing as a guarantee when it comes to war.
The outcome's known. Why try? Return your rusty sword to battered sheath, bow your head and bend your stubborn knee. Why take the field when you cannot win the war? But Harry -- he went down to Agincourt.
PLEASE. i know the length is intimidating i KNOW it’s a very long fic but please. please read down to agincourt i am begging you. head in my HANDS this series is incredible.
Non Supernatural AUS
Long-Term Relationship by bendingsignpost (2.7k)
Castiel says, budging over to make room for Dean on the couch, “I thought we should have a serious talk about our relationship.”
Reflexively, Dean laughs.
Castiel does not.
“Uh, Cas... you know we’re not dating, right?”
look man it’s bendingsignpost okay. it’s bendingsignpost it’s good and it’s sweet and you should read it
One White Lie by komodobits (11k)
Castiel takes a deep breath and rings the doorbell. He doesn’t need to run through what he’s going to say – he’s already planned and edited and rehearsed it a thousand times. He is going to ask Dean Winchester out to dinner. If it’s not too forward, he’ll say, perfectly charming. You see, I’ve seen you around the neighbourhood and you always seem so earnest and I’d really like to get to know you bette— The door swings open, and Castiel panics.
He intends to excuse himself. He means to apologise and come back some other time. However, in a moment of blind fear, what comes out of his mouth instead are the words, “Could you spare a moment for Jesus Christ?”
do you ever pretend to be a jehovahs witness for months to hang out with the guy you like because you fucked up asking him out? yeah.
separate ways and sleeping dogs by sobsicles (53k)
Dean is three years sober when Cas comes back into town.
~~~
For a moment, they just stare at each other. Dean, once again, has to swallow the urge to offer to swallow something else. It's very hard to resist the gut-wrenching pull of want that hooks in his chest whenever he looks at Cas. And to think, he used to have him, used to be able to act on that want.
God, he's so fucking stupid.
Well, there's no point in kicking himself three years later for shit he can't change. He'll just sit right here and pretend that his fingers aren't twitching with the urge to reach out and touch. He can't do that anymore, and it's his own damn fault.
"Three years ago," Cas prompts.
Dean huffs a weak laugh. "Yeah. Eventful."
this fic hit me SO hard emotionally oh my god. don’t have much to say bc most of my thoughts on this fic are very personal but my god read this please
Everyone’s a Critic by Englandwouldfall (109k)
The one where uninspired chef Dean Winchester has a one night stand with the male (!) food critic who described the flavour of his garlic bread as 'closeted' and accidentally ends up dating him to try and prove that he's a kick ass chef, thank you very much.
(He may have a point about the 'closeted' thing).
this one is SO fun. dating the food critic who called your garlic bread closeted and lying about your career because you’re embarrassed and you want to redeem your food in his eyes but then you fall in love with him
Non Destiel Centric
gender? you mean that thing i have that pisses people off? by bigender dean winchester (homosexualitie) (946 words)
sam and dean paint each other's nails and dean abuses the technicalities of her gender. what more could you want? 
HELLO HE/SHE DEAN COMMUNITY oh my god the pure rush of euphoria reading this. oh my god. oh my god. 
the quiet road to a distant city by rottingbrains (1.2k)
Sam stares out the windshield again. They’re approaching a city, and she can see the lights in the distance. She’s past the danger zone, and she feels like the world around her reflects that in some way she can’t put into words- as if God is telling her that it’s okay. She did the right thing, and soon she will be past the lonely unknown and into the warm, forgiving light of acceptance. Or something. Come to think of it, the lights only look warm from far away, and she knows that the actual city will seem far less welcoming. Still. Best not to imagine the worst when it’s already going well.
required reading for transfem lesbian sam fans. fics that live in your ribcage to make your heart feel good
Four People Ruby Seduced & One She Actually Fell For (Or: Ruby's Epic Love Affair with Humanity in General and Sam in Specific) by tuesday (3.7k)
In which Ruby has a lot of sex, is not any kind of therapist that would be legal, and helps a few people out for her own reasons. (S4/S5 AU)
for everyone out there who enjoys ruby being a girlboss <3
Fractured Link by Trell (orphan_account) (5.5k)
Meg goes on, resolute despite the way Dean flinches, "He likes me. He likes me a lot, and I like him back, and that's probably good enough for both of us. But fuck me for saying so, Dean-o, he loves you, probably more than anything else on his daddy's green Earth, and you need to man up and give back what Clarence over there has been devoting to you for years."
this is meg/dean/cas which is not smth i really seek out but this was extremely good. set in s7 so it’s meg and dean and honey cas and it’s a lot of dean figuring his shit out and trying to forgive cas and i love meg a lot in this
475 notes · View notes
nohoney · 4 years
Text
Eyes lit
notes: Artist Keigo is something I did not know I needed until I made my own dumb paintings lol. Title credit from Crimewave by Crystal Castles 
characters: Hawks/Keigo Takami
warnings: 18+, artist!Hawks, drug use, minor choking
summary:
You see swirls of purples and greens forming spirals that you’ve never thought of before, dancing like glitter being blown in the wind and then suddenly you see white. You’re thinking in tones of purples and pinks, they pulse and shine against a wall of white and now you’re thinking of Valentine’s day.
The blanket is pulled from over your head and you look up into golden honey eyes, they look even brighter and you swear that they glow as you look up into them. “You having fun under there babe?”
I’m not an artist, I don’t know how to paint. You told him, intimidated initially when you walked into his apartment and saw a box of paints along with two small easels. The only painting you’ve done was just with your fingers back in elementary school when you were a child, how were you supposed to paint alongside someone who’s a fucking art major who’s got a whole portfolio to backup his experience? But Keigo eased your worries, told you that there’s no need to be intimidated at all.
“You don’t have to worry at all about being good or anything like that dove. The trip will tell you what to paint.”
“It’s gonna look like shit when the trip is over Keigo.”
“Don’t say that dove, art is subjective. Trust me, when you’re on you won’t care as much.” He touches the small of your back and leads you towards the dinner table, “And besides, you might really like what you make in the end.”
“I don’t know what I want to paint.”
“The trip will tell you what to paint, you’ll see.”
Keigo has you sit down to eat first, just takeout pizza from a nearby restaurant along with some breadsticks. Barbecue chicken with a side of ranch, he doesn’t like pepperoni pizza at all. His first choice was fried chicken or wings but that’s damn near what you eat with him almost all the time so this is his compromise. He’s got a little basket of snacks and candy on his kitchen countertop, prepared ahead of time for tonight along with a plastic container of red and green grapes already washed.
“I don’t like grapes Keigo.”
“Trust me, you’ll be grateful to those grapes when you’re on dove.”
He brought out a plastic baggie from his fridge and set out the contents of it onto a wooden chopping board, watching as he broke up the small pieces carefully with a knife. You heard that acid comes in forms of little blotter paper or that people put a drop of it into sugar cubes and dissolve it in water to micro dose someone. Keigo cuts two pieces of what look like little window panes, very small fragments and when you inspect them closer, it almost looks as if there’s little gold flakes inside the gelatin.
“When will I know it’s kicking in?” you ask him, looking down at the tiny piece that sits in the palm of your hand. Such a small little thing that’s apparently a strong hallucinogenic, Keigo’s told you before that he’s felt his sensations cross over like hearing colors or seeing sounds. You had no idea what he spoke of but the best way to find out is to give it a try. “How long will it take?”
Keigo’s fixing up the easels in front of the couch, has blankets ready and is putting a video playlist up on his television. “Depends on the person but most of the time it tends to kick in after half an hour or so. You’ll know when you’re on, you’ll see it.” he explains.
You look around Keigo’s apartment, paintings he made himself hung up on the walls of his home. Most of his paintings were done sober but he’s got a few framed up that he’s particularly proud of that he made when he went on acid trips. He’s already such an amazing artist, certain pictures on his walls capturing your attention and invoking particular emotions from you. You’ve seen Keigo color match your sweater in just a mere manner of seconds, sampling little bits of paints and combining them until the hues matched exactly what you were wearing. And there’s you, just a mere amateur when it came to the arts. But Keigo assures you again that it’s not about making something ‘good’, it’s just there for you to have fun with it. He’s got canvases of all shapes and sizes for you to work with and that even though he’ll be on too, he’s definitely going to take care of you for your first trip.
You trust Keigo, it’s just the canvases and the paints that make you nervous.
He stands in front of you, smiling gently before leaning down to kiss you. His lips are soft, just a hint of vanilla you taste off his mouth because you let him borrow your chapstick earlier, and it’s so tender the way he holds your cheek in his hand that your heart flutters in your chest and butterflies tickle the inside of your tummy. You feel a little flustered when he pulls back, blonde hair swept back stylishly and a lazy grin on his face as he holds his own tab in between his fingertips.
“Cheers!”
The little tab goes underneath your tongue and you’re just supposed to wait for it to dissolve.
So Keigo puts on the playlist and the two of you talk for a little bit before moving to the art stations. “Choose whatever colors you want dove, choose the colors that you think will speak to you.”
You squeeze certain colors you think you want to work with into your little plastic palette, making sure to shake the bottles first and filling all the little spaces that’s meant to hold the paint. Keigo easily chooses the paints he knows he’s going to work with to start himself off and sets himself in front of his easel. He wears a simple red hoodie and gray sweats, comfortable loungewear for the next few hours and you’d be lying if you said that you didn’t notice the print of his cock sometimes when he swiveled his hips a certain way. You wear pajamas pants and one of your soft sweaters, a gentle shade of lilac, perfect for keeping you warm on this rainy night.
You know you’ll be exhausted by the end of it, deciding to take acid for the first time overnight but at least you’ll have the next two days to recover.
And you’ll have Keigo as well.
He makes easy conversation with you, talking about how his week was and in turn asking how yours was. You look down at the paints in your palette as you talk back and forth with him, forcing yourself to not wonder how much time has passed. Your phone is by the kitchen table, placed face down so that you don’t obsess over the time so you try to measure the amount of time has passed based on the time of the videos playing on the television. Yet you start to care less about the time as you actually start to get caught up in the paints in front of you, experimenting and pleasantly surprised with how you came up with such a pretty violet color. You point it out to Keigo, stupidly excited over it but he smiles and agrees with you. “Such a pretty color dove, but not as pretty as you.”
His words make the butterflies flutter in your stomach again but you say nothing, turning back to your canvas and picking up a brush. For a few minutes you just stare back and forth between the paint and the white canvas, wondering how you should start off. Keigo obviously sees you concentrating too hard and reminds you, “Don’t think about it too hard, just paint and see what happens.”
Okay... so in other words, just do it.
So you take a deep breath, dip your brush in the paint, and make a single stripe at the very top edge of the canvas.
“See? Not so scary.”
“Y-Yeah, it’s not!” You squeak out, still embarrassed but a little less intimidated now that you actually started it. You’re not exactly sure what you’ll do with it but there’s no harm in just winging it.
Hm... wings...
You glance over to Keigo, one of his sleeves rolled up and his tattoo visible on his forearm. It’s a detailed wing on his forearm inked in only black, the very tip of it extended towards his elbow and he’s got a matching one on his other forearm as well. You remember the first time you saw them and how Keigo let you run your fingers over his tattoo, watching in amusement over how fascinated you were.
Back to your canvas, you see the sheen of the fresh paint on the white canvas and decide to add more to it. Maybe you’ll get inspired the more you add to it, thinking what colors compliment violet and what exactly you could create. Over the next few minutes you just continue painting the violet further onto the surface of the canvas, looking down briefly at the black paint that’s also in your palette and wonder if you could try painting a mountain. You recall plenty of times looking up at the sky when you were done hiking and just in awe of the colors of the sunset, hues of purples and reds and orange that invoked a certain feeling in your chest.
A sunset... a sunset!
Easy enough yeah?
You just have to add red, orange, yellow, probably a touch of blue... some clouds would be nice too.
So you spread more of the purple across the canvas, concentrating hard at first before realizing something. “Keigo?”
“Yes dove?”
“I think my painting is breathing.”
Keigo laughs from his side and you feel his hand ruffle your hair affectionately.
You look hard at your canvas and swear that you can see the paint inhale and exhale, the veins of the paint pulse in the painting. Wait... veins? You don’t remember painting anything like that, all you did was just cover part of the canvas to get you started. The longer you stare at the canvas, you swear that you can see the paint drip down slightly, the canvas inflating and deflating, and hidden designs on the untouched parts of the white canvas.
The acid had finally hit.
“Keigo... I think I’m on.” you say as you dip your brush into the water cup to wash off the violet, this time into the yellow paint and haphazardly brushing it onto the canvas before switching over to the bright red without washing off the yellow. You think how powerful the color red is, how strong and overpowering it is on the canvas and you tell Keigo, “I think you’d look gorgeous with red wings Keigo.”
Keigo is concentrated on his own canvas but he does glance over to you and smiles how you’re suddenly so into painting when you were so reluctant at first when you walked into his studio. He watches you blend the red into the yellow, wondering what exactly is inspiring you and what your finished product will be. “Ah how interesting dove, you comparing me to an angel?”
“Angel wings are white, I said your wings would be red.”
“Why red?”
You shrug your shoulders as you brush some blue onto the violet on the top of the canvas, blending the blue and violet together. “I don’t know, just suits you a lot... I wore wings last year, I was an angel last year for Halloween.”
“You dressed like an angel last year for Halloween, you certainly didn’t act like one.”
Suddenly the memory of last year’s Halloween comes rushing to the front of your memory and you begin to giggle, needing to set your brush down and have your little giggle fit; he was very right, drunk shenanigans in your angelic costume while holding White Russians with your friends surfacing to your mind. You don’t know why you’re so amused but you are, leaning back against the couch and curling yourself into a ball. You pull the blanket over your shoulders, pulling the bottom corners into your lap and you look down in awe. You swear that even though you’re sitting still, the blanket looks like it’s pulsing as well and you can see the small fibers of it sticking out from the surface. You can’t help but pick at one and hold it in between your fingertips, staring for a few seconds before releasing it.
Moving to lie on your side, you press your cheek into the couch cushion and stare at the painting you just started. It looks weird right now, purple on top with yellow and red in the middle but you’re determined that you’re going to paint that sunset!
You look over towards Keigo, seeing that he started off his canvas a golden yellow at first and is brushing a crimson red on top of it as well. It sort of reminds you of fire and you wonder what he’s seeing. You pull the blanket over your head, sheltering you from the bright lights of the room and you stare at your own hands right in front of your face. Every line and wrinkle is moving, like they’re switching places on you and you ‘ooh’ quietly. When you shut your eyes, it’s not a straight darkness you see like when you close your eyes and go to bed. You see swirls of purples and greens forming spirals that you’ve never thought of before, dancing like glitter being blown in the wind and then suddenly you see white. You’re thinking in tones of purples and pinks, they pulse and shine against a wall of white and now you’re thinking of Valentine’s day.
The blanket is pulled from over your head and you look up into golden honey eyes, they look even brighter and you swear that they glow as you look up into them. “You having fun under there babe?” Keigo asks you, clearly amused to have looked back and saw you as just a lump under his blanket. “Yeah, looks like you’re having fun.”
“Hehehe... yeah.” you smile up at him, pushing some of your hair back from your face. You look as he presents a single red grape to you, drops of water still on it to let you know that it had just been washed and while grapes weren’t your favorite fruit to eat, somehow they looked so appetizing in that moment. You open your mouth and Keigo places the fruit into your mouth, chomping down and it’s so juicy and firm and crunches so loud in your head that you moan as you chew.
Delicious, it’s delicious!
Keigo feeds you grapes every so often, whether you’re sitting in front of your canvas to continue painting, looking at the television and the visuals presented along with the music, get up to look at his other paintings that you think are whispering or waving to you, or when you decide to just stare at the tapestry he hung up in front of his balcony. You understand why tie dye is so appealing to look at now, you know for sure it’s not the wind making the tapestry move, the colors waving at you and you try to reach into the tapestry, your fingertips just barely grasping the colors in front of you.
“How long has it been Keigo?” you ask as you continue to look at the tapestry.
“It’s almost eleven, so it’s been three hours since we took it.”
Wow, three hours...
You’re not sure how the passage of time is feeling for you, everything is looking warped and you suppose that your sense of time is included in that as well.
You feel hands under your armpits and your lifted up to your feet, leaning back and touching the arms that hold you securely. The tattooed wings on Keigo’s forearm, the feathers look as if they’re rustled, they look like they need to be preened. It’s important for birds to preen their feathers so that their wings look presentable. “Okay dove, time for a bathroom break. Think you’ll need my help?”
No, you’re a big girl, of course you can go to the bathroom yourself.
Though you do have to ask Keigo to hold your hand, looking down at the floor and not trusting your own feet. It’s like you’re looking through a fish eye lens, like the floor seems so much wider and closer to you. Keigo says something to you when he drops you off at the bathroom but you don’t hear him, humming absently and you close the door. You do your business and wash your hands, using the nearby hand towel to dry off your hands and then you look up at the mirror.
You lean forward and inspect your pupils, they’re blown up and you think you can see shifting colors in your iris. You really are on, pulling back and inspecting your reflection. Now you feel like you’re caught, not sure if you recognize the person who’s looking back at you and... and... is the shower curtain moving towards you? Is that really you in the mirror? Your hair is never this mussed up and the color of your shirt you always liked before but why did it look so weird on you now?
“Dove, I’m coming in.” Keigo announces and slowly pushes open the door so that he doesn’t catch you in any indecent state. But he sees you just staring intently at your reflection and just comes up behind you, pressing his front to your back and tilting your head back to look at him. “Ah got caught looking at yourself in the mirror huh? S’alright, the first time I did acid apparently I spent a half hour just looking at my own reflection too.”
His eyes are the color of honey and you think you can suddenly taste it in your mouth, you imagine it. “Your eyes are pretty.”
“You’re pretty.”
But you shake your head at the compliment and ask, “Did I always look so weird Keigo?” you ask him, reaching one hand up and brushing the tips of your fingers along his stubble.
“No you never look weird, you’re always so cute.” he reassures you, pressing a kiss to the tip of your nose. “Go back to the living room, lemme have my bathroom break and I’ll join you in a hot minute.”
“Don’t fall in the mirror.” you say absently as you walk out the bathroom and shut the door. You hold onto anything you can to help balance you, the floorboards beneath your feet look as if they’re trying to trip you up but you manage on your own to make your way back to your spot on the couch, staring at your unfinished painting.
What... what was I making again?
Violet, blue, red, yellow... oh yeah, the sunset.
Keigo really was right when he said that trip would decide what you would paint.
You don’t hear the bathroom door open but you look up as Keigo comes into your vision and ask, “How do I make clouds?”
“How do you mean? Like how clouds are made in the sky? Well you see clouds are made of water droplets that are so small that they’re able to stay in the air. You see the water vapor-” Keigo starts on what you know is a very educational lecture on clouds but you stop him with a whine, pointing to your canvas. “Oh... oh! You want to know how to paint clouds. Haha, sorry dove!”
Keigo makes himself comfortable right behind you, your bodies once again pressed to one another as he hands you the palette of paint and picks up a different paint brush has you hold it in your own hand but he covers it with his own; you’ll hold the brush while he controls your movements. So he dips the paint brush in the white paint, also adding in a touch of red that almost makes it pink and you gasp. It’s not gonna go together! you think but Keigo hushes you, tells you to just trust him. And although you’re watching how he dabs the paintbrush onto your canvas, you’re not really perceiving the process. One minute it’s a messy slate of purple, yellow and red and then boom suddenly there are clouds that actually create a picture. “Ah you were trying to make a sunset, I can see why you wanted to paint clouds. Very creative, I’m proud of you!”
“I did that?”
“You did!”
He praises you as if you were a child doing it for the first time... though you actually are painting for the first time and honestly it actually is coming out pretty nice, though it’s only thanks to the help of Keigo. So you look back at him, pressing your lips against briefly and whisper out, “Thank you.”
Returning back to his canvas, you decide that you can continue painting on your own. You close your eyes and try to remember any memory that contains a sunset, whether it was through your own eyes or perhaps looking at images on the internet. You try your hardest, your mind producing more interesting shapes and patterns of colors that almost distract you but you’re going to pain that sunset damn it! So you blend the colors on the canvas, adding in more tones of violet and purple towards the bottom to cover up the blank spots. You thought about adding in a mountain or some trees but you feel that’s much too advanced for you to attempt, though you know that you can ask Keigo again but he already helped you once. Now you were determined to do another by yourself.
You ask if you can have another canvas and Keigo gets up to the little pile of untouched ones. When he hands you one and ask if it’s a good size, it’s a question you can really answer because the way he holds it out to you makes it seem to long. And realizing that your perception is altering the way you look at the canvas, he holds it upright for you and you ask for something a little bigger.
Carefully setting aside the sunset painting... whoa it’s like the clouds are really moving!
Focus.
You set up the new blank canvas in front of you, wondering what to make next.
“Ah I almost forgot, I got this for you too while I was at the craft store.” Keigo tells you as he brings up the box paints, holding out a tube of-
“Ooooh... glitter.” you awe at the opalescent colors, holding it against the light to see sheens of white and pink and purple. You’re not sure if it’s the acid or not but it looks extra pretty and you shake the little tube in your hand.
“Have fun with it just uh... make sure to not get too messy.”
You could imagine such pretty colors like the stars and them falling into your eyes... oh, you could make a starry night for your next painting. So you enthusiastically brush more violet and blue onto the new canvas along with a touch of black to make a dark sky. The canvas breathes at you and you think that the more color you add to it, you think you can hear it sigh in relief. You blend it all together and wonder what else you could add to it. You drift to the palette and zero in on the white paint, exchanging your current paint brush for a smaller one, dipping it into the white paint and just making little dots here and there to represent the stars. Then you open the tube of fine glitter and you’re particularly giddy; your painting is going to be amazing, it’s going to look exactly like the night sky... no even better! It’ll be like the cosmos!
You must have been a little overzealous with the glitter on your painting because Keigo nudges a towel just right underneath your easel and you feel him pat down your feet.
Careful with the edges of the painting since it’s still wet, you gently shake off any of the excess glitter and then lean back to really inspect it. In the moment it really looks like a beautiful starry sky and you think that you can literally see shooting stars in it, so sparkly and pretty in the moment. You pull the blanket back over your body and crawl your way to Keigo’s side of the couch, sitting behind him and perching your chin atop his shoulder. Weird, you could have sworn that when he first started painting he started off with yellow and red, he’s painting over it with blue and green now. “Keigo, what are you painting?”
“I don’t know. I started off thinking about fire at first and then all of a sudden I just started putting green and blue together... I think I might have been either thinking about the ocean or the forest... I forget.” Keigo explains, still not stopping his paint brush over the surface. You guess that even artists start off sometimes nonsensical too and that they don’t always have a clear idea how their end product might come out. But you still admire it anyway, reaching your hand out and loosely holding onto his wrist. His arms look even longer from where you’re looking and yet he’s sitting so close to his painting at the same time.
Perception sure is a strange thing when you’re on.
He smells nice, pressing your nose into his neck and breathing in his cologne, humming in delight and pressing yourself even closer to him.
Now you’re not exactly the bold type, every once in a while you’ve decided to make the first move but most of the time you let others give you the signal first before you flirt back. Already you and Keigo have been seeing each other for a few weeks, a few dates here and there but you’ve yet to progress anything spicier than a few make outs and maybe some teasing touches. So it comes as a surprise to him when you drag a hand down from his chest and let it rest in between his spread legs, groaning when you lick the shell of his ear and nibble on it. “B-Babe... we’re supposed to be... to be...”
“Painting? That canvas isn’t the only thing you can paint Keigo.” you whisper in his ear, feeling for his cock in his gray sweats and pleased that you can feel that he’s getting hard. You form your hand over his cock and stroke it through the sweats while your other hand drags over his arm, still stretched out towards the painting but now his arm is tense. “For example... you can paint me with your cum. Inside or out, I’ll let the artist decide.”
Keigo sets down his paint brush and his palette before tugging you to his bed.
It’s dark in his room when he shuts the door but you’re quickly put on the surface of his bed. You can hear him fiddling around somewhere in the corner of the room and then red light fills the room, it’s pretty basic of him to own those strip lights seeing as you’ve had more than a few friends decorate their room with it too but now isn’t the time to critique the mood lighting. You do have to wonder why the color red, why not just put on the regular ceiling lights?
He’s on you once the lights are on, pulling off your pajama bottoms and setting them to the side for the time being. Spreading your legs open, Keigo starts off with kissing the inside of your thighs and slowly goes up higher. Your panties are still on but you moan softly when he kisses your pussy through the cotton, then it’s up to your belly button, pushing your sweater up along with the soft bra you decided to wear tonight as stops to pay attention to your breasts, nipples perked up to the cold air along with the way Keigo flicks his tongue over them. While he sucks hickies onto your breasts, you run your hand through his hair and look up at the ceiling, you think you can hear the flap of a bird’s wings and think something flutters from the corner of your eye. “K-Keigo... is it okay for us to do this while we’re on?”
“You’re safe babe, I’m here.” he assures you as he helps tug off your sweater over your head. “Just focus on me, I’ve done this before.”
Oh great, he didn’t just allude that he’s fucked other people on acid before did he?
Keigo seems to catch his choice of words and grinds his clothed cock against your panties and gives you an apologetic smile. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. I just mean that sometimes sex on acid can be a precarious thing to engage in, I just wanna let you know that I got you.” he presses the pad of his thumb where he guesses your clit is. “You trust me yeah?”
Yeah, I do.
“How about a little art lesson for ya? That’ll help get you in the mood and you’ll learn something interesting.” Keigo takes off his sweats and his underwear, leaving you the only one who’s almost naked in the room. The music still plays from the living room, smooth guitar and easy beats still reach your ears. “You wanna know why I made the lights red? Red provokes the strongest emotion and is considered the warmest and most contradictory of the colors. Can you tell me some things you think of when you think of the color red?”
Apples, firetrucks, blood.
“Red is one of the most visible colors in the spectrum, its the kind of color that’s an attention grabber which is why it’s used to warn people of danger. Red can convey a sense of danger,” Keigo explains this while he pets you through your panties, it’s almost leisurely the way he does it but he can see how you quiver underneath his touch. “but it’s also associated with excitement, that even sometimes just being exposed to the color can cause elevated blood pressure and heart rate.”
Your heart rate is certainly up right now and it’s not just because of the acid.
You feel Keigo pull your panties to the side and easily glide a finger in but he wants something in return as well, “Spit in your hand and stroke my cock.”
As you stroke Keigo and he gently fingers you, he continues on about his lesson on the color red. “So along with danger, excitement, there’s also aggression and dominance. There’s not exactly a clear reason why red is associated with dominance, maybe it just goes hand in hand with feeling aggressive, perhaps also representing power as well.”
“K-Kei... please get to the point!” you whine, sitting up with one hand braced on the bed while the other continues to stroke him. He’s added another finger and you notice that he’s put a little bit more vigor in his actions. “Please won’t you just-”
“Most of all though, my little bird,” Keigo continues over you but you can take a guess where this ‘art lesson’ is going by the way his lips quirk up and how is voice drops. “red is also linked to passion, love, and desire, that it’s apparently a very attractive color. You remember what color you wore the first time we met?”
“You... you saying that you only liked me ‘cause I was wearing red?” you ask, a breathy laugh leaving your lips but then whine as Keigo strokes your g-spot and you almost dropped back onto the bed but he’s quick to catch you. He quickly pulls his fingers out of you and winds it around your waist to pull you flush against him and settles you in his lap, your hand trapped between your bodies but you continue to jerk his cock despite the limited space.
Keigo chuckles along with you, leaning down to press a kiss to your neck and give you a gentle bite. “Aha I’m just teasing you dove, it was your cute face I saw first and besides, you weren’t wearing a red shirt when we first met... You were wearing red panties, I remember seeing them when you bent over in that short little black dress.”
“You’re embarrassing.” you mumble, adjusting yourself so that you hover over his cock, slapping the head of it against your clit. “And that wasn’t an art lesson, that was more like color psychology.”
“You still learned something, did you not?”
You cup Keigo’s cheeks in your hands, kissing him briefly and pull back to tell him, “I’m not looking to learn anything except how your cock feels inside me.”
So you brace your arms around Keigo’s shoulders, sighing as he eases himself into you slowly. His hands hold your ass, gently lifting you off his cock and then easing you down again to take him further, repeating the process until his girth was sheathed all the way inside you. You gasp together, you at his size and him at your tightness, hands all over each other and you’re wondering where his body begins and yours ends. Whatever other cocks you had inside you before, they’ve never felt like this when they first entered you.
And then the two of you are moving in sync with one another, holding each other’s gaze, just barely able to see the reflection of each other in your blown out pupils. You can’t really see the honey gold of his eyes thanks to the lights but you you think you can taste it still, every time you just taste that sweet nectar when you look into Keigo’s eyes. It must mean how sweet he is, that must be why his eyes are colored like that.
He’s sweet like honey.
Again, you hear the flap of a bird’s wings even though you know the bedroom window isn’t open.
It’s slow and sensual at first, sex on acid is something more heightened, something indescribable behind the sensations as you lean back slightly to roll your hips while you meet Keigo’s thrusts. Your hands locked behind his neck and your head lolling back, a sensual sigh from you when you feel a hand go to your throat. A breathy ‘yes’ spills from your lips as the pads of the fingers carefully press at the sides of your neck; feels good, feels so good...
Suddenly you’re pushed onto your back, gasping in surprise at first and then uninhibited moans as he viciously fucks you. And what can you do but take it, take all of it, peering at him through the haze of pleasure and the peak of your high when you see it.
Bright red wings spreading from Keigo’s back, brighter than the lights, the feathers ruffle and seem to groan alongside him, he’s losing himself in this carnal moment, bracing himself over you and the wings coming forward as well. You feel floaty, almost as if the wings are carrying you themselves, you think you can feel feathers tickle your skin while Keigo’s hands have your hands pinned above your head, your ankles locking just right above his buttocks.
It feels like the sex is lasting forever, that as fast and hard Keigo pumps into you it feels never ending. In truth you don’t know how much time has actually passed, just that the passage of time seems longer. But it feels good, you feel one with Keigo and even just the slightest clench of your fingers intertwined with his feels even more intimate. His panting, your whimpers, the music, the lights, the flapping of the wings, and you crying out his name.
Even as you clench your eyes shut, swirling patterns of hues of red dance behind your eyelids. They seem to move in time with Keigo’s tempo, every slap of his hips connecting with your body, they respond accordingly. You feel one of his hands drawn down from your neck, past your breasts, giggling when he goes over your belly button, and groan when he plays with your clit.
He praises you, tells you how good you’re doing even though you’re just lying there and taking it, you try to participate by rolling your hips up to meet his but his power is just too overwhelming. “Kei... Kei... go, it feels so good...!”
You wriggle your other hand free from his and pull him down, practically hugging him and bringing him even closer, eyes shut hard as he goes into double time. His face is pushed into your neck, breathing hard into it and you think you can hear his wings flapping even harder. His hands hold your waist, just lifting you up slightly so that your back slightly arches.
Soft skin against rough hands.
“Where you going to paint your cum Keigo?” you ask, your lips just barely brushing against the shell of his ear. “All over my face? My tits? Maybe... even turn me around and blow it all over my back?”
“Fuck! Keep talking like that! ’M gonna cum dove... I’m gon’a cum!”
You push him back just enough and once again cup his face in your hands, “Look at me when you cum.”
Jittery nods of his head, he’ll absolutely obey anything you want as long as you don’t let him leave inside of you. All over your face would be so nice, your tits even nicer, he hasn’t pulled out to cum on someone’s back in months but fuck when you mention it, it’s so fucking enticing. But nothing beats when it’s oozing out, like ice cream melting on a hot day as it drips so he has to ask you if it’s okay. “Babe... can I paint you inside babe?”
Does an artist even have to ask permission to paint their canvas?
“Yeah... paint me white inside.”
And that’s all permission he needs, a few harsh thrusts and he cums with you, his cum shooting inside you while you gush around him, almost like it’s trying to push him out. But he stays inside you, his visit isn’t over quite yet, he doesn’t want to leave, not when he feels so connected with you.
You catch your breath, blinking your bleary eyes and see all of those red feathers slowly leave Keigo’s back. You don’t know how many there are, maybe two hundred or something like that, but you watch them leave one by one, almost as if they’re each being controlled individually. You think Keigo is the one that’s dismissing the feathers and you reach out towards them; you never got the chance to touch them.
Hands sliding down his back, you express a mild disgust over how sweaty Keigo is, “Ew... take a shower.”
“Only if you come with me.” Keigo chuckles pushing himself off you but wiping at your forehead as well. Geez, you hadn’t even realized you sweated too.
So the two of you stand under the warm shower spray, he lathers his shampoo and conditioner into your hair first, washing it out for you before you return the favor for him. You note how even more intimate this is compared to the sex before, looking up into his eyes and you give each other an endearing smile. The peak has been passed and now the acid will ease off, already things look a little less distorted and the intense distortions don’t feel like they used to when you first started.
“How are my eyes dove? Getting lost in them?” Keigo chuckles but he doesn’t give you a chance to answer, choosing to kiss you instead. “Did you mind that our first time was on acid?”
“No, it was good.” you tell him as you draw a single line on his collarbone with the tip of your finger. “I can’t wait to have regular, sober sex with you.”
“Hehe, I hope it compares well to my first performance.”
“I don’t know,” you singsong to him, “maybe you set the bar too high having first time on acid.”
“Well don’t say that now.”
The two of you laugh together, he playfully pushes your head but pulls you back in for another kiss. The water runs down both of your bodies and you pull back, looking down at the ground. Keigo thinks that you’re looking down at his cock and that you might be up for another round but you look back up at him and ask, “My feet are like a million miles away... have I always been this tall?”
You dry up together and change into clean clothes, returning to the easels and you’re surprised that the television still is playing music from the playlist. After so long without having your phone, you check the time to see that it’s well into two in the morning and it’s no wonder that you feel tired, not just from the sex but how late it was as well.
You curl up onto the couch while Keigo still works on his painting, the last thing you see were your sunset painting alongside the starry night one, the clouds shifting on one and the other still sparkles with shooting stars.
━━━━✧
“Ugh, I told you that they’d look like shit when the trip is over.”
“Don’t say that, they look fantastic.”
You hold up both of their canvases and each hand, looking deadpan at him with tired eyes. “This one looks like I just puked glitter on it and the only part of this one that is good are the clouds that you helped me paint!” you sigh out and look down at each of the paintings. You knew it, you weren’t an artist after all and you had thought that you did such a good job last night.
Keigo takes your starry night painting and brings it over to the sink, banging the edge of it gently a few times to shake off any glitter that didn’t dry on the paint before handing it back to you. “See, now it looks a little less like glitter puke and I have to tell you this dove, but you painted those clouds yourself.”
Huffing at him, you set down the starry night painting and look down at your sunset painting. “Keigo, I know I was on last night but you for sure helped me paint the clouds. I remember that part pretty clearly, don’t try to treat me like I’m a kid and say some bullshit to make me feel better.”
“I helped you get started but I saw that you picked it up on your own and you painted the rest of it yourself, I swear.”
“Keigo-”
He stops you with a soft call of your name and even though the two of you are tired as hell and feel disassociated from your own bodies and personalities, something tugs in your heart that way he says your name. “I’m serious, I helped you start making the clouds but you actually got the hang of it and watched you do it yourself. I told you the trip would tell you what to paint and you did it!”
You still look disbelieving at him, swearing that you thought you felt his hand help you paint last night. But then again, you also thought you saw one of his paintings of a balloon flying away too so maybe he might be telling the truth. It’s a little hard to discern what were your actions that actually happened versus what was in your mind. Much like the wings you thought he sprouted when the two of you had sex.
“Can you just show me yours? I fell asleep before I could see what you made.” He hands you his own canvas and you stare hard at it, looking back and forth between him and the painting in your hands. “Did you make another one last night?”
“Nope, I used that one canvas the entire night.”
“Didn’t you start off painting it with yellow and red? How did you end up with,” you turn the painting around to show him, “painting this?”
Delicate pinks and purples dotted just right to look like wisteria flowers and a big tree trunk in the very center of it. It just wasn’t fair that he was so good at conceptualizing these kinds of things. You have to wonder if he just had a natural talent for it or if it was something he honed over time. Either way, you know he didn’t get that art degree for nothing.
Keigo chuckles and sets aside his painting. “I looked at your sweater last night and thought I saw wisteria flowers sprouting out, I got my inspiration from you. Also you seemed really into the color purple last night so that helped too. Although you did also give me an idea last night too.” he takes your hand in his, pulling you close to him and reaches one hand underneath your shirt, his palm resting on the small of your back. “That whole ��paint me thing’ you said yesterday... I was wondering if one day you’d let me paint on you?”
You tilt your head to the side, “What do you mean?”
“Like... just let me paint on your body one day. I can get those body friendly paints and just make a picture on you.” Keigo explains with a sheepish smile coming onto his face despite how tired he looks. “It kinda turned on me on last night when you said you wanted me to paint you inside and I just thought ‘well what if I actually did?’ But not with my cum I mean, though I wouldn’t mind that either.“
The thought of laying down for Keigo while he does such a thing, it sounds quite intimate. You look into his eyes, his pupils still a little wide but it’s only a few more hours for the acid to exit your bodies. It was intense last night but you were glad to have done it with Keigo and even though you think the art you did last night is sort of crap now, you can’t deny that it was sort of fun to do it still. 
Your paintings lay to the side, his own stupidly good wisteria painting sitting alongside your glittered starry night and sunset painting. Strange how your eyes perceived everything last night from elongated lengths, the dynamically changing colors you saw when you shut your eyes, you felt everything alive around rather than thinking of the furniture as mere static objects, the red wings and feather you swore you felt against your skin when Keigo fucked his cock into you, everything was beautiful and you couldn’t have asked for a better first time.
You’d like to do it again.
“Can I dove? Can I paint on you one day?”
“... Yeah, I’d like that.”
154 notes · View notes
writerpeach · 4 years
Text
Room For Dessert
Momoland Ahin x Male Reader
4197 words
Categories: smut, bathroom sex, daddy kink, dirty talk
18+
---
Read on AFF
Read on AO3
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It was supposed to be a romantic night. 
It took two months to get a dinner reservation at one of the most prestigious restaurants in downtown Seoul, a place that claimed to be more than just about food, but an experience, which made you roll your eyes but enough friends and co-workers recommended it to give it a shot. 
You had dressed your best, wearing a nice pressed shirt, slacks, and expensive shoes, while your girlfriend Ahin had picked a more...different route and decided to wear the tightest, shortest dress in her wardrobe. White-colored with roses everywhere did not make the outfit or her any more innocent. 
The restaurant was packed, a tiny building with no more than eight tables, it became apparent one of the reasons for the long waitlist. 
You entered hand in hand with your Ahin and felt eyes staring, mostly at Ahin which wasn’t a shocker. She was very easy on the eyes - blonde, gorgeous, and a deadly body. 
You were seated at a small round table by a large window, being on the third floor you had a beautiful view of the city at night, although it was nothing compared to the pretty blonde across the table.
An hour in, it became hard to concentrate on your food. Peering from her side, Ahin’s eyes were a mixture of innocence and sin. One second they were soft and sparkling, the next they became full of lust, flashing bedroom eyes in a place where that was the last thing on your mind. 
“What?” you asked, as you continued eating but couldn’t help but feel like you were the meal by the way Ahin stared at you.
“Nothing, you just eat well,” she replied, feigning a purity to her words. “And not just food, either,” she added with a smile, and you nearly choked.
This was how things always went. 
It was bad enough dealing with her constant teasing, but she had to wear a dress that barely covered her up, her dress involuntarily hiking up to show off her wonderful thighs and was so low-cut her tits were practically spilling out and needing to breathe. 
“You should eat.” 
“Oh, I will but I’m waiting for something more delicious,” she said, and you can’t say you didn’t see that coming from a mile away. 
“Can I get you two anything for dessert?” You were thankful for the interruption, but before you could say another word Ahin spoke up.
”I’d love something sweet...and sticky,” she told the waitress innocently, but yet you knew there was nothing innocent at all about her. 
“Right away, ma’am.” 
“It’s not good to be eating something so sugary this late.”
“I can’t help it, I love sweets. And you know how much I love having cream inside me.”
She was going to be the death of you. 
The waitress shortly returned and placed a delicious looking slice of yellow cake down on the center of the table, decorated with sprinkles, white frosting, and caramel icing. 
“Thank you,” Ahin told the waitress as she grinned playfully at you. Not wasting a second, grabbed the plate towards her, forgoing the use of the two forks placed as she used her fingertip to scoop up a bit of the vanilla frosting. You knew what was next. 
With a smirk a mile wide, she brought her finger to her lips, licking the frosting clean and making sure to leave just a smidgen on the corner of her lips.
“I think I have something on my face. Can you get it for me?” Ahin asked.
You sighed deeply, not wanting to play into her trap and simply handed her a napkin. She frowned and tossed it aside, licking her lips instead. 
Ahin made a show out of eating her dessert, every bite into her mouth full of pure raw seduction. You admired how hard she was trying and simply enjoyed watching her struggling to claim a reaction out of you.
When you had enough you leaned over to Ahin’s side of the table and aimed for a kiss, faking her out as you pivoted your face into the side of her neck. 
“You’re not getting away with this,” you whispered. 
Ahin giggled innocently and averted her attention. She grabbed her phone, her fingers swiping over keys frantically and moments after you felt a buzz inside your pocket. She gestured for you to check your phone but you refused.
“It’s rude to use your phone at the table, baby. Need to say something to me?” 
She didn’t speak, but her lips moved and you could tell what words she had formed.
“Ruin me.”
“Not until we get home.” 
Ahin huffed. “You know...I'm not wearing any underwear,” she boldly said, folding her arms and grinning devilishly, always trying to up the ante. 
“Is that supposed to surprise me?” you asked. To Ahin, underwear was something she wasn’t particularly fond of, and you would have been more shocked if she had any on. 
“No, but it would be a shame if I accidentally dropped something and the whole restaurant saw my bare ass, wouldn’t it?” Right on time, you heard the clang of silverware hitting the cold floor. 
You had enough. Before she had a chance to do anything you grabbed her wrist, leaving enough cash on the table to pay for both meals and a little extra and got the hell out of there. 
“Where are we going...daddy?”
Ignoring her favorite pet name to use you dragged her away, squeezing her hand until you found the perfect place, a large metal door with a sign that said bathroom. 
Not even bothering to check to see if other people were around, you shoved the door open and made sure it was empty before holding it open for her.
“Get in,” you demanded, and she complied without delay. The door slammed shut behind you loud enough to cause the sound to ripple throughout the walls. 
“You’re cute when you’re angry, daddy,” she said as you leaned up against her body, pressing her up against the wall.
“Angry? I’m not angry,” you said as you cupped one side of her pretty face. 
Ahin didn’t believe you with the way she reacted with a grin that was plastered on her stupidly gorgeous face.  
“You didn’t lock the door.” 
“And I’m not going to,” you said harshly. Your only regret was this was a private bathroom, you’d love nothing more than to make good use of a less private stall. 
You could sense the tension in her body as you considered a thousand different ways to use her, running a hand down her shoulder and felt the soft skin of her body as you considered what to do with her. 
“Are you going to fuck me, daddy?” Ahin asked. 
You denied her an answer, sliding a hand in between her thighs and feeling the wetness of her cunt already, confirming the lack of underwear. She was freshly shaved, every inch of her mound smooth as silk as you teased her folds with one fingertip, threatening to enter her and stopping just before giving in to her desire.
“No...I'm going to make you beg.” 
Using your knee to spread her thighs open, Ahin’s breath hitched as you slipped a finger inside her tight hole only for a moment before withdrawing it out. It also didn’t surprise you to find your finger covered in her slick. 
“You like being such a slut in public, don’t you?”
“You caught me,” she smirked, but her confidence was shattered as you felt up one of her warm, creamy thighs, inching closer to touching her pussy again but stopping short at the last moment as she instinctively whined. 
That sound you had heard before meant she was breaking already, letting her guard down without a struggle and melting at your every touch. 
Before you could even touch her pretty pussy again you could feel her thighs becoming damp, trying to close them around your hand but you kept them forced open.
Ahin was a messy girl, to say the least. Her apartment had a closet dedicated to spare sheets as she was known to ruin them without warning, turning herself into a water fountain without an off switch.  
With Ahin’s confidence draining you kept the pressure, kissing her luscious neck in several spots before rushing to pull the straps of her dress down. Licking her neck just once, you yanked the top of her dress down to expose her marvelous chest, her full round breasts bouncing as they were freed. You salivated at the very sight of them. 
You felt your pants tightening as you stared at her juicy tits, her pretty nipples swollen already and bright pink and you were hungry for your second meal of the night. 
Ahin gasped as you touched her, fondling her huge breasts in the same way you had done dozens of times. Hearing her moan softly was pleasing to your ears as you squeezed and massaged them, you never got tired of playing with her tits. You never got tired of how heavy and soft they felt in your hands, fingertips sporadically teasing her pretty nipples to earn another moan. 
Licking in between her cleavage, you kept up the obsession with her breasts as you brought your lips to her chest and traced the outline of one nipple before sucking harshly on it, switching between the two. It didn’t take long before her nipples were drenched in spit and you found yourself back in between her legs, one finger than another, feeling her warmth on your fingers but barely moving as her entire body twitched. 
“D-daddy...” she whined. She was yours now. 
“Yes, princess?” you asked as she tried moving her hips to ride your fingers. You made sure to pump your fingers inside her as slowly as possible to deny her the full friction really needed. Had she not acted up earlier she’d be gushing already all over the bathroom tile for sure.
It’s easy to see why Ahin did this, why she spent so much time trying to get a rise out of you if this is what she got in return. 
Finding a rhythm you pumped faster inside Ahin, feeling her walls squeezing your finger as she moaned breathlessly. She was doing a lousy job of keeping quiet, but you weren’t sure if she couldn’t control herself or just wanted to rile you up. 
That wet squelch of your fingers fucking her hole echoed alongside the bathroom walls, finding her spot with ease and curling inside her as her pretty moans increased. Your fingers were soaked, her slick coating them and dripping down her thighs and Ahin looked so damn beautiful like this.
She could barely keep her eyes open at this point, her arms down by her side as she tried to scrape her nails into the wall, desperate to hold on to anything as she felt her abdomen tighten.
You worked a third finger into her very tight pussy, feeling her juices leaking all over your hand as you rubbed her clit, her walls tightening with each pump of your fingers. 
She was close, you could see it in her eyes and you could hear it, she needed just a tiny bit more.
But you weren’t going to give it to her. At the last possible moment you pulled your fingers out abruptly and she almost came untouched. 
“D-daddy!” she whined, and you smiled brightly at her. 
“Only good girls get to cum,” you said, giving her needy pussy a handful of slaps before removing your hand from her thighs. 
“That’s not fair,” she whimpered. 
“Oh, I think it’s plenty fair given your actions.”
“I was just trying to spice up dinner. It’s not my fault you’re no fun.”
“You wanted fun did you?” you said, running a hand through soft strands of Ahin’s pretty golden locks. 
If anything you wanted to rip that dress completely off her tight sexy body and force her to walk out of here bare ass naked, but you really liked this place, and getting kicked out was the last thing you wanted. 
“Then suck my fucking dick,” you hissed, grabbing the back of her head and guided her down until she knelt in front of you. With her lips smiling wide she quickly unzipped your pants and yanked hard, taking them down with your boxers and released your cock. 
Her eyes lit up as your cock ended in her small hand, licking her sinful lips as she stroked you and licked your length at the same time. 
“So fucking hard already, daddy,” she smiled as she jerked off your cock, planting several sloppy wet kisses alongside your shaft in admiration. 
“Then do something about it.”
Giving one more kiss on your tip, Ahin licked stripes up and down your heavy balls before taking you inside her warm mouth. You moaned loudly at the feeling of her soft pouty lips wrapped around your cock and she went to work. 
“That’s a good girl,” you told her as she took you halfway in already, keeping a hand stroking you as her lips did their magic. 
“Feels so fucking good. Such a good little slut aren’t you, sucking me off in a bathroom?” 
With her mouth currently occupied, Ahin couldn’t answer verbally, but her eyes showed she loved what she was doing. She slurped and slurped, sucking sloppily and keeping her eyes wide open to see your reaction, keeping her mouth on your shaft as her head bobbed up and down.
“It’s nice having you quiet for a change. Should really have you do this more often.” You smiled proudly as you held on to her head with both hands, pushing her gradually down towards your base and feeling her throat tightening as you felt the back of it. 
“That’s it, baby, take it all.” 
You groaned as her lips met your base, keeping eye contact as you felt her wet mouth deepthroat every inch of you with ease, stuffing her mouth full of hard flesh. Ahin didn’t need any adjustment as she withdrew her lips and slammed herself back down, taking all of you again and again and found a rhythm, moaning around your shaft as you felt warmth and wetness enveloping every inch of your cock.
“Fuuuck...” you moaned and gasped as Ahin continued sucking you off, guiding her movements as she gave the most phenomenal blowjob. Loud messy slurps accompanied her sultry lips as her tight warm mouth moved from tip to base in one satisfying stroke, sliding up and down without a hint of a gag reflex as saliva dripped from her mouth.
Your cock inside her warm mouth felt like heaven, her tongue working against your underside to create even more pleasure, watching the look in her eyes as she swallowed you down her throat. There was more than enough happening to finish you off herself, to take pleasure from her without any in return, but you wouldn't be satisfied, not until she was a mess. 
Regrettably, you pulled her off your shaft as saliva spilled out of her mouth. She looked rather disappointed as she stroked your cock furiously, grabbing a handful of your sack and fondling your balls. 
“They’re so full, daddy,” she said as she tenderly kissed each one, licking and slurping away greedily and hungrily.
“Alright, that’s enough. Time for me to have some fun.”
You grabbed both hands as you lifted her up to her feet, taking a second to gawk at her body. Her anticipation was high as you hiked her dress up, lifting her up and grabbing her ass as you pinned her against the wall like she was an expensive piece of artwork.
She gasped and never felt so wet between her thighs. “Fuck me, daddy,” she begged, wrapping her arms around your neck, with desperation etched on her features. 
“Do you deserve that?” you asked as you teased your cock through her soft silky folds, collecting her wetness on your shaft. She nodded without a word.
“I don’t think so. Maybe I should just finish um all over that pretty face without even letting you feel me.”
”Daddy, please…” she whined.
“Please what?”
“Please fuck me, daddy. Please.” 
Every desperate word out of her mouth matched the pleading expression on her face. 
“Please daddy...I want to feel that big throbbing cock fucking me senseless and stretching out my tight little pussy. Please, please fuck me, I’ll be a good girl I promise.”
Ahin being reduced to begging was your favorite thing in the world. You looked at her, enjoying the need and wanton desire in her eyes. Without a second of warning, you shoved your cock inside her tight pussy all the way deep, earning a loud shriek as you filled her up with every inch. 
“Oh my god!” 
“Careful baby, you don’t want someone to hear you do you?”
“We both know the answer to that.” 
Moving at an agonizing pace, Ahin’s tight walls swallowed you inside her as you started to thrust, her pussy squeezing the life out of your cock as you began fucking her up against the wall. Plenty wet, hot and tight around your shaft, her cute whimpers and moans filling your ears were just the thing you needed as you kept her tight hole full of your cock.
“God, you’re fucking big, shit.”
“You’re so tight and wet. Acting like a slut turns you on this much?”
“I’m not acting.”
You both smiled, and you kissed her for the first time of the night, muffling her moans as you exerted more energy in your hips.
It took several thrusts for Ahin to adjust, breathing heavily already. She was so wet and becoming wetter with each deep thrust, the way her pussy wrapped tight around your cock and refused to let go, there wasn't a better feeling. 
"Daddy, pound me," she pleaded. 
You had your fun with her and didn't see any reason to deny her request this time. Building up the pace, you gradually fucked Ahin harder, earning louder and deeper moans as you buried your shaft deep inside her pretty tight cunt, setting her sensitive nerves on fire. You kept her tight body pressed up against the bathroom wall, keeping a tight firm grip on her ass as you drove yourself into her, hearing her moaning beautifully into your ears. 
"God you’re so deep, so fucking deep,” she moaned and you kept your eyes glued to her, watching the pleasure overtake her body. 
“You like when I fuck your pussy like this? You like when I use you in public like a dirty little slut?” 
Ahin’s bliss kept her from answering, the pleasure wreaking havoc on all her senses as she rested her head on your shoulder, wrapping her luscious legs around your waist to help take some of her weight off.
Neither of you were a stranger to messing around in public, but the thrill of anyone able to come into the unlocked bathroom while you were balls deep in your girlfriend wasn’t any less hot.
“Y-yes, daddy, fuck me just like this! More daddy, fuck me harder!”
You were going to fuck Ahin hard enough that anyone left inside the restaurant would hear her. Squeezing her ass even more, you slammed harshly inside her and pistoned your hips, finding the right angle to slam into her cunt with. You could hear how wet she was before you felt it, her juices leaking everywhere, dripping down your balls and her thighs, leaving a mess on the tile floor. 
“You’re so fucking hot, I can’t stand it. I love how your pussy feels.” 
“I’m so glad, daddy. I love what you’re doing to me, I’m so fucking wet. Don’t stop, even after you blow your load in me.”
She had such a filthy mouth and you loved it. Her tightness was overwhelming, clamping down so firmly on your dick as you pounded into her, it was amazing you’d lasted this long. 
The rawness of the situation, the public setting, the way Ahin was constantly moaning into your ears, it was far too much. Your cock was drowned with her juices, the rhythm constant as you fucked into her tight hole as harshly as you could, her big tits bouncing with every thrust that rocked her slim sexy body.
With every entrance into her, Ahin grew tighter and tighter, setting off signals that she was approaching climax. 
“D-daddy, c-can I cum? P-please?” She had learned her lesson, and you didn’t feel a need to deny her again. 
“Of course. All over my cock, princess.” 
You could sense her relief as her limbs tightened around your body, becoming an absolute mess as her pussy tightened almost painfully and pulsated around your shaft. Her breathing became heavy and deep, throwing her head back as she came all over your shaft.
You kept the motions going and fucked her through her orgasm, not letting her recover as you selfishly chased your own pleasure. Keeping her tight body in your arms, squeezing the soft flesh of her ass you kept up the moments in your hips, letting her feel every inch.
Letting the last fleeting moments of pleasure take control of your body, you savored the hot flesh of Arin’s slick pussy as you slid inside and out at a pace you couldn’t keep up for much longer.  
“I’m gonna fucking cum,” you growled, harshly pounding into Ahin as deep as you could, the sounds of skin slapping loud enough to be heard outside. 
“Fill me, daddy. Please, I need it dripping down my thighs, cum inside your little slut.”
Her begging was the exact encouragement you needed, giving everything as you continued to fuck her against the wall as long as you could last. 
You suspected anyone outside could hear, maybe they didn’t care, or maybe they were outside with their ear to the wall. Either way, you wanted to finish before someone showed up, and you weren’t intent on drawing this out.
The final moments felt eternal. You and Ahin staring into each other’s eyes, waiting for that peak to hit, for you to explode at any point. It was beautiful as it was hot.
Your breathing stalled and you couldn’t take it anymore, throbbing inside Ahin as you deposited your load deep inside her pussy, groaning loudly enough for anyone within range to hear. She watched the contorted expressions on your face, as you pumped as many times as your body would let you as you filled Ahin to the brim with hot cum, her tight pussy milking every last drop out of your shaft. 
Ahin had never looked so satisfied. You kept yourself inside her for as long as you could take it, but the weight of her body in your exhausted state was too much as you let her down gingerly and pulled yourself out of her as her limbs unraveled around you.
Trying to catch your breath you detached from one another, Ahin’s legs felt weak, and you watched proudly as your load leaked from between her flushed thighs and began dripping down.
“I don’t think I’m going to be able to walk out of here,” Ahin said with a smirk as she fell to her knees. It so happened that she was at the perfect eye level to your cock, sucking you clean as she played with the remnants of the hot load that was still inside her freshly fucked pussy.
“I’ll carry you if I need to, but we should get out of here, we defiled it enough,” you said, dressing back up and trying to clean up as best as you could. There weren’t enough paper towels in the world to clean what you did to that bathroom.
Ahin pulled herself together with the limited energy she had left, pulling her straps back and her dress down, checking herself in the mirror.
“You really ravaged me,” she smiled tiredly upon seeing her messy disheveled hair in the mirror and deciding against fixing it. 
“Can’t say you didn’t deserve it.” 
“Oh, I definitely did.” 
“It’s a shame we’ll have to wait another two months to come back here.” 
“We don’t need a reservation for you to fuck me in the bathroom.” 
“You make a very good point.”
You were scared to even open the door at this point, slowly letting it creak open as you took a peek. Not a soul. Seeing Ahin on spaghetti legs, barely moving and fatigued you quickly picked her up and carried her to the car, not wanting to dawdle.
“One of these days we’re going to get caught,” you said, helping her sit inside the passenger side. 
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
She kissed you as she buckled in, you closed her door and headed to the other side. 
Starting the car, you looked at Ahin in her post-sex afterglow, still beautiful as ever.
“Are we heading home?” she asked weakly, still feeling the effects of the night.
"No...not until I have my dessert."
410 notes · View notes
gothamsglam · 3 years
Text
Can I have Your Name? (a SamBucky ficlet)
for @samshield hope you enjoy 😘
(also on ao3 under @/the_fifth_marauder101)
---
“Thanks, can I have your name?” asked Bucky with a charming smile on his face, pulling out a sharpie. However, instead of writing on an empty class as the poor customer thought, he scribbled down “Tony” on one of those ‘Hello, my name is…’ stickers.
“That’s a wonderful name by the way,” Bucky compliments, because fck you Steve, he can be polite. 
He fcking told Steve going into customer service was a great idea. Idiot wanted to continue doing door to door shit, or, even worse, mope around forests for wandering travelers. He told him it wasn’t the 1400s anymore, and to grow up. Damn the supernatural council and their ‘hunt in pairs’ rule, he will go rouge and leave Stevie, he will do it. 
“I’m this close,” Bucky had hissed, holding his fingers in the air so Stevie could see, 
“Your fingers are touching,” Steve deadpanned. 
“Exactly.”
The man doesn’t look up from his flurry of typing, “Thank you, it’s a family name.”
“Sure,” Bucky replies quietly “Alright, your order will be right out,” Bucky grinned, replacing his name tag with the new one without looking away from the brown-haired customer. The second the tag sticks to his shirt, he feels a refreshing rush of energy. Kind of like what he imagines those ‘caffeine/sugar rush’ those damn teens keep harping about. 
“Thank y—” The customer—Tony—looks up from his phone to flash him a grin, only to have it fall from his face when he sees the name tag. 
This was the fun part. Bucky didn’t break eye contact, maintaining it with the same smile, only now he could tell it felt eerie to the human. Like something wasn’t right. 
The man’s brown eyes flitted up and down between Bucky’s face and the name tag, before he surged forward, “What di—”
“Have a good day,” Bucky bit out, still keeping the smile and cheery customer service tone. His eyes were blank, he made sure of it. Honestly, this whole song and dance was unnecessary. Stevie usually just wrote the name tags, and then stuck them on as he was making the drinks. Their shop was typically slow enough that there wouldn’t be people behind to question why the tender had a new name. But Bucky loved to fck with humans. What the hell else was he supposed to do? He’s been alive for 70 generations, let him have his fun. 
However, today was a bit different. Another two walked into the shop, Bucky didn’t see it as much as he felt it. Bucky kept his back turned, hollering “Welcome to Stars and Stripes, I’ll be with you in just a moment,” over his shoulder as he made the three drinks. What asshole ordered three drinks?
Bucky’s question was answered when he saw the two men walk over to Tony’s table. One of them kissed Tony on the cheek and the other just faux-gagged before giving Tony a hug as well. Bucky called out the order, eyes tracking the way Tony mumbled something to the two men and both reacted oddly, as they probably should. Bucky would expect no less. 
Apparently, he jinxed himself, because the man who hugged Tony came to pick up the drinks. 
“Nice name,” said the man.
“Thanks,” Bucky flashed his uncanny valley smile and offered nothing else. The man winked and then walked back to the table. 
Bucky did not look at his ass, he didn’t. 
---
The next day, the man comes in. Not Tony, but other guy. The cute one. 
“Hi my name’s Jacob, how may I help you today?” Bucky asks politely. 
The man, to his credit, didn’t bat an eyelash, “Hi I’ll have three—” And he rattled off the same order that Tony had. Bucky resisted the urge to frown, maybe it was just a two-time thing? This group has only come into their shop once before, what are the odds of it happening again, for a third time?
“Perfect,” Bucky slid the receipt across the counter, “Can I have your name?” Bucky asked, as he reached for a pen. 
“Nope,” the man replied. 
Bucky froze in his moments, “What?”
The man shrugged, face showing nothing but politeness, “I’m the only person in this store, you’ll be able to find me.”
Bucky was stunned as he watched him walk back to the spot the trio was in the other day. As he sat down, the man gave a nod of acknowledgment to Bucky, who was still staring. 
His brown—almost hazelnut with the light of the sun—eyes stared into Bucky’s own, and in them all he saw was mischief. 
Fck.
---
For the next two days, Bucky kept a—subtle, he wasn’t obsessed or anything—watch out for Tony or The Man. And for those two days, he didn’t see hide or hair of them. Bucky figured they must have been college students from nearby campuses, wandering in when Starbucks was too full, which happens often enough. Then on the third day, he returned. 
“Hey, Jacob” greeted The Man, his smile so bright—so bright that Nat would have burned like she does under the sun and threaten to bite the man in the jugular. Bucky, who was too gobsmacked to even deliver his customer service opening, stared at him. 
“Not Jacob,” Bucky said, his voice strangled. 
The Man chuckled, his eyes sparkling with the same look from the first day he ordered, “Ok ‘Not Jacob’, may I have—” And repeated the same order from the last two times. 
“Um, right, uh” Bucky stammered, face growing hot as The Man raised an eyebrow at him smugly, “Can I have your name?”
“Put Redwing,” The Man said, shrugging. The corner of his lips pulled upwards into a happy smirk—how can a person have a fcking happy smirk?—, not that Bucky was only looking at his lips or anything. 
“Redwing?” Bucky asked, stupidly. Because why ask, idiot, why ask for clarification? He read somewhere that the psyche is powerful enough to make the body do things, like fake pregnancies. Whether that’s something only reserved to humans is up for debate, but maybe, if Bucky doesn’t ask and lives in blissful ignorance, he can feed off of a fake name. But no, because he’s a bloody fool, he asked. 
“It’s my pet’s name,” The Man answered, then looked tilted his head, giving a sheepish smile, “Or at least, that’s what I want to name a pet, I don’t have one.”
“Right,” Said Bucky, suddenly feeling empty in ways that have nothing to do with hunger, “Your order will be right out.”
Their conversation was longer than normal, so when the man went to sit down, the couple came in moments afterward. All three sat in the same place as before. 
‘Oh no,’ Bucky thought in dawning horror, ‘Regulars.’ 
---
“Falcon,” grins The Man, now foregoing any attempts to be subtle and simply being a little shit.
Bucky looked at him, face void of any amusement. At this point, he’s shucked the polite customer service voice and snarked back and forth with the regular like there’s no tomorrow—only in this situation, there is a tomorrow, there always is tomorrow.
Their staring contest probably goes on for a bit too long, judging by the way Tony and his boyfriend—Bucky can feel comfortable calling the two a couple, based on how disgustingly affectionate the two get in the cafe—walk in. 
The Man flashed a smile and turned away to greet the couple. An audible ‘Rhodey!’ reached Bucky’s ears. Now, finally, he has a name for one of the dark-skinned men, the one who kissed Tony’s cheek and was currently walking in with said Tony, arm around his shoulders. Only Bucky doesn’t feel that familiar warmth pool in his gut, refreshing his energy levels. 
‘Oh,’ Bucky thinks, and watches as the man—his regular—laughs with his friends but also how his eyes flit back to peek at Bucky as names are spoken. ‘oh, loopholes.’
Bucky is so screwed. 
---
The names his regular gives become increasingly goofy, and Steve teases him about how flirty they get—Bucky absolutely didn’t have a favorite, and it absolutely wasn’t Angel. But Bucky only believed Stevie when he got a number instead of a random moniker. 
“What?” Bucky short-circuited. 
The man just sighed, “Come on, I gave you my number, work with me here.”
“You finally did it, huh, Sam?” Tony called out from where he was typing away on his computer, which rested on Rhodey’s legs. Rhodey, who was sprawled out in one of their chairs, nudged Tony with his foot, “Shush, let them have this.”
‘Sam,’ Bucky thinks,  and all he can come up with in his blue screened mind is, ‘Perfect’.
In his phone, the name Sam’s contact is under is ‘Angel’.
Steve heckles. 
---
“How did you know, Angel?”
Sam looks at Bucky, and Bucky’s struck into silence, The whole world falls around them in muted sounds and lights fade into balls of blurry color, because as they lock gazes all Bucky can notice is Sam’s eyes. Sam’s eyes—his wonderful, soul-deep eyes that shine with mischief and laughter, that glow so bright and rival the heavens when the sunlight reflects off it just so—are sad. 
“My friend,” Sam says quietly, “Riley. He was one of yours.”
Bucky nods, and reaches out with his metal hand—an injury from decades ago and a gift from a shapeshifter who hissed that his debt was repaired before slithering off into the night—pulling Sam closer to him. They watch the sun go down from the top of the roof, the stars revealed one by one, twinkling against the darkness of the dusk. 
---
(One day, Bucky will ask for Sam’s name again, specifically his last name. Only then, will Sam reply honestly.)
---
AN: This is a more bastardized version of faeries/fae, I just made up my own creature for what Bucky and Steve are. Simply because I just wanted to write a little ficlet about SamBucky and didn’t do much research. Don’t think too hard about it :)
(and the link to the Tik Tok I saw on tumblr that inspired this is also linked on my ao3 fic)
Hope you enjoyed! 
-vix
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Ariadne and why the Mycenaeans can fuck right off
Warning: Includes brief mentions of r*pe, cultural destruction, ancient patriarchy reminding us why no woman would ever time-travel more than 5 years into the past if that and a great deal of spite for male historians/public education history/mythology classes. 
Possible side effects may include a sudden intense rage for an ancient society equivalent to the innate rage one has for the Romans burning the library of Alexandria, a distinct hatred for ancient men not being able to let anyone have nice things, and a sudden fascination for Minoa. 
Usually, I stick to writing imagines and being happy with that. It’s fun! I love it! But every now and again, in an attempt to escape the crushing forces known as reality and responsibilities I’ll put on a few cutscenes from games I’m: A) Too lazy to play B) Too broke to play C) Too unskilled to play D) All of the above
because cutscenes are free and why torture yourself with impossible levels when its free on Youtube?* *In all seriousness please support video games and video game creators, but no shame to those of us who prefer cutscenes to gameplay.  A few weeks ago I added the game Hades made by Supergiant to the list because the cutscenes were bomb and the characters are so much fun! Intricate as all hell! Hella cute too but that’s unrelated! Now my pretty little simp patootie is especially a big fan of Dionysus and his gorgeous design so the cutscenes with him are my favorite.
I’m re-watching his cutscenes a few nights ago for fun as background when he has a certain line about Theseus. Don’t quote me on this since my memory is foggy at best but roughly it was: Dionysus: Good job with Theseus. Never cared much for him- what he did to that girl was just horrible.*
*I know that’s not his exact line but this is clearly a rant post fueled by spite and ADD-hyper-focused obsessions with ancient civilizations so let’s not worry too too much about the semantics here. 
Now, I like mythology! Personally, I prefer the Norse mythology due to the general lack of very very gross dynamics that several other ancient mythologies seem to include, but I’m decently familiar with Greek mythos. Enough to go - “Why does the God of Wine give a single fuck about the frat bro of Greek heroes being a dick to a woman? Grossness is embedded into the very DNA of all distant relatives of Zeus, a woman being harassed by Zeus or his bastard army is a typical Tuesday in ancient Greece.” 
Wikipedia confirms that Ariadne is the only woman in the story of Theseus and the Minotaur, which I kinda knew already so unless Theseus did some f’ed up shit to some other princess of Minos, Dionysus could only be referring to her. Disregarding what I know about Wikipedia and how it can suck you down the rabbit hole of rabbit holes through sheer fury I stupidly clicked the link to Ariadne’s article. 
By the time we get to the end of this shitstorm, I will have two separate plotlines for two separate stories based of Ariadne, 2k+ notes (and going) on an ancient civilization prior to a week ago I didn’t know existed and within me there will be a rage towards a different ancient civilization I vaguely recall learning about in high school. 
Here’s how this shit went down. 
First of all, apparently after Theseus abandoned Ariadne on an island to die (yep! He did that! To the one person who is the only reason he defeated the minotaur! Fuck this guy.) there are multiple storylines where Dionysus takes a single look at Ariadne and falls in love. 
“A god falls in love?” you say, aware of how most love stories in Greek mythos can be summed up with Unfortunately, Zeus got horny and Hera is a firm believer in victim blaming. “This poor woman is about to go through hell!” I thought so too! And in one variation of the story, Dionysus does his daddy proud by being an absolute tool to Ariadne. In the majority though? He woos the fuck out of her, and ultimately marries her by consent!
Her consent!
In ancient Greece!
The party dude of the Greek pantheon knows more about consent then his father and modern day frat brothers!
Okay! That’s interesting, so I keep reading. 
Ariadne getting hitched to Dionysus is a big deal in Olympus, to the point of getting a crown made of the Aurora Borealis from Aphrodite who is bro-fisting Dionysus, beyond glad she didn’t have to give him the talk about consent. The rest of the gods are pissy especially Hera who doesn’t like Dionysus much since he is the son of Zeus and Semele but they don’t do much. Ariadne ascends to godhood, becomes the goddess of Labyrinths with the snake and bull as her symbol and that’s that on that. 
Colorin, colorado, este cuento se acabado.  And they lived happily ever after. That’s the end of the post right?
NO! Because curiosity has made me their bitch and there’s more to this calling me. 
Also, I was pissed! Still am! Why the fuck-a-doodle-do did I have to learn about the time Poseidon r*ped a priestess instead of the arguably healthiest relationship in the entirety of the pantheon? Why is Persephone and Hades’ story (which has improved since it was first written and I like more modern versions of it, no hate) the only healthy-ish Greek love story I had to learn when Dionysus and Ariadne were right there? The rage of having endured several grade levels of “Zeus got horny and Hera found out” stories in the nightmare of public education led me to keep looking into this. 
There’s this wonderful Youtube channel called Overly Sarcastic Productions that I highly recommend that delves a lot into mythology, and I have seen their bombass video about Dionysus and how his godhood has changed since he was potentially first written in a language we comprehend. 
Did ya’ll know this man is the heir apparent to Zeus? ‘Cause I didn’t know that!
YEA! Dionysus, man of parties, king of hangovers and inducer of madness, is set to inherit the throne of Olympus! Ariadne didn’t husband up the God of Wine, she husbanded up the Prince of Olympus and heir apparent to the throne! Holy shit! No wonder some of the gods were against her marriage to Dionysus - can you imagine the drama of an ex-mortal woman sitting on the Queen’s throne of Olympus? Hera must have been pissed.
BUT WAIT.
There’s more.
The reason we know Dionysus is a very important god and is possibly even more important than we think is because of a handy-dandy language known as Linear B, otherwise known as the language of the Mycenaeans!
For those of you fortunate enough to have normal hobbies and interests, the Mycenaeans were the beta version of the Greeks. Their written language of Linear B is one of, if not the first recorded instance of a written Indo-European language. This language, having been translated, gives us an interesting look at what the Greek gods were like back in their beta-stages before they fixed the coding and released the pantheon. 
Interesting side facts of the Mycenaean Greek gods include:
Poseidon being the head god with an emphasis on his Earthquake aspect, and being much more of a cthonic god in general. 
Take that Zeus, for being so gross. 
The gods in general being more cthonic, as Mycenaeans were obsessed with cthonic gods (probably due to all the earthquakes and natural disasters in Greece and Crete at that time)
Several of the gods and goddesses that we know being listed, alongside some that we don’t consider as important (Dione)
The first mention of Kore, later Persephone, but no Hades because since a lot of gods were cthonic, there would be no need for one, specific cthonic god to represent the majority of death-related rituals.
That’s not what we’re focusing on though! What we’re focusing on is a specific translated portion of Linear B that we have. One of the translated portions of Linear B that for the life of me I can’t find (someone please help me find it and send the link so I can edit this post) says an interesting phrase. “Honey to the gods. Honey to the Mistress of Labyrinths.”
One more time. “Honey to the gods. Honey to the Mistress of Labyrinths.”
Mistress of Labyrinths. 
Now wait a gosh darn minute. Isn’t there a goddess of labyrinths in the Greek mythos? Why yes! Yes there is! Ariadne!
Here’s a question for you. If Ariadne is but a minor god in the pantheon, a wife to a more predominant god, why is it that while all the other gods and goddesses are bunched together in a sentence of praise, the so-called ex-mortal gets a whole-ass sentence to herself singing praises?
And thus, we have arrived to Minoa!
What is Minoa, you ask? Minoa is to Rome what Rome is to us. An old-ass civilization either older than or younger by a hundred years to ancient Egypt. Egypt, that started in 3200 B.C-ish depending on who you ask. That’s old. Old as balls. They were contemporaries to their trading partner, Egypt until 1450 BC-ish. A 2000 year old civilization.
Minoa was founded on the island of Crete, and was by what artifacts we have found a merchant civilization with its central economy centered on the cultivation of saffron and the development of bronze/iron statues of bulls. Most of what we know about them comes from artifacts and frescoes found on Crete that managed to survive everything else I will mention later, but what matters is that we know a few things about them. 
Obsessed with marine life for some time, given their pottery. 
Had the first palaces in all of Europe, some of them ridiculously big. 
Wrote in Linear A and Cretan Hieroglyphs, both still untranslated languages. 
Had a ritual involving jumping over a bull, for some reason. 
Firm believers in “Suns out, Tits out.”
You’d think I’m kidding on the last one but no! No no no! All the women apparently rocked the tits-out look in Minoa!
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^^^^One of many, many Minoan works featuring women giving their titties fresh air. ^^^^
“Wait a second Pinks! What does this have to do with Ariadne being the Mistress of labyrinths?”
Well you see dear wonderful darling, while we know very little about Minoan religion because Mycenaeans (we will get to those bastards in a second), we do know this:
All the religious figures appear to be exclusively women.
The most important figures of their religion seem to be goddesses as there are few artifacts featuring male gods.
Because of the religion, the culture may have been an equal society or even a matriarchy! Historians who are male aren’t sure. 
A frankly ridiculous amount of their temples, including the ones in caves in the middle of fuck-all feature labyrinths. A lot of labyrinths!
Their head god is a goddess! Whose temples have labyrinths and whose main symbols are snakes and bulls. Who do we know is a) the mistress of labyrinths and b) is symbolized a lot by snakes and bulls?
ARI-fucking-ADNE THAT’S WHO!
Ariadne didn’t upgrade by marrying the prince of Olympus! Dionysus wifed up possibly the most important goddess in all of Crete and becoming her boy-toy! 
I’m not even kidding, most Minoan depictions of the goddess’ consort features a boy/man who cycles through the stages of death. Dionysus himself in several myths goes through the same cycle - life, being crushed, death, rebirth, repeat.  Cycles the consort goes through in Minoan legend depictions too!
Okay, that’s great, but what does that have to do with the Mycenaeans? Why do you want to single-handedly go back in time and strangle the beta-Greeks with the nearest belt?
Everything I just said about Ariadne being a Minoan goddess, the Mistress of Labyrinths being hella important on Minoa, is all theoretical. The Mycenaeans are partially to blame for making it theoretical. 
Minoa thrived for 2000 years but it had a lot of issues, mostly caused by natural disasters. Towards the end of their civilization (1500 BC-ish), the nearby island of Thera, today known as Santorini, decided to blow up. The island was a hella-active volcano that when erupted, destroyed a lot. 
How big was the eruption? Well when Pompeii was wasted by Mt. Vesuvius, the blast was heard from roughly 120 miles away, 200 km. 
The blast on Thera was heard from 3000 miles away. 4800 km away.
Fuck me, the environmental effects of the explosion were felt in imperialistic CHINA.
Holy shit that would waste anybody! And it did! Minoa went from being a powerhouse in the Mediterranean to scrambling to recover from losing 40,000 citizens and who knows how many cities. Tsunamis may have followed the blast, further destroying ports which for a navy-powerhouse of an island nation is a bad thing and the theorized temperature drops caused by a cloud of ash lingering for a while would have destroyed crops for the year.
Minoa was fucked. 
The Mycenaeans and all their bullshit made it worse.
Up until a few hundred years prior to Thera’s explosion, Minoan artifacts don’t depict much in terms of military power. Why would it? Crete is a natural defense post. Sheer cliffs, high mountains and a few semi-fortified areas would make it pointless to invade. It’s only when the Mycenaeans in all their bullshit decided to attack/compete that Minoa really needed any army to speak of.
Guess who decided to invade while Minoa was reeling from an incredibly shitty year? Mycenaea!
Guess who won?
Also Mycenaea!
Nobody knows how this shit went down though because wouldn’t you know it, the Mycenaeans in all their superiority-complex glory decided to destroy most written accounts about Minoa, a good junk of the temples and culturally eliminated most of Minoan beliefs. 
Minoa isn’t even the real name of the civilization! It’s just the name Arthur Evans, the guy who re-motivate interest in Minoan archaeology, gave to the civilization because the writings that would have included the name of the civilization were destroyed.
“That sucks!” Fuck yes that sucks! “What does that have to do with Ariadne though?”
Oh ho ho. Strap in because you’re about to be pissed. 
Those of us unfortunate enough to be aware of all the bullshit the Christians pulled on the European pagan belief system are familiar with the concept of cultural, religious destruction. There’s a special name for it I don’t know but if I did I would curse it to be absorbed by the horrendous will of fungi. 
An example: Christianity was not the most popular of religions amongst the Vikings. A monotheistic religion that is heavily controlled did not strongly appeal to anyone with a pantheon as rad as the Norse one. 
In order to appeal to the Vikings, what monks would do is they would write down traditionally Viking stories which up until that point were orally passed down. Beowulf, the story of the most Viking Viking to have every Vikinged, was one of these first stories. 
However! Did these monks write Beowulf as closely to the original oral transcript as possible? Of course not! They took liberties! While Norse features such as trolls and dragons and all sorts of Norse magic occur, there is a lot of Christian features added in. 
This happened across all Pagan religions that Christianity came into contact with in Europe. Stories would be altered when written down to be more Christian (this happened to the Greek Pantheon too btw), holidays that were Pagan magically lined up with ones the Vatican just happened to suddenly have. Even names of mythological figures were taken and added onto Christian figure names. Consequently, a lot of pagan religions they did this to got erased over time, with many of their traditions and details being lost forever, and the details we do know being tinted by Christianity.
The Mycenaeans were likely no different. 
Minoa and Mycenaea were as culturally opposite as can be. Minoa is theorized to be a matriarchal or equal society*. Mycenaea and most of early Greece absolutely was not. In fact, during early stages of their religion where they believed in reincarnation, the Mycenaeans believed the worst thing to come back as was a woman. 
Did you get that? With your options ranging from man to ever single animal on Earth, a woman was ranked as beneath literal animals in Mycenaean society.
Fuck the Mycenaeans.
* This is not to say Minoa was without fault, as a society that is matriarchal or equal can still have rampant issues such as privilege, classism, racism, sexism and more, but when history has a shortage of civilizations that didn’t treat women like shit, you find yourself rooting for them more. 
 What do you do then, when you take over a society that is very much the opposite of a nightmare of a patriarchy? You fold their beliefs into your own to bait them into yours. Going back to the Linear B line about “Mistress of Labyrinths” that line would/could have been an early tactic of incorporating Minoan belief into Mycenaean belief. Other goddesses and gods were made into aspects of Mycenaean gods. Bristomartis, the Minoan goddess of the hunt, would become Artmeis. Velchanos, a god of the sky, would become Zeus. 
With more time, the religion shifted more into Mycenaean and eventually into ancient Greece as we know it. Through trade other gods and goddesses would continue to shift and change, some being straight up imported (Aphrodite for example). Dionysus himself changed a lot too, going from a God representing freedom and attracting slaves, women and those with limited power into his cult, to a God of parties for the wealthy. 
Theseus and the Minotaur was a myth likely based on a Mycenaean myth based on a Minoan myth that changes Ariadne from an important, possibly the important goddess of an ancient religion and relegates her to a side character in a pantheon so vast that she would be lost within it. 
All of this brings us to today. Today, where as soon as work ended I spent most of the day, as well as the past two days, looking up everything I can on Minoan civilization and added it to my notes. Spite is fueling me to write two possible different stories for two different fandoms where Minoa dunks of Mycenaea and it is giving me life. Expect an update within the next two weeks folks as I lose control of my writing life once more. 
In summary: Ariadne deserves more respect, fuck the public education system for skipping over the good parts of Greek mythology instead of the r*pey as shit parts, the Mycenaeans can eat my shorts, and a world were Minoa became the predominant power instead of Greece would be an amazing world to live in.
Thank you for coming to my TedTalk. Pink out. 
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viole-tmoon · 3 years
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Lamia
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- summary: jungkook is a vampire hunter looking to party and wants his crush. oc is a vampire who just got cheated on. what could go wrong
- genre: angst
- word count: 4k
- notes: IN PART 3 THIS FIC CHANGES TO A READER INSERT. lmk what you think! this is a reupload from my old account that got deleted. i renamed this fic!! 
- warnings: vampire fic, indecent exposure, public nudity, talking through a bathroom door, possible death mentions(i don’t remember right now), alcohol mentions and usage, cheating, sex mentions
masterlist - part 1 - part 2 - part 3
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“I’m not gonna drink your piss,” I said sipping on my vodka tonic as I watched Sana point her bottle towards me. She rolled her eyes and picked at the glitter that was all over her boobs.
“It’s just Bud Light. I don’t like it just as much as you do,” she said still obsessed with the annoying glitter. I could almost feel glitter sinking into my hair from watching her. 
As I continued to stare at Sana’s boobs, I saw from the corner of my eyes my ex, who had broken up with me less than three days ago, kissing another girl. 
I was going to puke.
“What’s wrong?” Sana inquired. “Does this push up bra make me look too thirsty?”
I heard her but I couldn’t understand a word she said. I was watching the guy who almost proposed to me tongue punch a girl I was pretty sure was a freshman. 
I wanted to die. I wanted to die.
“Hey,” Sana said snapping my attention back to her. I nodded, eyes glued to the scene before me, and sat my drink on the counter behind us. Sana eventually got the memo and turned to the scene as well.
“Oh my God,” Sana said. “And I thought he had to ‘work things out’.”
“Shut up,” I nearly shouted. I knew I was being selfish and I didn’t care. I snatched my purse off of the counter. “I’m going to the bathroom...”
I could feel my best friend staring at me. It hurt more than she could ever know to feel her pity.
I knew she wanted the best for me but I’d never felt so much pain at once because of someone who I thought loved me. Her eyes asked if I was okay but I wasn’t at all and I wasn’t going to be. I wanted to scream at him and make a scene but my face was red with confused anger and I could feel my tears already falling. I needed to leave. Unfortunately, it was one of my oldest friends, Jongin’s, party so I couldn’t leave without hearing about it tomorrow and being asked every goddamn question in the world. 
Why was this was happening to me?
I was so sure he loved me too. All I thought we needed was a break. I thought we could be happy. I thought we were meant to be beyond time and space. I thought he was my one. Sure we’d broken up a few times but he’d never done that. The scene flashed before me again as I waded through the masses of my colleagues. I was conscious of the weight of their eyes on me. They were probably wondering what was wrong and why did I seem as if I were going to cry? Jongin noticed me and I rushed away. I didn’t want to deal with anyone other than myself right now.
.........................................................................................................................................................
{Jungkook}
“A man’s car is his life,” I said, watching my elder spray paint ‘Learn how to park’ in bright green on some poor fuck’s car. Yoongi had his tongue poked out as he observed his masterpiece. 
“If it’s his life he should take better care of it,” Yoongi said turning around and putting his hand on his juniors shoulder. 
I scratched at my forehead beneath my red cap and let the sound of leaves crunching under my shoes drown out the party. Yoongi was way too quick to anger sometimes, everyone knew it and he had quite a few enemies because of that. I watched Yoongi step closer to his friend's house, I could see that it was brimming with people. They were an hour late because Jin and Namjoon asked them to go to the store to pick up an exorbitant amount of Mountain Dew and 7up. Apparently, Jin was going to ‘surprise’ his ex who had recently left him for their professor.
“Anyways, I heard Jennie was going to be here,” Yoongi spouted as he opened the glass-paned door to the two-story house. He glanced at me with a knowing smile. Jennie was one of the few girls I had ever been interested in actually dating. She just had something about her that made her seem perfect to me. Maybe it was her eyes or the way she smiled when talking about physics but I wanted her.
“Cool,” I said nonchalantly and he chuckled.
The party was fun, while I was sober. While I was detailing a few girls about some of the trouble I’d gotten into last weekend Yoongi found me and convinced me that I had to leave if I didn’t drink five shots: in a row. After that, I wasn’t sure where I was until, about an hour in, Jennie’s eyes pulled me in, requesting that I spend quality time with her. I plowed through the waves of students, stepping on a few shoes and splashing alcohol under my boots. 
“I didn’t think you’d be here,” she said, emphasizing the ‘you’.
“Really?” I said, examining her and edging in on her personal space. Jennie was usually annoyingly busy so I’d never had the chance to get to know her. She was also normally dating someone.
“You never seemed like the type,” she said with a smile. I really tried to not let people know about my personal life at university. Most people in class thought I went home and studied. Everyone I’d met outside of class had a very different picture of me.
“And what type do I seem like?”
“Like you don’t want to be here,” she said. Her face seemed closer than before and I couldn’t help but smile. 
“I mean, I can imagine of a few places I’d like to be,” I said to her and she giggled with her bright smile. We spoke for a few moments longer before I felt the consequences of those five shots and excused myself to the restroom.
On my way up the stairs, I noticed the long forming line next to the nearest bathroom and sighed. Jennie was probably getting chatted up by another guy already and that was all I could think about. I waited for a few moments before I noticed Jongin, Yoongi’s friend who was throwing the party, and asked, in a whisper, if there was anywhere else I could go. He pointed me upstairs and told me that there was a bathroom in his parent's room.
 When I finally found that room, it was hidden behind couples making out, I heard distinct wines and groaned echoing from the bathroom chamber. 
If it wasn’t one thing it was another. 
I knocked on the door, softly. I didn’t receive an answer so I waited and heard a girl continue to cry and talk on the phone to someone.
“Yeah, he kissed her and it was really hot and steamy,” a female voice said, followed by sniffles.
I want to die. 
Jennie was waiting downstairs for me and I needed to see her suck my dick at least once in my life. I couldn’t lose this opportunity because some girl was getting cheated on. I knocked again louder and more rapidly.
“Please solve this drama somewhere else,” anywhere else, “I have to piss,” I said.
“I’m sick,” the voice said with the saddest fake cough I’d heard in my life. The cough reverberated inside what I assumed was a large bathroom.
“Really?”
I heard a hiss at the door, kinky but not what I was really looking for at the moment, and she spoke again. I knew she was back on her phone. At this point, I would’ve been better off waiting in line. I banged my head on the door. I’d never see Jennie at this rate. I’d never have the chance to talk to her while she was single either. I sighed into the door. 
“When I sucked his dick that night I thought we were meant to be,” she said and I couldn’t help but smile at whatever this girl was going through as I banged my head on the wall, continuously, to let her know she was being overdramatic.
“Could you stop?”
“Nope,” I said still banging my head on the door and questioning my life’s purpose.
“You’re being an asshole, you know that?”
“You’re being a b-i-t-c-h,” I said. “Please, I really need to pee. I’m asking nicely.”
“I can’t leave here.”
“Just for like...two seconds, there’s no one around,” I said, but she had already started talking to her phone. 
I couldn’t wait any more and my dick was going to explode in the next few seconds if I didn’t relieve myself so I rushed down the steps. I watched the bathroom line and it had increased into the dining area. I searched for an exit until I spotted one to the left of the steps. I saw two large glass-paned windows filtered by a haze of smoke. I rushed over to the window panes and pushed them open. I gazed at the cerulean pool that reflected the waxing moon. The drizzling rain made ripples in the pool’s moon and I knew my night really wasn’t going to get any better. I eyed the bushes to the left of the pool and immediately ran there. I was finishing up when I heard a familiar voice behind me.
“Jungkook?” Jennie said. “I’ve be-”
.........................................................................................................................................................
I never wanted to hear Yoongi’s laugh ever again.
“So...let me get this straight,” Yoongi said in between fits of laughter. “She caught you .... outside .... with your whole dick out. The girl you’ve been talking about since school started.” 
Yoongi had been going over the events over and over as if he were a tape recorder. I kept remembering it through flashbacks that I never wanted or cared to see again. Her face was so red and she stammered over her words when I stupidly turned around with my dick out. 
“Can you please shut up,” I groaned. “I get it.”
“She probably won’t even remember.”
She did. 
The next time we spoke it was the most awkward conversation in the universe. She totally avoided my eyes entirely and talked about anything but last night and when the topic came up of if she had fun she went totally silent. Whoever that girl was had ruined any chance I had with her I hoped she burned in hell. 
.........................................................................................................................................................
{Avery}
I spread out my notebooks on the table and sighed while staring at them. History was my worst subject and I knew next to nothing. My next essay was 10 pages long and I knew I was going to fail this course. I was already on probation so I definitely needed all the help I could come by. 
Sana told me that she knew this tutor who helped her out a lot last semester and that she’d slept with him once. Apparently, he was a playboy. I tapped my pencil on the table and peeked at my phone. The guy was already 10 minutes late and I grew more restless with every passing second. I decided to scroll down Twitter with the few moments of freedom I had left. 
“Hey, sorry I’m late,” I heard the voice echo throughout the room. It seemed oddly familiar. I flipped through my book to the most recent page in my studies. ‘It’s fine,’ I murmured as I scanned the text for my most recently highlighted part. I didn’t even know where to begin, so this guy was a godsend for me. He scanned me over and introduced himself and I did the same. I sensed his gaze on me for a little longer than I thought was normal, so I looked up from my book.
“Do you know Jongin?” He asked as I picked my head up. “Or Yoongi?”
I shook my head and answered that I knew Jongin.
He bit his lip and nodded at his backpack. He opened it and scattered his studying objects onto our now shared table. I looked them over, eyeing them for any more details on his personality. I sighed when all I could spot were ‘ordinary’ things you’d find in any university student’s backpack. I saw pieces of scattered notebook paper, a binder, a few pencils, a textbook, and a small black book. No panties or anything interesting. 
“You just seem familiar, what high school did you go to?” He asked.
I told him and he still scratched the back of his head. He glanced over his pile before I noticed a small ‘aha’ smile on his face but I wasn’t really interested in finding out more. He seemed like the type of guy to play with you and throw you out like you were a cat’s new toy. 
I needed to ask Sana to clarify if this guy was a tutor or someone she had only fucked because he did not care in the least bit what was going on. He said that my questions made no sense and that I was grasping at straws with all of my opinions but he refused to clarify any of my questions or even put me on the right path. I groaned as I watched the clock slog on past an hour and he began putting his books away. 
“So, that’s it?” I said tapping my pen on the desk. I couldn’t help but deem this as a huge waste of my time.
“Yep, I did the best I could, good luck on your test, you’re gonna need it.”
I could only stare at this guy. While watching him I noticed how his brown hair lit up in the white light of our study box and how his pink lips curved as he put away his utensils. He was too attractive. It was almost as if he were an angel.
“I just .... don’t think you actually came here to help me, Jungkook.”
At that statement, he stared at me with a profound amount of incredulity, as if he’d never had someone be so straightforward to him.
“Why do you think that?” he asked.
I told him.
“Ah.”
“Did you like .... lose a girlfriend or something? .... Or do you just not know what you’re doing?” I said while fiddling with my pencil. I had a certain amount of rage inside me. I wasn’t going to let an asshole screw me over. I was so close to graduating and I couldn’t let him get in my way.
“Sana told me you were good and I don’t think she would lie to me .... Look I really need th-,”
“I don’t really give a shit,” he said. It was almost as if we were in a game and his true personality came out. Some part of me was surprised, at this outcome, but most of me was frustrated. 
“Why would you tutor me if you were just going to show up and do nothing.”
“I like getting paid.”
I rolled my eyes, “Please,” I begged. “I really can’t fail this.”
“It’s just a midterm.”
I rolled my eyes and in frustration threw a piece of paper at the door when he closed it, “Fuck you.”
.........................................................................................................................................................
“I wanna die,” I said and leaned on her best friend’s shoulder. I couldn’t believe I was going to fail my history midterm all because of a stupid guy. Sana stroked my hair, while Jihyo watched, and cooed to me that it was going to be okay and that there were plenty of tutors out there.  
“You said he was the best you’d ever had,” I whined. A part of me was worried that she might have meant that specifically sexually but I had no clue. I drank until I couldn’t feel my face and whined to Sana and Jihyo about how I was never going to graduate.
When I had turned away from the bar to get drinks for my friends I bumped into a hard chest. I managed to get half of my beverages on his white shirt. Fuck, was the only word going through my head. I shot out a ‘Sorry’, but immediately regretted it when I looked up and noticed that he held the same scowl I had seen less than 6 hours ago. I wanted to die but I also smiled at the karmic resolution the universe had placed before me. 
“So—rry,” I said slowly, as I stared at his white shirt with a pout.
“Jesus Christ, Avery,” Jungkook said while pulling on the hem of his now discolored shirt. I let out a tiny smile at his dismay.
I rolled my eyes, “Don’t be such a baby,” I said as I grabbed the nearest paper towels and pressed them on his shirt. I felt the impression of his abs underneath and was surprised by how sculpted they were. I stopped pondering for a moment before I heard an ‘ahem’ coming from the annoying guy. I pouted when I noticed that his shirt refused to return to its original state. “Let me get these .... drinks to my friends and we’ll figure something out.”
.........................................................................................................................................................
I stared at the washer and then inspected Jungkook who was in my father’s largest white. He seemed ridiculously cute to have such a bad personality.  I didn’t feel bad at all when I rinsed detergent all over his precious shirt that he had complained about all the way up here. 
“If it doesn’t come out you owe me so much money,”
“How much could a white button-up cost?”
“It’s a Kanye West or-ig-i-nal,” he stated as he sipped on the beer can he’d stolen from my tiny refrigerator. I couldn’t believe this asshole ruined my entire day and college career.
“You know you can go to your dorm and wait,” I said pushing open the laundromat door.
“And miss out on the free alcohol you owe me? No way,” he said.
.........................................................................................................................................................
As soon as I opened my dorm door he spotted my refrigerator once again, much to my chagrin. This guy was going to drink me out of a house and home. I sat on my bed and opened my laptop while I watched him open another can. 
“You really don’t remember me do you?” he said in the most drawled out tone. My bed shifted under his weight. 
“As the worst tutor I’ve ever had? Of course, I do.”
At that statement, he threw the rest of his body onto my bed and I knew I needed him out of my bedroom before I strangled him. He came in here as if he owned the place.
“You,” he said while drunkenly waving a finger in my vague direction, “kept me away from my future girlfriend.” I was glad when I saw that he was losing his ability to speak but upset when he decided my bed was the perfect place to rest.
I made a face of incredulity at his statement and decided to pry his beer from his drunk hand. “Ok .... That’s enough for you,” I said. He must’ve had me confused with someone who gave a shit.
“Maybe even wife .... whatever dude ....,” he said grasping for my drink as I pulled it away from him. He muttered out a few words before falling fully asleep in my room.
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{Jungkook}
I was pretty sure I was in a girl’s room. 
Which girl I had no clue. 
I stretched over in the empty bed and searched frantically to no avail for my phone.
“You talk in your sleep and cuddle a lot,” Avery said over the sound of rushing waters to which I let out a ‘huh.’ She came into my view wearing my shirt. What the fuck? I thought as I stared at my dick. Dude!!! I put my hand over my face and peered back at her. She looked really cute in it. Too cute. She wore it as if it belonged to her. I couldn’t help but think about ripping it off of her, for multiple unspecified reasons. 
“Um, did I? Did we?” A lot of me was pissed that I couldn’t keep my dick in my pants with a girl that I hated, but watching her in that made me reconsider. She giggled and I was scared yet excited for her answer
“Yeah, you proposed to me,” she said and covered her face as if she were embarrassed. I felt all of the life drain of me. What was wrong with me? What was wrong with me? When was drunk me going to realize that there are consequences to my actions? The onslaught of giggles made me reconsider my descent into madness. 
“Dude, you’re so gullible,” she said, unbuttoning my shirt. A certain part of me grew in anticipation for the outcome of her actions but I pouted when I found out that she had a shirt underneath. 
“We didn’t have sex...You did try to cuddle me a ton,” Avery said before gliding her way to her bathroom. “You owe me, like, 10 study sessions, dude. You’re welcome,” she said. I was left with my thoughts before she peeked her head back in. “Also, I told Jennie you were gay,” she said with a snigger. 
My whole body froze.
“You’re literally the most gullible person on the planet,” she said while throwing her head back in ungodly laughter.
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{Avery}
The first few times we studied I was exhilarated at the pace at which he taught me. After the events of last week, he seemed way more inclined to help me in my struggles. I was surprised by how organized and studious he was in contrast to his asshole exterior. He showed me how he kept track of his ideas and why I needed to study at least once a day. This was our last study session so I needed it to be in a quiet environment, so we decided on his room.
“Did Jennie talk to you today?”
“This isn’t going to help you,” Jungkook said as he watched me answer questions on the quiz he’d created for me. I sighed at the feeling of his scrutinizing gaze on me. I was glad that he was helping me but it felt as if I were in boot camp. The boy didn’t know when to take a break, his energy was overwhelming. I could tell he was leaning in closer when I smelt his musky honey scent creeping in.
“You’re probably not going to understand this one,” he said as he pointed at the question.
“I feel like it’s .... George Washington?”
“You’re closer than .... Napoleon?”
I sighed as I rubbed my finger on the desk. I was really glad for his help. I sensed his shadow creep in on my personal space and heard his chair roll closer to me.
“So, what do you suspect the answer is?” he asked. I could tell he was teasing me and I wasn’t able to focus on my memory. 
I groaned, “Could I get a hint?”
“Do you really think I’m going to give you a hint,” he asked while watching my emotions run over the question he had asked me. I pouted at my page.
“Yes...?” I sighed. We’d been working really hard to make sure I understood everything and I still couldn’t comprehend it. I sat my forehead on my desk. I felt him pull my chair closer to him and I had completely forgotten my last few thoughts. 
“I just feel like you’re stressing yourself out over nothing.”
“Mmm,” I let out. I was more than tired and had considered drinking coffee for the first time in at least two years. I turned my face so that my cheek sat on my cool desk and peered at his big bunny eyes. I noticed his arm wrap around my waist and he started speaking again, but I couldn’t tell what he was saying, I was obsessed with the way his touch felt against my shirt and how cozy his hand felt. I couldn’t stop staring at his lips.
“This is something you should focus on,” he said while pointing at my book. He watched me and I was sure he could tell I was dazed and confused. His lips turned into a grin before he pulled his face to my ear.
“I don’t think you’re listening,” he said, into my earlobe. I was surprised by his closeness and my goosebumps raised. I let out an ‘mmm’ and ‘I am’ absentmindedly. He pulled my chair until I was flush against him. I wanted to whine in embarrassment but I couldn’t even let that croak out of me.  He pulled away from me and my body missed the warmth he presented. My face slid so that my forehead was back on the table to avoid his gaze.
“It’s okay to look at me,” he said while lifting his hand onto my neck to press on any of my tensions. I peeked back up at him and was surprised to find his lips on mine in less than a second. Sana had told me a little about how he kissed but she never explained it like this. She never really gave it the amount of praise it deserved. His lips were like pillows and the gates to heaven. I never wanted someone more in my life. He pulled away from me in a knowing gaze.
“Yeah, I know,” he said, while smoothing his thumb over my lips. I knew he could see the dumbfounded look on my face and I wished I could take it all back.
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nobodyfamousposts · 5 years
Text
Mi-Crack-ulous Crackdown: Robodrien
Possible trigger warning. No one actually gets hurt (technically), but implications are still made.
Adrien’s mistake was that he had listened to Plagg. But Plagg insisted he had an “amazing idea” that would totally be worth the hassle. Which right away should have been his first indicator that things were going to go horribly wrong.
Well, that’s not quite true. The real first indicator was when his father informed him that he would be dating Lila to help promote the company brand. And that was indicator enough that things were already going horribly wrong.
At that point, Adrien reasoned that there was really nothing Plagg could suggest that could possibly make things worse.
“You just have to fake your death.“
“Sounds perfectly reasonable.“
In Adrien’s defense, he was a teenage boy. And teenage boys were prone to doing stupid and overly dramatic things.
Given his status as a model and “perfect”, as well as his overwhelming need to please, Adrien had been foregoing this rite of teendom. So really, it was a long time coming.
The plan was simple. They would arrange a “prank“ where Adrien would appear to become deceased through some over the top fashion. His overly dramatic death would be attributed to the multitude of reasons outlined in the 14 page long note that Adrien left behind. Not that it NEEDED to be 14 pages but Adrien apparently had more grievances than expected.
With the note set on his bed where it would surely be found soon enough, Adrien and Plagg headed off to the school with the necessary equipment to give the illusion of his false demise. Rope. Some electronic equipment with a pulley and remote. And of course, the wax statue of Adrien to serve as his body double.
How they managed to actually get to the school with his wax statue without anyone stopping him or even noticing him remains open for debate. But it could, perhaps, be attributed to Adrien’s good luck. Mostly because that’s the point that said luck ran out and everything started to go horribly wrong.
Or right, if you’re Plagg.
In short order, the rope wasn’t fully tied and pulley wasn’t fully in place when Adrien tripped and knocked into everything, causing his carefully collected tools to fall off the edge of the school roof. The remote, the equipment, the wax statue, everything went falling over the ledge and landing in a clatter, utterly breaking apart. Pieces of metal and wax body parts scattered across the ground.
Right in front of a crowd of shocked (and possibly soon to be traumatized) onlookers.
“Well, that’s unfortunate.” Plagg mused.
“Plagg!” Adrien hissed. “Now everyone’s going to know something’s up and I’m not going to get another chance! Then I’ll have to date Lila and Ladybug won’t want to date me and we’ll never get married or run away to our own island and have a hamster named—”
“Come on, it’s a mess of parts and pieces. It’s not like they’d figure out what happened or that you were involved.”
“OH MY GOD, IT’S ADRIEN AGRESTE!”
Adrien sent Plagg a withering look.
The kwami just shrugged.
It was over. It was over before it’d even gotten a chance to begin. Everyone would know how Adrien stupidly tried to fake his death with a wax mannequin of himself. Then it would get back to his father who would be annoyed but otherwise unconcerned and he would be confined to his room unless he was on a “date” with Lila and honestly, he wasn’t sure which was worse at this point.
“Wait...what’s with all the sparking bits?”
“And why did Adrien fall apart when he hit the ground?”
There was nothing left to do but face the music and admit to what he had done. He could only hope they would be lenient. After all, with all the proof right in front of them, the conclusion everyone would come to was obvious.
“OH MY GOD, ADRIEN AGRESTE WAS A ROBOT!”
Of course, “obvious” doesn’t amount to much in Paris, where limited braincells had to be spread out between a populous that includes but is in no way limited to a man akumatized 24 times because of his pigeon obsession, a principal who moonlights as a furry, a guy who believed ice cream was actual magic, a wannabe supervillain who less than cleverly stole his evil plans from old comic books and designed his monsters after off brand 90′s reject toys, and an old man whose bright idea of dealing with said supervillain was to pick out two random teenagers to hand off the exact magical items the supervillain was after.
Really, it was no wonder everyone kept falling for Lila Rossi’s lies without even thinking to check. Clearly there was something in the water.
Adrien and Plagg merely decided to take advantage of the confusion of the growing conspiracy theory to vacate the premises and hope that by tomorrow, the whole thing blows over.
...Naturally, by the next day, the whole thing had not blown over. In fact, not only had it NOT blown over, but if anything, this crazy claim had somehow only grown in the meantime and soon become rooted as fact.
As was clear when Adrien entered the classroom.
“Wow, they got a backup Robot Adrien already?” Rose asked in surprise.
“What?”
Which seemed to be the catalyst that set off everyone else.
“Robro! Welcome back!” Kim exclaimed, cheerfully.
“Thank you?”
“We were worried yesterday, Adrien. We didn’t know you had replacement bodies.”
“Replacement...?”
“How many of those things do  you have, anyway?” Alix asked, curious.
“How many of what?”
“I should have seen it!” Max insisted, looking over his phone with an almost crazy light in his eyes. “Clearly Agreste Industries was a front for a high tech robotics factory in the guise of a fashion company! How could I have been so blind?”
“Wait—no. That’s not—”
“Hey Adrien.” Nino said, placing his hand on Adrien’s shoulder consolingly. “I just want you to know that I don’t think anything different about you. No matter what, you’re still real to me.”
“But I am real?”
“Yeah! You didn’t have to hide that you were a robot.” Mylene reassured him.
“Because I’m not?”
“Yeah, you have heart. That makes you real enough.” Ivan said with a resolute nod.
“But...I really...”
Markov of all people flew up to Adrien. “I’m so glad to know I’m not the only non-human in class anymore.”
No. Markov, no. You’re gonna break his heart...
“Ridiculous! Utterly RIDICULOUS!” Came the shout as Chloe stormed into the room, a harried-looking Sabrina following after.
Adrien blinked. “Chloe?”
His childhood friend gave him a speculative look. “I was sure you were real. But if you are a robot, there’s got to be a whole line, right?”
“Um...”
She flipped her hair. “You peasants can keep the used ‘public’ version. I am going to order a NEW Adrien Robot. No—a dozen!”
He balked. “Chloe?”
Wow. He’d known she could be mean sometimes, but...wow. Wow.
He wasn’t sure he even wanted to know how Lila was going to react if this was any indication...
Or Kagami.
Or—
“I’m sorry! I didn’t know what to bring so I just brought one of everything and I hope it’s okay!”
Adrien blinked at the sudden appearance of a box.
A familiar box with the logo of the Dupain-Cheng Bakery.
A box that seemed to be overflowing to the point where the lid was nearly coming off due to the bulk of what was inside.
From behind the box of delightfulness, Marinette looked up at Adrien in worry and he felt something in him clench.
“I just...I heard what happened and I felt so bad so I thought I would bring something to help and...” She wilted.
Okay.
Okay, that was IT.
His little “prank” made his friends think he was a robot! They were cool with it, which was great and all, but it wasn’t true! He was human and they needed to know that!
There was no way he could let this continue!
“Wait...do robot boys eat sweets?” Marinette asked, surprised.
...
...
...
Screw it.
“Yes.” Adrien said, brightly. “Yes, we do. We have internalized distributors that break it down and convert it to fuel. It keeps up my energy levels, so the more the better.”
The brightness of Marinette’s smile was only outshone by the delightful smell of the rich buttery pastries she put in his hands.
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mari-vargas · 3 years
Text
Hey, I’ve got a weird one for you today. I want to tell the story of my favorite bully from when I was a kid.
Ya, like I said it’s a weird one.
I was bullied a lot growing up. I was quiet and didn’t really fight back over it. Honestly for the most part I didn’t care. It always felt worse for me when I tried to fit in, and I never succeeded anyways so basically my choices were “be comfortable and be made fun of for it” or “be uncomfortable and be made fun of for failing to do it right”.
Now I also have some blocked memories from bullying, so I can’t really speak to those, and I only know they exist because of an unconscious reaction to one bully approaching me and calling my name from behind while I was visiting my friend at my old school. This story is not about that however.
This is about the clique at the school I attended after that one. They were a group of mean nasty girls with money who’d pick on girls without, or would pick on you for going through puberty at a different rate than them, or for your opinion on who’s cute and who’s not or what should constitute a crush. They’d also pick on you for physical problem. One girl in our class was on crutches for months with a boot on one foot, and unfortunately she was already a target for this group because she wore her hair short and had started puberty long before anyone else (before I’d even started at this school).
There were two (and after one particular incident my opinion changed to three) especially mean girls, who I will refer to as K and M (the third is C). They would tear you down over every little thing. The thing about being the kind of kid I was, though, is that when someone is going somewhere to breakdown alone, they don’t really notice the quiet kid already occupying the hiding space due to their only two friends having a year long row with each other they didn’t have any business getting dragged into. As such I know that K, M, and C all had absolutely horrendous mothers, C had an unhealthy obsession with pleasing her father, K and M didn’t have great situations with their fathers (likely distant and mostly uninvolved), and K had some odd situations involving older siblings, and all three had stupidly high expectations placed on them—not about grades, but about appearances. So ya…I fully admit to doing the stupid thing and getting them to direct all their attention toward me and off of that one girl and away from my “friends” even though they’d basically disowned me. Because I mean really, I didn’t care what they had to say to or about me, their toxic opinions couldn’t really reach me. My friends on the other hand definitely tore me down. Their opinions did matter to me. So ya I was in a rough spot because of my “friends” and other stuff happening in my life but the bullies’ words really didn’t matter to me so I took it all on.
But this story also isn’t about me trying to say “ah yes I was strong against bullying ha ha ha!” I wasn’t, I just know that even back then I could tell whose actions were gonna affect me more. This is about one of the things the clique girls singled out on me and would’ve succeeded in actually tearing me down further than I’d ever been (again, in existing memory, because I have no clue what’s in those blocked memories and I don’t plan on ever disturbing them).
I have eczema, and a lot of triggers for it. The worst trigger to deal with though is stress. It’s not something I can remove like sugar or Red 40, it’s not something I can wash away like dust, not something I can soothe away with lotion and lots of water like dehydration. I have anxiety. Basically I’m always stressed. But anyways that year was a really rough year, with my friends fighting and my parents almost getting divorced and this was before my “twin” got her own phone so I had no reliable way to talk with her and my sister had just started driving… so I had my huge unavoidable trigger, plus this was before (or rather more specifically this was THE year) we discovered I was allergic to Red 40, and and and… Point is I had an extremely bad eczema outbreak. I’d always get it the worst on the back of my upper thighs. It was so bad that just to prevent it from getting worse while sitting in class, we had to tape these large patches of gauze over them. This school had a uniform and quite frankly the material for the bottoms was pretty uncomfortable to move in in the form of pants and shorts, so I often wore these pleated skirts my dad and I sewed because the pleats gave way more room to move.
So I’m wearing this skirt, with the gauze taped to the back of my thighs, and I’m out on the playground about to attempt the monkey bars (and being fully aware I’d fail, but I’d already finished like three books that day and it was only lunch and the monkey bars were at least still far enough away from where my friends were loudly arguing). M and K take notice that I’m gonna do something worthy of being mocked over so they gather their clique and bring them over to strike. C had been egging my friends on, but reluctantly was dragged away—reluctant that is, until she caught sight of something peculiar on the back of my thighs. So she called it out, jeeringly, “what’s that?” pointing at the gauze. So I tell her, simply, that it’s gauze. M rolls her eyes and joins C in sneering “why’s it taped on your legs?” So I tell them I have eczema and it’s pretty bad right now so it’s covered to help prevent it from getting worse. M asks what eczema is, so I start to explain “it’s a rash—“ only to be cut off by M and C loudly yelling “ew! It’s contagious your contagious you’re gonna give us all your rash” etc etc. K had been looking uncomfortable at the start of this which was unusual because usually it wasn’t C jumping in like this with M, it was usually K. I was trying to cut in to what M and C were yelling to explain that it wasn’t contagious, but again I was a quiet kid. I couldn’t cut people off, it was basically physically impossible for me at this time. But I wound up not needing to. Right when I was noticing that K wasn’t participating and was even looking uncomfortable, her discomfort transformed into determination. She cut off M and C and told them in no uncertain terms about how eczema was an autoimmune disorder transferred genetically and was in no way contagious and there was no way I could have prevented my own body from attacking me. She told them all that she had a cousin with bad eczema and that this was absolutely not something they could target to pick on me over. She then followed that up with a jibe at my lack of arm strength and my tiny feet, as though to demonstrate acceptable things to mock me over.
It might be a little stupid, but at that moment when everyone turned to mocking me for how small I was and how bad I was at climbing, I was so happy. So relieved. Because to this day I can’t stand to look at the back of my thighs, fully believing they are still covered with thick gnarled scar tissue. Because any attention brought to my eczema always made the itching and burning worse. Because any time my eczema worsened I felt horrible and that it was my fault for not being better at ignoring it. K stood up for me and saved me from the worst instance I can remember of a bully’s words actually getting to me. They didn’t stop going after me for it, but they had to do it quietly or else K would come down on them with all her righteous fury. I don’t think I ever got any physical attacks after that incident either and I know none of them wanted to touch me, still claiming I was contagious, but after that first time it didn’t bother me as much because I knew at least one of them understood.
K changed after that. She seemed to start noticing what people were truly bothered by and what they didn’t really care about, and she’d redirect mocking towards the unimportant things.
I left that school at the end of that year, but the next year apparently things in the social scene there went even worse. Remember my fighting friends? Ya that didn’t stop after just one year. Remember how C had been egging them on? She had gotten one of the other clique girls to support one while she backed the other. Soon enough, the whole clique had divided to back one or the other of my ex-friends—people they had mercilessly bullied for years and were now claiming to be besties with. I don’t know what exactly happened with K. Could’ve been something with volleyball or cheerleading. Could’ve been something with the bullying. Could’ve been a change in financial situation. But a year or two after I left she was booted to the curb from the clique. Full cold shoulder and then some.
She wanted to go to the fair, but as I mentioned her family situation was dismissive at the best of times. Her mother finally relented and said she could go IF she found someone to go with because they certainly didn’t have time for something so frivolous. She tried everyone and was shut out at every bend. Until, that is, she came across my phone number in her contacts from that brief time I was on the volleyball team because they didn’t have try outs that year because they almost didn’t have enough people for a team the year prior. So in a last ditch attempt, she messaged me to see if I’d be willing to go to the fair with her. And I thought back to that day she stood up for me, and how she had started redirecting her friends attention away from true land mines, and I went to my parents asking if I could meet a friend at the fair on that particular night. Because she needed a friend, even just for a night.
When we got there, she was all alone outside the front of the fair entrance. No family in sight. They had dropped her off and left. She was straining her neck around the crowd. I waved and ran up to her. She started crying as soon as she’d spotted me. She blubbered out her situation with her once friends and how she wouldn’t have been surprised if I hadn’t shown up because of how she used to treat me and so on and so forth. After she had calmed down we went to the fair and had a great time and I got to see a little spark of light return to her eyes.
So ya, she bullied me, and wound up getting exactly that in turn, but she also stood up for me at one of my worst moments, and I apparently did the same for her.
A year later and M for some reason invited me to a Halloween party she was throwing. I decided to go, and well that was basically the last time I ever spoke to my ex friends from that school. I was picked on by M and C and their cronies old and new while I was there and I decided that ya there was no need for me to be there and I called for a ride and left while there was still probably another 2-3 hours left of the party.
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artificialqueens · 4 years
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Take You for a Ride (Crystal x Gigi) - Catrina
A/N: hi! it’s been a long while since i posted here. my mental health had a lot to do with that, but here i am again, hopefully as a better writter lmao. apparently i’m obsessed with gigi and crystal and since it’s still crystal’s birthday here i wrote this inspired by dua lipa’s levitating (thanks gigi’s performance at wtw tour). hope you enjoy it and share your thoughts with me. thanks for reading!
Summary: It’s Crystal’s birthday, and nothing comes out as she expects.
Disappointment. That’s the definition of Crystal’s day.
Disappointment and alcohol… maybe some red velvet cake Jan bought for her. She tastes the bitter liquid and sweet frosting in her mouth as she stumbles in her way to the backyard of Jaida’s house.
She’s sick. Sick and tired, of both the party behind her and her day in general. It had really worn her off, first with her teacher grading her project with a humiliating score of 67 points out of 100, then the ridiculous fight with her mother over the phone (she can still listen to the woman screaming at her if she focuses enough) and her cat destroying her One Direction album with her small and deathly paws, and now — oh fucking now, with some idiot pouring their drink all over her dress in a party that she didn’t even want to attend, or happen for that matter.
This isn’t how her birthday is supposed to be. This isn’t even how any birthday is supposed to be, in fact. Crystal doesn’t get how Jan could get to the conclusion that a party at Jaida’s house would make her feel better.
“It’ll be fun!” Jan had said. “You deserve to celebrate your birthday. I’m sure it’ll improve your mood!”
Spoiler: it didn’t.
Crystal feels just as miserable as she would feel in her dorm. Being in bed and watching bad tv was her original plan for today. Was too much to ask for? Why did she let her friends drag her to a party full of people she doesn’t even know?
Right, because Jan and Jaida had made her puppy eyes and Crystal felt terrible for rejecting such a gentle and thoughtful gesture from her friends.
She groans, sitting down on the grass of Jaida’s backyard and rubbing a tissue over the huge stain in the blue fabric of the area over her chest, groaning again when she realizes the stain isn’t moving at all.
Perhaps more miserable.
It’s a sequin blue dress she had purchased a while ago. It wasn’t really expensive, and it isn’t even her favorite, but fuck, it hurts. It’s like today everything in the universe accorded to make her feel terrible. She usually would shrug it off and continue as if nothing has happened, and she can’t quite understand why her natural sense of positivity can’t wash the sadness away.
Giving up, she tosses the tissue to a side and lets the upper part of her body give up to lie down completely on the grass. She’s lucky everyone else is inside, enjoying the music so loud it makes the whole house pound in rhythm, the intermittent lights that must hurt their eyes, the colorful drinks served by Jan and the closeness of dancing bodies rubbing against each other, so she doesn’t have to worry about someone going out and seeing her throwing a tantrum.
The party is a success. She shouldn’t ruin it with her bitter existence.
The sky is quiet tonight, with some stray stars and the moon shining bright. It makes Crystal breathe heavily, over and over again, until she’s sure she’ll be okay.
But, as her breathing regulates, imagines of every earlier moment when she felt everything but okay flash through her mind, and her lungs are not cooperating anymore.
Her heart feels heavy, stupidly hurt. She knows tomorrow her terrible grade will still be there, and her mother will still be pissed at her for whatever she even got mad about, and her favorite album will remained ruined and her fucking dress won’t be wearable anymore, and it’s fine, because she can make work for extra points to improve her final grade and text her mom an apology and replace the material stuff that isn’t even that important whatsoever, but that won’t help her stop feeling so helpless.
Helpless — that’s a good definition for her.
“Crystal?”
Gigi Goode looking down at Crystal interrupts her pathetic thoughts.
More than the interruption, her mere presence is what makes Crystal blink twice and wonder, for a brief moment, if she fell asleep on Jaida’s backyard grass and she’s dreaming.
She’s used to see Gigi everyday, but since today has been a short taste of hell, it wasn’t surprising when Gigi texted her to say she had to miss part of her classes and Jaida’s party because she needed to find someone to fix the broken temperature system in her apartment.
She hasn’t come to terms of how she feels about Gigi yet, and it’s not something she would like to do at all. For the past two months, Crystal has noticed the way her heart starts pounding violently in her chest when Gigi smiles at her, or takes her hand to lead her through the corridors or when she simply looks at her with those big eyes full of emotion and it’s ridiculous but somehow fitting that the only person she craved to see today was the one she couldn’t.
“What are you doing here?” Gigi tries again at her lack of response, not hesitating to offer her hand to help her up.
Crystal takes her hand without thinking (she doesn’t do a lot of thinking in Gigi’s presence) and lets her pull her up in a sitting position.
“Shouldn’t I be the one asking what are you doing here? I thought said your temperature system was giving trouble.”
Gigi chuckles, crouching to be at the same height as her.
“Well, I really wanted to come and Heidi said she could manage it. The girl knows about mechanics, did you know that?”
Crystal shakes her head, breathing out a laugh. “I never would’ve guessed.”
Gigi hums thoughtfully. “Well, she does, thank fuck, because I really wanted to see you, birthday girl.”
Heat creeps up to Crystal’s face incredibly fast, leaving her cursing the power something so small can have over her.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I asked Jan where you were, actually. She said some dickhead poured all his drink on you and you were probably in the bathroom but you weren’t there.”
Crystal opens her mouth to vent about her now ruined dress, frowning as soon as a different thought crosses her mind. “But there are like five bathrooms here. You went all around the house looking for me?”
Confused, Gigi nods. “Is that weird?”
It’s extremely sweet, is Crystal’s first answer.
“No, of course not,” she giggles instead. “But why were you looking for me?”
Gigi looks suddenly flushed, as if she was caught doing something she shouldn’t.
“Well, I…” she tears her eyes away from Crystal to look at the party behind her through the glass doors. “What happened to you?”
The change of topic takes Crystal aback.
“What? What about me?”
“Yeah, you’re here all alone, looking like a child who dropped their candy, when you’re usually a little happy ball, and in your birthday,” Gigi remarks, although not harshly. “Had a bad day?”
Crystal hates this how easy is for Gigi to read her. She knows she looks terrible, beside her dress the signals of her terrible day surely mark her face in dark bags under her eyes and pale tired skin, but Gigi has always had a talent to read her beyond that. The simple fact makes her feel even more embarrassed.
“A horrible one,” she finally confesses in a low whine. “A straight up disgusting, draining, fucked up, impossible day! And, I know I shouldn’t feel so pressed about it, but birthdays are supposed to be happy and I — I am not. At least not now.”
Gigi snickers, taking Crystal’s hand in her own to give it an affectionate squeeze.
“It’s okay to have bad days. Now, to have a bad birthday is really fucked up, but it is what it is. Wanna tell me about it?”
“I’m not really in the mood of talking about me being mediocre in life,” Crystal means to joke more than to actually vent, and she loves the way Gigi giggles.
“Dramatic much?”
“Oh,” Crystal’s eyebrows raise as she laughs. “I can be more dramatic.”
But Gigi doesn’t laugh along this time. She purses her lips, and then stands up, offering her hand to Crystal again.
“Let’s go.”
Crystal looks puzzled. She takes Gigi’s hand, allowing her to pull her back on her feet. With her hand still covered by the other girl’s, Gigi begins dragging her back to the house.
“Where are we going?”
“Let’s go for a ride,” Gigi suggests, looking back over her shoulder just to give her a smile that reassures everything.
In the middle of the dark since the backyard lights don’t reach there, the path changes; Gigi takes Crystal through a small hallway that connects the porch with the patio to the front of the house. They meet a few people in the way; some passed out on the ground, others drinking in their friends and some couples making out. Crystal turns to watch them before she realizes they’re crossing the garden.
“Gigi,” she breathes as she spots the motorbike parked on the sidewalk.
The blonde reaches in the pocket of her jacket, her hand still on Crystal’s. She finally pulls out her keys and twirls them on a finger.
“Every time I’m sad, or mad… or high,” she grimaces and Crystal laughs, “I get on this thing and ride away. It usually works to clear my mind and calm me down, so I thought it could work on you too.”
Crystal feels something very close to gratitude. Instead, she knows it’s pure adoration for one called Gigi Goode.
“Okay,” excitement starts filling her face as she smiles. “Oh my god, I’ve never been close to a motorcycle before, wow!”
Gigi laughs, rolling her eyes. “You’ve literally seen it everywhere with me.”
“I know, but—” she eagerly motions to Gigi and then to the motorcycle. “I always see it as, I dunno, part of you. Like, yeah, there’s Gigi and her bike, you know? I’ve never seen it up close.”
Gigi’s light hearted laugh is the answer she receives again. “Well, now is your chance.”
The motorcycle shines in its black neat color, with not a single particle of dust on it or sign of being neglected; Gigi’s perfectionist personality reflecting. Crystal finds herself so absorbed by its beauty that she doesn’t realize when Gigi lets go of her hand and gets on the bike, using her legs to adjust herself as she takes the two helmets from the space behind her on the seat to make room for Crystal.
She reaches forward to pull the key in the ignition, and it only takes a firm move from her hand for the motor to start growling. The sound makes Crystal gasp.
“You think you can get on? I don’t want you to fall,” Gigi warns, but Crystal is already jumping behind her.
Of course, the gravity plays a cruel trick and she has to grab onto Gigi’s jacket to prevent her from sliding off, but Gigi doesn’t seem to care as she snuggles closer. She offers one of the helmets to Crystal, smiling.
“Safety first.”
“This is so pretty,” she drawls, passing her fingers over the shiny, baby pink surface of the helmet.
“Thanks. Heidi suggested me to get it customized that way,” Gigi comments as she puts her own helmet, of a white color, on. “She’s pretty much the only person who I give a ride, so I thought, why not?”
A tinge of jealousy pops in Crystal’s chest, but she forces herself to ignore it as she notices Gigi reaching over the hand grips, preparing herself to move. She rushes to put the helmet on and forces the image of Heidi taking her spot behind Gigi to fade away.
“You’ll probably resent the motion, so please hug my waist as hard as you can and hold your legs onto the sides of the seat,” says Gigi, so easily it makes Crystal think it’s something she has memorized. “I’ll go slowly anyway, since it’s your first time.”
Crystal complies immediately; she wraps her arms around Gigi’s waist and the stupid butterflies in her stomach seem to fly all the way up to her throat, suffocating her for a second, until she realizes it’s just Gigi’s perfume.
Fuck, she thinks bitterly. She smells really good.
The short heel of Gigi’s boot kicks on something at the same time she rotates the key one more time, and the motor growls fiercely.
They start moving — it’s almost magical. At first, Crystal can’t really feel it. It starts as such a gentle motion, but when she looks around, she sees Jaida’s house becoming smaller and smaller in the distance, and the houses around moving around them. That’s when it hits her; they’re moving.
Gigi speeds up once they’re out of the block, turning on the left and then right and moving smoothly until they’re exiting the neighborhood, but Crystal doesn’t mind in following their path.
She’s too busy giggling at the wind hitting her face and making her hair twirl, creating ginger waves at the sides of her head.
The world around them is moving so fast, and all she can recognize in the city at night are deformed street lights and bright colors everywhere she looks at; everything seems so distant but so close at the same time as they slide on the asphalt, and the late life of Los Angeles never looked so appealing.
Nothing seems important now. Her grade, the fight with her mother, her album nor her fucking dress. Her mind is full of Gigi; of her beautiful hair, her endearing voice, her flawless face and how soft she feels under Crystal’s hands; almost as if she belongs there, in her arms.
If Crystal wasn’t starting to feel dizzy for the speed, she would probably never think such a thing; her feelings for Gigi are something unexplored and feared, threatening to destroy their friendship because Gigi is everything and Crystal is barely something that exists. And Crystal isn’t ready to lose her.
It’s the little things, like the fact she went all around the house looking for Crystal or that she even wanted to see her, that she thought of a way to cheer her up, that make Crystal’s stomach coil and tie itself in a too tight knot that won’t probably never be the same. Gigi has some kind of security aura around her that, as Crystal learned, was impossible to ignore. She’s confident, sure, but there’s something more to that attitude; something that demands to be trusted under that bitch façade. She’s kind and loving and funny, and if Crystal has to swallow her feelings to make sure Gigi is always at her side, then she will.
As they speed up into a steady pace, Crystal notices how Gigi relaxes and leans back into her just a little, and without a second thought she leans on her as well.
“You okay back there?” Gigi asks, voice muffed by the violent wind and motor growling under them.
“Yeah!” Crystal exclaims. “Oh my god, Gigi! This is amazing!”
“Wait until you see this!”
Crystal is about to ask what she means, when they turn into an empty street, where a tunnel leans out. There are no more cars or motorcycles around them and Gigi speeds up even more as they approach the tunnel, lights flying around them.
A raw “puff!” echoes in their ears as they storm into the tunnel, and Crystal laughs as she feels the force the motorcycle is traveling through it. She feels light, like the butterflies flying around her stomach, levitating at the right speed and watching the world around them as secondary.
Gigi starts slowing down at the middle of the tunnel.
“Hold your arms up,” she tells Crystal, eyes locked at the front. “Just for a second, so you can feel the wind.”
At first Crystal hesitates, but the speed is steady and there are no more vehicles around, so she slowly pulls her arms away from Gigi.
She raises both arms, wriggling them at her sides. She makes a quick mental note to remind herself to thank Gigi later, because the air hugs her limbs in a way that almost tickles her, the soft touch running on her naked arms and she closes her eyes for a moment, wondering if she could fall asleep like this.
Of course, when the motorcycle runs over a bump and she has to hold on Gigi’s torso to avoid jumping out of the seat, that idea is quickly denied.
“Oh, right,” Gigi laughs. “I should’ve warned you about that.”
Crystal huffs, sleep knocked out of her as they leave the tunnel behind.
The rest of the way is calm; Gigi decides to go slow this time, so Crystal has the chance to see everything in a clear way (according to her, it’s very important to appreciate the view) and Crystal takes the moment to rest her chin on Gigi’s shoulder and wrap her arms around her middle, just like before, but this time without the messy rush of fearing being thrown out of the motorcycle by a bump.
The proceed to threat a way through town messily, going around buildings and onto streets Crystal doesn’t even know, but Gigi moves skillfully, like she knows exactly where she’s going, and Crystal trusts her. Soon she noticed that Gigi actually knows where they going.
She recognizes her surroundings as they approach the apartment complex where Gigi and Heidi live. She’s always complained saying that her place is small, but the few times Crystal has come over, she’s loved the cozy feeling that takes over her as soon as she crosses the door, which makes her feel even more excited.
Gigi parks carefully on a spot near the front gates. She pulls the key out and the motor shuts down, as she leans back with a pleased smile.
“I didn’t ask you if you wanted to come here, but I thought you didn’t want to go back,” she whispers, barely having to turn around to see Crystal’s face resting on her shoulder blade.
“You thought correctly,” Crystal sighs with content before a thought crosses her mind, making her gasp. “Shit, I gave Jan my phone before going out—”
Gigi reaches on the inside pocket of her jacket, pulling out Crystal’s phone.
“She gave it to me when I asked for you,” she explains to a stunned Crystal. “She thought we would leave together eventually.”
“How smart,” Crystal mumbles.
She unlocks it while Gigi takes her helmet off, noticing the time; almost two in the morning. She tugs on Gigi’s sleeve, pointing at the screen.
“It’s late, won’t Heidi be pissed if we come in? She could be sleeping.”
“The girl wouldn’t wake up even if a rock fell in her head,” Gigi rolls her eyes, gesturing for Crystal to take her helmet off as well. “C’mon, let’s go inside.”
Crystal shrugs as she does so, too wrapped in the thought of spending more time with Gigi to care. She gets back on her feet with a little jump, following her inside the building as they carry the helmets with them. Gigi talks about her day while they’re making their way to the third floor through the stairs, blame the elevator that never came back to the lobby, by Crystal’s request. She wanted to know how she had been doing while she was miserable, and Gigi complies, walking through the empty building.
“I noticed this temperature thing was broken because, c’mon, California will never be hot enough to make fucking ice cream almost boil,” she says just when they walk into the right corridor, Crystal trailing behind her. “It was a nightmare, everything was so fucking hot. I hope Heidi could fix it.”
The metal of her keys knocking makes the only sound that fills the air as Gigi opens the door. She reaches for the switch and the small living room lights up, cool air receiving them.
“She fixed it,” Crystal muses, smiling.
“God bless her,” Gigi sighs, taking off her boots. “Could you leave your shoes by the door and the helmet over the coffee table please?”
Crystal steps on the soft carpet on her short blue socks, watching as Gigi makes her way to Heidi’s bedroom door. She opens it just enough to poke her head inside. After exchanging a few words with her roommate, she turned back to Crystal, closing the door behind her.
“Heidi was just going to sleep.”
“Oh,” Crystal’s eyebrows raise. “Tell her hi?”
“I’m not sure she’ll appreciate me bothering her again,” she giggles. Her mouth opens again, but she closes it seconds after, thinking for a second on what to say. Finally, she gestures at the kitchen. “You want something to drink?”
The apartment is small, Gigi’s right. The living room has barely enough space for a couch and a coffee table and is too close to the kitchen. The bathroom is that white door carelessly next to the television hanging on the wall, and Crystal bets Gigi and Heidi’s rooms are just as small, although she has never seen them. The few times she has been there, with Jaida and Jan, they simply preferred to stick to the couch and a barstool they would drag from the kitchen.
Gigi’s room suddenly becomes source of her curiosity, but she nods, remembering Gigi’s question.
“We’ve got a great menu tonight, in honor of your birthday,” Gigi hums as Crystal sits on one of the stools of the kitchen bar. She opens the fridge, eyeing the content blocked to Crystal’s view by the fridge door. “We have… well, we’ve got beer, and pretty much nothing else.”
Crystal laughs. “Beer! Just what I wanted!”
Gigi is beaming under the kitchen lights as she tosses her a beer and takes another one for herself, nonchalantly kicking the fridge closed. She leans a hip on the kitchen bar, worryingly close to Crystal, and holds her beer up.
“Cheers,” she clicks their cans together.
“Cheers,” Crystal repeats. She stops right before taking a sip, frowning. “But what are we exactly cheering for?”
Sipping her drink, Gigi breathes out a laugh.
“You just killed the moment, babe.”
Babe. Crystal’s ears burn with the name, and she attempts to conceal her surprise by pretending she’s genuinely confused.
“Well, who cares?” Gigi shrugs, holding her beer up again. “Here’s to terrible birthdays, a broken temperature system, and…”
“Motorcycles,” Crystal fills in for her.
“Yeah,” Gigi grins at her. “Motorcycles.”
Crystal leans back to take a long sip of her drink, savoring the slightly bitter taste going down her throat. She notices Gigi staring at her when she places the beer back over the bar, with the ghost of a smile on her glossy lips.
“What?”
“What,” Gigi repeats, snickering.
“You’re looking at me,” Crystal points out, smiling to cover her worsening blush.
“I like looking at you,” the blonde simply says, as if it’s obvious. “I always wanna look at you.”
“That’s creepy. Do I need to call the cops?”
Far from looking bothered, Gigi shrugs. “Who knows. Maybe.”
Crystal scowls with no genuine annoyance, but her face softens as Gigi’s smile somehow widens.
“You’re weird, miss Goode. I thought being weird was my gig,” she jokes, making Gigi throw her head back in laughter.
Internally, Crystal is praying this moment never ends. Seeing Gigi under the dim lights of her kitchen, toying with that beer and looking so effortlessly gorgeous is having the same effect as when she was feeling the air hit her face on the motorcycle, and her head already feels lost in space, far away from the apartment.
“Why were you looking for me earlier?” Crystal asks, voice small.
The intimate atmosphere created around the two is beginning to feel suffocating. Crystal can feel Gigi so close, like she’s the only real part of a dream and the rest of the world was nothing but a wallpaper for her wonderful figure to stand in front of and lead Crystal through the rest of the night.
“Nothing,” Gigi doesn’t even look taken aback by the sudden question.
“Oh, c’mon. It can’t be nothing,” she whines as Gigi takes another sip, purposely taking a long fucking time doing so. “Gigi, c’mon. Tell me!”
She leans forward, making her lower lip stick out in an exaggerated pout. It seems to work catching Gigi’s attention since her whole face seems decomposed when she glances over.
“Don’t do that.”
Crystal frowns. “Do what?”
“Don’t pout.”
“Why not?” she quirks en eyebrow.
“Because it makes me wanna kiss it off your lips,” Gigi deadpans. She takes a final sip from her beer before walking to the fridge again, not minding if Crystal just froze on her spot.
Crystal laughs nervously, trying to convince herself she just misheard. Her heart is beating so fast on er chest, if she watched any medical tv show she might be worried for it to pop out of her body through her nose at any second.
As time passes, she wonders if that’s possible.
“What did you say?”
Gigi sighs, returning with another two beers. She looks uncharacteristically shy, sheepishly placing the new beer in front of Crystal, eyes glued to the carpet.
“This is dumb,” she blurts.
“Gigi—”
But Gigi leans in to kiss her, and suddenly any word forming in Crystal’s head dissolves.
It’s slow and tentative at first, but any doubt disappears when Crystal’s hands move to cup Gigi’s face, pulling her even closer.
She feels light. So light, like when she was holding her arms up in the tunnel to feel the wind, and everything moved so far away from her, she felt ethereal. And now, moving her lips against Gigi’s and feeling the texture of her lipstick between them makes her wonder how Gigi can make such raw sentiments be born in her, riding a goddamn motorcycle or kissing her in the tiny kitchen of her apartment.
Gigi’s hands are tight at the sides of her waist, tugging a little tighter as she pulls back to grab some air.
“That’s why I was looking for you earlier,” she confesses after a while of comfortable silence.
Crystal feels pulled out from a deep trance… or rid over by a bus. Whatever sounds romantic as she stares at the blonde’s deep blue eyes and runs her fingers over her shoulders.
“I think I’ve felt this way with you for a while… I mean, you’re pretty, and I have eyes, so I can tell that you’re pretty,” Gigi continues and if Crystal wasn’t focusing on breathing she would’ve laughed, “I thought that I could keep it friendly, but this morning, when I knew the temperature system was broken and I couldn’t make it to class or the party, I was so pissed. I didn’t wanna let you down.”
The butterflies in Crystal’s stomach have eaten her tongue. Yes, that’s why she’s speechless.
“You’re not mad at me, are you?” Gigi finally asks and everything fits in Crystal’s head.
“Why would I be mad at you? You’ve literally described how I feel for the last semester with this crush I have on you,” Crystal blurts out.
Before regrets covers her entire face, she notices Gigi raising an eyebrow, with a smirk threatening to form on her lips.
“Last semester, huh? That much?”
“Shut up,” Crystal tries to sound pissed, she really does, but with Gigi being so close, her blushing cheeks betray her initial expression.
“Don’t be embarrassed, you’re flattering me.”
They both laugh. A warm feeling spreads across Crystal’s chest at the fact.
“This day… it was hell,” she mumbles, and almost smiles at how Gigi looks at her, having her entire attention, “and I also was thinking of you. It was weird… like, as I said before, birthdays are supposed to be happy and while I was sad and grumpy I couldn’t help but think ‘I wish Gigi was here, because she would make everything better; she’d make me laugh or help me or just make me feel like I’m not alone’ and I hated the idea of not getting to see—”
“The love of your life?” Gigi suggests, sounding way too hopeful.
“I was gonna say that blonde bitch,” Crystal grimaces, “but if that works for you…”
Gigi laughs, mumbling something about who was the real bitch is as she reaches over for her second beer.
Leaning her side on the kitchen bar, freshly open can in hand, Gigi smiles again. It’s a show of her teeth and little wrinkles at the sides of her eyes that Crystal remembers noticing the day they met that morning at History of Art class.
Glancing at that very smile, Crystal’s pretty sure she’s dreaming. Did she fall asleep on Jaida’s lawn? That’d be pathetic. Someone could think she’s dead tomorrow morning when everyone’s hung over and oh, the idea frightens her, but she has to be dreaming. She can’t be this lucky — she’s never been lucky. What are the chances someone like Gigi can have a crush on her?
This flawless, beautiful girl with a golden personality that Crystal’s been making heart-eyes at for months has a crush on her.
God, she thinks. If I fell asleep Jan better never wakes me up.
“Crystal?”
The redhead blinks a couple of times, meeting Gigi’s eyes in the process.
“You were lost in thought, babe. You alright?”
The fucking pet name again. Crystal isn’t dreaming; her brain wouldn’t be mean enough to make up scenarios like this.
“Was I? Sorry.”
That’s not the answer Gigi wants. She drags the other barstool from the other side of the kitchen bar to Crystal’s side, sitting down with her beer still in hand.
“Stop overthinking.”
It’s not a suggestion. Crystal attempts to laugh, but no actual sound comes out of her mouth.
“Well, I can’t,” she babbles, “it’s hard. This doesn’t feel real.”
“Doesn’t it?”
“No,” she whispers, more to herself than to the other girl. “I always thought that you were…  romantically different than me.”
Gigi looks utterly confused. “Please elaborate?”
The butterflies are not dead. They’re flying around Crystal’s stomach now, begging her to not fuck it up.
“I never thought you’d feel the same,” she admits, too quietly for her taste.
Vulnerability is not a good look on her, she has decided years before, and definitely not in front of Gigi. She has all the time in the world to be a cry baby in the comfortable privacy of her dorm, not right now, for Christ’s sake.
“This is real,” Gigi gestured at herself, then at Crystal. “We’re real. Everything is. I can’t understand why you’re so impressed about it, but I know for sure it’s not enough of a reason.”
Crystal nods. Gigi’s right, as always, and she’s just wasting time questioning why has her day taken the path it did instead of enjoying it.
“I’m just being stupid.”
Gigi rolls her eyes, pulling her again for another kiss — a shorter one, but Crystal can’t help but try and memorize how her lips feel against hers. She’s never stopped and think of how it would be to kiss Gigi, and she’s somehow glad; none of her expectations would have been better than the real thing.
“I like you stupid,” Gigi comments once they part, receiving a smack on the arm by Crystal. “You know I’m kidding; you’re never stupid, but I do like you.”
“I like you too,” Crystal breathes, feeling every of her limbs relaxing. Gigi doesn’t say more, and maybe it’s the end of their conversation, but there’s something else forming in Crystal’s throat and before she knows it, she blurts out, “thank you.”
Gigi looks up, puzzled. “For what?”
“For the ride. It was the best birthday present ever.”
Under the dim lights of a small kitchen in an even smaller apartment somewhere in Los Angeles, Crystal knows there’s nothing better than Gigi Goode.
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katsidhe · 4 years
Text
Fic: games of skill; games of chance [14.17 coda]
Sam, and a head injury, and a car ride: one vessel considers another.
AO3
“You’re still looking green around the gills,” Dean tells him.
“I feel okay now,” says Sam. He is still nauseous, but it’s fading. Jack did a good job pasting his skull back together. Nick’s dead. Lucifer’s dead. Sam should be dead but, as usual, isn’t.
“We should have just ganked the guy,” Dean says. Dean is angry, of course he is. Sam doesn’t begrudge him. Sam is probably angry himself.
When Sam broke it to Dean, that Nick had survived and they’d been getting him back on his feet, Dean had told him that it wasn’t his responsibility. You don’t have to martyr yourself, Sam, he’d said, it doesn’t have to be you taking care of him, like Sam was making a sacrifice. But Sam hadn’t been. He really, really hadn’t been.
In fact, Sam’s pretty sure he was being fundamentally selfish.
Cas would have taken it on, if Sam had asked; Sam knows. Same with Mom. But Sam had been the one to bring Nick back, so Sam volunteered. He even told himself it was to spare the others. To spare Cas, who had spent months possessed; to spare Mom, who’d spent an uncertain amount of time in that other world one-on-one with Lucifer.
(When Sam had asked, vaguely, she’d been noncommittal with the details, said, oh, you know. Said, it wasn’t that bad, and hadn’t been long anyway. She’d smiled the way she often smiled, without her eyes, in a way which meant nothing at all.)
But he knows now it hadn’t been because of them, not really. Patching Nick up was—it felt good, like holding his breath and pressing on a bruise.
Dean deserves to enjoy an I-told-you-so, at this point.
***
The noise in his head is loud and long, strident, persistent, splitting him open. Sam tries to wedge himself upright on the wheel, lying across the horn: the noise is his lifeline.
Saving Nick’s life in that church was still the right thing to do, Sam knows that. He’d just about collapsed from the shock when Nick had tried to sit up, then crumbled back down, unconscious; but Nick so obviously wasn’t Lucifer. Not then, and not today either—not even when he’d been singing, goading Sam like a toddler, using familiar lines—there wasn’t ever really a moment that Sam got them mixed up. He’s sure it’s actually easier for him to see the difference than it was for Mary and Dean; even Cas, for some reason.
But everything that came after—the warning signs, of which there had assuredly been more than one; the mood swings, the harsh gestures and words. The obsession. Sam didn’t miss the signs. He was simply desperate not to see them. Desperate to believe that someone as indelibly ruined as Nick would manage to pull himself up out of that hole.
But he was wrong. He’d let himself think... it’s getting harder to think. He leans more heavily on the horn. The sound fractures his skull.
***
“So… what happened, how’d he get the drop on you?” Dean’s asking like he doesn’t actually want to poke at it, but he’s compelled to say something anyway.
Sam knows the feeling. The oppressive quiet is somehow too much like the drive up, with Nick in the backseat—even though Nick was anything but quiet; loud but benign, hallucination made solid. Intangible, until he wasn’t, until his human flesh crashed into Sam’s.
It was an odd slip in time, listening to that harmless off-key singing in the dead silence. It was funhouse-mirror strange to glance out of the corner of his eye and see that somehow Dean was grimacing at the off-color taunts—for a second, it was as if Dean could hear into Sam’s mind, or else that he’d taken up residence there too.
”I don’t know,” says Sam, several seconds too late. It’s not really a lie. It was stupid to think all that was behind him, and he’s not sure why he did it, why he assumed he could handle Nick in a fight.
Dean makes a noncommittal sound.
They drive in silence (actual silence, no sound in Sam’s head) for a few more minutes.
***
The car door rattles. Sam startles upright and falls off the horn; the noise in his head slackens.
“Dean,” says Sam. It’s Dean. Dean’s cursing, fumbling with the keys. Sam should help him. He fumbles for the handle, tries—
The door’s open. “Sam!”
“Nnngh,” he tries. He can’t make the words come out. “S’gone. He.”
“Sammy—you and your thick fucking head, come on, come on, big guy, you’re fine—”
“Lucifer,” Sam gasps. That one’s easier to get out.
“Not Lucifer,” says Dean, “Nick cold-cocked you good, but you’re fine, okay?”
“No,” says Sam, or he thinks he does. “Help.” Help, help, help. He’s being yanked out of the car, pulled out bodily. He struggles but not for long, the light cuts through his eyes, too sharp.
Dean’s pushed his arm under Sam’s, gripping Sam’s ribs. Sam blinks stupidly at the ground. He buckles forward and throws up, retching emptily onto the pavement.
***
“So, the blood I get, but where’d Nick get the grace? Is that something we need to be worried about now, secret fuckin’—horcruxes or whatever?”
Sam considers this briefly, with faint horror—thinks about vials of Lucifer stashed in his vaults like little phylacteries, contingency plans waiting for the wrong tripwire to spring. “I don’t think so,” he says. The possibility of his death hadn’t seemed to hit home for Lucifer even in the moment he was stabbed. “Nick must have extracted it himself.”
“Extracted?”
Sam suddenly remembers that Dean hadn’t been around when he and Cas had tried to get out Gadreel’s grace, for that spell. “Yeah. Remember Gadreel?”
Dean glances sharply at him, then looks away. “Right. Yeah, I remember now.”
The drive on in uncomfortable silence.
Dean rubs the back of his neck. “So. So, when Michael went through my psychic maintenance pipes—he left behind some grace, huh?”
“Probably,” Sam says. “That’s probably part of how he got back in.” He glances sideways at Dean, trying to gauge his expression. “I’m sorry,” he offers. It’s paltry next to the nausea of the realization, he knows, but he can’t bring himself to say anything else. Michael’s dead now. Lucifer, Nick, Gadreel—all dead now.
***
Dean says something. He’s shouting. There are hands in Sam’s hair, damp hot fabric pressing hard against his temple. The world does a dizzy loop and then he’s staring at the sky.
The air hurts, the gravel prickles on his skin like knives, he’s too stiff to move away. He’s going blind. Where did Lucifer go?
“The Empty,” says Dean. His face is blurry and worried, hovering.
“Lucifer, Lucifer’s, he’s gonna—”
Dean pinches him hard on the shoulder, Sam flinches away. “You seeing things? Hey. Stay with me, it’s just us. Okay. Donatello!”
Dean’s hands are a heavy, grounding weight. The world tilts on a nauseous axis.
***
“Wish I’d just let you kill him,” muses Dean, after another long minute.
“No, man, you were right,” says Sam. “I was out of line.” He’s looking out the window, at the dirty snow, broken through with patches of brown grass and scrub oak.
“You couldn’t have known,” insists Dean, apparently intent on easing Sam’s guilt.
Sam scoffs. Dean shouldn’t bother.
“Cmon,” Dean says, focusing in on his goal now, a dog with a bone, “you couldn’t have. How could you have guessed, huh? Everyone else on the planet, it takes two seconds of Lucifer’s smart mouth before they wanna shoot him in the face just so he shuts up. Who’d have guessed Nick’d be the one dick in existence to actually like the guy?”
Sam gives him a sharp glance. Shrugs. “He’s not the only one who does.”
“…What?” Dean stares at him.
Sam raises an eyebrow. “Most of Hell? Plus a fair chunk of Heaven, plus who knows how many sects of human followers.”
“Oh.”
Dean’s still looking at him like he expected something else. It coils uneasy in Sam’s stomach.
“I really should have—figured, though,” says Sam, finally.
It’s a too-long, too-quiet drive, without anyone in the backseat.
***
It’s a slow-moving nightmare, this disconnect between his head and his mouth. The only thing preserved is the urgency, awful and bloody. But he can’t marshal it, can’t connect it, can’t remember how—he blinks dumbly at Dean, at the icy sky. “Nick’s getting him back, blood, grace, s’a ritual.”
Dean freezes. His hands go still. “Fuck. Shit, dammit—now? Where’d he go?”
“Dunno. He’s got—his grace—Jack’s blood—” The panic has him fighting, batting weakly against Dean’s tight grip. He can’t think through it, a molasses-thick dream where all he can do is writhe and struggle against the syrupy weight pinning him down, try vainly to push away the slimy stifling horror in time.
“Sam—focus, okay. Shit. Okay. We can handle—we’re on top of this—I’ll call—”
Dean knows.
Sam’s warned him.
He’s done it—Dean and Cas and Jack and Mom will—Sam lets his eyes slip closed, just for a second.
***
How long had Sam let Nick wander, unfettered, with a piece of Lucifer nestled in his soul? How well did Nick know Sam, how much had he seen? How well did he know Dean? How much did Sam let his stupid impulse to—to fix someone Lucifer broke, blind him to basic safety precautions?
And now that the damage is done, as always, Sam has the time and the hindsight to look back and see all the cracks in his intentions, the places where he’d thought his motives were pure and his actions were just, where he’d allowed self-delusion and selfish need to drive him onwards without caring about the fallout.
It’s that fucked up self-righteous part of himself, that need to be right, that need for something to go right, that lets him think that just because he has a worthy goal, he’s excusable.
It’s the reason for the near miss today. It’s the reason nearly everyone they saved from that other world is now dead, buried with too little ceremony in a mass grave in Kansas, far, far from their home. It’s the reason for a whole hell of a lot more, if Sam wants to go back a year or several.
He doesn’t know why he keeps wanting things like this for himself. The shame should be whittled to an unbreakable point by now, a mechanism to keep Sam from fucking things up irretrievably; and yet he keeps pushing through it anyway, and the blood keeps building up on his hands.
Nick flinching from his hands, glancing up at Sam from hooded eyes—how long did it take? How many of those times that Nick stared at him had been with twisted, insane jealousy and not deep unease, as Sam had assumed?
Sam noticed him looking; he couldn’t not. Sam was the one taking care of him, after all: feeding him, bandaging his wound, bringing him news and human contact that Nick had seemed to grasp at like a man drowning, his understandable awkwardness aside.
Sam asked after his nightmares. Sam asked him carefully if he remembered anything useful about Michael. Sam stitched together his flesh. Sam kept tabs on Nick, watching his human movements and his human posture. Nick ate, Nick slept, Nick hissed in pain under Sam’s hands, and Sam tried to keep his careful thrill quiet—he curled his toes and licked his lips and slowed his breathing.
Must be weird for you, helping me, Nick had said.
And it had been weird, Sam agreed. Just, not in any way that was quantifiable or straightforward. Being around him was like being suspended over knives, tense and perfect. Safe and unsafe. Proof that this wasn’t ten years ago, or seven, that Sam could inhabit his fear and come out unscathed and breathing hard and tingling—that Sam could shove all his issues into one box with one face, minimize and control whatever the world threw at him, lose sleep and come out the stronger for it.
Sam looked forward to visiting Nick, every time, with an anticipatory adrenaline like being ratcheted up the lift hill on a rollercoaster, waiting for that safe, sickening drop. Waiting to come out sane.
He’s a junkie, through and through—can he complain that it turned out the ride wasn’t up to code, after all, when he’s the one who tore through all the caution tape, who hotwired the car and ignored the brakes?
***
Everything’s dim and red like this. His pulse thunders sick and loud. No matter how many times Sam’s died, he can never shake the animal terror. There’s a point where mortal instinct takes over; the shift from pain-without-purpose to soul suffocation, the body’s last-ditch scream.
It’s okay, though. He’s done it.
“Stay with me, now. We’re just gonna play a little game.”
It’s happening. His brain’s clawing uselessly at life. It’s the last starbursts of agony.
Not so perfect now, Sam thinks. What he did to himself, what he would have done to himself. How many rocks, the ways he would have smashed his own bones apart if it would have changed a single thing.
“Just count with me,” Dean says.
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burning-clutch · 4 years
Text
The Not So Grim Reaper
Read on A03 Here Pairings: None Trigger Warnings: mild blood and cartoon style violence  Author: @burning-clutch (Team Ghost) Word count: 4291 Prompt by:  All-hail-trash-prince / KitKat Cat  FFN: the-trash-prince
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 It was the third anniversary of the half death day of one Daniel Fenton and said teen was not exactly sure how to feel about the matter. He had been contacted by none other than the master of the timeline, Clockwork, to let him know that today was going to be a big important day for him…
 So he was understandably nervous…
 The ancient ghost had taken a vested interest in him, sure, but Danny was pretty sure it was mostly to spite the Observants who had their hands in the old ghost’s work. Regardless of the reason though, when clockwork spoke or rather wrote him a note or some other such thing, he knew well it was important and he needed to heed whatever it was.                  At least it was a Saturday, so he didn’t need to worry about school, however, when his ghost sense went off causing him to exhale a wispy billow of cold air, he silently wished that the ghosts could give him a couple of days off a week as well.
 With a reluctant sigh, Danny transformed in his bedroom before taking off and heading off towards the location he’d felt the strongest pull from the ectoplasmic disruption. It was downtown, a great start overall, though what was odd was as of yet there was no destruction… no running people trying desperately to escape an ethereal threat…
 It was uncomfortably calm actually…
 Danny frowned and spun about trying to focus inwards to locate where the pull was. His eyes flashed open in an instant when he felt it, his ghost sense going off for a second time as he honed into the feeling. Whatever ghost had decided to pay him a visit today was powerful. Scarily so to elicit such a strong reaction from his ghost sense.
 He flew up towards the ghost, he was eager but weary. There was no outright attack yet so he wanted to hold out hope that whatever ghost was up here was peaceful.
 Danny was not prepared for a lanky ghost in a solid black robe looking out over the city from the highest building in Amity. Danny opened his mouth to speak but the stranger beat him to it. “Ah, Phantom… or do you prefer Daniel? Or some other such derivative of that?” the ghost asked, not even shifting in the slightest.
 Danny was unnerved by that. The ghost had a deep voice, gruff but buttery smooth… it had a strange resonance in it that made it sound both soothing and unsettling at the same time. Still, Danny was on guard. Ghosts could go from zero to a hundred really fast, and he’d been bitten by that ruse far too often to have not learned at this point… Still, he was always an optimist and any chance to get out of this without a fight he’d take it.
 “And you are?” Danny asked, trying to keep his tone as neutral as possible to this potentially dangerous and powerful spectre.
 “Oh silly me, how rude.” The ghost chuckled out before turning around with a flourish. The ghost was bone white and rail thin, with ruby red eyes that shone with mirth around a deep navy blue iris. With the black cloak closed all Danny could see was the white glow around him and the elongated face of the ghost. As he laughed he revealed a long set of fangs both upper and lower hidden away by bone white lips.
 “My name is Mortimer, Morty for short if you’d rather. Most people prefer it anyway.” the ghost, Morty mused with a small tap of his white slender finger to his lips. “Ah well, that’s not important what is as that you’re a prompt kid, and I like that. Pleasure,” he stuck out a hand to shake.
 Danny eyed the hand suspiciously before grasping the pale appendage into his own. There was a cool and electric feeling radiating from Mortimer, that just screamed of power, but the literal grim grinning ghost before him seemed nice enough.
 “Right, introductions out of the way, now we can get down to brass tax hm?” the pale ghost said releasing Danny’s hand and clapping his own together with a soft and chalky sounding smack.
 “What?” Danny blinked stupidly. “You're a tax collector ghost?” he asked, making a face of confusion.
 “What? Oh Ancients, no! I am a collector of sorts and you Phantom,-”
 “Are going to be the newest thing in your weird collection? No thanks.” Danny scoffed having interrupted the ghost.
 “You don’t even know what the offer is and besides it’s not exactly something you can refuse being what you are, and how you have handled yourself up until now,” Morty said with a flippant wave of his hand. “Your fate was sealed into this the moment Clockwork took an interest in you.”
 “Clockwork? Where does he fit into this? With you?” Danny huffed feeling a little more angered by the second now.
 “Well, it’s your third death day right?” Danny nodded. “Well, today is when you officially transition from a kid to a teen, well from a ghostly standpoint anyway,” Morty said with a tilt of his head revealing a thin whisp of flame like hair that looked to be hardly there at all on his ebony ectoplasmic flesh.
 Danny blinked a few times as his mind caught up with that. This guy had mentioned Clockwork and Clockwork had mentioned today would be important… So…  “You’re who I was supposed to be looking out for today?” Danny asked.
 “I mean maybe? Were you told a reaping recruiter was comin’ to get you?” Morty asked in kind. “Because if you were that makes this a whole lot simpler.”
 “A what?” Danny barely got out before the other ghost grabbed his arm and thrust him forward into a ghost portal. Instantly Danny engaged his flight and rounded on Morty, fists flaring only to stop cold when he saw where he was brought.
 The literal valley of death.
 Morty now had out a scythe as tall as he was, with a blade that was half the length of the pole. The blade, seemingly made of a blinding white plasma dipped into the portal and closed it in an instant. Morty then spun the scythe banishing the weapon to whatever unworld it had come from.
 The weapon itself was impressive enough, but the fact that it matched the exact description shape and apparently portaling powers, from what he remembered the reaper ghosts were usually seen to wield… Danny was very glad he didn’t try to attack this ghost now.
 “You really are a reaper.” Danny gasped out, staring wide eyed at Morty.
 “Yes, I thought I’d mentioned that? No? Eh, well we’re here now and we’ve got work to do boy!” Morty said with a motion aimed at the halfa to get him to follow.
 Reaper ghosts were dangerous, said to kill a living person with just a touch of their hand… Danny’s eyes widened as he stared down at the hand he’d shook Morty’s with earlier. Did that mean…? He rubbed at his neck as he followed, thankful to feel the slow and shallow ‘Ka-thump’ beneath his gloved hand.
 “Wait, you mentioned you were a recruiter?” Danny asked moving quickly to catch up to the other ghost.
 “Yep,” came the simple reply with a popping P. “And you’re here because-.”  he trailed off with a wave of his hand urging Danny to put two and two together.
 “I’m being turned into a reaper?” Danny hazarded out his guess.
         “Got it in one kid. Congrats. Morty said with a nod of approval.
 “Wait… Why me?”
 “Well, the main one is you being a demi-ghost. You’re between the life and death binary system. Meaning, you yourself are the focal point in that scale of life and death,” the reaper responded.
 “What about Vlad? He’s a halfa too…” Danny asked, genuinely curious.
 “Indeed he is, but you are not like him in the slightest when it comes to personality. Tell me do you know what we do? What job does a reaper ghost have?” Morty asked, turning to look at Danny over his shoulder.
 “You take the souls of the living, collecting them and forcing them to die…?” Danny asked nervously. “I don’t want to kill people though! Even if they are on some list or however you decide who’s time is up!” he argued to Morty. He really didn’t want to kill people…
 “Ha! No, Why does everyone always think we deal in the living? Life and death are something that can’t be influenced by us.when your number’s up it ain’t us that's coming to kill you, nature does that plenty well on its own.”
 “Then-”
 “We deal in the souls of ghosts,” Morty stated. “When a living thing dies, regardless of whether they become a ghost or not, the souls flow to the ghost zone. If they do become a ghost it means they had an obsession that was stronger then the pull of the zone’s core, the collective.” Morty explained.
 “That much I know… It’s a basic concept.” Danny nodded curiously now as the reaper led him into a catacomb beneath the garden they were standing upon a moment ago.
 “Right, well, what do you think happens to ghosts who’s obsessions get out of hand to the point the ghosts themselves are a danger? Or ghosts that get trapped in the human realm? That’s where we come in. if they’re a danger it’s our job to force them into the collective. And the easiest way is to slice the obsession right out of them, slicing through their core with your scythe. No obsession, no reason to be and the ghost is absorbed into the collective.”
 “That’s still killing people! Even if they’re ghosts I still can’t-” Danny shook his head unable to think of himself potentially killing or ending a ghost… he would be no better than Dan then…
 “Well you’re not killing or ending, you’re returning them to the collective. Alternatively, you can also repair a broken core so long as the ghost isn’t too far gone. Putting down troubled spirits is our main service as a reaper, secondary is that making sure the collective stays as exactly that, a collective. We make sure nothing in the zone ventures too close, and nothing in, comes out.” Morty said with a sharp look about him as he said that.
 Danny offered the reaper a sheepish smile, before turning away from the glowing gaze to look about the catacombs. There were a lot of dirt torches on the walls and doors and really not much beyond that, but suddenly the door to his left was the most interesting thing on the planet.                  “You do not want to know what happens when something comes out of the collective and back into the ghost zone,” the reaper warned in a stern tone.
 Danny flinched his gaze snapping back into the ruby eyes of the reaper.
 “Besides most commonly it’s a reaper’s job to retrieve stranded ghosts from the human realm and lead them home to the zone. A starved ghost is not something to take lightly after all. And that brings us to why we’re recruiting you, and not the other halfa.”
         “Because I’ve been doing that as it is?” Danny tried after a moment of the other ghost looking at him expectantly.
 Morty grinned at that. “HA! Nice once again in one, and they said you were a dunce,” the ghost chuckled as they finally stopped to enter a large wooden door with a golden trim.
 “Who did?” Danny asked as he followed the ghost inside.
 “Don’t worry about it. Just pick out a scythe that calls out to you,” Morty waved him off dismissing the insult on his intelligence easily.
 Danny couldn’t bother to rebuttal though when he laid eyes on the weaponry in the room. They were in a word gorgeous. All glowing with an array of coloured blades and handles and the teen’s eyes lit up like a kid in a candy store.
 “Woah…” was about all he could get out as he gently reached out to try to grab a scythe with a bright white handle and a blue blade. As soon as his hand touched the pole Danny recoiled from the shock he’d received from the weapon.
 “Nope, that one didn’t like you kid,” Morty said amused. “A reaper’s blade is special to them, and only one reaper can wield a blade, so much so that if a reaper is destroyed the blade shatters along with them. It’s an extension of yourself,” he explained.
 “So then… how do you know?” Danny asked, trying to grab another one with a black pole and purple blade, only to recoil with a hiss and suck on his now burned finger.
 “You really need me to answer that one kid?” the reaper asked leaning against the door and crossing his arms.
 “...No…” Danny grumbled. The teen sighed looking at all the blades in the rows of weapons. They were all scythes and all slightly different, though some not by much to their neighbours. With a thoughtful frown, Danny explored the shelves.
 Morty watched the teen go eyes shining with mirth as he looked on into the rows and rows of weapons. As a halfa, he would become an angel of rebirth, a force to be reckoned with and eventually a great ruler. Until his one-hundredth death day, he wouldn’t know of that tidbit and instead would remain in their ranks as a reaper.
 Danny sighed after the tenth or so blade zapped him, he decided to try a new tactic. He closed his eyes and focused like he would when normally looking for a ghost with his ghost sense. These weapons felt like more than just average weapons after all perhaps they had a bit of life er, rather death in them?                  And so he focused and walked forward, moving along eyes closed until his hand rested in front of a rack. He blinked his eyes open and scanned the handles in front of him. It was easy to pick out the one that he thought was calling to him after that.
 The handle was deep black with coloured sparkling glowing speckles all along the shaft, swirling and pulsing shifting slowly all along the handle. They looked so much like stars that Danny’s core fluttered eagerly at the sight of that alone. When he grabbed the handle, he felt the sheer burst of power that flowed through him and it was both intoxicating and worrisome.
 He quickly regained his focus to stare at the white blade that pulsed and flickered with just the tiniest bit of blue. It reminded him of a comet’s tail with how it waved along when he moved the weapon. It was gorgeous and he knew it was his.
 “Oh, that’s a beaut’!” Mort said with a low whistle almost right into Danny’s ear, causing the teen to jump into the air and float there staring angrily down at the reaper. “Now you’ve got that I gotta teach ya how to use it, well the basics, then from there you’re to come back here every week til we deem you ready to don a cloak.”
 “I- right… so where do-” Danny didn’t even get the chance to ask as no sooner had he started Morty ripped a hole into space with his own summoned scythe and grabbed Danny dragging him through the portal. “Training…”
 “En- Garde boy!” Morty called, pointing the butt end of his scythe to Danny. “First things first summoning and banishing your blade, then portals, and that should do it for today. I’ve no doubt you’ll figure out fighting with it on your own after that.”
 “Yeah, ghost attacks in my town are far too common…” Danny admitted.
 “Well now you can portal them away,” Morty said with a chuckle. “I think that’s why humans all think us to be bringers of death, we’re often seen bringing newly dead ghosts across the threshold to the zone… but you being a halfa you can stay in the human realm and not have to worry as much about ectoplasm intake. It gives you a huge advantage.”
 With a final amused shake of his head, Morty went into army Sergeant mode. Like the flip of a switch, Danny was suddenly being worked over the proverbial coals. He wasn’t sure how long it took him to be able to summon and banish the scythe, but he was suddenly overly glad that there was only two things the reaper had wanted to work on.
 Once he had successfully done the summon and banish three times in a row they moved on to portaling. And this was where Danny felt the drain.
 He had to push his power into the blade to keep it rigid and allow himself to actually use the thing to cut. That alone was hard, but trying to force his power through the scythe to make the portal… after his third attempt, he was already almost ready to pass out.
 Push the power into the blade then past it, force it to burst out of the blade and reach into the human realm, then spin the energy around the blade to pull open the portal. He knew the concept Morty had drilled it into his skull by this point, but for the life of him…
 Danny panted leaning forward using his new weapon to hold himself up. He was almost ready to transform back…
 “Is that all you got?” Morty taunted. “If it is we’ll be here a lot longer. You’re not getting out of here unless you can portal out yourself. Do you have a clear destination in mind?” he asked again for the fifth time.
 “Yes, I do… I -I don’t think I have enough power.” Danny wheezed out.
 Morty shook his head. “You don’t, but your scythe does. You’re only supposed to use your power to supplement and direct that of your weapon. Now try again with that method.”
 Danny sighed and readied himself before standing up once more. With a deep breath, he readied himself and tried to talk with his scythe as weird as it sounded at first to his tired brain.
 “To Fenton works come on now… “ Danny urged. With a force of power from his weapon pulling from his own energy pool he swung his blade and sliced down. The curve went through space and sliced the fabric between dimensions open.
 With a triumphant cheer, Danny whooped out to his teacher. “You’ve done well kid. Now remember, to close it stick the butt of your weapon into the centre of the portal and give a small pulse of energy.” Morty said with a bright grin. “And I’ll see you next week.”
 With that, the Reaper ghost gave Danny a salute before opening a portal of his own and taking off to wherever it was he went when not on duty.
 Danny on the other hand eagerly flew through the portal, dispelled that, banished his scythe and B lined into bed practically collapsing onto the plush surface with a tired and sore groan. It didn’t take him long after that to fall asleep.  
 -.-.-.-
 It was dinner time when Danny woke up, or rather Jazz had brought up some leftovers to him after telling his parents that he was sick… Still, it was an easy win for him to sleep the day away and he’ll take any chance he can get for that.
 Jazz was easy to dissuade from pressuring him too much after he simply said ‘ghost problems’ she dropped it begrudgingly, and he was able to shoo her out of his room to eat his meal in relative peace.
 Or at least half of it since his ghost sense went off not too long into his meal.
 With an angered groan and a forlorn look to the mac and cheese loaf he had been enjoying, he transformed and headed out to knock some annoying ghost sideways… and for once he was almost hoping it would just be the box ghost.
 When a missile came flying towards him a few seconds later he knew that hope was dashed. Even more so when Skulker moved in himself to try to toss a weighted net at him.
 With a quick blast of his plasma the net was no more but the missile he’d dodged before rounded back on him, slamming into his back and launching him down to the ground.
 He pulled himself up with a groan and a small huff of annoyance escaped him when he saw an almost identical him shaped hole right beside the one he’d just pulled himself out from. “Well at least I’m consistent…” he muttered in annoyance, before launching back up towards Skulker.
 “I have you this time whelp!” The robotic hunter called out aiming a blast towards his prey.
 Danny threw up a shield before grinning to himself and summoning his new weapon. “I got something new for my death day and I wanna try it out!” Danny called. “Hope it gives me a new edge.” he offered quickly, swinging the blade around, doing his best to look cool, before pointing the business end of his scythe at Skulker.
 The self proclaimed Ghost Zone’s greatest hunter paused upon seeing the weapon. “That can not be real,” he scoffed out though the worry in his tone was clear as a crystal bell.
 “Like my new toy Skulky? I got myself a new upgrade!” Danny proclaimed channelling a bit of power to solidify the wispy blade into a solid and keen blade. With one two handed strike the thing struck true and sliced Skulker’s hand clean off as if it were butter.
 Skulker would be sweating if he were capable… as it were he could only stare at the halfa in dread and slight awe. “It’s real, isn’t it…” he gulped.
 “Very.” Came Danny’s amused reply as he decided to try something. Focusing hard on the area in the ghost zone just outside Walker’s prison Danny turned and stuck the air right beside Skulker. To the teen’s absolute delight a portal appeared in all it’s spinning glory. “It worked!” He chirped before kicking at Skulker to toss him through it.
 The bewildered robotic ghost hardly stood a chance and sailed through the portal with a yelp of dismay. To think the prey he’d been hunting all this time was a reaper!? It made him all the more valuable… Skulker reoriented himself before trying to zip back the way he’d come only for the portal to suddenly vanish leaving him stranded on this side.
 Danny meanwhile, was elated. This was going to make his job of protecting Amity a whole lot simpler. He wouldn’t need to worry if he forgot his thermos ever again! It was a good feeling. He swirled his scythe around like the leader of a marching band with far too much flare, simply enjoying how natural the weapon felt to him.
 His exceptional high feeling was cut short however when Valerie’s voice hit his ears. “What… What was that?”
 Danny squawked, he didn’t even hear her coming up behind him! He clutched the scythe to his chest, the blade’s wispy form flickering along with his ghostly tail and aura. “What?” Danny blinked stupidly.
 Ever since Danielle Danny had shared a shaky alliance with the huntress, though it was more of a stay out of my way and I won’t shoot directly at you, sort of thing. Still, any sort of relief from attacks, he’ll take.
 “That scythe… it’s new.” Valerie commented suspiciously.
 “Oh, Yeah! I’m three now so I got a cool toy! Apparently, I’m a reaper ghost. Neat huh?” Danny grinned doing his best to keep up his playful hero persona.  He spun his weapon around a few times before vanishing the thing and taking a bow.
 “A reaper?” Valerie asked carefully, floating a little bit further back from the male now.
 “Yep!” Danny exclaimed popping the P and straightening back up to properly face Valerie. “Oh! But I’m a reaper for ghosts, not one for humans,” Phantom added placatingly, hands up in a hopefully soothing manner. “You can still touch me it’s fine!” he added barely making out the frown behind the face shield the huntress wore.
 Valerie grimaced further at that. “I’d really rather not.”
 “No seriously, it’s fine. Come here! Let’s hug it out!” Danny called arms open wide and a shit eating grin in place.
 Valerie called out a curse to him and fired a volley of blasts forcing the halfa to dodge and fly back. “Try that again and I’ll put a hole through your head.” she hissed.
 Danny’s grin never faltered and instead simply used his bodily manipulation powers to do just that. While Valerie shuddered Danny tried again for the hug arms wide.
 “Ugh, you're impossible.” She grumbled, firing a blast with pinpoint accuracy through the hole he’d made in his face.
 “Come on Val~ That’s not nice.” Danny teased smiling brightly, only to yelp and zip off when she brought out her thermos threateningly.
 The citizens of Amity park that night were witness to an hour’s long game of cat and mouse, as the Red Huntress chased the elusive Phantom about. Though if asked about it later Phantom would insist it was all in good fun. Even if the burn on his backside begged to argue otherwise…
 And as Phantom learned more and more from the reaper ghosts, he became a better and more efficient hero to the people of Amity.
 The approval ratings going up felt nice too.
 -.-.-.-.-
 Complete:
 Total word count: 4291
49 notes · View notes
spaceskam · 5 years
Text
for @youaremyworldlois ❤️️
ao3
“Do you wanna come stay with me? There’s room.”
“No, no, I don’t wanna get your dad sick on accident.”
“Okay,” Liz said skeptically, “I’m here if you need me.”
“I know, thank you, but I think it’ll be fine,” Alex sighed. 
He was huddled in bed, trying not to pout too much about the situation for the last week. Starting Monday, classes would be solely online which sucked since he was a guitar major and there were few things more anxiety-inducing than being in a small apartment and practicing for hours on end. However, it was only made worse by the fact that he was stuck with his stupidly hot roommate that apparently didn’t have anywhere to go home to either.
“Stay safe, love you!” Liz told him.
“Love you too.”
The call ended and forced Alex to see that it was already 2PM and he hadn’t gotten out of bed. He decided to climb out of bed and face reality. He put on pants and a shirt, knowing damn well his roommate would probably be roaming around. He wasn’t even sure that guy even slept.
For the first two years of college, Alex had lived in a dorm with random guys that always made him uncomfortable. He hated living with strangers in just one room with no semblance of privacy, especially when he had no idea what they would do if they knew their roommate was gay. Then, whenever dorms would close, he would have to couch hop since there was no way he could go back home. 
So, after his sophomore year, he started looking into off-campus apartments. He had a good amount of money saved up and all he had to do was find a roommate. It proved harder than expected because Liz already lived with her boyfriend and Maria lived back home, so he had to actually look for someone he could be comfortable with.
That’s when he found Michael.
Or, actually, Liz found Michael. He was her boyfriend’s brother and apparently a genius that doubled as a giant puppy. He was in a frat and had lived in his frat house for a while before deciding to move out so he could focus better in school. They’d met and Alex had laid out all his concerns and Michael had taken them all in stride, happily agreeing to whatever as long as he had a place to rest his head.
They’d been living together for about six months by the time schools were beginning to shut down and, the closer it got to when UNM would be closing, the more Alex got anxious. Living together for six months didn’t actually mean they hung out ever. Most days, they never even saw each other and he could count the number of conversations outside of ‘I’m going to the store, you need anything?’ on one hand.
But now, according to the fucking CDC, he was going to be stuck alone with him for the foreseeable future.
“Good morning,” Michael said, not even looking his way when Alex stepped out of his bedroom.
“Is it morning?” Alex asked. Michael looked up from whatever the hell he was doing at the coffee table and smiled.
“For you it is,” he answered happily.
That was another thing about Michael. He was so painfully heterosexual that he didn’t seem to have any idea what the hell that smile could do to someone like Alex who basically fell in love with any guy who gave him attention. It was the worst and it would the main reason Alex had no problem keeping his distance from him.
“So, quarantine,” Alex hummed, looking in their newly stocked kitchen for something to eat. He decided on toast and popped two slices of bread in the toaster. “Are you, like, gonna go home?” Alex already figured the answer was no since he didn’t go anywhere to Christmas, but he figured he should ask.
“Nah,” Michael said, “You?”
“Nope,” Alex answered, “So I guess we’re stuck together.”
Michael gave that overwhelming little smirk and licked his lips, cocking his head in Alex’s direction. “I guess we are.”
Alex turned to face the toaster and tried to think of how he was going to survive like this. Why did he have to be so hot and so straight at the same time? It just wasn’t fair.
When Alex had first met him, he’d thought that maybe he wasn’t straight. It was just a vibe he gave off and the way he sat in his chair. However, when he asked Liz about it, she’d basically laughed and said he was the straightest guy she knew. Then, when Alex inevitably let him know that he was gay, Michael just said ‘cool’ instead of coming out as anything other than straight. It was even further confirmed whenever he’d text Alex to make sure it was okay to bring a girl over. Which, that only happened about six times, but still. All girls. Straight, straight, straight.
Not like he’d have a chance anyway.
“What exactly are you doing?” Alex asked, holding a napkin under his toast as he walked towards the living room. Might as well get used to talking to him.
“A puzzle,” Michael answered. However, when Alex got closer, he saw what looked like the base of a miniature house.
“That is not a puzzle,” Alex laughed. Michael laughed right alongside him.
“Yes, it is! 3-D puzzle, it’s a replica of the Neuschwanstein Castle.”
“The what?”
“Sorry, did I pronounce that wrong? I didn’t Google it.”
“I have no fuckin’ idea,” Alex said, shaking his head. Michael gestured for him to sit on the other side of the coffee table.
“Wanna build it with me? Maybe we can actually bond for once?” he suggested. Alex huffed a small laugh and agreed, carefully sitting down across from him and placing his toast on the napkin on the table. “So, Alex, you come here often?”
“Is that how we’re gonna bond? Because I think I might have to go back to my room.”
“No, stay,” Michael laughed, “Help me build this thing.”
So Alex did. It was kind of weird actually spending time with him, but it turns out Michael wasn’t so bad for a straight guy. He was funny and a whole lot better at building than Alex was. 
When the castle was halfway built, Alex felt a socked foot graze his calf. Every hair on his body stood up in alert, eyeing Michael in shock only to see him straight up steal the rest of his toast by shoving the entire thing in his mouth.
“Did you just eat my toast?” Alex scoffed. He was actually pretty thankful for the distraction because he would’ve hyperfixated on that little touch for hours. Who was he kidding? He was going to do that anyway.
“You haven’t touched it for five whole minutes,” Michael said, his cheek puffed out and stuffed with bread, Alex laughed, genuinely laughed.
“What is wrong with you? Were you never taught manners?”
“No,” Michael answered innocently. Which, honestly, just made them both laugh harder. “Also I lived in a frat house with, like, 10 other guys for two years. We consume or we die. You’re, like, the cleanest and most respectful guy I’ve ever lived with.”
“Well, thanks, I guess.”
“Want me to make you some more toast?” Michael offered. Alex smiled and tried not to become too obsessed with his charm, shaking his head.
“No, but I will take you up on a pot of coffee.”
“On it!” Micahel said, standing to his feet and showing that he was in nothing but a ratty old t-shirt and tight boxer briefs and socks with little koalas on them. Alex tried—and failed—not to watch him walk to the kitchen area and slide on his socks towards the coffee maker.
This was going to be a long couple of weeks.
-
“Hey, I hate to be that fuckhead, but could you turn your music down? I have a lesson.” 
“No problem,” Michael said, turning his music down. Alex gave him a thankful smile and then quickly went to go to his online guitar lesson at his setup in his room.
He had his sheet music in front of him on his stand and his laptop propped up beside it, easily connecting whenever his professor started the video call.
It was weird, trying to take notes and adequately tweak them via video. He was used to being shown in person how to correct his finger placement or his posture. This was just... He wanted to go back to normal.
“Keep up the good work,” Dr. V said. Alex could tell, though, that he was just as irritated with the lack of hands-on teaching. Working with one teacher one on one really created a close bond of trust and familiarity. Alex could fuck up with Dr. V and not even think twice about it. They were like family.
And now it was fucking weird.
“I sent you scans of that more contemporary piece considering it’s less crucial for you to work on your performance pieces. Have fun with it, play around, show me what you come up with next lesson,” Dr. V added before saying his goodbye’s. Thankfully, that was Alex’s last class of the day.
“You’re really good.”
Alex nearly jumped out of his skin when he opened his bedroom door to see Michael loitering a few steps away. He looked like he’d been there for a while.
"Were you standing there the whole time?”
“Huh? No, I, uh, I was gonna ask what you wanted for dinner and then I heard you were still playing, so I was waiting so I wouldn’t interrupt you. And, well, you’re really good,” Michael said, his fingers tapping against his thigh as he rose up on his toes and dropped back down. His curls sprung with the movement.
“Thank you,” Alex said, trying to smile despite the fact that made him uncomfortable. As stupid as it was, he didn’t really like having random people hear him play. It was different when he was actually performing. Whoever was there came to see him and wanted to hear him. But, like this, it felt like he was simply being annoying.
“You know, I always wanted to play guitar,” Michael said, biting down on his lip just a little bit and Alex had to wonder why the hell he deserved that.
“I mean,” Alex started, looking around before being forced to look back at Michael due to the lack of scenery, “Maybe I can show you a thing or two sometime? I don’t just know classical.”
Michael split into a happy grin and bounced on his toes one more time. “Sounds super fun.”
“So,” Alex said, “Dinner?”
Michael blinked a couple times as if suddenly realizing where the conversation had originated. It was the cutest thing.
“Oh, right.”
-
“We need to do this more often, I think it’d help my fucked eating schedule.”
“Well, we can, if you want.”
“Cool,” Michael said all happily. They were making breakfast together like some sort of domestic couple, bustling around the kitchen to concoct something edible. Eggs, toast, and apparently Michael also needed waffles with those things. 
Alex got to work on the toast and waffles while Michael made the eggs.
“Don’t put any pepper in mine, please, pepper makes me wanna gag,” Alex mentioned. Michael gave him a bewildered look.
“Says the guy who put, like, an absurd amount of Tony’s on his fried rice,” Michael scoffed. Alex grinned. He remembered that?
“That’s different.”
“Is it? Is it really?” Michael asked. Alex laughed and swatted in his direction. Michael grabbed his arm instinctually and tugged him closer. It caught Alex so off guard that all he could do was stare with wide eyes. Eventually, Michael seemed to realize that was a little fucking weird and let go, taking a step back. “Do you want me to put Tony’s on your eggs?”
“Yes, please,” Alex said, clearing his throat in an attempt to not sound like that was weird. Which, it was weird. And absolutely not at all good for him brain that seemed to think Michael was more and more lovable each day.
A couple minutes later, Michael got his attention again.
“Try this, tell me if it’s enough,” he said, holding up a fork with scrambled eggs on it. Alex looked between it and Michael’s eyes a few times before realizing he was just going to feed it to him. Is this what they did at the frat house? He would really like to know.
But, instead of questioning it, Alex opened his mouth and let Michael feed him the bite.
“Good?” Michael asked, smiling all proud of himself. Alex almost forgot what he was asking about.
“Yeah. So good.”
-
“I’m gonna go insane.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Alex hissed, covering himself with his blanket to try and stifle his words despite the fact that Michael was taking a shower and couldn’t hear him, “He’s so fucking cute and nice. Who allowed him to be both? It’s a goddamn crime.”
“Alex, his niceness is why you let him be your roommate in the first place,” Liz pointed out with a laugh.
“Yeah, so?” Alex groaned, “It’s overwhelming. Do you know what he does for fun? Puzzles. And then, last night I guess he ran out of puzzles, because I woke up at, like, three in the morning to get water and he was building a house of cards. Not just a house, a fucking castle. What the fuck is that? Why am I attracted to someone who builds card castles?”
Liz laughed even louder, “Alex, maybe it’s the quarantine. I mean, you’re stuck with him, so you’re bound to catch some feelings because they have nowhere else to go.”
“Okay, but he’s a straight guy that I once saw wash his hair in the kitchen sink on one side and defrost chicken on the other.”
“Ew,” Liz said.
“I know! And yet I look at him and want to put my head through a wall to stop feeling like a pile of goo,” he groaned, “Sometimes I think he is just instigating it.”
“What do you mean?”
“A couple mornings ago, he pulled me close to him and fed me a bite of eggs. Like, who does that? The more I think about it, the more I think he’s messing with me,” Alex whined. Liz was silent for a moment.
“Michael isn’t the type of guy to just, like, mess with people. Especially not his roommate,” she said cautiously. Alex didn’t know what to respond. “Maybe ask him not to do stuff like that? Ask him not to lead you on?”
“Okay, but I’m not going to ask him not to lead me on because then he’ll think I like him,” Alex argued.
“But you do.”
“But he doesn’t know that!”
“Hey, Alex?!” Michael called from the other room, very quickly making Alex panic about what he could’ve overheard.
“Yeah?!” Alex yelled back.
“Can you get me a towel from the dryer?! I washed them to take a shower and then I forgot!” he called. Alex gulped hard and looked upwards, letting out a quiet, strained noise.
“Yeah, gimme one second!” he yelled, “Okay, Liz, I gotta go, He needs me to get him a towel.”
“Seriously, Alex, you need to ask him—“
“Nope, bye! Talk to you later,” Alex said, hanging up before she could try to pressure him into having an adult conversation.
Instead, he went and fetched a towel and then knocked on Michael’s bathroom door. The door opened only a few inches, but it was enough to see a soaking wet body that was tanned and covered in chest hair and Alex realized he was beyond help.
Instead of risking saying anything embarrassing, he just held out the towel. Michael flashed a smile, a ringlet already forming against his forehead that dripped water onto his nose. How was he even real?
“Thank you,” Michael said, winking before he closed the door again.
Alex decided then and there that it had to just be hormones. He was going stir-crazy with nothing but hormones and a hot guy. That’s it. Because there was no goddamn way he looked that good. Alex had to be exaggerating in his head.
He just fucking had to.
-
“Okay, you promised me over a week ago that you’d teach me some things on the guitar and you still haven’t.”
“Okay, okay, come here,” Alex said. Michael smiled like a kid in a candy store and bounced on his toes before meeting Alex on the couch. 
Alex had been a little bit better about keeping his distance and giving himself a reality check daily after the amount of wet skin he’d seen during the shower incident. That was really only two days ago, but still. He was reminding himself that he only felt so attracted to him because he had no other choice in the moment or something. Now, however, that was hard to remember when he was sitting so close.
Still, Alex handed over his guitar. Michael looked at him expectantly. It was almost too much to handle.
“Okay, so these things are called frets and the strings are numbered one through six going from this end to this end,” Alex said, pointing at what he was talking about. Michael nodded along. “Okay, so put your index finger on the first fret, second string. Middle finger on the second fret, fourth string. Ring finger, third fret, fifth string.”
Michael slowly did just that. When Alex reached to adjust his finger and hand placement, he let him. He listened well and molded to whatever Alex suggested.
“Okay, now strum,” Alex told him, listening to the sound it made, “And that’s C Major.”
“Oh, shit,” Michael laughed. Alex huffed and rolled his eyes.
For the next few minutes, Alex walked him through chords: A minor, G Major, F Major, the basics. He explained how to hold the neck of the guitar so it wouldn’t cramp up his hand and how to not press down too hard, but also not too light to get the best sound out of it. They walked through them and switching chords. Alex explained how it got easier with time and with calluses. 
“And now basically you can play 90% of pop songs,” Alex said. Michael’s eyes went wide and he laughed.
“What?”
“Yeah, most pop music is made up of just those four chords or variations of them. Sorry to disappoint,” Alex told him. Michael shook his head.
“Show me another one,” he asked. 
“Okay,” Alex agreed. He leaned a bit close again, talking and guiding Michael through the finger placement for D Major. But then Michael moved his hand off the body of the guitar and to Alex’s cheek, leaning.
For a moment, Alex was frozen and feeling more confused than he had in a long time.
“Sorry, do you not want to?” Michael asked after a few seconds of kissing Alex and Alex just not kissing back.
Logically, Alex should’ve explained that he was confused. He should’ve said that he thought Michael was straight and that, if he was indeed straight, he shouldn’t be doing this because this was mean. He should’ve been an adult. 
But he had been stuck alone with him for three weeks and all sense of logic seemed to fly out the window.
Alex moved the guitar to the coffee table with one hand and grabbed Michael’s neck with the other. He pulled him in for a much more heedless kiss that the first one. Michael made a soft noise of approval as his hands went to pull Alex closer by his hips.
Things moved fast. If it were a normal circumstance or a normal situation, Alex would’ve thought it was too fast. But this wasn’t normal and Alex couldn’t contain himself. He’d been thinking about this for days. Weeks. Probably even months.
He let Michael kiss down his neck, he helped strip them both down, he happily melted when he was finally being touched by someone that wasn’t himself.
He enjoyed every second.
-
Alex wished his horny brain had warned him that the next morning would feel weird.
He woke up first and laid there, frozen on the couch for thirty minutes because he was too scared to moved. Michael was laying on top of him partially, his head on his chest and his thigh draped against his hips. It was the first time Alex had ever actually seen him sleep and so he was too nervous to wake him.
In that hour, though, he was able to plan what he was going to say. He was going to assure him that it didn’t mean anything and that things happen. It was just circumstances. They could still be roommates. Going down on a guy didn’t make anyone gay. He had it all planned and fully expected a breakdown the moment Michael woke up and realized what happened. 
Only, again, he couldn’t have predicted what actually happened.
Michael woke up slowly, shifting a little bit and stretching his legs out. He didn’t jump or scream. He rubbed his thumb all the way from Alex’s nipple to his armpit and made a sweet waking-up sound before raising his head.
“Hi,” he said sweetly, his voice a little deeper than normal. It was jarring and Alex was trying to find the beginning of his speech. He was only more thrown off when Michael kissed his jaw and put his head back on his chest, seeming comfortable in their placement.
“Hey... Uh, maybe we should talk?” Alex said awkwardly. Only then did Michael seem to react, pushing himself up a little bit. He took in whatever expression happened to be on Alex’s face and sat up completely. Alex followed suit. “So, um, I’m sorry about last night. We’ve just been crammed together and stuff happens. I hope this doesn’t make it awkward between us. We can still be roommates.” Micahel’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion and, with each sentence of Alex’s speech, seemed to become more and more offended.
“What?” Michael asked, rubbing his face.
“I-I mean, don’t worry,” Alex assured, “What happened doesn’t make you gay and I hope you aren’t, like, weirded out by me.”
“Alex,” Michael said, voice matching the offended look as he held his hand up, “What the fuck are you talking about? Why are you acting like I wasn’t a fully engaged participant? Like, I did that on purpose, it wasn’t an ‘oops, tripped and fell onto your dick’.”
Alex gulped, shifting a bit as he began to feel offended. So he wasn’t wrong. Micahel had been leading him on.
“Okay, well, you can’t just act interested in me because you don’t have any girls to hook up with, that’s just—“
“Alex!” Michael said, cutting him off and looking at him with genuine hurt, “Why do you think I’m acting? What the fuck?”
Alex didn’t actually know what to say to that. He stared at him blankly, trying to think of a response that wouldn’t make this situation worse. But he figured he’d already ruined a soft morning by accusing him of things, so he might as well just say what he was thinking.
“You’re straight,” Alex said. Michael huffed a laugh, falling back into the couch and staring up at the ceiling.
“Why the hell do you think that?” Michael asked. Alex sat up pin-straight, looking at him in a whole different light by that one little sentence.
“You... You’ve only brought home girls,” Alex pointed out weakly.
“That’s just not true,” Michael said, looking over at him with amusement rather than anger. Alex relaxed a little. “Ari was a guy, you just didn’t see him, and Dylan was non-binary, you just didn’t see them either—and that’s just since we moved in together. You never saw anyone I brought over, Alex, don’t assume based on names I say and the way I look.”
Alex felt his face flush and he started feeling more than a little embarrassed. In fact, he was so embarrassed, he kind of wanted to cry. Or lay on the floor. Preferably both.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to,” he said, dropping his head into his hands. Michael sighed and shifted closer, his hand pressing into Alex’s shoulder.
“It’s okay. I’m honestly more concerned with how many allegedly straight guys you’ve hooked up with that you had a speech prepared,” Michael said. Alex laughed a little.
“I was the only gay guy in my high school, I got pretty used to it,” he admitted.
Michael clasped his hand over Alex’s shoulder and pulled him in for a hug. Alex melted into it, hoping that it meant he hadn’t embarrassed himself for life.
“I’m bisexual,” Michael said so confidently that it almost made Alex cry just by that alone. He was so sure of himself. 
“So does that mean you were flirting with me?” Alex asked when he got to courage to raise his head. Michael huffed a laugh.
“Wow, thanks for noticing.”
Alex groaned, “God, I’m embarrassed.”
“Don’t be. Just, you know, head’s up, next time we hook up, I’d prefer to have the speech be at least an hour after I wake up,” Michael said. Alex groaned louder. “What? No cute remark about me saying next time?”
Alex held back a smile and glared at the boy in front of him.
“I already know there will be a next time because we are still going to be stuck alone in this apartment for at least a couple more weeks. It’s after that that I’ll have questions,” Alex said.
“So confident for someone so embarrassed,” Michael teased. Alex raised an eyebrow that said ‘am I wrong?’ He got a kiss instead of a response. “Here, to balance out your embarrassment, I’ll admit a thing. The only reason I brought that many people over was because I wanted to see if you’d get jealous and make a move.”
“I don’t get jealous, I just get confused.”
“Noted,” Michael laughed, nudging his nose against Alex’s. It was so much touching, so much affection. Alex couldn’t remember a time anyone had done that to him in a non-platonic way. “Point is, I liked you the moment I met you.”
“Liz insisted you were straight so I kept my distance until I couldn’t because I didn’t wanna catch feelings.”
“Oops.”
“Yeah, oops.”
They both laughed for a few seconds before it slowly died down through Michael giving him full heart eyes. It made Alex’s heart go a little haywire.
“Okay, so now that we talked, can we have a redo of last night where you don’t think you’re getting head from a straight dude?” Michael asked. Alex flashed a smile and nodded.
Who knew something good would come out of this?
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yue-muffin · 4 years
Text
Time Raiders (2016)
Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3
In my quest to consume the entirety of the DMBJ franchise available in English, I have decided to start with the non-canon movie because at least this one has an ending, unlike the train wreck that is Reboot/Chongqi’s pacing. I will probably be bitter about that for all eternity, but I digress. I heard good things about the movie from the bird app, and as I am a Pingxie shipper at heart, I decided to finally watch this one.
P A R T O N E
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The cut-in animation to the title was gorgeous, I do so love the qilin in every adaptation. It’s particularly striking here with the gold outline and geometric, maze-like lines. It looks like the cards at the very beginning were being arranged in the image of this qilin.
My first reaction upon seeing white people in a dmbj adaptation is: oh no, the English, but I was pleasantly surprised to hear perfect English that matches the actor’s lips! What a miracle, haha. I remember The Lost Tomb 2 being the worst for how many lines had to be in English, sob.
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These look so cool. I see we start off with a good old “seeking immortality” antagonist, and an obsessed collector who has dedicated his whole life to this apparently. As usual, he is a scumbag threatening the locals.
The old guy’s accented English is also better than TLT2, ha. The breathy/nasal quality is not at all uncommon. I don’t know what language the locals speak though.
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Me, immediately: Zhang Qiling already??
I know he appears in rather early in TLT1, TLT2, and Reboot/Chongqi, but he’s so often mysteriously absent or stuck behind a gate (or in Reboot’s case, put on a bus) that I got excited, ok.
My favorite Zhang Qilings are the cold-looking pretty boy types in terms of my mental image of the character, but this one is also very easy on the eyes and as usual, unfazed in the face of danger coming at him with a knife. This is the only series in which I’m not bothered by the constant cast change between adaptations (unlike Ever Night), I suppose since it’s been this way from the start.
I’m interested in seeing how the backstories differ from canon. It’s actually rather interesting that this is pretty much an official AU, like that’s kind of wild as a concept. I’m used to the late 1990s/early 2000s anime adding new characters and changing plot points and endings everywhere, but Time Raiders takes it a step further.
Zhang Qiling being an ultra-competent badass who doesn’t even need a weapon to take the bad guys down never changes, no matter the universe. He steamrolls everyone, no questions asked.
Did he- he break the blade with his bare hands hahaha. Oh, yup, and a Zhang Qiling with a weapon is even more dangerous. I see those severed fingers. Such a good fight scene and we’re not even 5 minutes into the movie.
I love how he could have simply fired the arrow while he was still on the statue, then jumped down, but he had to be Extra and fire while he was jumping off haha.
It- the divine piece was right there?? By “beneath the statue” I would have thought it would at least be under it, not in a convenient little slot on the side of the altar area haha. So Zhang Qiling’s mission is to destroy the divine piece(s)? To, um, save the world apparently.
WHO ARE YOU? What an excellent question to ask a Zhang Qiling (and that staring into the mirror shot, too.)… I wonder if this one even knows - it’s possible he doesn’t have his signature amnesia here.
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Wait- a gate? I think it’s in a cave or something in the novels, but gates have significance in DMBJ. The cinematography is really nice in these mountain shots. I know nothing about film, but I like the shots in the snowy mountains.
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This Zhang Qiling knows and practices martial arts on screen! You would think he’d pull some moves normally, but in the drama-adaptations he tends to just beat people up as efficiently as possible. Sometimes with his sword. Other times he just fights ‘em. I have to admit Jing Boran looks excellent going through some forms. He nailed the force and power underlying every movement, then exploding outward with a strike. I do like the impression it leaves.
I, on the other hand, am an absolute noodle and look ridiculous when I do martial arts.
What in the world is happening in this flashback scene with the weird CGI qilin. Ah, it’s when he received his tattoo. That was super dramatic.
Wushanju is looking real edgy with the heavy iron gate on the interior, haha.
He is puzzling (ha!) over those cards so intensely you’d think it was a thousand piece puzzle instead haha. You’re almost there! Just a few more to finish the qilin!
Aw, is this our Wu Xie? Haha his facial hair is- hm. But I love his voice it’s so soft. Really fits that “Mr. Naive” vibe.
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Is that. Is that the author of the series. I found out that he makes cameos in almost all (if not all of) the adaptations!
NO. ONLY I CAN FINISH THE PUZZLE. HANDS OFF BUDDY.
Why are there so many pigeons in here. Who let them inside.
A writer, who came to hear his story and turn it into a novel- HA yup it’s the author.
“This should be a story about me and him.”
Ahh I’m loving it already. DMBJ is the ultimate bromance story. Fair warning, I do ship Pingxie so my shipper goggles will be on throughout the movie. But even without shipping, you do have to admit the series is a bromance underneath all the mystery – between the Iron Triangle, between Wu Xie and Xiaoge.
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This Wu Xie is a photographer and that is sort of adorable. Already there’s a theme emerging of needing to record events and telling stories. Interesting that he wants to turn his memories into a novel to record his experiences, because otherwise he’s afraid those memories might turn into a mere story in his own head. Wu Xie, that’s a worrying mindset.
Those ancient mask things always make me crack up, I don’t know why.
Ooh, background about Wu Xie’s birth into the Wu family. I’ve never read up to the part in the books where they go into his place in the family in detail. To be fair, his grandfather had three sons and only one of them had any kids – and Wu Xie is his parents’ only child. So, he becomes the only one who can really carry on the family legacy. Aw, I really like seeing his extended family present though! In the dramas we only ever get either his Second or Third Uncle, and he rarely ever mentions his parents even though they’re alive.
And there’s his namesake! The origin of his nickname, and the irony once the story gets into the Sha Hai timeline.
Wu Xie was a bit of a rascal as a kid, haha. To be fair he has a pretty sharp tongue in the novels and is mostly a pure cinnamon roll in the early dramas.
Little Wu Xie in a suit is so adorable. Nooo kid don’t go into locked up abandoned places. He’s already so adventurous haha. Seems that it’s not actually abandoned judging by all the lights on, but.
UH. MASKED MAN BEHIND YOU. I think he wants that item back. This is why you don’t go into abandoned places, kid. He definitely does not learn his lesson though. Also why are you still holding onto that thing, just drop it, I think he wants it back.
Haha he kept one of the coins.
WOAH. Every month someone in your family dies?? That’s uh- sort of traumatic. Also that would be a really good first line for a novel…Just saying. I do love the singing though.
Oh, the Nine Families exist in this universe too! They even give a quick explanation about the ranking system.
Oh yeah, I love how Wu Xie is such a nerd for all this knowledge of ancient texts and tombs. And YES HE FINALLY DOCUMENTS STUFF FOR ONCE.
Uncle Three looked dead for a moment there, scared the shit out of me too.
VAMPIRE MOTHS? Oh I hate bugs I would not be okay lol. WHOOPS. You guys are really good at reading ancient texts on the fly lol.
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That’s the mask he has in the beginning of the film, isn’t it. NO DON’T TOUCH THINGS IN TOMBS. AHHH. So you just put it on your face?? Well that was a stupidly simple way to open the door. I’m guessing the creator didn’t care if anyone opened it.
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This guy just severed his own arm, ok…and how many years later is his hand still clinging to it? UH. THIS IS WHY YOU DON’T TOUCH THINGS IN TOMBS. Then he proceeds to steal the box thing.
Ah the white dude again. I am so happy there is GOOD ENGLISH though haha.
Oh, hi Zhang Qiling. Just hanging out on a rooftop I see.
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He looks so melancholy. Someone give him a hug! This adaptation makes him more human, less stoic robotic superhuman, I noticed. You rarely see him eat or drink anything in the other adaptations, but here he’s just chilling on a rooftop having some drinks haha. It’s ok. I love all the Zhang Qilings.
WHAT THE HELL, LIGHTNING? What the hell is this high tech machinery haha. Eight days? Coincidentally eight days after sitting in a tomb for how many years.
That is a very Extra bookcase to hold a book that apparently has ALL the secrets.
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WOW that is a fancy notebook. It looks so beat up in the other versions haha. In this one, it even gets its own hidden shelf in a giant portable bookshelf!
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The props for this franchise are so cool and detailed. I always wish they would show more of the creative process in the BTS, I’m such a nerd for that stuff. The Longest Day in Chang’an was pretty good at that, which is half of my enjoyment of that show haha!
I’m also still pleasantly surprised they bothered to incorporate other languages. I’m not sure what the Snake Lady and the old man in the beginning were speaking, but at least the English is good.
I can’t believe they worked in a steampunk chastity belt this movie went all out, huh. Also with these weirdly high tech structures and lightning and moving tomb structures.
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And all the pieces start coming together! So that’s why it’s believed they hold the secret to immortality. What a steampunk-looking key.
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Is that a writing desk??
Oh, they’re getting a team together to go tomb raiding! Ha, forget money! You may or may not end up dying on this adventure, so who cares about money, right.
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He’s so cute standing there with his camera. Look at the little smile as he watches everything going on!
It’s a desk and a storage container?? Oh, there are ~qualifications~ to going on tomb raiding. Makes sense. That is the oddest looking sword.
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Must appreciate Zhang Qiling’s fingers in every adaptation. They look very strong and steady here. Let’s not talk about the slooow trailing across the handle.
Wow did you really just throw sand in his face. Have we not learned not to mess with Zhang Qiling after he trounced that first guy who attacked him. I love the fight scenes so much after the bore-fest that was Reboot/Chongqi’s second half of Season 1.
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Super pretty, but why did it cause him to stop and stare in the middle of the fight?
This is like a Final Fantasy sword haha. Also I think you should stop while you’re ahead, why did you think a table would stop this dude. (Hey, it’s Da Kui! He was in the novel but not TLT1.).
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It’s HERE. Their first meeting. How did he know the coin was on that cord? It wasn’t visible, I don’t think. But uh. That was a hilarious move on his part, he is so Extra?? He just casually flicks the necklace off with his big-ass sword and it drops into his hand. Then casually goes “oh, here, you dropped this” as if he wasn’t the one responsible for it coming off in the first place!!
HERE IT COMES. The unnecessarily long eye contact. Pingxie in every adaptation needs a Staring Into Your Eyes scene.
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Real smooth.
Ahh this Wu Xie is such a cutie. He’s like a puppy.
WHAT. Third Uncle, I can’t believe you let him tag along so easily haha. In the beginning he was scolding Wu Xie to never get involved in tomb business, then what happens? They’re going tomb raiding!!
Next Up: to the tomb we go! This can’t end badly or anything what are you talking about.
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elareine · 5 years
Text
Met a boy (cute as can be) (TimKon)
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Never in his life would Tim have expected to enjoy this holiday as much as he did. In fact, when his father had proposed the getaway—to get to know his son again, come to terms with the whole Robin thing—he had been violently opposed. Even when Bruce told him that he should go, that it would be good for him, Tim had expected the whole thing to be boring. Sure, the beach was nice, but there was nothing to do. What was he supposed to do? Talk to his dad?
Good joke.  
All that changed when he met the boy that was staying in the hut next to them. Conner Kent. “Call me Con,” he’d told Tim when they’d met. They had bonded immediately over being miserable here. Apparently, Con had been forced by parent/big brother-figure (Tim hadn’t quite understood that relationship) to come along on a family trip. According to him, it was just awkward, so he tried to be out of the house most of the day. Tim still hadn’t met that family, though he didn’t mind.
It meant that he got to have Con all for himself.
He was just so cool. Like Han Solo, but somehow better, because he was also a total nerd. Con was into comics and superheroes, and he listened to Tim ramble off trivia just to counter with his own. It was the best.
They could spend hours sitting together at the docks, just watching something on Tim’s tablet or chatting. Time passed so quickly. Ever since he had become Robin, Tim appreciated the sunset as the time his day really began. Now, watching it set over the horizon with Con, it gained a whole new meaning.
Con yawned, then stretched his arms above him.
“Tired already?” Tim teased.
“Nah,” Con grinned, letting his arm fall down and across Tim’s back casually. “Just stiff from having to bend down to your level all the time.”
Tim would totally elbow him for that if he weren’t so distracted by how warm Con’s hand was on his skin. Tim shuddered.
“Cold?”
“A little.”
Annoyingly, that made Conner pull away. Tim forgave him for it, though, when he took off his jacket and wrapped it around Tim’s shoulders, instead. “Better?”
“Yeah. Thanks.” It was really difficult to sound casual while trying not to vibrate out of your skin with excitement. Con had given him his jacket! He was wearing Con’s jacket! And it was all big and warm and smelled like him. This was the best evening of Tim’s life.
Con smiled down at him and put his arm back around Tim. “Sure thing.”
This was romantic, right? Sunsets, Con’s jacket, holding him in his arm… There was no way this was friendly. Tim really, really hoped this wasn’t friendly.
“Hey, Tim?”
“Hmm?” Tim turned toward his friend, just to see Con close his eyes and move in for a kiss.
Holy shit. Tim had read about this. Like, a lot. Okay, so he had gone down an obsessive Google spree, trying to figure out how this whole kissing thing worked so he wouldn’t make a fool out of himself.
There had been nothing to worry about. They moved together, if not smoothly, then sweetly, and Tim had to pull away to giggle against Con’s mouth a bit.
“Yeah?” Conner asked, his smile blinding.
“Yeah.” Tim nodded. “Like, so much yeah.”
“Awesome.” Con kissed him again, and Tim thought he was gonna melt.
Best. Vacation. Ever.
When he woke up the next morning, Tim was in his bed, and Con was gone.
Well, that was disappointing. Tim wouldn’t have minded a good morning kiss at all. Still, the idea of Con carrying him home made up for a lot of that, and it was with a spring in his step that he got dressed and went to grab some breakfast.
“Someone’s up early,” his father chuckled. “What’s gotten you all excited.”
Tim forced himself to slow down, shrug. He wasn’t ready to share this with his father, yet. “Nothing much. Just looking forward to going to the beach with Con, I guess.”
His step-mother looked up from her paper. “Oh, Tim, didn’t you know? I saw Mr. Kent this morning, and he mentioned that they would have to catch an early flight home.”
Tim’s sandwich dropped to the floor. “What? When?”
“Over an hour ago? I think they were leaving for the airport as we spoke.”
His father frowned. “A flight? But there’s a storm—”
Tim didn’t hear him. He was already out of the door and on his skateboard. Maybe, if he was quick enough, he could say goodbye.
He knew he was too late when he entered the one terminal of the small airport and found it basically empty. Still—there was a single plane outside. Maybe there was hope yet. Tim ran up to the single luggage attendant present.
“When does the flight to Metropolis leave?” he asked. “My friend is on there, and he forgot something very important.”
The attendant looked at him strangely. “There’s no flight to Metropolis today.”
“But—but he said—what airports are on your list for today?” Tim demanded. Maybe the Kents hadn’t taken a direct flight.  
But she shook her head. “No, you misunderstand. Flights are closed today because of the storm.”
“The storm? Oh, right.” Tim had completely forgotten about that. “But then—”
There was pity in the attendant’s gaze now. “Sorry. Maybe your friend got something mixed up.”
Tim deflated. “Yeah. Maybe.” It didn't matter, either way. Con was gone.
It was only when he was back at his family’s hut that he realized just how dire the situation was. He tellingly, stupidly, didn’t even know Con’s, like, Instagram handle or something. There were a dozen ‘Conner Kent’s on Facebook, but none of them was Tim’s. There was no way for Tim to get in contact with him. In desperation, he changed his own profile to public and even started posting regularly—anything to make him easier to find.
But there were no messages from his handsome boy with warm hands.
So Tim sulked.
Even Bruce noticed when he came back to his Robin duties. When he introduced him to the idea of forming a group of teenage superheroes called “Young Justice,” Tim suspected that was his way of cheering him up. Still, he agreed.
What he wasn’t prepared for was for Superman’s clone to look a whole lot familiar.
“Hi, I’m Superboy. Conner, or Kon-el, or whatever.” Con looked bored and distant, so unlike the boy Tim had gotten to know that summer.
Well. Tim knew how to change that. He held out a hand. “Robin.”
He watched as Conner’s eyes widened at the sound of his voice, and grinned.
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