#conference room booking system

[techcomengineering]

7 Key Advantages of Embracing a Meeting Room Booking System

Making use of the potential of a meeting room booking system unlocks a plethora of advantages that effectively address critical challenges in the realm of reserving meeting spaces. Let’s delve into these benefits, delving deeper into the value-added solutions they offer: Simplifying the Booking Process for Meeting Spaces Navigating an inefficient or outdated meeting room booking process, often…

[sunderwight]

Bingqiu roleswap where disciple Shen Yuan knows he's gay, and figures out that he has a big huge crush on his handsome Shizun, but also concludes nearly at once that he's not going to be drawing Luo Binghe's eye any time soon. Firstly, Luo Binghe is notoriously straight. Secondly, even if he weren't, he wouldn't go for his scrawny untalented nerd of a disciple! Shen Yuan's not bad looking, not before or after transmigrating, but he's neither a beautiful nor a hot manly man, and he assumes if Luo Binghe were into dudes he'd be into the same kinds of twunks that Shen Yuan likes. Guys on his own level, etc etc.

Plus Luo Binghe hated the original disciple Shen, and only started to warm up to the transmigrated version after Shen Yuan got injured in front of him trying to stop the other disciples on the peak from killing a small animal. For some reason, Luo Binghe brought Shen Yuan medicine. He got even nicer after Shen Yuan distracted the skinner demon by trying to convince it to take his skin instead of Luo Binghe's, and then again when Shen Yuan successfully fought off a demon invader -- though initially when Luo Binghe volunteered him for that job, he thought it was an assassination attempt. His heart was in his throat when Luo Binghe nearly took a poisoned blow for him, but luckily he reacted more quickly and got hit by the thorns instead. His heavenly demon blood took care of the poison, and he managed to convince everyone that he narrowly avoided getting cut at all.

Shen Yuan's careful not to read anything into it when Luo Binghe finds out about his, erm, uncomfortable dormitory situation and moves him into the side room, or when he completely messes up trying to make dinner and Luo Binghe takes over cooking and bans him from the kitchen (he swears he's not actually that bad at cooking, he just never had to use a kitchen without a microwave or an electric hot plate before...)

After all, it's not like Luo Binghe is cooking for him, he's just making food he likes and letting Shen Yuan eat it too! Because he's nice! He's way nicer than the book gave him credit for being, see, clearly Shen Yuan was correct in signing up for his defense squad, "top ten worst villains of all time" his ass that poll was nonsense...

Unfortunately, though, the plot's still gotta plot. Shen Yuan is heartbroken when the Immortal Alliance Conference rolls around and his shizun stabs him and throws him down into the Endless Abyss. Heartbroken, but not surprised. After all, it was always going to go this way, wasn't it?

But at least, now that it's done, he has some agency in how he reacts to it. He's changed the story enough that he doesn't need to go get revenge. Maybe Luo Binghe's still the villain of his story, maybe that was inevitable, but some heroes let the villains get away. Don't they? It's all part of that noble, breaking the cycle of abuse type stuff. He can be that kind of hero. He can let it go. As long as he avoids Luo Binghe altogether, it should be fine, right? It's not like he's obligated to turn people into human sticks. He asked the system, he's definitely not!

Technically he's not even required to conquer the demon realms. He just has to get out of the Abyss and the be sufficiently cool and/or tragic. Conquest is just one means of doing that, and not even Shen Yuan's preferred, since he doesn't exactly want to rule over anybody. Going around the demon realms beating up some jackasses and rescuing some damsels in distress and becoming sworn brothers with Shang Qinghua, one of the current demon kings, is suitable. He definitely doesn't want to marry any of the damsels he encounters (thank fuck the system lets him off the hook for that!)

But eventually he has to go back to the human world. Not only is it mandated by the system, but he also misses living there. The demonic realms are in many ways better than expected, plus a lot of the monsters are really cool, but he misses the weather and plants and the people he's more accustomed to being around.

He misses Qing Jing Peak, if he's being honest with himself. Shizun's cooking and the bamboo forest and the crisp mountain breezes, the comforts of home.

Not that he can actually go back there in specific. Of course not. If he did that, Luo Binghe would try to kill him, or else the system would try and make him kill Luo Binghe. Bad ideas all around. No, he can't go back to Qing Jing Peak, but he can go find someplace nicer than the demon realms at least. He just has to keep a low profile, which shouldn't be hard since the original goods did that even while actively scheming to kill his former master!

Except.

Everywhere he goes, suddenly Luo Binghe is also there?!

Good thing Shen Yuan thought to take a page out of the book of Luo Binghe's actual love interest, Liu Mingyan, and start wearing a veil. He just didn't want any randos who might have seen him at the Immortal Alliance Conference or on any of the other missions his shizun sent him on to recognize him. But one minute he's investigating a strange case in Jinlan City, and the next the streets are full of Huan Hua cultivators (Shen Yuan has no intention of joining them, that's the path the original took to getting revenge! He doesn't want revenge!), and then Luo Binghe and Sect Leader MBJ and Peak Lord SHL show up, and SY is ducking down alleys and hiding behind columns, just trying to stay out of the way until the lockdown on Jinlan lifts and he can leave.

Except...

Luo Binghe really isn't acting like himself?

He looks like he hasn't been eating or sleeping well. There are dark circles around his eyes, and something almost melancholy in his countenance. And he's dressed entirely in white, none of the usual Qing Jing greens and blues anywhere to be seen. Of even greater concern, he's being reckless. Shen Yuan can't stop himself from rushing out when he sees his former shizun get infected by a sower demon.

Luckily, it's been some years since the last time they saw one another. Shen Yuan's gained a few inches in height, so he's almost at eye-level with his old master now, and though he's still more slender than bulky he's picked up some totally new styles from training the demon realms. He doesn't move the same way he used to. With that, plus the veil, it's enough for him to quickly swallow back his words as he grabs Luo Binghe and quickly administers a cure for the sower infection.

Well, he has one of course. He wouldn't need it himself, heavenly demon blood and all, but his time running around playing hero in the demon realms meant he rescued a lot of humans from such fates. Which is hard to do if you don't have a cure to their afflictions, but between him and Shang Qinghua, sourcing such things was almost easy.

Luo Binghe looks at him like he's just seen a ghost. The other Cang Qiong sect members are alarmed by SY suddenly accosting one of their own and of course find him suspicious, so he runs away right after, and then he has to lose Sha Hualing's pursuit in the city.

But what else could he do? He manages to evade the system's attempts to railroad him into meeting Gongyi Xiao, avoids the rest of the Cang Qiong crowd, and drops some of the cure through the current Qian Cao peak lord's window to get the incident sorted out. Then he flees and puts a good amount of distance between himself, Jinlan City, and every righteous sect he can think of.

The only problem is that after this point, Luo Binghe is everywhere.

Any time Shen Yuan stays in one place for longer than a few days, Qing Jing disciples start turning up. Any time he takes a job hunting some cool-sounding monster or pursuing some interesting tome of knowledge, the better to satisfy the system, it seems like Luo Binghe has selected and gone after the exact same target! Which is especially annoying because back when SY was a disciple, Luo Binghe was always assigning him to do this stuff. Since when does his chronic homebody master have an interesting in six-tailed scorpion lemurs or ancient spiritual kilns?

What's weirder, though, are the rumors.

It seems like any time SY stops at some well-populated place and asks for the latest gossip, he has to hear about how the Qing Jing peak lord lost his beloved disciple during the Immortal Alliance Conference, and mourned like a widow, and now wanders the earth in search of solace for his grief. Seeking something, possibly even the ghost of his dear disciple.

What nonsense! Luo Binghe threw SY into the Abyss himself. He had to do it, it was the plot! And also his obligation as a righteous cultivator, confronted with a "dangerous" half-demon. Does it sting? Yes it stings! That's why SY wouldn't just forget it! Despite logically knowing it's pointless, is there some part of him that wishes his master would have chosen differently? That thinks he should have known that no matter what kind of power Shen Yuan had, he would never use it to hurt people recklessly, or harm innocents, or especially not harm... well. It's pointless, his blood condemned him, and if there is some part of Luo Binghe which regrets what happened, it's doubtless just that he unwittingly harbored a monster for so long.

Which is fine and Shen Yuan would leave it at that, if the guy would just let him!

But no. Instead he has to deal with Luo Binghe turning up and asking him questions, trying to get him to talk (SY has no hope of disguising his voice, if he says anything he's not even sure it won't crack as he comes perilously close to tears instead, so he just stays silent), and then asking for his name, asking if he's mute, asking about his background, his sect, his kin. Is his a righteous cultivator? Where did he get that sword? (NOT Xin Mo, thanks, he used that thing once and then tossed it back into the Abyss before the portal finished closing behind him -- he knows a poisoned chalice when he sees one, although knowing the plot twist about that sword from the novel sure helped.) Where did he learn those forms? Is he... does he have a safe place to go home to? Someone to tend his injuries? Make sure he eats his meals?

SY, of course, stays silent. But it's difficult. Not only because Luo Binghe asks, but because he still looks... bad. Sunken, sorrowful, desperate almost. Shen Yuan can't figure out if he knows or not. Maybe he's unsure, maybe he's looking for SY to give him a sign, so that he can figure him out and then flip a switch and try to finish the job he started.

That can't happen. If they fight, SY will win, and he doesn't want to hurt Luo Binghe.

But even if Luo Binghe's not a heavenly demon, he is a highly accomplished cultivator, and it seems he's got his own breaking points to reach. Eventually he corners SY and gets a hand on his veil, and for a moment SY is sure he's going to rip it off, see his face, and confront him all "I knew it was you, you twisted evil demon, you won't escape justice a second time" and he feels a deep, icy terror close around his lungs--

Luo Binghe lets go of the veil before he can lift it.

But then something even worse happens. Because Shen Yuan's handsome, peerless, noble master breaks down. He falls to his knees, begging forgiveness, sobbing, clutching at his head like he's being driven to madness.

It all spills out of him, then. How he pushed his own dearest disciple into the Abyss, which obviously SY already knew, but also how he was apparently qi-deviating the whole time, and his senses could not differentiate between one kind of demonic "threat" and another. How he realized what he'd done only after he regained his senses hours later, and rushed back to the place where the tear to the Abyss had opened, but could not find a way in after the one he lost. How he had betrayed and thrown away the only person who cared about him, and couldn't even explain that he hadn't intended to. How he would accept anything, any punishment, hatred, penance, or revenge, if only he could see his disciple's face once more.

SY is stunned.

Apparently, Luo Binghe hadn't rejected him for his demon blood?

Not only that, but beforehand, he seemed to have valued Shen Yuan a lot more than Shen Yuan would have credited.

Is it a trick? Is he lying? SY would have guessed so, would have assumed that Luo Binghe's plan was to lull him into complacency only to turn on him once he finally had confirmation. But somehow, he just... doesn't think this is an insincere display. His old master is too cool for this stuff! He has too much dignity to just throw it away on a scheme! There are other ways to get what he wants.

Even if it is a lie, Shen Yuan is tired of running. He's the hero. He won't actually lose, and if it comes to it, it's still in his hands to decide if he wants to spare Luo Binghe or not (he does, of course he does, even if this whole spiel is an act). Plus he's got a backup plant body in one of Shang Qinghua's greenhouses if all goes to shit.

He takes the veil off himself.

Luo Binghe, teary-eyed, stares at him as if his face is the most beautiful he's ever seen.

Shen Yuan nearly puts the veil back on. His cheeks heat up. Dear Shizun, aren't you an immortal master? A noble peak lord? Isn't it your calling to vanquish demons? Get up off the dirty ground right this minute! Where did your dignity go? Shen Yuan did not spend all those nights doing the laundry to watch his teacher dirty his knees for no good reason!

There's a quaver in Luo Binghe's voice as he points out that Shen Yuan was terrible at doing laundry. Luo Binghe had to redo it the day after, all the time.

Shen Yuan chides at him that he should have made one of the other disciples do it then.

Luo Binghe just laughs, and stays on the ground, until finally Shen Yuan has to physically pull him up. Muttering about how he's being ridiculous, what's he crying for, why's he been moping so much, doesn't he know that handsome face should never look so bereft? Then he realizes what he's saying and shuts his mouth, but Luo Binghe just looks happy for the first time in years. Since the Abyss. How is it possible that SY, who actually had to slog through that awful place, can still smile more than Luo Binghe, who didn't?

They're standing so close. Holding on to one another. Almost as if... as if the scene's tone is... well...

Oh what the hell!

Shen Yuan closes the last little bit of distance between them, and kisses Luo Binghe.

[violetrainbow412-blog]

Emergency room [S. R] +18

Spencer Reid x fem!reader

word count: 12k

Summary: Spencer forgot to mention that you're still his emergency contact. You wouldn't have had a problem with it if you weren't his ex of over a year and the hospital took you out of the bed because he had a car crash

contents: exes to lovers, car accident, hospitals, mention of injuries (nothing graphic), mutual longing, SMUT, porn with plot, a little sub!spencer if you squint, penetrative sex (p in v), vanilla sex

Maybe there is a mistake with the grammar and pronouns, I swear I checked it the best I could but surely something escaped me! Enjoy :)

The ringing of your cell phone snapped you out of your hard-won reverie a few hours ago, and you sighed audibly into your pillow before opening your eyes. The device was somewhere on the nightstand, so it was enough to reach out and feel the wood a little to take it.

Virginia Hospital Center. 

You hoped the caller ID was wrong, which was highly unlikely, and you swiped to take the call, wondering what it could be.

“Virginia Hospital Center, may I speak to Ms. Y/N Y/L/N?” With a shaky voice you answered in the affirmative and then the woman continued: "I am calling because you are the emergency contact on file for Mr. Spencer Walter Reid, who has just been admitted to the emergency room”

Hearing this, you jumped out of bed like a spring and felt how a chill ran through your entire body, a sign of the obvious panic that had just invaded you.

"What happened? He's fine?"

“He suffered a car accident and now he is being transferred to the operating room. It is imperative that you show up at the hospital so that you can account for any complications and can help us complete the information in his medical history."

The woman behind the phone was barely finishing saying that when you were already looking for your car keys and a decent change of clothes. You only took what you had in your bag before getting in your car and starting the engine to start the march, even with the adrenaline that you had coursing through your system. The hospital was a bit far away, so every time you accelerated too much you had to remind yourself that you could have an accident too, and then that would be the last straw. With that constant change of speed, you managed to get there in almost an hour, a little less than the time it would normally take, but still too long for your liking.

Somewhat agitated you rushed to the reception desk, where there was a nurse whose voice you recognized from the previous call. She had to reassure you a bit when you desperately asked her, almost with tears in your eyes, to tell you where Spencer was and what condition he was in. 

“What relationship do you have with the patient?”

“I am his…” Your breath caught for a moment, thinking about whether it would be correct to tell the woman the truth or not; In the end, you decided to lie to her "girlfriend"

You and Spencer hadn't seen each other, at least not physically, for a little over a year. You often saw him on the news, in one or another now-forgotten photo that fell by accident from between the pages of your books, or in the articles on the internet about the conferences he gave; but you had never dared to contact him to go out, just as he hadn’t called again. You thought that eventually, you guys would meet again even if it was by chance, but you never imagined that it would be under these conditions. 

“Can you help me answer a few questions?” she murmured and to each question she asked you answered almost mechanically. You were quite surprised that, even with the time that had already passed, you still remembered everything perfectly, as if it were your own medical information that you were providing.

The woman informed you, as kindly as she could be, that Spencer had already been in surgery for an hour and that when the doctor came out he could explain what had happened in more detail. You thought about the hit he had suffered to end up there and the anxiety of knowing if he was okay was eating away at your place in the waiting room, where you alternated between biting your nails and moving your leg up and down to calm down.

You wondered, meanwhile, why he still had you listed as an emergency contact. You knew he wasn't a person with many friends, but it sounded more practical for that position to be filled by someone he lived with more often, like Prentiss or Hotchner, not you. It wasn't the first time you'd been in a hospital with Spencer as a patient and you tried to remind yourself that those other times everything had gone well, but on those other occasions he'd always gotten immediate care because he'd been working or it was simple things like a cold that had become too bothersome. You wondered how far he had crashed, how long it had taken the ambulance to get there, how much pain he had experienced. You were really worried, until after half an hour that seemed like an eternity you heard the nurse call you and a doctor appeared next to her.

The first thing you asked, with a trembling voice, was if he was okay, and when you felt the doctor's soft nod you felt your soul return to your body. Then he explained everything that had happened in greater detail: Spencer had been hit from the side by a drunk driver who had entered at the same time as him and who, unfortunately, hadn’t survived. The surgery had been delayed because Spencer had a stab wound to his leg, dangerously close to the femoral artery and at risk of bleeding, as well as multiple pieces of glass buried deep in his torso, which punctured muscle and could damage vessels, nerves, and tendons. He had made the emergency call before falling unconscious and the doctor in front of you emphasized that if it hadn't been for the speed of the report things could have ended worse.

"Right now he is in intensive care, you can come in to see him until he wakes up"

"And how long will that take?"

“It varies from patient to patient. I can't give you an exact answer, but it won't be for another hour or two”

You warmly thanked the doctor for the job done and somewhat disappointed, but definitely calmer, you returned to your seat in the waiting room. You asked if you could stay there the rest of the night even if it wasn't on his side and the woman agreed. A little less upset, you searched in the hospital for a place to prepare coffee and after obtaining a well-charged one you waited again.

At some point you curled up in the chair and after an hour, and the fact that the coffee had no effect on you at all, you had already fallen asleep. Luckily your sleep was light, so you could clearly hear when a new nurse murmured your name and said that she would guide you to where Spencer was, who had woken up a few minutes before. During the walk down the corridor, she warned you that in intensive care only visits of less than an hour were allowed and when you entered the room full of stretchers protected only by curtains, she took you to one almost at the end, indicating that your patient was there.

You didn't go in immediately, because you needed to get some air first to gather the courage to do it, and when you finally did, a sea of feelings flooded you. Spencer looked fatigued and a little pale. His eyelids were closed and if it hadn't been for the heart monitor next door emitting soft, continuous beeps, you would have thought he was already in a better place. 

Carefully you approached a chair right next to the stretcher and once seated there you remained silent for a moment, until you felt the need to hold his hand as a way of comforting yourself, as if you were closer this way. Said action didn’t go unnoticed by the man, who, when he slightly opened his eyes, believed that his mind was vilely deceiving him, and a second later your name left his lips as a scratchy and confused whisper.

"Hello" was all you managed to say, holding back the tears that had already pooled on your lashes. "How are you feeling?"

“I feel like everything around me is spinning”

With a little more confidence, and so that he wouldn't strain his eyes, you approached the edge of the bed, still not letting go of his hand.

"The doctor said you really had a bad accident"

"The other man? He is…?"

"Dead" you completed in a whisper, completely admiring your friend's pure spirit that allowed her to worry about who caused him to be there "He was drunk when he hit you and they couldn't do much"

"Oh," was all Spencer said, with a genuine tone of pity. You didn't know what to say, or even what to do, you were just looking at him as closely as possible to reassure yourself that he was okay and with his whole body. Your hand hadn't let go and he seemed comfortable with it.

"Do you want me to call someone?"

"A doctor?"

"To a friend"

"They..." Reid still looked disoriented, as if he couldn't even remember the conditions in which he had the accident, and when he finally got his thoughts together, he looked back at you, "Why are you here?"

“I am your emergency contact”

It took him a moment, again, to process the words. When he was aware of the situation, he closed his eyes tightly as if he had done something terrible, and looked at you with shame.

"I'm so sorry"

"Don't you want me here?"

"What? No! Of course I want you here. It's just that I didn't want to bother you with this, I… I thought I'd change that information when I found a better candidate and I never did, so months went by and I… forgot. Well, I didn't forget, but I didn't want to change it because I didn't think it would be necessary and right now I think I should have discussed it with you and I never did, so I'm sorry. Are you upset?”

“Spencer, relax,” you exhaled gently, rubbing your fingers over the back of his hand “There's no problem staying here, I just want to know if you need me to call someone. They didn't let me stay here for long."

“Call Hotch. I want to let him know that I'm taking a vacation."

It was difficult for him to keep his eyes open continuously, probably from the remaining effects of the anesthesia, so you just nodded and did as he asked. Spencer listened to the entire conversation in which you explained what had happened and even answered some of his boss's questions himself, assuring him that he was as well as he could be after an accident of this magnitude. Aaron also promised that the team would visit him as soon as possible, and he asked you to keep in touch, with an odd familiarity that made you smile.

After finishing the call, you returned to your chair and leaned over to brush his hair off his forehead, taking the opportunity to caress his face carefully. Spencer, still with his eyes closed, smiled at the touch.

“You cut it” you observed “Are you still doing it yourself?”

"Yes, still"

You smiled at him and he smiled back, but neither of you said anything else. There would be time to answer questions later.

Although he seemed to be asleep, he was aware that you were by his side for another long time, and when you said goodbye you promised that you would return there as soon as you could.

The next morning, after taking a shower and calling work that you had an emergency, you kept your promise. Spencer seemed a bit more recovered on this second visit; his color had returned to his cheeks, he was almost sitting on the bed and could basically keep his eyes open for more than ten seconds at a time. The doctor had told you that he would stay there for observation for the rest of the day and once he moved to a general room you could be with him for as long as you wanted. For now, you would have to make do with that sixty-minute visit.

"Do you feel better?"

"Not really. But I'm not complaining, it could be worse” he replied, settling better on the bed and wincing.

“I told the doctors no… I asked them not to give you Dilaudid” you confessed, with a bit of fear of his reaction “No type of morphine, in fact. They told me that they could substitute another analgesic, but that you would feel a little more pain than you normally would. Still, I insisted. I hope you don't mind"

“The doctor told me. And I appreciate it,” he murmured sincerely. He couldn't describe the ease he felt when he found out about it, for he had been drug-free for too long to mess it up by carelessness. Luckily, he had you.

"How have you been, by the way?" you shyly exclaimed, taking a step closer to him "I don't mean right now, but... during this time"

"Relatively well" he replied, inviting you with his eyes to sit in the same chair you had been a few hours ago. In doing so you hoped that he would develop a more complete answer than just two words and then he began to relate to you some events significant enough to deserve a mention.

One of the things you'd always loved about Spencer was hearing him talk, whether it was for a minute or an hour. With other people he talked fast, afraid someone would ask him to shut up, but with you he always took his time. In his words there was no sign of spite towards you, even when you thought you deserved it, always showing the beautiful heart that he harbored in that chest.

“I have also been giving conferences more often and that makes me happy. Many of the people there don't understand what I'm talking about, but those who do always come up and ask me questions. Sometimes Emily or Rossi accompany me and other times I go alone. Oh, and I'm taking a PhD."

"Another?" you said surprised, although you didn’t doubt his ability.

"I've been kind of bored, if I'm honest" was his poor explanation from him. You wanted to remind him that no one went into PhDs just because they were bored, but he was a genius you were talking to.

You didn't dare to confess to him that you had been watching some of his labor movements, but just knowing again a little about the things that were happening to him made you feel good.

“Have you been alright?” he continued, looking genuinely interested in hearing your answer.

“I have been able to defend myself, yes. Do you remember when I told you about asking for a promotion? Well, it finally happened a few months ago and the extra money has been doing me good. I have a little more work freedom, too, and I'm considering moving”

“Where do you plan to move to?”

You explained some of the options you had in mind and after hearing each one he helped you learn about some of the pros and cons in terms of costs, services, and security in the area. You would have continued your talk if it hadn't been for a nurse coming in. She was the same one that had received you the night before and you smiled kindly when you recognized her.

"Good morning, how are you feeling, Mr. Reid?" she asked, as she maneuvered to change the IV pole bag.

“Better than yesterday, definitely”

"You don't have to worry, you will recover soon"

"I hope so" he smiled.

“You gave your girlfriend quite a scare, that's for sure,” she teased, nodding her head in your direction.

You tensed at that, and if you had been an ostrich, you would have buried your head in the ground. Spencer watched you from the stretcher with a little smile and answered something you didn't understand to the nurse. They exchanged another couple of sentences until she was gone, saying goodbye cordially to both of you.

"Did she misread the situation or is there something here I'm missing?" he asked you once you were alone, looking genuinely amused.

“Okay, I admit it, maybe I lied a bit last night. I thought they would have more compassion and trust in a girlfriend than an ex-girlfriend" 

"And your real boyfriend isn't going to be upset if you're here taking care of me?"

Ever since you met him you could say that if Spencer lacked a quality, it was subtlety and now he himself was showing it. You knew that there was enough trust for him to tease you like that, but you also knew that asking about your love life was some kind of revenge for having lied to the staff and so you decided to humor him.

"No, he isn’t very jealous to say. On the contrary, he is open-minded and right now we are trying to have an open relationship. You know, I see some people, he sees others, but we still have our thing."

Spencer's previously mocking expression immediately changed upon hearing you say that, having no idea how he would be wise to react. But you couldn't stand it for a long time and you burst out laughing, clarifying between laughs that you were only joking.

“Well, even so, it is likely that at some point in your life you could be in such a relationship, there are even those who think that it is healthy and mature when both people agree”

“It's not quite my style. I prefer safe monogamy or if the guy is very stupid, the sex without commitment for a single night” you laughed slightly.

The deadline for the visit had already expired and with all the sadness you had to say goodbye to him, promising that you would return as soon as he came out of intensive care.

“You've done a lot for me, but it's okay if at some point you're too busy to come, okay? I will understand"

"Don't talk nonsense" you exclaimed firmly, while you leaned down enough to give him a hug without hurting him. Suddenly a new concern invaded you and you felt that you had to ask him a question that you had omitted: "Unless you have a psycho girlfriend who is after my head, do you?"

"Do you think if that was the case, I wouldn't have mentioned it already?" he muttered obviously and now it was your turn to smile.

You didn't want a nurse to come in to get you out of there by force so you took your things and looked at your ex-boyfriend one last time to wave goodbye.

You always thought that when a relationship ended it was because either party had made a serious mistake: “I slept with your best friend”, “my family secretly hates you”, or “it turns out I'm still too in love with my ex to love you”. But when you decided to break up with Spencer, you found that that formula didn't apply to everyone.

Perhaps it was an unfortunate combination of situations, feelings, and problems that led to things simply stopping working overnight. You didn't know how to explain it, none of you, but you guys couldn't even kiss the same way you used to. Your work exhausted you, his work exhausted him, and in the end it was you who decided for both of us that things would be better if everyone took their own path. This isn’t to say that the breakup was less painful, it was just that the hope of being able to have a friendship after it made the grief more bearable. But none of you was able to forget what had happened to pretend to be friends and so, little by little, you stopped seeing each other. Over a year passed with neither of you discussing the silent breakup and, though you and he couldn't have known it, even your respective group of friends suffered a little from the pain of parting from a couple they'd swear would walk down the aisle.

That was why a part of you was guiltily glad that you could see him again and that things weren't at all awkward, like you always imagined they would be. It was your same Spencer, just a little teasing and with less hair, but other than that he had barely changed. He still had those kind eyes that once saw you as if you were the most beautiful person on earth.

You took advantage of the way home in your car to think about everything that was happening to you and for a moment you wondered if with Spencer's recovery all relationship with you would end up withering like a flower with the arrival of autumn or would be reborn as they do in spring. 

"I don't even know why we're playing, we both know you're always going to win" you complained, throwing your pathetic poker hand onto the bed sheet, as he laughed.

The hospital called you when Spencer was admitted to the general ward and you had stayed with him ever since. There was a television in the room, but you knew that he was not a big fan of technological entertainment, so before coming back you decided to take as many things as you needed so that you could kill time; a few books, a deck of cards, a book full of word scrambles and crossword puzzles you'd picked up at a newsstand on the way, and even a blank notebook that could do multiple jobs.

He would stay there for about a week (the doctor explained that it all depended on how fast he healed) and that morning you had gone to talk to your boss at the office to ask her for a couple of days so you could stay with him. You still had a week of vacation available and although he felt extremely guilty you insisted on staying there, after all no one from the BAU could leave their post for that long. In addition, urgent or essential things could be done from home and it was enough to connect for a couple of hours from your laptop to solve them.

Spencer hadn't told you, but he felt comfortable having company during his stay there. Hospitals weren’t his favorite places and having such a familiar presence comforted him.

"I'll let you win once if it makes you feel better"

"If you wanted me to feel better you should have done it without telling me, now I know you were just being silly" you huffed, shuffling the cards with both hands.

"It's all about math, it's really not that complicated"

“Why have you never thought about betting big in casinos? You're from Vegas, you must know a lot. And you could become a millionaire with it."

“It is illegal, in fact, and I am banned from casinos in Las Vegas, Laughlin, and Pahrump because of my card-counting ability. So sorry to disappoint you, but those plans wouldn't work."

“A wasted talent. What a pity” you sighed, starting to hand out a new game.

While you were doing that, a nurse came into the room carrying a tray with food and your friend's eyes sparkled, because being fed intravenously for a day and a half hadn’t been very to his liking. When he put it down in front of you, you noticed that everything looked appetizing considering it was hospital food, and after thanking the man he took the dessert and spread it in your direction.

“You don't like Jell-o anymore?

"Yeah, but I know it's your favorite," he added, shrugging and starting to eat the main course voraciously.

"I'm not going to take advantage of a sick person"

“You aren’t taking advantage. I'm giving it to you" with a smile you put the dessert on the nightstand, ready to return it to him if he wanted it later, and as seeing him eat your own hunger woke you up, you told him you'd go out for a moment to look for something.

You were surprised that across the corridor, at the reception, there was a group of people that you recognized immediately. Morgan was the first to notice you and had to turn twice to make sure his brain wasn't playing tricks on him. Then he motioned to Garcia, who was holding a bouquet of flowers and a balloon, and she waved her hand in your direction with a huge smile.

“Are you really who I think you are?” he asked, once they approached you.

"It seems so" you laughed, under the watchful and surprised gaze of almost everyone present.

The team greeted you with hugs, seeming genuinely happy to see you around and asking about the status of your mutual friend. You related all the medical details of the accident, the care they had taken and in the same way you told them that you had been there throughout the entire process.

"And how is he now?"

“He is fine, just a little sore. But the worst is over, the doctor says he will recover soon”

"It's a relief that everything was quick, I don't even want to think about what would have happened if the doctors didn't arrive on time"

"Do you think we can stop by to see him?"

"He'll be delighted, I assure you" you answered happily "He's in room 501, I'll come back to you as soon as I find something to eat"

Everyone thanked you and set out to find the room, except for Aaron who stayed in the hallway so he could talk to you.

"How has everything been?"

"Okay, as far as that goes," you smiled, arms crossed over your chest, "How's Jack?"

"Growing up" was all he said and you didn't need more to know what he meant "I just wanted to tell you that the plan is to stay here for a few hours, in case you want to come home and rest"

Although you didn't often see him, Hotch had always been particularly nice to you when you were the boy's girlfriend, and he had also tried to cheer the man up when he found out about the breakup: he was especially fond of both you and him.

“Oh, thank you very much for that, Aaron. I was going to go get something to eat, but I don't have much of an appetite for fast or canned food, so I could probably eat at home and come back."

"Do what you have to do. We'll be here,” he assured you.

"You're not going to ask Spencer to go back to work, are you?"

"I won't ask him, I'll be lucky if I convince him not to do it" you giggled to see that Spencer was still the same stubborn person as always, and you thought about whether it would be correct to ask your ex-boyfriend's boss a personal question. You had always seen someone strong in him, of course, but he also had a gentle and understanding part.

"He told me that he's been fine, but… has he really been?"

You wanted to hear from someone else how he had been, because you knew that it was likely that the chestnut omitted the bad parts of the story just to not worry you.

"I don't know what can be considered ‘fine' in Reid's life. He has kept up his spirits and as far as I know his mother is doing well. He doesn't drink, he doesn't smoke, and even though I've insisted on it, he refuses to see a therapist, but I guess he finds another way to deal with the problems. There have been bad days, but he always gets over it” you felt calm when you heard that and you nodded with a smile.

“He is always like that. It makes me happy that he has you"

"Sometimes he's not that happy" he sighed, probably with some important background for those words "But in the end it's like in all families, right?"

"I think so" you smiled bitterly. He was watching you carefully, trying to read your micro-expressions as much as possible. After all he was a profiler, that was his job. "Then I'll go home quickly and come back as soon as possible, okay?"

“Good luck, drive carefully”

"It was nice to see you again, Hotch."

Spencer hardly even noticed your absence with the bustle of his friends in the room and when you came back you were even wearing other clothes. During their visit you were just a listener to the funny stories everyone seemed to have and from time to time you answered a few polite questions from others.

You talked to them about your plans to stay there daily and you agreed that they would take turns helping you for a couple of hours each, when possible, so you would get some rest as well. Also, most volunteered to replace the amount of blood he had needed in surgery. All the attention had the man a bit dizzy, but still he felt lucky for the people around him.

The days went by and sometimes you smuggled in a snack that wouldn't harm your friend's health so he could eat during the afternoon. You had convinced him to see one or another movie, you had brought some yarn and needles for you to resume knitting lessons that had been forgotten for many years, and in general you could say that you had a good time with him. Chats with Spencer always felt natural so topics of conversation weren't a problem either, as he would be able to recite facts to you from memory as long as you guys didn't get bored.

The doctors came in frequently to check that everything was in order and every time you heard positive responses about the recovery process you felt calm.

You'd come home at night because Spencer insisted on it, but the next morning you'd leave your apartment as early as possible and spend the rest of the day there.

Although you didn't want to admit it, you were more and more convinced that those days by his side became the spark of happiness that your life needed. All the time was only yours and served to recover some of the lost things.

“Do you want me to read aloud to you?” he offered an afternoon and you put aside your occupations to accept the offer. You had gotten him a copy of The Narrative of John Smith by Arthur Conan Doyle because you knew he loved that book and that was the one selected for the activity.

Contrary to what many people thought, he was a great speaker and the sound of his voice brought to the surface memories that you thought were lost.

"What are you reading?" you had asked that night, after brushing your teeth and putting on your pajamas. Spencer spent at least 10 minutes reading before going to sleep, enough for him to devour an entire book, or at least a large part of it.

You assumed that his current reading would be something related to a case, but you were surprised to hear the answer.

"Alice in Wonderland"

"Why are you reading Alice in Wonderland?" you asked helpfully, as you slid under the covers into the space next to him and peered over the side.

“My mom used to read it to me when I was a kid and I wanted to reread it. It's a nice story"

"I have never read it. I just watched the movie"

"You are committing a sin. The cinema will never do justice to the original stories.”

"And why don't you read to me a bit?" you asked nicely, followed by a short kiss on the lips "I like listening to you and maybe you will help me fall asleep"

You carefully slipped in until you were comfortably recharged on his chest and when you were ready he complied with your request, beginning with the story he knew by heart.

Alice was beginning to get very tired of sitting by her sister on the bank, and of having nothing to do: once or twice she had peeped into the book her sister was reading, but it had no pictures or conversations in it…

It became a habit and sometimes you guys wouldn't even finish the books because you always picked another one that seemed interesting, even if it was in a different language because you knew Spencer would translate it for you. It was those kinds of actions that allowed him to feel useful around you and thus show you how much he loved you. 

You had already read that book once, as you were also an enthusiastic Doyle fan, so he felt free to choose one of his favorite chapters. You didn't lie down as comfortably as you used to, but you still enjoyed reading, with a big smile to return to that habit of yours that you loved so much.

In the midst of everything you reflected that, perhaps, the love between you was something that had not completely disappeared, but rather a latent feeling that had now found an opportunity to appear.

Loving meant many things and if you didn't love it then you wouldn't be there at that moment, but somehow repeating an exclusive activity from your time as a couple made you miss that greatly. Spencer hadn't read to anyone else because he knew that was just yours.

This time you didn't fall asleep when he finished the chapter, but you kept looking at him the whole time, afraid that it was just a ghost in your memory that would evaporate in your hands as soon as you dared to touch him.

Luckily he was very real and inside that small hospital room, you could travel to the past as many times as you wanted without being disturbed. And for now, that was enough for you two.

A whole week passed and everything seemed to be going great. That day Spencer had convinced you to watch a Korean movie he had on DVD and you were about to leave when he cleared his throat to get your attention.

"Before you go, do you think you could do me a favor?" he asked. He could move a little better now and right now his feet dangled to the side of the stretcher, from where he watched you slightly nervous. You didn’t imagine what this behavior was due to.

"Whatever, what do you need?"

"I didn't ask before because... I'm a little embarrassed, to be honest," Spencer wasn't watching you speak and your brow furrowed in obvious confusion at that "But... I asked the nurse if I could take a shower now and she said yes, but I need someone to help me"

Your mouth opened with a soft oh and then you understood why he seemed so shy about the request.

“You don't have to do it if you don't want to” he added “I know it can be awkward, I just don't know who else to ask and you know it bothers me so much being so dirty. I hadn't tried it before because it literally hurt to breathe, but now that I feel better I think I really need it and I would really appreciate it if you… you know."

"It’s okay, Spencer," you replied, taking a few steps toward him, "There's nothing in there that I haven't already seen.”

“I will wear underwear, I don't have to be completely naked. You would just have to help me wash… some parts”

“Then why are you making this fuss? Let's give you that shower!" you laughed, sitting down next to him so he put his arm around your shoulders and you could help him up.

He was still having a bit of trouble from the leg injury, but the bathroom wasn't that far away and you managed to guide him there. The shower was surrounded by a plastic curtain, with a proper chair for patients and a hose with a shower head at the end. You helped Spencer into the chair and while you recovered from the effort you took a look around; there were some toiletries on a shelf that would surely do for him, and a white towel as well.

“Morgan brought me some new clothes and the nurse said we could ask the store manager for a gown,” he muttered, before you started doing anything. You took off your shoes and left them nestled to one side, always feeling his gaze following you.

When you noticed that he didn't take his eyes off you and was just there, sitting, you spoke:

“Should I help you take off your gown or do you take it off yourself?” there was amusement in your words and Spencer, as if taken from a trance, hastened to find the knot of the garment for himself. He was already wearing his underpants below and it only took him to get rid of the material so that he was half naked.

You hadn't seen his wounds until that moment and you couldn't help but wrinkle your face imagining the pain he must have felt. His stitches were still there but they were already healing and he would have at least four scars, plus one twice the size on the leg opposite where he had taken a bullet; that added up to five marks adorning his body. He was never an athletic person, but since he wasn't a very keen eater either he was able to keep himself in shape. Personally, you had always been attracted to him in every possible way, so his physique was never something that bothered you: thin, muscular, with some paunch, you were going to like him no matter how he was.

“Are you going to help me or are you just going to stare at me?” he countered, looking down at you with that expression you knew was the boldest thing he could get, and you snorted a laugh.

"Shut up"

You stretched to reach the shower head to warm the water, not wanting him to catch a cold and knowing that a warm shower would make him feel better because it would relax his muscles. Once it was at the right temperature, you wet his hair a bit and took shampoo in your hands to wash his head. He gave a barely audible moan as you began to massage his scalp and closed his eyes so he could enjoy your touch. Once you were done there you took a sponge and started cleaning his shoulders, torso, and back, trying to be as careful as possible. Sometimes you even let your fingers slip through the side of the sponge to touch his slightly tanned skin, as smooth as it had always been, while you gazed at those moles you'd kissed so many times. The first time you had sex with him, as you watched him in the twilight after the act, you had tried to study every part you could, from the little freckles on his back to the birthmark on his leg, and right now you felt like crying to see those little things about him again.

You were enjoying treating him like this so much and not to mention Spencer, who felt like he was in heaven to feel you so close to him. He could smell your perfume, a little worn, but still present after the whole day and from time to time he dared to look up to meet your face. And every time he looked at you, he remembered why he thought you were the most beautiful woman of all.

"You didn't have to give me the whole shower, you know?" he joked at some point, when you lovingly washed his hands “I just wanted you to help me with the parts I couldn't reach. But honestly, I'm not complaining about this."

Of course the two of you had ever taken a shower together, but it had never been anything like this. They were always things to optimize time, like when you were short of time to go to work or too tired to shower separately. This act was something different, something more private and delicate; it was too domestic. You were taking care of him and at the same time enjoying seeing him in such a docile position, peeking at you from time to time.

"I'm just doing an old friend a favor" you answered with a smile, although when you heard the words out loud it immediately faded.

An old friend. Was that what you were now? 

The place was silent for a moment, with only the sound of water dripping on the white tile floor.

"Did you ever miss me?"

His question had taken you by surprise and you remained silent before answering, trying to figure out what relation the question had to the situation. From the way he'd said it, you almost thought it was one of those things that burned in his chest and he'd needed to exhale.

"Yes, sometimes" you finally answered. He seemed satisfied with the answer "And you?"

"Many times," he laughed, a bit of guilt tinging his words.

A part of you wondered what he was trying to tell you with that: was it a confession… or a declaration? Ending the relationship had been imminent, and if you hadn’t done it that day you could have done it months or even weeks later, however, you weren’t going to lie in saying that you weren’t tormented by the thought of what would have happened if you had tried just a little longer. And that was accompanied, of course, by a tremendous feeling of nostalgia. You wanted to correct your answer and tell him that you had actually missed him terribly, all along, but you couldn't bring yourself to. And he, who couldn't read your mind, thought that he had simply bothered you with an out-of-place comment. 

"You can rinse off while I get a new gown, what do you say?"

Spencer nodded at the idea and then you walked out of there, your cheeks feeling strangely hot. What was happening to you? Did you still have feelings for him?

Maybe the real question was, have you ever stopped feeling something for him? 

It didn't take you long to get what you needed and you came back to find it wrapped in the towel. After he got dressed, you maneuvered in the same way to help him out, although now with the added problem of the slippery floor, and before long he was lying back on the bed.

"I feel much better now" he smiled at you. From the bedroom window you could see the night sky and then you realized how long it took you to shower.

"Do you want me to do something else?"

Your curt response wasn't because he deserved it, but because you were too confused to stay there any longer.

“No, everything's fine. Thank you very much for this”

"You're welcome" you smiled.

"Well... I guess you'll want to go now”

You still knew Spencer too well to know that that slight frown between his brows was a sure sign of concern, and you felt bad for speaking to him in the way you had. To atone a bit for your guilt, you approached him and sat on the edge of the bed, leaning against his body in a hug.

His body still felt warm and comfortable and just as if it had been made to fit yours. His arms held you firmly when he was finally able to react and you felt his chest deflate a little, as if he wanted to give you more space to feel close.

Time passed so slowly that you didn't even know how long you stayed in that position, just enjoying the closeness and his gentle hands rubbing your back.

"I like how you smell" you exclaimed in a low voice, fearing to break the tranquility of the moment and you felt his chest vibrate with a laugh.

“Did you know that your sense of smell is directly linked to the attraction you feel for a person? Your nose captures the pheromones that the opposite body secretes and if it considers it a good candidate to mate then it is pleasant”

"I think it's just the shampoo," you laughed. You turned your head up a bit and Spencer, by inertia, turned down to meet your gaze. "Although I wouldn't need to sniff you to know if I wanted to mate with you”

The joke had been so natural that you didn't measure the weight of the words until they left your mouth, and the worst thing was that the position you were in hadn’t been the most appropriate. You could feel his breath mixing with yours and it was enough to get a little closer to melt your lips in a kiss.

You had put yourself in that situation, as if your body was unconsciously looking for his own, and Spencer hadn't refused at any time. Just like how no one had forced you to stay with him all this time and you still had.

Your boss had been too permissive with the situation during that time, but you were sure that she would no longer be so if more time passed, so you would have to return to the office the next morning. And Spencer had at most two more days before the doctor released him.

And what difference did it make if you kissed him at that moment? Would you ever get a chance to do that again? You didn't have to think about it too much, because he was the one who started closing the distance; an inch, then another, until you felt your lips brush against each other. And he would have kissed you if it hadn't been for the unwelcome ringing of a cell phone that made you jump away.

"It's... yours" you stammered, handing him the old artifact that announced Penélope García's contact calling him.

While he was having a conversation, you didn't even look at him, but started packing your things spread out around the room so you could get out of there as quickly as possible. You could tell by the rush in the man's words that he could read your intentions and wished he could talk to you before you left.

"Everything's good. Thanks for calling, Garcia. Yeah, I love you too. Bye”

"Look the hour! I have to go, I'll go back to work tomorrow and I want to have everything in order" you said as soon as he hung up the call, waving your hands in the air as you spoke as a sign of your nervousness "I'll try to come back tomorrow, but... I don't know if work let me"

“Okay, you've already done too much. I'm fine now,” he assured you, giving a thumbs up with a tight-lipped smile. Even though you wanted to say something the words didn't come out of your mouth, so you just raised your hand to say goodbye and then you rushed out of there.

All the way home your mind was busy processing the feelings that almost kiss had evoked in you and, to be honest, they all ended in the same thing: the wish that he had cut the distance completely. That desire followed you when you showered, when you went to sleep, when you woke up, and all through the workday the next day. Minute after minute your mind could only think about him and what would have happened if you hadn't been interrupted by that call.

As you had feared, you didn’t have time to visit him at night and since you didn’t find the courage to call him personally, you only asked the hospital to pass on the message. You intended to see him a day after that, figuring that the matter would have been forgotten, but your plans were thwarted when Spencer called you to say that they had just authorized his medical discharge. He sounded calm and, of course, happy, when he told you that an ambulance was going to take him to his apartment.

"That's wonderful" you answered honestly. You were sitting at your work desk sorting out some documents, so you held your phone between your ear and your shoulder.

“I just wanted to thank you for everything you did. For all. I… I don't know what he would have done without you here. And you didn't have to, but you still did it. So, thanks"

"I already told you before, you don't have to thank me for anything"

"But I'd still like to," he murmured firmly, "Would you let me buy you dinner sometime?"

You were silent for a second, honestly confused by what he was asking. I mean, you knew what he was inviting you to, but you didn't know why. 

"Dinner?"

“Well, it's the least I can do for you. I have to use crutches for a while again, so we couldn't go out to a fancy restaurant or anything. It would just be us in my apartment, do you still like Italian food? Rossi taught me a great recipe and I think I cook decent enough.”

“Ah… yes, I would love to” you stammered. You thought that after his recovery you would not speak again and things would return to how they were before; but apparently Spencer had other plans.

"How about Saturday?"

“Sounds perfect to me” you breathed out, still a bit surprised and quite nervous about the proposal you just received. Even if it was merely friendly, you were happy to know that he still wanted your company.

Perhaps you had been too hard on him and on yourself by not allowing things to just follow their natural flow, holding onto the misconception that you and Spencer Reid no longer had romantic feelings for each other.

"I'll meet you here then, do you still remember how to get there?"

“If you have the same address, then I still do it”

"Good. I was just calling to ask you that. I guess you're busy working."

"Only a little"

"Well, I'll let you do it. Thanks for accepting"

"Thank you for inviting me"

You guys were silent for a moment and you wondered if Spencer was smiling the same way you were.

"Bye," he said kindly and after saying goodbye you hung up.

You were left smiling like a fool at the idea that your first date in a long time would be with the only man who years ago had been capable of stealing your heart and after taking a few minutes to process it you went back to your work, but not before pointing with circle the date on your calendar, like a teenager in love.

When the day finally came you made sure to look for a nice outfit before your dinner with him, holding yourself back from looking too excited. You rarely wore dresses but, if your memory serves you, he really liked how you looked in them, so you made sure to look for one that would accentuate your figure and make you look more youthful. You carefully combed your hair, put on just a little makeup, and came on your way to buy a bottle of wine. You still remembered the information that he had told you about which wines were best suited for each meal and although you still didn’t know about dinner, you brought a bottle that it presumed to be Italian.

When you reached number 23 on the second floor, you knocked on the door and after hearing a couple of noises, he finally appeared in front of you.

"Hey!" he greeted you happily. He was using his old crutches, had shaved off the facial hair that had appeared during his hospital stay, and was wearing a black apron with white lettering, which Garcia had surely given him, and which read: Kiss the cook. Please I'm very lonely “Come in, come in” 

"How are you?" you asked, stepping into the apartment and greeting him with a gentle kiss on the cheek.

“I’m okay, dinner is almost ready. I had technical complications because I didn't consider that cooking with crutches is more difficult than doing it without them, so I just hope it tastes good" he complained, moving deftly through the apartment to the kitchen "Sit down, I'll join you in a moment"

When he got lost in the kitchen you took the opportunity to take a look at the place. He kept having piles of books both on the shelves and stacked on the floor, on his desk, next to the chair. There were a couple of new artworks on the green wall along with the ones you'd helped him choose in the past, and picture frames everywhere: him with his mom, several with his co-workers (old and new). and you were surprised to see that even you had a space. The frame was smaller than the others, maybe to make it more discreet, but it was carefully arranged on the shelf that, by chance, or perhaps not, contained many of the books that you had given him.

"Do you need help with something?" you half screamed, hearing the crash of some pots and he denied in the same way. The air smelled delicious and your stomach rumbled with anticipation. After a few minutes Spencer was with you, both sitting in the brown leather chair where you had spent so many afternoons together.

“You just have to wait for it to cool down a bit and we can have dinner”

"I brought a wine" you murmured as you handed him the bottle. He examined it and congratulated you on your choice, telling you that it would go perfectly with the pasta he had prepared. "Are you still taking any medication?"

"Not anymore. The doctor prescribed me some things for the pain, but… I'm not taking them” he said, with a guilty smile on his face “I like your dress, by the way”

Hearing this, a satisfied smile spread across your face and you modestly thanked him for the compliment.

As he said, dinner was ready in a few minutes and you accompanied him to the dining room to serve a couple of dishes. Spencer seemed to have put an effort into everything, as he looked really exquisite and you didn't hesitate to compliment him on it even before trying it on. Dinner remained pleasant, with a couple of laughs, jokes and a flirtatious look that sometimes you weren't even aware of. Now that he had gotten rid of the apron, you could see that he was wearing a purple button-down shirt that you had always liked on him, because it fit in all the right places to make him look gorgeous. Besides, that color had always favored him.

Once you were finished, you offered him a drink of wine and he agreed, listing the digestive benefits the drink had for you. He asked if you wanted to go into the living room to be more comfortable and then both of you walked to the rickety chair, taking the bottle with you. Within a very short time the liquid in it was almost completely finished and both he and you became gigglier.

Unfortunately for you, with the laughter that came, your self-control also left. Every time he spoke you couldn't help but let your gaze slide to his lips, a little to be able to correctly understand the words that came out of it and another little just to be able to appreciate the pink color they had; they still looked soft, and you wondered if they would feel soft. 

You didn't know Spencer was aware of the struggle you had inside of you, as he kept talking, laughing, and just looking so handsome while you fell apart. After a couple of minutes, you couldn't resist it anymore. Your body was vibrating with the desire to have him, maybe because of the alcohol in your blood or maybe because he looked strangely attractive when he rambled on about his PhD research.

“Spencer” you stopped him suddenly. He looked at you with a hint of concern for having overwhelmed or bored you with his talk about him and you thought he couldn't look cuter that way.

"What's wrong?" he started to say, but the question was drowned out by your lips trapping his.

You kissed him fast but deep and all the weight of guilt fell on your shoulders when you looked at his reaction; he kept not looking at any specific point and breathing heavily through his mouth, totally petrified by what you just did.

"Sorry, I don't know why I did that" you stammered. You regretted it just because you made him uncomfortable, not because you didn't want to kiss him “I messed it up, didn't I? Are you mad at me?" you wanted to know, panicked, but now it was your words that were cut off by a kiss.

He wasted no time and taking advantage of your shock one of his hands came up to hold your cheek, while he leaned more in your direction. His lips tasted of wine and nostalgia, they tasted of an overflowing love that you had finally agreed to continue feeling for each other.

He kissed you so hungrily that he was making you completely dizzy and you only separated when it was absolutely necessary to breathe, repeating kiss after kiss. He lowered his other hand to your waist to try to get you closer and you, reflexively, climbed onto his lap. It was then that you guys really looked at each other; wet lips, messy hair, hot pink painted cheeks and completely agitated breathing.

"Uh, I..."

"It was too much?" you said fearful. His hands had automatically gone up to your waist, since that position was already quite familiar to him, and yours were on his shoulders.

"No, no. I mean… only if this is okay with you”

You could have told him you were sorry, but that would be a lie. You loved being so close to him, you loved that you finally had your courage, and you loved that he cared about what you wanted. And you were going to tell him, that's for sure.

"I am telling you the truth?" you gasped, carefully holding his face to force him to look you straight in the eye. They were the most beautiful eyes you had ever seen: "Right now all I can think about is how much I need you"

No more words were needed for what happened next. You melted into a kiss again and when you pressed your hip against his, he sighed against your mouth, feeling his crotch suffer the consequences of the heated kisses you were giving him. For a moment he wanted to feel sorry, but he knew better than anyone that you already knew perfectly every inch of his body and from the smile he felt on his lips he suspected that you were enjoying the heat in that area more than you should. It was satisfying to see that you still had that kind of power over him, where you barely touched him and he was already a mess. But you couldn't speak more highly of yourself, because when his hands went to your hips you felt like putty between his fingers.

"You want to…?" he started to say, but your insistence on kissing him barely left him thinking "Do you want us to go to my room?"

Spencer was afraid he was going too fast and scaring you with it, but he couldn't find another way to interpret the result of what you were doing. He just wanted you to be as comfortable as possible.

"Yeah, I think so" you answered in a whisper.

You got up from your seat and took his hand intending to help him up, until the crutches next to the sofa reminded you of the man's physical condition. Spencer looked at the hesitation in your eyes, but he didn't give you time to back down, because in one quick movement he was on his feet and crossing to the door that led to his room, ignoring any kind of pain he might feel.

Once there, he sat on the bed and pulled you towards him to continue kissing you. None of you bothered to turn on the light to continue what you were doing. You thought the position might strain him so you gently and carefully pushed him back to lay him flat on the bed. This allowed him to better knead the soft meat on your thighs and you rewarded him with enthusiastic kisses on his neck.

You separated a little until you were sitting on his hip and then you undid the buttons of his shirt. You made sure to gently kiss the wounds he had made and Spencer just sighed with each touch of your lips. A little needy to kiss you, he also stretched out his hands to your dress, asking with his eyes for your consent to lower the zipper and get rid of it.

The dress was left tossed somewhere in the room and you leaned in just enough for him to smear kisses down your shoulders and across your chest. You could tell that he was taking his time and that only increased your desire to have him, to feel him inside you and make you his as he had done so many times.

  “Y/N” he whispered against your mouth and you just hummed a nod “Darling, can you help me take off my pants?”

The nickname had come so naturally from his lips and had sounded so delicious that you had to suppress a groan. He called you that all the time, he was a very vocal man and it wasn't uncommon to hear him say those kinds of things. Both in bed and out of it. 

You did exactly what he asked and you took the opportunity to slowly pass your hand over the bulge in his crotch, hearing him let out the first moan of the night.

“Hey, do you have a… uh, some protection?” you asked timidly. You loved him and trusted him, but a baby wasn’t what you needed; at least not at that time.

"In the usual drawer"

As if no time had passed, you rummaged with your hand in the left side of the second drawer in the nightstand, until you found what you were looking for. Sudden and unwarranted jealousy swept over you as you wondered if he had invited other women to spend the night and if those others could find things as naturally as you had. No one knew Spencer as you did, you were sure of it, because he wasn't a man who opened up easily to others. And no matter how many people had passed through your life, no one would understand you as much as he did. 

Once you put the condom on, you took the opportunity to pump it up and down with your hand and the man's whining made you realize that he had really missed you. Both of you were trembling with anticipation, so with one movement you discarded your missing items and climbed back into his lap. Still a little fearful you looked at him and even in the middle of the darkness you realized the loving eyes on you.

“If it hurts just tell me and I'll stop. I know you're still delicate and I don't want to hurt you.”

"You would never hurt me" he answered and although you wanted to believe that they were limited to his injuries from the accident, you knew that it wasn’t so.

Those words carried more weight than you thought. They were a vote of confidence that he gave you over your entire person, not only his physical condition, but also his feelings and desires.

When you became one you groaned in unison and took a moment to get used to each other again. Your movements became soft, constant, and deep and he, unable to do more, just enjoyed that feeling.

After a few minutes, things went beyond the physical plane you were on; you realized that no one, ever, could make you feel what he did. You felt complete, whole and loved. You loved to hear everything that came out of his mouth and respond with an even more obscene sound. You loved that he knew the right points to touch and when to do it, you loved that he looked for your kisses in the middle of the act and you loved that being with him everything became so passionate and intimate. At that moment it was just him and you, no one else. As it always should have been.

After a while both bodies were already covered by a fine layer of sweat and your hands, small compared to his, leaned on his biceps to be able to move better against him.

"I missed this so much" you confessed, your voice muffled by uncontrollable moans "I missed you so much, you don't know how much I did"

He wanted to answer you, but the truth was that for the first time he had run out of words. He could only feel your body pressed against his and your boobs bouncing with each thrust.

There were certain gestures, movements, and sounds that told Spencer when you were about to arrive, so when he heard your erratic breathing and sensed your hesitation, he placed both hands on your hips to help you keep up.

At some point you felt the knot in your belly forming and you just let yourself be guided by it, anxious to feel the ecstasy exploding in you. It was enough to feel your walls pressing against him, your loud moans and a couple more pushes for Spencer to reach his own orgasm, wishing that the hot liquid had filled you instead of the barrier that protected you.

Your body fell against his, completely surrendered, and you felt his chest rise and fall as you tried to catch your breath. One of his arms, still clad in his shirt, slid around your waist and his lips groped for your forehead to place a small kiss. You were exhausted, but at the same time overflowing with joy, and he shed a single tear. Maybe because he had had a good orgasm in a long time or maybe because of the overwhelming reality that you had just made love to him.

For a few minutes you stayed like that, so peaceful and calm that you feared falling asleep in his arms.

“Y/N” he whispered, your name slipping from his lips so softly you thought you misheard.

"Yeah?" you inquired in a whisper. You two had always liked to talk for a bit after the sex rush wore off, as a way to keep things romantic.

"Risking to ruin the moment, can I ask you something?" he murmured and you rearranged yourself to face him to watch him. He looked so handsome, with dilated pupils and a flushed face, that you thought you might take him again right then.

"Whatever you want," you replied, gently brushing back the hair that had stuck to his sweaty face. You were drunk with love, he could have asked you to lower the moon and you would have done it without hesitation.

"What did this mean to you?" he added cautiously. You knew better than anyone that Spencer needed a certain security in things as well as people. The question would come eventually, though you thought you would have more time to think of an answer that would suffice. “It's okay if you say you just felt like doing it or that it was something that happened in the moment, I understand. I just... I don't want to get the wrong idea."

“And what would that wrong idea be?” you asked curiously. Suddenly he had become shy and just avoided your gaze without knowing how to respond to that, but you took him by the chin to force him to pay attention to you "Spence?"

“I don't want to have any illusions about you. If you don't see something in the future with me, that's fine, but at least I'd like to know."

They were not aggressive or demanding accusations; they were just sincere words with which he sought to protect his heart.

"I honestly don't know what's going to happen to us," you replied. A disappointed expression came over his face and you took him by surprise when you reached up a bit to kiss him again, but this time reassuringly and gently "But today I realized that you are perfect for me, in all the senses. And that I can never love someone like I love you. Does that answer your question?"

“I guess I feel the same way” he replied, but this time he was smiling slightly “And I know that we should have ended a long time ago, but… if your heart agrees, I think I'd like to start over. We were both in a bad situation back then, but now things could be different."

And of course they were going to be, because a part of you was convinced. You loved him, you had admitted it, and you knew he felt the same way about you. That was enough.

"I guess you're right. As always, Dr. Reid” you laughed, hearing his melodious laughter as well.

"For once, that makes me happy" he confessed and almost a second after that you heard him let out a weak moan that made you aware that you were pressing your chest against his still-fresh scars.

But to be honest, any previous signs of pain had been dwarfed by the pleasure of your body grinding against his.

"Maybe I should move" you apologized, but when you tried to, he didn't let you, instead tightening his grip on his arm against you.

"Don't do it” he begged you "Stay here just a little while longer"

For him, you could stay your whole life if he asked you to. Now you were sure of that. He was sure of that.

And now that you two had it back, you weren't going to let it go.

taglist: @navs-bhat @reidwritings @tricia-shifting14

[goodlucktai]

gently in the cold dark earth

scum villain's self saving system word count: 2k canon divergent / no system au; sy transmigrates into an empty npc role; gray lotus binghe loves his shixiong more than life and he's ready to make it everyone's problem

title borrowed from work song by hozier

read on ao3

x

The first thing Luo Binghe does when he escapes the Abyss is return to Cang Qiong Mountain. 

With Xin Mo secured to his back, the way could be instant if he so chose—the journey of a thousand miles reduced to a single step—but he unsheathes the elegant jian at his hip instead.

Yong Liang sings sweetly for him, the snow white blade still shining and untainted even after years of helping Luo Binghe carve his way through hell. It has never once failed him, soulbound to the one person still on this earth who has never failed him. 

“Take it,” his shixiong insisted, low and urgent. The Abyss was behind them, an even deadlier threat was ahead, and Without A Cure clogging his meridians made Luo Binghe the best choice to wield the only unshattered spirit sword they had between them. “Binghe, take it.”

He pressed until Luo Binghe’s grip curled tight around the hilt, not hesitating to put his soul in Luo Binghe’s hands even with the rosy glow of an unsealed demon mark shining on his face. 

Luo Binghe flies at a pace best described as dangerously reckless, hardly smelling the fragrant spring air or feeling the sun on his face. His robes are a disgrace, his hair a tangled, matted mess, and it occurs to him that he could stop somewhere and clean himself up, make himself presentable, but it’s a brief, fleeting thought. 

Shen Yuan would be furious to find out that Luo Binghe wasted even a single second returning to his side. 

——

He passes through the ancient wards effortlessly, feeling them fall away from him like water. It’s a simple thing to tamp down on his demonic qi, to disguise the parts of him that those so-called righteous cultivators would scorn. He ghosts through the familiar grounds as eagerly as a starving animal bolting down a fresh game trail, but one by one, all of their familiar haunts come up empty, without even a lingering trace of Shen Yuan’s spiritual energy left behind.   

The head disciple’s room is dusted and undisturbed, as if its occupant might walk through the door at any moment, but the lack of clutter and the empty book shelf makes it very clear to Luo Binghe what the truth must be.

If Shen Yuan returned to the peak after the Conference, he didn’t stay. 

All at once, images crowd the front of his mind—his shixiong grieving, pulling away, turning his back on those responsible for his heartache. 

Yue Qingyuan, always only a step behind wherever his precious Xiu Ya sword went, promised that no one wanted to hurt them. They only wanted to help.

He looked so solemn and righteous that Shen Yuan reluctantly allowed himself to be convinced. Luo Binghe, who had gone to the man for help after a bloody whipping when he was a child, only to be given a walnut cake and turned away at the door, knew better. 

He wasn’t surprised when Shen Yuan was wrenched away from him, and shizun sent him staggering off the cliff with a spiritual dagger buried to the hilt in his chest, all of it happening within a matter of seconds—but it still hurt. 

Shen Yuan’s scream followed him all the way down. 

I’m alive, Luo Binghe thinks, with no one there to tell it to. I came back to you. Let me come back to you. 

——

Including time spent in the abyss, it’s three years before they meet again. 

Luo Binghe’s revenge is his second priority at best, but he is nothing if not efficient and knows how to kill two birds with the same stone. Huan Hua affords him ample resources and opportunities to scour the world for his missing shixiong while playing the role of earnest and diligent new disciple. He snatches up each mission that comes along as though  eager to prove his worth to the sect that so graciously took him in, but he takes every excuse to wander, to search, to make conversation with vendors and innkeepers and passing strangers. 

Have you seen my heart? It lives outside of me in the form of a beautiful young man and tends to wander. Very contrary, likes to fuss over people, could argue the stripes off a lushu just for fun. You’d know it if you met it. You’d never forget. 

The days blur together, meaningless and gray, but he doesn’t stop looking. Shen Yuan still exists somewhere in this world, because otherwise Luo Binghe wouldn’t. It’s the only thing that makes sense. The alternative doesn’t bear thinking about. 

And then, finally—an afternoon in Jinlan City, when Luo Binghe arrives in a throng of incompetent gold-clad Huan Hua disciples, to investigate a plague of all things—

He’s there. 

In dark, neutral colors and plain clothes, a traveling cloak with its hood resting down around his shoulders, as if his beauty could possibly be lessened by cheap, shapeless fabrics rather than effortlessly enhanced. His hair falls from its half-tail in glorious waves—he never did have the patience for anything elaborate, only wearing braids when one of his sticky shidimei cajoled and convinced him. Traveling alone, who could he possibly have to roll his eyes at and complain about and sit patiently still for?

A pale green ribbon is all that decorates his hair. Luo Binghe recognizes it instantly. 

“You should spend your allowance on yourself, Binghe,” Shen Yuan scolded him, not for the first time and certainly not for the last. 

“But I did,” Luo Binghe protested, widening his eyes and clasping his hands earnestly, the way he knew worked best. “I wanted it! And now that I have it, I want to give it to you.”

Shen Yuan was too clever by half to be truly fooled by the innocent act, but he always folded like paper anyway. He spoiled all of his shidimei but Luo Binghe most of all. Anyone on Qing Jing Peak would be hard-pressed to think of a single example of Shen Yuan telling Luo Binghe ‘no.’ 

Sure enough, after a second spent visibly wrestling with himself, he blurted, “Oh, fine! Hand it over.” 

He wore it every day since. He’s wearing it now. The wind catches the ends of it, sending it streaming behind him like the tails of a paradise flycatcher. Lovely. 

For a brief moment, Luo Binghe is frozen where he stands, finally faced with the very thing that he’s been missing for years, that he’s been living a miserable half-life without. 

And then he remembers himself and lurches forward. His voice is a tangle in his throat but he manages to choke out, “Shixiong!”

A strike of lightning couldn’t have jolted Shen Yuan into more perfect stillness. He stops mid-step, every inch of him as good as carved from precious jade. He doesn’t turn his head, and the sliver of his face visible from where Luo Binghe stands is very pale. 

Luo Binghe wonders suddenly if this has happened to him before—if Shen Yuan has heard a voice on the road or in the market that was almost familiar, that was almost the one he was hoping for, only to be disappointed when he turned to follow it and found a stranger. 

Luo Binghe shortens the distance between them with a few anxious steps and tries again. 

“Shixiong.”

The older boy whirls around abruptly, as if to get it over with. He’s bracing himself, but Luo Binghe barely has a second to absorb Shen Yuan’s painful-looking anticipation before it bleeds out of his face in favor of something else entirely. 

He looks like the earth has fallen out from beneath his feet, like he hardly dares to believe his eyes. Zheng Yang gleams golden at Shen Yuan’s hip, reforged and whole again.

“Binghe?”  

“It’s me,” Luo Binghe says softly. 

There’s a tableau he’s afraid to break, as if they’re in a delicate dreamscape and a move too sudden or loud might dissolve it. He wants to say I’ve missed you the way lungs miss air, immediately and needfully, I haven’t breathed at all since we’ve been apart. He wants to say you’re my light in the dark, I can only stand in front of you now because I love you too much to ever truly leave you. 

Instead, he tells his dearest friend, “This one made you wait. But your Binghe is here.”

Shen Yuan sprints the rest of the way to meet him, almost before he’s even finished talking, and they collide in a solid embrace that knocks the air from them both. 

His arms wind around Luo Binghe’s waist like steel bands, fingers digging into the back of his robes, precious face pressed into the crook of his neck and shoulder. Luo Binghe doesn’t hesitate to gather him up close, holding him as tightly and securely as he knows how, burying his nose in his shixiong’s hair and breathing in the familiar, beloved smell of him.  

Shen Yuan is a few inches shorter than he remembers. All the better to tuck him beneath Luo Binghe’s chin, to cover and surround him so completely that not even the heavens above can get a decent eyeful. 

He wants to grab and bite and pin Shen Yuan beneath him and never let go. His jaw aches with wanting it. 

“I’ve been looking for you,” Luo Binghe says, eyes wet. “I went home first.” Unsaid goes the obvious but you weren’t there. 

“How could I stay?” Shen Yuan bites out, managing to sound all at once strangled and bewildered and—charmingly—offended. He shakes his head without lifting it, an aggressive nuzzle against Binghe’s shoulder. “After what they did to you, I’d rather die than represent their stupid sect another minute.”

“Step away from it, Shen Yuan,” shizun said coldly. “I’ll put that beast back where it belongs.”

“No,” shixiong said in a voice that was smaller than usual, one that shook. He was frightened, clearly overwhelmed, but he didn’t budge from where he was plastered in front of Luo Binghe like a breathing shield. 

“Now.” 

“No, shizun.”

“Shizhi,” Yue Qingyuan said gently, offering his hand. “Come here. It will be alright.”

Shen Yuan said, “No. You can’t hurt Binghe. He’s not bad just because of who his parents are. He’s as good as he was yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that. He’s hardworking and loyal and a sweetheart to anybody who gives him half a chance. He’s so good.”

Liu Qingge was behind the sect leader, sword drawn. Shen Qingqiu was quickly losing what little patience he had, face twisted into a sneer, dark eyes stabbing hatefully at Luo Binghe from over his head disciple’s shoulder. There were more figures rapidly drawing closer, the other peak lords following the flare of Yue Qingyuan’s qi. The standoff was becoming more and more untenable, and Shen Yuan was too smart not to see that, shrinking back against Luo Binghe as much as he could without crowding him closer to the edge. 

“You can’t hurt him,” he said again, the closest Luo Binghe had ever heard him come to tears, “he’s my shidi.”

Luo Binghe is unsurprised by his shixiong’s loyalty, because it’s already been proven to him over and over. It’s unremarkable at this point, which is an absolutely remarkable thing in itself. It makes him feel warm with gratitude and affection and ownership. 

Shen Yuan is clever and quick on his feet and always three steps ahead, more knowledgeable about flora and fauna than anyone else Binghe has ever known combined, and probably a force to be reckoned with as a rogue cultivator, where the only rules of conduct he has to adhere to are his own. 

But Luo Binghe hates to think of him on the road alone, without the little martial siblings who follow him like ducklings, without his Binghe there to make sure he remembers to eat all his meals and comb out his hair before bed. He’s a creature of comfort, made for airy rooms with too many cushions and an abundance of sweets and books to read. 

Luo Binghe has fantasized more than once about building a home for Shen Yuan to lounge prettily in. It was, in fact, his favorite flavor of daydream since he was about thirteen. 

If Shen Yuan wants to rogue cultivate, then that’s what they’ll do. But Luo Binghe thinks, if he constructs a palace that’s as comfortable as it is grand, and fills it with trashy romance novels and obscure beasts and his own hand-made meals, he can convince his friend to live in it with him.

Shen Yuan needs to be taken care of. Luo Binghe needs to be the one taking care of him. They’re together now and they’ll never be apart again and those needs can both be met. 

That possessive, proprietary feeling coils dark and deep inside him, undulating lazily like a serpent who’s fed enough for days, reminding him over and over what he already knows:

Mine. 

[saint-ajax]

lowkey

“I WISH TO SEE YOUR LOVELY SMILE.” Wanda had heard from the wonderful mind of her clandestine significant other who sat across her. She knew Wanda could read her mind or hear her thoughts, which is why she whispered little cheers for her. While the Secretary of State discussed the accords that half of the Avengers seemed to disagree with.

   She knows what Wanda's going through right now, and she wants nothing but to be there for her. Wanda forced a little smile for her to assure her she was fine. Before she looked away to read a book Ross had handed them. 

   She was solely focused on Wanda. She was watching how her expressions changed as she read the book before handing it to Natasha. She didn’t care about the material everyone was frowning on and passed it to Steve when he asked for it.

  “Everything okay? ” She asked Wanda in her mind. When Wanda looked at her, she met Wanda's gaze with worry. She subtly shook her head, indicating that she didn’t know.

   In a world where saving people could paint you as the hero and the enemy at the same time, where chaos and battles are the muse of the system, they could only find peace and order in each other’s company.

   Perhaps no one in the room truly knows what’s between the two of them. Perhaps it’s forbidden, or it may not be. But the holy truth is that they do not care for it. 

   To feel, to hold, to cry, and to laugh beside one another is all they care about. For as long as the world can only bring anything but unkind nature to them, they will always lean on and seek each other.

   The meeting was left with an indefinite answer, which Secretary Ross and the United Nations wished for them to create a smart and cooperative decision.

   Everyone was gathered in the living room. They were scattered around to discuss the proposal of leaders from different nations. Yet she was only worried that Wanda was blaming herself for an inevitable incident. 

   She sat in between Vision and Wanda. The atmosphere was getting heated the more the group dove into the conflict they were challenged to solve. Meanwhile, Wanda listened to what the veterans had to say, while her girlfriend was busy watching and playing with her slender hands. Entwining their fingers and placing them in between their thighs to hide them from everyone's view.

   Wanda was used to her gestures like this one, and so she wasn't fazed as she absorbed the points everyone had to point out. Finally, she was all caught up.

   “You're saying they'll come for me.” 

   “I wouldn't let them. I will protect you.” Wanda gazed at her as she squeezed her hand three times and gave her a reassuring smile.

   “We all will protect you.” Vision had commented on the side as they continued to exchange thoughts.

   She rubbed Wanda's hands with her thumb as they continued the discussion until Steve left. “I have to go.”

   Everyone followed after Steve to attend their respective errands. 

   The look Tony gave Wanda before asking Vision to talk in private did not escape her sight. They spent the whole afternoon in Wanda's room as she remained suspicious of it. Eventually, she had to chase Natasha to borrow a car for the late-night drive she planned. 

   “Nat?”

   “Yeah?”

   “Where are you going? ”

   “Attend a conference. Why? ”

   “Can I borrow a car? ”

   “Sure.” Natasha tossed her keys before leaving. 

   “Thanks.” She ran back upstairs to see Vision cooking and Wanda tasting it.

   “Spirit lifted.”

   She stood by the hall as she watched the two exchange laughter. Something inside her spiked and poked her, and it felt close to pain. And anger. She shook her head to get those thoughts out of her head before having the courage to steal their attention.

   “Hey, Wands, ready? ” 

   “Oh, yes. I'm sorry.” Wanda immediately went to her. Something about watching Vision frown upon Wanda coming to her instead of him was satisfying.

   “Apologies, but may I know where you're going? ” 

   None of your business. “Don't worry, Vis; I just want to show her something. We'll be quick.” She didn't even bother to hear what he had to say and carried Wanda away with her, hand in hand.

   Wanda didn't protest, and she let her drag her away. “I heard that,” she remarked.

   “Surprising.” She scoffed as she played with the keys.

   Wanda frowned at her attitude. “What's wrong, darling? ”She was supposed to ignore it, but Wanda made them stop walking and made her face her.

   “Talk to me properly. You're not letting me into your head. I can't understand.”

   “Nothing's wrong.” She avoided her gaze as she denied the truth.

   “I'm not asking again.” Wanda took her hand back harshly and crossed her arms. 

   “Fine. It's.. it's Vision..   and you.”

   “What's wrong with Vision and me? ”

   “Nothing! See? Nothing wrong. Let's go.”

   “Are you jealous? ”Wanda squinted at her when she finally put the puzzle pieces together.

   She puffed air as an act of dismissing her accusation. “No. I'm not.” Me? Jealous of a synthezoid? No way.

  “Darling, you are jealous . ” Wanda smiled to hide her laughter at her charming girl.

   She rolled her eyes. “Yeah? What if I am? ”

   “I like it. Even though you have nothing to be jealous of.”

   “I was trying all day to lift your mood, but with him, one paprika, and you're all giggling like a little girl,” she frowned. Now that she thought about it, it actually hurt.

   “Oh, baby, you have no idea how calm you've made me the entire day.” Wanda had cupped her face for her to directly look into her emerald eyes. “I have been on edge all day, and you've kept me sane.” And there it was; her lovely smile had finally shown up, and it was beautifully contagious.

   Wanda looking so pretty and smiling while staring into her eyes made her knees weak and her cheeks pink. “You have to stare at me like that? ”

   “Like what? ”

   “Like you want to kiss me.” Wanda let out a wholehearted laugh. It was a scene to behold. She watched the redhead with shiny eyes, appreciating her beauty when she smiled.

   “Oh, you know very well how to read my mind,” Wanda uttered before pulling her into a kiss that sent butterflies into her stomach.

   She received the kiss well and responded with the strong passion they both possess. Their lips were crashing in sync as their heads angled in a pattern while their hands roamed.

   “Oh, there you are—” They both stopped and looked at the owner of the voice, which interrupted them. It was Vision. “Oh...” He tilted his head as he studied what was happening. He blinked it away and proceeded to state his business. “I'm glad to catch both of you. I'm afraid you're not allowed to leave the building.”

   “Let me guess, Tony's orders? ”She said, making Wanda frown in confusion as she looked at her.

   “Correct,” Vision responded. 

   “That's not happening.” Another familiar voice came from the other side, and when they looked, they saw Clint. “Come on, kids, pack your bags. I'm here to pick you up.”

   “I'm afraid I can't let them go.” Vision begged to differ. 

   “Oh my god! What are you doing here? ”Wanda said in surprise.

   “Disappointing my kids.”

   “In whose orders, Clint? ”

   She questioned.

   “Captain. Cap needs our help. Come on.” She looked into Wanda's eyes to consult their plan. Wanda looked hesitant.

   “What's wrong? ”

   “I’ve caused enough problems.” She and Clint frowned at Wanda.

   “You gotta help me, Wanda. Look, you want to mope, can go to high school. You wanna make amends, you get off your ass. We gotta go.”

   “Come on, Wanda. It'll be okay.” The girl holding Wanda's hand and giving her assuring eyes and comfort was what helped to convince her.

   Wanda nods and lets her drag her along as they follow Clint. “Stop! Clint.. You should not be here.” Vision interrupts and Clint rolls his eyes.

   “Really? I retire for, what, like five minutes, and it all goes to shit.“

   “Please consider the consequences of your actions.” He started to elevate as he turned his guard on.

   “Okay.. they're considered.   Okay, we gotta go.” They immediately turned their backs on Vision while he was held back by a force field. It was sparkling and crackling between the two arrows. None of them had the time to notice when Clint had shot them.

   Just as they reach the exit, Vision catches up to them. As they were caught off guard, he punched Clint, but he quickly recovered. “I knew I should've stretched.” Clint groaned.

   He extended a baton in an attempt to hit Vision, but it was useless as the blows went through him. He resorts to punches and comes back to the baton until it breaks. Clint doesn't give up and tries to kick Vision, but as expected, his kicks pass through him. They ended up with Vision having Clint in a headlock. Completely naive about the existence of the two ladies.

   “Clint, you cannot overpower me.”

   He was still able to speak, but it was crooked. “I know I can't, but they can.”

   Vision's eyes found Wanda's glowing ruby orbs. “Vision.. That's enough; let him go.” As the energy from Wanda's hands falters Vision, Clint manages to slip from his grip.

   A yellow, sparkling circle opened beneath Vision caused by her. The body of water in the area of HQ was seen on the other side of the portal.

   “If you do this… they will never stop being afraid of you.”

   “The thing is... She cannot control their fear,” the sorcerer answers Vision.

   “Only my own.” Wanda buries Vision through the water and passes the ground, and her sorcerer closes the portal just in time for the water to not splash at them.

   She finds Wanda's eyes; their glow is starting to fade as she calms down. She walks over to her and holds her hand. “I'm proud of you,” she whispers as she touches her chin to make Wanda look at her.

   She managed to make Wanda smile lightly and entwine their fingers together. “Thank you.”

   “...Alright, what the hell is this? ”She and Wanda forgot about Clint and looked at him before chuckling lightly. “What has Nat been teaching you two? ”

   “Looking over my shoulder should be a second nature. And I’m starting to think she's right.” Wanda chuckled at her own remark of being caught in the moment and kept forgetting there were people with them.

   “So, you two? together? ”Clint asked to confirm.

   Both of the ladies chuckled as they held hands and followed Clint to the van.

   “Lowkey.”

[anniebeemine]

in the age of darkness, light appears

warnings: descriptions of depression, poor dude is going through it

Spencer was sinking, and he knew it. Every day felt heavier, each hour dragging him further into a darkness he couldn’t shake. He had been in funks before, had felt the weight of the world pressing down on him more times than he could count, but this was different. This was worse. It was as if all the color had drained from his life, leaving everything dull and gray.

The only thing that got him out of bed anymore was work, and even that was becoming more difficult. He went through the motions—getting dressed, heading to the BAU, pretending to read whatever book he had picked up. But the words didn’t register. They were just shapes on a page, meaningless and empty.

His friends hadn’t noticed. Or maybe they had, and they just didn’t know what to do. He wasn’t sure which was worse. They kept talking around him, over him, as if his silence was normal, expected even. He knew how to keep up the façade, knew how to smile and nod at the right moments, to slip in a comment here and there to keep the illusion intact. But inside, he was crumbling.

He felt himself slipping deeper into that dark place, the one where the walls felt like they were closing in, and every breath was a struggle. And then you walked in.

You were introduced to the team as the new liaison, or maybe it was something else. Spencer hadn’t been listening when you presented yourself during the morning meeting. He had been too caught up in his own mind, the weight of his thoughts drowning out everything else. But when you spoke directly to him after the meeting, it was like a jolt to his system.

“Dr. Reid, could I catch a ride with you to the airstrip?” you asked, your voice pulling him out of his sulking. “I’m still getting the hang of directions around here, and I don’t want to get lost.”

For a moment, he just stared at you, trying to process what you were asking. It was the first time in what felt like forever that someone had addressed him directly. He felt a flicker of something—curiosity, maybe—cut through the fog that had settled over his mind.

“Uh, yeah, sure,” he said, his voice rough from disuse. “You can ride with Morgan, Prentiss, and I.”

You smiled, and it was a small thing, just a curve of your lips, but it was enough to make Spencer feel like maybe—just maybe—things weren’t completely hopeless. He nodded, more to himself than to you, and turned to gather his things.

As you followed him out of the conference room, Spencer felt a strange sense of clarity. He didn’t know what it was about you—maybe it was the way you had approached him without hesitation, without treating him like he was fragile or broken. Or maybe it was just the fact that you had noticed him at all, had seen past the mask he wore and reached out to him.

Either way, something had shifted. It wasn’t a lot, but it was enough to make Spencer feel like he could take a step forward, even if it was just a small one. And as he led you out to the SUV where Morgan and Prentiss were waiting, he felt a flicker of something he hadn’t felt in a long time—hope.

Over the next few weeks, Spencer found himself drawn to you in a way he hadn’t expected. You were always friendly, always warm, and you never failed to address him by his title, whether in the field or just in passing. It became something of a quirk between you two—your insistence on using his title even in the most casual of circumstances. Like the day you stopped him in the hallway to ask for the time, or the time you had invited him to a local festival with the rest of the team.

He didn’t go to the festival. The idea of being in a crowded place, surrounded by noise and people, had felt overwhelming at the time. But still, the invitation lingered in his mind, a reminder of your kindness and your warmth. It was a warmth he hadn’t realized he had been missing so much until you began showing it to him, bit by bit, in small, consistent ways.

Slowly, almost imperceptibly, he could feel himself returning to his normal self. The heaviness in his chest began to lighten, and the colors that had once drained from his world started to seep back in. It was as if your warmth was the sun, and he was a planet being pulled back into its orbit, unable to resist the gravitational pull.

He wasn’t fully there yet—not by a long shot. But he was getting closer, and for the first time in what felt like forever, he felt like maybe he was moving in the right direction. He began to notice the little things again: the way the light filtered through the windows in the morning, the sound of the city waking up outside his apartment, the rhythm of the team’s banter as they worked through cases.

And he noticed you. Your smile, your laugh, the way you always made a point to check in with everyone, not just him. You were a constant presence, and though you never pushed, you were always there, orbiting just close enough for him to feel your warmth.

One night, after landing back in D.C. around midnight, you approached him as the team gathered their things to head home. You looked tired, but there was a glint in your eye that told him you weren’t quite ready to call it a night.

“Hey, Dr. Reid,” you said, falling into step beside him as you walked toward the parking lot. “I was thinking of grabbing dinner. My last cup of coffee is keeping me up, and I’m starving. Want to join?”

He paused, taken aback by the offer. It wasn’t the first time you had invited him out, but it was the first time you had done so when it was just the two of you. He felt a strange flutter in his chest, something he hadn’t felt in a long time. For a moment, he considered declining—falling back into the comfortable solitude that had been his shield for so long. But then he looked at you, saw the easy smile on your face, the way you seemed so at ease despite the late hour.

“Sure,” he found himself saying, the word slipping out before he could stop it. Then, as if on impulse, he added, “You can call me Spencer, you know.”

Your eyes widened in surprise, and for a second, he wondered if he had said the wrong thing. But then your smile grew, lighting up your face in a way that made his heart skip a beat.

“Okay, Spencer,” you said, the name rolling off your tongue with a warmth that made him feel lighter than he had in weeks.

[svu-ncis-criminalminds]

Learning to Trust, Part 5

Part 1 , Part 2 , Part 3 , Part 4

Aaron Hotchner x Reader

Words: 1757

Series Summary: Things with your boss were becoming complicated, but they became even more complicated when an Unsub sought you out and began targeting you. Can a relationship that hasn't even officially begun survive this?

Garcia set up a mobile system in the conference room so that she could verify and cross reference as you tried your best to piece together everything you could remember about the woman. Reid sat on one side of you, listening intently, and occasionally interrupting to ask a qualifying question. Emily was writing things on the board that stuck out more so than other details. 

Rossi was still trying to find more on Hiálmar - combing through some books that were so old their pages were yellow and crumbling. Reid would have read it faster but Rossi had a hunch. You couldn’t shake the familiarity of it still. 

“Ana was there before me,” You confirmed when Reid cut in, asking if you had gone to school together, “She was older then I was, maybe 21 or 22 when I first met her.” You could see her face like she was in the room with you now. Pale skin and bright blue eyes, long blonde hair she nearly always kept in a tight french braid. She had a strong brow and jaw. She never smiled, not with her lips, almost like such a display was beneath her. But she did smile with her eyes, and over the years you had missed that. 

“She was my friend,” Your voice was slightly strained as you spoke before you cleared it, looking away from Reid and Garcia. Your eyes landed on Aaron instead. He had been relatively quiet since you’d found Paul’s body and your last message from whoever was doing this - and it was beginning to eat at you.

Aaron met your eye and held your gaze for a moment, his eyes were slightly probing. He was checking on you. You offered him a tight smile and he nodded slightly. Much was said for two people who spoke no words. 

“Is Ana her real name?” Garcia asked, “Is there a last name?”

“Lundgren,” Your voice felt foreign on your tongue. Aaron moved around the outskirts of the room towards Rossi, glancing down at the man’s current work - attempting to give you the impression of privacy as you spilled your guts on the floor. “That’s her real name.” You knew that. 

The smell of bread filled the small studio of the cabin. You were currently assimilated into an organization that was holed up in a fishing village in the North. Ana’s gentle singing filled the room as you laid on the sofa, staring at the woodgrain of the ceiling. For a moment life was peaceful here with your friend. 

The singing quieted and Ana approached you, placing the bread on the table, already sliced and steaming, along with a small bowl of homemade butter. 

“You’re a gem,” You smiled, lazily reaching for a peace, “You love this shit don’t you?” Homesteading, as she called it. You grew up in a city, this was a new lifestyle for you. 

“I do,” Her eyes crinkled and you smiled, unable to help it. “My ma did a lot of this when I was a girl,” She told you, eyes glistening at the memory. You two had become close friends during the months you spent with the organization. Little contact was held with the rest of your team, some monitoring from afar, some elsewhere in the organization.

But that didn’t mean you talked about your families. “Sarah,” She spoke, garnering your attention again. Sarah. The name you’d given yourself when you joined the NIS - someone else entirely. “Do you ever worry?” She asked and you considered the question. Of course you worried. 

“Sure,” You agreed, biting into the bread to give yourself another moment to think, “Worry about plenty of things - are you worried?” 

“Sometimes I think,” She stopped. You knew what she was about to say. Not really - but you knew it was something you shouldn’t know - something you didn’t want to know. When joining this team you had all had to take an oath to leave your personal lives behind. You were no longer sons or daughters, friends, brothers, sisters. You were a team who was set to do a task and to do that task as efficiently as possible, there was no room for anything like that. In order to look humanity in the eye so closely - you were told to abandon your own. 

“I know,” You agreed, smiling tightly, “Me too,”

“My name is really Ana.” She looked at you, her eyes dull and watery. You didn’t like this Ana. “My last name, it’s Lundgren.” You palms felt sweaty, why was she telling you this, she shouldn’t be telling you this, “If I die you tell my ma, okay?” 

“Her mother’s name is Ulla. She’s passed but might help you track her down.” You pulled yourself from the memory, looking at Garcia who looked at you gently. “Ana is bottom of my list for suspect,” You told Garcia, like you were trying to reassure her, reassure yourself. 

“Then why are we starting with her?” Morgan asked. 

“Of those left, she probably knows me best,” You explained, “And,” you paused, “I’m worried she’s most likely to be the next target, if we can track her down, maybe…” you didn’t need to finish, he understood. Preventative. 

It was late when Garcia got a tentative contact number, half past one. She had an address as well, a family friend in Southern Pennsylvania. 

“I will call the local PD and request a wellness check,” Hotch stepped forward and you stood to meet him. 

“No, if we freak her and she goes into hiding no one will ever find her,” You assured him, “Let me try and call her first,” He looked at you seriously, and you could tell he didn’t think it was a good idea, “Please,” 

“Call. Once, if she doesn’t answer, leave a voicemail and I am calling the local PD. Then everyone,” He looked to you pointedly, “Is getting some rest.” He had his no business Hotch voice on, and a glare to match. In another world under different circumstances you’d be fawning over the handsome display, you may even argue to rile him up a bit more. But right now you were tired - emotionally - physically - and he was right. You hoped he was right. 

You dialed the number from a secure line and hit call before placing the phone to your ear and counting the rings. One. Two. Three - voicemail. 

“I’ve been sent to voicemail,” You told the room.

“Sent?” Garcia asked, typing furiously at her computer. 

“Please leave a message after the beep,” The robot told her before a ‘beep’ emitted from the phone, you were silent for a moment before you swallowed and spoke. 

“Hey,” You breathed, “It’s me, call me back at this number - please - we - Kod röd, fara sång i soldat.” Another beat of silence and you hung up before looking at Aaron, “You can call the local PD. If she listens to that message she’ll call me back - if she doesn’t.” You shrugged slightly before turning and walking from the room. Not bothering to say anything to your team as you went - though you could feel their eyes, those pitying looks - on your back as you walked towards the elevator. You hit the down button, and someone stopped beside you. You knew who it was. You waited for the elevator in silence before stepping in together - he hit the button for the floor of the parking garage and you rode the elevator together in silence. 

“I’m sorry,” Aaron finally spoke and you looked at him surprised for a moment.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for,” You reminded him. 

“Doesn’t mean I can’t be sorry it’s happening,” He reminded you, and your lips threatened to tug into a smile momentarily. 

“Thank you,” You sighed and he nodded his head, “I’m sorry,” It was his turn to look surprised.

“For what?”

“Bringing this to the team.” The elevator doors opened and you stepped out into the dark - nearly empty parking garage. 

“No,” His word was firm and final, he stopped to face you, a hand going to your elbow and squeezing. “You’re not going to blame yourself for this - not if I have anything to do about it.” You stood there for a moment before your eyes began to burn. 

“It is my fault,” You told him, almost feeling an anger bubbling within you, what did he know? He didn’t know what you saw, what you did, what your nightmares replayed over and over, “These people - for years Aaron they were my world for good or bad.” He looked sad, his hand tightening on your arm and tugging you slightly closer as a stray tear threatened to escape. 

“You were a child who was recruited into a government organization, you were used.” His words feld sharp and you flitched. Aaron saw and the fact that anyone - at any moment could come down that elevator and stumble upon the pair - didn’t matter anymore. The man pulled you forward fully, guiding you into a hug, wrapping firm arms around you and holding you tightly to his chest. You broke. The tears fell forward dampening his dress shirt as you sobbed into his chest. Sobbed hard. Sobbed for your childhood, sobbed for the girl you were, sobbed for the years you lost. Sobbed for you now - having to deal with this all again. And when you had no more tears left you hiccupped into the man’s chest - catching your breath. 

The whole time Aaron had stood firm and strong and held you in his arms allowing you to get it all out. He had one arm wrapped tightly around you, keeping you to him, and the other hand rubbed reassuring circles in your back the entire time, even as you calmed yourself down. 

But now you didn’t move to step back. You smelled his cologne, masking his sweat and the scent of coffee. Now you were embarrassed. For breaking down so dramatically and in front of Aaron Hotchner nonetheless. If you stepped back now, you’d have to face him. 

“Are you alright,” He whispered and his chest rumbled in front of you. 

“Yes,” You whispered, finally pulled back from him, but his arm remained around you, not letting you go far, “No, well, better.” You laughed, “Sorry, thank you I needed that.” He smiled gently and nodded.

“Never apologize to me for crying, alright? You’re allowed to.” You nodded. You believed him - for the first time someone had given you permission to feel vulnerable around them, and you believed him.

Tag List

@ivebeenthearchersstuff, @emalynvtgtgfhvgg , @flashyflash23-blog

[trans-axolotl]

I went to the anarchist/abolitionist healthcare conference this weekend, and it was really a beautiful experience that I don't even have words for. Being able to share resources, knowledge, dreams, and joy together with other people invested in this work was so special, and I gained a ton of hope by seeing the many ways that other people are actively engaged in resisting these fucked up systems and building care into our communities. I gave a presentation about psych abolition, talked about resistance within the psych ward, and got a standing ovation from a room filled with 50 people, many of whom were mental health professionals looking to build solidarity. I legitimately almost cried because of being to have that experience with my mad comrades. I met so many beautiful crazy people who intimately understand what it means to survive as a mad person, and just gained so much knowledge from people actively putting their abolitionist values into practice. I want to share a few of my favorite resources that I became aware of at this conference, and I'll make another post later with some of my key takeaways.

Mutual Aid Self/Social Therapy: This is a support framework designed by one of my friends that provides an intentional structure for providing therapetuic support within communities, especially organizing communities where there's a lot of burnout. It offers so many resources for skills training to allow anyone, whether you have a background in emotional support or not, to set this up within your community. The framework is purposefully not hierarchial or transactional, and allows for actually addressing people's material conditions as well as providing space for emotional processing.

Of Unsound Mind: Incredible archive and research on psychiatric history. Mostly focused around America, but also has some info on other countries. The author of the website will be coming out with a book later this year, which I think is mostly going to be about the Trieste, Basaglia, and that history of psych resistance in Italy.

Power makes us Sick: Collective that focuses on autonomous healthcare and emotional support, especially in terms of autonomous trans healthcare. Has some fabulous zines and resources.

A Corpse among Corpses: Incredible documentary about asylum graveyards in the Midwest and the trade of graverobbing for experimentation in medical schools, and how this connects to settler colonialism, slavery, eugenics, and modern gentrification. Really do want to emphasize a trigger warning for genocide, eugenics, medical violence, self harm, antiblack racism, instituionalization, and lots of discussion of death. I talked a lot with the filmmakers, and really appreciated their care and intent in making this film as a way of bearing witness rather than exploiting atrocity in the name of art, but do want to be very clear that this film is incredibly heavy to watch and might be something worth doing with other people. It was deeply impactful for me, and made me tear up many times.

The Living Museum: Through transforming the old Creedmoor hospital grounds into a musuem and workspace for current patients to showcase their art, this space celebrates psychiatric resistance, transformation, struggle, and joy. I really want to go visit and share in that space, as it seems just so fucking cool. It seems like you might need to contact directly to schedule a visit.

Cahoots Crisis Response Model: This is one model for crisi intervention teams that respond instead of police. They are not perfect, still have some enagement with police, but are an interesting example of how to try to implement these types of programs. Since theyv'e been around for 25 years, they have a lot of knoweldeg and could be a good first group to reach out to if you're trying to create this in your community.

Overall this whole weekend was a beautiful example of how to put our values into practice, and really just wanted to share these projects with you all!

[techcomengineering]

The Role of Conference Room Displays

In the realm of meeting room management, the virtual world intersects with the physical through the presence of Conference Room Displays and wayfinding screens.

Conference room displays, typically equipped with touchscreens, are strategically positioned outside each meeting or conference room. These displays serve a multifaceted purpose: they exhibit the room's availability, empower individuals to secure or cancel a meeting directly from the screen, and facilitate hassle-free check-ins.

By showcasing the occupants of the room and the allocated time slots, these displays mitigate scheduling conflicts. Moreover, they empower employees to administer meetings directly through the display, circumventing the need to access laptops and alter meeting particulars via a web application.

The digital aspect of conference room displays confers an advantage—centralized management of numerous meeting rooms from a singular hub. Since the displays synchronize with a central management portal, a real-time overview of each room's status is accessible.

This centralized approach facilitates prompt alerts in case of technical issues reported by employees and enables the dynamic update of all displays from a central interface.

For comprehensive insights into the world of meeting room displays and signage, delve into our comprehensive guide.

Navigating the Right Meeting Room Booking Software

A multitude of alternatives exists for meeting room booking software. This section provides an evaluation framework to aid you in appraising different solutions. The more checkboxes your chosen solution ticks, the higher the likelihood of success in your meeting room booking endeavor.

Simplicity of Usage

Adoption pivots on user-friendliness. The software interface should be intuitive, allowing swift navigation and seamless room reservation with minimal clicks. This approach minimizes the learning curve, ensuring universal competence in utilizing the system.

Real-Time Availability and Reservation

Ensuring real-time visibility of room availability is pivotal to thwarting dual bookings. The software should seamlessly facilitate room reservations.

Integration with Ecosystem

Assess the software's compatibility with other systems integral to your organization, encompassing calendar systems (such as Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook), email platforms, and communication apps like Zoom and Slack.

Customizable Permissions

Prioritize software that confers the flexibility to configure distinct levels of access with modifiable permissions tailored to individuals or designated roles. This empowers effective room booking by regulating access to particular spaces.

Quality of Hardware

Vet the durability and quality of conference room displays, tailoring them to your team's size and frequency of usage. The displays should demonstrate robustness against prolonged usage, negating the need for frequent replacements and minimizing expenditure.

Scalability

Ensure the software's scalability to accommodate your company's expansion. It should seamlessly manage additional meeting rooms, extra services, or geographical expansion.

Mobile Accessibility

Given the prevalence of mobile work, a mobile app component within the software proves beneficial. This feature empowers employees to ascertain room availability and book spaces from anywhere via their smartphones.

Insightful Reporting and Analytics

Opt for software equipped with reporting capabilities and workplace analytics. Such insights illuminate the utilization of your meeting rooms, aiding informed decisions regarding space management and planning.

Tailored Customization

The software's adaptability in customizing room descriptions, booking protocols, and attributes aligns it with your specific requisites. Furthermore, the option to brand the software's appearance and interface according to your company's identity ensures a harmonious integration within the overall employee experience.

[1824deadpoetssoc]

Spoilers for final episode of BBC Ghosts

So, Ghosts is over. I’ve seen a lot of people talking about being disappointed with the last episode. I’m not at all. I would have liked it to have been longer than the normal 30mins, just so we could get in to some of it a bit more.

Anyhow, I have some thoughts on what the ghosts might like about the hotel, and how Alison might leave the house but doesn’t really leave them. It’s a long one, and I made it mostly for myself as I wanted to get the thoughts out of my head!

So these are my head canons…

Alison returns there regularly to walk in the grounds with them whilst Mike plays golf, they have all their family celebrations there (A second child’s/grandchild’s christening party, wedding anniversary celebrations, graduation parties, milestone birthdays, Mia gets married there etc…), and the ghost come, join in & dance (because they love a party!) and they obviously return for Christmas every year.

I also don’t think the ghosts hate the hotel after a while either. There is an endless stream of guests and staff to keep them entertained. I like to imagine there is still the ballroom for weddings & functions, conference rooms, the library and a games room. I like to think the library contains the history of the house and holds a version of Button House archives for guests who want to know more about the history of the building.

Julian likes to mess about behind the desk with the booking system or follows the golfers around the course throwing shade about their skills. He sits in the members bar of an evening and listens in on the local Tory gossip from Barclay.

Lady Button spies on the guests/staff with faux disgust & gossips about them. The hotel hosts a murder mystery evening and she loves it.

Robin hangs out with the maintenance team & likes to mess with the lights to keep them on their toes. There are several chess boards in the games room, Alison sneaks a “reserved, don’t touch” sign on one of them so he can still play chess with Julian.

The Captain does morning inspections of the grounds, and visits the gym- there’s a PT employed there with very impressive arms (ahem, carry on). When the hotel hosts wedding receptions he is in his element.

Thomas has a dramatic “across the class divide” (his words) infatuation with a chambermaid who is working at the hotel whilst studying for her MA in English Literature. She sees his portrait in the Thorne suite & tells her friends that she finds him attractive and makes him the object of her regency romance style fantasies. This makes him extremely happy (and even more insufferable).

Pat loves the regular quiz nights hosted in the members bar. He still runs all the clubs in whichever function rooms are empty. Very much enjoys hanging out at the breakfast buffet.

Kitty likes to wonder down to the spa and watch people get manicures. She listens in on all the beauticians chatting about their love lives & celebrity gossip. She reads magazines over people’s shoulders whilst they wait for their treatments.

Humphrey also enjoys the members bar with Julian as he likes to hear people joking and having fun. There are a few French members of staff & Robin continues to help him learn the language by listening in on those conversations.

So, for me the Ghosts are able to continue a very happy afterlife, and are still very involved with Alison and her actual life.

[youcouldmakealife]

LBTE: Jared (158-160)

In which there are meetings.

If you'd like to follow along, the series page is here.

158. Under Advisement

Sit down, it’s actually a good thing I have a chance to talk to you guys without PR breathing down my neck.”

“Um,” Jared says. Private meetings with GMs are not historically his favourite thing, even if Foster’s always been cool before. “Should we — maybe we should wait for everyone?”

“No, no,” Foster says. “Sit.”

Brian Foster: PR’s worst nightmare.

“Ownership’s explicitly told me you’re not currently tradeable assets — I didn’t need to be told that, by the way, I just want you to know that the first thing they said to me. Well, actually not the first thing, the first thing was — never mind, I’m rambling, I do that. It’s an annoying habit.”

“It’s not annoying,” Jared says, which gets him a grateful look from Bryce as well as Foster. “I think PR would have been pretty cool with that speech, honestly.”

“Are you kidding?” Foster says. “It’d be all ‘you can’t identify who asked for advice, Brian!’ ‘you can’t tell them about a private conversation with the owner, Brian!’ Though probably that’s more HR. Who are also going to be at the meeting, by the way. It’s an all hands kind of meeting. We probably should have booked a conference room. Not that we need to book, it’s — never mind.”

PR’s worst nightmare. Also there are three people in this room and maybe one functioning brain to mouth filter between them.

“Of course they do,” Foster says, then frowns at him. “I told you to as well. Anyway don’t tell them I told you that stuff. I shouldn’t have. That’s — I know the rambling is annoying. I’m trying to get better about it.”

I am very fond of this man.

“I couldn’t figure out how to book the conference rooms,” Foster says. “The system kept locking me out.”

“You’re the GM, Brian,” Dwyer says. “You delegate that. Stay here, I’ll find us a conference room.”

Everyone suddenly arrives, then they scatter, off on the hunt for a room big enough to hold everyone, then on the hunt for someone who has keys to the room, then calling Summers and Greg to let them know things will be delayed. Foster was right — everyone calls him Brian, and there are a lot of exasperated ‘Brian’s being said, while Bryce and Jared sit in Foster’s office, forgotten for the moment.

Very, very fond of this disaster GM.

“Babe—“ Jared says, then Foster’s coming in, saying, “Sorry to barge in!”, like they aren’t sitting in his office, then, “They found a conference room. I’m not allowed to organise meetings anymore. Did you guys want coffee? Shelley’s assistant is going on a coffee run.”

Every bit I write of Brian makes me smile. A little treat for me.

“Okay,” Foster says, then, retreats, mumbling something to himself that Jared can hear — he’s reciting Bryce’s drink order under his breath, presumably so he doesn’t forget it.

“Oh,” Foster says, bursting right back in. “You guys should probably come to the conference room, eh?”

He, like Greg, is doing his best.

So — small mercies, he guesses. They have supportive friends and teammates. His parents are giving him some distance because he asked for it, but they’re standing by. Bryce’s mom came with food and hugs. Their GM is behind them, as is their room, and they couldn’t have depended on that in Calgary or Edmonton. This could have happened earlier in their relationship, when Bryce was less comfortable with his sexuality and Jared had less faith in them as a unit. It really could have been so much worse.

Listing all sorts of possibilities that could have, but did not, occur in this narrative.

Do we need Dmitry as an annoying chaperone going forward Jared texts Stephen after Elaine heads out. He wonders after if that’s a confusing question, but then decides that Stephen pretends to be omniscient often enough that he can figure it out or be confused.

Gabe is much less annoying if you require a chaperone Stephen replies, which is comforting, and also true.

Yes but Jared doesn’t scowl the moment Gabe enters a room, so that will do nothing to mitigate Jared’s soppy face.

Also: confirmed, Stephen is omniscient. Or just very on Jared’s wavelength.

“What’s twitter saying about us now?”

“How should I know?” Bryce asks, but his guilty face gives him away and he knows it.

Someone must stop him.

“It’s not as bad as I figured it’d be,” Bryce says. “Like. I don’t know if I made it bigger in my own head all along, or if it’s like — it was that bad, the first few times players came out, and then time passed and it kept happening and people got used to it. I don’t know. There’s shit but it like — honestly people said worse shit about me when I got traded to the Canucks. By like, a lot.”

That’s weirdly unsurprising, and both depressing and encouraging at the same time. Like, sure, you can marry a dude, but playing for a divisional rival? That’s a bridge too far.

The conversation has significantly changed since Marc and Dan were outed (2010). There’s some extremely alarming backsliding happening, but all told, it would be a very different reaction than what Bryce witnessed as a teen.

Also seriously imagine if Leon Draisaitl joined the Flames or something. CHAOS. OUTRAGE!!

“And everyone’s talking about how hot you are,” Bryce says. “Which, like, obviously I agree.”

Jared rolls his eyes. “They are not,” he says.

They are. Incessantly.

And it’s kind of comforting to know that while Jared would get caught obsessing over all the worst tweets, Bryce is focusing on the ones that call Jared hot. Not the ones complimenting him — and if there are tweets about Jared being hot, there are probably twice as many about Bryce — but Jared.

There are not twice as many about Bryce.

“What’s that for?” Bryce asks when Jared kisses his temple, the crest of his cheekbone, his mouth as it curves up. He was clearly expecting that argument about cognitive bias, and he looks confused but pleased that he’s getting kissed instead.

“Nothing,” Jared says, and takes that golden opportunity, Bryce smiling, guard down, to confiscate his phone, because clearly Bryce needs to be saved from himself.

Bryce so touched he forgot about machinations.

159. Rehearsal

Bryce makes a noncommittal sound, and Jared breaks his own ‘don’t touch the driver’ rule, reaching out and squeezing Bryce’s thigh in a way he hopes is comforting and not like, grope-y. Not the time for grope-y. Kind of because of the general situation, but mostly because of the whole driving thing.

No groping in motor vehicles. This is not a lesson Jared needs to learn twice, unlike the shower lesson.

Jared wonders if they opted for a younger employee to make them feel less defensive, more related to. If there’s one department he can assume is always trying to spin something, it’s PR.

Yes.

Grace also does a lot of the social media stuff though, and they knew this wasn’t something they could handle exclusively via traditional media. So ‘relates to the youth’ but also ‘is the youth’. She’s in her late 20s, which they consider close enough. There are youth-ier employees, but nobody’s putting an intern in charge of this, even with supervision.

“Before we start discussing how the press conference is going to go, I want to hear from you guys, in your words, the answers to some of the questions you’re probably going to get,” Grace says. “And we can build on everything from there, okay?”

In other words: how much do I have to edit the words that will be coming out of your mouths?

Jared tries not to wince. He thinks he fails. Bryce glances over at Jared, and then gives a very tame, very redacted version of camp. Jared only sounds moderately dickish in it, which is impressive, really, because now that he’s no longer seventeen, he accepts that he was extremely dickish the entire time, and also extremely lucky that Bryce likes that about him for some reason.

I think this is the first time Jared admits, without caveats, that he was an asshole to Bryce at the camp. No ‘but he was a douche’ quickly following or the like, no defensive ‘he started it’, just ‘I was extremely dickish to Bryce’. Good work, Jared. (He’s still never telling Bryce he was right about that stretch, even though they both know he was)

“That’s how we met!” Bryce says.

“It sounds sketchy,” Jared says.

“It sounds so sketchy,” Grace confirms.

It was supposed to BE sketchy. Fucking Bryce, man.

“Great,” Grace says. It does not sound like she thinks it’s great, honestly.

“Jared was really mature for—“ Bryce starts, then quiets when Jared kicks his ankle before he makes things sound even sketchier.

NO, BRYCE.

“I’m not going to ask you to lie about how you met,” Grace says. “But I am going to ask you to not tell the truth, unless you want people to start talking about power differentials and the age of consent.”

“Not in Canada,” Jared says. “Age of consent is sixteen.”

Of note! Because of course Jared looked it up (there are also ‘Romeo and Juliet’ near in age exceptions that would encompass their relationship, because nobody wants that law getting used to harass a sixteen year old dating a fifteen year old.)

“It wasn’t sketchy,” Bryce tells her very earnestly. “I know it sounds sketchy, but it was like—“

Jared silently wills Bryce not to say ‘true love’.

“—true love,” Bryce says.

BRYCE. NO.

“Like, we’re married,” Bryce says. “We’re spending the rest of our lives together. It was like—“

Jared hopes ‘fate’ or ‘destiny’ isn’t leaving Bryce’s mouth next.

“—meant to be, y’know?” Bryce says. “Stop looking at me like that, J.”

“I’m not even looking at you,” Jared says. He is looking at the table, because he can’t bear to accidentally meet Grace’s eye while Bryce is saying these things.

Bryce is starting to warm up to this media business as he realises he can say things like ‘true love’ and ‘meant to be’ and nobody starts booing and face washing him.

“This is exactly the kind of dynamic we want. People tend to push back against the gross in love stuff when it seems manufactured, but it’s pretty clear it’s genuine. We can definitely run with this.”

This is a very kind way of calling Bryce gross.

“That’s not really Jared’s thing,” Bryce says.

“We could try?” Jared says weakly.

“No,” Bryce says. “That’s — that’s not J. We’re not like — we’re not coming out just to pretend to be people we’re not.”

Oh Bryce.

“Just because you’re stupidly romantic like, naturally, does not mean I can’t be just as gross as you if I want to be,” Jared says.

He doesn’t believe it even as he’s saying it, and neither does Bryce, judging by his face. Which is — fair. It’s fair. Nobody could compete with Bryce’s level of mushy, but Jared isn’t even in the running. Dmitry is mushier with Bryce in public than Jared is. And frankly Jared’s fine with that, but he can be mushy if he has to. He guesses.

“Doing this in public is also totally acceptable,” Grace says.

“Doing what?” Jared asks.

As Jared is feebly arguing he can be romantic, Bryce continues to have visible hearts in his eyes for his lying husband. It’s a great dynamic. Grace is excited about it. (she hasn’t seen them in front of cameras yet.)

They exchange contact information, making sure to CC Summers. Also Greg, though that’s more so he doesn’t feel left out. This is Summers’ show, and Jared thinks Greg knows it, and honestly doesn’t think he minds. Jared certainly doesn’t.

I cannot begin to express how relieved Greg is that this is Dave’s show.

“Absolutely no internet,” Grace tells them. “None. I mean, other than the email I’m going to send you, obviously.”

“Not even funny dog videos?” Bryce asks.

Bryce has to make sure after Dave’s ‘nobody but me and Greg’ somehow allowed him to take calls from his mom.

“Okay, fine, you can have funny animal videos,” Grace says. “But stay off all social media. Also anything to do with hockey.”

“Can I check the box scores, though?” Bryce asks. “It’s important to keep up with the rest of the league.”

Grace sighs. “Okay. You can have box scores and animal videos. And that’s it.”

“But—“ Bryce says.

Jared doesn’t see Bryce much in the context of ‘authority figures’ (loosely, in Grace’s case, but she is calling the shots), so beyond Bryce and Dave having a combative relationship, Jared misses part of the issue with Bryce in these situations is that he sometimes (often) pushes back just to push back. He’s gotten a lot better about it as he’s matured, but sometimes he can’t help himself.

“Everyone likes you best,” Bryce mutters as they’re walking to their car, but only after someone from security made sure no one was lurking in the underground parking lot hoping to ambush them for a picture or a scoop. Which is obviously such a fun thing Jared hopes will continue indefinitely.

“You’ve never checked the weather in your entire life,” Jared says.

“I could,” Bryce says. “Maybe I’m getting old and boring.”

“Knowing what it’s like out is not boring,” Jared says. “It’s preparation. Are you mimicking me right now?”

“No,” Bryce mutters, abruptly ceasing.

Jared elbows Bryce in the side, and Bryce hip checks him right into a pillar. Gently, but still: rude.

They don’t bicker much — it’s more Jared snarking at Bryce, but it’s fun when Bryce bites back. For me and for Jared.

160. Whirlwind

So Jared guesses they got engaged like, practically as soon as they got together. Like, boom, date three or something: engaged. Bryce moves fast in the storyline. Also in real life, but not that fast. Jared thinks Bryce in this storyline moves a little too fast, frankly. And it isn’t realistic that Jared in this storyline said yes that early in their relationship.

Nitpicking Grace’s storyline for OOC behaviour is peak Jared.

“Please,” Grace says, pinching her nose. “It was a whirlwind romance. Based on a friendship that grew out of shared interests and mutual respect and nobody being anybody else’s coach at the time.”

Jared would like to again point out that Bryce was a terrible couch who didn’t do anything but sulk, so it basically doesn’t count.

“You come here, wringing your hands about best business practices,” Foster says. “When a decade ago both Riley and Lapointe went to the Habs as a package deal. Did you forget about that or are you just coming here with a bullshit line of reasoning so you can pretend you’re not being homophobic as you’re asking homophobic questions? You don’t get to have it both ways. You don’t get to say their sexuality has nothing to do with this and then turn right around and ask me if I knew about their sexuality when I signed them. That’s not how this works.”

Brian Foster’s entire press conference was some of the most fun I’ve ever had writing a scene. Pure Id.

Grace finds a tweet with a longer clip, in which Foster manages to insult three media organisations, mock homophobic fans, swear at least half a dozen times, and reiterate the organisation’s support for Bryce and Jared. He also takes a question about the power play.

Love me a man who can multitask.

“I think you should probably give in and start calling him Brian?” Bryce says, looking over at Jared. Bryce caved to his demands the third time Foster explicitly told him to, but Jared wasn’t planning on it: it felt too weird. But he may have to revise that decision.

“He does keep asking me to,” Jared says.

Jared figures angry monologue defending him and Bryce earns first name basis.

He’s sure there’s already going to be ‘wow, Marcus is slumming with a middle sixer’ shit.

“Literally nobody is going to be saying that,” Bryce tells him. “Like. At all.”

Babe you’re the arm candy.

“Bryce!” Jared says.

Bryce very busily looks at literally everything but Jared.

“Stop going online!” Jared says.

He can’t help it!

“I mean, not by Joe from Kamloops who’s decided he can’t support the Canucks anymore, no,” Jared says. “And definitely not Jim from Red Deer who doesn’t give a shit about the Canucks, but has come to say he’s pretty positive your shoulder injury is proof that being gay is morally wrong, actually.”

No offence to Joes and Jims. Full offence to Kamloops and Red Deer.

And Dmitry will probably beat them up, judging by the text he sent Jared assuring him that he will beat them up, along with approximately seventeen emojis Jared didn’t bother trying to parse.

Look: emojis transcend language. A fist is a fist is a fist.

“Okay, then quit reading the opinions of people who are so miserable that the idea of two people in love with each other makes them furious,” Jared says. “It’s pathetic. They’re pathetic.”

Jared was at a very tender, vulnerable age when he saw some of the blowback of the OG coming out controversy. It didn’t make things easier for him as he started to come to terms with his sexuality, and it did not make Jared like people any more than he was originally inclined to.

“They’re planning on like, rainbow flags,” Bryce says. “Canucks fans. They’re coordinating it online. They’re planning on bringing rainbow flags. And supportive signs and stuff. Some have taken pictures. They’re — they’re really nice.”

It isn't all bad though.

“There aren’t any bad ones,” Gabe says, nudging Jared’s shoulder. “If that’s why you’re keeping your head down.”

“I wasn’t doing it on purpose,” Jared says.

This warm up scene is dialogue and action heavy because Jared’s trying really hard not to feel anything right now, starting with keeping his eyes on the ice so he can't see the crowd.

“There’s one behind the net that says LJBTQ,” Gabe says. “The JB is in a heart. I thought it was kind of clever, but you just know someone on the internet is going to say it’s bi erasure. Which, as a bi dude, I completely agree there’s bi erasure in the community, but — oh, that one says PB&J and peanut butter and jelly are holding hands. It’s adorable. I have no idea what the P could be, though. Maybe Pacific? That’d work, I guess, but—

The P stands for ‘we can’t make a PB&J pun without the P’, for the record. Sometimes it’s not that deep.

“Gabe,” Jared says.

“Okay, okay,” Gabe says, putting his hands up, and skates over to where Dmitry’s doing the ridiculous motions he calls stretches.

Jared looks up, but the lights are bright and his eyes are blurry and all he can see is a wash of colour, so he blinks and blinks and goes to find another puck to try to get in the back of the net.

God Gabe can’t you see Jared is trying not to feel emotions?

“If anyone says shit to you,“ Dmitry says. “Tell me. I will fight them.”

“I know,” Jared says.

“Even if they say ‘hello’ or ‘good evening’,” Dmitry says. “I will fight them.”

“Kind of sounds like you just want an excuse to fight someone,” Jared says.

Well. Yes. But also — got your back.

But something breaks through during a TV timeout, has him looking up at the Jumbotron, because the applause and cheers are louder than a kiss cam or dance cam or celebrity lookalike. The camera’s on Bryce in the press box, looking a little stunned. After a moment Leo elbows him, grinning, and Bryce raises a hand to wave at the crowd in acknowledgement, the sound intensifying in response. The Canucks all bang their sticks against the boards, and Jared is late to join them, eyes caught on Bryce’s face.

And Jared knows this is a home game. He knows it isn’t going to be anything like this in other arenas, knows other teams’ fans won’t be this supportive, that opponents are going to use this against them, that there are always going to be people that think less of Bryce, of both of them, simply because they love each other. He knows that.

But Jared also knows Bryce is looking bashful but smiling, a mixture of happiness and bone deep relief on his face, and in this moment, that’s the only thing in the entire world that matters.

The moment that Bryce gets everything he never even dreamed of hoping for. That he gets everything he never thought he could have.

This is the original ending, before one last arc decided to jump onto the back. I also consider it the end of the climax — it’s all denouement from here.

[little-annie]

Another WIP Weekend is ahead of us!

Have I worked on different WIPs every weekend 😝 yes, yes I have. Am I going to start working on the same ones from now on? TBD

🏔 Eddie Bang- I can't reveal anything about this WIP until art claims have been completed, but still, I need to desperately work on it. MAKE ME WORK ON IT.

💼 Businessman Steve- This guy has been sitting in my drafts for too long. It's a 5 & 1 of times concierge Eddie has encountered Steve Harrington, the son of business mogul Richard Harrington. At first Eddie isn't sure of the young businessman who seems to have a sex and drug problem, but as he gets to know Steve through these few encounters, Eddie comes to find Steve is living a life he truly despises. Through these few encounters they become friends and eventually by the end fall in love.

🤘🏻 Role Reversal Steddie AU- @tinytalkingtina and I have been expanding our world of Trackstar!Eddie and Metalhead!Steve and can't wait to share with you all that we've created.

⛺️ Steddie Set Up- Steve and Eddie meet on a camping trip organised by the kids. Clueless to the fact that they've been set up they become fast friends and soon a couple.

You know the drill. In an ask send me the emojis of the fic(s) you'd like me to work on and post updates.

What exists of 💼 as of now, below the cut.

There's a commotion at the double doors of the hotel lobby, multiple men spilling in all at once. Tailored suits, expensive watches, and the numbers of their mistresses hardly hidden in their phones.

Every one of them looks like an asshole.

From where Eddie sits behind the reception desk doodling in his notebook, he inwardly sighs before standing and tugging at his stiff uniform to at least appear professional. Black slacks and a white button down that he's had to treat for Ketchup stains more times then he cares to count. It's the least personalised thing he owns and with the added fact of not being allowed to wear jewellery or have his hair down, he just feels like another cog in the machine.

God he hates his job.

"Good morning, Sir," Eddie says with feigned composure as one of the suit and tied assholes of this month's conference approaches the front desk. The guys sporting a full head of salt and peppered hair, thick and perfectly coiffed on the top of his head. Eyes haunting, smile sinister in a way that's much too menacing for Eddie's taste. Shark like in the way it makes Eddie feel pinned down like a hopeless piece of prey.

"Harrington, Richard Harrington," the man says with a thundering voice instead of a greeting, slapping his credit card and ID onto the marble countertop between them and turning his back to say something snappy to the man at his rear.

Harrington, Eddie thinks with distaste, remembering the name from his first day on shift. Richard, the pompous prick, was yelling at the poor woman training Eddie because she forgot to make sure his room came stocked with higher end liquor than their Luxury Suites usually did. Really, it was something so small it could have been handled with just a phone call down to the front desk. It's a rather vivid memory and Eddie's sure that at the time if that would have been suggested the man would've dropped dead of a heart attack.

Though really, would that have been so awful?

He's seen the man far too many times since. Monthly business conferences and meetings at the hotel keep the entirety of Harrington and Associates forever coming through the lobby doors.

Much to Eddie's dismay.

He sighs at the thought of the many more encounters to come, watching as the vein bulges from the side of Richard's head and he turns a rather grotesque shade of red. Eddie feels bad for the man Richard's snapping at. It's obvious not much has changed other than the jerk sporting a few more wrinkles and grey hairs.

With a hardly contained eye roll, Eddie types 'Harrington' into the system, the keyboard clicking under his fingertips before two separate bookings pop up on the screen. One for Richard and another for a Stephen.

Eddie hums in thought, as familiar as this gaggle of assholes are, he doesn't remember a Stephen from the past bookings.

Must be new. And related. Poor bastard, Eddie thinks absent-mindedly. He can't imagine working for this guy, let alone being his son, though, maybe this Stephen's no different.

He grimaces at the thought and hopes he doesn't have to meet the man if he is.

Quietly, as not to disrupt the hissing match happening in front of him, Eddie finishes checking Mr. Dick Harrington into the hotel. Sliding the room key, credit card and ID in the man's direction, Eddie watches as Richard does nothing but continue to berate the man before him. Something about scheduling or mergers or what the fuck ever that Eddie really doesn't have the time or energy to give even a single shit about.

From the edge of the crowd of assholes a young man steps in to grab the cards and quite frankly Eddie couldn't give two shits if this guy's helping or stealing from the rich bastard. Though by the near matching formal attire and the way no one bats an eye, he supposes he at least works for the guy.

Or…

“Steve Harrington,” the young, startlingly beautiful man says as he picks up his apparent father's ID and replaces it with his own on the marble countertop.

There's a cute twist to his lip when he talks and Eddie already hates himself for staring, but how can he not?

This is Richard's son?

No

No

Mr. Tall Tan and Beautiful cannot have come from that.

But the matching square of their jaws, tilt to their cheeks and hazel of their eyes begs to differ.

Fucking hell.

He's probably just as much of a prick.

The pretty ones always are.

The straight ones too.

Chewing on the inside of his cheek, willing his apparent blush to go down Eddie nods once and selects the only obvious choice of name in the booking system.

Stephen Harrington.

He can feel the man's eyes boring into him as he's typing, searing almost in their stare, so much so Eddie wonders if he has something on his face or if the guy just has zero social skills.

Chancing a glance up his suspicions are proven right and Steve doesn't so much as move, his eyes not meeting Eddie's but staring a little lower.

Eddie swallows, the judgement feeling heavy as he pulls the collar of his shirt higher, making sure there's no evidence of ink or any other bad decisions peeking out from the white buttoned around his neck.

It wouldn't be the first time some business asshole had something to say about his tattoos or the occasional hickey concealer failed to hide.

“605,” Eddie says almost mechanically after placing Steve's room key between them, his voice finally drawing the man's eye away from his throat.

Steve coughs into his fist, nods and grabs his and his fathers remaining cards and room keys but he doesn't leave. Navy blue suit and eyes Eddie thinks will take him weeks to forget, Steve remains standing before him, chewing on his bottom lip until he… he does a quick once over of Eddie. Top to bottom. Head to tail. Hazel eyes scanning, judging, making Eddie's skin feel like it's on fire for completely other reasons.

Then without a second's notice he looks from side to side rather hastily and leans into Eddie's space across the marble countertop, the sound of his elbow meeting the surface between them, a dull thud.

He smells like the pine of a forest floor and the musk of a man who's been nothing but busy and exhausted for weeks.

But God it's doing something to Eddie and he hates it.

Steve works his jaw in an odd way, rubbing at the muscle before he asks in a hushed tone, “There uh, there any clubs around here, for the, you know,” he lifts his hand to drop his wrist limply, fluttering his lashes as he continues, “variety?”

He's asking Eddie if there's any gay clubs around.

He's asking Eddie if there's any gay clubs around?

What the fuck?

Eddie bristles, already feeling his brows pull into a glare. He's making fun of him. These businessmen always do.

It's not like he's wearing a pride flag anywhere or skipping through the fucking halls, but somehow these pricks always seem to pick up on his preferences.

It's been years and only once has anyone been genuine in their inquiry.

So genuine in fact that Eddie found himself with his dick in the guy's mouth not more than thirty minutes later when he went out for his smoke break.

But a Harrington? Richard's son?

He thinks Hell will sooner freeze over.

Really if anything Eddie wants to tell the guy to fuck off, but he can't because professionalism.

So he does the next best thing.

If the guy's gonna be a judgy dick, well…

In a matter of seconds Eddie prints off a map of the city that has each and every gay bar starred and hands it to Steve with a very fake and falsely enthusiastic, “Enjoy you stay in the city Mr. Harrington, I hope you find what you're looking for.”

And then before he even has a chance to catch the guy's reaction, he's waving towards the crowd, calling out “next please” and moving to the other computer to check in the next asshole.

[captainjimothycarter]

I spun the whump wheel and your prompt is: Shot (arrow).

Who pissed off Clint this time? 😂

I have no idea where this came from. I mean it just came out of nowhere with poor Clint.

--

Weight Of The World On His Shoulders

Kate asks Clint a question he can't avoid and he relives one of the worst moments of his life.

"The arrow is a tool, remember that, Kate. You always use it as a tool, an extension of you. You must pay attention to the environment around you. Every little thing works against you." Clint glanced at his partner, seeing her nod in agreement with his statement. Her eyes were keenly on him, watching his every move. She wasn't the only one, he was fully aware that Bucky was watching them from the loft above. He could feel their eyes on him, watching, waiting. "You keep your eyes on the target, don't look away until you're sure it's struck." He nocked the arrow and kept his eyes on the target before him, listening to the gears crank as the target moved around. A feature that he insisted they needed in the archery room. "Breathe, focus, let go." He released the arrow, still holding his breath. It cut through the air and landed with a solid thunk in the middle of his whirling target. For a moment, nothing happened and then it exploded with a handful of foul-smelling goo that coated the target and the gears. Bucky's impressed whistle and Kate's impressed look went straight to his ego. "Hey, Clint." He knew that tone, Kate had a question that had been weighing on her mind for a while. He also knew that look, the slight knit between her eyes. She was trying to figure out how to word the question that wouldn't offend him. "Yeah, Katie-Kate? You got a question?" "Hundreds but..." Kate paused with a trick arrow twirling between her fingers. "Just the one for now. Have you...ever..." She struggled to find the right words, curiosity pulling on her. No, it was more than just curiosity. There was something about the way that Clint acted during these lessons, the way that his eyes looked and how he gripped some arrows tighter than others. Subtle actions that always struck her as odd. "Have you ever shot anyone and killed them?" The question was jumbled and rushed, said in all one breath like she had to force it out of her system before it got stuck again. Clint knew the question was coming, it was always asked by curious fans or nosey journalists when they were forced to do those press conferences. He could easily brush them off, make some joke, deflect them, or depend on his teammates to deflect it for him. Yet with Katie, he couldn't avoid the question, he couldn't use the Barton Charm to deflect it. She knew she could read him like a book and dissect him. She had more rights than others to ask that question, considering all they've gone through together.

Death - @avengersbingo, Free Space - @fandombingo, Free Space - @hurtcomfort-bingo, Skeletons In The Closet - @marvelrarepairbingo

Whump Wheel: Send Me A Prompt

[miela]

Shattered Memories • Chapter X: The Return of a Hero • {Peter Parker x Stark!Reader}

Chapter Genre: Heartfelt Angst, F L O O F Y Fluff Chapter Warnings: back to a regular-sized chapters lmao Extra: next chapter is gonna be smut and it might be posted before the next update. Word Count: 3.4k

Masterlist | Playlist | Pin Board

↪ divider by firefly-graphics

It’s been no more than fifteen minutes since Peter left and you were in the conference room holding the Helmet of the Iron Suit of your late father. You were sitting on the table again as you looked out the window at the New York City skyline in contemplation as the ghosts of Peter’s words echoed and danced around your head. 

Me, a hero, you thought. 

You knew that you used to be an Avenger. You used to be a damn good one actually, but that didn’t mean that you were a good hero. Anyone can save a life but not everyone can truly be a hero. And now that you think about it, you don’t think you ever saw yourself as a true hero. 

You didn’t see yourself like how you saw Steve.

You didn’t see yourself like how you saw Nat.

You didn’t see yourself like you saw your dad.

And you certainly didn’t see yourself like how you saw Peter. 

You were meant to be a legacy, not a hero. You were meant to change the world through business and philanthropy. That was your place. 

You were Corporate America, not Captain America.

If Peter really knew what happened five years ago, he would understand why you couldn't see yourself as a hero. If he knew how you're responsible for the pain and loss and downfall of many people because of your selfishness, he would understand why you tucked your suit in a far corner. You were doing a favor by staying in your place as an American Sweetheart and not an American Hero. 

Then…if that’s the case why do you feel this yearning? Like you're supposed to be out there doing more? 

You sighed and looked down at the helmet that your father once wore. Inside of it was a message that he left for you years ago that you refused to look at because you knew that it was his farewell message to you and that meant that it was final and that he wasn't coming back. 

You felt that now was the time to see it. 

You activated the system in the helm as a hologram came up through the eyes of the mask. You clicked around until you found the file that read "FOR ELDEST LITTLE ME" which brought a smile to your face.

You took a deep breath and pressed play. A life-sized hologram of your dad came up. 

Hey Daughter number one, I hope you never have to see this message. But it’s like you say many times “shit happens, and it’s our responsibility to be prepared for it.” So I’m taking a page out of your book and doing just that. Preparing for the shit that may or may not happen. 

If you’re seeing this message that means I’m dead. Or I lived and you got nosey and I forgot to delete this. Whatever. If I’m alive, delete this right now or I’ll hide all your guitars in some off-shore estate of ours. Including the one on your bedroom wall. If I’m dead then…well, stay tuned. 

I’m going to cut right to the chase. Don’t blame yourself for my death. None of this is on you. There was nothing you could have done to save me and I mean nothing. Things played out exactly how they were supposed to. You did everything you were supposed to and I’m so proud of you. 

I want you to live your life and I want you to be happy. I know you’re gonna love Morgan and I know that you and Pepper will take care of each other. You’re gonna grow to be this powerful person in the world just like you always wanted to be. This world will try and knock you down because you are different and you constantly break the status quo, even if I specifically told you not to. Keep being a swiftie, keep playing guitar, keep dancing, keep creating things, and keep being a little smart ass too. I don’t want you to blame yourself for something that you had no control over. 

You will make mistakes, some probably as big as mine and I’m sorry that you have to be left with the mess I made in my lifetime. People will try to knock you down because of me. People will try to discourage you because of me. People will try to destroy you because of me. You will have enemies everywhere and at some point it will probably cause you to be your own worst enemy. So here’s a word of advice from your dear ol’ dad:

“Don’t give up before you can see what happens when you persevere.” 

Yes, I came up with that quote because I am a freaking genius.

Remember what I always told you. “Behind that heart of iron, there is gold.” You are headstrong, stubborn and so damn rebellious but it’s because you care about others, you care about making this world a better place, and you care about saving the earth that we all live on. 

And for that, you are a hero, whether you believe it or not. 

I love you, 3000, (Y/N). When the time comes, I'll see you on the flipside.

By the time the message ended, you were crying. You picked up the Iron mask and leaned your forehead against it. You let out a sob as a wave of emotions washed over you. 

“Thank you, dad…” you whisper to the mask. “I love you, 3000.”

You sat there and cried for a good twenty minutes before you calmed down. You took a deep breath, got up, and walked into the office of the penthouse, a place you avoided like the plague because of all the memories of Tony Stark living in it. 

You were unlocking all types of bravery today.

When you stepped inside you walked over to the desk and set down the mask right in the center of it before patting it softly two times. You walked around the office and looked around at the different decor and pictures that were placed nicely on shelves and the desk. There was a picture of you, Pepper and Tony and another one with Morgan, Pepper and Tony. They made you smile as you looked over and noticed another two pictures. 

One was of you and Peter. 

You both were hugging each other cheek to cheek with big smiles on your faces. You noted how young you both looked and how happy you both were with youthful twinkles in your eyes and baby faces much like how you were in the scrapbook pictures. The other picture was of you, Peter, and Harley all making funny faces and wearing Stark Internship tee shirts as a joke (and as proof for Aunt May and Harley's mom that they're doing something other than Avenger's Hero work). You giggled to yourself.

"All the clues I needed, right in here in the only place I didn't look," you smile to yourself. "Figures."

You set the photo back down as a notification popped up on your stark specs.

"A message from Spiderman," FRIDAY chimed. "Or better yet, your boyfriend."

You hummed in amusement with a smile. "Open it please."

"Certainly."

Through the specs, you could see a picture of the Avengers Tower in the distance and a red webbed hand doing a finger heart at it. The caption was a red heart. Your smile widened as you faced the window, did a finger heart at it, and sent him a picture of it with a heart caption back. 

You wanted to ask him how patrolling was going, but your mind decided on other things. You made your way to your room down the hall and made a beeline to the walk-in closet filled with your business clothing that you would rather keep there than at home. You walked inside and made your way to the very back and stopped at the long mirror that stood in front of you. You sighed and put your hand on the hidden scanner on the side of the mirror. A blue light Illuminated around your hand. 

"Welcome back, Silk," the system said as the mirror turned around and revealed your spider suit. "It's been a long time."

You looked at the white, black, and red one-piece with minimal gold details and minimal blue LED lights. You had almost forgotten what it looked like and you were about to remember what it felt like.

You smiled. "Yeah, it has."

Next thing you know you were in the suit, with your full white mask on and your white hood up. It was just as comfortable as you remembered. It felt liberating, freeing and right wearing the suit and now you were going to put it to the test. You strapped on your web shooters and tested them to make sure that they still work. Then you made your way to the platform outside. 

"Shall I notify, Peter?" FRIDAY asked through your mask.

"No," you replied with excitement and nervousness flowing through your body. "I'll surprise him."

You took a deep breath that came out more shaky than you would’ve liked. You haven't done this in so long and you honestly felt like you were going to run into a building or something. And although you can make webs from your fingertips, you haven’t really haven’t used your webs in a while either, so you opted for the web shooters that you also used in combat before.

Oh god, what if the fluid is no good anymore? You thought.

"You're afraid,” FRIDAY stated.

"Is it obvious?” You asked as you took the web fluid container to check it from the web shooter. “I haven't done this in five years."

"Just like your first time, it’s a leap of faith."

“FRI, that leap of faith could have me seeing my father on the flipside much sooner than planned.”

“You could summon an iron suit for emergency purposes.”

"You're right." You took a deep breath and put the container back in the slot of the web shooter. "Here goes faith."

And with that, you ran across the platform and dove off. The fall was terrifying but invigorating. The wind was harsh and cold but in an instant reaction, your suit auto-warmed you. You shot a web from the shooter as it attached to a building and you swung across the veins of the city. Once you got the hang of it from your muscle memory, you flung yourself high up in the sky over some of the buildings and did a flip. You could hear people from down below pointing you out and you waved as you passed by them. You smiled from behind your mask as you swung and ran on the side of buildings, careful to not hit windows. You landed on top of a building and laughed happily to yourself as your heart raced in your chest.

You almost couldn’t believe you gave this up. Almost.

"Man, I missed this."

"Spiderman detected nearby. About five blocks over." FRIDAY stated as she showed you his location.

"Thanks, FRI."

You swung and leaped from building to building until you felt your senses tingle. You land on the building where he was at. He was spider-squatting (as you two called it)  on the edge and looking down at the street. You began walking quietly over to him.

"Friend detected," FRIDAY chimed. "Hello Karen."

"Hello FRIDAY," Karen chimed back.

You lay your hands on his shoulders softly and his body instantly relaxed at your touch. You sensed a form of happiness from him. 

"You came," you could hear the smile in his voice.

You leaned against him, wrapped your arms around his waist, and hugged him from behind. He turned his head towards you as you rested your chin on his shoulder. He kisses your cheek through his mask as heart emotes pop up on the screen through your mask lenses. Your face burned. 

"I did."

"What changed your mind?"

"I wanted to see your ass in the suit again."

Peter laughed in response. “Is that why you made the suit so form-fitting?”

“No,” you replied with a giggle. “But I��m certainly not complaining.”

“I’m not complaining about yours either,” he said lowly in your ear which caused your face to burn even more.

He smirked under his mask knowing what your silence meant.

"How long have you been staking out here?"

"Since I sensed you like three minutes ago," he explained. 

You smiled and then moved to sit next to him. "I decided to try the hero thing again. If I'm gonna do it with anyone, I'm glad it's you." 

He was looking at you when you looked back at him. He then moved his covered hand to cradle your masked face gently and you leaned into it as your mask showed you closing your eyes. His thumb caressed the apple of your cheek gently and you let out a soft breath at the sweetness of it all. 

"Are you okay?" He asked softly with obvious worry in his voice. "I sensed your sadness earlier."

You look up at him with a covered smile. "I'm okay. I just found a message from my dad and it just kinda got to me," you explained and put your hand over his. "But I'm okay." 

"You sure?" 

You nodded and then stood up. 

“Let’s go protect the little guy,” you held your hand. “Together.”

He took your hand and stood up. “I’m really glad you’re here.”

You nodded. “Me too.”

Both of you swung through the streets of New York City. You stopped several things from happening including petty thefts, muggings, car accidents, and children from getting themselves into danger unintentionally. You mostly assisted more than anything, which neither of you minded since it’s been a while since you’ve done any heroic justice work. 

After a while, you guys stopped and got some food to replenish the energy you used. Peter settled with a sandwich while you got a wrap and you guys split your food in half and gave it to one another. You both sat on the edge of the roof of a lower-rise building scanning the streets for any suspicious activity.

"You got one thing wrong earlier," you started. "In your big ass rom-com speech."

"Oh?" Peter looked at you. "Enlighten me."

"Draco Malfoy and Aaron Warner aren't my book boyfriends anymore," you smirked. "I've moved on from them."

"Oh really?" Peter mused. "Care to share with the class?"

"Why? So you can feel some type of way about him too? Nah I'm good."

"Oh, come on!" 

You giggled and took another bite of your wrap. "I'll tell you once he's ready to meet you."

He scoffed and shook his head with a playful smile. "I'll just ask Morgan."

You snorted. "She probably does know. Speaking of, she told me you helped her out yesterday. Thank you for that."

"Don't mention it," he smiled and took the last bite of his sandwich.

You looked out into the skyline of the city and scanned over its beauty before letting out a sigh. You felt the happy chemicals working through your body over time and smiled to yourself as you finished your food. 

"So," you began. "I know this question is annoying as hell but what do you plan on doing after college?"

"I have a few options," Peter started. "But the two that resonate with me most are working in a lab or being an educator."

You look at him. "You wanna become a teacher?"

Peter nodded. "I love science as you know and I have a passion for it. I know it's not for everyone and some kids struggle with it y'know? so I would love to share my passion with them and show them that even though they're not good at the subject they can still get some sort of fulfillment from trying. Like the scientific method. Also, some kids need someone who they can turn to when bullies happen and when they're struggling. I'm no counselor but I could help them connect to one."

Your heart swelled. He is just so pure and too good for this world. You couldn't understand why the universe would ever want to do any harm to him when he's such an angel. All he wanted to do was make this world a better place in the best way he could. 

You pouted.

"You're such a sweetheart," you pecked his lips. "My sweet boy."

He blushed. "I-I-It's nothing, really."

"To some kid out there, one day, it'll be everything."

He looked at you again and he could tell that had a loving look in your eye. You both leaned in and kissed each other softly. Kissing Peter had become one of your favorite things in less than twenty-four hours. And if you said it out loud, Peter would agree with you.

"Oh my god!" You heard a shriek from below and both of you reacted by whipping your heads around and pulling down your mask.

There was a group of three girls at the bottom of the building gawking up at the both of you. 

"Silk! Is that you?!" The girl who shrieked before asked. She had long braided locs that were tied up in pigtails, dark skin, and big brown eyes that sparkled at the sight of you both. She wore a black long-sleeved turtle neck and a black pleated skirt under a hot pink corset. She has fishnets on her legs and demonias on her feet and several spikes accessories to top the outfit. 

She reminded you of Draculaura from Monster High.

You smiled and waved down at them. "Hello," you sang, putting on your best Brooklyn accent.

"You came back!" The girl chimed excitedly. "Everyone thought you were dead!"

"No, they didn't," a girl next to her corrected. She had long wavy brown hair and she wore an oversized maroon sweater that looked nice against her tan skin, with a white flowy skirt, Doc Martens, a denim jacket full of embroideries and patches, and a white beanie on her head. "Spidey said on many occasions that she was taking a break due to unknown reasons."

You looked at Peter who shrugged. 

"I didn't know what else to say," he whispered so only you two could hear.

"Are you two dating?" The other girl who was with them asked curiously. She had short blonde hair and wore a green crew neck sweater over a white turtleneck and a pair of loose mom jeans with Doc Martens. 

"Uh, duh? Why wouldn't they be?" The Draculaura girl said with a smile. "They're, like, perfect for each other! He picked up the slack so she could take a break! That's sooooo sweet! Iron Spider Duo is the OTP!"

You couldn't help but giggle like an idiot with your hand over the area where your mouth would be as you crossed a leg over the other.

God, she's so cute, Peter thought as he blushed under his mask. 

"Where are you girls headed?" You asked. "You shouldn't be walking by yourselves at this hour."

"Oh, we ubered here to this cafe," White beanie replied. "And we should get inside so we can meet up with everyone else!" She urged the other two to go inside. 

"Wait, can we get a picture with you?" The blonde asked.

You and Peter exchanged looks and shrugged in a why not manner before jumping down and posing with them. After that, you saluted them a goodnight as they hurried inside to meet up with whoever they were supposed to meet up with.

"We do make a good pair don't we?" You smiled and nudged his arm playfully.

"We sure do," Peter nudged back.

After that, you patrolled some more before calling it a night. When you two finally got back to the tower, it was one in the morning. Nothing big as an Avengers-level threat happened on patrols and so you both still had some energy. But that could also be your senses being happy.

You missed this. You were all smiles and adrenaline high when you walked back in.

"I'll take a shower in the locker room," Peter smiled and before he could turn and walk away you grabbed his arm. He looked at you wondrously in response.

"Why waste water?" You smiled softly looking at him with a longing in your eyes. 

Peter's eyes widened slightly as he looked at you. His wild eyes betrayed him as they traced over your body and just as you do a lot of justice in that suit, that suit was doing you a lot of justice. 

He pressed his lips together and licked them as he nodded at you. You smiled, taking his hands and walking him towards your bedroom.

~

Tags:

@chrisevans-realwife @riordanness @peterdarlingg @thecrystalclarity @brckenmemories @paleprincesssxo @blackcanary130 @kindlover @i-have-no-life-charlie @melodicheauxxlovesfood

[ohtobeleah]

Minimal Losses // Jake Seresin

Chapter Four: Kryptonite

Summary: Jake occupancies you down to the local North Island precinct and is totally stuck by the way you are treated by the local authorities.

Warnings: Jake Seresin x FBI!reader. Slow Burn. Criminal Minds crossover. Sexism, misogyny.

Word Count: 4.1k

Author Note: I want you ALL to know that ONE reblog was responsible for reviving this series and putting it back into my writing roster. That’s all it took. One comment. MASTERLIST

Jake, for the life of him, couldn’t quite get a good grasp on the reality he was falling into. He's sitting at a blackened glass round table, in a conference room that he isn't sure he has clearance to be in, sweating so profusely that he’ll need to change his shirt the second he gets back to base. 

He hasn’t even really recovered from seeing how easily one of Ben Stiller's many variants had treated you at the front gate, he’s seething, seeing red, but he has to accept that that’s something you've dealt with far too many times to count to even be phased by it now. Desensitised. 

There's a man sitting across from him he doesn't know, he’s only just walked in a few seconds ago with a stack of paperwork and cream coloured files. Sitting across from Jake with a huff, clearly pressed for time. The man with dark hair and brown eyes seems to be rattled, but Jake isn't going to be the one who initiates the conversation. It's so quiet he can hear the ticks of hands on the clock hanging above his head. 

Spencer Reid is on his left, sitting patiently as ever as he decides now's an incredibly appropriate time to get some light reading done. Jake swears the guy only started the book twenty seconds ago and he's nearing the back pages. He can’t help but to feel awkward and far less worthy than he’s ever felt while he’s tucked between two PHD having brainiacs. But as the thoughts of unworthiness threaten to overcome him, Jake looks to his right, with anxiety he didn't know he could experience riddling his nervous system, he watches as a soft smile creeps across his face absentmindedly as you take a bite of the ham and cheese sandwich he’d watch you slap together in a hurry in the kitchen of the precinct. Typing away with one hand on your laptop that's prompted open in front of you, catching Jake looking at you in your peripheral is what has you freezing, looking at him with a smile so pure it sends his heart clear out of this world. He’s in love. 

“Did you want a bite?” You ask as if you're sitting in the livingroom of the dorm you’re occupying back at base and not about to discuss highly classified information regarding an ongoing murder investigation. “I can share if you want?” You ask again and it only has Jake's heart pounding against his chest harder. You were everything he’d dreamed of and then some. Brilliant minded, whitty, so incredibly intelligent, he loved the way your glasses sat just perfectly on the bridge of your nose. He adored the way you just pushed your hair back into whatever position, shape and place would hold. Jake thinks he’s dying, he’s never felt this kind of sensation before—it’s like he’s floating. He’s never been in love with someone before. “Or I can quickly race back and make you one? You like ham and cheese?” 

“Nah, nah, I think I'm good.” Jake rubs his clammy hands on his jeans as you go back to what you were working on. He just sits there in awe of everything around him. How you did this for a living he’d never understand. 

“JAG got wind of the ongoing investigation.” You don't even look up from the email Special Agent Bradshaw had just CC’d you in on. “Apparently they wanna take over the case.” Jake sat back as he listened, watching intentionally with how you acted around your own team. “Agent Bradshaw just emailed me a copy of the email chain, seems like they’re really pushing—“ 

“Well, you can tell JAG, Kas, that that won't be happening.” Aaron Hotchener passed you one of the many cream coloured files he’d lugged into the room as Reid sat up a little straighter with his ears pricked to attention. “Ensign Sue Snelling was just found dead in the engine room of the Lexington, thismorning, that’s three victims, no arrest.” Opening the file, you had to quickly shut it so as to not throw up the sandwich you’d just finished scoffing down. “I've just touched base with Agent Bradshaw, she's in the process of pulling her men from the other carriers that we’d had our eyes on but this just means it's been confirmed a serial killer is currently stationed out on the UUS Lexinton and we need to act now.” 

“Did the unsub use the same methods?” Spencer asked as he leaned over to take the file from you. “That’s interesting considering he’d know that killing abroad only makes it easier to narrow it down. Like catching fish in a barrel.” 

“Unsub?” Jake asked curiously as he looked at Spencer, his elbows now resting on the glass tabletop. 

“It means Unknown Subjects.” You explained, which made Jake frown because he thought you knew who the guy was. “We have our suspicions, now we know he’s on the Lexington for sure it rules out a handful of other persons of interest.” 

“You must be Jake Seresin?” Aaron smirked for a second from across the table. “I’m Special Agent Aaron Hotcher, Behavioral Analysis Unit chief—Sorry, I’ve had your file sitting on my desk for about a week now but I trust Agent Bradshaw's judgement enough to know she wouldn’t pick a lemon and I haven’t received a distress text from Agent Kas here either.” Hotch kinked his gaze your way for a brief moment as you dipped your chin. Jake wondered if distress texts were something you often sent out. “So, I trust that you’re up to speed and ready to sign your life away to the government for better or worse.” 

“I already did that the second I was tapped out of the naval academy, sir—I’m government barcoded and all.” Jake cracked the slight joke just so he could hear you laugh, it worked. Spencer watched with a questioning brow as you covered your mouth to muffle the sounds that escaped without force. He’d never known you to be one for romance, although—he’d never seen someone look at you the way he observed Jake. It was with kind, compassionate eyes that Jake admired you. 

“I trust you'll be a fine asset to the team Lieutenant Seresin, Y/n here is an exceptional analysis—keep up with her and you’ll be just fine.” Jake took a moment to rub his hands against his thighs again, suddenly feeling in over his head. He was used to being the best at what he did—but now he wasn’t even on the register. You could sense Jake was spiralling, opting to fish for his pinky under the table and hook yours with his. Grounding the naval aviator who’d drawn you out of your shell. 

“You and Agent Kas will be stationed out to the Lexington with the rest of your squadron as of late tomorrow afternoon—we can’t afford to push this anymore than that if we’re another victim down.” 

“I don’t know how you guys are gonna spin such a quick turn around.” Jake scoffed softly in disbelief. “Some of the guys who aren’t privy to this whole undercover investigation are gonna smell that somethings up.” Jake was right, but Hotch was already two steps ahead in the short amount of time it had taken you and Jake to shower, change and head over to the precinct. Sliding a cream folder into the aviator's hands, Hotch tilted his head at you in a shared moment of thought. Jake had his head screwed on tight, Arron Hotchner respected that. 

“You’re admirals are in a briefing as we speak, they’ll have to figure something out and figure it out fast because you, Lieutenant, are officially an employee of the BAU.” Jake eyed off the content of the file Hotch had slid Jake. It was his. Anything anyone needed to know about Jake Seresin was contained in that file. Stamped across the front read liaison officer. “Bradshaw tells me you’ve been carrying some old NCIS badge around like it’s made of gold.” Spencer snickered to himself as Jake's cheeks lit up like a Christmas tree. You couldn’t help but to laugh as Hotch tossed him a leather flipper case. “So I took liberty and got you actual liaison officer credentials, agent Seresin.” 

“Now it’s really official—“ You cooed, smiling at Jake with genuine kindness and admiration as he showed you the credentials you carried around all day everyday. To you they were just another form of Identification, but to Jake? It was something else. He had a duty to keep you safe. That was his only task.

“I haven’t had a chance to organise a weapons training session for Lieutenant Seresin, should I organise that before we go back to the naval base?” You stated and Hotch just shook his head softly. You were good at your job, he’d give you that—but you needed more experience in fieldwork. There was a small part of him that thought you were in over your head with this case—too young, too youthful, too by the book, but Agent Bradshaw had been the one to slap him upside the head and told him to give you a chance. She saw something in you not a lot of people saw. Strength. This was your case and you’d work it start to damn finish. 

Much like Spencer, everything was by the book. So when you looked at Hotch as if he’d just told you to forget about the very book you were told to know word for word, he simply replied with something that resonated with Jake a lot more than he’d probably intended it to. 

“He doesn’t need to carry a gun to be able to kill someone, Kas.” 

“Would be good to at least have him cleared for handling, just for legality purposes.” Spencer could sense the frustration going against protocol and procedure brought you. He could practically see the existential crisis brewing under your skin. “Have you ever handled a gun Lieutenant Seresin?” 

“Probably not to the extent you three have but yeah, I’ve dabbled in the odd firing range excursion.” Jake's father had been an avid hunter growing up. He knew his way around a hunting gun, but he’d never used a gun for anything other than shooting rabbits, ducks or deer. 

“You and Kasper can head on down to the firing range for a quick skill eval.” Hotch sighed, holding the bridge of his nose. “You’ll need to be quick.” 

“I heard Morgan’s in to do a talk on cop killers.” Spencer added as he stood. “I’ll have him line up a skill eval and we can kill two birds with one stone.” 

“Perfect, set it up, get these two kitted up, signed out and on that carrier before we end up with another victim—“ 

***~***~***~***~***~***~

“Alright alright!” You beamed as Jake flashed you his new credentials in the elevator down to the shooting range. “You can stop showing me your badge Jake, it’s getting old.” 

“Sorry—it’s actually Agent Seresin now.” Jake corrected you as he pocketed the new identity he’d unlocked, another level of self promotion to ascend his already higher than heaven ego. “God, Roosters gonna cream his pants when I show him.” 

“You and Rooster close?” You asked gracefully as the elevator dinged, Jake let you walk out first as his hand fell to the small of your hip. Guiding you although he had no idea where he was going. “Seems as though you get along with Agent Bradshaw on a personal level as well as professional?” 

“Well, it’s—“ Jake wasn’t sure this very moment was the most appropriate time to go over his relationship with the Bradshaws. “They’re my people, to put it simply.” That was no word of a lie. 

As you and Jake entered the firing range, there were a vast variety of men in uniform huddling around one of the firing zones. Pushing through—you met Derek Morgan, a familiar face amongst a sea of people you didn’t know. 

“Hey, Morgan? Why’d you call all these people down here for?” You greeted the much older man who just smiled at you, nodding at Jake in the process— acknowledging his presence. There would be a later time for formal introductions, but right now was not that time. 

Hey! How you doin kid?” Morgan teased, he was forever taunting you about your age. “Does your mother know you're here?” Jake caught onto the way people treated you quickly. He was aware that Agent Bradshaw treated you with enough respect that it put a pep in your step, but Jake also caught the glances the men surrounding you at the present gave you. Like you weren’t supposed to be here. 

“Give me that.” You hissed as you snatched the handgun from Morgan’s hand, placing a single round into the chamber as you walked into the shooting zone. You placed the earmuffs over your ears haphazardly that have been hanging on the hook beside you and with a single exhale and soft shoulders, you fired the round with precise precision. 

“Nice shooting Kas–” Morgan promptly complimented you. Taking the gun as you held it out for him. 

“Better than Billy the kid.” You beamed, again—Jake noticed the pep in your step. 

“Diaper rash makes you cranky huh?” That same pep was gone just a few seconds later. “Here.” Morgan handed you the target you’d shot, there was a bullet hole directly in the middle of the target. “Give this to your mum, maybe she’ll stick it on the refrigerator door.”

The girl who stood amongst a sea of testosterone wasn’t the girl Jake had taken home that night from the bar, you’d shrunken six feet under as your shoulders slumped, taking the target sheet from Morgan. He didn’t know how much his commitment affected you, but Jake could see straight through the tough exterior you tried to front. 

“Shit, that was pretty badass, you know—“ Jake caught your gaze as you came to sant beside him, bumping his hip to yours. “For a behavioural analysis.” 

“I took an advanced firearms course my second year with the bureau, not that I ever thought I’d be in the field.” With every day that past, Jake Seresin learnt a new fact about you that left him stunned into complete silence. For someone who had the gift of the gab, that was a compliment in and of itself. You’d been the only person who could render Jake silent. With nothing to say. 

“Okay who's wearing?” Morgan looked around the group of police officers who just stared at him blindly like he’d asked such a personal question. When no one answered, you frowned. Idiots you thought as you rolled your eyes.

Raising your hand, every man that stood in the room laughed and turned to one another like you'd just outed yourself as some prissy desk jockey. 

“Kas?” Morgan even raised a brow in response to you wearing a vest. 

“Everyone should be wearing.” You replied shortly. “It’s protocol.” Looking around, all eyes were on you. All snickering, all looking down at you. 

“Okay, fair—but baby girl imma need to borrow it real quick.” Morgan smirked, gesturing for you to hand over your vest. 

“Here sugar, let me assist you–” a voice called out from the back of the crowd before a gaggle of laughter erupted from the man who all stood around waiting for the demonstration to begin. Jake couldn’t have clenched his jaw harder if he wanted to. 

“Oh no thanks, I've been dressing myself since I was five years old.” You snapped back, turning your chest into Jake to shield yourself from being completely exposed as you undressed from the waist up. “All you perverts turn your heads.” You spoke over your shoulder as a horrifying whistle echoed throughout the firing zone. Jake saw red as he looked down at you, watching as you slipped your shirt over your head, unclipping the bullet proof vest that you’d been wearing since you left the base. It left you vulnerable, exposed in just your bra. “Here.” You handed Morgan the vest with a meek look. Fuck you could just die right about now. 

“Hey, I’m right here—don’t worry about anyone else.” Jake cooed, his eyes searching yours for confirmation you were listening to him. Tilting your chin up with his index finger and thumb as you balled your shirt up in your firsts against his chest. “I ain’t gonna let no one hurt you.” Jake was quick to  whisper. “But for what it's worth? Both on and off the record? I think you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid my eyes on.” 

You would have kissed him then and there on the spot if you hadn’t been standing where you were. Morgan’s voice brought you crashing down to reality harder than ever as you worked to throw your short back on. Turning so your back was now against Jake's chest.  

“Okay everybody listen up, I want you all to take a good look at these lovely little bullets.” Morgan handed out a handful of red tipped bullets. “Cute right? You’ll notice the smooth jacket, pay particular attention to the tip.” Hanging your vest, Morgan pushed the bottom that had it flying back towards the furthest point away from the shooting range. Further back than you’d ever really seen anyone practise at. 

“Now you've all seen one of these vests stop a .357 magnum bullet at close range haven't you?” Everyone nodded, including you. Jake nodded just to fit in but he didn’t know shit. “Observe–” Morgan turned, firing a single round into the vest at long range. You weren’t too sure what to expect, but as he pressed the button to bring the vest back to the window, you audibly gasped. 

“Son of a bitch–” You sighed, watching as Mogan poked his finger right through the bullet hole he’d shot straight through the vest. Pulling out a piece of protective armour and holding it up. A single round had gone straight through. 

“Armour-piercing bullets?” Jake raised an eyebrow as he leaned in behind you to whisper his concern into your ear, not wanting to sound dumb to anyone other than you. 

“Yeah, cop killers.” 

“Now these bullets came from a suspect one of you fine young men arrested yesterday.” Morgan passed one of the police officers who stood stunned the bullet pierced armour plate that had now been rendered useless. “Yep–that's right, gentleman, and lovely little lady.” Morgan turned to you, the only woman in the room. “They’re out on the streets.”

It made your heart race slightly, the idea of far less protection being readily available now than there was before. What a time to make a breakout in your career, there was a slight moment of regret behind your eyes as you turned into Jake, he looked just as worried as you did but he wasn't plagued with the same plethora of knowledge you were. You should have stayed behind the desk, given the case to someone with more experience, you were far too in over your head. 

Morgan handed you the shot through vest, winking as he noticed the way you hung closer to Jake than he’d ever seen you hang around anyone. You were far too much like Spencer in that aspect, walking, talking computers. He smiled, taking in the fact you hadnt bothered to separate from your new partner, clearly comfortable in his presence as you took the vest back. Pressing your lips together in a tight line as Jake let his hand rest on your shoulder. 

“Vests are optionals boys and girls, especially girls.” 

***~***~***~***~***~***~***~

You could tell something was up just by the way Jake was practically silent in the car on the way back to base. He had the gift of the gab, so when Jake Seresin was silent it wasn't hard to come to the conclusion that something was ping ponging around his that big ass head of his. 

“Jake, it's fine–” You sighed, letting your shoulders slump back as you drove, your hands at ten and two.

“I really don’t fuck with the way you’re treated.” Jake’s voice came out far more gruff than he intended it to as he looked out the window. “From that dickhead at the gate to that Derek guy to the way those officers just–” He couldn't finish his own sentence without clenching his jar, cracking his knuckles. “You should stand up for yourself a little more, you know that right?” 

“Huh.” It was hard not to feel slightly offended, amongst all the little jabs that had been dealt your way today, Jakes had been the hashest of them all, unintentionally. “I'll be sure to put that at the top of my to-do list, Lieutenant Sersin.” 

“Kas–” Jake let his head fall back against the headrest as he turned to look at you. He hadnt noticed the glossy look in your eyes or the way you bit your bottom lip until it was too late to take what he’d already said back. “I didn't mean it like that, I just think you deserve so much more respect than you’re given and if people aren't giving it to you then you need to–” 

“Jake, I already have enough people telling me what to do right now, I don't need you adding yourself to that ever growing list.” The drive back to base wasn't all that far, but with the way Jake was burning a hole into the side of your head with his glare, it felt like a lifetime. 

“You are the most intelligent person I know, yet you act like you’re less than significant?” Jake questioned, he didn't understand why you let people walk all over you. He didn't understand why you didn't speak up when being spoken down to. He didn't understand what it was like to be a woman in a man's world. He’d only ever surrounded himself with people like Phoenix and Special Agent Bradshaw. His mother and sisters would ever let someone treat them the way you let others treat you. Powerful forces to be reckoned with who took no crap from anyone, including him.

You were just different, Jake didn't understand why you weren't like the other women in his life. For someone as brilliant minded and gifted as you he thought there would have had to have been some sort of cockness to you–a level of I know more than you, somewhere buried deep inside. But you just didn't see yourself the way he saw you. 

“The way people talk down to you, it makes me want to break every bone in their body.” Jake saw you as a higher power, a goddess living amongst merely mortal men. 

“I am insignificant, Jake.” You mumbled as you turned into the base car park, dreading having to pretend to be someone you weren't. A fighter pilot with balls of steel. You couldn't even stop yourself from getting a nosebleed. “I'm a pencil pusher! I'm not like Agent Bradshaw, I don't know what I'm doing, I'm in over my head and people are dying.” Jake just let you talk, he listened with intent to everything you had to say, wanting an insight into how you saw yourself. 

“There is a serial killer on a carrier in the middle of the ocean and my sole responsibility right now is making sure I take him down and you’re sitting here, telling me I need to stand up for myself?” 

“I'm not trying to tell you anything Kas, I just think you deserve more respect than what's given to you.” Jake reached gently for your hand, being careful not to startle you as he guided your grip off the wheel and into his palm, fingers intertwining as he brought the palm of your hand up to his mouth–pressing his lips to your pal in a simple domestic act of admiration. “You are so beautiful, so intelligent, it's hard to understand how people don't see you the way I see you.” 

“Oh yeah? And how exactly do you see me?” Jake wanted to say as the love of his life, he wanted to say his future wife, the mother of his children he didn't know he wanted. But he knew that sounded crazy, so he stuffed the crazy deep inside and went with something a little more appropriate. 

“I see you for you, Y/n.” You had to pull your eyes away from the carpark you'd just parked in for a few seconds to really take a minute to look at Jake. “The reason I came up to you at the Hard Deck initially had been because I thought you were one hell of a looker.” You had to chuckle, you couldn't help it, shaking your head as Jake tilted your chin back up to look at him. “But unlike all the other women I’ve met, you didn’t fall for my crap, you spoke to me like you knew every answer to every question I could think of.” Leaning over the centre console, you smirked against Jake's lips as he pulled you close with his hand pressed to the back of your head. 

“I still slept with you though—“ Jake's lips ghosted your own as he smiled devilishly, rubbing the pad of his thumb behind your ear as he kept you leaning into him. “Three times actually, so I can’t be as bright as you think I am.” 

“Everyone’s got a kryptonite.” That’s what sent you and Jake into a frenzy, gripping onto each other like you were the last two people on earth, dizzy and needy. Your lips crashed against Jakes as his hand moved from the back of your head to the dip of your neck, holding you in a feverish kiss that honestly had you seeing stars. 

Your tongue danced with Jakes like you'd known him for a lifetime, before you pulled away to breath, to find your bearing and remember you were back at base. 

“What you saw today, that's an everyday occurrence, to me it's just become an occupational hazard, so unless you are single handedly going to change the stigma surrounding Female Agents, Lieutenant Seresin?” 

“That's Agent Seresin with the FBI to you Lieutenant Jackson.” You couldn't help but to scoff, shaking your head as you bit your bottom lip. 

“Do me a goddamn favour and get off my dick.” Jake just beamed, wrinkled his nose and balled his fist as if he were celebrating a victory of some sort, looking at you with such bright, love filled eyes. You were defending yourself, well–trying to, in the safety net of Jake Seresin. Your effort was met with a thousand watt grin, the corners of Jakes lips tucked ear to ear before he cooed three simple words that had you drooling.

“That's my girl.”

***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***

Tags // @auroraboreallisfine @buckythewintersquirrel @a-lil-bit-nuts @bookaholics-stuff @ilovewhalesharks444 @a-serene-place-to-be @alexsisrebekah @rhirhikingston @caitsymichelle13 @twsssmlmaa @chaoticversion @topguncultleader @averyhotchner @phoenix1388 @emma8895eb @avaleineandafryingpan @endofdays56 @dempy

[sarahowritesostucky]

Art: @hopelessartgeek

📖 "Medically Necessitated" Ch 5

Rated: Explicit Pairing: Bucky x Steve Tags: a/b/o, age gap, past rape, rape recovery, trauma recovery, pregnancy, medical trauma, hurt/comfort, mentions of CSA, religious fundamentalism, first time, gender dysphoria, male omegas are intersex (peen & vagine) Summary: After a medical emergency brings him into the ER, Bucky escapes the religious cult he's been raised in. It's up to Steve, nurse practitioner and omega sex & repro specialist, to see him through a medically supervised heat.

Wait! I haven't read an earlier chapter! Story masterlist

5. Robert Wheeler

Just as the bond is settling, someone from Bucky's past shows up unexpectedly.

“Good boy,” Steve praises again, when Bucky obeys him and finishes a fair amount from the breakfast tray.

By the time they’d woken from their nap it’d been nearly noon, so they nuked everything and had breakfast for lunch. Bucky’s been saying he isn’t hungry, but he needs carbs and sugars during his cycle, and thankfully he’s been very compliant to Steve’s commands now that they have each other’s pheromones in their systems.

They’re bonded.

Steve had Voiced for him to eat at least one of the pancakes, “with plenty of syrup.” Bucky ate two.

Once he's finished, Steve puts the tray outside the suite and relocks the door. There’s a notification flashing on the room’s tablet. He pulls it down to check and sees it’s a message from Banner.

B. Banner M.D. [om-Sex&Repro]: We need samples: CBC, BMP, TFT. And a urinalysis.

Steve twists his lips and types back: Urgent?

The tablet chimes as Banner’s reply comes through.

B. Banner M.D. [om-Sex&Repro]: No. After his next insemination would be ideal.

Even Steve has to grimace at that one. People in his field can tend to become callous and clinical in their language over time. Steve really hopes he isn’t that bad yet. There’s a message from Sam as well, marked from earlier that morning.

S. Wilson R.P.N. [om-Psy]: I have him booked for a session. Banner knows to send him my way once you two are done shacking up. And they’re scheduling a care plan conference at his discharge. Barton says the foster parents will probably show, so you should prepare him for that.

Steve’s still frowning at that when the tablet pings another incoming message. “Christ.”

C. Barton L.C.S.W. [om-Care]: Somebody from his home situation showed up. They’re forcing legal into a meeting. Today. They won’t get him, but Phil wants you there if possible.

Another, automated notification pops up on the home screen. It’s from legal, informing Steve of the conference room he’s now supposed to try and get to in only a few hours. Tense, he grits his teeth and tries to mentally clock out if he could possibly get Bucky down to a dip somewhere around 3:30. That’d feasibly give him time to—

He glances up to see Bucky, sitting in the bed and watching him use the tablet. “What’s it say?” Bucky asks.

Steve hurriedly sends back a thumbs up emoji to each of the messages and closes out the app. “Just a few staff notes,” he says, purposefully vague. Bucky might panic if he knows anybody from his old life is here trying to claim him. “The doctor wants to test your blood again. And I’m supposed to try and make a meeting in a few hours.”

Bucky shrinks into the back wall of the nest. “Oh. So … you’ll leave me alone? And somebody else is going to come and—”

“No,” Steve cuts him off, shaking his head. “No, nobody else is coming. I’ll do the blood draw myself.” He sees Bucky visibly relax at this, and offers him a tender smile. “I promised you, remember? Nobody but your Support touches you while you’re in here.”

“And that’s you.”

Steve smiles. “Yeah, Buck. That’s me. Did you get enough to eat?” He goes over to the counter and grabs a protein bar for himself. He’s got it ripped open and half the thing rammed down his throat by the time he turns back around to face Bucky. The omega has rolled up the sleeve of his bathrobe and is blinking at Steve expectantly. Steve makes a sound past his mouthful of granola and swallows. “Aw, no, not yet, Sweetheart.” He walks back over to the bed and stops Bucky with a hand on his shoulder. “There’s no rush. It can wait.”

He purposefully doesn’t mention the ‘insemination’ factor from Banner’s message. Knotting Bucky’s body and exposing him to alpha semen during his heat is a therapeutic tool that’s part of what’s helping here, but Steve is almost positive that the kid doesn’t really understand that. Bucky’s certainly had zero sex education on such topics, and Steve doesn’t think bringing up words like ‘insemination’ would be helpful at all. “I’ll take your blood later,” he simply tells him, then changes the topic by asking the omega if he’d like to use the bathroom or maybe watch a show during the lull before his next peak. “They’ve got Netflix and Hulu,” he says. “Disney Plus too now, I think.”

Bucky glances briefly at the tv on the wall, but then decides, “... Yeah I’ll grab a shower.” He wrinkles his nose and grimaces down at himself. “Cause, ya know, I probably stink by now.”

Steve laughs. “Oh I’m sure we both do. We’re just nose-blind to it at this point.” He cheerfully reminds Bucky that the tub has jets, and Bucky perks up and heads into the bathroom to investigate. Steve doesn’t follow at first, convinced that the omega will want his privacy.

But Bucky soon reappears in the bathroom doorway, peeking back out. “Um, the tub’s big,” he says. “... Wanna share?”

“Sure.” Steve’s hands go to the tie of his robe, but then he hesitates. “Are you sure? We don’t have to.”

Bucky looks down and shrugs, heat collecting in his cheeks. But he surprises Steve by throwing out a blithe little, “I mean I’ve already seen you naked, Steve. But if you’re too shy …” He shrugs dismissively and turns to walk back into the bathroom, out of sight.

Steve chuckles and follows after him with a grin. If the kid is feeling relaxed enough to make jokes at Steve’s expense, then they’re probably doing okay.

Once they’re dried off from the bath, Steve starts to reach for their robes again but Bucky quickly touches his wrist and shakes his head a little. “No?” Steve checks softly, noting the rising flush under Bucky’s skin. “Okay Honey, okay.”

Bucky climbs back into the nest and rolls around a bit, rubbing his face in the piles of soft blankets, picking up Steve’s scent again.

Steve watches it fondly and with a small thrill of possessiveness that he can be almost certain is coming from their bond. Bucky’s gone increasingly non-verbal again since he let Steve hold him in the tub and rub soapy hands all over his body. “C’mere,” Steve murmurs as he gets into the bed, guiding Bucky to lie on his back and crawling over him. He kisses him down into the sheets, still able to taste the remnants of maple syrup on his lips. “Hey Sweetheart,” he rumbles, propping over him on his elbows. He idles a thumb at the edge of Bucky’s damp hairline, clocking his pretty blue eyes and his pupils, blown wide in arousal once again. “How you feeling?”

“Better,” Bucky whispers, squirming under Steve’s bulk and parting his legs more. He’s been more relaxed with the bond, more pliant. “Um ... I think it’s coming back,” he admits.

Steve glances over to the clock on the wall: 12:27pm. He’s got the next three hours to get Bucky through this peak. “Yeah. Well it’s been a while, so that’s not a surprise.” He presses kisses to his lips, keeping it gentle and shallow until Bucky starts to ask for more by venturing out with his tongue in timid little licks. Steve hums in approval and gives him a slow, purposeful swipe of tongue, dipping into his mouth and relishing the whimper he makes.

They kiss like that for a bit, Bucky humping his half-chubbed little cock up against Steve’s abs and Steve feeling his own cock getting rock hard at the increasingly strong smell of slick. “You wet, Honey?” he asks, when Bucky has started squirming and whining like he wants more. “You want to have sex again?”

Bucky nods. There’s a little color in his cheeks but Steve’s apt to believe it’s more from arousal than shame now. Bucky can sense Steve’s urges through their new bond, after all. He can feel the proof of how much Steve wants him, how desirable he finds him, and it’s helping him to not be as embarrassed. “But can we …” he starts, but cuts himself off unsurely.

“What is it, Buck?” Steve prompts. “What do you want? Tell me.”

“Well … this way I can see you,” he murmurs, still shy but forging ahead. “Um, and it’s … it feels closer, ya know? I like it when I can, like, touch you and stuff.” He slides his hands over the tops of Steve’s shoulders and his upper arms, eyes going half lidded as he drinks in the sight of the alpha's body. “Can we?”

“Of course,” Steve coos, pride flowing through him at Bucky’s improved confidence, at him asking for what he wants so sweetly. He cups Bucky’s jaw and draws him in for another kiss to show him how pleased he is. “We can do whatever you want, Baby. Whatever makes you feel good.” He reaches down between their bodies and finds Bucky’s cock. He’s small there; soft and delicate, just enough that Steve’s palm barely covers everything from root to tip when he wraps his hand around him.

Bucky gasps quietly when Steve starts working it, more of a pulsing squeeze than actual stroking, and his hips judder up into it. “Oh!”

Steve keeps eye contact the whole time, watching, turned on by Bucky’s easy reactions. “You want to cum like this?” he asks, and Bucky gives a breathless little nod. Steve smiles. “Okay.” It only takes a few more minutes of gentle touching, and then Bucky’s tensing up and moaning, what meager ejaculate his body can produce wetting up the inside of Steve’s hand. “Good boy,” Steve praises, kissing along his neck and shoulder as he recovers. “Beautiful, Bucky. Yes. I bet that felt so good, didn’t it?”

Bucky nods weakly, still catching his breath. “Yeah. Oh.”

Steve chuckles and waits him out while he calms back down. Like beta women, omegas don’t have much of a refractory period, and in estrus they tend to need four to eight orgasms every time their cycle peaks. So, knowing his job isn't done, Steve lets Bucky’s cock go and looks back down at him. “Face to face?” he rechecks, stroking a thumb tenderly along his cheek. “You’re comfortable with that?” He’s not going to say one word about the rape if the boy doesn’t initiate it himself, but he now knows a few specifics on how Bucky was violated, and he wants to give him plenty of opportunity to decide on what his feelings are as they move along. Triggering distress in a tied omega is something that Steve’s dealt with before and wants to avoid at all costs. It’s not the easiest thing to change positions once knotted, after all.

But Bucky smiles and nods, pulling down on Steve’s neck for more kisses—which Steve happily gives—and bringing his knees up higher around Steve’s hips. “Yeah,” he breathes, “yeah I am.”

If they didn’t have the physicality of the bond, Steve would ask again, but he can feel the certainty and safety that Bucky feels, and that’s enough to have him nodding, reaching down to run fingertips over the omega’s slit. Bucky whines and tries to tilt up into it as much as he can, so eager from only a touch. And Steve can understand because he feels it: Bucky is soaked already, so slick that Steve’s fingers just glide right through, effortless. He hums and pulls away so that he can kneel back between Bucky’s legs. He can’t resist, he wants to see.

He hushes Bucky gently when the boy whines at losing their full body contact. He guides Bucky’s knees higher, pushing, making him spread his feet farther apart in the sheets. “Good boy,” he praises. “There you go. Let me see you, Gorgeous.” Bucky whines and shuts his eyes like he can’t take the scrutiny, but he’s still humping the air, tilting up for more. “Shhh,” Steve soothes, running his hands over the skin of his lower belly and hips, framing his pelvis as he stares. He represses the moan that’s building in his throat, his own hips twitching once and his balls giving a mightly throb at the pornographic sight before him. “Fuck,” he can’t help but whisper.

Bucky’s sex is pink and glistening, outer lips swollen and inner lips bloomed open from his first orgasm. It’s obscenely beautiful. Steve loves getting to see such a sweet cunt unfurl under his attention, loves slipping the pads of his fingers through all that wetness, watching that vulnerable little hole pulse and clench on nothing.

All he wants in the world is to bury his cock inside and never come out.

But they’re not here for him. They’re here for Bucky. So he ignores himself for the moment and continues to explore Bucky instead, stroking along the delicate lips of his sex. Bucky’s only a little different here than a female would be, but he’s still got all the same nerve endings in almost all the same places, and Steve wants to give him pleasure in every way possible. He uses both hands, thumbing errantly along the underside of Bucky’s little cock with one hand while sliding the fingers of the other through his sopping folds, up and down, giving just the barest bit of pressure. It’s so slick, so fun to play with, and Steve takes the time to tease him, avoiding penetration for long minutes.

Until Bucky opens his eyes and chirps in annoyance. Steve laughs in surprise. “Didn’t know you could make that sound, Honey.”

Bucky’s face flushes harder. “N-neither did I.”

There’s the tiniest bit of self-consciousness there, so Steve finally dips the very tips of two fingers in at his entrance and tells him, “I like it. I like an omega who asks for what he wants.”

Bucky groans and his hips jerk up, making Steve’s fingers slide inside by an inch. “Oh … fuck.” His eyes slip closed. “S-steve.” Steve watches his face carefully to make sure it’s good for Bucky as he slowly presses all the way in. Bucky breathes open-mouthed, eyes closed and an agonized little pinch appearing between his eyebrows. But it’s from pleasure. Steve starts fucking him softly on his hand, bumping knuckles against his mound on the way in, curling fingers on the slow drag out. “Oh, oh, oh,” Bucky pants; tiny, sweet little sounds that get stronger the closer he gets. He grabs suddenly at Steve’s wrist between his legs, not to stop him but to urge him on, and Steve grins and goes a little harder.

“Right there, huh?” he purrs.

Bucky's eyes are still closed but he nods his head tightly, whispering, “... f-ffuck. Ohh.” He’s gripping Steve’s wrist hard, clinging to the part of him that’s giving him so much pleasure, rocking his hips against it as his breath hitches in desperate little 'ah, ah, ah's. “M’gonna cum," he gasps. "Steve. I’m, I’m gonna …”

Steve rumbles low in his chest and reaches down to give his own cock a merciful squeeze. “Yes, Bucky,” he praises, fucking his fingers in faster, the noises wet and sloppy. “Good boy. That’s what I want. Come on now, right on my hand. Lemme feel it.”

Bucky fights for it for a few more seconds, then he cries out sharply and jerks, his cunt pulsing rhythmically as he starts to come. There’s a wet gush against Steve’s palm, and then a bunch of high, hurt little moans and sobs of “shit, shit, onghfuck!”

Steve groans at the feeling of it, at the sight and sound of Bucky gasping and riding his pleasure out against his hand, humping down mindlessly through the entire orgasm. “Fuck, Honey,” he whispers in awe.

“Ohh.” Bucky lets all his breath out in one big ‘whoosh’ and goes limp against the sheets, his death grip dropping away from Steve’s wrist. “Oh, man.”

Steve withdraws, using his absolutely drenched hand to tug on his own aching cock a few times. “Feel good?” he asks, voice coming out deeper and rougher sounding than intended.

Bucky hums and nods. His eyes open lazily. “Mm. Yeah. Really good.” He locks onto Steve's stroking hand, arousal growing in his eyes at the sight of his own slick coating the alpha's cock.

Steve gives him an easy grin and reaches out to swipe over his soaked cunt again, gathering even more slick to wet himself up with.

Bucky moans. “Oh my god, that’s so—” he swallows thickly, cutting himself off. Steve feels a pang of sadness, because he can tell when Bucky’s tamping down his attraction, can sense the intrusive thoughts and conflicting feelings he’s having again. His shame is creeping back in.

“Hey.” Steve snaps, a low, dominant growl starting up in his chest. He’s Voicing when he quietly orders, “Look at me, Omega.” Bucky snaps right to attention, wide eyes tripping down to Steve’s huge cock, and Steve hums his approval. “Yeah, that’s it. Watch me. Look at it. Watch me touchin’ myself.” He gives a lewd squeeze and drag, letting all the slick squelch between his fingers, and chuckles when Bucky looses a little, uncontrolled moan. “Yeah, exactly. Y'see that?” He wrings his fist up beneath the fat head of his cock, forcing a bunch of precum out of the slit. It rolls over his knuckles. He groans indulgently and finds Bucky’s eyes again. “That’s all because a’ you, Honey. Look how good you make me feel.”

Bucky whimpers and squirms, obviously pleased, so Steve keeps on using the praise and dominance and his own hand around his dick to distract him, telling him how gorgeous he is, how natural and good, how much Steve loves touching him and watching him come. It works, in that Bucky loses his reservations and his hips start to move again, tensing and releasing in little pulses that he probably doesn’t even know he’s doing. “Steve,” he says. “Steve can you?” He reaches for him, tries to pull his big body back down close, and of course Steve obeys.

“Course I can, Sweetheart.” He lies back over Bucky and lets his cock drag against his groin a few times, back and forth, their two very different cocks lined up and brushing together. “Want me inside you? It’ll feel so good, won’t it?”

Bucky makes a meek little sound and nods, tilting his pelvis up to try and get him lower, where he’s aching for him to be. “Yeah. Please.”

Steve reaches down to guide his cock up and down through the slick folds of his cunt. “Yeah, okay. Here you go.” He allows himself another few indulgent swipes before letting the head catch at Bucky’s entrance. He lets go of himself, propped on his elbows as he watches Bucky’s face, watches his expression as he slowly, slowly pushes in.

Bucky’s irises flare and his breath shudders and trips as Steve slides all the way home. Finally, when they can’t get any closer, he lets out a sob and wraps himself around Steve, feet hooking behind his thighs and arms grabbing around his shoulders. Steve lets him cling, lets him bury his face against his neck and mouth needily at his glands. Bucky starts crying, rubbing his tears against Steve’s skin.

“Shhh,” Steve soothes, nuzzling into his neck in return, not thrusting yet. “Shh, it’s okay. It’s okay.” He strokes at Bucky’s sides, up and down his ribcage, promises softly against his bond mark, “Only when you’re ready, Buck. You just tell me when.” It’s only because of their bond that he knows he doesn’t have to be worried about the crying. They’re tears of grief, but not distress. And there’s relief there, too. Steve hums against Bucky’s skin and gives him time. He never expected a miracle out of the poor kid. This has got to be equal parts devastating and pleasurable for him. “You’re so good, Honey,” he tells him, murmuring kind, understanding things for Bucky to latch onto. “So brave. I know it’s hard. It’s gonna be okay. Gonna take care of you.” Bucky calms down over the next few minutes, tears going sluggish and then disappearing altogether. When he stops clinging to Steve enough to look up at him, his eyes and cheeks are still wet. Steve offers him a tender smile. “Feel better?”

Bucky nods, licking his lips. “I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry for,” Steve says, gripping him a little tighter. “Whatever feels good. That’s what I said. If you need to cry, that’s just fine.”

Bucky relaxes and his body loosens a little bit more. He moves his hips experimentally, looking up with an expression that makes Steve’s balls throb. “Please,” he says, hands migrating to the backs of Steve’s arms, up to his shoulders and back down again. “I’m ready.”

Steve smiles and leans down to kiss him as he pulls out and pushes back in. He begins to roll his hips, setting into fucking Bucky with a steady, if somewhat slow, rhythm. And it’s exquisite, has his cock pulsing with need and his knot aching within minutes. He has stamina though, knows he can fuck Bucky through at least one more orgasm before he gives in to his own.

And Bucky is so perfectly responsive beneath him, moaning little sounds of pleasure and pushing up into every thrust, hands roaming ceaselessly over his back while he mouths at his neck. “Oh, ohSteve,” he sighs when Steve has grabbed behind his one knee to hitch it higher and rut deeper. “Yeah.”

Steve grinds slow and hard against him, keeping himself buried in Bucky’s warm cunt. “You close?” he asks, feeling Bucky’s fluttering walls as he holds still. Bucky whines and nods, trying to move his hips, to get more. Steve growls and obliges, fucking him firm and with purpose, grinding in and barely pulling out, making him feel it deep, getting him close.

Bucky’s soaking wet and his cunt makes filthy noises with each thrust, getting wetter and wetter until he cries out and starts to come. Steve shoves a hand between their bellies and thumbs rapidly under the head of his cock, prolonging it for him. "Aw, yeah Honey. There you go, there you go ..."

It’s gorgeous, Steve could watch it all day. But eventually Bucky’s orgasm subsides. When it’s clear he’s done, Steve kisses him softly. “Feel good?” he murmurs. Bucky nods his head, still calming his breathing. “Can I knot you?” Steve asks, desperate to do it. But then he catches the eagerness in his tone and revises it to a more open ended: “Do you want me to knot you?” He needs to make it Bucky’s choice. Everything, every step. He waits for an answer and kisses leisurely along the boy's jaw, pulsing his hips a little bit but keeping himself buried.

“Please,” Bucky eventually whispers, when his desire has started ramping back up and his hips are chasing Steve’s again. He kisses Steve and drags his lips against the short hairs of his beard. “Please.”

‘Please’ is Bucky’s way of asking for things he’s ashamed to want. Steve knows this well by now. So he hums in approval and tells him he’s a good boy, and he starts to fuck him again, this time letting his self control go enough to start seeking his own release. When he’s close he grunts a warning, but he knows Bucky can feel his knot growing erect, can feel it tugging more with every thrust, and he hasn't pulled away. He pushes into it, legs wrapping around Steve’s waist and holding him deep as he comes and ties them together.

Steve moans through it, eyes slammed shut because holy fuck does it feel good. Bucky’s cunt is so tight and wet and perfect. The sheer, primal satisfaction Steve gets from burying his knot and emptying his balls into a willing omega while he comes and comes and comes is the best feeling in the world. He registers Bucky’s body locking down in another orgasm, and it only prolongs his own. “Uhfuck,” he moans, humping into it, face buried in Bucky’s neck and mouth latching onto his gland in a hard suck. Bucky keens and Steve thinks he comes again from the stimulation, but he’s too blissed out in his own, drawn-out pleasure to be sure.

It feels like it lasts forever, but eventually they both come down. Steve rubs his face over every part of Bucky he can reach, a reassuring and possessive gesture, and Bucky hums little sounds of satisfaction as he lets it happen. When Steve pulls back enough to look him in the face, Bucky is totally relaxed, his heavy-lidded eyes blinking slowly up at him. Steve smiles and strokes his cheek. “You’re purring, you realize that?”

Bucky huffs and makes a face, but Steve can tell that he’s pleased. “Can’t help it,” he murmurs.

“You’re not supposed to help it,” Steve says happily. He can feel how relaxed Bucky is, can feel it so intimately from the bond. And it feels good in a way that’s intensely pleasurable but not exactly sexual, to be tied to him right now, his knot held snug inside his body. Steve sighs and gives him a lazy kiss. “It usually takes me about fifteen minutes,” he murmurs, knowing that Bucky will know what he means. They trade kisses and he asks, “You want to cum again?” He rolls his hips a little in indication.

Bucky smiles and shivers at the jolt of stimulation. “I don’t know if I can,” he says, but he rocks into their tie a few times to test it out. His breathing picks back up, the tension returning to his body as he works himself to another orgasm on Steve’s knot. It feels good for Steve but he can’t come again so soon, so he focuses on giving Bucky pressure, on encouraging him with sweet sounds and praise rumbled into his ear. Bucky exhales long and low after he comes that final time, relaxing again. “Oh, man.”

Steve smiles against his neck. “Feel good?” He’s nuzzling against the bond mark.

“Duh.”

He laughs softly, satisfied and beyond pleased that he’s just been able to bring Bucky to orgasm … five times? Six? One of those. He asks him if he wants to roll over together, so that Bucky can lie on top. “You can fall asleep if you want.”

Bucky makes a thoughtful noise and yawns and asks if that will be uncomfortable for Steve. “Mmm. Won’t I be too heavy?”

Steve rolls his eyes and holds onto Bucky's hips as he turns them, putting the omega on top and letting him settle into the new position. Bucky seems happy to rub his cheek against Steve’s pecs and chest hair, quickly growing still and quiet, though there is the faintest hint of a purr still coming from him.

Steve closes his eyes and lets his mind drift as he pets the smooth skin of Bucky’s back. He’s extremely content right now, primally satisfied in a way that only this can make him. Helping an omega feel good through their heat, helping them find that relief, is the absolute best feeling in the world. And Steve is so thankful he’s the one who gets to help Bucky now. The poor kid’s been through the wringer and he deserves a fucking break. He deserves to be treated like something precious.

Steve plans on doing just that. Peeking his eyes open, he glances around the mussed nest, spotting several blankets that’ve come loose from where they were tucked neatly in formation. Bucky’ll probably want to fix it before they go again, Steve thinks with a smile. They’re both still overheated from their sex, but once they cool down and lose the tie, he'll snuggle Bucky into the soft things around them, hold him close and watch over him until his heat peaks again.

After a long few minutes of his breathing deepening and slowing down, Bucky begins to snore the tiniest, most adorable snore ever, right against Steve’s pec. Steve chuckles and reaches for the nearest loose blanket.

There’s a simple blood draw chair next to the suite’s medical supply cabinet. Steve makes Bucky sit in it while he gets everything ready. Given that omegas tend to become dehydrated during heats, he selects a pediatric butterfly needle for the draw. Bucky whines from the moment Steve ties the tourniquet and starts tapping around for a vein.

“But Steeeve: I hate needles.”

In Steve’s experience, roughly a third of all patients are lookers, and the rest are looker-awayers. Bucky falls into the previous camp, needing to know exactly when the jab is coming. He still complains ad nauseam, and Steve catches on fairly quickly that he’s half doing it just to annoy him. It’s amusing.

The omega maintains his grumpy little grimace the whole time that Steve is taking his blood. “Hate needles,” he mutters, again, then gasps when Steve has the audacity to pinch him in retaliation. “Hey!”

“It’s already in, you big baby.” Steve removes the second collection tube and pops on the third, glancing up at Bucky’s face as it fills. “Stop looking, if it bothers you.” Bucky scowls at him. Steve finishes up with the whole process and has Bucky hold the cotton ball in place while he goes to root around for a bandaid in the supply cabinet. He grins when he sees the perfect box sitting there. Someone’s been stealing from Pediatrics. He rips the box open and hands one of the bandaids over to Bucky. “My little Pony, just for you, Princess.”

Bucky stubbornly takes it, slapping on the bright pink bandage and looking down at its pattern of googly-eyed little unicorn characters. He shrugs and looks defiantly up at Steve from his seat. “Whatever. I like it.”

Steve rolls his eyes. “Course you do.” He plucks a specimen cup from the cabinet and tosses it over. “Pee in the cup,” he says cheerfully. “Past the red line at least.”

Bucky complains less about this. He sighs and heaves himself up from the chair. Steve busies himself with labeling the blood vials while Bucky disappears into the bathroom. Bucky comes back out with the filled specimen cup. The dark color tells Steve that he was right to go with the butterfly needle.

“One, steaming-hot cup‘o’piss,” Bucky drawls, handing it over. “What’s this for, anyway?”

Steve’s still wearing gloves as he labels and bags the cup. “Just checking your progress,” he answers vaguely. “You had infection when they admitted you. The doctor ordered repeats on all your labs.” Luckily, Bucky doesn’t ask for any specifics, which is a relief. Steve would be legally obligated to tell him if he did.

The blood is for typical panels, but the urine is mainly to recheck for pregnancy. Hospital policy is to test throughout any patient’s heat where a support alpha or seeding machine is employed. Lab-manufactured seeding solution is sterilized, and Steve’s on the mandatory birth control for his position, but mistakes can happen, so they test for malpractice reasons.

He checks the clock and tenses when he sees that it’s already three-twenty. “Crap,” he whispers. Only ten minutes until the meeting with legal. He hurriedly starts collecting the cup and the vials in a little basket. He can drop it off at the nurses’ station, then if he gets like a three minute shower he’ll probably still have time to—

“What’s wrong?”

Steve pauses. He looks over to where Bucky has flopped back on the bed. The nest is a mess but Bucky seems unconcerned at the moment, attention fixed on the room’s tv screen as he fiddles with the remote to bring up Netflix. Steve tells him, “I’ve got that meeting, remember? They want me there in a few minutes.”

Bucky nods, getting distracted as he finds the horror section and starts scrolling through the titles. “Oh.”

“... You gonna be okay?” Steve checks. Bucky has seemed to be in the lull of a dip for the past half hour or so. It’s likely he won’t peak again for at least two more hours, and Steve has no intention of being gone for that long. “If I leave you here alone for a bit?” he adds. “I won’t be gone long. And you can page the nurses for anything you need.”

Bucky finally looks back over at him and smiles. “Yeah. ‘Course.” He waves Steve off, digging himself back into the messy remnants of the nest and clicking on what looks to Steve to be some sort of torture porn flick. Gross. “I’ll be fine.”

Between that and the bond, Steve can tell that Bucky really is feeling okay about being left alone for a time. Exhaling in relief, he turns for the door.

“What the fuck, Rogers?” Sharon snaps at him when he’s passing by. The next nurses are on shift at the desk and Sharon’s got her purse in hand, about to clock out. She’s pointing accusingly at Steve’s naked feet. “Gross!”

Steve grimaces just to avoid rolling his eyes at her. He’s in a hurry, okay? “Sorry!” He hustles down to the staff locker room and grabs a towel and pair of disposable shower shoes, because he’s not a monster. He doesn’t even give the water enough time to fully warm up before he’s stepping into the spray and yanking the curtain closed. The shower stalls are all outfitted with dispensers: shampoo, conditioner, and hospital grade scent-neutralizing body wash. Steve lathers himself up in record time, rinses, then dries off and goes to root through the supply cage for some scrubs that are big enough to fit his shoulders. He’d left his clogs in the heat suite, so he’s forced to don a pair of unisex keds that’re at least a half size too small, and that’s the best he’s going to manage. He glances at his phone: 3:29. Fuck.

There’s a missed text alert, too.

Clint Omcare guy [Today 3:22 pm]: You coming? We’re using the Soc. conference room.

Steve grinds his teeth and hurries for the elevators.

Most of Mercy General’s administrative staff is located on ground level. Steve takes the B elevator down to put him out closest to the building’s east wing, where social services, legal, and financial aid are all located. He pushes through the conference room door at precisely 3:33.

Six faces turn his way. Steve stalls as he tries to apologize for being late. “Sorry. Hope I didn’t hold things up. I was …” he twists his lips, not knowing a polite way to say ‘balls deep in our patient’. “Sorry,” he says again, pulling out one of the available chairs and sitting. He looks around. Phil’s there at the head of the table. Clint is sitting next to Sam, the woman from legal on his other side and Steve next to her.

The other two people, a man and a woman, sit isolated on the opposite side of the conference table. They stick out in their plainclothes, and Steve knows they must be the ones who are trying to get Bucky back. They’re from the cult.

The man looks like he's in his seventies, with mostly silver hair pulled back in a gross little ponytail. He’s older, but tall and broad in a way that hints he might’ve been an athlete, back in his prime. He’s got a look of authority about him, a stern face and the sort of posture that makes it clear he’s the kind of guy who’s used to getting his way.

The woman is much smaller and nearly diminutive in comparison. She seems meek, right down to her mousy brown hair and modest dress. She'd glanced up when Steve first entered the room, but now she’s back to keeping her eyes downcast and her hands tucked in her lap.

Steve instantly dislikes the both of them because he knows what they’ve done. He knows about the abusive way Bucky’s been treated and the messed up things he’s been raised to believe. These people, whoever they are, are responsible for Bucky nearly dying.

Phil is nearing the tail end of his introduction of Steve, explaining how Steve is the alpha support who’s been seeing Bucky through his heat. Disgust is already curling the old man’s lip as Steve nods in confirmation and says, “Hi,” without too much friendliness in his tone. “I’m Steve Rogers. I work on the hospital’s omega OB GYN ward. I’ve been caring for Bucky.”

The man scoffs. “Is that what he’s told you his name is?” When Steve and everyone else from that side of the table just stare at him, the man says, “His name is James.”

“And a last name?” Clint is holding his pen poised over a stack of forms. “Sir?”

The man shakes his head. “We forswear our earthly family names. James is simply James.”

“... Uh huh.” Clint looks about as unimpressed as Steve feels. “And your name is? Sir?”

“I am Russel. His father.” After a beat, the man seems to remember himself and flicks his hand at the woman seated next to him. “This is Rebecca. His mother.”

Steve catches Sam shooting him a dubious look from down the way. He gives Sam a matching look and a little nod back. This dude’s lying. Steve pulls out his phone, careful to keep it below the level of the conference table. He searches for the Wikipedia page on The Children of God’s Kingdom. When he finds what he’s looking for, he glances up. “You’re Russel Wheeler,” he says, confronting the man. “The head of your little religious group.”

Wheeler’s face goes stony but he holds his chin up. “I told you who I am.”

“Right. Bucky’s father.”

“James’ father,” he corrects. He and Steve kind of glare at each other from over the table for a long moment, until Phil clears his throat and says,

“Nurse Rogers has been booked into your son’s heat suite these past thirty-six hours. He’s the one who’s been most closely involved with James’ care. I promise you he only has your son’s best interests at heart.”

Steve watches as Wheeler’s face deepens in disgust. “'Heat',” he repeats, saying the word like it’s something dirty. “James was on suppressants. He shouldn’t be in heat.”

Steve leans forward in his chair. “We took them out. Suppressants are illegal for omegas under twenty-one,” he says. “You broke the law by putting that poison in him.”

Wheeler scowls. “I’m his father.”

“His biological father?” Steve challenges.

“Adopted,” Wheeler grits back.

“I’m sure you’ll have adoption papers to show us then. Legal ones?” Clint says.

Wheeler says nothing.

“You know he almost died,” Steve says icily. “People in your group assaulted him, and the reaction he had afterwards almost killed him. He could have died from all the years you suppressed his heats.”

The woman at Wheeler’s side finally looks up, her eyes round with alarm. “Is he okay?” she asks. Wheeler looks sharply at her for speaking up, but she keeps looking at Steve until he answers her.

“He’s okay now,” Steve says. He’s got a feeling that this might actually be Bucky’s real mother, if her concerned look is anything to go by. She seems way too young to have a seventeen year old kid, but cults have a reputation for child marriages, and Steve can see Bucky’s eyes in her eyes. She relaxes somewhat at his reassurance. “We’re helping him to recover,” Steve says. “He should be just fine.”

The woman’s shoulders sink in relief, but she quickly withdraws again once Wheeler makes an upset noise. “We want him home,” he says. “Where is he? We’re taking him home today.”

“Sir, I’m afraid it’s not that simple. Your son has treatments that he—”

“We didn’t consent to any treatments!” Wheeler snaps, cutting Clint off and hitting the table with his hand. The woman next to him flinches. “We don’t believe in all that stuff. Boy-girls. It’s unnatural and against God.”

“Sir,” Phil tries,

“You all are infringing on our religious liberty!” Wheeler declares. He points at Steve as if he’s the mastermind behind the whole situation. “You’re perverting him and forcing him to go against his religion!”

Steve glowers while everyone else shifts in place uncomfortably. “Hey,” he hisses. “You can believe whatever you want to believe, but not when it starts to spill over and hurt other people. Bucky almost died. Don’t you get that? Your so-called ‘religion’ nearly killed him!”

Infuriatingly, all Wheeler does in response is narrow his eyes and repeat, “His name is James.”

Steve scoffs and throws himself back in the chair, fed up. He folds his arms and shakes his head. Talking logic with these people is useless. The next person to speak is Phil. He and the woman they sent down from legal try again to explain the reality of the situation the Mr. and Mrs. Wheeler: Bucky isn’t in their charge anymore. OmCare has custody now. Bucky needs to receive ongoing medical care and therapy to get well.

“Unfortunately, sir, there isn’t anything you can legally do right now,” Clint finishes up at the end of the meeting, when they’ve made absolutely no progress with Wheeler. “There will be another custody hearing in two weeks. You’ll have to bring proof of identity and of legal custodianship, and you’ll need to get a lawyer to help you if you want any chance at getting your son back.”

“You bet your ass I will,” Wheeler says, standing abruptly from the table. He points angrily at Clint, and then at Steve. “I’m not going to let you pervert him against the Lord. I’ll be back. Come on,” he says to Rebecca, and when she doesn’t move fast enough he grabs her wrist and yanks her along. “I said come on!” He storms out of the room, promising that he’ll be back and that every single one of them is doomed to go to hell because of what they’re doing. Once it’s just Phil, Clint, Sam and Steve left in the room, the air seems to double in oxygen saturation.

It’s Sam who speaks first. He lets out a low whistle. “Wow.”

“You said it,” Steve grumbles. “What a piece of work.”

Clint makes a sound of agreement, still scribbling down notes on a paper form. “Well the good news is that it’s a pretty cut and dry case. Even if they are the real parents, he just openly espoused his nutso beliefs.”

Phil’s mouth quirks and he quietly checks, “Nutso?”

“An official, scientific word,” Clint maintains. “And we have him on record admitting that he's got no intention of following any medical care directive. That's good. No judge in their right mind is going to let an omega be dragged back into that cult. Religious liberty my ass. It’s completely unsafe.”

“Good,” Steve says, happy to hear Clint express it with such certainty. If anybody knows how the system works for minors in custody disputes, it’s Clint. And it’s just one less thing for Steve to worry about. He pushes his chair out from the conference table and stands up. “If you don’t need anything else from me, I’m gonna head back up.”

Phil nods at him that he can go, and Steve leaves to go back to Bucky.

Art: @hopelessartgeek

Story Masterlist

Masterlist

💖Join one of my tag lists by filling out this form

🍵Consider tipping your friendly neighborhood starving artist smut author!

✍🏻Commissions: reach out via Tumblr DM or contact here

🎨Art in banner by the incredibly talented @hopelessartgeek, who makes a ton of amazing Stucky art. Check her out! (The piece in the banner, used with permission, was not made for this fic.)

Tags: (sorry for the vertical list, the names don't link correctly in paragraph format)

@scottishrosefury

@not-that-syndrigast

@lolitsbuckybarnes

@kathy-2005

@stuckysgal

@thenewmissescullen

@sapphirebarnes

@yoruse

@autumnrose40

@alexakeyloveloki

@gretasimp

@kandis-mom

@ivoryangel1290

@mrs-rogers-barnes1

@iloveshawnieboi

@m0k0k0

@sousydive

@sapphirebarnes

@kandis-mom

@juicyfruit-22

@bloodrosefuryao3

@leightaylorwrites

@era

@laylamikaelsonbarnes

@leighta

@drfellow

@smlmsworld

@mrsstuckyboo