#by forcing the earth's core . Which is a heart . to keep beating even though it's pretty much dead. Imagine male salmon after mating seaso

[eebie]

oo you wanna say literally every thought you've ever had about your ocs soo bad (wants to know what their deal is)

ugouguhghhgnnnghhhhh ^ My thoughts on them

[vincess-princess]

in darkness shall you be reborn

Chapter 6

Word count: 3019 Warnings: none (for once lmao) A\N: this will probably be my last update for the month because i have exams coming, sorry :( and, of course, i'm not the author of the shanty mentioned in the chapter

By dinner, a generous share of warm beer and several bitter puffs of a cigarette that Mick forced through his teeth brought Vince back onto the sinful earth. He obediently followed Mick’s orders and fussed around in the kitchen, though wrenching even a single word out of him was rotten work. Neither Mick nor Tommy who dropped by the galley to “check when the dinner is ready” got a clear picture of what had happened: a few listless hand waves, barely noticeable head shakes and one eye roll at an especially bad joke were all they could get. Nikki was just as unwilling to share the details, apart from several curse words, and by dinner drank himself into oblivion. Which was probably a mistake on his side, because the upcoming day was expected to be quite turbulent – they were finally going to arrive to Port Royal and dump the captives and most of the goods into the grabby hands of local barons. The crew looked forward to it, having spent weeks at sea, and loudly and happily talked about their plans, which primarily consisted of girls and ale, during the dinner. Listening to them made Vince’s heart ache – he too wanted to lose himself in the warm embrace of a girl and a bottle of wine flavored with spices. But he knew he most likely would not be let out without supervision, or would simply be confined to the galley. Still, an inkling of hope in him persisted.

The nights in the Atlantic Ocean were always warm, but as the ship went southwards they were becoming more hot and humid, so the crew spent most of their time on deck instead of hiding in the wardroom. Vince didn’t like the idea of spending the night outside – he always heard that night air could make one sick, what if he caught a cold? – but staying in the galley was not an option. Provident Mick did not risk to leave him there alone, not with so many knives around that he could see attracted Vince like a mouse to cheese in a trap. Mick could see almost everything with his icy-blue eyes that penetrated Vince’s soul to its very core. Vince only hoped he couldn’t read his thoughts – he wanted to keep at least some part of him to himself.

Mick played his guitar on the deck that evening, and all the sailors passing past him slowed down or stopped in their tracks outright to listen to the quiet, haunting melodies that gradually evolved into heavy beats of such power the strings rang and wailed as if on the verge of breaking. Most songs Vince couldn’t recognize – of course, Mick wasn’t playing anything he typically heard in operas and at concerts. But some sounded familiar; Vince might have heard his men singing them while working on deck while he was in his cabin supposedly dealing with business. In reality, though, he often abandoned boring papers to press his ear to the door and listen to hoarse, powerful voices sing unevenly but with refreshing sincerity. No opera or choir could ever imitate the rawness and liveliness of such simple tunes sung by such simple folk.

One of them was just flowing from under Mick’s bony fingers. It was mostly beats and clapping rather than actual melody, but the sound intertwined so naturally with the winds howling around and the waves crushing at the bow of the ship that any professional music would sound out of place – fake, even.

Mick saw Vince tap the rhythm with his foot on the floor and raised an eyebrow. “You know the tune?”

Vince half-nodded, half-shrugged. He heard his crew sing it, and sometimes sang it quietly to himself when alone in his cabin. He was a decent singer – or he wanted to believe he was – but he couldn’t join his crew in it for fear of losing their high regard for him. He was of noble blood, after all, and did not belong among simple folk.

“How come? This ain’t what they play in operas, or wherever your kind goes to have some fun,” Tommy chimed in, unasked.

“Heard my crew sing it,” Vince replied reluctantly. These were one of the only words he said over the evening.

“Did you like it?” Mick asked, glaring at Tommy.

Vince shrugged again. Any weakness he had, any secret aspirations he nursed the pirates would target before everything else, because it hurt the hardest. Better not reveal his soft spots to them at all.

“Well, not like he’s got much of a choice. Don’t have a choir here, princess.” Tommy plopped onto the same bench that Vince sat on. It was a bit too short for three people at once, but Tommy unceremoniously squeezed in anyways, swaying his hips to fit on the narrow plank. His hand immediately slid onto Vince’s knee. Vince slapped it away, only for it to return, this time feeling his thigh. He was too tired to argue, so he let it be.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’,” Mick concluded. “T-bone, you remember the ‘All For Me Grog’ lyrics?”

“Of course,” Tommy grinned. “What, are we throwing a party for the newcomer?”

“Jesus, Tommy, give the guy a break,” Mick rolled his eyes. “Now, why don’t you put your mouth to good use and sing for us? The night is terribly quiet.”

“Not a problem, boss. Hey, everyone!” Tommy called out to the crew. “What do ya think of a little song break?”

The pirates cheered, dropping whatever they were doing and surrounding Tommy, Mick and Vince. They still stared at Vince like he was an exotic animal, but at least they didn’t look hungry. Only one person, a long-haired ginger sailing master, remained unphased, gripping at the helm like his life depended on it.

“All For Me Grog, everyone!” Mick declared and began tapping out the rhythm on his guitar. Almost immediately, Tommy began to sing.

He had a good voice, Vince had to admit. A little bit hoarse from all the cigarettes smoked, perhaps, but it only added to its charm.

Where are me boots, me noggin', noggin' boots, They're all gone for beer and tobacco, he sang, and his voice rang all across the ship and farther, drowning in deep black waters of the Atlantic Ocean. For the heels they are worn out and the toes are kicked about And the soles are looking out for better weather,

Well it's all for me grog, me jolly jolly grog, It's all for me beer and tobacco-

The crew joined for the chorus, croaky, husky voices interweaving together into a low, steady rumble. As much as Vince didn’t want to admit it, the sound forced goosebumps to run down his back.

For I spent all me tin on the lassies drinking gin, they sang as Tommy winked at Vince and squeezed his knee harder. Far across the western ocean I must wander.

Where is me shirt, me noggin', noggin' shirt, It's all gone for beer and tobacco, For the collar is all worn, and the sleeves they are all torn, And the tail is looking out for better weather.

I'm sick in the head and I haven't been to bed, Since first I came ashore from me slumber, For I spent all me dough on the lassies don't you know, Far across the western ocean I must wander.

As the singing faded, an unnatural silence broken only by the sound of waves descended onto the ship. The pirates stood still for a few moments, looking yet not seeing one another, their thoughts far away. At home with a wife waiting for them, or in a pub drinking with buddies, or in bed with hot fingers of a hooker all over their bodies… what else did people like them, always on the move, always hiding from the law, long for?

Well, at least Vince knew damn well what he wanted – to get away from this goddamn ship. And the inkling of hope inside him that he had no heart to suppress whispered to him that he could only hope to pull it off tomorrow. He needed to be alert and prepared – to seize the opportunity when it comes. Not if. When.

“Great, everyone, now back to work!” Tommy clapped his hands, and the silence was broken by shuffling of boots on the deck and indecipherable murmuring. “You too!” he poked Vince in the chest. “The dishes ain’t gonna wash themselves. Come on, come on, I’ll help you carry them.” With that, he pushed a tray in Vince’s hands and began piling up plates on it. Vince narrowed his eyes at him, trying to catch his gaze, but the first mate was terribly occupied with fitting as many plates onto the tray as possible. Since when Tommy was so eager to help him do the dirty work?

Of course, it wasn’t just out of kindness of Tommy’s heart. When they entered the galley, he slammed the door shut and turned to Vince. His angry frown made Vince clutch the tray tighter, as if it could help him should Tommy want to hurt him, although Vince couldn’t recall anything he did lately that would make the first mate dissatisfied with him.

“What the hell did you do to Nikki?” Tommy demanded.

“What are you talking about?” Vince forced himself to let go of the tray and upended it above the tub, accidentally splashing the muddy water on his pants. “Oh, fiddlesticks!”

Tommy snorted and his frown evened out slightly. “Jesus, if anyone else hears you say that you are gonna get your ass beaten. Just say ‘damn’ like everyone else.”

“I’ll have my fiddlesticks, thanks.” Vince grabbed a towel from the counter and tried to sop up the water on his clothes, silently hoping that Tommy would drop the topic and leave him alone. To no avail, unfortunately.

“Asking nicely for the last time,” Tommy stepped forward, towering over Vince in his high-heeled boots. How did he even walk in those on the always-swaying deck? “What happened?”

“Why do you care?” Vince snapped back. “Are you policing his sex life or something? Pervert.”

“I couldn’t care less about where he sticks his dick as long as his nose doesn’t fall off. But I do care about our business, and he’s lying there out cold surrounded by empty bottles. I talked to him in the morning – everything was normal. You leave his cabin, and he drinks himself into oblivion and refuses to show up on deck or even open the door. What the hell happened?” Tommy reached forward and squeezed Vince’s shoulder, not letting him back off.

Upon learning that Nikki hadn’t told anyone about Vince’s breakdown relief washed over him. Knew Tommy about it, the entire crew would have already been snickering and whispering around Vince, and for a reason. Going into a fit of panic when told to undress, like some hysterical nun who’d never seen a dick in her life, wasn’t quite what Vince wanted to be known for. Sure, everybody already knew he was Nikki’s toy, but he could at least carry that unflattering status with as much pride as it was possible to have in this situation.

“What do you think?” he said through gritted teeth. “Do you think he wanted to play poker with me or something?”

“Sure he didn’t. But I know him, and this ain’t how he behaves after sex, so I can only assume he hasn’t had any. Which is weird, because he always gets what he wants, even from bitches like you. What did you do to him?”

“Ask rather what he did to me.” Vince turned away demonstratively and reached for a sponge. “Maybe it’s his conscience finally waking up.”

“Hah, nothing of this kind in that asshole,” Tommy brushed him off with a chuckle. “Listen, I’m not gonna leave you alone until you tell me.”

“Then you’ll be spending a night here,” Vince didn’t retreat, plunging the sponge into muddy water, pursing his lips in disgust when his hand touched some food remains. “Maybe he’s upset I drank that premium whisky of his.”

“He gave you his premium whisky? You lucky son of a bitch!” Tommy almost jumped, his eyes lighting up. “Can’t imagine how well you sucked him off to get that. So all it takes is just offering you some booze? I have some vodka stashed somewhere-”

A plate almost crashed against his head – he managed to duck at the last second, and it broke against the wall instead. Vince didn’t have enough time to fling another plate – Tommy tackled him to the floor instead.

“Let me go,” Vince hissed, wriggling underneath him.

“I will, if you ain’t gonna throw more plates at me”.

“I will, if you cut that talk.”

“Well, we’ll stay like this then.” Tommy shrugged. “So that was all a show the first time? Are you more pliable one-by-one, or was that the booze?”

“Neither. I’ve drunk beverages a hundred times better than that whisky. And no, that wasn’t a show.”

“Hard to believe, princess.” Tommy pinched his cheek. “But you’ve got a grain of truth somewhere, I admit. Nikki wouldn’t react like that to a good blowjob.” He finally rolled off Vince and plopped down onto his sleeping place, his legs alone half of the room’s length, and patted the place next to him on the blanket. After a little hesitation Vince moved there too, solely because the floor was too cold.

“So, now that we’re comfortable and cozy, will you fuckin’ tell me what happened?” Tommy pressed on. Vince tried not to touch his body, but he could feel heat radiating from it even at a distance. “With as many details as possible. I won’t jerk off on it, I promise. At least in your presence.”

“Nothing much,” Vince shook his head again. “Nothing to jerk off to - we didn’t even have sex.”

“Well, that’s a shame,” Tommy looked disappointed. “I hoped for a juicy story. How come Nikki didn’t fuck you again? I know he wanted to – he’s been talking about you all night not letting me sleep in peace - and I doubt you are eloquent enough to talk him out of that.”

“I might be,” Vince got offended. Did Tommy think he had been taking all his rhetoric classes for nothing? “But words wouldn’t help there. They didn’t help me yesterday, after all.”

Tommy ignored Vince’s full-of-disdain look.

“How’d you squeeze the whisky out of him then? You don’t look like the type – and even if you did, I doubt you could get it with force. Nikki’s just as good at hand-to-hand combat as with a sword.”

Tommy didn’t lie, still looking fully determined to wring the answer out of him, and Vince gave up, not ready to listen to his nagging for the rest of the night. But even remembering what happened from a safe distance of the galley still made a lump form in his throat and his heart beat faster. He was so tired of all this. Even the pride he was clutching at like a drowning man to a raft seemed less important than just being left alone. Besides, everyone on the ship already knew he was Nikki’s bitch, so what difference would it make to have that happen twice?

“He started undressing me, and I kind of… began to suffocate. I don’t know what happened – everything was blurry and I couldn’t breathe. And then he pours this whisky into my mouth and sends me away. That’s all.”

Tommy stayed silent for a minute or two, which in his case was more frightening than when he talked all the time.

“Just don’t tell anyone,” Vince added hastily. “I mean, not that there’s much of a reputation to ruin for me, but still.”

“I won’t,” Tommy said after a few seconds of pondering over it, “but not because of you. Because of him. They might consider it a weakness.”

In other circumstances Vince wouldn’t believe him, but now it was different. Tommy spoke without a usual hint of mockery in his voice and looked more serious than Vince had ever seen him over the short period on the Shout. So he was inclined to believe him – or at least hope that he wouldn’t spill the beans intentionally.

“Still, thank you.”

“You’re welcome, princess. By the way, I just now realized I don’t even know your name. I know you’re a Wharton because we found papers in the captain’s cabin, but not much more than that.”

“Vincent Neil,” Vince said after a short pause. Maybe now he would start calling him by his name instead of giving him womanly nicknames? “I don’t suppose anyone here will call me that, so just Vince will do.”

“Alright, princess Vinnie,” Tommy grinned (no, this was a hopeless case) and then, unexpectedly, stretched his hand forward. “Nice to meet you.”

Vince stared at it like it was an exotic and extremely venomous snake somebody just suggested he pet. But seconds passed and Tommy’s hand didn’t waver, and Vince decided he didn’t want to decline this extremely rare demonstration of respect he was so unexpectedly offered.

“Can’t say it’s mutual, sorry.” He shook Tommy’s hand.

Tommy burst into laughter. “That was harsh! Didn’t you have your etig- etiqa- good behavior lessons in your childhood?”

“Etiquette, you mean? It’s useless outside social events. No one cares which fork you use for fish and which for salad here.”

“Wait, you use different forks for different dishes? Man, that’s crazy. How’d you remember all that? And what a pain in the ass it must be to wash all of them!”

“I never remembered anything even after all my lessons,” Vince smiled faintly. “Always thought it to be stupid, honestly.”

“Well, at least here we’re on the same page,” Tommy nodded and got up. “Now, you have work to do, and who am I to interrupt you?”

“Bastard,” Vince murmured to his back. Tommy jerked his shoulder, but chose to ignore the insult and hurried out of the galley.

[sserpente]

Seeds of Doubt

Synopsis: Months and months after grieving in your home realm Asgard, when you find out that Loki, the man you had promised to marry one day is still alive, you accompany Thor to Earth to bring him back to his senses. Your strong feelings for one another overwhelm you and you join the God of Mischief on his conquest to become a fearsome king. Together, you survive the strongest storms. Together, you win every battle. Together, you rule Midgard. As the sceptre’s steel grip on you becomes stronger and stronger, both Loki and you fall into a tyrannical frenzy feeding off of the fear of your mortal subjects and only once the sceptre is taken out of your reach do you begin to doubt your ways. What will be stronger in the end? Will it be the power of the mind stone… or your unconditional love?

A/N: Here it finally is! This is the 20k Follower Special! It’s a personalised Imagine written for @nebulousfishgills​ who won! ♥ The Reader in this story has a name, a specific appearance, traits and characteristics, so it’s a little different than usual! Enjoy, everyone! ♥

Words: 10469 Warnings: Loki wins!AU, Dark!Loki, Dark!Reader, Dom!Loki, mentions of slavery, violence, murder and gore; torture, dystopian universe, smut, dub-con, angst, mild exhibitionism

“Where is he?” Your voice echoed through the hall like a mother’s desperate scream for her child. They found him. Hysteria spread in your chest like a parasite, your feeble attempts to swallow down your worry for the man you loved all but fruitless. Your green cape—a homage to Loki—fluttered behind you like you were riding a tidal wave ready to destroy everything in its path. Perhaps you were. Perhaps today was the day you were going to hold the people who wronged him accountable for it and perhaps soon, you would finally hold each other again.

His death had ruined you. Day in and out, Frigga would find you crying in the library grieving the love of your life all the while Thor undid the damage they blamed on Loki, hiding in the very same spot he had spent most of his time in to read in peace, knowing that his tactless brother would hardly seek out a place of pure knowledge and wisdom.

The Queen knew better than to tell. Heads would roll if the kingdom found out about your tears, regardless of how inseparable Loki and you had always been. No one but him had ever seen you cry and you took pride in keeping it that way.

As of right now, your concern and anger overwhelmed the numbing sadness. Had you not overheard the einherjars’ heated conversation about the lost prince having returned from the dead and wreaking havoc somewhere you could not be a part of it, you might have never learned that Loki was alive until they brought him back and… and what?

Something was wrong, you could feel it in the very core of your being. Clenching your fists, you barged further into the throne room unannounced, ignoring the weak protests of the guards. Each of your steps was confident, calculated—even though there was a part of you that was on the verge of tears.

“Amnerys…” Thor spoke your name as if it belonged to a child caught with its hand in the cookie jar.

“Where is he, Thor?!” You spat through gritted teeth, narrowing your blue eyes at him.

The God of Thunder took a deep breath. “He is on Earth.”

“Midgard? What is he doing on Midgard?”

“Heimdall witnessed him entering the realm through a portal and slaughtering innocents. He means to rule the mortals as their king.” Odin said. Your heart skipped a beat. Loki… your sweet, loving, caring, perceptive and mischievous Loki, your mirror…

“This is not right. Loki would not… not like this.”

“It matters not,” Odin continued unfazed, “Thor will be sent to Midgard to put an end to his childish schemes and he will face trial for the damage and chaos he has caused across Yggdrasil.” No, he will not. You glared at him. Had you treated him differently, he would never have been tempted to throw a foreign realm into an absolute monarchy in the first place.

“I demand to come with him.”

“You, Amnerys? You wish to accompany Thor to Earth?” Incredulousness swung in Odin’s voice, his white eyebrows raised ever so slightly. He clenched his spear when you stood your ground, lifting your chin as if nothing was about to stop you—and nothing was, as a matter of fact.

“You know who he was to me. This is the least you owe me, your majesty.”

~*~

Odin knew. He knew you were not to mess with and he knew that it was solely Loki’s death that had kept you at bay. He would never admit it but your intelligence intimidated him. You could be dangerous if only you wanted to. Odin had learned during your early childhood already that keeping you close to the palace meant to remain safer than banishing you to a foreign realm where you would plot revenge until he fell. An eye for an eye. You would only ever treat the people who wronged you like that.

Dark magic was still sizzling in your blood when the clouds spat you both out and sent you flying through the crisp air, right until Thor slung his arm around your waist and brought his hammer down into utter nothingness, enveloped by heavy rainclouds and blinding lightning bolts in the distance.

You hit the roof of an aeroplane or something of the like. Mortal technology was beyond your comprehension, for neither Loki nor you required a machine to fly if you could simply transform into a bird and take to the skies.

“Don’t back down now, hammer boy.” You yelled across the stormy wind. Thor shot you a meaningful look, even more so when the hatch opened and you both jumped.

Loki. His eyes widened when his brother marched towards him like a bilgesnipe all the while an invisible force appeared to rip your heart right out of your chest only to mend it with the soft hands of relief. Loki’s gaze met yours, blue locking with blue and your souls intertwining like eager fingers.

Thor jumped and you followed, leaving the dumbfounded mortals behind.

Your digits were tingling with seidr as you landed on the cliff, your nails digging into the relentless rock to your feet. Thor was nowhere to be seen, not until you heard his battle cry in the distant forest. Odin would have expected you to help him but that was not what you were here for. You only had eyes for him.

“Loki…” His lips parted and several painful heartbeats passed in which he observed you like the antique paintings in the palace library. Doubtfully. What was it he expected to see? Your grief had made your round face grow older and your skin even paler than it already was and yet, you were still the same woman with blue eyes and those chestnut brown hair he used to love burying his fingers in.

“Are you real?” His voice was weak, wary. Frowning, you stepped closer to him, close enough for him to reach out and touch you. Loki was frozen on the spot like an ice sculpture in the deepest winter of Jötunheim.

“What? Of course I’m real.” You never noticed the tears swimming in your eyes until you took one final step and lifted your chin to look him in the eye. You were tall, taller than the average mortal woman and still, Loki towered above you like a true king. Like the true king he used to be before Odin and Thor drove him to attempted suicide.

He looked older, and colder. Worn out. Your voice was but a mere whisper, your palm cupping his right cheek. “What happened to you?”

Loki swallowed, making you gasp when his hand wrapped around your wrist. The moment he blinked was the moment you threw yourself into his arms. Inhaling his unique scent, this delectable mixture of molten metal, ice and leather, you pressed your face against his chest with your eyes closed, bathing in his presence and his touch, both of which you had missed more than anything in all of the nine realms.

The first, desperate sob escaped your lips when he hugged you back and rested his chin on your shoulder, burying his face in the crook of your neck.

“I missed you so much… I thought I had lost you forever.”

“You did not.” He replied, his lips against your chestnut hair.

“Why… why did you not contact me? Where were you?”

“Contacting you would have put you in danger. It was for the best you believed me dead.”

“Was it?” You raised your voice. “Was it really? Do not patronise me, Loki, you know very well I can hold a candle to you.”

“Yes…” He pondered. “I know that.” Silence. Uncomfortable and peaceful at the very same time, you both stood there as if there was a canyon between you, lost time you had to make up for.

“Have you got any idea how much I suffered without you?” You continued, your voice shaking.

His expression hardened. “Did Odin harm you?”

“No. No, he wouldn’t dare lay a finger on me. I was mourning, Loki. When you died… a part of me died with you and now… now I feel like it is coming back to me.”

His blue eyes locked with yours. “Join me.”

“W-what? Loki… I came to take you home with me.”

The God of Mischief shook his head bitterly. “Asgard was never truly my home, now was it?”

“It’s the place you grew up in, the place you know better than any other… the place where you met me. Is that not enough? Odin will not live forever. We will be free, Loki.”

“Yes,” he breathed hoarsely, “We will be free. With this.” Seidr tickled his palm, enveloping his hand in a beam of green light to reveal the sceptre.

“He will have me executed for this—you know this.”

“But you don’t want this. Midgard… why would you want to rule the mortals?”

Loki did not respond and yet his glance spoke volumes. Something is wrong, I can feel it.

“Why won’t you tell me?” You chirped, hot tears worsening your sight once more. If your cheeks were wet and reddened, you never noticed. Then, his expression hardened once more.

“But I am. This is it, my sweet Amnerys, my triumph. I will rule, I will be powerful and I will prove myself a worthy king. Is this not what we always dreamed of as children?”

“It is. Loki, it is… but…” But what? He was back. Loki was alive and you could not care less about the mortals’ fate if only he would never leave your side again. Loki was your soulmate and you were his.

This was wrong. You knew it was wrong and yet… the urge to give yourself to him rose with every single heartbeat.

“Join me.” He repeated. A disarming smirk played on his lips, even though it did not quite reach his eyes. “Be my queen.”

You gasped for air, your hesitation dissolving like moist fog in a spring forest. By the time Thor returned with the mortal wrapped in metal, you had gone.

~*~

5 years later

Loki chuckled at the words he himself had written, his fingers entangled with yours and his thumb stroking the back of your hand. Propping his chin up with his free hand, he watched the hilarious play unfold on the small stage he’d had built. The actors were sweating, yet a look into their terrified and helpless eyes proved it was not the warm stage light increasing their body temperature.

Loki had executed three actors over the past week because they had failed to please him and play their part convincingly. Naturally, they had all played the parts of Thor, albeit a humiliated and weak version of the God of Thunder who was currently in exile.

You still remembered the day of victory like it was yesterday, the adrenaline and the rush of power coursing through your veins like liquid fire. The Chitauri had overpowered the Avengers almost too soon for your entertainment. A few of them, Thor, the redhead Natasha Romanoff and the green beast they called the Hulk remained alive, plotting revenge and assassinations.

Not one month went by in which Loki and you did not publically execute a hitman or a hitwoman, and yet their feeble attempts to murder their king and queen were all but pathetic. Only the fewest made it past the heavily guarded entrance doors of what used to be Stark Tower and now posed as a striking palace you called your new home. Midgard was not so bad, after all.

Terrorising its people was quite fun, actually and thanks to Loki’s sceptre, getting them to bend to your will was not only fun but way too easy and convenient. The God of Mischief had soon gotten rid of the leaders the mortals called their would-be queens, kings and presidents anyway. Those who had resisted were now rotting away several feet below the earth.

Oh yes, the sceptre was truly a most marvellous object. You fancied a foot massage? The sceptre would convince the helpless mortal in charge of gardening the roof terrace. You wished for a special food delivery? Anything was possible with the mind stone. They were so easy to manipulate, so easy to control and undermine, to step on like a boot would step on an ant. It was fun. Nothing less did those petty and ignorant mortals deserve after polluting their own planet to the point of death and destruction. They were paying the price for it now.

In your youth, years and years had gone by on Asgard where you would study the powerful stones until you knew all of its secrets. The Tesseract was gone—Loki had failed to tell you whom he had given it to after the successful invasion of the Chitauri, nonetheless, as long as you still had the sceptre, you were not going to complain. It felt like the mind stone was connecting you two, wrapping a steel rope around your love for one another. Love which you never failed to act on at any given opportunity, for your days were mainly spent cuddling and, quite frankly, fucking on every possible surface of Stark Tower, having luxurious dinners and Loki sending terrified mortals to buy you expensive gifts and jewellery.

The humans feared you and unlike what you had expected from yourself, you were enjoying it. You were bathing in their terror, their anxiety and their tears, even their blood—metaphorically speaking—especially after Loki put you in charge of labour distribution.

What was the play about again? Snapping yourself out of your trance, you sighed, even more so because Loki’s hand had discreetly disappeared under your dress under the table, his thumb caressing your clit. There was no need for underwear here, after all.

“He is positively the most unenthusiastic Thor of the whole week.” You choked out when he slipped two fingers inside of your warmth, his free hand coming up to stroke your pale arm. “He is boring me.”

“Is he now? I believe the reason for your boredom is that I have not yet sentenced him to death. He is rather delightful. Look at how much he is shaking.” He chuckled. “He is trying so hard to appear devoted. He will live, for now.”

A moan escaped your lips when he curled his fingers inside of you, repeatedly stroking your g-spot. Loki chuckled once more. “Oh, what is it, my sweet Amnerys? Will you come for me? Will you come undone before all these people?”

Slaves were positioned to either side of the long table. If they knew what Loki was doing to you right now, they’d do well to keep their mouths shut and pretend they did not notice and the actors on stage were too caught up in their own panic to realise. Whyever not? You moaned once more. No one would know and if there was something Loki wanted, then he would get it anyway. That included your orgasms.

“I… I will…” You whispered, blood biting at your pale cheeks. He raised his eyebrows slightly, a mischievous smirk growing on his lips. His thumb applied more pressure, making you throw your head back into the cushioned backrest of your throne. By the time you let go and let pleasure consume you, Loki had lost all interest in the play. His blue eyes were fixed on you and your sweet whimpers, his heart pounding fast in his chest upon realising one too many times that you belonged to him.

“My queen…” He purred, helping you ride out your orgasm all the while you attempted, miserably, to keep a straight face. It was then the slaves in the room began to clap and the actors on stage bowed, relieved it was over.

“You are dismissed. Get out of my sight.” Loki barked. You giggled at the way they almost fell off the stage, hurrying to get away from you two.

“They are like lambs,” you remarked, still panting. “Like innocent lambs and we’re the wolves.”

“Hmm… lamb sounds like an excellent idea for dinner, would you not agree?” He hooked his index finger under your chin, forcing you to look up at him—not that you had wanted to look away anyway. The remaining mortals in the room knew better than to wait for an order. Without a word, they rushed towards the kitchen to prepare the meal—regardless of how they would acquire a lamb.

Then, finally, Loki’s hand retreated from under your dress, his digits coated with your juices. Your lips parted when he brought them to your mouth, having you suck them clean which you did with no hesitation.

“I have to leave New York for a few days tomorrow.” He said quietly, his gaze fixed on your lips wrapped around his fingers. You released him with a silent smack to pout.

“Without me?”

“Yes, my love. There have been concerning reports of riots in New Jersey. Now we cannot have that, can we?”

“No… of course not.”

“I shall be back soon. You will rule this meagre place just fine without me until I return. You know how to put the mortals in their place, no?”

You giggled again. “I do.”

“That is my queen. I trust you, my sweet Amnerys.”

~*~

I trust you, my sweet Amnerys. You smiled. You were the only one in the nine realms that the infamous God of Mischief trusted. Even a few days without him would be hell. You would handle the kingdom well, there was no doubt about that and yet… you already longed for him to hold you in his arms again. Throwing back the satin green covers of the huge king-size bed the two of you slept in, you climbed off the soft mattress all but naked, your smile widening when your blue eyes fell on the golden fountain pen Loki had gifted you, along with a bouquet of blue roses, your favourite flowers—one of his first gifts, back on Asgard when you were only five-hundred years old, right before you had run off like children to practice magic with Frigga. So young, so naïve, so in love.

Loki had always been so gentle, so considerate… your smile faded. He had changed though, had he not? His behaviour towards you was no different in the slightest bit, but even though he radiated dominance like a radioactive gemstone, you wondered why it was only now you realised how cruel he had become. The humans were shivering with fear when they spoke to him, barely able to kneel properly for their trembling robbed them of their balance. And what about you? Were you not inflicting the same amount of pain and suffering?

You scoffed. Where were these thoughts coming from? This was ridiculous, right? You were a queen, Loki’s queen, and you were together and happy. It mattered not if the mortals lived in agony for this cause… only it did.

Your lips parted. When was the last time Loki and you had spent a peaceful day together outside, without anyone attempting to assassinate you? Without anyone quivering in fear of what might happen to them if they displeased you?

When… when had you become like that? You swallowed thickly. Loki had left earlier this morning. You were not going to sulk away in his absence, now were you? He had left you in charge for a reason and you would make him proud.

“Y-your majesty?” It was one of the maids, standing in the doorframe like she was about to be sacrificed to the Norns and hence ripping you out of your thoughts with brute force, making you drop the fountain pen back on the desk and spin around.

“Don’t you know how to knock, you silly girl?”

“I… I did, your majesty.”

“What is it?” You barked.

“There… there has been a brawl on the street right in front of the Tower. The guards have told me that two… two men were fighting over a stolen loaf of bread.”

You rolled your eyes. Well, theft was a crime and it was going to have to be dealt with.

“I am to let you know, I wasn’t going to let them in just in case you were not decent yet… which… which you aren’t, so I was…”

“Get me my morning robes,” you cut her off. “I shall get freshened up and meet the culprits in the throne room.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.” The maid nodded and hurried away quickly but even the hot shower you took before she returned did not succeed in washing away the seeds of doubt in your mind. Something was wrong. It was the very same thought you had harboured back when you had first found Loki again after his attempted suicide. It felt like ages away now and yet… you remembered your concerns like they’d been keeping you awake only yesterday.

When you entered the throne room an hour later, the two men were quivering, one of them crying even and the fight they had had over a mere loaf of bread—pathetic—all but forgotten. You tilted your head as you raised your eyebrows and made yourself comfortable on Loki’s throne.

“Well?” You spat.

“My q-queen, w-we are so sorry. I-I just… I need to f-feed my family. We have been living in p-poverty after K-King L-L-Loki shut down m-my b-business. T-the oil factory?”

“The oil factory that kept polluting the seas, you mean? Killing the fish, contaminating all of your drinking water, making you all die even faster?” You scoffed. “Perhaps now you know what the fish must have felt like.”

“N-no, I-I mean… y-yes. I… r-realise my mistake but my… my family, they had nothing to do with it. I need to f-feed them. My w-wife s-suffers from severe social anxiety, she is unable to work. O-our children… we are going to starve to death. W-we… I would have paid for the loaf if only I could have, all I want is to k-keep my f-family alive!” His last words were swallowed by pathetic sobs. The urge within you to roll your eyes grew with every passing second and yet, for some peculiar reason and for the first time in years, you felt your heart clench with something you almost did not recognise anymore. Compassion.

This man had not stolen out of spite or malice. He had stolen out of desperation. The other man, you presumed, must have been the vendor then. He too now feared for the worst for causing a scene. The punishment for theft was execution by dismemberment. Fingers first, arms next, lastly the head. It was a surprisingly effective way to keep the robbery rate at a minimum.

“W-Will I… will you have me killed, my queen?”

You took a deep breath. Whatever it was that overcame you, Loki would not be pleased. But this man had not truly committed a crime, now had he? It was a loaf of bread, for Heaven’s sake!

“No. Now get out of my sight and you,” you pointed at another maid, “have that bread replaced for the vendor.”

One of the maids had once called you “ruthless” and “dangerous”. Loki had had her executed for her disrespectful behaviour and gossiping behind your back. As of today, however, you were wondering if she was right. The maid who had caught you off guard earlier this morning, she used to be a Mathematics student, you knew that from when you had taken her belongings back at her arrival to see if she had anything you liked. She did, as a matter of fact. A beautiful emerald stone necklace reminding you of Loki’s colours. You had barely worn it since, it was more the principle of being able to simply take what you wanted. Not to mention what the mortals were to expect if they resisted you. As if on cue, your seidr tickled your fingertips, once more reminding you of Loki.

Tricks and pranks you had always enjoyed together but this? You did not want to give up the life you had, did not want to give up Loki because what was done was done. He ruled Midgard now, with you by his side, you could not have one thing without the other.

But when… when exactly had you begun to doubt that a kingdom drowning in blood, tears and hard labour was not what you wanted after all? After everything Loki had gone through? He deserved happiness, he deserved to rule but not… not like this.

You growled. “Run me a bath.” You ordered, avoiding looking at your shivering maid.

“Y-yes, o-of course, Your Majesty. Would you like a bath bomb, too? I… I had them brought to the Tower for your baths. They are with… with lemon tea, your favourite scent.”

Really? You meant to say. Instead, you froze her in place with your scrutinising gaze. Your expression uncontrollably softened when you met her terrified and tear-stricken eyes. “Thank you.”

The maid’s eyes widened. “O-Oh! Y-You’re welcome, my queen. I… I will also prepare your favourite wine for you.”

Well… She doesn’t do this because she likes you or respects you, a reproachful voice in your head whispered. She does it because she’s afraid that you will kill her if she so much as breathes in your direction at the wrong moment.

~*~

Loki had made sure to have all of your personal belongings, along with your beloved fountain pen, brought to Asgard. Stacked away, somewhere in this gorgeous bedroom, were your old books too. Books that you had studied so intently and so often that they were on the verge of falling apart. Most of them were about the Infinity Stones and their creation.

You could not shake off the feeling that your subconscious was trying to tell you something—yet all you knew was that the answer was hidden in between the lines of your books. It had to be. Seeds of doubt had clouded your mind after Loki had gone, alas once he returned… you had felt more powerful than ever.

And now, something was keeping you down like a heavy blanket of snow on Jötunheim.

“One of the maids was caught snooping around in our bedroom last night, did you know?” Loki said casually when he entered the room, his armour melting off of his body to reveal a pale but well-defined body. Distracted, you blinked, losing all focus on your books.

“Which one?”

“You know the girl with the brown hair who spends most of her time in the kitchen. Only the Norns know what she is doing in there when it is not meal time.” He began to smirk, bending down to kiss you gently.

“Would you like to have her?”

You grinned. “With pleasure. I don’t wish to kill her though.” You replied. Loki frowned. “She is one of our best cooks! Let us torture her a little and punish her for invading our privacy like that. If she has not learned her mistake by then, we can still kill her.”

Loki sighed. “Well then. As you wish, my queen. Now come to bed. I wish to feel myself inside of you.”

~*~

You laughed, hysterically almost, when the maid screamed. Your fingertips were tingling with seidr, one of your hands clutching Loki’s sceptre. Pain distorted the girl’s face as she cowered on the ground before you, trembling to the point she would be unable to stand on her own accord. Her eyes were glowing blue, the sceptre’s influence clouding her mind.

Power rushed through your veins, from the mind stone into your arm and through your entire body, making you feel invincible.

Loki chuckled behind you. If you kept going for much longer, the nosey maid would die after all. But oh, playing with the sceptre was just too much fun.

“Go on. Hold your arm into the flames.” You commanded, nodding your head over to the chimney. The fire was crackling peacefully, the warmth spreading all over the throne room. The maid’s lower lip, chewed on to the point it was bleeding, was shaking. You sincerely hoped there was still a part of her knowing what was going on, knowing what she was being forced to do and yet, without any hesitation, she crawled over to the fireplace, stretched out her left hand and held it straight into the flames.

Her ear-piercing screams echoed through the room like sharp needles stabbing your skin and from the corner of your eye, you could see the other slaves in the room swallowing thickly, forced to watch the horror unfolding before their eyes as a lesson that would surely not fail its impact.

“See… who plays with fire will likely burn themselves.” You spat through gritted teeth, albeit with a dangerously sweet voice. Then, before she could utter a single word, you knocked her out, hitting her hard on the head with the blunt end of the sceptre.

She would not need any more mind control when she woke up and yet, the moment the sceptre struck her, a painful sting tore through you, her physical agony turning into mental torment for you. For just a brief moment, you saw a young, innocent girl who had been robbed of her entire life to serve you and Loki as a mindless slave to be punished severely if she dared to step out of line.

You blinked, stumbling back a few steps to chase away the atrocious feeling in your guts, crashing straight into Loki. He frowned, steadying you, and took the sceptre from your hand in response. The moment it left your grasp, the sensation grew even worse. What was wrong with you?

“Are you quite alright, my love?” Loki whispered, quiet enough only for you to hear it. You nodded, taking a deep breath.

“I feel a little dizzy, is all. Let me go lie down for a bit—and tell the maid to prepare us supper with salmon when she awakes.”

The God of Mischief was still frowning by the time you fled from the throne room and retreated to your shared chambers.

Heavens, what in the nine realms was going on? Staggering over to the window, you gaped outside to take in the beautiful skyline of New York City and rubbed your eyes. It almost felt like you had been seeing the world in black and white and, for some dubious and peculiar reason, the colours were now slowly pouring back into your perception. It scared you.

You were not surprised when Loki entered the bedroom not soon after you had stormed out, finding you biting your nails nervously—which was something you had never down before.

“Perhaps you should tell her about supper yourself. She is even more terrified of you than she is of me, my queen.” He chuckled, stroking over your hair as he approached you. When you only sighed with hesitation sparkling in your eyes, Loki’s lips parted.

“You are unwell.”

“I’m fine, I…”

“You are not. Should I call for a healer?”

“They’re called doctors here.” You replied weakly.

“I do not care what they call them as long as one of them helps you, my love. I will not have you suffer.”

“Perhaps it is my cycle, Loki. I am fine. Let us—“

There was a sudden tumult in the throne room that interrupted you both. Loud gasps and even screams became audible with a start, almost as if a wave of relief washed over the entire staff… well, your slaves.

“Sire! Sire! Help!” Alarmed, the both of you exchanged a look. Your heart sank to your boots when you hurried back into the throne room and were greeted by an assassination commando.

“Loki. Amnerys. It’s Game Over. Stand down.” Red dots in your field of vision blinded you when you came to a halt, laser pointers, so you figured, belonging to heavy machine guns aimed directly at you two and before you… Natasha Romanoff, Bruce Banner and, much to your surprise, Thor.

“Chloe… take the elevator downstairs, someone will be waiting for you there. And take all the others with you.” Loki glared at her. It was the maid Thor had addressed and if looks could kill, the poor girl would have dropped dead this instant. You should have killed the stupid wench after all. She had been spying on you all along, catching glimpses of moments where you would be unprepared… Both Loki and you growled.

“Thor… what a lovely surprise.” The God of Mischief announced then, arrogantly lifting his chin. “Have you at last decided to see for yourself what I have done to your precious Earth? Is it not better to keep the humans under control like this, to keep them from destroying their own planet?”

“By enslaving them and working them to death? I don’t think so, Loki. This is madness.”

“Perhaps. But so is you coming here.” His expression hardened. “You have signed your death warrant, brother.”

“Not this time. Our father—“

“Your father!” Loki spat.

“We did not want to do this, Loki. But you left us no choice. You must be stopped. Both of you.”

“Skip the reunion speech, Thor…” Natasha muttered. You snarled at her all the while holding on to Loki’s arm. What did he mean by no choice? What had he planned?

With your heart in your mouth, you soon found your seidr tickling your fingertips, ready to fling them all straight into the nearby wall to listen with delight how several of their bones would break in the process.

When you turned your head back to Loki, he gave you a barely visible nod. It was in the very moment you sent both Natasha and Bruce flying through the throne room with but a flick of your hand that Thor called for his beloved hammer—only it was nothing like you remembered it anymore. It was enveloped in orange fire, its flames licking high up into the air, ready to devour. Blood Orange. There was only one being in this universe who was able to create such indestructible and powerful flames—Raskk, the highest fire demon from Muspelheim.

If Thor intended to use his hammer against Loki… as a Frost Giant, he would be dead before it dawned. Surely, your heart had now stopped beating altogether.

“Loki…”

The God of Mischief growled in response. His hand found yours, fingers entangling and before you knew it, he materialised the sceptre just in time to catch his brother off guard. The both of you teleported.

Knowing how much harm Raskk’s fire was able to do to your husband and king, something inside of you snapped. If they found him again… they would kill him for sure.

You felt broken and mended at the very same time. Like a thread cut in two with a pair of sharp scissors, your vision cleared to finally reveal all the colours drained from your eyesight for so long. Breathing heavily, you gasped for air in a desperate attempt to fight off a panic attack.

“Amnerys…” Loki caught you in his arms before your shaking knees hit the floor of the shabby motel he had brought you to, an inconspicuous place you had discovered a while back on the hunt for electricians to maintain what used to be Stark Tower. Loki had done well to remember the tacky place in the suburbs. You would be safe here until you could come up with a plan.

The truth was, Thor’s hammer, strengthened by Raskk’s blood orange fire, had caught you both off guard. Loki had expected any form of resistance from his brother—not, however, that he would try and end his life in such a brutal and excruciating way.

Your fear for Loki’s life… it had broken the influence of the sceptre. You saw it so clearly now… how it had been the weapon all along, dragging you down a rabbit hole so dark it had blinded you.

“I… I…” Unable to speak, you allowed him to scoop you up into his arms like a bride. Your thoughts were too tangled up to follow the harsh commands he barked at the poor receptionist behind the desk in the foyer, only dared to whimper once he had closed the door behind you.

He put you back on your feet, ensuring you would not simply drop like a marionette. “Amnerys, speak to me. Are you in pain?”

It took you another moment to pull yourself together. With a deep shaky breath, you locked your eyes with his.

“What have we done?” You whispered, your lower lip shaking. “Loki, what have we done…”

“What?”

“What have we done… the slavery, the torture, the murder… Loki… we turned Midgard into another Helheim.”

“Whatever are you talking about?”

“Don’t you see? It’s… the sceptre. It’s been the sceptre all along… it… it brainwashed us like puppets!”

“You are confused.”

“I am not. Loki, listen to me, please!”

He shushed you, pressing you against his chest. With his heartbeat against your cheek, you could not help but relax into his arms, your rapid breathing calming down again—if only a little.

“We are safe here. Relax, my queen.” His lips found your neck, planting feather-light kisses on your sensitive skin in an attempt to distract you further. His mouth on you did not fail its effect. Your eyes fell shut with a sigh as you went limp in his arms, albeit reluctant to allow him to seduce you now of all times.

“Loki… w-we shouldn’t… not now… we have to… Raskk’s fire, we… you h-have to get rid of the sceptre. Thor will listen to reason once he learns—“ You were cut off by his tongue demanding entrance into your mouth, forcing you into a kiss that stole away your breath. Loki pushed you down on the hard mattress of the motel room, one of his hands capturing your wrists to pin them down above your head, rendering you completely helpless.

His sheer strength overwhelmed you and despite your Asgardian blood, you were no match to Loki… at least not when he had you on the brink of utter submission and with pleasure coursing through your blood, clouding your mind as your body kept pleading for more and more of his pampering.

“Loki… please. Loki, listen. We have to… this isn’t right… Thor… P-please… get rid of the s-sceptre, you’ll see it’s…”

“Amnerys, stop it!” He growled with a start. His dark and chastising glare sent both fear and excitement through your veins. “What is it with your obsession with the sceptre? It is making us powerful, is it not? You, my dear, are the one with the insatiable interest in the Infinity Stones and their workings.”

“I was wrong… Loki, I was wrong, we were wrong, I…” You groaned when his digits found the hem of your dress and pushed it up your pale thighs to give himself access to your wet folds, your whole body shivering the moment his fingertips brushed against your lips and finally, parted them to reveal your throbbing clit to his greedy eyes.

“L-Loki… Loki, l-listen to me…”

Part of you wanted him to stop, to talk to him rationally but… oh… it just felt too good. Your blue eyes rolled to the back of your head, your nails digging into his naked back. You hadn’t even noticed him removing most of his clothes.

“Oh, I am listening. I will be listening to your moans and whimpers as you come undone for me, my sweet Amnerys.” He paused, indeed eliciting a defeated whine from you. “Tell me you want me inside of you.” He whispered into your ear, sending pleasant shivers up and down your spine.

You swallowed thickly. You did. Your quim was aching to be filled by him, to have him mark you with his Jötun seed and make you his like he had done so often in the past and yet… was now really the time for pleasure? Now that your husband’s life was at stake? Now that you had realised the harm you had done to this planet, to its people? You were monsters. You had become exactly what Loki had feared to turn into when he had first learned about his true heritage.

Loki made you gasp for air when he slipped two of his long fingers inside of you, curling them at your g-spot and making your back arch.

“Tell me.” He spat through gritted teeth. He was in a frenzy—and you were unable to shake off just how much you loved his dominant side, this side he had developed the very moment Frigga had handed him Gungnir. You were lost. Lost in his embrace, lost in his desire, lost in his love for you.

“I do… I always do…”

He chuckled, content with your response. Freeing himself from his remaining armour with his seidr, he pushed your legs apart meeting only little resistance and positioned himself at your entrance. A moan escaped your lips when you felt his rock-hard cock press against your slick opening, the red tip leaking pre-cum already.

He never let go of your wrists, even when he sheathed himself deep inside of you with but one firm thrust, watching with an animalistic growl how you threw your head back in pure bliss, welcoming him in. His free hand was all over your pale skin, exploring every inch of your tall body.

Your walls clenched around him at once, moulding around him perfectly and unwilling to let go of him again, no, willing him even deeper when he retreated only to plunge back in and claim you thoroughly, fucking you with a steady but firm rhythm stealing not only your breath but all of your senses.

Your mind drifted away from how Loki was still under the sceptre’s control and how it made him more ruthless, more dangerous and more villainous. His lips found yours again to keep you from talking, his strokes getting more and more frantic.

You moaned when his free hand found your clit, massaging it swiftly and applying just enough pressure to send you flying. You tightened around him fast, with his name on your lips like a prayer.

Again and again, his length grazed all of your secret pleasure spots, some of them hidden deep inside of your quim. Loki moved the way he knew he would throw himself off of this delectable cliff of pleasure with you and when you came undone, rhythmically clenching around him and milking him for all he was worth, you instantly triggered his own release.

With but a few more eager thrusts, he emptied himself inside of you, coating your walls with his warm seed of which he shot rope after rope into you. He stilled, his length throbbing hotly inside your cunt as he filled you up.

No less than ten seconds passed, seconds in which you were still pulsing around him, failing to come down from your high and the pleasure and the love you felt for this man as it overwhelmed you once more, even more so when he collapsed on top of you and you inhaled his intoxicating scent.

Another ten seconds and you could Thor’s voice bellow through the lobby. You gasped.

“I shielded this place. The motel owner must have told them. I will tear him apart.” Loki growled and jumped out of bed. Your legs were still shaking from your orgasm, his warm seed dribbling out of you and running down your inner thighs when you stood to follow, enveloping yourself with seidr to get dressed much like Loki had done and followed him—only to stop dead in your tracks when ice-cold realisation hit you. You had only just arrived. There was no way the motel owner had been able to alert the Avengers this fast, let alone reach them when they were out and about to hunt you down.

Your lips parted. “They’re after the sceptre. It’s not the owner, Loki, they’re tracking the sceptre! It must be just like the Tesseract, the stone gives off traceable energies.” And the only reason they had not done so before was proper preparation. And a risky alliance—with Raskk.

The God of Mischief slowed down and glanced at you from the corner of his eye but did not halt. Too angry were his steps leading him back towards the lobby, ready to murder the receptionist despite the unusual alliance Thor had formed with one of Muspelheim’s most dangerous fire demons.

“Loki, stop! Listen to me!” Finally, he obeyed albeit turned around so slowly you feared he might pounce on you like a wild wolf at any moment. “Please. Leave the motel owner alone. We have to get out of here, we…” You gasped once more, your feeble attempt to calm yourself with deep breaths failing miserably. “Leave the sceptre behind.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Leave it behind! Else we have to find a way off-world, Loki. Listen to me, I will not risk you dying at the hand of Raskk’s fire just because you are too keen on satisfying your enormous ego!” You shrieked, clenching your fists so hard your knuckles turned white. Your heart was pounding in your chest so loud you feared his words would be drowned by the blood ringing in your ears.

Loki’s nostrils flared. “I am not leaving our kingdom behind for Thor of all people to overthrow it!”

“Then give me the sceptre!”

“No!” The word was so loud it echoed through the entire dimly-lit hallway, without a doubt giving away your location and you realised in that very moment that he was not going to relent. The sceptre’s influence kept its steel grip on him like an unescapable prison.

Tears formed in your eyes when you swallowed, locking your eyes with his—you had never noticed how the blue colour of his irises had intensified to the point of utter mind control. Whoever was behind this… they would pay for it but for now… for now, you had to save Loki’s life.

“Then go. Take it and leave. I will find you.”

“What?”

“I am going to distract them. Go. You cannot go near Thor’s hammer.” Loki hesitated. His thin lips parted once he understood you meant to give yourself up in order for him to escape.

“You are not leaving my side.”

“Do not argue with me, Loki. You know they will not kill me.”

“No,” he growled, “worse. They will torture you.”

You scoffed. “Do you truly believe that?”

A young man stumbled out of one of the motel rooms, a pathetic whimper escaping his lips when he spotted you both standing in the hallway, and legging it instantly.

“Thor has always liked me, Loki—he knows how much I love you and why I did this.”

“If he is prepared to kill me in the cruellest way possible, what makes you think he will not make you suffer a similar fate?”

“They’re up here! Up here! Avengers! Help!” Loki gritted his teeth. With but one swift hand movement, he shot an energy blast from the sceptre into the panicking young man’s direction. It hit the railing of the stairs with an ear-piercing crack, sending pieces of sharp wood flying through the hallway. Luckily, only one of them hit the man in the thigh, who, screaming in surprise more than agony, almost fell down the carpeted stairs and straight into the Avengers’ arms—one of which had turned into a giant green rage monster.

Loki growled once more when you attempted to push past him, his free hand slipping around your waist. He pressed you close against his strong body in an attempt to teleport you both to safety once more, heeding your advice even if he would never let go of the sceptre after everything it had done for him. You spun around, cupping his face in your hands and kissed him hard.

“Go. Do you not trust your queen?”

His lips parted and he scowled. He had no need for a reply, for he did. He trusted you with his life and by the time the Avengers finally reached you with their weapons raised, only you were left standing there, your fingers tingling with seidr urging to be released to help you survive.

Thor stopped dead in his tracks when he saw you, his mortal companions following his actions suit. Your gaze found his glowing hammer spitting Raskk’s fire.

“Amnerys?”

“Hulk? Any moment now.” Widow said surprisingly calm.

“Don’t. Please. I am unarmed.” Lifting both of your hands to prove your intentions, you met Thor’s puzzled expression.

“Where is Loki?” The redhead’s voice was harsh, her glare deadly. You understood now why she was one of Earth’s fiercest assassins and yet, she did little to intimidate you.

“Gone,” you spat in response, “for now. I know where he went. But… but first… we need to talk.”

~*~

Thor buried his hands in his face. “So what you are saying is that this whole time Loki has been under the influence of the sceptre?”

You nodded, shifting on your seat. The Avengers’ hideout was filthy, hidden away in an alley you would have never even set a foot in under different circumstances.

“I have been to. That is why… by the Norns, all those people we killed… all those innocents we tortured… I cannot believe what I have done.” Looking up, your expression hardened with a start. “Loki and I have always been mischievous, you know that. But neither of us would ever have intentionally hurt anyone.”

“It’s kind of hard to believe that, you know.” The Black Widow gave you an incredulous look.

“I agree. What if this is a trick? What if it’s a trap?” Bruce whispered. He was himself again, wearing no more than a pair of ripped jeans that were way too big on him and appeared to swallow up his mortal body whole, making him look even more fragile and meagre than the humans already were. You rolled your eyes. Of course they would not trust you… but then again, you understood. You would not have trusted yourself either, not after everything you had done.

Thor lifted his chin and gave you a warning look. “I have known Amnerys my whole life. She loves Loki, she would do anything for him. I have Raskk’s demon fire—if she is luring us into a trap, my brother will not live long enough to see daylight tomorrow. She knows that… don’t you, Amnerys?”

You swallowed. All of a sudden, all you could muster was a weak “Yes”. Your heart was beating like a steam hammer, your instincts screaming at you to either run or kill. You were with your greatest enemies after all. You were with the very people eager to send your husband to Valhalla, sitting at the same table and drinking tea that might as well have been poisoned.

“If what you are saying is true… then how did you break the sceptre’s influence?” Bruce asked. And it was a good question, one you did not quite know the answer to yourself.

“I am not sure,” you responded, “I had… these strange moments of clarity, a whispering voice in my head telling me to practice caution but once…” You paused, pondering. “Loki was gone. He travelled to New Jersey and he took the sceptre with him, that was the first time I felt these… all these doubts about… about all this.” You motioned around yourself, shame and remorse once more rolling over you like a tidal wave.

“And then?” Bruce probed.

You looked up, your blue eyes once more falling on his oversized jeans. You frowned. “You. I think it was you. All I could think about was how Loki’s life is in danger, how scared I am to lose him… I think this ultimately overwhelmed the power of the mind stone.”

“You know about the Infinity Stones then?”

“Better than you think.”

“What I still don’t understand is what you’re expecting from us now, Amnerys.” Natasha tossed in. “Loki is a criminal and so are you. He will be arrested once we get his hands on him… until Thor can take him back to Asgard, at least.”

Your eyes flew in Thor’s direction. “Odin will have him executed.”

“Not if my mother gets a say in it.”

“You truly believe Frigga will be able to stop him? Face it, Thor, Odin has been looking for an excuse to get rid of him ever since Loki found out about his true heritage. Perhaps he knew. Perhaps he knew that he was still alive somewhere and yet he chose to feign grief.”

Thor opened his mouth to contradict. You cut him off before he could even take a breath.

“Swear to me on your life that no harm will come to him.”

The God of Thunder looked up, meeting your stern gaze with all but resignation and guilt. “Amnerys… I… I cannot swear. I shall speak to Mother and Father, that is all I can promise you to do. You are coming home with us, are you not?”

“Where Loki goes, I go.” It was one of the most sincere truths you had ever spoken.

“So here is what we will do then. We’ll gather the team and you will lead us to Loki, like you promised, we capture him, Thor gets him off-planet. That sounds simple enough. It shouldn’t be too difficult to overpower him now that Min-… Amy…? I’m sorry, what was your name again?” Bruce raised his eyebrows and pointed a finger at you, making you roll your eyes in response.

“Amnerys. My name is Amnerys. Out of mere curiosity… why do you not track the sceptre down again?”

“We could do that eventually but it requires a lot of power. You see, these wires connecting to the…“

“Don’t,” you interrupted, “I have no idea what you are talking about, Dr Banner. It’s electricity, that is all I need to know.”

“Well, yeah… what I’m trying to say is that it will take a lot of time to recharge without cutting the power in the entire city… which would make it even easier for Loki to disappear unnoticed.”

“We never expected you two to separate.”

You scoffed. “I know.” But we will not be for much longer, you added silently.

~*~

Loki was indeed where you had expected him to be. And you had a plan. Centuries ago, the fetid sewers of New York used to be a labyrinth made of beautiful caves and underground rivers—one of which led straight to a secret passageway to Asgard. Loki had discovered it one day, by accident, if anything, for he had been looking for a way to enter Helheim for minerals. Back then, you had been too young to comprehend that Loki had taken you to Midgard a while later.

“Are you sure she’s not leading us straight into an ambush?” Natasha whispered into Thor’s ear. With your heightened hearing abilities, however, she looked to the moist ground quickly when you turned around to raise an eyebrow at her—warningly.

“Trust me,” you spat, “if I had wanted to kill you, you would all be dead already.” You smirked. “Thor is very well aware of how powerful I am.”

Bruce cleared his throat. The sound, much like your voices, travelled through the long and disgusting tunnels seemingly endlessly. “I don’t like this. Where is he?”

“Keep your mouth shut and follow me. Loki’s hearing is as good as mine. And watch your step.” The mud, dirt and brown water to your feet had mixed with garbage only the Norns knew how old. You had already cast a spell to hide your sounds from unwanted ears—you just didn’t want to have to listen to the remaining Avengers expressing their concerns about your person like you were a mischief-maker with no heart or soul. You shook your head silently. They thought the same of Loki, did they not?

Your plan was simple enough. Loki and the sceptre had to be separated, for good. And the best way to do that, if not for your persuasion skills which had failed this time despite how infatuated he was with you, was for the Avengers to do the job for you.

You were not going to let them take him to be executed by Odin. In fact, you would murder them all in cold blood before they even tried.

Now one more turn to the left and then…

Loki would not dare use the sceptre in the sewers due to the underlying danger of collapse; he’d rely on his seidr and his swift fighting skills instead.

You turned around the corner and he looked up as if ripped from a deep thought. His face lit up when you approached him. He stood from his crouching position on the ground and away from the fire he had lit and which was throwing eerie shadows on the wall, and opened his arms for you to embrace him.

You did. A sigh escaped your lips the very second you wrapped your arms around his middle, pressing your face against his chest. “I’m sorry…” You whispered.

“Whatever are you sorry for, my queen?”

You glanced up, praying to the Norns that he would take the hint and see the deceit and mischief sparkling in your blue eyes when the Avengers entered one by one, their weapons aimed at the both of you.

Loki’s face fell, his soft expression transforming into a frightening rage. Not directed at you—but at the god he had called his brother for centuries. Staring daggers at Thor, his voice when he spoke was so dark you felt shivers racing up and down your spine.

“Did they hurt you?” He asked you.

“No. I’m fine, Loki.”

“Actually, she took us here.”

“What?”

His eyes met yours again and in this very moment, you wished you had worked harder on your telepathy skills. Loki had introduced you to the art only two decades back…

“I did this for us, Loki. There was no other way anymore.” You mumbled, inhaling his heavenly scent. He had to understand. He had to understand why you were doing things the way you were doing them.

Just trust me, you willed for him to hear in his mind.

But in the end, your unease betrayed your body, whatever happened next happening too fast for you to comprehend. Someone pulled you to the side and whoever it was, their grip felt like steel around your upper arm. There were shouts, screams, sounds of rage and torment, growls and pants and then… then you heard a pair of Asgardian shackles lock in place around Loki’s wrists, the sceptre clattering to the ground with an ear-piercing noise ricocheting through the cave. Just like that, the God of Mischief, eager to avoid the flames dancing on the indestructible metal of Thor’s hammer, was defeated. Or so they were led to believe.

They did not let you carry the sceptre, of course. Natasha Romanoff never took her eyes off of you on the way back to the Avengers’ secret base, wary and vigilant in fear of you turning the tables after all.

Meanwhile, you did not dare look Loki in the eyes, not until you would be alone together again, and part of you even longed to join him in the cell a man called Nick Fury had been working on for months after Loki’s and your triumph and beginning of a tyrannical reign.

“Thank you,” Thor said, observing his brother on the camera they had set up in the cell. He was sitting there on the wooden bench like a Greek statue motionlessly, staring holes into the metal walls with a blank face. There was disappointment, unease and even… even remorse clouding his flawless features like eerie fog on a gloomy day in the woods of Niflheim. “I owe you, Amnerys.”

“No, you don’t. I did not do this for you. I did it for Loki.”

“I know. I still owe you my gratitude.”

“Just remember your promise, Thor.” You only hoped he would not have to act on it anytime soon.

“I will. Good night, Amnerys.”

It isn’t Good night for me, you thought as you watched him walk off. Regardless of how well the remaining Avengers had prepared for this, their security measures were meagre, embarrassing almost. You were quite surprised they had not locked you up as well for the night after all, as a matter of fact. As of right now, the only thing keeping Loki in his cell was the threat of Raskk’s fire. Nothing, whatsoever, that would harm you any further than inflicting a second-degree burn.

The spell you cast that night to shield both Loki and yourself from the cameras was so simple you resisted the urge to laugh out loud as you snuck through the dark and scabby hallways and eventually reached Loki’s cell.

“My love…” You whispered. The Trickster looked up, glaring right through you for a second before finally meeting your blue eyes.

“Thanos…” He began.

“What?”

“His name is Thanos. He was the one who handed me the sceptre. He promised me victory and power in return for the Tesseract. He manipulated me. Tortured me.” Your lips parted. “I wish I had truly died the day I let myself fall off the Bifrost when I subjected to the pain he made me feel.”

“Oh Loki… this is not your fault, none of this is…”

He snorted, gaping at you darkly. “Are you still blaming the sceptre, my queen?”

“Loki…”

“I heard your plea in my mind… and yet you have signed my death sentence, my sweet Amnerys. Did Thor not tell you what will happen once the Bifrost is fully restored?”

“I do. I know exactly what will happen.” You replied as you unlocked the door and swiftly stepped inside. “They will be looking for us. They will tear the nine worlds apart in their search and yet they will never find us. We will be free, Loki. Just us. No thrones, no sceptres, no obligations and rules.”

Loki began to smirk, warming your heart. “We leave it all behind?”

You nodded, reaching out for him so you could teleport together. “We leave it all behind.”

And you would start by planting little seeds of doubt into his mind, seeds that you intended to grow into nothing but unconditional love.

~*~

A/N: I hope you enjoyed it! Head over to my blog to read more of my writing and to find my Kofi link! ♥

[cow-smells]

Jealousy Games [Part 3] ( Demetri x reader )

A/N: hello friends, this is the end of this little fic <3

i personally dislike unrealistic first time fics so i attempted to make this realistic yet still as sweet as possible :) thank you to everyone who messaged asking about and requesting this part, you are appreciated <3

Words: 1578

Warnings: Smut, virg!nity loss

Part 1, Part 2

Read on AO3

Demetri visibly gulps as you step in front of him. You raise your hands to lay them softly on his cheeks, bending the taller boy down to meet your lips.

The kiss is tender as you pour your affection in to it, only to take a welcome change of air when Demetri's hands land on your thighs, caressing their way up to your behind.

    “I told you I'm not wearing anything,” you coo in the most seductive voice you can muster.

Demetri's eyes try to take all of you in, gazing upon you in a way you've never seen him before.

    You decide to up the ante.

You let one hand fall to his chest, your fingers dancing their way to the hem of his t-shirt. “Don't you think we ought to even things out?”

Demetri's eyes widen further, and for a moment he's lost for words -  until he finally decides to take up on your suggestion, pulling off his shirt with too much excitement to hold any grace in the motion.

You can't help but feel your pulse rising, too. You've briefly seen Demetri shirtless once or twice at the beach, but this time there was a whole new vibe to seeing him strip off his top.

    Letting your hand caress his now bare chest, you lean in to kiss him once more. You deepen the kiss, feeling Demetri becoming so entwined in the kiss he towered over you a bit too much, unintentionally forcing you to take a step back from him – making you fall on the bed.

    “Oh,” is all he says, and you can see his mind running a mile a minute.

Your lips are painted with a smirk as you wring a finger around his belt loop, pulling him over you.

You reposition yourself more comfortably on the bed, Demetri following your lead. You can sense the buzz of happening in the air; Demetri's stomach ties in knots as unwanted nerves kick in.

Demetri doesn't wait for you to lean up this time, deciding to dive down to kiss you. You can tell by the passion in which he devours you that he's enjoying this new position, his hold over you. His hand skirts up your thigh once more, slowing as he gradually urged the courage to let his fingers climb under and up the shirt you wore. Feeling a surge of nervousness trickle down your spine, you decide to combat it by stopping the kiss to take off the shirt altogether.

    It looks like Demetri forgets to breathe for a long moment. Having broken the kiss, he was left holding himself above you, now drinking in the sight of your naked body.

    “Dem?” you eventually ask, his prolonged stare beginning to make you self-conscious.

    “I - you -” he stutters before pausing and reconsidering his words. He looks you deeply in the eyes, a tenderness in his voice as he says, “you're so beautiful.”

A blush creeps up your cheeks and you can't help but lean up and kiss him again, boldly sending your hands to undo the button of his jeans. You unintentionally brush over his groin in the process, making Demetri gasp in to your lips; a proud smirk finds its way to you.

    “What're you so pleased about?” Demetri asks, his voice low and raspy. He moves to kiss down your neck.

You shut your eyes and let your instincts take over as you lace a hand under his boxers, taking his member in your hand; you tried not to be daunted at the size of it in your palm, rather focusing on the motion of your palm around it.

Demetri's head falls to your shoulder and he makes a noise that tells you you're on the right path.

    “D'you have any idea what you do to me?” he asks, looking back up at you with lust-clouded eyes.

    “After what you did earlier? I have an idea,” you reply. Demetri takes that as an invitation, it seems, as you soon feel his finger brushing your core.

    “You're still wet,” he observes wondrously.

    “What did you expect?” you smile, feeling your body heat rise. Your hand leaves his member – you try not to laugh at the whine Demetri sounds at that – to tug on his jeans. “Off.” Somehow, wording full sentences is feeling like a nuisance.

Demetri eagerly obeys, getting off you to pull off the remaining layers he wore. You can't help but look him up and down, burning the sight of him in to memory.

He quickly scrambles back on top of you, but you stop him. “Umm,” you begin awkwardly. “do you have a condom?” the question comes out nearly as a squeak, and you hate your awkwardness until he replies, “Oh, yeah!” as though he wasn't sure that's where you're going tonight. Demetri gets up and goes through his dresser drawer until he retrieves the condoms you had found earlier.

Your heart beats uncomfortably rapidly at the understanding of what's about to happen; you take deep breathes to soothe yourself.

Demetri repositions himself over you, and you lean up to kiss him. This time it's Demetri who breaks the kiss. “Are you sure you're okay with this?”

His voice is as small as yours was, and you can tell you share the same nervous excitement; something about that makes you more sure than ever. “Yes,” you reply with a kiss.

The next time you two break apart is when Demetri takes the line of condoms in hand, tearing one away and opening it. He looks to you nervously and you reassure him with a smile before he rolls on the condom.

His lips find yours once more, making you gasp in to him when you feel his length pressing in to you. You wince in pain as he pushes in deeper, your nails digging in to his back.

    “Are you okay? Do you want me to stop?”

You shake your head, opting to avoid sounding your voice right now. Demetri looks slightly concerned, but goes on pushing deeper until you feel him well inside you.

    “Just -” you gasp, “stay like that for a minute, all right?”

Demetri nods, kissing down your neck. His hands hold on to the sheets around you, trying his best to stay cool.

    “Okay,” you say once you feel ready. “You can...”

Demetri understands, pulling away from you and earning a gasp from you at the lack of him, only to push back in and gain an even louder moan. He can't hide the pleased grin he wears at that, and something about that makes you smile, too.

There's a dull ache in you as Demetri thrusts, coupled with gradually growing pleasure.

What keeps you from focusing on the pain is the feeling of Demetri's slender fingers caressing your skin, his lips kissing every inch of you that he could reach, the sound of Demetri moaning in pleasure at the feeling of you.

    It's not long before Demetri's thrusts grow rapid until he stills inside you, groaning loudly and riding out a few last thrusts.

He pulls out and falls on top of you. You smile at the pleasant contentedness you were feeling at the night, caressing your loves back as he regained his strength.

A couple of minutes after, he rolls off you and discards the used condom. Immediately his hands are back on you, pulling you to lie atop of him. Demetri squeezes you tightly in his arms for a moment before lightening his hold, petting the side of your body and kissing your forehead.

    “How was -” he begins before reconsidering his words. “How are you feeling?”

You smile at his tenderness; there was a whole new chapter now between you two, and you were excited to be growing closer to the man you loved. “Amazing,” you say. Despite the pain and discomfort, the closeness to Demetri and the shared new experience has you on cloud nine. “You?”

    “I -” Demetri puffs his cheeks, feigning a loss for words. “I'm alright. You know, if alright is... Mind-blown, earth-shattered, intensely euphoric.”

You laugh loudly and take notice of the golden foil left on the bed behind Demetri. You reach over and pick it up, examining the long line of condoms. “How long have you been expecting this?” you ask, humor colouring your voice.

    “Oh – I – I wasn't,” Demetri quickly defends, his cheeks reddening.

    You raise a brow. “Oh?”

    “They – they're from Miguel,” Demetri admits. “I kind of... told him about us.”

    “You did?” you ask excitedly. As far as you had known, you were keeping your relationship hush-hush, although you never clearly agreed on it.

    “We had just shared our first kiss. I was excited!”

Your cheeks are growing tired from your non-stop smiling. “That... actually explains so much.” It suddenly clicks to you how come when all your Cobra Kai friends texted you trying to convince you to come over to Aisha's, Miguel was the only one who didn't.

Demetri shrugs shyly. “I had to confide in someone.”

You lean over him and kiss him. “Maybe... We could start telling everyone?”

Demetri's face brightens up instantly. “That – yes. That would be amazing.” He circles his arms around you, pulling you back down to his chest. “It's about time everyone knows you're mine.”

----

Tag list: @skateb0red @lllyyysss02 @violeata @mike-tozier @marvelwweprinxessesworld

[subwalls]

i simply think a sensory deprivation curse on c!dream would be like. hm.

raising a world seed into a full-blown server requires some negotiation. it’s not hard, because the universe loves each and every player that exists, but the voices are pickier about it, so it’s still a process.

dream is very good at it. he has to be, to spawn so many little worlds for manhunts and the like. this time, though, he’s asking for a lot more than he normally does: every natural feature the universe has to give, enough room for those he loves, every barrier to keep out those he does not, and enough power to administer justice as he sees fit.

the universe sings in eager delight. the voices twist closer, curious but skeptical. the starlit glimmer of their speech curls around him, staying just clear of the wishing seed he cradles between his hands.

now, hold on. the structures you seek are many. whose eyes will it be to appreciate them, even if they lie at the edges of the world, even if their gifts are not worth the trek taken?

mine, the player says.

the vast space you seek is heavy. whose shoulders will it be to hold the weight of it, when the world becomes too burdened to sustain its own place in the universe?

mine, the player says.

the protection you seek is unyielding. whose hand will it be to carve every permitted callsign into its most protected chambers, to tame the roaring blaze of its defense so that some may pass unharmed?

mine, the player says.

the power you seek is heady. whose body will it be to anchor the soul that must bear that responsibility, which will cave to the rebellion of the world against the will of its soul, if it must?

mine, the player says.

there is silence as the voices contemplate this. they drift away and draw near again, intelligible static moaning quietly from their unseen throats as they discuss amongst themselves. and then, at last, one addresses him again.

this is much to put on you and only you. but you have accepted this. do not forget.

you make this for the joy and laughter of your friends—this is easy to see, young dreamer. do not forget.

a server world is a world that serves. it will serve your friends. we will not tolerate anything less.

we will not tolerate oathbreaking. the world will not tolerate abuse.

you are its vassal.

you are its to punish.

dream says, i understand.

and the universe says, i love you, and the seed cupped in his palms pulses gently, and then fiercely, boldly, life blooming under the sworn promise of someone who will tend to it, and—all at once, the void is forced back. land shudders into existence in a rushing wave that reaches far and wide, and the core of it purrs to life into dream’s heart.

the wind whistles along the plains, laughing through the trees and their countless leaves. lakes lap gently at their shores at the base of mountains that stretch up to the sky, high and waiting.

and dream has his server. he inhales the sweet air and runs his fingers along the grass, curling his fingers along the soft petal of a flower and feels nothing but love and anticipation for what the server is and what it might become.

he lifts a hand and the protective borders of the world roar to him, walls of flame rushing past his senses before a shimmering white list coalesces before him. it is empty until he carves a few callsigns into it. just three, for now, but there is room for many more.

his friends arrive, after that. they play, and they relish, and they ask for more. who is dream to deny them, in a world meant to be theirs? he carves more names into the list. they arrive, they play, they ask. he carves more still, and then more, and more.

there is as much room as dream needs.

they skirmish and play-fight. it’s an easy thing, running rings around each other while shrieking for mercy or blood, building ugly things of wood and faith and cobblestone and friendship, playing pretend without a care in the world.

at least, it was easy, up until—

wilbur soot says, “this is a different server, independent of dream smp.” 

wilbur soot says, “you and yours are forbidden from stepping foot here.”

wilbur soot says, “this is l’manburg, and this is mine, and we will stand our ground.”

wilbur soot, whose father is the winged angel of death, who could nearly call the blood god his own family, whose bloodline is so entrenched in the dealings of voids and voices that he must know what dream had to do to turn a world seed into a haven of a server, this wilbur soot is the one who meets dream’s mask with a wide grin and an open taunt, daring him. mocking him.

and dream, remembering the responsibility he swore to take on as his own and no other’s, the word mine in echo through his soul, says, “no.”

and they war.

(you know this story.)

but it’s odd. it’s odd because after dream’s arrow sinks into tommy’s heart and dashes his soul against the rocks, he tastes ash in the back of his throat. it does not go away when he rinses his mouth out in the clear rivers of his land, nor when he gulps down a bucket of milk, nor when he bites into the cake his allies make to celebrate their victory.

the pastry melts on his tongue with what must be copious amounts of sugar, but he cannot tell that it is meant to be sweet.

dream tastes nothing but ash.

he laughs past it. there is an inkling of fear in his gut, but compared to the rib-shaking thunder of his heart when he’s low on health on a manhunt, it is easy enough to overlook. especially when tommy comes to him.

tommy offers a trade and dream is intrigued enough to accept. he figures that if tommy was willing to give up his most treasured items for this, for what is little more than a name and an toothless claim, then maybe this nation deserves a... chance.

in name, at least. not true independence—no more than a flower can be independent of the land it is rooted in—but there is no need to overreach his control when he’s already proven that they cannot do anything to him and his.

he lets them play. that’s what this server is for, in the end.

(the end. that should’ve been the end, but it’s not.)

not long passes before the fake nation festering like an unwelcome cancerous growth on dream’s land suddenly wants to make itself realer than before. it turns words to action with an election that goes sideways at its peak and buckles under itself. by the close of the day, its new leader has driven out its founding members, lighting the fuse to its own destruction.

dream, overlooking the chaos of it all, sighs.

this nation will never be anything more than a mistake, it seems. whether it is l’manburg or manburg does not matter; it binds its population by excluding something else, and thus by definition is a sin against a world made to be shared.

in the aftermath, dream curls a little tighter around his family, but it’s too late. the first crack has already been made and everyone is all the more fragile for it.

when a few more decide to take leave of the heartland, they do not tell dream. he finds out by the empty houses and unfamiliar flags, and he...

they...

... it’s fine. they did not like the fighting, is all. of course they would rebrand and skirt the violence.

it does not mean abandonment, surely.

dream does not raise his sword against his inner circle, no matter where they place their allegiances. he instead focuses on the one he’s certain is rotten to the core, and he’ll sing l’manburg’s praises if it means that piece of land will finally stop inciting war after war after war.

“its name is l’manburg, not manburg,” he says in the dark ravine of pogtopia, and wilbur cheers and tommy raises a brow and dream feels sick to his stomach.

tommy mumbles something about carbon monoxide poisoning and complains about the smoke from all the torches and campfires and lanterns they use to light up the place. wilbur rebukes that they cannot ventilate the smoke without giving themselves away, and so they bicker, but it occurs to dream that he hadn’t noticed the difference.

the stale smoke-tinged air smells the same as the fresh winds outside.

he’s handed a baked potato as he leaves. he holds it to his face for a beat before tentatively biting into it.

ash. dust.

the lack of taste, he’s grown used to. but his sense of smell is gone now as well, and that inkling of fear strengthens.

he remembers what he promised to the voices. his body will cave to the rebellion of the world, should he stray from its intended purpose. but he has yet to break an oath or abuse his powers. he doesn’t understand.

is it the side he’s on?

if the server vies for him to join manburg, then of course he will flip sides for it. of course he does. he even conspires behind their backs, ensuring that if pogtopia wins l’manburg still does not win.

he was right to, because the day of reckoning comes with the failure of manburg’s leader.

he was wrong to, because dream’s fingers go numb on the handle of his axe when he brings it down on his rival’s shield, and the feeling never returns. something in his chest sours with frustration.

(something cracks, deep inside, ripping apart hairline fractures into something more serious, more troubling. his soul quakes. the universe wails, but nobody has touched the server’s End by law decree, and the void goes unseen.)

dream rips off his helmet and lets time run out the invisibility running through his veins. he yields to pogtopia’s glaring victory with ease, because it was never the nation he fought for but his responsibility to the land it sat on.

and because he still wins, in the end. the ground ruptures as a blast consumes the remnants of manburg, and yet even then dream is the last to move away from it.

he knew it was coming, but reacted last, and not only that but overbalances along the way. he nearly tips sapnap into line of fire when he meant to pull him free from it.

they laugh it off later, but. sapnap looks over his shoulder more often. dream does not meet his gaze, instead contemplating the ground and how he did not feel the rumble of the earth before it blew.

he needs to sort this out. so he goes to find an open field.

he spends hours and then days in that field, figuring out how much he needs to pull back a bow to loose it swiftly. how tightly does he need to hold a weapon before he cracks its hilt? how roughly can he handle his own armor before the thorns bite back at him?

(elsewhere, an entity realizes it can touch, and it does. it uses that touch to kill those who kill on its sacred lands. the rules of the world must be followed. it does not know anything else.)

later still, a mushroom house burns.

dream looks to the smoldering remains with something tight and knotted and insufficient between his ribs, and then he looks to george, upset by the loss but upset more by dream taking back his crown, and he says, “it’s to keep you safe.”

his words leave his mouth, and the world falls silent.

dream blinks.

it’s not silent. he knows this because he can still feel the flames that should be crackling behind them, because george’s jaw is moving, because sapnap is nodding in agreement.

but they are silent. the world is silent.

no, the world is not silent. the world louder than it has ever been in its rebellion and his body is caving to it as he promised it would, and dream—dream does not falter, despite the sudden knowledge that the server he raised loathes every step he takes. he does not stammer.

he repeats the words he cannot hear but knows have left his lips, turns, and leaves.

he does not look back. he does not know that sapnap is calling after him, that george pauses mid-turn, that among the vitriol thrown at his back there is also a worry and a question. but there is no way for him to know, not with the server itself in uproar, devastatingly loud in the utter silence it inflicts on him.

fear claws up his lungs and he breaks from a walk to a jog to an outright run, and he runs and keeps running past all the structures he knows and built until it just forest and land and silence. safe, far, and alone, he digs his hands into the grassy dirt and says is this not what you wanted? is this not what i swore to do?

why do you hate me?

selfish, his precious world accuses. it is not a sound because there is no sound he can hear, but it is a hiss in his marrow, a keening in his soul. selfish, selfish. you leap for control you oughtn’t take and will burn them for it.

they burned me first.

did they? what did they do but till the fertile land? speak. speak. what did they do but flourish as you bid them to, wished them to?

they took from me and would not return it and struck back when i came to them. you are mine. i raised you.

and did you not freely give? is that not the purpose this world serves? do not forget. do not forget. do not forget.

dream does not so much pull back from the foundations of the world so much as it throws him out with teeth bared in warning and talons pressing down over his ribs, the ever-fragile beat of his heart cowed in its cage. it is a thought rather than a feeling, thankfully; just as it is the force of an arrow nearly knocking him down that makes him aware of the two others sticking out from his shoulders, once he lifted his arm to see what it was that had bumped into him.

his blood trickles down his arms as he yanks out the arrows, unfeeling.

fine, he thinks.

and dream, creator and administrator and player who cares too much and brought too much on his own shoulders, takes the injured confused uncomprehending thing so soft in the back of his mind, and puts it out.

enough is enough. his world is his server is his, and it will be brought to heel. even if it does not want him, and he does not want it, it is his to raise or raze and he will not have this haven ruined at the hands of the clumsy and unknowing.

who do you love, he asks it bitterly, yanking a netherite axe out of the air.

all of you.

who do you love, he asks again, and this time he finds his own answer in the way the events churn around one person, one survivor, one person who moves the server with a word and turns it against itself with another and leads every storm that rages: tommy.

all of you.

if you will not be mine, he says, then you will be no one’s. and he knows that this is a dangerous line to walk, and he has seen wilbur walk it to its bloody, deadly end, but he has right where wilbur had only words and songs. dream made this server for a reason and he will not give that up.

so he walks back.

he walks back, and he thinks, sourly, that maybe this is a blessing. the world takes his senses but he is stronger without them, really. who has need of taste or smell on a battleground? he can fight better like this, unfeeling, unburdened by pain.

it is easier to talk over their protests when he cannot hear them to begin with.

“exile tommy,” he tells tubbo, carefully shaping the words on his tongue, “and i will forgive you.”

and tubbo sputters and tommy rages and the world claws at him from the inside out, no, no, why are you doing this, this is not what was wanted.

he is calm, because their words pass over him without ever reaching.

he is calm, because they’re running out of time, and they will agree to him or die failing to. night is coming; shadows fall over them.

and then:

—nothing.

(nothing?)

nothing.

dream blinks. the void stares back at him, unblinking, stars aswirl and dancing, and just as he realizes that maybe night hadn’t come and maybe the void is not rising around him and maybe it’s just that his last sense is failing and maybe the world has rejected him for the last time and maybe everything he swore to do thinks he’s broken them and—

the silence breaks.

why why why why did you break what you swore was yours to uphold why did you lie why do you hurt and abuse and break. you were warned. you were told.

i didn’t.

you did. a server serves and you got in the way. do you not do this for your friends. why give them a beach to build on if you’re only going to punish them for using what they have. why. why why why.

... ,,uhhh honestly i don’t. know where this would go from here but because dream gets stopped early he still gets a chance to be better. the exile arc doesnt happen because dream just like collapses mid-negotiations lmao and even tommy feels kinda weird about stabbing him while he’s unresponsive. but i think i would like for the conclusion to be something like—

the universe says, i love you.

the world says, i love you more.

but it’s the the players holding him to their chests, hearts thumping in syncopation, tugging him from the brink of an edge that might have killed his love in a month’s time, who say, “i love you most. come back to us. come back.”

[mailboxmerchant]

PANIC

yall ever wonder it would be like to go into an idv match while dating dear ol gravekeeper? me 2, here you go!

character: andrew kreiss (grave keeper)

fandom: identity V

warnings: none? in game violence typa stuff! (and maybe some more rougher violence(?))

Tired and drowsy, you dredged your way back into the main hall of the accursed manor you had trapped yourself in. Match after match, hunter after hunter, injury after injury. You were exhausted, your only motivation to keep trying being your albino sweetheart.

"Y/N....you don't have to keep doing this to yourself, we can t-take a break if you want..." Andrew whispered as he reached down to pat your shoulder affectionately.

"I know, I know...But I can't give up yet." You sighed as you rested your hand over his, your hand shaking ever so slightly as you did. "Y/N, you-you're shaking...?" Andrew looked down at you in harsh concern, grasping your hand tighter as you leaned back to press the back of your head into his stomach.

Letting out another heavy sigh, you forced a weak smile as reassurance to Andrew. The both of you knew well that you were both reaching your limits, but neither were willing to stop until you gave in.

An expression of fear struck your face as you saw your hunter. "A-ahh....Wu Chang, huh?" You tightened your shoulder muscles, your grip on Andrew's hand growing harsh as you prepared to be downed in the first minute of the match. As your vision began to fade, indicating you'd be left in a random location somewhere in the hospital, you felt a cold pair of soft lips leave a kiss on your forehead, the chilly skin telling you it was Andrew.

Your heart was still and calm, and cautiously so, you began to sneak about rubble and rubbage to reach the nearest cipher. "Please don't let it be us first.....Please, god, please." you whispered as you began to tap away at the keys of the machine. When a more feminine voice screamed out, you guiltily let out a breath of relief, now knowing that Andrew would be okay for the time being.

About thirty seconds passed as you began to hear a quiet crumbling noise beneath the ground.

'Andrew!' you silently cheered as you prepared to help him out of the dirt. And as if on cue, a pale hand emerged from the ground. It was funny, similar to the dead raising, but you knew better than to make such jokes to Andrew.

Grasping his stiff, frigid skinned hand, you pulled your beloved out of the moist dirt. "Th-thank you.." Giving him a shy smile as a sign of "you're welcome", you both got back to decoding your half done machine. But of course, as your luck would have it, steadily your heart beat grew hard against your bony frame. "Andrew, go, dig!" At your command, Andrew gave a nod before grabbing your wrist and pulling you under his dirt tunnel with him.

As you felt your heartbeat hit harder and harder against your chest, your breaths became short and shaky. "A-Andrew..I can't..." But before you could get your words out, the two of you were yanked from the dirt and thrown to solid ground to continue by foot.

But the weak lungs that carried you weren't fully recovered yet, and eventually you got bashed on the shoulder as you were crossing a ledge, sending you reeling to the ground. "Sh-shit, I can't...stand..." Angry and wounded, you did your best to futily crawl across the ground to follow Andrew's dirt path he left in his wake.

A shining green light that emitted from Wu Chang's umbrella forced you to close your eyes for a few moments, the brightness just being too much for you after having been smacked down on a jagged concrete wall.

When you could see again though, you instantly wished you could go blind. Andrew was sprawled out on the floor, his shovel thrown far from him as he did his best to crawl to you. His face was harshly bruised, seemingly as though he had landed right on it after taking whatever injury he had sustained. "Y/N, h-help....me-" When you were readying up to heal him, he released a pained noise. As you looked up, a deep feeling of rage and panic bloomed in your core. Wu Chang stood smugly above your dear Grave Keeper, his umbrella piercing shallowly in the lower area of his back. His whimpers of pain were enough to push you to at least limp over to shock the hunter with a spare glove of Luca's you'd found in a chest. But Wu Chang sunk his pointed umbrella further into Andrew's spine as a warning.

Andrew's cries were sending you into a flurry of emotional panic now, your heartbeat now echoing painfully in your head as you cried out for him. It felt like all the colors and people you saw in front of you were melding together, your mind aching for some kind of relief as your eyes focused on the bright red that began to trickle into your vision. “y/n...y/n....”

“Y/N! Y/N!” Andrew’s voice was directly in your ear, your head now flush against the cool dirt. He was gently shaking you, just enough to snap you out of you illusive daze. “Wh-what the...A-Andrew!” You clung to him  like that breath was the last you’d ever take, squeezing the life out of him in the process. “Hmbph! y/n, i-it’s okay..” his voice brought you back down to Earth, his soft tone ringing like quiet music to your mind. His hands were placed at your shoulders as he kneeled in front of you. You were both sitting on the top floor of the run-down hospital, both exhausted, out of breath, and wounded to some varying degrees. 

Slowly, you eased your grip on the tall man’s shoulders, but as you let go, his hand met the side of your cheek, which you instinctively leaned into. Taking it as a sign that you’d be okay to go on, Andrew stood and offered a hand down to you. 

“You really scared me, y/n. You got launched off that window sill, and I thought I wouldn’t be able to get to you before you got g-grabbed...” You shushed his worried thoughts aloud with a finger to his lips. “I’m okay now. This can...be our last match for the night. I can’t handle another one of Wu Chang’s visions, and I think I’ve run you thin of energy...” You smiled sheepishly as Andrew’s cheeks grew redder as you kept your finger near his soft-skinned lips. 

You quickly pulled Andrew close, diving for underneath the creaky bed frame behind the tattered curtain. Your heartbeats thumped powerfully in sync as Wu Chang grew near again, his low chuckle indicating he was not happy you both escaped from his terror. You now held a finger to yours and Andrew’s lips, the both of you stifling your breaths to shallow, quiet ones. The noise of the gates being accessible breached the playing field, and Wu Chang quickly changed directions to go to the south bound gate entrance. 

Once you could no longer hear the thump of your heartbeat, you  made a quick audible note to yourself and Andrew.

“Detention.” You spoke in sync.  

While gaining an extra boost of stamina was rewarding, the stakes were now much higher with an even more dangerous hunter. 

Taking slow, even steps, you and Andrew made it down to the first floor of the dirtied hospital. 

“It’ll be okay, we just have to-” Cut off by a loud clattering, Andrew silenced himself and dove with you into a barely lit room, a hand over each of your mouths. 

“y/n? Andrew? It’s just me, guys.” Luca’s voice rang out from the hallway, his silhouette signaling that it was safe to come out. “The gates open, lovebirds, let’s go before he comes back.” 

Andrew led both you and Luca, taking role as the leader (pretty surprising to see!). Luca paid no mind to the fact you were holding hands, only giving you a smug look as per usual. When you finally reached the gate, you were all surprised to see Wu Chang was no where to be found. Either he was planning something, or he really though you’d all appear at the south bound gate. Regardless, now was the perfect time to make a break for it. 

“What are you waiting for, let’s go!” Luca called as he booked it for the exit. You turned to Andrew, giving him a confirming nod before pulling the both of you from your hiding spot and dashing for the gate. And just as you tumbled through, Wu Chang’s umbrella appeared directly above you both. Luckily enough, you both made it in time, Andrew taking the chance to tunnel underground with you to ensure a safe escape. 

word count:1440

[theseshipsshallsail]

Chapter 1

The revelry from the bookstore leaves a heady buzz of la libertà flowing through their veins, and as the crescent moon climbs higher in a pin-pricked sky, Rome’s labyrinthine streets bear witness to the loss of their remaining inhibitions. Drunken kisses give way to drunken dancing - and unfortunate drunken vomiting - but the ancient cobbles are their compass on this ferragosto evening, steering them back to the complicit safety of their hotel. 

The stale scent of sex still lingers in the room, yet tempted as they are to add to it, the prospect of their imminent separation is a sobering force. Elio’s body is heavy with exhaustion. The oppressive tightness in his chest magnified by all that he’s trying to ignore. Their time is borrowed. Soon, all of this will be naught but memory. The man beside him nothing but a ghost. Haunting his every step with visions of a life denied. A future obfuscated by what-ifs and maybes.   

He refuses to sleep, however. Refuses to sacrifice a single minute to unconsciousness in spite of the grappa’s siren call. Absurd though it is, a part of him dreads waking up alone. That Oliver will disappear like a thief in the night - taking what’s left of his shattered heart with him. His guards are down - all his pretences stripped away - but here they are, stretched out on a too-small bed, solemn fingers caressing familiar skin. Worshipping each other by words, if not by the flesh. 

And it isn’t easy. Of course it isn’t. Elio’s an individuo reservato. A trait he’s uncomfortably aware of. But he can’t let that stop him from spilling his innermost thoughts. From divulging the things he wishes he’d done differently. Or not at all. In some aspects, he’s sure he’s repeating himself, but there’s just so much he needs Oliver to hear. Things he never dared tell him previously - never deemed vital - when the end of their summer idyll was a nebulous concept.  

Like how he’d leave the adjoining door open at night, hoping beyond hope that Oliver would walk through it. Or that afternoon at the tennis courts, when he’d recoiled from his massage for fear of leaning into the frisson of excitement. Needs him to understand his visceral reaction the morning after they first slept together. The crippling anxiety that twisted his intentions, necessitating a hasty - if short-lived - retreat. Wants to beg him not to forget. To remember everything. So that when next he tastes the salt-tang of the ocean upon his lips, the sweetness of apricot juice beneath a cloudless yonder, a piece of Elio - nevermind how fleeting - will slip into that parallel life, too.

All his secrets. 

All his worries. 

All he’s put off for later. 

A futile notion, admittedly, now that there is no later. 

No more chance for postponement. 

Thankfully, he isn’t the only one speaking, and Oliver lays his own regrets out like a hand of cards whenever he stumbles into a tongue-tied silence. His forearm is slung around his waist, their legs tangled at the knees, and Elio drowns in his eyes as he recalls the steely glares that once pierced him to the core, but which he now appreciates were a means of self-defence. An attempt to stave off the unavoidable.

“Did you mean it?” he whispers, twisting Oliver’s Star of David between his fingertips as he burrows into the sticky warmth of his neck. “When you said you’d been happy here?”

“How can you even ask me that?” 

“How can I not?” Elio replies, failing to control the tremor in his voice. “You tried to keep your distance when you arrived. It was me who sought you out. If I hadn’t pushed so hard -”

“I’d have probably spent ten more days kicking myself for my cowardice,” Oliver tells him, dropping kisses to his knuckles as though they’re something to be cherished. “Wearing holes in my espadrilles… trying to hide a semi each time you passed by in those swim trunks...”

Elio snorts. “The feeling’s mutual, mon ami.”

“So we’re both idiots, then?”

“Well… one of us was being purposefully difficult...”

“Goose,” Oliver growls, and Elio giggles despite himself when he’s tickled without mercy. “I’ll show you purposefully difficult.”

It soon devolves into a childish wrestling match, Elio’s wrists pinned above him as Oliver scrabbles along his sides, leaving him bow-taut and winded. “Tutto apposto! Enough!”

“You give?”

“I give,” he says, lungs heaving in his chest. “Dio… I shouldn’t have asked.”

“Nonsense.” Oliver rolls to the side, tipping his chin up to better meet his eyes. ”This is new to us both. It’s only natural to have doubts.”

Elio huffs. “Doubt is the father of inventions.”

“And may I ask what you’re inventing?”

An awkward shrug. “Nothing,” Elio says, afraid his misgivings will lead them down a destructive path. “And everything. You know how my brain works.”

“I do, yes.” Oliver brushes a thumb over his bottom lip. “Though for my sins, I’ve yet to find cause for complaint.”

“Déviant.” 

“Takes one to know one.”

Elio nips at the tormenting digit, not quite ready to let the subject go. “I want to hear it,” he murmurs, teeth scraping the nail. “I think I need to hear it.”

“Elio…”

“Just tell me,” he insists, and sighing, Oliver pinches the bridge of his nose. 

“It’s complicated.”

“Isn’t it always?” 

Impatience flares at the return of his evasiveness, and the remorse in Oliver’s gaze is immediate. “We never talked much about my family, did we?” he asks, and Elio shakes his head, shuffling closer as Oliver draws a shuddering breath. “My parents, they’re.... well. To describe them as traditional would be a kindness,” he continues. “Our relationship has been strained for years, but they have certain... expectations, I suppose. For my future, specifically. You know how it is.”

“Do I?” Elio asks, stiffening as I'm sure I'll pay for it somehow echoed from the not so distant past. 

The implication is clear, and maybe there are razor blades in his expression, because Oliver’s own turns instantly apologetic. “I guess not,” he says, sliding a conciliatory hand to his hip. “Do you have any idea how lucky you are?”

Elio frowns. “In what way?”

“With your folks,” Oliver explains. “My father would cart me off to a correctional facility.” A beat. “He still might.” 

“Only if he finds out,” his traitorous mouth blurts before his alleged genius can catch up, and Elio’s heart sinks. “But he won’t, will he?”

It’s less a question, more a statement, and Oliver’s jaw clenches as he stares at him in silent concession. “I wish things could be different.”

“I know,” Elio says, the words braver than the sentiment behind them. “Me too.”  

But the universe isn’t that lenient. Like Icarus, they’ve flown too near to the sun, and the consequences of such defiance will see their wings clipped once they crash back down to earth. He’d cautioned himself on the journey south to prepare for the blow. Peered out the grimy window of the direttissimo, knowing that when he next stands on the platform he’ll be alone. That he’ll hate it. Those rehearsals, it seems, have done little to dull the pain of what’s to come, and latent superstition has left him fumbling in the dark, regardless.

“E’ la vita,” Elio says, resorting to self-preservation as he dredges up a smile - the over-bright, false one he’s perfected through years of dinner drudgery. “Why risk it all for a bit of fun, right?”

“Don’t do that.” Apparently Elio’s not the only one who can see through a facade. “You mean more to me than some fling, and you know it.”

“But -” 

“No. Hear me out.” Earnest, Oliver smooths the hair from Elio’s temple. “These past six weeks… I don’t know how to describe how important they were to me. The freedom. The acceptance.” His throat bobs in the grey strokes of dawn. “You.”

“Me?” 

“Us.” Oliver fidgets with a loose thread on Elio’s shirt. “I meant it,” he mutters at last, winding an errant curl around the index finger of his other hand. “I have been happy here. I’ve been happy with you.” He hesitates. A quick flash of indecision. “I’m not sure I was ever really happy before you.” 

“Please don’t say that.”

“It’s the truth.”

“Per carità! That only makes it worse,” Elio says, whirling away to hide in Oliver’s collar. The sour musk of sweat is soaked into the material, and he inhales deeply, hoarding every piece of him while he still can. “You are the very best parts of me,” he confesses, lifting his head. “I don’t know what I’ll do when -”

“Hey…” Oliver’s grip tightens. “Didn’t we go over this? You’ll be -”

“Fine. You said.”

“Clearly it bears repeating.” 

Elio touches his face. Watches the ripples of emotion spread out like a pebble cast into the lake. “And you?” he returns, recollecting that night on the rock. His naivety in presuming Oliver’s ghost wouldn’t always be staring out at the horizon. Rodin’s Thinker clad in billowy cotton. “You’ll be okay?”

A breath. “I’ll be okay.”

Elio’s not sure which of them he’s trying to convince, so he kisses him gently in lieu of examining it further, his stomach flipping when Oliver pulls back with an air of exquisite softness. “What time do we need to be at the airport?” he asks, seeking sanctuary in distraction. “You have your passport, sì?”

“I do,” Oliver says, studying him carefully. “The plane leaves at noon. But don’t feel you have to -” He stops. Swallows. Tries again. “You don’t have to see me off. Not if you don’t want -”

“I want.”

“Elio -”

“Non essere ridicolo. I’m coming,” he tells him, fighting a shiver as the cool breeze from the window brings goosebumps to his skin. “Of course I’m coming.” 

The relentless tick of the clock rings loud in the sudden silence, and Elio raises up on his elbow, only for Oliver to cup his cheek before he can turn towards the wall. 

“Don’t look,” he whispers, sounding choked as he double checks the time on his watch. “It’s ten minutes fast at any rate.”

“Ten minutes?” Elio laughs. Slightly unhinged. “What difference does that make? Ten? Twenty? You still have to leave.”

He detests the unspoken word that hovers between them. The entire phrase a sullen admission of weakness: you still have to leave me.

“Don’t think of it like that,” Oliver murmurs, one hand stroking the base of his spine. ”We have a few hours yet.” 

Elio sniffs. “Not like they’ll matter tomorrow.”

“Maybe not. But they matter right now.” Oliver nudges their foreheads together. “Every second, Elio.” 

“Every second, Elio,” he echoes numbly, if only to call him by his name one last time.

He’s shaking, he realises, though in all honesty he doesn’t care that his vulnerabilities are on display. That Oliver can see how lost in him he really is. That the situation is gutting him, and he’s unable to stop the bleeding. His chest feels concave. The space below his ribs too small to contain the sheer need and protectiveness that washes through him. He wants to shelter Oliver from the storm that lies ahead. To house him beneath his breast where the burdens of this world cannot touch him. Encapsulate everything Oliver is within the confines of himself, meagre as those confines might be.

But what can he do? Implore him to stay? Ask him to give up his doctorate? His career? His responsibilities? And for what? A life in the shadows? Always looking over their shoulders. Always that sense of shame.

He thinks of the pink and yellow lilies that bloom in the giardino back in B. The delicate petals that unfurl for such a brief period of time. There’s something recherché, he knows, in such transitory beauty, yet Elio’s never lacked for stubbornness. Oliver may believe his story is already written - that their destiny is forged in stone - but no one’s ever survived a freefall by continuing to spiral. 

For something so tragically temporary, their bond has left a permanent mark. And Elio? He wants to beat his fists against this odious ending until they’re bloodied and raw.

[aniverous]

Analyzing the Girls' Outfits

Amphibiasideblog made a post analyzing the colors and shapes used to design our Amphibia trio, so I wanted to take a closer look at the outfits themselves. With how many one-off outfits these girls wear throughout the show, I'm only doing the main ones we see more than once.

First up, Marcy:

Her first outfit is definitely the simplest. Very little catches the eye, and while the green skirt does stand out, it's a dull green, something you wouldn't notice if there wasn't so much gray. It's also the only starting outfit that doesn't have their school emblem printed large on the center, being limited to a small patch on her chest, close to her heart.

This says that Marcy is a person who doesn't stand out, who doesn't try to, only being in front when she happens to be the most interesting thing there. She has the weakest attachment to Earth, but it still affects her in who she is at her core.

Her second outfit is much more noticeable, but doesn't feel that much different. It has much more color, tons of additions and details, but the colors are still dull, and the details blur together when you look at the whole thing. Her weapon is much less obvious than the other girls' swords, meant for hitting weakpoints and staying out of a head-on fight. She wears fingerless gloves and tough boots that are made for work that requires effort, but not enough that she'd need serious protection. Same with her armor, it covers her chest to protect her vitals, but is designed to let her move freely at the cost of less protection. She kept the hairclip, and while it's not the same skirt, as you can tell by the lack of lines going down it, she kept the same color, even stitching it rather than getting a new one. Her cape is the most noticeable thing about her, the plumage and size making her look bigger and bulkier than she actually is. She's also the only one to change her hair, letting it grow and fluff out more.

This outfit emphasizes how Marcy has become more outward and confident on Amphibia, even though she still stays in the background. She's grown a lot, with her changing herself on a deeper level than the other girls, expressing traits she never had back on Earth: confidence, independence, the willingness to fight for herself and others. but she's not changed as much as she first appears; she still avoids direct confrontation, she still stays out of view. She's tried to reject Earth, but it's still apart of her. While she's stronger than she was at the start, a well placed blow will still go right through her armor.

Next, Sasha:

Her starting outfit has the most color and detail. The jean-jacket immediately stands out, and instantly screams 'teenager'. It says that she is young, wild, and rebellious, with it partially covering the school symbol in the center of her chest. She wears high-heels that make her taller, making her more intimidating and adding to the eye-catching effect. Her bright yellow hair is tied up and has bangs that also work to catch the eye.

Everything about this outfit says that Sasha is prominent. She is a young rebel living life to the fullest. It also tells you that she's powerful, that when she talks, people listen. Yet while she lives large and has big ambitions, she still has values and attachments that make up a big part of her.

Her next outfit is startlingly different; her color pallet has completely changed, with even the skirt being a different color. She's all browns, with only her sword and hair retaining her bright colors. She's covered in armor, even wearing a sturdy glove, shoulder pads, and reinforced boots. Her cape doesn't make her look bigger, but puts more focus on the entire outfit. She no longer has a jacket, but full armor and weaponry.

While her first outfit said she was primarily rebellious and lively, this says that Sasha is powerful and stubborn. She's someone who will fight for something and not stop until that something is completed. She has nothing from her earth outfit, this one is pure Amphibia. It says, 'look at me, I'm going to beat you'. When she loses the cape and shoulder pads in season two, the single-note aspect of her outfit becomes even more prominent, with her only focusing on her goals. Despite all of that, you can still clearly see that it's Sasha under all that armor, with even the weapon she uses for her cause given a splash of her old colors.

Her last outfit is virtually the same as her previous one, even down to losing the cape and shoulder pads when she becomes more focused. She's completely changed color pallets yet again, this time using more aggressive reds than her dull browns. The biggest difference, however, is the Toad Rebellion symbol on her right shoulder pad and cloak. These are only added after the outfit is introduced, and stays for as long as we've seen it.

Sasha is still stubborn about her goals and loyalties. She's become much stronger since we last saw her, being the driving force behind her agenda rather than a supporter who benefits from it. Yet, the symbols serve as a constant reminder that her goal has changed, even if it doesn't seem like it at first glance. Amphibia is the focus of her attention now, she's not just looking to escape it, and she cares about what happens to it.

Finally, Anne:

Anne has this outfit for a vast majority of the series. While she has the most one-off outfits by far, she always ends up back to this one. She keeps wearing only one shoe, she keeps having a stick and leaves in her hair, and she never ditches the school uniform. She's the only one who doesn't have her gem color in her starting outfit, having a royal purple instead of any shade of blue. Her school symbol is front and center, the only one that isn't covered or pushed to the side. She's also the only one to change appearance immediately after arriving in Amphibia, with the stick and leaves appearing and her shoe disappearing right away.

Anne's outfit shows how she isn't a person who changes much on a fundamental level. She has lots of phases, but she always comes back to her core. While Anne certainly learns a lot of lessons about herself and how she acts, those are all traits she already had. She was already loyal and kind and stubborn, she just needs to learn to channel and moderate these traits. She always has her foundation, and even if it could be improved or adapted, it never is.

The only change between this outfit and the last one is the armored chestplate, which has the Amphibia crest on it. It's barely even an outfit, and more of an addition to the previous one.

This outfit shows that even when Anne gets fully dedicated to Amphibia outside of her little valley, she still remain the same person. She never changes her views, never changes her goals. She still has the same imperfect foundation she always did.

[jinnora]

i think i have figured out why people like atla more than korra: atla provides a clearer version of emotional payback than korra does.  

whenever people engage with media, they are agreeing to do the emotional work of getting to know characters, following the plot, learning about the world/lore, and understanding themes.  in response, the audience expects some kind of emotional payback for the work they’ve done.  this can take shape in many forms, but the ones we see most prominently (speaking from a western media standpoint) is the defeat of the villain/success of the protagonist.  

atla at its core is a protagonist-beats-villain story.  even though there are both good sides and bad sides to every element, who is good and who is bad remains very clear throughout the show.  and before you raise a point about zuko’s redemption arc, i’d like to remind you that azula’s lack of redemption makes this show cut and dry on who is good and bad.  if azula was able to be redeemed without helping the good guys ever, we’d have a more complex understanding of goodness and badness.  azula being cast aside is necessary to keep the dichotomy stable, so there’s always a version of who-zuko-could-have-became out there who doesn’t get redeemed.  

and from this, we get a massive emotional payback in the final battles.  seeing aang beat ozai not through force, but through taking his bending is exactly what he needed to do to both succeed as the avatar and as the last piece of an otherwise destroyed culture.  the final agni kai also provides emotional payback by completing zuko’s arc (the scar parallels him to aang; katara healing it resolves their first point of conflict) and katara’s (letting her fight someone not for vengence, but to stop an evil that is currently existing).  toph and sokka’s arcs are similarly closed when toph finally is able to be vulnerable enough to need help and when sokka see someone he loves return from battle.  so, at the end, the audience feels at peace.  we did the work to feel good and now we feel good. 

korra, on the other hand, is a completely different show because the point of it is that you can’t just defeat badness.  whereas aang had one great evil to defeat, korra must battle a new villain every season.  of course, this could provide emotional payoff, but just in smaller, more constant quantities (1 per season vs. avatar’s one per show).  why it doesn’t is because 1) korra’s existence creates her enemies and 2) her enemies are extremists, but often not 100% wrong. 

the equalists are entirely wrong in their approach to bring equality and their leader is vengeful liar, but their desire for equality isn’t necessarily bad.  they want to bring balance just like korra, but their ways of doing so actually bring more division and chaos.  the interesting part is that korra's presence initially amplifies conflict instead of ending it, since she is the symbol of bending and holds so much power.  unalaq would literally not have needed to become the dark avatar if korra didn’t exist.  while his desire to overthrow the southern water tribe was corrupt, the heart of the reasons (wanting to increase spiritual connection) caused korra to make the decision which brought airbenders back.  however, it also made zaheer able to become a threat again, which is probably the most literal version of korra making her enemies.  zaheer’s perception of peace being taking down world leaders would also turn the world to chaos, but once again, his heart is in the right place.  kuvira stepped up because no one else would but did not have the correct ideologies to make her a good leader.  while she did harm, she also fed people and gave them protection.  and, of course, the reason for her taking so much power (while often blamed on su) can also be traced back to korra’s reluctance to be patient with her healing and come back strong enough to either 1) be the one uniting the earth kingdom or 2) be able to defeat kuvira earlier in the season. 

this allows for a more complex version of goodness and badness to exist.  when korra says that she “had to understand what true suffering was so [she] could become more compassionate to others, even people like kuvira,” it acknowledges that villains can have good intentions that are simply pushed too far AND that korra herself can be pushed to make similar mistakes when placed in traumatizing situations.  this is entirely different than aang and ozai’s relationship; so, when you finish korra, you are left with an ambiguity between goodness and badness that atla doesn’t have, making the work you did seem less paid back, except it isn’t.  korra demonstrating a more complex version of goodness and badness allows a world more abundant in forgiveness and growth.  it gives you a more nuanced perception of character, allowing the protagonists to have horrendously obvious flaws that somehow don’t stop you from rooting for them.  there’s just no final battle, big showdown, or huge revolution the protagonist starts.  there’s nothing plot wise to signify the clear defeat of evil that people crave.  and while everyone is allowed to have a favorite, and most people will naturally sway towards atla because of this, thinking less of korra as a show because of the moral ambiguity it addresses seems dismissive, because if if korra had followed atla’s simple dichotomy of good vs. bad, it most definitely wouldn’t have been as gripping, complex, or interesting as it is. 

[spadesverse-official]

In the Spadesverse universe, there are four kingdoms. Every kingdom represents an aspect of what keeps the world going and humanity’s connection to it. They all have their individual roles to fulfil- Protectors for every one of this world's fundamental mechanisms, thus each nation is known to oversee a certain aspect of this world’s magic. The ability to control these ‘types’ of magic depends on how dangerous the magic is, some can be used by everyone, whilst others are trusted to the Monarchs alone. It is the duty of each monarchy to work together to bring balance, peace, and prosperity.

The four kingdoms are Diamonds, Hearts, Clubs, and Spades.

Diamonds

Magic

Diamonds’ connection is with nature. Their magic lies within controlling the elements; Earth, fire, water, and air. These are of course umbrella terms, water can extend to ice and other liquids, earth can also refer to plant life, etc. Elemental magic is the easiest to master as people are surrounded by nature, though it comes most naturally to citizens born in Diamonds or anyone who has ancestry from said nation, but it is not limited to just Diamonds alone. It can be wielded by anyone without connections to Diamonds who has a basic knowledge of magic or anyone in tune with nature. However, there have been cases where people have been able to resort to elemental magic without having studied any sort of magic before, usually under pressure, in distressing situations, situations that have activated one’s natural ‘fight or flight’, or under intense emotional responses stemming anywhere from joy, grief, rage, etc.

It should be noted, however, that the Diamonds Monarchy wields it the strongest. Diamonds Royals can complete elemental feats that even Masters (A title earned through training in the magical arts and mastering advanced types of magic) deem unimaginable, such as bending significantly more difficult elements like magma, or singlehandedly stopping entire natural disasters which would usually take hundreds, if not thousands, of magic users to stop.

General

Diamonds is known for its wealth and luxury, the nation of lavish galas and garden parties. They earn this wealth from their vast collection of natural resources, which they are able to take full advantage of due to their born ability to wield the elements. Before other kingdoms learned this magic, Diamonds was the first to hone this ability, getting a head start.

Their soil is already naturally rich, but it doesn’t hurt that farmers can make crops sing by taking advantage of plant based magic, for example. Most notably, Diamonds has exploited the caves that run deep within their grounds and the mountains to the North East, using earth based magic to create mines and harness resources all the way from coal to rarer finds like diamonds, hence the name of the nation. It’s fair to say Diamonds was quick to make significant profit, at least when other Kingdoms began to thrive, that is. The palace was decorated with the gold they mined to honour this show of wealth and, eventually, it became their national colour.

To put it simply, Diamonds thrives off of its agriculture and trade of luxury. They’ve become the fashion capital of the world, with fine silks, metals, and shimmering jewels for the most breath-taking of jewellery. You’ll find many aspiring designers migrating here, and often people retire to Diamonds after a lifetime of building their wealth. Diamonds has been able to enjoy the easy, expensive life with little financial concerns for the majority of the populace, leading, also, to a significant boom in leisure. Notably, Diamonds is home to some of the most famous theatres and the leading nation when it comes to the theatrical arts.

Hearts

Magic

True to its name, Hearts’ core magic revolves around the heart- More specifically, a heartbeat. The beginning and end of said beat. The Hearts Monarchy oversees life and death, tracking souls, so to speak. They do this through pendants (Can also be referred to as ‘amulets’). There are two types of pendants: Fertility pendants and soul pendants.

Fertility pendants are used to track pregnancy and the health of an unborn child. They are usually worn when trying to check if someone is pregnant, or if a couple is trying to conceive. A colourful ‘mist’ will appear in the pendant if the wearer is with child. The mist represents the soul of the child. If there is more than one child present, there will be more than one colour depending on how many embryos there are. There will be two colours in the case of twins, three for triplets, etc. The colours of these mists vary, the reason as to why is unknown. Some say certain colours depict what personality type your child will have, similar to Zodiac signs. There is no evidence to support this theory, however, and so the colour of the mist seems to be just up to chance. One colour is known, however, and only happens in a particular scenario. The mist inside a fertility pendant will turn black in the case of a miscarriage, which only happens if there is infidelity between a couple. Some say this is a punishment given by a higher power, but it is one that seems greatly unjust, especially if the wearer was not the party at fault.

Soul pendants are used to ‘store’ souls. Empty soul pendants will be worn by those who are aware they do not have long left, such as the elderly and/or the severely ill. When they pass, part of their soul/‘life force’ will then be ‘captured’ in the pendant, rather than moving on. Storing a soul using this type of connection to Earth allows the deceased to watch over the living realm as a part of them is still being kept on the physical plain. They can watch over their loved ones from a place most call ‘The Inbetween’. Not much is known of The Inbetween or the afterlife other than this, at least not to anyone still alive.

Soul pendants that are filled with a soul will be given to a loved one of the deceased to wear. The chosen wearer can be named in one’s will if, leading up to their death, the original wearer knows who they want to watch over the most.

A fertility pendant will act as a temporary soul pendant in the case of a miscarriage so that, if the parents wish, their child’s soul can be transferred into an actual soul pendant so that the child, in a way, will still be with them.

Finally, soul pendants (That have a soul inside) can enhance the magic of a wearer by using the life force of the captured soul, but this will weaken the soul overtime until it fades and the connection the deceased once had to the living realm will then be lost, forcing them to fully move on into the afterlife.

Only the Hearts Monarchy and their Makers (Term given to people that manufacture the pendants) can create these pendants. The Monarchy will bestow some of their magic onto Makers, so that they will also have the ability to transfer souls/make pendants that have the ability to capture souls as well. Makers are chosen by the Monarchy and there are very few of them, but they exist to to lessen the workload for the Monarchs themselves so they can still see to their Kingdom’s needs whilst not neglecting the demand for pendants.

It is rumoured that the King and Queen of Hearts share a power that no one else does, however. A final power that links to the human heart. This is the ability to see soulmates. But, again, this is merely a rumour and has not been proven nor disproven.

General

Hearts, well, has a lot of heart. As cheesy as it sounds. But it’s true. This Kingdom is known for its national pride, but also for its sense of community. Citizens will admit that it’s difficult to walk through most villages without at least one grandmother trying to feed them. Children are usually raised by whole towns, not just their own family.

Festivals are not rare in this Kingdom, and they usually surround its citizens’ love of food and alcohol. It’s a wonderful place to go when needing to feel loved and appreciated. It also doesn’t hurt that it’s one of the hotter nations, with a beautifully warm climate.

Moreover, its citizens seem to naturally value life more, and not just their own life for that matter. Many of the world’s best medical schools reside in Hearts, and many of its citizens become doctors, nurses, etc.

Hearts is also known for its art. Diamonds may thrive when it comes to theatre, but Hearts soars when it comes to painting, sculpting, pottery, etc. Both are currently racing to prove who produces the better bards and singers, though.

Clubs

Magic

Clubs' magic revolves around the sun and moon, light and dark, good vs evil, etc. The Clubs Monarchy oversees the balance between light, dark, and neutral magic within the atmosphere, constantly making sure the scales never tip into darkness too much. Dark magic warps people’s minds, makes them give into their darkest desires and selves, having too much of it in the atmosphere can lead to drastic consequences. It will lead people to insanity, create chaos and discord. Thus, it is the Monarchy’s duty to balance out the scales. Say if someone was dabbling in dark magic and they released too much of it into the universe, the Monarchy would balance it out via releasing light magic into the atmosphere, usually by giving out blessings, such as ‘luck’. This is also seen as distributing ‘karma’.

Since balancing the scales is their duty, it is also the role of this Monarchy to decide what types of dark magic are too dangerous and will decide the legislature regarding these types, such as what is illegal and what isn’t, or what needs to be licensed to use, etc. They will consult the other Monarchies before making a final decision, however. Typically, it is also the Clubs Monarchy who will then choose the punishment given to those who are practicing illegal types of magic, such as curses or necromancy.

It is said that the King and Queen can take away one’s ability to do certain types of magic if they begin to abuse their power, and can give this power to remove magic to others they trust, too. It is also said that the King and Queen can harness the energy of the sun and moon to enhance their own magic or the magical abilities of those around them. Neither of these theories have been confirmed.

General

Clubs is...Barren. It’s mountainous terrain, freezing temperatures, and overall snow covered lands makes it difficult to grow almost anything. It’s citizens get by on luck alone, quite literally. The King and Queen throughout history, apparently, have had to bless their citizens with luck just to get by. It’s actually because of this that their national symbol, which had once been a sun, a moon, and an eclipse to represent the balance between light and dark magic, became misinterpreted as a clover through the generations.

It’s main trade is ice and vodka. It doesn’t produce a lot of profit, but it gets them by. Clubs is not a very lively place. Whether this could change or not is up to the New Monarchs.

Spades

Magic

Nothing is known about Spades’ abilities at this point in time. It will remain that way until its Monarchy is found. There are rumours that float around still, from the days of the Old Monarchs, that the Spades Monarchy had the ability to change time. One can dream.

General

Spades is not known for anything yet, other than being the last Kingdom to fall, but also the last to rise again. All they have to show for themselves is a hundred years worth of ruin, like every other Kingdom did before Diamonds rose. They have some farmlands to the West, forests everywhere else, the ruins of old docks. Who knows what the new Monarchy will bring, and who knows what legacy they will create for the Kingdom.

[robininthelabyrinth]

I don't know if you ship ChengXian, but maybe a soul mate au for them with a happy ending please?

1

They figured out that Wei Ying’s parents had died, and Wei Ying left alone, when Jiang Cheng’s fingers started scabbing over.

After all, that’d been the agreement: Jiang Fengmian would consent to his wife’s proposal to engage his eldest daughter to the Jin sect’s heir, and in return she would agree to allow him to bind his best friend’s son to his own the way he and Wei Changzhe had once been bound, before the latter dissolved it in order to marry. 

A soul binding contract, allowing the wounds incurred by one to be shared with the other – a life-saving panacea, halving the severity of the injury by splitting it among two people’s bodies.

It was supposed to be for Jiang Cheng’s benefit, or so Jiang Fengmian had said, but the more his father went out to search for the missing Wei Wuxian – because it had to be his fingers that were so cold that they nearly froze, his nails that were breaking off as he scrabbled for food, his palms that were scraped raw by landing too-hard against the earth – the more Jiang Cheng thought that it was actually for him.

The other persons’ child.

Jiang Cheng didn’t mind, though. He forced himself to eat twice as much as he needed at meals, thinking about how the way he still lost weight he couldn’t spare, but his father forced him to eat even more than that, more and more until his mother threatened to beat him with Zidian if he even suggested another spoonful. He carefully bandaged his fingers and stayed inside, not risking any injury that might spread to Wei Ying’s body, anything that might be the difference between life and death for him.  He took warm baths and wrapped himself in blankets to try to pass along what warmth he could in winter, huddling in his bed with Jasmine, Princess, and Lovely so they could add their warmth, too, licking his fingers whenever they hurt.

When his father finally came back with Wei Ying in his arms, Jiang Cheng was so happy to finally have a chance to meet the boy who was going to be his best friend, just like their fathers had been.

It was nearly all ruined when Jiang Fengmian sent Jiang Cheng’s puppies away, citing Wei Ying’s fear – the contract couldn’t survive hatred, would break at once if one of them ever really hated the other – but in the end Wei Ying came to him and whispered that he remembered little tongues licking his fingers, that maybe these dogs weren’t so bad, and maybe they could go find them again…maybe even together?

That was when Jiang Cheng knew that every bit of effort he’d put in all those years was worth it.

2

It was hard to tell which one of them got into more scrapes when they were younger, Wei Wuxian in his recklessness or Jiang Cheng in trying to keep up with his friend, so they got into the habit of patching each other up as quickly as possible before either Jiang Fengmian or Madam Yu could see – depending on who they encountered first, one of them would get blamed, and neither of them wanted to see that.

Madam Yu sometimes talked about arranging a marriage for Jiang Cheng so that he wouldn’t be burdened by the soul-contract any longer, but Jiang Fengmian refused, insisting that his son pick his marriage for himself, and Jiang Cheng was quietly relieved: he didn’t want to trade in Wei Wuxian for some girl he didn’t know.

Even when Wei Wuxian began to outpace him, being more skilled, more talented, more charismatic – even when people started saying he understood the Jiang sect motto better, that he would be a better sect leader, that he was Jiang Fengmian’s true heir –

Jiang Cheng didn’t care. Wei Wuxian would stand by his side, always, and that was worth a sacrifice.

A little pain in the body, a little pain in the heart, it was all the same.

They were by each other’s side in the Cloud Recesses, they were by each other’s side in the Nightless City, they were at each other’s side as they fell into the cave and came up against the Xuanwu –

And then Jiang Cheng had to be the one to go, while Wei Wuxian had to be the one to stay.

Jiang Cheng clutched his bleeding arm and ignored his burning chest as he hiked back to Yumeng from Qishan, running as far as he could and walking the rest until his feet started bleeding and then he stopped, because he couldn’t let Wei Wuxian face the Xuanwu with bleeding feet, could he?

“Don’t listen to your father,” Wei Wuxian told him after he’d been rescued, when Jiang Fengmian had praised Wei Wuxian and ignored everything Jiang Cheng had done. “I know what you did for me.”

He touched his ribs, which had ached with the exertion, and his feet that were so tired, his stomach that been filled with ill-tasting weeds from the side of the road, that old concern about Wei Wuxian starving rearing its head again, filled and filled until the point that Wei Wuxian had tasted bile that wasn’t his own –

Yes, Wei Wuxian knew that Jiang Cheng loved him.

3

One of the Wen guards slapped Jiang Cheng in the face when he captured him, laughing at their newest prisoner, and only a few streets away Wei Wuxian coughed up blood in response. He didn’t realize then what had happened, but when he returned to find Jiang Cheng gone…

Jiang Cheng would never in his life tell Wei Wuxian what he had done for him, but Wei Wuxian touched his jaw, thought of the timing, and put two and two together.

“It was supposed to be for you, idiot,” he said, wiping the tears from his eyes as he made his way back towards the Lotus Pier as quickly as possible. “It was supposed to protect you – why do you always insist on protecting me?”

Wei Wuxian went as quickly as he could, but he didn’t have his sword and didn’t dare try to find another; his progress was slow, and slowed further by the night he spent screaming up into the stars as the discipline whip fell on Jiang Cheng’s shoulders and chest.

By the way Wei Wuxian suddenly felt terribly sick, empty inside, and didn’t know why until he rescued Jiang Cheng.

(Wen Chao, Wang Lingjiao, Wen Zhuliu…Wei Wuxian vowed that they would all die horrible deaths, every one of them, for what they did to his shidi – to his Jiang Cheng. How dare they..!)

“Remember not to fidget too much,” Wei Wuxian called with a fake smile on his face as Jiang Cheng started his way up the mountain in Yiling, blindfolded and hopeful and believing in Wei Wuxian’s words the way he always had. “Don’t forget: when you get back down, we’ll have matching scars.”

4

“I refuse,” Jiang Cheng said, and turned away from Wei Wuxian. “I will not kick you out of the Jiang sect. I don’t care if Jin Guangshan is angry over what you did – I will not do it.”

“Be sensible for once, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said. “This is shijie’s marriage we’re talking about, and the Jiang sect’s well-being! The stupid things I’ve done are on my head – they shouldn’t drag anyone else down.”

“It’s not a matter of dragging it down – you wouldn’t say that I should abandon the sect because of my failures, would you?”

“What? No. Of course not –”

“Well, the Jiang sect’s as much yours as it is mine.”

Wei Wuxian rolled his eyes. “Jiang Cheng –”

“It is,” Jiang Cheng snapped. “And if you don’t know that by now, you’ll never figure it out, will you?”

He stormed off.

Wei Wuxian stared behind him for a long time, twisting his fingers together. “Oh,” he said, thinking about how Madame Yu would often declare that she was every bit the mistress of the Jiang sect as Jiang Fengmian was the master. “Oh – Jiang Cheng –”

But in the end, what had to happen had to happen.

5

“I’m his uncle. Do you have any last words?”

Wei Wuxian turned around, back going cold – that voice was Jiang Cheng, his A-Cheng, A-Cheng who he’d left behind and all alone.

Jiang Cheng who had run straight to him in secret as soon as the siege of the Burial Mound was planned, still clad in mourning clothes from the Nightless City and covered in the dust of burying Jiang Yanli, whispering in Wei Wuxian’s ear desperately that he had to run, he had to escape, that if he could only get out of the encirclement that Jiang Cheng hide him, he’d find a way, they’d find a way, I can’t lose you too –

Wei Wuxian had looked his lover in the eye and lied to him again as he’d lied to him before: he told him to go gather up his Jiang sect cultivators, as many as he could, and join the siege, told that he’d be able to claim Wei Wuxian for his own sect and demand the others stay out of his family business, told that it would all work out all right.

All lies.

The cultivation backlash had already begun at that point, building deep inside Wei Wuxian’s dantian that no longer had a golden core to help hold it back, and he knew there would be no escape for him. Better that his death serve some purpose in clearing Jiang Cheng’s name.

Now, back in the present, Wei Wuxian slowly turned on his heel.

Jiang Cheng was even more beautiful than he’d been when they were young. He had finally settled into his adult body, well-proportioned and strong; his entire being sufficed with an aura of power – with Sandu at his side and Zidian on his hand, he was every inch the sect leader he had always been meant to be.

But that wasn’t what took Wei Wuxian’s breath away.

Jiang Cheng’s clothing was high-necked and his sleeves were worn tight to his wrists – but there was still enough flesh visible for Wei Wuxian to see the silvery scars that were peppered throughout his skin, little flecks that shone in the light of the moon from every meridian he had.

As if his body had been torn apart by a thousand fierce ghosts, a cultivation backlash fierce enough to kill no matter how much it had been divided between two bodies.

Jiang Cheng must have refused to release the soul-binding contract until the very end, even as it nearly dragged him into the abyss at Wei Wuxian’s side.

“A-Cheng…”

“Who are you to call my uncle that?” Jin Ling cried out, furious, and he flung out his sword; Wei Wuxian was so shocked that he barely remembered to dodge in time, the sharp end of the blade cutting a thin line in his cheek as it passed him by. “You madman! I can’t believe I was nice to you once –!”

Jiang Cheng held his hand.

At first Wei Wuxian and Jin Ling both thought he was calling for silence, but then Jiang Cheng moved his hand to touch his own face – his cheek, where a thin line of flesh had opened up, and blood dripped down.

“…A-Xian?”

6

“I’ve heard so much about you, shishu!” Jin Ling said later, when they were back in the Lotus Pier, his eyes shining as bright as stars. “Jiujiu’s told me all the stories – I even know how to make Mother’s soup, he said that was your favorite! Do you want to try some?”

Wei Wuxian wasn’t sure how he’d manage to eat soup, even his shijie’s special one, given that Jiang Cheng showed no inclination to release his hand now or forever, but he smiled and nodded and watched as Jin Ling ran away to the kitchens.

“You’re not angry at me?” he asked, not for the first time. To think that Jiang Cheng had never released the soul-binding contract, even when Wei Wuxian had been a ghost, even when his soul had been recalled into a body not his own…

“I’m furious,” Jiang Cheng replied. “The only way you can make it up to me is to stay with me forever.”

[megashadowdragon]

vortigern artorias uncle 9 pages

source www . reddit . com/r/grandorder/comments/nl3ytw/vortigern_artorias_uncle_9_pages/

comments : 

 by the op : wasn't satisfied with how he ended last time so i made some modifications to his looks

Servant Class: Saber

Alternate Classes: Lancer, Rider

Alignment: Lawful Evil

Origin: Arthurian Legends.

Attribute: Earth

Trait: Humanoid, Male, Dragon, King, Weak to Enuma Elish, Servant,

Parameters

Strength: A++

*Endurance:*A

*Agility:*C

*Mana:*A++

*Luck:*D

*Noble Phantasm:*A+

His sword is called Black Zagan, It has no special abilities aside from being able to handle Vortigern's power and not breaking.

I took inspirations from his looks from the dragon knight archetype and Dark knights from final fantasy. I modeled his face after mephiston from the blood angels in warhammer 40k.

My goal was to make him look human but with some features that make you doubt his humanity, huge sword, burning red eyes, he also had to look like a king...somewhat...

The reason for his high strength is because he's a dragon, not dragon blood, nor a dragon core, but a straight up dragon.... Story goes he killed the white dragon and drank it's blood. When Artoria fought him, he turned into a dragon. And not some weak ass mid lvl dragon either! a whole ass end game secret boss dragon lol.

He looks like an old man but with one blow can "steal the light" from holy swords, he's strong enough to mop the floor with gawain and artoria. The story described Artoria beating him as a "miracle". It was all thanks to Merling gifting her with Rhongomyniad. It was a secret trump card Vortigern did not know she possessed. This felt similar in Vibe to when Gil went to fight Umbaba and was terrorized by it, only being saved by the sacred prostitute. For Artoria, it was merlin bailing her out. OK everyone thank merlin! Our cute little lion would just be a stain on the wall if not for him!

His strength lets him be on top of any constest of strength, most magical spells and curses have a hard time connecting due to dragons natural magic resistance. He is quite self sufficient in the mana department though, his heart and eyes efficiently absorbs a great amount of mana from the environment, considerably lessening the burden on his master

Interactions with servants:

Artoria: Doesn't care about her since his death, but upon first meeting he'll say something along the lines of "I told you so".

Gawain: Saw Cowardice within him during their fight. To Vortigern, Gawain is a failed knight deserving only death for showing fear when his master was in danger. After he learned of his performance at the battle at camlann, his evaluation on him only got worst....

Mordred: Sees her as a puppet with cut strings that keeps repeating the same mistakes. He would cut her tongue off if she dared to call herself a knight in front of him. He also doesn't like her rudeness and crass tongue, Mordred despite being a reckless idiot sometimes figured out that it's wisest to stay silent near the grumpy old man, she can't take much more "forced trips" through the walls.

Siegfried and Sigurd: Despite being at a disadvantage against dragon slayers he seems to like fighting them.

Charlemagne: He's quite impressed by what he accomplished despite his weird demeanor, he can get along with him somewhat. somewhat.

Saber alter, Lancer alter: He thinks it's foolish of them to try and take his looks as they're both too diminutive to be intimidating to anything other than children. He will mercilessly "Ragdoll" them should they say something rude.

Most servants: One will find that He's quite polite when talking to him, if not somewhat cold. The greatest challenge for most servants is summoning up the courage to talk to him. Even great heroes just have a hard time getting over his terrifying aura. "He's like a black hole in the world, a force of nature who's mere presence is enough to make you run the other way"

-Anonymous servant.

Interactions with master

At first he's quite disappointed as the master looks very unreliable, just some kid with no talent or vision here by accident. he doesn't care much about the fate of humanity but he finds it pitiful, yet he admits his evaluation is presently incomplete. One misstep would be enough for the master to lose his head, literally. Vortigern will despite this, fulfill his duty as a servant.

After increasing his bond he finds himself amused by the master's will to fight on despite the impossible odds " Usually I would mock someone as foolish as you but...you have me at your side".

Chaldea:

In Chaldea he has taken the role of "Heroic spirit evaluator" in which he sets trials for heroic spirits that lack direction or find themselves lost or doubting. The trials are custom made for each servant and makes us of their talents in effective ways...however the failure rate is astronomical.

Vortigern can most often be found roaming the corridors, guarding master's room from the stalker trio and ragdolling disciplining delinquent servants.

[davidmann95]

How about those JL storyboards?

In case you haven’t heard, Zack Snyder is putting on display the ‘storyboards’ - i.e. a rough plot summary accompanied by some Jim Lee sketches - for what would have been Justice League 2 and 3, or as this puts it 2 and ‘2A’. You can see them here (I imagine better-quality versions will soon be released), and read a transcript here. This is evidently a very early version: this was apparently pitched prior to the release of BvS and Justice League being rewritten in the wake of it, with numerous plot details that now don’t line up with what we know about the Snyder Cut, plus it outright mentions it builds on the originally planned versions of the Batman and Flash movies. But it’s a broad outline of what was gonna go down, and while I initially thought it was Snyder throwing in the towel, the timing - paired with the ambiguity left by the necessity for changes, including that this doesn’t factor whatever that “massive cliffhanger” at the end of the Cut is - says to me he’s hoping this’ll be a force multiplier behind efforts to will sequel/s into existence. He’s probably right.

I’ll be discussing spoilers below, but in short: with this Zack Snyder has finally lived up to Alan Moore, in that like Twilight of the Superheroes I wouldn’t believe this was real as opposed to a shockingly on-point parody if not for direct, irrefutable evidence.

Doing some rapid-fire bullet points for this baby to kick us off:

* Folks who know the subject say a lot of this is a yet further continuation of Snyder doing Arthuriana fanfic with the League reskinned over those major players, and I’ll take their word for it.

* I don’t know whether I love or hate that in Justice League 2 the Justice League are only an extant thing for the first scene, and then it’s Snyder giving everybody their own mini-movies. It’s compressing the entire MCU “loosely interconnected solo stories leading to a single big movie later” strategy into a single movie!

*  Funniest line in the whole thing: "Even Lantern has heard of the Kryptonian, worried that he's under the control of Darkseid. He heard his spirit was unbreakable." Hal what fuckin' Superman movie did YOU watch? Second funniest being “IT WILL GIVE HIM POWER OVER ALL LIVING LIFE”

* 90% of the plot I have nothing to say about, it’s generic stage-setting crap. That to be clear is the ‘shocked it’s Snyder’ element, it feels so crassly commercial in a way I can’t believe is coming from the BvS guy.

* Most of what I have to say is unsurprisingly gonna be about a handful of characters but Cyborg’s happy ending being “he isn’t visibly disabled anymore!” is not great!

* The Goddess of War battle with Superman...never pays off? No clue why it’s there.

* What I’d originally heard was that the Codex in Superman’s blood was the last key to the Anti-Life Equation and that’s why Darkseid was coming to Earth. It’s not like all of this wouldn’t have already been averted by Kal-El’s pod smacking into an asteroid on the way to Earth so it’s not as if this makes it any more Superman’s fault, and it would have at least tied all this back to the beginning of the movies, but I suppose that was either fake or from a later draft.

* I have NO idea how this was reimagined without the ‘love triangle’, it’s the central character thing and the entire climax flows directly out of it!

* Darkseid’s kinda a chump in this, huh

Anonymous said: So: Does Zack Snyder hate Superman?

Look: the hilarity of this when Cuck Kent has been a go-to Snyder cult insult towards ‘inferior’ takes on Superman for years cannot be understated, yet at the same time I can almost wrap my brain around where Snyder’s coming from with that as the end for his take on the character. He talked in that Variety piece on how his interest in Superman is informed by having adopted children himself, and Deborah Snyder is the stepmother to his kids by previous relationships, so I can see where he’d be coming from, and I can even imagine how he’d see this as ‘rhyming’ in the sense of “the series begins with Kal-El being adopted by Earth, it ends with him adopting a child of Earth!” In the same way as MARTHA, I can envision how he would put these pieces together in his head thematically without registering or caring what the end result would actually look like. In this case, Superman raising the kid of the man who beat the shit out of him who Batman had with Clark’s wife, who earlier told Bruce she was staying with Clark because he ‘needed her’, suggesting if inadvertently that this really honest to god was a “she’s only staying with Superman out of pity, she really loved Batman more” thing.

But Clark is nothing in this. He’s sad and existential because of coming back from the dead I guess, then he’s corrupted, then time’s undone and he woo-rah rallies the collective armies of the world (interesting angle for the ‘anti-military/anti-establishment’ Superman he’s talked up as) as his big heroic moment in the finale, and then he stops being sad because he’s adopting a kid. So his big much-ballyhooed, extremely necessary five-movie character arc towards truly becoming Superman was:

Sad weird kid -> sad weird kid learns he’s an alien, is still weird and sad, maybe he shouldn’t save people because things could go really wrong? -> his dad is so convinced it could go wrong he lets himself die -> ????? -> Clark is saving people anyway -> learns his origin, gets an inspiring speech about being a bridge between worlds and a costume -> becomes superman (not Superman, that’s later) to save the world, albeit a very property-damagey version, rejects his heritage he just learned about and space dad’s bridge idea -> folks hate him being superman and that sucks though at least he’s got a girlfriend now -> things go so wrong he considers not being superman but his ghost dad reminds him shit always goes wrong so he should be good anyway, which sorta feels like it contradicts his previous advice -> immediate renewed goodness is out the window as he’s blackmailed into having to try and kill a dude but the dude happens to coincidentally have some things in common so they don’t kill each other after all -> big monster now but superman keeps supermaning at it because he loves his girlfriend and he dies -> he’s brought back, wears black which apparently means now he likes Krypton again? -> he has work friends now but he’s still sad because he was dead -> evil now! -> wait nevermind time travel -> rallies the troops -> his wife’s having a kid so he’s not sad anymore -> Superman! Who gives way to more Batman.

Do I think Zack Snyder is lying when he says he likes Superman? No. I think he sincerely finds much of the basic conceits and imagery engaging. But I don’t think he meaningfully gives shit about Clark as a character, just a vessel for Big Iconic Beats he wants to hit. Whereas while for instance he’s critical of Batman as an idea (at least up to a point), he’s much more passionately, directly enamored with him as a presence and personality. So while Superman may be the character whose ostensible myth cycle or arc or however it’s spun might be propelling a lot of events here, it’s a distant appreciation - of course the other guy takes over and subsumes him into his own narrative. Of course Batman is the savior, the past and the future (though if he’s supposed to be Batman’s kid raised by Superman there’s no excuse for him not to be Nightwing), the tragic martyr to our potential. Admittedly the implication here is also that Batman can apparently only REALLY with his whole heart be willing to sacrifice his life to save an innocent, for that matter apparently his great love, once said innocent is a receptacle for his Bat-brood, but he and Clark are both already irredeemable pieces of shit by the end of BvS so it’s not like this even registers by comparison.

Anonymous said: That “plan” Snyder had was utter dogshit. Picture proof that DC & WB hate Superman. Also I love how you’re like Jor-El: Every single idealistic take you had about Snyder, his fandom, and BvS was wrong. Snyder’s an edgy hack, his fanbase just wants to jerk off to their edgy self-insert Batgod as he screams FUCK while mowing people down with machine guns, and the idea that BvS said Superman was better than Bats was completely wrong. You know what comes next SuperMann: Either you die or I do.

In the final analysis, beyond that mother of god is there sure no conceivable excuse for the treatment of Lois in this? The temptation is to join that anon and say as I originally tweeted that these were “built entirely to disabuse every single redemptive reading of the previous work and any notion of these movies as nuanced, artistic, self-reflective, or meaningful”.

...

...

...yeah, okay, that’s mostly right. Zack Snyder’s vision really was the vision of an edgelord idiot with bad ideas who was never going to build up to anything that would reframe it all as a sensible whole. He’s a sincere edgelord genuinely trying really hard with his bad ideas who put some of them together quite cleverly! But they’re fucking bad and the endgame was never anything more than ramping up into smashing the action figures together as big as he could, the political overtones and moral sketchiness of BvS while trying to say something in that movie reverberated through the grand scheme of his pentalogy in no way beyond giving his boys a big sad pit to rise out of so when they kicked ass later it’d rule harder, and all the gods among men questions and horror and trappings were only that: trappings. Apparently he’s really pleasant and well-meaning in person, but at his core his art as embodied in a couple weeks in his 4-hour R-rated Justice League movie meant to be seen in black-and-white all comes down to that time he yelled at someone on Twitter that he couldn’t appreciate Snyder’s work because it’s for grown-ups. He made half-clever, occasionally exciting shit cape movies for a bunch of corny pseudo-intellectual douchebags, folks latching onto and justifying blockbusters that at least acknowledge how horrifying the world is right now even if the superheroes are basically useless in the face of it if not outright part of the problem until a convenient alien invasion shows up to justify them, and a handful of non-asshole smart people who vibe with it but...well. ‘Suckered’ is a harsh word, and definitely doesn’t apply to all of them re: what they’ve gotten out of it up to this point and would (somehow) get out of this. But it doesn’t apply to none of them, either.

[giowritess]

Dull — Michael Corleone

masterlist. | michael corleone.

Pairing: Michael Corleone x fem!OC Tatiana van Doren

Plot: Tatiana and Michael have always been pushing each other’s buttons. One day, when confronting him about a deal that went south, their relationship takes a different path.

Warnings: cursing, sexual themes — choking, vaginal fingering, intercourse, unprotected sex, edging. 

Word-count: 2,555

Kinktober: prompts — • 4. begging • 10. against the wall • 11. hatesex • 12. fingering • 13. edging • 32. choking

Author’s note: Wassup people!!! Sorry for taking so long to write something. I finally wrote something about one of my all-time favorite characters, who doesn’t have a big fandom but should. If you don’t know what The Godfather is about, all you need to know is that they’re gangsters and this man is perfect. This lovely piece I wrote alongside the most precious being on universe that’s @pacinorose! I love you so much and I can’t thank you enough for entering my life. I haven’t written smut in four years and this is my first attempt at it. This is also my 1st official post for kinktober. About the banner/gif: @littlefreya​‘s inspired me to do one. The gif edition is mine, but I don’t know who the gif itself belongs to (let me know if you do). I really ope you all enjoy it! Also, not beta’d. xoxo 

     Tatiana van Doren was not a force to mess up with. The van Doren family and the Corleones had always been on each other’s bad side. Their mutual hatred transpassed the invisible strings of time and, all that despise, disdain and hostility towards each other carried on through generations and generations. It definitely hadn’t missed out on Tatiana van Doren and Michael Corleone, the oldest children to take over the two businesses.

      Interaction between the two of them was always hard. The only exceptions were when both had to attend any kind of social gatherings, where they had to maintain politeness and grace. Usually, they were always at each other’s throats like cat and rat, always pushing each other’s buttons to nothing but pure and inexplicable rage. Michael always made Tatiana turn into an angry beast who wouldn’t keep quiet, and she did the same thing to him. He couldn't even recognize himself when he was around her. Michael always tried his best to suppress his emotions and stay indifferent, but with her, he just couldn’t do that. He brought out the worse in her, and she did the same to him.

      So, that meant that business between them was nearly impossible. They'd joined forces against a common enemy and that involved mastering a hazardous business deal which included exchanging weapons imported from the docks. Of course, it hadn’t been easy to find something both agreed on.

      “Miss van Do-”, Michael’s secretary started to speak, standing in a flash from his chair in a futile attempt to try and stop her.

      Tatiana was on a warpath as she blasted through his office door and almost took it off its hinges. She didn’t give a damn about discretion and was ready to take out the revolver from her thigh holster and shoot any bastard that dared to stand in her way.

      Michael’s eyes were wide from the action as he snapped his head up from his work. His eyes soon narrowed when he saw exactly who had interrupted him and caused such a scene. Her dark, doe-eyes no longer had that sparkle full of mischief and teasing. Instead, they held complete and utter anger as she pierced holes into him, her chest weaving up and down in an erratic rhythm.

      “I tried to stop her, Mr Corleone. I’m sorr-,” his secretary started. Michael interrupted him putting his hand up, a gesture for him to be quiet before he silently dismissed him and he left both alone.

      Michael took a deep breath and finally brought his eyes back to the brunette girl. He wasn’t in the mood to deal with her day-to-day teasing and uncontrollable annoying mouth, that just wouldn’t close without spurting snarky comments about how he conducted his work.

      “Do you not listen, princess?” he asked with a calm voice,  his brow arching in question. He clenched his jaw so tightly he thought his teeth might crunch under the tension of his frustration, .

      Tatiana’s face completely fell in disbelief at his audacity, and her eyes soared into his so intensely the Corleone almost took a step back. Him calling her like that made her blood boil, and he knew that.

      “I’m sorry? I don’t fucking listen?!” the words started to violently fall from her lips, like bullets hitting their targets. “I told you not to move the contraband under a fucking full moon! We agreed on that! And what do you go and do?!” she asked, prodding her index finger towards him as she spoke. Her eyes were wild with fury as she looked at him.

      While she did her small angry speech, Michael couldn’t help but notice how well that floral-print summer dress hugged her body, leaving little to the imagination. To his imagination, that would happily fill in the gaps late at night, both when he couldn’t sleep and when he’d dream of her. Of course, his dark desires were well hidden as he kept a stern look and averted his eyes back to his desk. He moved his hand to align a piece of paper that fell as he stood up to confront the intruder in his office, shrugging her comment off with an emotionless glance.

      This only pissed her off more.

      “Who the fuck do you think you are?!” she continued, striding in front of him so she'd force him to make eye contact. She was fuming. “My men could’ve been caught because of you. Because you’re so fucking dull.”

      Her fast breathing matched his clenched body, and she couldn’t help but feel a shiver run right through her while he looked down into her eyes. He seemed to be staring right through her. They'd never been so close before and, by how he was staring at her, she couldn’t help but feel like a prey, about to be devoured by its predator.

      “You’re a dull fucking bastard,” she mumbled, not even a bit intimidated by him.

      He inhaled so quickly and sharply before he brought his hand up to her throat, she had no time to register what had happened. Tatiana winced as she felt the impact of her back hitting the wall, her eyes immediately locking onto his. She wasn’t surprised by his action. Instead, it surprised her with the effect it was having on her. Her body was tingling everywhere, sending shivers through her spine and sending a fire straight down to her core. The feeling of Michael’s strong hand clenched around her throat, not hurting but still strong enough to keep her in place, was doing more to her than she wanted to admit. That she would like to admit. He could squeeze the life out of her if he wanted to — the predator could easily devour his prey. But by the look on his eyes, she knew those weren’t his plans.

      She gathered her posture back up, that mischievous glint that he so much hated returning to her eyes. Even though she wanted to be devoured by him, she couldn’t help the words coming out of her mouth.

      “What are you going to do, Michael? Kill me,” she asked, her voice slower than usual, “or fuck me?” she rolled out the last words with the pop of her tongue, sounding almost like a purr.

      Unsurprisingly, he slammed his lips down to hers, pressing her further against the wall, his hand still strong on her throat. Then, he pulled away abruptly as his hand loosened its grip around her neck, uncertainty making its way to his mind. As Tatiana slowly opened her eyes, he thought that she was the most beautiful woman on Earth at that moment, without the ice wall she had built around herself. He knew that doing what she did, she had to protect herself, but she was even prettier when she didn’t need to hear that mask. And she definitely didn’t have to wear it around him. Michael could see straight through her without any effort.

      Tatiana could see his jaw clenching as she brought her hand to his neck, slowly dancing her fingertips over his skin. As they reached his face, her eyes repeatedly travelled from his lips to his eyes, which were following every single one of her movements with attention. His chocolate eyes softened at the look of longing in hers, but then it was gone as fast as it came as she smirked up at him. Her fingers finally reached his lips, tracing a line in them before moving her hand to the back of his neck and entwining in his soft hair as she stood on her tiptoes and brought her lips to his, pulling him closer by the neck. It was slow and sensual, giving each other to explore that uncharted path that they had been longing to discover for a long time now. His hand left her throat and travelled down her back, while the other found the back of her neck. Their kiss got needier and hungrier by the second, the mutual desire finally coming to light after being repressed and ignored for so long. They kissed until both couldn’t breathe, pulling away and kissing again, letting their tongues dance together in a harmony they could only find in each other.

      She could feel herself getting flushed, her skin hot, as if she could make fireworks explode every single time that sinful mouth of his made contact with her skin. He was kissing a path down her neck and her collarbone, quickly pulling down and exposing her breasts, begging for his attention. The shape of his erection pressed against her felt like hard marble, and it only made her even wetter than she already was, feeling her panties soaked.

      A moan left her lips as his hot mouth sucked on her breast, and Michael felt his cock twitch in pain at that heavenly sound. He hadn’t even touched her where she needed him the most, but she was already a panting mess from his kisses alone. He knew he was going to leave marks on her body as he sucked, kissed and bit every piece of skin available to his reach.

      Her heart skipped some beats as he started kneading on her thigh, her whole body tensing with expectation and anticipation as his hand went up slowly. She knew he was doing that on purpose — he wanted to torture her, and it was working. Michael finally found the hem of her underwear and stole the air out of her lungs when one of his fingers dipped down her cunt, meeting no restrain.

      “So wet for me,” he whispered in her ear, watching carefully every reaction that crossed her beautiful face.

      “Fuck,” she muttered.

      Tatiana had to cling to his white shirt as his finger swiftly entered her, moans and sighs leaving her mouth as they pleased. Her eyes fluttered closed as he started moving up and down, his finger soon joined by another, while his other hand remained on the side of her head.

      But his torture wasn’t going to end. When her heart started beating faster and her breathing got unstable, he slowed down, only to speed up again when her breathing went back to normal. Over and over and over again, lever letting her chase her high. He could see the eagerness and irritation on her face. The fact that she was entirely at his mercy and under his control only made him harder, if that was even possible.

      “Michael…” she moaned. He could hear the exasperation in her voice.

      “Yes, princess? he replied in a mocking tone, never stopping his movements.

      He knew how impatient she was growing.

      “I… I want you,” she admitted, making a smirk appear on the corner of his lips.

      God, how ironic it was for the roles to be inverted.

      “You’re gonna have to be more specific, darling,” he said, his hot breath against her neck.

       “I want you,” she repeated, this time staring into his eyes. Her voice was nothing but a desperate plea. “Your cock, buried deep inside me. Please," she muttered, almost whining. "Please, fuck me. Please!”

      Her raspy voice full of desire and need turned a switch inside of him. Having her beg for him was exactly what he wanted, and now he just couldn’t take it anymore. He wanted her too, badly, and he couldn’t wait to be inside her. Pulling his fingers out, he held her by her thighs as he picked her up and placed her on his desk, throwing its contents to the floor and not giving a fuck about it.

      Tatiana watched impatiently as he unbuckled his belt and finally released his cock, painfully hard. She couldn’t help but lick her lips as she wondered how it would feel on her mouth, against her tongue.

      And then he thrust into her, and she felt like her brain had short-circuited and stopped working. Was she even alive? Was she breathing?

      "Like this?" he asked, but she couldn’t even reply. "You like it when I fuck you like a whore?" his voice was almost aggressive, his hands holding tight on her hips where he knew would be purple tomorrow.

      A breathy "yes" left her lips, followed by a series of moans that only made him even closer, feeling the way her velvet walls enveloped him with perfection.

      "I bet,” she started to say, but a loud moan interrupted her, “you've… you’ve dreamed..." it was hard for her to finish her sentence, getting harder and harder to form coherent thoughts, "of this."

      Even with his cock thrusting in and out of her and hitting every right angle, making her roll her eyes with bliss and see stars, she still managed to be snarky.

      “All the fucking time," he growled back, and one of his hands found its way to her throat, squeezing lightly, testing the waters. His other hand was busy, rubbing circles in her clit that made her feel as if she was going to explode.

      He knew he was in good waters when his name left her ajar lips in a scream, Tatiana shutting her eyes closed, overwhelmed with the pleasure building up inside of her. Quite satisfied with himself, he applied a lot more pressure around her neck, and he felt her getting tighter around him.

      "Fucking you on my desk until you couldn't speak was all I wanted when you wouldn't shut up," he said, punctuating his last words with some particularly hard thrusts.

      "Michael," she moaned, almost begged, and his name on her voice could've made him come alone. It could easily turn into one of his favourite sounds, and he could get used to hearing it all day long.

      Well, he had fulfilled his goal — she was nothing but a moaning mess under him right now. She couldn’t form a sentence even if she wanted to, her brain simply wasn’t working. The only word that came out of her lips in-between moans and sighs at that moment, the only word she knew, was “Michael”, chanting his name like a prayer as if he was a god meant for her to praise.

      He admired her as she threw her head back in complete bliss, her eyes clenched tightly and her mouth agape as the pleasure overtook her. Her hands were gripping the edges of his mahogany desk so firmly that her knuckles were turning white. No one could say this was the mighty, feared Tatiana van Doren, cheeks red and flushed, out of breath and eyes out of focus, her breasts exposed, spread out on his desk while he impaled her with his cock, each time sending her over the edge and into oblivion. To him, she had never looked prettier.

      Michael was completely enthralled by her, mesmerized by the way she moved, her face, her expressions, the way she grasped his cock and made him see stars. It was as if she’d cast a spell on him, making him feel like no one had ever done before. Now that he finally had had a taste of her and her ferocity, he couldn’t let her go anymore. He couldn’t even understand how he’d gone so long without her, but now he knew he definitely couldn’t keep on without her.

      Who would have imagined all it’d take to tame a beast was another beast?

[pizzazz-party]

Part 2: Ring’s Powers—And What They All Have In Common

Easily the most mystifying thing about this game is— how on earth the magical sentient Pilates ring can do what he does. Seriously. Except, there is some underlying logic here. Buckle up, guys, we’re doing pseudo-science.

(Spoilers for up to the end of the main storyline. Various outfit spoilers beyond that.)

So. I’m just going to say it? The foundation of Ring’s powers essentially boils down to “energy manipulation.” That was probably an easy conclusion to reach if you’ve read Part 1. We’ve already basically established that much. So today we’re diving into the three main categories of how Ring manipulates energy.

They are:

Amplification. Using energy to amplify the strength of a physical motion.

Construction. Using energy to build new structures.

Conversion. Altering the state of the energy itself. Either by converting it to another type of energy, or by converting it into matter (and vice versa).

All of Ring’s various powers and abilities fall under at least one of these categories. Most belong to more than one.

You’re going to want to peek at this little Venn Diagram I’ve made. And possibly make friends with it, because it’s going to keep coming back at the end of every segment. We’re going to go over Ring’s lesser abilities first, then his five special powers, and finally his sealing ability.

And before we start! Some quick reminders, in case you need them.

“Life energy” exists in all things everywhere.

“Exercise energy” is a type of life energy, and we see its presence most often in the form of Trainee’s signature flames.

The type of exercise energy Trainee produces is now pure and inhuman—because she’s synced with Ring.

Pure energy exists on a scale from “positive” to “negative.” Ring is partially made of pure positive energy. It’s the glowing stuff that flows through his tube.

There’s a fundamental difference between the “red,” “yellow,” “blue,” and “green” energies that get used in fit battles by other humans and humanoids, and the “pure positive” stuff that Ring and Trainee exhibit. (Seriously if you’ve never read Part 1 before, I strongly suggest you do so now.)

———

Alright! Ring’s wild list of “lesser” powers include:

Acting as a heart beat monitor

Crushing boulders into pebbles

Creating air blasts

Creating suction vortexes

Creating and wielding fit battle constructs

Creating ab guards

Creating non-battle constructs (Or whatever you would call “Quick! Turn into a tree!”)

Creating a sync bond

Creating solid constructs in Game Gyms

With exactly three exceptions, all of the abilities on this list involve some degree of amplification. So let’s walk through this.

HEART MONITOR. Amplification. The simplest to explain. When Ring is measuring your heart beat, he’s just amping the sound or vibration, sort of like a stethoscope.

BOULDER CRUSHING. Construction + Amplification. When you press Ring into your stomach to crush a boulder, he (1) loops a construct around said boulder and then he (2) amplifies the crushing motion of said construct, using raw exercise energy from the force of your press.

Air blasts and vortexes are a bit trickier to explain, but you have to remember that Ring is actively choosing what to amplify and what to ignore.

AIR BLASTS. Amplification. In the case of air blasts—when you squeeze the Ring Con, you’re also technically squeezing air molecules out of the center of the Pilates ring as you distort the shape. In-game, Ring is just picking a direction (away from your avatar’s face, very helpful) and amplifying the force of that squeeze into a harsh blast of air.

SUCTION VORTEX. Amplification. The vortex operates on a similar, but opposite premise. When you pull on your Ring Con, you’re actually still just pushing air molecules out, same as when you squeeze. But when you release it and the Pilates ring springs back into its original shape, the air molecules go rushing back, as though sucked in. In-game, Ring is once again just picking a direction to amplify the force of that suction.

FIT BATTLE CONSTRUCTS. Amplification + Construction + Conversion. Alright, this one is a bit more complicated. But have you ever noticed that no matter how how poorly you are at holding squats—as long as you hold that squat, Ring’s construct will buff up to completion. It’s, for the lack of a better word, the “quality” of the exercise energy going into it, that determines how hard the construct can swing—and how much damage it can really do. The better the “quality” that Ring has to work with, the more he can amplify the strength of his constructs.

Construction here is pretty self-explanatory . We’ve already poked at this in Part 1, but Ring is in charge of crafting and swinging your battle constructs, not Trainee. Once you select a fit skill—before you even have Trainee move to perform and hold said fit skill—the appropriate glowing limb constructs are already hovering above your enemies. That’s Ring’s doing. You have to remember that he does, actually, have his own supply of energy separate from Trainee. And this is just one of the ways in which he openly uses it.

Conversion technically only comes into play here after World 2, once Trainee and Ring retrieve the Color Coding power. I mentioned above (and yet again, more thoroughly in Part 1) that the exercise energy Trainee and Ring give off—purified positive exercise energy—fundamentally differs from the red/yellow/blue/green stuff found in human beings. Ring can manipulate light and color on a superficial basis without Color Coding (he once mimicked the purple flames of Dark Influence back in World 1), but it’s a surface level change. Ring’s constructs don’t yield any “extra damage” benefits in a fight until Color Coding is retrieved.

AB GUARDS. Construction + Amplification. Admittedly, this one’s pretty similar. (I mean, I’d argue that Trainee and Ring are both making the construct this time...) But with one key difference! There’s no conversion happening here. At all. Which makes sense, actually. A shield of “red energy” would be especially weak to red attacks. A shield of “green energy” would be especially weak to green attacks. And so on and so forth. Ring’s signature energy, however, doesn’t appear to come with any such caveats. (We never run into another being quite like Ring.)

QUICK TURN INTO A TREE. Construction + Conversion. The tree thing, functions like a fit battle construct, minus the amplification. Trainee holds the pose so that she and Ring can continue hiding in the construct, because slinkbugs are thieves that steal away valuable grocery monies. She’s the power source. Ring’s job is to shape the tree as convincingly as possible. There’s no amplification going on here.

SYNCHRONIZING. Conversion. As far as we know, synchronizing with Ring appears to have somehow overwritten Trainee’s original—human—energy signature, and made her somewhat biologically closer to being like Ring. There’s still a lot we don’t know about syncing, but you can read more about it here in Part 1.

GAME GYM CONSTRUCTS. Construction + Conversion. Up until this point, when it comes to “conversion,” all we’ve talked about is when Ring takes one glowing energy type, and converts it into another glowing energy type. Let’s talk matter.

Fit battle constructs, while still being made of energy, are actually pretty solid. You whack monsters with them all the time, this isn’t news. You don’t have to be a physics expert (and I’m really not) to understand that “energy,” as it exists in Ring Fit Adventure, operates under some pretty loose rules of reality. In this game, Pilates rings can be sentient! Dragons can be bodybuilders! And “energy” can be condensed into a shape hard enough to send your enemies flying—and still be considered “just energy,” not “matter”. Because we’ve seen what it looks like when energy gets turned into physical material, and vice verse. We’ve seen Ring do it loads of times.

Specifically, we see it happen in the mini game gyms.

So there are thirteen types of gyms spread across the world of Ring Fit. Most of them, like Dreadmill, don’t require a person to use any fancy tools to play. But others do. Exactly four require that Ring attach an extra accessory.

We only see Trainee play, but these gyms are canonically popular with the public. It’s implied that the gym supplies participants with the appropriate props instead of, like, making people bring their own parachutes or something. It’s also implied that Trainee refuses a bunch of these props, because she has Ring. And Ring can (temporarily) create his own props.

I say “temporary” because when you finish a game like Aerochute. Or Bank Balance. The two props are converted back into Ring’s signature golden energy, and then they dissipate into sparkles. We never explicitly see Ring making these tools, but we sure as hell see them get expelled.

We never see the other two props from Core Crushing and Smack Back dematerialize. (We also don’t see Trainee victory posing in either game.) But I don’t see why we should rule out that they can’t, if Ring was able to make the first two.

So. Like I said: CONSTRUCTION + CONVERSION = GAME GYM CONSTRUCTS. No amplification here, I doubt Ring would ever knowingly help you cheat.

This concludes Ring’s “lesser” powers.

———

Ring’s five—“special”—powers. You know them. You love them! They are:

Color coding

Smoothiecraft

River Rowing

Jump Boost

And the Wing Ability

Even before digging into what these entail, the special five are…interesting. Outside of Ring, they take the shape of giant, pulsing balls of energy. They’re coveted by nearly everyone who comes into contact with them. Seriously. From Dragaux himself to Honey to the Sportans, to random monsters to Daddalus to Solar Plexia the rain goddess—most of the persons listed here either can’t use Ring’s powers, or don’t even recognize them for what they are. “Treasure,” “shining jewel,” “glowy thing.” These are all things they have been dubbed as by outsiders.

Except, they’re not supposed to be removable. This is not a feature of Ring’s. We know thanks to Allegra (and Titanium White, bless her soul) that metaphysical traits can be ripped out of a person. This is more or less what Dragaux did to Ring. But unlike with what happened to Titanium White, it seems like Dragaux ripped out an extra glob of Ring’s energy reserves with each power. Those little “badges” in the menu screen aren’t just visual representations of your retrieval progress; they physically exist in the game. Ring shows one to Solar Plexia in World 8.

Once Ring’s reunited with one of his powers, it could be that he reabsorbs the excess energy, and all that’s left behind is the little “badge” that’s been sitting in its center—and that’s the thing that actually lets him wield whatever power he’s reacquired.

———

COLOR CODING. Conversion. Taking pure energy, and converting it for fit battles benefits. We covered this one.

SMOOTHIECRAFT. Conversion. Actually, the weirdest one on this list. I’ve gone over this video as slowly as my phone will allow. And to the best of what I’m seeing, Ring is taking these ingredients, converting them into a bubble of light, and then squeezing them back out as a physical paste. You can watch a video of it happening here.

The fact that it’s a chilled paste and not a fine liquid, speaks to some level of intent and control. Fire is what happens when atoms are moving very, very fast. Ice occurs when eligible molecules are moving very, very slowly. Cold is an absence of heat, and heat is just another form of energy.

RIVER ROWING. Conversion + Construction. For the longest time, I thought this “power” was Ring just storing a boat and some oars in his pocket dimension. But that’s not the whole picture.

The one time we “see” Ring summon something—as in we are 100% sure that he isn’t creating the object in question—is when he’s summoning ingredients for a smoothie. And the process looks very different. Please refer to the appropriate screenshots below the video. But to spell it out: there are two consistent traits that appear, when Ring is summoning something from his “pocket dimension.” There is:

Always some circle of light present. The item emerges from the “pocket” as energy, so Ring is converting it back into matter as he takes it out. If whatever’s getting converted normally exists as a physical object (and not just as a “temporary” one) then there’s some kind of circle present somewhere.

Always some level of detail to whatever is getting taken out of the “pocket,” even before the item appears to “solidify” into normal.

You can see River Rowing in action at its activation and deactivation. Unfortunately the position of the camera prevents us from seeing a clear image of the boat as it appears. But its massive light show does include a conversion circle—or a “portal,” if you will, as Trainee walks under the arch. (The camera also prevents us from seeing the boat get sent away.)

We do see the oars, though. As sturdy as they look, they each start out as a shape made of pure energy, with no extra detailing before they “solidify.” So again, conversion and construction are at work here.

JUMP BOOST. Amplification. Works the same way as an air blast. I…don’t actually see a reason as to why Ring can’t already do this? So long as the both of them are fast and strong enough, they should be able double-jump. I don’t like it, but I’m willing to chalk this one up to gameplay mechanics. Jump Boost only exists so you can skip over enemies anyway.

WING ABILITY. Conversion + Amplification. If the boat in River Rowing is an object being converted into and out of Ring’s pocket dimension—then so are the wings. I’m certain of it. There’s a circle of light as Trainee runs under the arch, same as with River Rowing. And if you watch closely here, you can see that each wings appears with distinct, detailed trimming straight from the get-go. Maybe more importantly, you can see each wing actually emerging from a portal of light. These portals come back again as Ring banishes the wings back into his pocket. The wings visibly sink into the portals, and then disappear.

This ability also falls under amplification. It looks like Trainee’s energy also gets fed into the trimmings, and that could increase the force of the flaps. It might be that the two of them wouldn’t be able to cut into the air as well without that boost.

This concludes Ring’s “special” powers.

———

And last but not least: sealing.

Ah, sealing. One of the first powers we ever see on screen. We witness it in action only once, way back in the beginning of the game. So our knowledge of how it works is limited. Something we also know very little about? Ring’s sneaky little “pocket dimension” trick. Unlike sealing, Ring doesn’t even acknowledge this as a power worth talking about. But as it turns out, if you’re working under the assumption that these two are related, it starts filling in some blanks.

Sealing, as we’re shown in the initial cutscene, has done something weird to Ring’s colors. His metal is the same as ever, but the energy that flows through his veins? It cycles through a faint rainbow as it flashes from light yellow to light purple. Dark Influence purple.

“Pocket dimension” implies Ring is somehow connected to a space physically separate from him and further separate from our reality. But if the objects Ring pulls from his “pocket” emerge as energy, that need to be converted back into matter. What if it’s closer than we thought. What if—everything that Ring stores away for you, from every boat or shirt or—heaven forbid—bodybuilding dragon…

What if it all.

Goes into.

His tube.

Life energy exists in everything, everywhere. And Ring is apparently a master at manipulating it into his donut stream. If a tomato, a living thing, can be converted twice and still come out of his “pocket” in one piece—then why not Dragaux? Maybe even especially Dragaux. He appears to convert himself back into the flesh once he’s out.

As for the physical seal that Trainee breaks…As best as I can figure, that thing is a lock being held into place by Ring’s sheer might and concentration. The way Ring talks about it, sealing sounds less like a one-time thing and more like this one, long, continuous effort in suppressing Dragaux. Because despite all restrictions, Dragaux never stopped training, never stopped straining, against his new prison. That seal was on its least legs, even before Trainee ruined Ring’s concentration.

———

STORAGE. Conversion. Physical matter gets temporarily converted into energy, and then tucked away into the tube containing Ring’s personal reservoir of life energy. Safely reversible. Objects can be converted/stored/released remotely, far away from Ring’s center.

SEALING. Conversion + Construction. Storage with a locked gate. The lock needs constant focus and effort to maintain. The physical seal bears a spiral symbol—the very same we see flashing white across the screen before every fit battle—and possibly doubles as a warning sign for danger, please don’t touch.

———

And that’s it. That’s all of them.

This thing is so dense, you genuinely deserve a pat on the back for making it to the end. Unless, you skipped around looking for the last Venn diagram? Which. In that case, here it is! As promised, the complete picture.

TL;DR:

Maybe some of these alignments leave room for argument, but I think the categories themselves stand up pretty well.

I hope reading this only gave you half the headache that writing it gave me! It was fun…when I wasn’t muttering curses against Ring under my breath. The formatting was a pain, but I think I handled it okay.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

DISCLAIMER: I take this video game way too seriously. This is all for fun! I feel pretty strongly about my conclusions, but I’ll go back and edit this if/when/where applicable. Thanks for reading.

———

Ring Analysis

Part 1: Synchronizing—How It Works and What It Tells Us About Ring

Part 2: Ring’s Powers—And What They All Have In Common

Part 3: Ring’s Biology and Possible Origins

[seokra]

IF YOU LET ME...| (JJK) PART 9

Series: If You Let Me

Pairings: Jungkook x Reader

Genre: Angst, Fluff, Mutual Pining

Word Count: 2518

WARNINGS: Grinding/Dry Humping, Steamy Make-out Session, Guilt

A/N: Be prepared for a roller coaster ride of emotions, my friends.

The following week, you’ve spent every day at the gym with Jungkook. He kept to his word and taught you how to box. Demonstrating how your stance should look and how to throw a strong punch. His hands would find your hips, positioning you correctly, before nodding his head for you to begin.

You’d be lying if you said you didn’t notice the way his hands would linger on your skin, making your nerves tingle beneath his touch. You also noticed the way his eyes would linger on yours long after he’s explained what to do, causing a spark to ignite in your chest. To make matters worse, you couldn’t help the way your breath would hitch whenever you observe the way his muscles contract and expand as he exercises beside you. He was a walking Adonis, there’s no doubt about that. Still, you tried your best to shove away the feeling, ignoring the stutter of your heartbeat whenever you’d feel his body brush against yours.

After working out, you’ve created a routine of having dinner with Jungkook. Your meals always started casual and easy, but always ended with some alcohol in your veins and heat on your cheeks. You’ve always known Jungkook is a flirt, more so when he gets some alcohol in his system. You just never thought you’d be on the receiving end of it, or maybe you just never noticed it before now. But the way his eyes sparkle at you while he flashes that devilish smirk of his, has butterflies erupting in your stomach.

Honestly, just the littlest things are catching your attention all of sudden. For example, the way his fingertips would just gently touch yours on the tabletop has electricity flowing through your hand and up your arm to your heart. You think maybe it’s just an accident, but he doesn’t move his hand away, and you don’t want to move yours either. In fact, You find yourself wanting to feel his hand in yours again. Since that first night at the gym, you can’t stop thinking about the feel of his large hand, rather it be around your own or on your body.

He’d always take you home afterwards and leave you at your door. For some reason, you have this urge to ask him to stay, not ready to part from him yet. But because he’s just your best friend, you fight back the feelings and reluctantly enter your apartment alone. You’d end your nights with your rabbit vibrator, always envisioning Jungkook’s tattooed hand. It seems you’ve developed quite a hand kink, Just imagining his long fingers wrapped around your throat has your core clenching. God, you really need to get laid… maybe then, your insane fantasies of your best friend will stop.

You wake up the next day and find yourself counting down the hours until you get to see Jungkook again. The image of his adorable bunny smile gets you through your work day, and then you’re off to finally meet him at the gym, beginning the cycle of emotions again.

Today, Jungkook is coming over for your weekly movie night. You feel anxious, busying yourself with tidying up your apartment, even though it’s already pretty clean. You keep moving around your throw pillows and rearranging your shoes by the door. You also find yourself constantly checking your reflection more than normal. Why are you so nervous? It’s only Jungkook! This isn’t the first time he’s been over and it’s not like it’s a date. So why do you feel like you’ll throw up a kaleidoscope of butterflies at any second?

Before you can ponder on your nerves any further, you hear Jungkook turn the knob of your front door. You quickly throw yourself onto your couch and turn on the TV, trying your best to seem at ease. He enters your apartment and joins you on the couch.

“Hey,” he greets you as he sets the bag of snacks he’s been carrying onto your coffee table.

“Hey,” you respond, disliking the way it sounded like you were out of breath. Luckily Jungkook hadn’t noticed, or if he did, he didn’t comment on it. You reach into the bag, looking for your favorite bag of chips, but you’re only met with healthy snacks like protein bars and dried fruit. You turn and look at Jungkook puzzled.

“What?” he questions, seeing your expression.

“Where are my chips?”

“I didn’t get them,” he shrugs.

Your eyebrows pinch together. “Why not?”

“Because they’re not good for you, Y/N,” he chuckles.

“So?” you huff.

“So, if you’re trying to get healthier, you gotta start eating healthier.”

You roll your eyes at him before you grab the banana chips out of the bag.

“What are we watching tonight?” he asks as he throws his arm behind you to rest on the back of the couch. Your eyes widen at the action, and you immediately tense up, unable to move or even look at him.

“Hello, earth to Y/N,” Jungkook waves a hand in front of your face. You blink and whip your head to look at him.

“Huh?” your breath catches in your throat when you realize how close his face is to you and you can’t help yourself from glancing down at his lips.

He gives you a goofy smile before repeating himself. “What are we watching tonight?”

You scoot back to put a little distance between the two of you, nervously pulling a strand of hair behind your ear. “Oh, um, what are you in the mood for?”

Jungkook leans back into your couch, eyes casting up to your ceiling as he thinks it over. “Hmm… I’ve been thinking about watching this new comedy on Netflix that just released,”

“Okay,” you say as you hand him the remote. He quickly finds the movie and presses play. You pull up your legs, crossing them and leaning back into your couch, forgetting that Jungkook’s arm was behind you. He starts to absentmindedly play with your hair, causing you to quickly look over at him. He isn’t paying you any mind, his focus is on your tv screen. Does he know he’s playing with your hair? You think to yourself. You run your hand over the back of your hair, which causes him to stop touching it.

“Oh, sorry, I-I didn’t realize…” he stammers, looking at you with his large doe eyes.

“It’s fine,” you assure him with a smile.

“Can I get some too?” he asks, motioning towards the bag of banana chips sitting in your lap.

“Oh, sure,” you move closer to him so he can access the bag easier. His arm slides off the back of the couch and lands around your shoulders. As he grabs a handful of banana chips, his arm pulls you closer to him. You narrow your eyes at his profile. He knows what he’s doing, that jerk! You catch him eyeing you from his peripheral as he stuffs his mouth, but he quickly looks towards the TV again, unphased by your glare. You shake your head as you try to focus on the movie in front of you.

Jungkook is trying his best to concentrate on the plot of this movie, but anytime you throw your head back laughing at something hilarious that happened on the screen, he can’t help but glace your way. His heart swells at the melodic sound. He’s reminded of the first time he ever heard such an adorable sound; the moment he knew he had fallen for you.

“Oh my god, did you see that?” you ask him, still laughing. He can’t help but brightly grin at you nodding his head, even though he had missed most of it due to watching your reaction instead. You’re covering your mouth, hiding your stunning smile as you slap your thigh from laughing so hard. God, he loves you. It’s been so long since he’s seen you like this; his heart fills with joy at the sight.

As you calm down from your laughing fit, you wipe the tears piled up on the corner of your eye. You glance at him and your heart skips a beat. He’s looking at you so endearingly. His eyes soft with an adoring glimmer, bunny smile on full display.

You give him a light shove. “Stop looking at me like that, you dork.”

“Like what?” he questions, a smile still planted on his face.

“Like that!” you exclaim, giggling. He could listen to that sound all day.

“Didn’t realize I was looking at you a certain way,” he shrugs, gaze falling to his lap for a short moment before returning to your face.

You lock eyes with his, smile faltering a little as you watch his smile slowly morph into a soft smirk. Your eyes land on the tiny dot beneath his bottom lip, admiring it. How can a freckle be so adorable? You don’t realize it but you bite your lip, drawing his attention from your eyes to your mouth before they flicker up to your eyes again, and you meet his gaze. His face remains soft, but his doe eyes have become more intense, staring at you with a look of want and longing. He starts to lean in closer to you, and your breath hitches. You stare at him wide-eyed while your heart rate begins to accelerate against your rib cage, threatening to break through. He’s so close you can feel his breath fan over your face. All of a sudden you lose all of your senses. The only thing you can focus on is him: the smell of his cologne; a combination of musk and jasmine, the heat radiating off of his body, and the sight of this beautiful man in front of you. Your mouth goes dry, causing you to force some saliva down your throat. Jungkook’s eyes flashes towards your throat as you swallow before finding your eyes again. You keep your gaze locked on his as his nose brushes against yours, lips ghosting over your lips but doesn’t touch. God, you just want to taste his lips. If you lifted your head just a centimeter, you’d be able to finally feel them against your own, but you hesitate, waiting to see what he does. He gently rests his forehead against yours and it feels like he can see right through to your soul. Your heart is beating so hard you almost don’t hear him speak.

“Y/N,” he calls, breathless

“Yes?” you sound just as breathless.

“Can I kiss you?” he whispers.

Unable to speak, due to your jumbled mind, you nod your head. That is all the permission he needs before his lips finally capture yours in a soft, gentle kiss. His hands reach up to caress your face as his lips slowly move against your own. His tongue juts out to lick at the seam of your mouth and you part your lips, granting him access. He doesn’t hesitate to wrap his wet appendage around yours. You moan into his mouth as your hands find the nape of his neck, grabbing onto his long tresses. Jungkook lets out a groan at the sensation and you happily swallow it. Your mind is clouded with only thoughts of him; the feel of his soft lips against your own, the way his velvet tongue tastes like bananas, and the way his hair feels like silk between your fingers.

His large hands slide from your face down the sides of your body to your hips before lifting you and placing you onto his lap. You straddle him and press your chest against his, deepening the kiss. You capture his bottom lip between your teeth and gently tug, eliciting a moan from his lips which causes a flash of arousal at your core. You grind your hips into him, and his hands find purchase on your ass. Jungkook firmly squeezes it before running his palms up your back. His tattooed hand weaves into your hair at the back of your neck, gently tugging it, causing you to expose your neck to him. He leaves wet kisses along your jaw, slowly traveling down the column of your throat. He nips at the sensitive skin where your neck and shoulders meet, making you gasp. He quickly circles his tongue over the bite, soothing it before licking a stripe up the side of your throat, causing a shiver down your spine. His lips find yours again, and the kiss becomes more fervent than before, leaving you breathless.

You break from the kiss for air. As you look down at him beneath you, he has this lovely twinkle in his eyes. It makes your heart stutter. His hand travels to your cheek and you lean into his touch, eyes fluttering shut.

“God, I love you,” he breathes out.

Your eyes snap open upon hearing his words. No. You can’t do this. You shouldn’t have done this. This was a mistake. How could you stupidly jeopardize your friendship like this? No. Jungkook can’t love you. You shake your head as you start to back away from him.

Panic sets onto Jungkook’s features as you start to withdraw yourself. “No, wait, Y/N. Let me explain.” He tries to grab for you, but you move out of his reach.

“This was a mistake,” you whisper more to yourself, but Jungkook hears it and his face falls. That’s the sight you didn’t want to see. The hurt painted on his beautiful face was what you dreaded most.

“Y/N, please let me explain. I-I'm sorry. Let’s talk this out,” he pleads, but you just shake your head.

“I’m sorry,” you mutter as you make your way to your bedroom. Jungkook follows you and catches your wrist before you reach your door.

“Y/N.” You keep your back towards him, afraid to face him and see the hurt in his eyes from your rejection. “Please.”

“You should leave.”

“What?” He drops your wrist and you finally look at him, sorrow in your eyes.

“We shouldn’t have done this.”

“What do you mean?” he presses.

“I mean we’re friends, Jungkook! We shouldn’t have kissed. Friends don’t kiss each other, at least not like, like that.”

He narrows his eyes, blood boiling with anger. “That didn’t stop you from sleeping with Hoseok,” Jungkook throws at you.

You scoff at him in disbelief, crossing your arms over your chest. “Get out,” you order, tone cold as ice.

“Whatever,” he angrily mutters as he leaves.

Once he’s gone, you’re left standing in your hallway, angry, confused, and disappointed. Angry with the way he threw your relationship (or lack thereof) with Hoseok at your face. Confused by the feelings you had for Jungkook, and disappointed in yourself for the way you handled this situation. Frustrated with your emotions, you cover your face with your hands as you mentally scold yourself. What is wrong with you, Y/N? You exhale a deep breath. Did you just lose Jungkook? The thought breaks your heart and tears begin to fall from your lashes. What have you done…?