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jinmukangwrites · 2 years ago

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weep little lion man (4/14)

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Fandom: Star Wars: Jedi: Fallen Order/Survivor Rating: T Warnings: Unreliable Narrator, Drama Queens™ Ao3 Notes: sorry for being a week late posting this on Tumblr. Formatting fanfiction on Tumblr is. So. Annoying. So, just know that I always prioritize uploading things on AO3 first, which just got chapter 5 of this fic uploaded this morning. I'll upload chapter 5 on Tumblr later, probably Sunday to give a few days between posts. Until then, please enjoy this chapter <3

Summary: After defeating Dagan Gera for a third and final time, the Compass ends up in Bode's hands without a scratch. He could go back to Jedha with Cal... but he's holding what he wants. He doesn't see the point in pretending any longer. He makes a split-second decision. Or: Bode's betrayal goes a bit differently.

~~~°~~~

The walk back to the old Jedi ruins is an awkward one.

Cal feels emotionally tied up; bent and squeezed in all sorts of directions. Walking with, even at a few steps distance, a man who's betrayed him so deeply and personally feels... degrading.

Honestly, how is he supposed to react to this? There's no Jedi handbook that tells you how to react when your former best friend betrays you, kidnaps you, and forces you to live on an inescapable planet. Sure, maybe Master Yoda would have had something wise to say, but Cal's on his own. All he knows is that fighting Bode wouldn't accomplish anything. At least he has the comfort of knowing he's the only one victimized here. His family is safe, and they will continue to be as long as Cal doesn't threaten a little girl which he definitely doesn't plan on doing even if the hanging threat wasn't there.

Cal can deal with that. He can function knowing this only hurts him. He can walk with his captor back to where they'll be staying, untied and in fresh clothes, and not feel the need to pull his lightsaber out. In fact, given time, Cal's almost willing to forgive Bode. If anyone understands what it's like to be desperate, it's Cal. If anyone understands what it's like to be obsessive, and terrified of what the Empire could do to the ones you love most to the point of hurting the ones you love most, it's Cal.

While Cal's priority is to find the Compass and the ship and get out of here, he also can't help the small sliver of wishful-thinking that maybe, just maybe, Cal can get Bode back.

But for now, the thought of Bode even looking at him makes his skin crawl. He's just glad Bode isn't trying to make small talk.

So yeah, the walk is emotionally awkward, but Cal tries to ignore that and instead focus on how physically needed it is. Every step comes with a limp from his wounded knee, sure, but moving his body, stretching his muscles, it relaxes him far more than what a good night's sleep could ever do. Cal's always moving. It's what reminds him that he's still alive, and that he can still fight the Empire.

The Jedi temple comes into view, and Cal finds himself abruptly recognizing the path they're walking. The flora is different, as are some rock formations, but he's been here before within the memories of Dagon Gera.

The temple is magnificent, as large as the mountain itself. Cal can't help but behold the sight of it, reveling in its history. It's meaning. It's role in Cal's life hundreds of years after its architects died.

Bode stops near the edge of the cliff and lets out a low whistle. "To think a place like this has been completely hidden for hundreds of years, you have to wonder why the Council abandoned it."

Cal wants to stay silent, but he can't help his shrug. "The people who attacked it could pass through the abyss in mass numbers. Probably wasn't worth the lives it would cost to defend."

Bode tilts his head in a slight nod. "Probably. Good thing they did, though, left it the perfect hiding place."

Cal's lips thin. It's not just a hiding place. It's a haven. The selfishness of keeping it for themselves instead of sharing it with other victims of the empire makes Cal's stomach churn. He doesn't want to argue again, not now. He has to act complicit, get a lay of the area, figure out Bode's boundaries and push.

"C'mon, scrapper," Bode says, adjusting his duffle and Kata's bag on his shoulders. "Not far to go."

-o-o-o-o-

There's an abandoned starship. Cal spots it the second they get to the top of their current cliff, and he knows Bode sees it too. Cal doesn't have to wonder about it's functionality because Bode doesn't stop him when he bee-lines toward the machinery the second they carefully make their way down the steep slope.

Bode had definitely already checked the ship out to see if it's functional; if it worked, it wouldn't be here for Cal to see.

But he approaches anyway. Partly because checking out broken ships for anything that still works is something he's an expert at, but mostly because curious and often the victim of low impulse control. Psychometry has its ups and downs, but it certainly enables him to stick his nose into places where it might not belong.

He sets the duffle down, poking his head into the rusted heap of junk, eyes immediately landing on various shredded consoles and controls. It's immediately obvious that this is a battleship of some sort, based on the one pilot chair and lack of anywhere else for passengers to sit. There's faded text written here and there within the interior of the ship, but nothing in any language he knows.

The echoes are faded here, nothing he can sense besides faint emotions; anger at the Jedi, exhilaration of the hunt, fear as the ship hurdles to the ground.

He sighs and wishes BD-1 were here. Or Cere. Maybe one of them knows who's responsible for the invasion of Tanalor. Cal's never been known for having good marks in his history lessons, despite how his rare Force ability is practically a direct link to history itself. That's something Master Tapal had always tried to pound into his head, something that never really stuck around when Cal was much more interested in lightsaber fighting and parkour... despite not being very good at either until he got off Bracca.

He'd always been afraid of the past when he was a child. Of echoes. The council warned him time and time again that using psychometry in the time of war could lead him to the Dark Side if he found himself in the wrong kinds of echoes. Echoes of hatred, of death, of turning to the Dark Side.

It's only now as an adult that he's learnt that maybe those warnings were not to scare him, but to seek toward greater understanding.

He exits any lingering memories and focuses back into the mind of a scrapper. Regardless of the time period or group of sapients that created the ship, most things surprisingly follow an unintentional pattern. He doesn't physically poke around too much, he hopes to keep this looking more like he's curious in a psychometric sort of way rather than a scrapper way, at least to Bode. He carefully makes sure that if he has to touch anything, he uses an ungloved hand and just sorta hopes he doesn't find any strong echoes hiding that won't ask permission before dragging him under.

He doesn't. Luckily.

By the time a few minutes passed, he finds the radar is completely crushed, the steering controls frayed. The power supply fried. Nothing is salvageable from here, but when he steps away he can't help but feel an inkling of hope. If there's one crashed ship here, there are others, maybe ones that have fared their crash landings better. Ones Bode doesn't know about.

He needs to test his leash, once he can. Find out how much space Bode's willing to give him, how long he can go out of sight.

He's taken apart more ships than what he can count, it's not... entirely impossible for him to reverse engineer, especially if he finds a High Republic ship. If he can't find Bode's jet, then he'll just have to make his own.

-o-o-o-o-

A familiar tune reaches Cal's ears as they approach the final large clearing before the temple. It cuts off, however, as the singer notices their arrival.

A little girl, barely taller than what Cal was when he was a Padawan—and believe him he was small—stands up from where she was sitting on a decorative ledge of the temple, her eyes are wide and locked directly onto Cal.

"Hey, baby girl," Bode says as he stops a few feet from her. Cal stops as well, suddenly feeling completely lost in what to do.

"Is this him?" Kata asks hesitantly, her eyes flickering to her father before stubbornly returning to Cal. The irony of that isn't lost on Cal, her father can barely look at him while she stares unashamed. "Your best friend?"

Cal winces, and she must notice that because her eyebrows and nose-bridge crease.

Bode gives a tight smile, his hand lifting as if to rest it on Cal's shoulder but thank the stars he thinks better of it and brings his hand to the back of his neck. Cal could feel his entire body tense.

And it's odd. This sudden respect for personal space. It makes it near impossible to find out where Bode's boundaries lie. How far he's willing to go. One minute he's fully willing to restrain and stuff him into the smallest cargo compartment Cal has ever seen—(a lie, he's being dramatic)—and the next he's apologizing for touching and refraining from acting too physically.

Perhaps it's because Cal may no longer be restrained by physical means, bound now by having nowhere to go even if he did run.

"Yeah, honey, this is him. Cal Kestis." Bode lowers his hand back down to his side. Cal sighs silently, then offers Kata the most genuine smile he can muster. "Though, Cal and I had a bit of an argument, but he's here to stay."

Kata looks down at a little plush she's holding in her hands, then back at Cal with her nose wrinkled further. "You don't look that much like Mookie," she says, baffling Cal, before turning to her father. "If you had an argument, why don't you apologize?"

Cal takes it as a win that Kata immediately assumes Bode's the one who should apologize.

"Well," Bode says carefully, "sometimes arguments can't be settled with just an apology."

"If you're friends," Kata says, "it should be."

Bode's face tightens for a second before he sighs. "Cal and I just need some space and time to figure out what's important. Why don't you show us around the place, surely you didn't sit out here the whole time."

She stares at Cal for a second longer before nodding and turning. "I didn't," she says.

Cal releases a breath he didn't know he was holding. Judging by how Bode's shoulders dropped, he didn't know either.

After a second, they both begin following Kata into the temple. She walks with little hesitance, leading Cal to believe that she truly had done her fair share of exploration while waiting for Bode to return.

Instead of thinking too deeply about Bode's comment that they need to quote unquote figure out what's important and spiraling into an angry inner rant, Cal busies himself by admiring the architecture around him.

There's something about Jedi temples. No matter the planet, era, intention. When Cal was younger, they used to inspire him. The Force would flow between every little building brick and intentional decoration, promising wisdom and strength with age and experience.

Now Jedi temples are ghosts. The walls have eyes, and they're watching him. Challenging him. Every standing Jedi Temple is a challenge.

A challenge to his connection to the Force and his kyber crystal. A challenge to duality, detachment, connection, fortitude, clarity, reason, ambidexterity.

What challenge these walls hold for him he cannot even begin to guess, but he knows it's there. It'll reveal itself when it's ready. When he's not.

Who knows, maybe with enough exploration he'll find out the name of the temple is something like "Temple of Patience." Or sanity. Or composure. Tolerance, maybe? The Temple of Stop Trusting People So Easily has a nice ring to it.

Maybe one day he'll get back to Koboh and ask Zee if the temple has a name and she'll say, "oh why yes it does! It's honestly such a coincidence I have met you Cal, as the temple is named Cal's Ability to Refrain From Force Pushing a Former Best Friend Into the Nearest Star! Yes it's a strange name, but Master Khri insisted!"

Eventually, Kata leads them to a medium, dusty corridor that has rooms lining the sides. At the end, there's a cave-in, which piques his interest. He wonders if there's any echoes at the far end that will hint as to what's on the other side, though for now Kata shows them the rooms she found and claims the biggest one for herself but also says she would like to spend the night with her papa tonight. Bode indulges her, promising her that he'll set up a place to sleep in a moment.

Kata gives one last look at Cal, gives a smile, then takes her bag into her claimed room, leaving Cal and Bode alone once again.

Cal glances at Bode, keeping his expression neutral as Bode finally turns towards him, his eyes settling at a familiar point between Cal's jaw and shoulder.

"Anything you want to say, you can say it, Scrapper."

He doesn't sound confrontational, but he definitely sounds like he knows something's been on Cal's mind for a little while. Cal curses himself for letting Bode get close enough to where he could read Cal so well.

Well. Might as well say what's on his mind.

"What are your limits, Bode?"

Bode blinks. "My limits?"

"The rules. Conditions. How long is my leash?"

He doesn't mean to say leash with poison, but he supposes the muzzle got to him.

"I've... told you the rules. If you go after Kata, there will be consequences. If you go after me, I will defend myself. You're not on a leash, Cal."

Cal scoffs. "It can't be that simple."

"Why is that so hard to trust?"

Cal levels him with a glare. "You want an answer to that?"

Bode pauses, purses his lips. "Yeah, I asked for that one."

Cal takes a deep breath, it doesn't calm him. "Look, Bode, I don't know what to expect from you. You're unpredictable, everything I thought I knew about you was a lie. I can't read your mind, I don't know what you want from me. How do I know I'm not going to push too far on some unseen boundary and end up tied-up and locked away somewhere. I saw you keep those restraints."

Bode has the audacity to look offended. "Cal, I know you don't see it, and I know it wasn't done in the best way-" Cal snorts "-but you're not my captive. You can do whatever you want except ruin what I have for Kata."

"Everything except go back to Koboh."

Bode pauses.

"I'm not your captive, huh?"

"It's for your own good," he says, voice low. "You'll see that."

"And what if I don't?" Cal challenges. "What if I spend every day from here on out hating you. Running from you. What if I spend every waking moment searching for the compass and your jet until I can leave you here."

Probably a bit too on the nose, but Cal has to know how much he's risking here.

"Lower your voice," Bode says sharply, Cal almost forgot they were right outside Kata's chosen room. "You want rules? Will having punishments make you feel better? Fine. You win. I'll get you rules. You try to leave, if I catch you anywhere near where I've hidden the compass and my jet, there'll be consequences."

Cal resists looking too pleased with making Bode lose his composure, even if his threats are made in whispers. He lifts a hand, and does something he wasn't even expecting of himself. He places it on Bode's shoulder, and his gut twists in satisfaction when he flinches.

"Then start there," Cal says, patting his shoulder. He releases his hand, then cocks an eyebrow. "So, will I have my own room or will I be chained to your bed?"

Bode glares at him, meeting his eyes. Cal really shouldn't push Bode more than he already has, but he almost can't help it. He knows so little of what the future holds, knowing what sets Bode off as early as possible will surely help in the long run. Besides, it's... it feels good in a venomous way to finally be getting reactions out of him. To finally be seeing his true, traitorous nature under that false smile and considerate words.

"Get some sleep, Kestis," Bode says, tone like ice. "Sleep outside for all I care right now."

Bode turns heel and walks away from Cal, entering Kata's room.

Cal stands there for a minute, letting the won argument wash over him.

Sleep outside, huh?

He scoffs humorlessly to himself, walking down the corridor to the cave-in. He turns into the room on the left, but he doesn't enter. He drops his duffle, fixes his hair, then turns right around to do exactly as Bode suggested.

Or well, half exactly. He won't be sleeping, but outside seems more inviting and less aggravating than the thought of being inside within the same mile's radius of Bode anyways.

#cal kestis #bode akuna #jedi fallen order #jedi survivor #star wars jedi fallen order #star wars jedi survivor #star wars #fanfiction #jin writes

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hidingoutbackstage · 2 years ago

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Probably not

Okay let’s start off with how the fandom treats the addict characters. People love to drool over Shane because he’s a hashtag sad boi and they wanna feel for him. Whatever, I don’t care, he’s inconsequential to me in my playthroughs. It’s nice to see him get better ig and it’s nice that CA acknowledges issues of mental health. That said, people only like Shane because he stops being an addict, because he cleans up and gets better. The same can’t be said for Pam.

Pam is given such shit from the fandom that it’s exhausting. One that really irks me is the consensus among a LOT of people (including popular Stardew creators) that Pam doesn’t deserve the house upgrade you can give her. That’s just your own shitty politics bleeding into your video game experience if you think that. EVERYONE deserves a house in our society. No one is undeserving of a home. That’s a basic fucking principle that’s sadly not the case in this society. The fact that people are casually willing to spew this rhetoric when talking about a fictional world that deals with real world issues is troubling. People (popular Stardew content creators, even) go as far as to call Pam a “degenerate” and alcoholic, but said as if the term itself is negative. Her addiction and her poor treatment of her daughter are entwined in the game, and thus the takeaway on many young and impressionable players is that those two things are entwined in real life. Alcoholics are abusive. Unless they show remorse like my good sweet uwu boy Shane. Then they’re okay and fixable.

Pam also isn’t a happy, “everything is better and I’m fixed” character like Shane is either. Even after she gets a house and no longer feels ashamed living in a trailer, there’s a cutscene that shows she’s still struggling with addiction despite her attempts to quit. She doesn’t WANT to be dependent on alcohol, but she can’t break the habit. It’s a sad reality for many addicts, but players just interpret that as being Pam’s moral failure, as if she’s not trying hard enough to quit. It’s ridiculously ignorant.

In terms of treatment of other disabled characters, in the GAME if you choose to side with George after Penny pushes his wheelchair out of the way without his consent, the game frames that as the WRONG choice. Instead you’re supposed to tell Penny how kind she is for helping out an old man without needing to be asked, and if that were the case it’d be fine, but the fact that she moved him out of the way, not respecting George’s autonomy, is shitty. The game seems to not really like or respect its one wheelchair user, since George is a grumpy old man and his only personality traits are “watches tv” and “likes leeks” and there’s really not much to be gained, gameplay-wise, by befriending him. He’s just the grumpy guy in the wheelchair, that’s it.

Outside of the characters, players seem to be very picky about what kind of gameplay is “okay” to them. Like, for a community obsessed with mods, they can be really judge mental when it comes to mods that make the game more accessible for disabled players. For example, there’s a mod that removes the fishing minigame part of the gameplay. I’ve never used it but I assume you’d just click your rod and pull up the fish. People scold this mod, cal it unfair, call it cheating, but the fact of the matter is that not everyone is going to have the motor skills to do a minigame like that. Same goes for combat, there’s mods to remove enemies on the mines floors, which people again argue is cutting out a core feature of the game. But again, some people simply can’t do that due to things like motor function.

This is a small one, and there are some people who will give warnings (albeit a single second in advance which isn’t a real warning but w/e ig) a common thing in speed runs will be to quickly read all the mail as fast as possible after sleeping for a long time to get quests or presents from certain npcs. This causes a strobing effect for anyone watching the speed run, and I don’t think I should have to say why forcing some members of your audience to look at strobing lights without warning (or with a warning a single second in advance which isn’t a warning at all) is fucking shitty.

These are the only examples I can think of right now, but I feel like I could be missing some. Lmk if I am

If I made a post abt the ableism in the Stardew Valley community would anyone care?

#sid rants #sid bitches #stardew valley #ableism

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venusiangguk · 4 years ago

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gold rush pt. 2 | jjk (m)

>>pairing: jungkook x reader

>>genre: pwp, v little plot, smut, kinda fluffy, college au (kinda), established relationship

>>word count: 8.9k

>>warnings: romantic ass eating 😐, oral (m), fingering (m/f), butt stuff but it’s SEXY, explicit sex, crying, jungkook likes to be praised, soft koo, dom reader... but like soft, spitting in mouth, dirty talk, multiple orgasms, overstimulation, this is so soft, that good smut, literally like 7.5k of filth

>>notes: hot girls eat ass!! oc is a hot girl!! this involves butt stuff (just mouth and fingers, no pegging 😔), so if that isn’t ur cup of tea just read pt 1 again lol, i separated it this way in case there were people who weren’t down to go down... iykyk. but with that said, i encourage u to open ur eyes and ur mind and give this a chance 🤩

>>summary: jk finally lets you eat his ass 😁👍🏻

pt. 1 | pt. 2 | pt. 3

It’s day 6 of trying to get Jeongguk to let you eat his ass. It’s getting hard to function, and the sun doesn’t shine as bright as it used to. The week has been a rough one, filled with clenched butt cheeks, and fewer blow jobs than normal. You just can’t seem to stop yourself from wandering south when you’re down there, so you’ve lost the privilege. Constantly met with Jeongguk’s laughter filled eyes when he pulls you up to where you’re supposed to be, and a “You should not want to eat my ass this bad.”

He just doesn’t understand.

Currently you’re sat in the cafeteria with your friends, your eyes consistently roaming to a table across the large room. He’s laughing at something and his hands are clapping in front of him as he throws his head back. You rest your head on your arms, pouting, and you breathe a deep and miserable sigh.

“Alright y/n what the fuck?” Your friend Yuna says, flicking your cheeks.

Her speaking up causes a few of your other girlfriends at the table to direct their attention towards you. “Yeah, you’ve been like... pouty for the last few days. What’s going on?” Cho questions as well.

You debate keeping the silly internal struggle to yourself before giving in and stating plainly, “Gguk won’t let me eat his ass.” You blow absently at a piece of hair that falls into your face, eyes crossing as you look at it. Next to you, Jiwoo chokes on the zero cal drink that she’s been sipping.

Yuna stares at you blankly for a moment before recovering. “That’s... well that’s a predicament.” She hums in thought. “Does he actually not want to or is he just being shy and stubborn?”

“Second one.” You say. You’ve known your boyfriend for years and you’ve definitely learned how to tell when he’s being serious and when he’s just being stubborn. If you really thought he wasn’t about it you would have dropped it. But you know Jeongguk’s just being difficult because he thinks it’s funny to make you pine, and actually has at least some curiosity about the act. He just won’t admit it.

“Minjun was the same way,” Cho nods in solidarity. “But he likes it now.”

“How’d you get him to change his mind?” You ask perking up. A beacon of hope.

“We watched porn of it together.”

“That’s how I discovered it!” You gasp.

You pull your phone out to text your boyfriend.

you:

minjun let’s cho eat his ass 🥺

You watch Jeongguk from across the room and see the moment he receives the text. He searches the lunch room before his eyes land on yours and he let’s out an incredulous harsh laugh, before shaking his head slightly to himself. You glance at your phone and see the text bubble appear in your messages.

koo 🥴:

maybe he’ll let you eat it too 🥺

You gape at your phone and look at your boyfriend only to see him talking to his friends again. He gives you a side glance and you see his smile grow bigger as he tries to ignore you.

~~~

Jeongguk’s sitting at his lunch table picking at the food in front of him listening as Jimin rambles about the not-so-great grade he got on his latest science test. “Why the fuck do I need to know that the sun will make it too hot for life to exist on earth in a couple billion years? Not only will I be dead, but that is just anxiety inducing.”

His phone that’s vibrating on the table catches his attention, a picture message from you on the home screen. He gets a little excited at the sheer potential that a picture message has and opens it eagerly. Sure the chances of getting a titty pic when it’s mid-day and you’re both in the middle of a lunch cafeteria are small... but they are never zero.

When he opens the message and sees the picture, he laughs loudly before clapping his hand over his mouth to quiet himself.

baby 🥺💘😏🧠🙄👊🏻:

He’s about to respond when Taehyung says, “Alright, you can’t keep laughing at your phone and not tell us what’s so funny.”

Jeongguk looks at the couple in front of him a trace of a smile still lingers on his lips. He shows them what you sent. “Y/n wants to eat my ass so bad.” He laughs to himself, going back to his phone.

“Are you not letting her?” Jimin asks.

Jeongguk sets his phone to the side before he gets to respond. It’s clear his friends are ready to have a conversation about it. “I don’t think so.”

Jimin and Taehyung look at each other and smirk. “Why not? It feels really good.”

He looks between them silently before asking, “You’ve done it?” He receives two nods.

“This one’s a real ass-muncher.” Taehyung says jerking a thumb at his boyfriend. Jimin swats at him.

“He says like that like its a bad thing and like he doesn’t cum from just my mouth and my fingers.” Jimin rolls his eyes.

Jeongguk tenses and turns a little red. A little tremor of heat coursing through his body at the thought of feeling so good that he could cum without even having a hand around himself. “Just from that? No dick touching? Is that even possible?”

“Oh to be straight and oblivious to the wonders of butt stuff.” Jimin pouts at him like he feels bad for him.

Taehyung on the other hand is a bit more helpful. He pops a fry in his mouth and talks with his mouth full, “It’s possible. We have like a button in our ass that’s like... magic. You know what a prostate is right?”

Jeongguk scoffs. “Obviously.”

“Okay well let her put her fingers and tongue in your ass then, if you know so much about it. Have you eaten hers?”

“Yeah I’ve had my tongue in every crevice of that girls body.” He’s nodding and smiling like he’s proud. He glances at you, and he sees you huddled next to your friend, looking closely at something on her phone, your long hair falling like a curtain over your shoulder, some pooling on the table. You look so pretty. You feel his stare, and look at him. Your smile is soft, and your lips pucker in a little kiss. Chuu.

“Right,” Jimin says bringing Jeongguk back to the topic at hand, “Well if she let you, and you’re open to it you should let her... like it will actually feel better for you than it probably did for her.” Jeongguk looks like he’s about to defend his honor and sex skills, before Jimin cuts him off, “Not saying you didn’t do it right or whatever. It’s just that guys are like programmed to like it... like biologically or- something.”

“Or something.” Jeongguk repeats.

“Why don’t you want to in the first place? Is it because you think it’s gay?” Taehyung asks laughing, knowing that that’s not why.

Jeongguk gives him a bored deadpanned stare. “No. Maybe it’s because I shit out of my ass and don’t want her mouth near it? She’s perfect, she doesn’t deserve that.”

Jimin cackles. “Well it’s not like you just let her go for it! You have to prepare.”

Jeongguk sits and listens as his friends give him nothing less than a full comprehensive lecture on the logistics of ass eating and ass getting ate. Ass 101. He’s still unsure but hearing from guys who have actually done it and enjoyed it makes him feel a bit more open and curious. It has him pulling out his phone and tentatively typing out a text to you, finally replying to the picture you sent.

me:

i’m thinking about it

He watches you, waiting for the text to get to you. He smiles when he sees you get excited at seeing his name on your home screen, something warm blossoming in his chest. He struggles to keep his face straight when he sees your head whip up, looking at him wide-eyed like you can’t believe what he just texted you. His fingers wiggle in a small wave, and the biggest smile slowly crawls across your face. He receives one last message before lunch ends.

baby 🥺💘😏🧠🙄👊🏻:

say less, sir 🤤

~~~

Jeongguk lays on his back patiently, looking down at you below him while you take your time planting soft kisses all the way down his body. He was in a quite docile mood considering all the pestering you’ve put him through the past few days. And despite what you both knew you had planned for him. Something he claimed to be nervous about, but you supposed one could be nervous and excited and pliant all at once.

When you take one of his nipples into your mouth he lets out a soft “oh...” his hands flying up like he wants to wrap them in your hair, hold you there till he’s pleased, but he catches himself when his arms are halfway raised. He brings them back down by his sides, fists the sheets like he’s holding himself back, like he wants to be good for you. As you lick and suck on the paired nipple, feeling it pebble in your mouth, you watch Jeongguk’s mouth fall open silently while his eyebrows furrow and a wrinkle of pleasure forms between them. His cock is steadily going from warm and plump to hot and hard and leaking, you can feel it twitch against your lower belly.

He opens his eyes to watch you and you can see his pupils are blown and you smile up at him, a tiny bud still pulled between your teeth and Jeongguk whines. A high pitch needy, breathy noise falls from his lips before he pulls his bottom one between his teeth. His head turns to the side, baring his neck in subconscious submission, and God. He doesn’t get like this often but when he does? He is the prettiest sight.

Heat pools in your belly and your panties are already sticking to your bottom half. You hum before moving your ministrations to his torso, soft wet open mouth kisses being placed any and everywhere, prolonged ones on each of his abs. He works so hard for his body, his physique. It’s something he does for himself, but you feel lucky that you get to see him like this in all of his glory.

“Thank you.” You say as you place a kiss on the tattoo he has on his hip bone.

He hums, “For what?”

“For letting me see you like this,” You finally wrap a hand around his cock. You bite your lip when you feel it jump in your palm, “For letting me explore today. You’re so sexy, and so lovely, and so perfect. You work so hard, baby.” Kisses, so many kisses planted over his groin area, but never where he wants it most.

He huffs and you can see a flush from embarrassment darken the already present flush of arousal, due to the praise and mention of exploring. He squirms in your hold, not wanting to talk, probably wishing you would just get on with it already. Surely you can feel him throbbing in your hand, right?

Finally, you bring your lips to his frenulum and place the softest kitten lick to it and Jeongguk positively keens in your hold. You stroke his cock, squeezing on the upstroke to watch a bead of precum well at the top. It glistens, shiny and clear, at the pink head. You wrap your lips around the tip fully, lapping and swirling your tongue over it, humming at the heady, slightly bitter taste on your tongue. It’s not particularly pleasant per se but it’s sexy. The fact you get him so worked up that his cock can’t help but leak, so worked up that he can’t help the soft little whines that fall from his lips; the fact that he gets so turned on and hard and wet just from a few of your kisses and licks makes you moan with his cock in your mouth, thighs squeezing together for some type of pressure and relief.

You pop off with a harsh suck. “I can’t wait to taste you.” You groan, licking a broad stripe up his cock with the flat of your tongue.

He grumbles quietly shifting, sort of like he’s antsy and frustrated. He knows what you mean and he knows you don’t mean his cock that you just had in your mouth.

“What was that?” You ask through a smile, nipping at his hip with your teeth.

“Can you stop talking about it and just suck my dick so I can forget you’re even gonna do that?” He rolls his eyes and pouts down at you with a tiny scowl on his face.

“Oh baby,” You laugh, not patronizingly, but there is a little bit of a teasing lilt to your voice, “Are you still embarrassed?”

He doesn’t answer, just scowls harder if that was even possible.

You move away from his cock, and up his body. His eyes reflect panic and his hands finally move from the sheets to press on your shoulders, trying to keep you in place. “No, stay,” he whines.

You laugh again pushing against his hold before finally settling half on his chest. You rest a leg over his thigh, keeping your body close and pressed to his. You look into his big brown doe eyes that are slightly glassy from all the teasing. You can see some apprehension and nervousness swimming in them as you place a hand on his cheek, stroking softly. He closes his eyes and nuzzles into your palm before his hand comes up to hold your wrist, to just touch some more. His other hand runs up and down your body that’s resting half on top of him, tickling slightly like your the one that needs attention. He kisses your hand that’s on his cheek softly before looking at you again.

“We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.” You say quietly, thumb brushing over his cheek bone.

His eyes fall closed again and you can see his brow furrow once more, though this time it isn’t out of pleasure it’s because he’s thinking. Despite all the playful teasing and pestering and banter, you’ve always made sure to check that he was actually okay with you going down there. And, yeah, he was nervous but after talking about it seriously and doing some research together he always said he was fine with it. But you know things can change in the moment and you just want to double check, make sure that he still feels that way.

You hum in question gently, prompting a response.

He huffs, tightening his grip on your wrist, a nervous gesture. His eyes are still closed when he quietly says, “No I just... I- I’m not like backing out...”

“You can though.” You interrupt.

His eyes open quickly, and he shakes his head. “No, no I want to I just...” His voice starts off strong but tappers into a softer tone. “I want to I just feel a bit like... weird.”

Your brow furrows this time. “Why, baby?”

“I feel like I shouldn’t want you to.” He doesn’t meet your eyes and you can feel his cheek heat up in your palm.

Ahhhh, you think. Although you talked and teased about the topic, you realize that while Jeongguk agreed (whilst impishly feigning a faux diswant on principle) you never realized that the lighthearted “You shouldn’t want to eat my ass this bad” remarks may have stemmed from something serious, and weren’t just playful protests.

“Why do you feel that way?” You press gently.

His eyes flicker to you and then to your mouth, then back to something (nothing) off to the side. He has a small not-so-amused smile on his lips when he says, “It’s kinda taboo isn’t it?”

You can’t help but giggle at the word he used. Taboo. Out of all the things you guys have done, this is what he chooses to get shy about. Sweet boy.

“Not any more tabooo than you wanting to eat my ass, or fuck my ass.” You hum at him, stretching out the word in a teasing manner, making him look at you. You smile at him before continuing, “Or you like slapping me, or me gagging you with my panties, or-“

“Okay okay! I get it.” He laughs and places a kiss to your lips to get them to stop moving.

You beam, glad to see he’s a bit more relaxed. The boner however, is definitely gone, but that can be fixed.

“I’m not trying to convince you though.” You emphasize, “I only want to if you want to.”

He nods, softly smiling at you. “I want to.”

A salacious grin takes over your face and you sigh softly into his ear before whispering, “Perfect... I’m going to make you feel so good baby, make you feel so good with my tongue. Get you all whiny and red and sweaty. Maybe your legs will start to shake from how good it feels? Do you want that, Jeongguk?” You nip at his ear lobe as you feel a slight tremor run through his body. Your hips subtly roll against the side of his body, seeking any friction at this point. You feel him nod. “Maybe if you like my mouth enough we can use fingers when you’re ready baby.” You hear him suck in a sharp breath and slowly let it out on a shaky exhale. You grin and place a kiss to his temple before continuing. “Get them inside of you to find that spot that will really set you off. The spot that will make you cum for me. Wouldn’t that feel so good baby?”

He nods again and you can feel the hand that has been running up and down your back throughout the conversation grip at your ass roughly.

“Say it baby, I wanna hear you.”

He whines and struggles against the hand on his face that is now gripping his jaw, still putting up a little bit of a fight about wanting something he considers “taboo”. But he gives in easily enough when he realizes you won’t continue until you get more confirmation that he genuinely wants this, and is excited to have it.

“It’s gonna feel so good y/n. God, you’re gonna make me feel so good.” He’s shy when he says it, but he’s almost panting as well. At last, he’s giving in and admitting to himself that this is something that will feel good and is okay to want.

He grips your face and kisses you. It starts slow and tentative but quickly manifests into a kiss that is deep and hard, one that is full of lust and neediness. He bites at your lip needing to release some of the pent up frustration but at your whine of pain he licks over it apologetically, placing softer kisses instead for a moment before he rests his forehead against yours, both your breathing is ragged for a minute until he speaks up.

“Please y/n. I’m so hard.” He pleads in a soft whisper.

You take a second and look down between your bodies and sure enough, his cock has returned to full hardness, and your mouth waters seeing even more precum welling at the tip than before.

“I’m gonna suck it.”

“Please do.” Jeongguk laughs as you move down his body, but the laugh goes high pitched and breathy when you take him down your throat immediately.

“Fuck...” he sighs, his head falling back and eyes fluttering.

You pull off and close your eyes, relishing in the fact that you can make him feel like this. Grinning against his cock you place a kitten kiss to the shaft. “Good baby?”

He nods his head. “Yes yes, please keep going.”

You hum against the head causing Jeongguk to exhale sharply, hips twitching due to the vibrations. He’s so sensitive and you crave the reactions you pull from him. Whether they’re the soft noises and the small twitches or the loud moans and jerking muscles, they are all equally loved and desired.

Quickly you pull off and reach up placing your hand under his mouth, before he can protest at you pausing again. Maybe you’re being a little mean, but he sounds so pretty when he’s desperate and you just can’t help yourself.

“Spit.” You instruct.

You see him work his jaw, sharp edges protruding here and there while he gathers some in his mouth before spitting it into your hand. You peck a nipple on the way back down to his cock wrapping the spit filled hand around him. You see him watching you and you hold eye contact as you gather some of your own and let it drool from your mouth landing on the tip of his cock. You swear you see his eyes go impossibly darker, his jaw clenching, hands turning to fists in the sheets beneath you both.

When you stroke, mixing everything, his eyes close and he lets out a breath through his nose as he rests back and gets a little more comfortable. It’s not too messy, just the perfect amount of wetness for the glide to be slick and pleasing for him. You tighten your grip and twist under the head watching as the muscles in his stomach and thighs tense, a soft grunt draws your gaze to his face.

“Yeah... like that...” he whispers. He’s just barely rocking his hips into your hands, trying to be subtle while also trying to chase the feeling.

You speed up your hand, keeping up the movements he likes while adding your tongue to flick at the underside of his head. You glance at him and find him watching you again, a fucked out look on his face, mouth slightly parted and a bead of sweat running down his temple. Slowly you sink down watching him till you can’t anymore, burying the tip of your nose in the soft patch of neatly kept hair at the base of his cock. When you feel him hit the back of your throat you contract it and shake your head from side to side and finally, finally you pull out one of his loud and unrestrained moans. It goes straight to your pussy, making it feel like it’s pulsing in your panties.

You come up for a breath before you stay down as long as you can repeating the same actions that pulled the lovely moans from his throat and you continue to hear them as you feel him start to sink his hips, almost like he’s overwhelmed and trying to pull away from how good it feels, like he can’t handle how how good it feels.

In your peripheral vision you can see his hands twitching like he’s fighting with himself before he gives in and sinks them into your hair, pulling slightly before pushing your head down and bringing his hips back up. He’s not fucking your face, but he let’s his cock sink as far back as it can and let’s you work your throat around him, lets himself get overwhelmed instead of pulling away from the feeling like he was before.

Jeongguk was a head pusher in every sense of the term. Some people hated when their partners did that, but you loved it. You loved it because Jeongguk was different from most head pushers. He had variety. Sometimes he liked pushing your head down and holding you there to choke you and watch tears form in your eyes, to watch your makeup run while you struggled to breathe. Sometimes he did it in a face-fucking way, his hips jackhammering while he moved your head up and down just the way he wanted it. This time though, he held your head down in a begging way. In a way that said “Oh god please, please don’t stop, it feels so fucking good, please stay there forever”.

Jeongguk is whimpering above you and you hum and moan loudly sending strong vibrations up your throat and down his cock and he’s thrashing, throwing his head back, grip in your hair tightening, a pleasant pain on your scalp.

“Oh my fucking god,” He groans, neck extended and his eyes squeezed shut.

His whole body is burning when you bring a hand down to massage his balls while still moving your throat against his tip and then all of a sudden he tenses and stills before he’s pulling you off, frantically chanting “Stop it, stop it.”

At lightening speed you grip the base of his cock, squeezing, trying to keep his orgasm at bay. Jeongguk’s whole body jerks with his cock, but no cum leaks out, only precum and spit making a mess on his angry, swollen cock. He relaxes back for a moment, cock still jumping, chest rising and falling as he catches his breath and you do the same and after you slowly release the hold you have on his cock you wipe your mouth with the back of your hand.

Suddenly your world is blurry and you’re quickly being pulled to his chest and smothered with his hands on your cheeks, and his lips everywhere they can reach.

“God. You’re so good, so so good y/n. So perfect, make me feel so good baby. How do you do it?” He praises you between kisses and you giggle, gently pawing at his chest to get him to stop or at least slow down.

He does and you take a second to look at him. And he’s glowing. His eyes are shining, like he was close to tears and his cheeks are flushed. His sweaty hair sticks to his forehead in places while the longer pieces are fanned out on the pillow underneath him. And his smile. He’s beaming and you are so in love.

You bring a hand up and brush some sweaty strands back off his face. His eyes close and he pushes into the touch like a kitten wanting pets. He sighs contentedly.

“You’re so beautiful, Jeongguk. So pretty.” You whisper, placing a kiss to his forehead.

You bring your hand down from his hair and cradle his cheek, running your thumb over his plump, red bottom lip. You can see faint teeth marks underneath it from where he was biting it. His eyelashes flutter on his cheek as his eyes close and he sighs quietly before he nibbles on the fingertip with his front teeth and then takes the whole thing into his mouth, sucking on it. You gasp quietly, and apply light pressure pushing down on the wetness of his tongue prying his mouth open and he just lets you.

Your lips find his, and you dip your tongue into his open mouth before your hand moves to his jaw to keep it agape and you fuck your tongue into it.

“This is how my tongue is gonna fuck you...” you whisper.

He whines high and needy, and his hands move to cup your cheeks. You moan before settling over him more comfortably and pushing your soaked panties to the side before wiggling till his cock is settled between your lips.

The night was supposed to be about him, but you need something before you lose it. You move your hips in small little thrusts, the length of his cock rubbing deliciously over you clit. You both gasp into each others mouths. The hands on your ass encourage you, pressing into your cheeks and the small of your back whenever you thrust forward, and the thumbs on your hips push when you grind back.

“Holy fuck you’re so wet.” He’s says it like he’s in awe, like he can’t believe it. Like he hasn’t made you this way so many times before.

You rest your forehead on his while continuing to grind on his cock. “Love you like this...” You grip his jaw again and pry it open, even though you know he would open willingly if you just asked. You look in his eyes searching, before you feel him nod in your hold. You lean forward over his mouth and let some spit fall into it, he moans while he eagerly drinks it down.

His grip on your hips tightens and you feel his cock jerk against your clit, but he’s good. He doesn’t cum.

“I love it too... just not all the time... it’s- a lot. Overwhelming.” He whispers, and you coo.

“I know baby, you’re doing so well. Color?” You ask.

“Green.” He answers without hesitation.

You smile and kiss him. “Wanna keep going?”

He flushes when he nods his head. “Please.”

Once again you find yourself between Jeongguk’s legs. You play with his cock a little before smoothing your hands under his thighs, trying to gently push them up and back but he whines and resists.

“You have to let me see baby.” You say, a smile in your voice.

Jeongguk squeezes his eyes shut and takes a deep breath before slowly letting his legs fall apart.

You hum, before saying, “Hand me a pillow please.”

He’s confused but does as you ask, understanding when you tap the side of his cheek with instructions to lift his hips, pillow settling underneath his ass and lower back, propping them up a little.

You settle back down on your tummy, and open his legs again. Jeongguk says nothing but you can feel his body shaking a little with a constant tremor. He takes a deep breath settling back into the pillow he placed behind his head so he can watch what you do next.

“Ready?” You ask, hands gripping at the meaty inside parts of his thighs. You get a stiff nod, but still no noises. You pout but get started by running your tongue flat over his balls, hoping to ease him into it.

You feel his thighs tense, as you lap at the hairless balls, sucking them into your mouth every once in a while. Your eyes constantly flicker to Jeongguk’s face to make sure there’s nothing wrong, but all you see is pleasure on his face while he breathes out in soft little puffs through his nose. His eyes are hooded and his lip is drawn between his teeth.

You hold his heady gaze and you place your first little lick on his perineum. At the contact, his head falls back, mouth hanging open. You wiggle closer to place a kiss to the area, transitioning to quick little flicks of your tongue and Jeongguk moans, and you watch as he spreads a bit more, lifting his feet so his knees are pulled closer to his chest, giving you easier access. You moan at his eagerness, and have to stop for a minute, putting a hand between your legs to just press on your center for some kind of relief.

His eyes are still closed, like he doesn’t want to see you between his legs licking at his most private area, but his quiet whining and restless shifting is enough to let you know that he’s okay and enjoying it.

You bring your hands up and place one on each of his cheeks, squeezing a little, admiring the soft give of his muscles. He’s so plush. You apply pressure so his legs fall farther back and then spread him apart. You bite your lip and your mouth waters at the thought of how good your going to make him feel.

Tentatively you poke your tongue out and trace it around the little ring of muscle. He gasps and tries to clench and close his legs but you hold them in place.

“It’s okay baby.”

“‘S weird...” He mumbles.

“I know. Just try to relax for me, okay?”

You hear him take a few deep breaths before you feel his body shake with a nod. His legs fall open again and you make quick work of his hole, placing your tongue flat over it, dragging all the way up to where his balls meet his perineum.

“Ohhh,” He breathes out.

You take that as a good sign before getting a bit rougher with your actions, less of the tentative licks and more of some tight sucking and quick flicking. He’s doing so well and you can hear him moaning above you. His cock is so hard and swollen on his belly, neglected and leaking.

“Pull your legs back baby.”

He opens his eyes and they are unfocused. It takes him a second to process what you asked him to do, but once he does he moves quickly. He has a hazy look in his eyes, his mouth in parted slightly, and his tongue peaks out to wet his lips as he gets comfortable in the new position.

“Watch me?” You plead, while licking over his hole again, eyes not leaving him waiting for a response.

His eyes close for just a moment and a wrinkle of pleasure forms between his brows and his cock jumps, a little spurt of precum oozing out. He inhales and opens his eyes on the exhale, breathing out a small “Okay.”

Once you start to figure out what he likes and what makes him happy, all you hear is the steadily getting louder pleased noises falling from his lips. You point your tongue and gently push past the tight ring of muscles and Jeongguk sobs. He brings a hand to his face and rubs over it, before throwing his arm over his face, hiding because he’s so overwhelmed. To your surprise he starts to gently rock against your tongue.

“Oh my god you’re so hot Jeongguk,” You moan.

“Don’t stop,” He begs. He sounds close to tears.

“Touch yourself, baby.”

You wait until you see his hand wrap around his cock giving himself a few slow strokes, wet eyes on you, waiting for you to keep going.

As soon as your mouth meets him again, his hand he has on his cock starts moving faster, almost frantically over his length and his hips are stuttering like he doesn’t know if he wants to fuck his hand or if he wants to fuck himself back onto your tongue. You decide for him and hold his hips close to your face, sucking repeatedly on the ring of fluttering muscle.

Jeongguk gasps, “I’m close, I wanna cum y/n- Please, I-“ His head falls back and his hand doesn’t slow.

You give your hum of approval against his hole, and watch him fall apart.

His head is thrown back and he’s so sweaty from working so hard for his release. His chest rises and falls in quick staccato breaths, and his free hand goes up to a nipple, lightly rubbing his thumb over it and he keens, before he goes silent, whole body stuttering and he chokes out nothing more than a quick, quiet “Cumming” before his cock pulses and shoots out 1, 2, 3 stripes of white, the rest dribbling down his length and over his fingers. His body almost convulses from the pleasure coursing through his veins. He keeps stroking, and he lets you keep licking until he squirms, uncomfortable from the overstimulation.

You wipe your mouth and immediately make your way up to his face, straddling his hips. You don’t care about the cum, but you’re carful to avoid his sensitive cock, which is a little deflated but still laying somewhat hard on his tummy. You’re both out of breath when you slam your lips against his so it’s more gasping into each other’s mouths while your lips occasionally meet before you need a breath again. But you’re desperate to show him how good he did.

You pull back and grip his face in your hands. His hands hold your wrists, like he’s keeping them in place on his cheeks. He’s still catching his breath with his eyes closed, but you want him to see how proud you are.

“Jeongguk, look at me.”

He does and his eyes are glassy and wet and his eyelashes are clumped together with unshed tears. He offers you a sheepish smile.

“You did so good baby. So fucking good. I love you.” You pepper kisses over his face.

He laughs breathlessly, “Didn’t get to your fingers...”

You laugh with him quietly. “That’s okay baby, we can do that next time. You were perfect.” You take a deep breath and collapse on top of him, resting your face in the crook of his neck, smiling while leaving small lovebites all over.

After a minute or so though, you feel him start to get restless underneath you.

“What is it baby?” You ask not really moving much.

He mumbles something into the top of your head.

“Huh?” You say sitting up to look at him.

He looks kinda petulant for someone who just came so hard it hit their neck.

He mumbles again.

“Koo. Words.”

He blushes and scowls looking away from you but the hands settled on your hips rub small circles into your hip bones, showing he’s not actually mad and most likely just being a brat.

“I want them now.” It’s quiet and pouty, but at least you understand him this time.

Your mouth opens in understanding but your eyebrows raise in surprise. You look over your shoulder and down to see his cock still laying plump and hard on his stomach in a little puddle of cum.

“Are you sure? We don’t have to, I know we said that was the plan but we can always do it ano-“

He grabs the back of your neck pulls you down to kiss you deep and slow, his tongue finding it’s way into your mouth. When he speaks again it’s soft against your lips.

“Please y/n... it felt so good,” A tiny peck is given as your noses touch.

You exhale a shaky breath, “Yeah, okay. If that’s what you want.”

He kisses you deeply again, but positions you over his cock so he can rut up into your pussy.

“Can’t you feel how bad I want it?” He whispers against your lips. He nips at the bottom one while smiling before pulling away and settling against the pillows again, looking at you expectantly once he gets comfortable.

You roll your eyes playfully. “Big words coming from someone who claimed they didn’t even want this like an hour ago.” You smile down at him, eyes sparkling.

He snickers. He breathes a deep sigh before settling back even more. “Yeah. That was before I came so hard that I almost blacked out.” His hands are behind his head and his eyes are closed like he’s reminiscing about a distant memory, a smug smile on his lips.

“You switch from being my baby to a pain so fast.” You pout as you settle once again between Jeongguk’s legs.

He parts them with a hum. “Still your baby... just- make me feel good please, I’m like so hard- throbbing.”

You suck on your fingers a little bit to get them wet before circling one around the ring of muscles. You don’t miss the tiny gasp, or the way his legs subconsciously part even wider.

“I don’t think it’s gonna feel the best at first....” You warn, applying the slightest pressure to his hole, before going back to circling it. “Hand me the lube on the nightstand please.”

Jeongguk obliges before he says, “I know just... go slow.” He sounds just a little bit nervous.

You give a quick nod while you open up Jeongguk’s half empty bottle of lube and drizzle some onto your fingers, lathering it over them to warm it some before getting them into position.

“Do you think about me when you use this?” you ask still running your slick fingers over him.

He nods and licks his lips subconsciously. “Mhmm sometimes.”

You fake gasp and bite at his knee by your side. You’re sitting crisscross applesauce in between his legs. “Only sometimes?”

“I watch porn too,” He giggles breathlessly. “Sometimes I look for girls that look like you though, if that helps.”

“It does not.” You say indignantly, only half joking.

He brings his foot up and lightly kicks at your leg. “You watch porn too that’s literally why we are in this mess right now. We watched it together.”

You full on laugh at that. He has a point. “Okay enough, hush and relax baby.”

You weren’t sure if it was better to warn Jeongguk, or just slowly ease him into it without saying anything. If you warned him you knew he would tense up and it would just make it harder on his body, but you also didn’t want to take him by surprise either.

You must have just been circling his rim for a minute because Jeongguk huffs before asking, “Are you gonna like... put it in or...?”

You take that as a go, and peck the inside of his thigh a preemptive apology because you knew it was going to hurt a little. Jeongguk had prepped you for the times you tried anal with him and you vividly remember the sting before it became bearable. Your hands and fingers were much smaller than his, and certainly much smaller than his cock, so you are hoping the pain isn’t too horrible and ends quickly.

Oh so slowly you start to sink your middle finger inside of him. He sucks in a breath through his teeth and when you flick your eyes up to look at him you can see his eyes squeezed shut tightly and his jaw clenched.

“I’m sorry are you okay? Does it hurt?”

He shakes his head. “Doesn’t really hurt yet, it’s just uncomfortable... Keep going.”

You nod softly before you resume what you were doing, and once you get down to your last knuckle, you wiggle your finger around inside for a second like you had seen in the porn that you and him watched together, hoping to stretch him out some.

Above you Jeongguk is taking shallow breaths the sort of sound like they are getting a little higher pitched at the end, and he shifts and wiggles a bit because of the foreign feeling. You glance at his cock and see that’s its gone just a little soft.

“Touching yourself might help you relax a little bit and it might make it feel a little bit better.” You suggest lightly.

Jeongguk doesn’t say anything but he does as he’s told, slowly stroking his cock back to it’s full length.

“That’s it, good boy. I can feel you’re less tense already.” You praise, and you start to move your finger in and out. It’s tight, but there’s a lot less resistance. You move them just a bit faster and focus on Jeongguk’s reactions.

His hand has started to move a bit faster over his cock, and his mouth is parted and his eyes are closed, like he’s lost in the feeling. There’s a flush on his face that has travelled all the way down his chest. Soft moans fall from his lips occasionally, although you can’t tell if that’s from you or him touching himself.

“Does it feel good?” You ask, genuinely curious.

“It feels…” He pauses like he’s unsure. “It feels… nice. I think.”

You snort. “You think?”

He laughs a little breathless, hand still stroking over his cock. “I mean it’s weird. But it’s not unpleasant. I could probably cum if I kept touching my dick.”

“Don’t cum, I haven’t found your button yet.” Your eyebrows furrow, determination set on your face.

“I do not have a button.” He says absently.

“You do. I’m gonna do the second one kay?”

“I don’t and okay.”

You ignore him and grab the lube again, adding a bit more. Your fingers find their place and as they start to sink in, Jeongguk sucks a sharp breath through his teeth, and goes rigid. You wince.

“Hurts…” He says quietly.

“I’m sorry baby.” You rub your free hand over his thigh, trying to comfort him. You give him a moment, he takes a few breaths before saying to keep going.

It takes a little bit but eventually you get both fingers in. Jeongguk isn’t feeling good yet, teeth grinding, body tense, and hands fisted in the sheets trying to ground himself, but you are determined to make it good for him. You get on your stomach and add your tongue to your fingers as you start to pull them out just to push them back in. The lube doesn’t taste very good, but the way that Jeongguk’s breath hitches when he feels your mouth on him again makes up for it.

“I- I love that.” He says, voice airy and soft as he turns his head to the side and into his shoulder like he’s trying to hide.

“Mmm, starting to feel good now baby?” You ask, flicking your tongue while your fingers start to sink in easily.

“Yeah, ‘s good…” He mumbles.

Once you’re sure that there’s no pain at all for Jeongguk, you start to crook your fingers inside of him on every thrust in trying to find that secret spot of his. Jeongguk sounds lovely while you’re searching, but the way he sounds when you finally hit it is like nothing you’ve heard from him before. It’s like he gets punched in the gut and looses his breath, a moan getting caught in his throat for a moment before he exhales a high pitched whine. You didn’t get to see it, too focused, but you know his eyes rolled back.

“There,” he breathes.

You moan as you rest your head against his thigh, focusing on your attention on your fingers and hitting that spot every time you move them inside of him. Each time you hit it sweet moans are punched out, or quiet affirmations are whispered. “Yes, please, more…”.

He has that look of pleasure on his face, the scrunched eyebrows, the parted mouth. He’s fidgety, and fussy like he just wants more but doesn’t know how to get it. He huffs, annoyed, before he starts to push back on your fingers.

“God… you’re so desperate for it,” You whisper completely captivated by how much pleasure Jeongguk looks like he’s in.

He doesn’t acknowledge you. Until you start to put a constant pressure on his prostate, rubbing.

“Oh fuck- I-“ He looks down to where your fingers are like he can’t believe the way they are making him feel before he throws his head back and let’s out a deep groan.

He lets you make him feel good, let’s the pleasure build up in his body until you start to feel him tense. His whines start to come out more frequently, almost constant moans filling the air. So noisy. His legs open more and you see how his toes curl in the sheets.

“Oh my god I think I’m gonna cum,” It’s said breathlessly, almost confused. Like he didn’t think that he would actually be able to cum just from your fingers inside of him, hands still at his sides fisted in the sheets.

“Yeah baby?” You ask, voice airy.

He nods, tongue poking out of his mouth like he’s concentrating.

Your arm hurts, but you keep thrusting and rubbing over that spot inside of him. His muscles are strained, and next to your body, you can see his legs start to tremble. His breathing is fast and short. His cock is fat and swollen laying in a puddle of precum, it looks like it hurts with how red it is. You take you other hand and start to rub on his perineum, stimulating him on the outside as well as the inside and that’s when he loses it.

He let’s out a choked cry before his body jerks up, curling in on itself. “Oh fuck I’m cumming, I’m cumming, I’m cumming-“

You don’t let up, an awestruck smiling forming on your face as you watch Jeongguk fall apart on your fingers. He’s so tight around them, it’s like his body is begging you not to stop, keeping you in place. He feels like every hair on his body is standing on end and like his skin is overly receptive and sensitive to every little thing. Wave after wave of ecstasy is flowing over him. His whole body trembles, yet his cock doesn’t jerk like with his other orgasm. This time it just pulses flat on his stomach, cum leaking out of the tip adding to the mess that was already there. With every pulse of his cock, Jeongguk’s body curls more, back raise off the bed, abs flexed due to the strain on his core. The look on his face is one of indescribable pleasure. It’s obscene. After the final pulse of his cock, he falls back, absolutely spent.

Your fingers slowly come to a stop, and you carefully remove them from him and wipe them on the bed before you crawl over his thigh and flop down by his side. You peck his cheek, staying quiet this time, not wanting to overwhelm him. He’s still has tremors running through his body when he turns his head to look at you. His chest is heaving and his eyes are droopy, but there’s a sleepy smile on his lips. He curls onto his side so you guys are facing each other.

The silence is thick and heavy but not in a suffocating way. More so in a comforting way. The atmosphere feels like you both are wrapped in a weighted blanket, just relishing in the warm afterglow of what you did together.

You wiggle closer, hook a thigh over his hip. “How was it? Did you like it?” You don’t know why but you sound shy, kinda nervous.

He simply nods, a soft smile on his face as he brushes some hair behind your ear, hand coming to rest on your cheek for just a few seconds before it’s sliding down your arm, down your hip, playing with lacy top of your panties. He bumps noses with you, breathing in your exhales before he closes his eyes and fits his lips between yours. His hand slips into your panties.

You open easily for him, angling yourself mostly on your back so it’s easier for him to reach where you want him most. He sighs into your mouth when he feels how wet you are. He dips between your lips and you gasp, hand going down to grip at his wrist willing him not to tease, to not move his hand away.

“Don’t worry, I just wanna make you feel good baby.” He coos in your ear as his middle finger starts to rub slowly over your clit.

You let out soft whimpers at the slow pace that makes the fire in your belly curl and steadily grow.

“Jeongguk, I’m already close…” You warn.

“Mmm, that’s it baby. Want you to cum for me, like I came for you.” His finger speeds up some. “Fuck, you made me cum so hard y/n. Made me crazy. You always do.” He moans gently into your ear.

You nod, and your legs begin to tremble. “Don’t stop,” You beg, meaning both his fingers and his words.

“You wanna know what it felt like? You wanna know what you did to me?” He presses a touch harder, and nips are your cheek.

You nod again, subtly rocking your hips into his touch.

“You made me cum untouched y/n. Do you know how good you had to fuck me in order for that to happen? God, it was so intense, and I was just leaking so much the whole time. You did that to me baby, you made me feel that good. Fuck, I wanna make you feel that good too, please cum for me y/n. I know you’re close, I know your body just as well as you know mine.” He sounds desperate, just yearning to get you there. “I can tell by the way your legs are shaking, and the way you can’t stop whining my name. Sound so pretty baby, just for me. Your hand on my wrist is gripping so hard, like you can’t take what my fingers are doing to you. But you’re gonna take it and give me what I want right? Just like I gave you what you wanted, hmm?”

“Fuck, Jeongguk I’m cumming,” You cry, his words and his fingers making you shake and finally get the release that you’ve been putting off the whole night. Your thighs close over his hand but Jeongguk doesn’t let up, not until you’re cumming for the second time in a span of minutes.

“Please- I can’t-“ You squirm, and wiggle, until his fingers slow and finally slip form your panties. You sigh in bliss, body twitching as the last bits of your climax leave your body.

You turn back to your side and snuggle all the way against Jeongguk’s body, legs intertwining. Jeongguk runs his nails over your back, making little goosebumps sprout over your body. There’s a peaceful quiet coming over you, both tired from the events of the night. Jeongguk breaks it.

“Thank you for taking care of me.” It’s a timid statement, but you can hear how much he means it.

You kiss softly over his heartbeat. “I always will.”

“Just please don’t ever ask to peg me.”

You simply hum. “Goodnight baby.”

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

i hope you liked it!! i’m thinking of writing a smutty drabble of when oc and jk watch the porn together 🤨 let me know if you would want to read that or anymore of this universe! comments, notes, and feedback are YEARNED for. my ask is also open if you want to request, share thoughts, or just talk

part 3 here!

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4lph4kidz · 3 years ago

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The combination of being an indigoblooded hero of Void and also a Derse dreamer is dubbed as the 'Engineer' by the Extended Zodiac. also generally speaking the aspect of Void is often associated with water or liquids (hint Eq's sweating problem). also most of Horuss' gadgets (including his suit) were powered by steam most likely by evaporating his sweat. Eq gave his own blood for Aradia's soulbot, however Hussie confirmed that this was only a symbolic thing, the bot could work fine without it.

I also think that 'embodying absence' is good wording for the Void's connection to robots. But I'm not so sure it goes beyond that, because Dirk is also associated with them. Although in his case it's more about his 'splinters' and 'puppets'. I suppose that could be seen as embodying the absence of something. The reason why Dirk fell so deep into his own psyche and made all these splinters of himself, is because he had no other reference point in his surroundings.

Dirk had no real life friends (other than Cal). So he made some. Well, real life friends that he could actually meet in person that is. His gesture towards Jake when he sent him parts of a robot one by one could be a form of embodying his feelings in a place he physically can't be, because he never existed in the past. Jade is also associated with robots, but I'm not yet sure what her connection could be. And of course Rose and Dave turn into robots in the Epilogues, but that's another story.

(regarding this post about equius as an heir of void 'embodying void')

Just in case it wasn't clear, I would like to clarify that rather than focusing on the robots themselves, I was thinking about how Equius helps other people by literally replacing missing body parts (including Aradia's entire body) and thus 'embodying' an absence. Robots are a tool he uses to fulfil his function as an heir of void.

I don't know if they are inherently Void-aligned by nature, or are inherently related to any one aspect really. To me it's quite clear that they are extensions of a character in one way or another, either a part of them or part of their impact on the world, and thus they become a symbol of that character's aspect?

So Equius uses robots in a Void aligned way (thanks for pointing out the Zahhak's connections to liquid void motifs!) whereas it's very clear that in Dirk's case they are expressions of his Heart aspect - reflections of him, embodiments of his feelings, extensions of himself and his agency (like, rather than the alpha kids, 'Unite' & 'Synchronise' could refer to Dirk Uniting and Synchronising all of his extant splinters when they are working together to save everyone)

Jade's dreambot is sort of Spacey bc it allows her to interact with the physical world while asleep. It's not her creation though, it's Grandpa Harley's, so does that mean it's technically Hope-aligned instead? Embodying the power of Hopes and dreams as well as the limitless creative potential of Skaia??? IDK

I know I've been talking about classpects all night but tbh I think classpects are kind of bullshit and you can interpret these things any way you want to. Not to detract from your observations though, they're good!

#ask #anon #meta #??? i suppose #there's also aradiabot but since she's just straightup the vessel aradia uses i guess her being time aligned is obvious

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king-maven-calore · 4 years ago

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46 for fluff + marecal

"you're hurt. please just let me heal it."

I'm starting to think fluff may not be my forte🤐... enjoy!

What was the argument of the week? Farley couldn’t remember. There always seemed to be some source of tension between the two dramatic assholes, even now that they were engaged and in a more or less functional relationship.

“I told you I had this!” Cal panted furiously as they half ran, half swam through the swamplands, the water up to their waists.

This was supposed to be an easy recon mission on one of the last armament outposts in The Lakelands. The former prince and she were supposed to take some pictures and leave, but the place had been more heavily guarded than they had anticipated. Mare had been on a separate mission a few miles south, and by some miracle, she had decided to check on them rather than going back to Ascendant directly. A good call, because Cal and she had been seconds away from being turned into prized prisoners of the Lakelanders.

As they fled to the pickup spot, they zigzagged between the thick vegetation to lose their pursuers. Fifty silver soldiers against three was hardly a fair number.

“If I hadn’t shut the lights, you two would be dead!” Mare whisper shouted. “You ungrateful prick!”

“We are,” Farley cut them off before their voices gave away their location. “Now shush.”

By the time they reached the light aircraft, peacefully floating in the part of the swamp where the twisted trees were scarce, instead replaced by tall grass, they lost their footing and had to swim to get there. The Scarlet Guard pilot was at the side, waiting to help them up but Farley signaled wildly for him to start the plane.

She hopped up first, followed by Cal, and then Mare who had been lagging for the past few minutes but had glared at them whenever they tried to help her. His highness was done listening to her silent refusal, for he grabbed her arms and pulled her up into the aircraft.

Two sharp intakes of breath cut through the charged silence when she found out at the exact moment Cal did, what exactly had been slowing Mare down.

A long gash ran along the side of her thigh, oozing blood freely and staining her brown cargo pants now she was out of the swamp, pooling on the metal floor, mixing with the water that dripped from their bodies, so it looked like a river of blood.

“Relax, it’s a scratch.” The force of her glare was diminished by the sick pallor of her skin and her unsteady sway as she slid the door closed behind her.

“When did that happen?” Farley asked dropping to her knees to get the first aid kit under one of the two lonely rows of seats.

“Courtesy of a fellow new blood with a weird sense of allegiance to her oppressors,” Mare winced as Cal pushed her to the opposite row of seats.

Cal’s jaw was clenched so tightly one might think he was angry at Mare. He carefully arranged her so her legs were across the seats as he kneeled before the wound and ripped the fabric to expose the cut. It was definitely worse than a scratch. The plane vibrated around them as it started moving.

“Did you kill them?” she inquired further and Call all but ripped the kit away from her hands.

“Stunned her-” Mare smirked weakly and Cal grunted something as he poured a generous amount of disinfectant on her leg, “-this is how she repaid my kindness.” She hissed and sank her nails in Cal’s shoulder.

“I hope she hit her head when she dropped unconscious,” Farley joked darkly, sitting down and buckling up, facing the couple across the narrow space between the seats.

“She did. Against a railing— fuck, I told you I’m fine! Just bandage it up until we have a healer!”

Farley opened her mouth to say that she was going to pass out if she kept losing blood, but Cal’s broken plea was much more convincing, “You’re hurt. Just- please, let me heal it.”

And even though she couldn’t see it. She was sure he paired it with some anguished smoldering look because Mare’s shoulders slackened and her grip on his shoulder did as well. Mare nodded and he started stitching her up.

“Can’t you cauterize it?” Farley suggested, looking dubiously at Cal’s horrible stitches. It was a waste of time and she couldn’t imagine Mare was enjoying the experience.

He looked up at his wounded girlfriend, who worried her lower lip with her teeth for a few seconds, then nodded again. “Make it quick,” she exhaled shakily.

Cal raised himself on his knees so he was eye-level with Mare and wrapped one arm around her waist, pulling her close to him, and she hugged him in return, burying her face in the crook of his neck. A tender sight... until he started tracing the gash with his fingers and the smell of burned flesh filled the small aircraft, forcing Farley to cover her nose with her sleeve.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he kept repeating against Mare’s hair every time a suffering whimper down on her throat betrayed how much pain she was in, despite her reassuring him she was fine.

The three of them sighed in relief once Cal declared it was done.

Farley rolled her eyes when he kissed the top of her head while still apologizing. It was either that or a lost leg. They really needed to sort out their priorities.

“Thank you. It feels better already,” Mare’s voice was muffled against his chest.

“I should be the one thanking you for saving us,” he whispered fervently. “I- I shouldn’t have raised my voice at you- it's just, you get so little rest as it is. I worry.”

Mare snorted and pushed him enough to cradle his face in her hands. “You’re one to talk,” she scolded him, then crushed their lips together.

Oh by her bloody colors. Every damn time. Could they finish a mission once without the lovebirds eating face in public? Farley huffed, struggling to release the seatbelt, and jumped out of the seat, going straight to the cockpit to sit down next to the pilot.

She may hate the sight of being thousands of feet above the ground, but the alternative back there was worse.

“The usual?” the fellow Scarlet Guard member smirked at her and craned his head to check on the other two.

“Eyes up front, soldier,” Farley barked. Sinking into the uncomfortable seat, she allowed herself a smirk of her own. The mission had been, despite everything, a success, and they were all returning home safely. “And yes, the usual.”

#my fics #RQ fanfic #red queen #marecal #ask

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matildashoney · 4 years ago

Text

𝙸 𝙵𝚎𝚎𝚕 𝙰𝚕𝚒𝚟𝚎? // 𝙰𝚕𝚕 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙻𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚆𝚎 𝙲𝚊𝚗𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚂𝚎𝚎

𝙼𝙰𝚂𝚃𝙴𝚁𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃 // 𝚃𝙰𝙶𝚂 // 𝙿𝙻𝙰𝚈𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃 // 𝚃𝙰𝙶𝙻𝙸𝚂𝚃

𝚝𝚊𝚕𝚔 𝚝𝚘 𝚖𝚎 𝚊𝚋𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚢 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚌𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚎 // 𝚜𝚞𝚙𝚙𝚘𝚛𝚝 𝚖𝚢 𝚠𝚛𝚒𝚝𝚒𝚗𝚐

𝙳𝙸𝚂𝙲𝙻𝙰𝙸𝙼𝙴𝚁: 𝙱𝙸𝙿𝙾𝙻𝙰𝚁 𝙳𝙸𝚂𝙾𝚁𝙳𝙴𝚁, 𝙼𝙴𝙽𝚃𝙸𝙾𝙽𝚂 𝙾𝙵 𝙷𝙾𝚂𝙿𝙸𝚃𝙰𝙻𝚂, 𝙰𝙽𝚇𝙸𝙴𝚃𝚈

𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚔 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚝𝚘 𝚖𝚢 𝚕𝚘𝚟𝚎𝚕𝚢 𝚏𝚛𝚒𝚎𝚗𝚍𝚜, 𝚎𝚜𝚙𝚎𝚌𝚒𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚢 @theharriediaries 𝚊𝚗𝚍 @truckerhatharry 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚋𝚎𝚝𝚊-𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚍𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚌𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝𝚎𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚘 𝚖𝚎 𝚝𝚊𝚕𝚔 𝚊𝚋𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚑𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚢 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚌𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚎. 𝚒'𝚖 𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚒𝚏 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚗𝚎𝚎𝚍 𝚊𝚗𝚢𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐. 𝚒 𝚕𝚘𝚟𝚎 𝚢𝚘𝚞.

Truthfully, Harry isn’t sure what time it is, this time around. Clocks seem to evade him, and numbers seem to dance into intricate formations that he can’t seemingly understand.

Harry Styles stops time when he walks into the room. Caroline always says that it’s the commanding presence, the nature of his personality, the way he holds everyone’s attention so easily that makes him stop an entire room and gain their attention. Caroline always says that Harry is the type to make everyone know they’re important and needed in the space, that there isn’t one person that would be in the group or the audience or the meeting that wouldn’t feel like they’re an essential part of whatever is happening.

Caroline always says that Harry makes her feel that way.

Harry makes the effort to be this way if he’s being honest. Harry makes the effort to hold everyone’s attention and make everyone feel important, because, for years, he portrayed the demeanor of someone who thought he was the most important person in the room, that he was where all the attention should be. That is until he met someone who made him see how truly minuscule in the affairs of universes and worldly happenings, he is. That is until Harry met Caroline, and he realized that there was nothing more that he wanted than to know everything and anything about her, instead of talking about himself, for once.

Until Harry met Caroline, and everything changed.

Harry isn’t sure what time it is, right now. Green eyes stare at the stark white walls surrounding him, his head leaning against a concrete foundation and the clicking of the clocks on the wall – and yet, he still can’t seem to find the time from anyone – and a raging headache forming at the forefront of his mind. His eyes shut quickly, squeezing closed to try and make the time pass any quicker than it is. Time is going so slowly, though, that he thinks he might scream. Harry wants to scream, honestly. That might make the pain easier to swallow, the heartache easier to handle.

Going based on the trajectory of the situation and where they are, Harry would be going home alone, tonight, and that’s a pill that he’s not prepared to swallow quite yet. That, and the idea that someone might tell him something that he really doesn’t want to hear, something about Caroline that will break him at the core.

Caroline wasn’t … you know … right?

Thinking that makes Harry want to be sick. There would have been a sign. There would have been some sort of something if she was. There would have been a note, a letter, something. And yet, there was nothing when Harry came home; nothing that could give him a sign or a clue or something that will tell him if he needs to worry or not.

Harry couldn’t make sense of it.

“Mr. Styles,” the nurse says, coming through a hallway and gently touching his shoulder to garner his attention, her soft demeanor comforting him as he looks with exhausted and bloodshot eyes, tears staining his cheeks. “Unfortunately, we have to keep Ms. Ryan for the twenty-four-hour waiting period, with her history and her family history, to make sure she’s not trying to hurt herself or others.” Harry nods understandingly without saying a word – that much was expected – and stands on his feet, ready to see his fiancée, finally. “Honestly, based on Ms. Ryan’s previous welfare checks and hospital stays, the doctor was not expecting it to go as well as it did. Ms. Ryan’s welfare check went much better than the others in her history, which is great news.”

“Think that we both know my wife isn’t okay, but is she okay enough for me to see her?” Harry asks nervously, unsure of the technical aspects of a hospital stay and the regulations that they’re going to have to follow. Caroline has never had this bad of an episode in their time together, and this has scared Harry more than anything. “Am I allowed to see her? I really want to see her. I’ll follow whatever regulations you have, but if I could see her, that would be really kind of you.”

That’s the first time Harry’s said the word out loud. Wife. Caroline would be Harry’s wife, soon. This could effectively tamper with the timeline and how long that very well takes. Harry doesn’t care about any of that like he knows Caroline will. Harry cares about Caroline getting better and coming home.

“Of course, Mr. Styles. Caroline can have visitors, now, and you can see her, stay with her, too. Caroline is dehydrated, mainly, and malnourished from not eating for a week, so she’s hooked up to a lot of machines, just so you’re aware,” the nurse says smoothly and calmly, checking her notes on her clipboard and reading technical terms that Harry can’t seem to grasp or understand. “Caroline is not suicidal, though. Truthfully, that’s what counts, right now. That’s what everyone cares about.”

Caroline sat in the hospital bed when Harry walks inside with the nurse, with wires clinging to her body, nibbling on a sandwich while he walks right to her and sits at her bedside. Harry swears that he won’t be able to handle seeing her like this, again. Harry wants to be sick just thinking about it. Caroline, naturally, makes a joke about the hospital socks, saying, “My third pair of hospital socks and they’ve finally given me something other than that hideous orange color. Oh, the joys of London Town!”

“Callie,” Harry sighs, shaking his head and breathes out a laugh, rolling his eyes as he leans onto the bed and kisses her forehead as she clicks her heels together in the baby blue sticky socks underneath the blanket and makes the wish for the two to be home, in the comfort of their own bed. Harry thought he couldn’t stay, that he wasn’t allowed, and that killed him, to know that she would be alone in a room by herself, having to sit alone with her thoughts for days. Thankfully, that’s simply not the case, tonight. He doesn’t think he could have handled being alone, tonight, anyways. Not after what he saw. “Callie, you scared the living shit out of me.”

Caroline sets her sandwich on the tray, wipes her hands on her napkin, and opens her blanket. reaching for Harry with wide arms, smiling softly when Harry immediately rushes towards her and circles his arms around her waist, hugging her tightly and breathing in her scent. “I love you. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t do that to me, again,” Harry says strictly, sternly, his eyes welling with tears as his fingers gently brush over her cheek and his lips meet her forehead softly. “Caroline, I need you to take this seriously, okay? Baby, you didn’t eat for nearly two weeks.”

Caroline whispers something in Harry’s ear, something that he can’t really understand, and he brushes it away, simply going back to holding her tightly and breathing in the sweet apple scent that lingers in her hair. Harry assumes it was something of another apology, which isn’t something he really wants, per se, it’s more the fact that she didn’t tell him, that she didn’t reach out to him. Harry knows why, and he feels guilty, so guilty.

Caroline doesn’t like bothering Harry when he’s doing business; especially not business that involves moving Shakespeare’s Library to elsewhere in the United Kingdom and would be a great investment opportunity. Caroline doesn’t like being the reason Harry can’t focus – unless it’s for ulterior motives – and the fact of the matter is, Harry wouldn’t have gone away on business if he knew Caroline was about to face an episode like she is, right now. Caroline and Harry both know that much.

Harry, then, feels incredibly guilty when something of the sort happens, because not only did he not know, but he wasn’t there to fix it. Harry likes to fix it.

“Callie, what happened that made you do this?” Harry wracks his brain trying to find a reason because Caroline was so good before he left. Caroline was writing and eating and functioning before he was set to leave; something must’ve happened in the day that he was flying and settling in that made her break. “What triggered it, Callie? I know something did. I wouldn’t have left you alone if I knew you were in an episode, like that. That’s not how we do things; you’re supposed to tell me. I’m supposed to be there for you, Cal.”

“Harry, it wasn’t anything.”

“Caroline Elizabeth Ryan.” Harry never uses Caroline’s whole name like that. That’s when it occurs to Caroline how poorly Harry is dealing with this, right now. Caroline, usually, only has to worry about how she is dealing with her episodes, she’s nearly forgotten there’s a whole other person on the receiving end, now, a person she loves very deeply. “Does it have to do with your mother? Is Lucy why you’re in here? ‘Cause I swear to God, Callie, I’ll march myself to wherever she has and have a kindly chat with her.”

“My mother has nothing to do with this,” Caroline says through her teeth, and Harry can tell that she’s lying. Caroline’s tell, her quirk, so to speak, is that fact that her jaw clenches tightly and she has to speak through her teeth whenever she’s lying. Caroline doesn’t lie to Harry – it’s one of their boundaries – and it’s easy for him to tell when she is. Harry tilts his head, his eyes pointing at her directly and his lips pursed together in a straight line, his expression saying everything that he isn’t. “Can we talk about this later? I’m exhausted and I missed you. I can hear that you’re angry with me, too. I don’t like that you’re angry, with me, right now.”

“Caroline,” Harry says calmly, sighing out a breath between his lips, shaking his head and sitting on the corner of the makeshift mattress that the hospital has laid her on, “not this time, okay. Can’t, you can’t shy away from this conversation, this time.”

“I’m not ready to have this conversation, Harry.”

Harry’s voice breaks, the tears beginning to fall down his cheeks again and the pain collecting in his throat, the lump that he swallowed down when he walked into the hospital room now resurfacing and bringing the tears to his eyes. “Callie, tell me. This isn’t something to run away from.”

“My mother,” Caroline swallows thickly, her eyes welling with tears at the thought, shaking her head to try and shake the incessant, nagging feeling that she’s going to cry, “she, um, sent me a letter in the mail. It came the day you left.”

“And what did it say, Cal?” That’s what makes Caroline break into hysterics, the six words making tears pour down her cheeks, her chest heaving with shaky breaths, her hands covering her face with her fingertips digging into her eyes, trying to hide the tiny markings her nails are leaving in her face. Harry gently pries her hands away, kissing her fingers and scooting closer to her body, taking her hands in his and holding them tightly. “Baby, tell me.”

Caroline sucks a breath in through her teeth and hurriedly says, “My mother is back in the country with her mother and would appreciate it if, even though we live only a few hours away, I wouldn’t contact her anymore. Lucy said that it’s great that I’m doing well and have my life together, that she’s happy for me, but she would prefer to not have any contact with me.” Harry kisses Caroline’s knuckles and gently wipes at her eyes, the wires getting tangled in their hands. “Harry, why doesn’t she want me?”

“Callie, baby,” Harry sighs, sliding himself closer and wrapping his arms around her shoulders, bringing her into his chest, her face tucking into his neck and immediately wetting his shirt with her tears. Harry doesn’t mind it, he would rather have her crying in his arms than see her unconscious in their bedroom, again. “I’m sorry your mother is so horrible to you. I’m so sorry.”

“All I want is for her to want me, Harry,” Caroline sniffles, shaking her head and feeling done with the conversation, taking her hands from her thighs and wiping her eyes, sighing into Harry’s neck and kissing his skin lightly for comfort. “Kiss? Could really use one, right about now.”

“Always, love. My Buggy.” Harry smiles softly and nudges Caroline’s face with his nose, his lips laying a kiss on her cheek and waiting for her to tilt her head slightly towards him to kiss her mouth. His mouth moves slowly on hers, kissing her sweetly and gently, as though a slightly harsh touch could leave her bruised and bandaged. “Callie, you mean everything to me. More than you’ll ever know.”

“Can’t be more than what you mean to me.” Caroline shakes her head in disapproval. “Hate that you still call me ‘Buggy’, as though I’m still a nuisance, to you, though,” she says, and he laughs breathily, at that, because it’s not the reason he calls her that, now, but it was. Oh God, Harry thought Caroline was such an annoyance when they first met. “Hard to believe I used to hate your guts,” Caroline giggles, tucking her chin to her chest and spinning her engagement ring on her finger, the tiny diamond sitting perfectly on her hand. Harry hates how small it is, but it’s Caroline’s favorite jewellery she’s ever owned. “Oh boy, the hate I had for you. I could’ve beat you up, Harry Styles.”

“Caroline Ryan, all you would’ve done is start to cry.” Harry shakes his head. “Barely a punch to the jaw, which I would’ve deserved, by the way, and you would’ve been in tears. I love you for it, but you wouldn’t handle that very well.”

“Hey!” Harry laughs for the first time in hours, a hearty laugh, a laugh that makes Caroline’s heart swell in her chest and feel like it’s going to burst with how much she loves him. God, Caroline really loves Harry. Like, wholeheartedly in love with him, type of love. “I could’ve done it. I could’ve done it, without crying. Maybe a little stutter-stepping, but I could’ve done it.”

“All right, all right,” Harry sighs, leaning forward and kissing her forehead, lingering on her skin to breathe her in, his eyes squeezing shut when she grabs his cheeks and kisses his mouth, once more. “Have all those tests and meetings with the doctors, tomorrow, and you need your rest.”

Caroline’s eyes go wide. “Can you stay? Do you have to go?”

“I’ll be right there, all night,” he says, pointing towards the makeshift lounger in the corner of the room with blankets and a pillow laying on the cushion. “Callie, I promised you ages ago, I’m not going anywhere.”

Caroline sighs, nodding quietly and pursing her lips together. Harry’s words are true, she knows this with her whole heart, but there is the angry and subconscious part of her brain that tells her that Gabriel Ryan said that, too. Her father said that, too. Caroline swallows a lump in her throat, breathing through her nose and shoving her tray of food away from her, suddenly feeling exhausted and mentally drained. Maybe it was the conversation about her mother, maybe it was the promise that her father broke, maybe it is the idea that Harry is there and no one else cares. Maybe it’s everything all at once making Caroline feel so utterly tired, but her eyes are beginning to shut against her cheeks and her heart rate is beginning to slow. Harry can see that she’s finished by her quiet actions, kissing her cheek and gently moving from the mattress to the lounger, looking at Caroline with concerned eyes as she turns onto her side and yanks the blanket closer around her neck.

“Goodnight, Bug. I love you,” Harry whispers, kissing her forehead and sighing against her skin as she nods her head. Harry can see the depression oncoming, the confession of her mother’s letter and the promise that her father broke lingering in the air. Caroline is great at putting on a façade around everyone else, but with Harry, it’s barely functioning. “Things are going to get better, Callie. Do you trust me?” Caroline nods silently, tears welling in her eyes and beginning to fall down her cheeks. Harry walks to the lounger, cranking the lever and turning out the recliner to lay on for the evening. Caroline’s voice draws his attention, turning away from his bed and listening to her carefully. “Say that one more time, for me, Cal?”

“Can you read me some of your poetry?” she whispers, the lights barely illuminating her eyes that he adores so much. Caroline doesn’t turn around, remaining facing the doorway and listening carefully. “Maybe from when we didn’t like each other so much. Tell me that things get better.”

Harry smiles softly, taking his leather notebook – the one that he carries with him everywhere – and opening to the first page written with an indented ‘C’ in the header. “This is from the day I was late to our very first annotations meeting.”

Caroline giggles, sniffling quietly and then says, “Oh, I was infuriated with you, that day. God, I asked Rigsby for a new annotation partner, too. Think I told you that I hope you never fall in love with someone like me.”

“That’s absolutely correct,” Harry laughs, shaking his head at the memory. Meeting Caroline and the very first few months of knowing her were so difficult, Harry thought they’d never get along. Harry made it a challenge for himself, to have Caroline like him, even the slightest bit, and that started his fascination and infatuation with her; the one that made him fall in love with her. “Are you ready, love?”

Caroline sucks in a breath and rolls to her side, her eyelashes wet against her cheeks as she stares at Harry adoringly, forcing a smile and swallowing back a choked sob as she notices how fully written in this notebook is, how many pages are marked and colored and decorated in intricate drawings that represent the poetry he’s scribbled in his writing. Caroline notices the ‘C’ imprinted in the front of the notebook, and that’s when she realizes. “Have you moved every poem about me into that notebook, Shakespeare?”

“Maybe.”

Caroline nods silently, sucking in a breath through her nose and snuggling deeper into the sheets on the mattress, smiling softly at the man laying across from her, ready to read his poetry. “Okay.”

Harry dramatically clears his throat, smiling softly at Caroline, his fingertip holding the page where the poetry begins on the day, they met alone for the very first time. “you told me that you never fall in love // that it’s too dangerous, too risky // and i have begun to wonder // that if love is too risky // what is it that makes you feel safe.”

Caroline waits at the coffee shop for nearly three hours without a show from Harry.

Having three coffees and one muffin and about three hours of gearing up to even come to the coffee shop alone, Caroline is fed up and ready to leave. That is until, the floppy tendrils of curls show up rushing through the door at a near four in the afternoon, sputtering apologies as he flops his things on the spare chair at the table and hurries to the counter to buy himself a drink. He looks dishevelled, as though he’s woken up only minutes ago and hurried here, and part of Caroline wants to feel sorry for him that he’s slept until two in the afternoon, most likely, and forgotten.

That part of Caroline is very small, though.

“Caroline, I’m so sorry,” Harry says hurriedly, brushing through his hair and taking a seat at the table and pulling out his notebook and his computer and textbook with the play written inside. “I overslept. I was working on this poetry assignment, all night. Not trying to make an excuse. This was our plan all week. I’m sorry.”

“Let’s just get started. Our discussions are due in less than,” Caroline says distractedly, looking at her phone for the time, “six hours.”

“Right, yeah,” Harry says embarrassedly, his cheeks turning red beneath the softened lights of the coffee shop, his hands slightly shaking as he was rushing to get himself together, his papers scattered in his notebook. “Have you annotated anything, yet? Obviously, there are my annotations that you can copy, if you need them.”

Caroline laughs, shaking her head and letting out a frustrated laugh, “Harry, that’s, um, nice, I think.” Her eyes are squinted as she stares at him, and then she turns to her textbook and opens to the first act of the play. “But, in the three hours I was waiting for you, I finished the entire first act. I’m ready for the discussion. Could do that, we could do that, and then leave, if you’d like. Obviously, you have more important things to be doing.”

Harry looks awfully embarrassed and there is a sudden boost of confidence that Caroline feels around him. Usually, Harry is the one with the chip on his shoulder, with the one-up on the partners that he’s working with, especially women. Harry has his looks, his charm, and occasionally – if he’s using it well enough – his intelligence. Harry’s poetry usually wins over the women and men he works with, the inspiration that strikes when he’s working with someone that is smarter, brighter, more intelligent than he is, bringing him closer and closer to finishing his poetry collection that he’s been working since his acceptance into the graduate program. Coming into his fourth section of poetry, Harry’s found himself writing about love and love stories and romance since the day he started his portfolio, and yet he’s missing an entire section about unrequited love.

That is more frustrating than anything, Harry’s found.

“Um, sure,” Harry sighs, letting out a heavy breath and raising his hand to the waiter that’s walking near their table, ordering a black coffee and a muffin before settling into his seat, once more, and opening to the page that the discussion post is referring to. “Okay, well, this discussion post is asking about the difference between infatuation and love between Orsino and Viola and Olivia, in Act One.” Harry looks between Caroline and their notebooks and their textbooks and says, “There isn’t one, really.”

“Did you just say there isn’t a difference?” Caroline asks astonishedly, shaking her head and setting her pen in her notebook and shutting her computer halfway. “Orsino is practically tripping over himself for Olivia, and Olivia is falling for Cesario, or Viola playing pretend to get into the palace and find her brother. All of it is infatuation. Orsino’s entire claim for love is based on his infatuation with Olivia.”

“Tell me something,” he says smoothly, nodding his head to the waitress bringing his coffee and his muffin and thanking her quietly before turning to Caroline and squinting his eyes. “Do you not believe that love is partially based on infatuation? Isn’t that how you fall in love? By becoming infatuated with someone, with something. Do you not believe in love at all?”

Caroline sits back in her seat, very well aware of the judgement being passed to her in this very moment, and is slightly insulted by his insinuation, his implication. “Look, Harry, whatever personal judgements I have on love and falling in love are truthfully none of your business. At the end of the day, love is risky and dangerous. Anyone that willingly falls in love is a fool.”

“That’s bloody depressing,” Harry says with a scowl, shaking his head and brushing his fingers through his hair, pushing the floppy tendrils away from his forehead and revealing his bright green eyes that suddenly feel intimidating to the look. “I love love, I think. I think there’s something so fun about wanting to be partners with somebody, wanting to be by their side through thick and thin. That’s what makes life exciting. Doing it with another person.”

“Happy for you,” Caroline notes sarcastically, shrugging her shoulders and beginning to write out her discussion post on her computer, completely ignoring Harry’s pointed stare and the judgement passing through his emerald eyes. “Love isn’t safe. This story proves that. Could you imagine falling in love with someone, only to realize they’re not really that person? That would be devastating.”

Harry uncaps his highlighter and pen and begins annotating the remaining sections of the play’s act, ignoring Caroline’s harsh judgements and words. “Guess that’s how you feel but it’s wrong,” he says under his breath, writing carefully his thoughts about the obsession between Olivia and Orsino and Cesario. “At the end of the day, everyone wants to find love in their life. Obviously, you want your love to be requited, but if it’s not, at least you experienced love in some capacity, yeah?”

Caroline doesn’t pick up her head from her computer screen, not bothering to even engage in the conversation with him. Caroline’s barely known Harry for a week, barely spoken to him for more than an hour, and she already heavily dislikes him. “Not particularly.”

“Look Caroline –” Harry goes to say, his eyes growing wide when Caroline cuts him off nearly immediately, shocking him out of his words for a minute.

“Callie, for the umpteenth time. Liv already told you that, I’m sure.”

Harry looks at Caroline with gritted teeth and a clenched jaw, tilting his head slightly and gathering his thoughts before speaking, again. “Callie, I’m not sure what your problem with me is, considering we just met, but–”

Caroline cracks her fingers, sucks in a breath through her teeth and says all in one outburst, “My problem with you, is that you’re not taking this seriously, unlike me, and you’re pretentious and think you’re the best at everything. That is not how you make a first impression and to put it simply, you’ve made the worst one upon me.”

Harry’s mouth clamps shut, his jaw tensing and un-tensing as he breathes in through his nose and out through his mouth, trying to remain composed and not act as though this conversation is absurdly hurting his ego. Harry’s ego is something that he built up so much over time, that it seemed impossible for anyone to tear it down, and yet here she comes, all in one break, destroying his egotistical demeanor. He is good at whatever he works on, the annotations, the poetry, the writing. His confidence is based on the boosts from professors and family and friends always building up his abilities and saying how capable he is to be someone, to be a writer.

And Harry is pissed, pissed that someone that is a bit too insecure themselves, that uses their mental health as a way to treat other people poorly, that wants to say he doesn’t take his education seriously, is trying to make him insecure about himself, too.

“If that’s how you feel,” Harry says, very much insulted by her statement and trying to formulate a response that is worthy to make it known how he feels about everything, “then I’m willing to speak to Rigsby about switching partners. Although, I think it’s unfair that you’ve passed a judgement about me so quickly when I’ve barely made a judgement about you.”

“Okay, Harry. Truthfully, Liv already told me what you said about me that first day I met you. You made judgements about me before we’d even sat down together, alone. That only supports my judgement about you, doesn’t it? That you’re an egotistical, pretentious person that quickly judges others that aren’t like you.”

“Caroline, the only thing that I’ve judged you on is the fact that you use your mental health or whatever the hell it is that you use to gain sympathy from other people. Especially your friends.”

Quickly standing up, she gathers her things and shoves her computer into her backpack, laying her hands on the table and gritting her teeth so hard it looks like her jaw might actually break. Caroline stares Harry down, making him slightly uncomfortable with how hard she’s looking at him. “Harry Styles, you don’t know anything about me or my mental health or my friends. Quite honestly, it’s people like you, that make people like me, not talk about my mental health with others. Maybe you should thank whatever the fuck you believe in that you don’t have to handle mental health issues. And I hope to God that you never fall in love with someone that wakes up with a brain like mine every, single, fucking day because you’ll ruin their life with how lowly you think of them.” Caroline gathers her belongings and hurries out the door, the wind brushing against her cheeks and whipping against her heated skin. Her fists are clenched together in tight coils of anger, one hand releasing from the tight ball and reaching into her bag for her car keys, quickly unlocking her tiny, navy blue sedan and throwing her backpack into the passenger seat and immediately walking around to climb into the driver’s seat.

Harry is speechless, absolutely and utterly speechless, and unable to stand up and say something properly to defend himself before she’s rushing out the door. “Caroline, wait!” Harry pushes his chair out from beneath him, stumbling around the fallen wood and drawing plenty of eyes to his distraught figure as he hurriedly rushes out of the building and into the parking lot where Caroline is spilling expletives with all of her belongings scattered on the ground. “Caroline, wait for a second!” Caroline doesn’t wait, continuing to try and gather all of her things and shove them into her bag but the material is wrapped together and making it difficult and there are tears welling in her eyes as she drops everything frustratedly and sits back on the tarmac in absolute frustration. “Caroline.”

“Harry, what do you want from me?” Caroline takes a deep breath, gathering all of her things, throwing her bag in the passenger seat of her truck and climbing inside, trying to ignore the silence that overwhelms the two of them as they stand there staring at each other. Caroline can feel a tear fall down her cheek in betrayal, the last thing she wanted was to cry in front of him.

“I,” Harry is quiet, unable to fully make a sentence and spit out a coherent thought. “I’m sorry for what I said. I, I didn’t mean it. That was wrong of me to say. Rigsby wanted us to work together because we’re the best students in that class and likely have a few things in common when it comes to working with literature. I need to graduate in May, too. Can you please give me a second chance? I swear I won’t make you regret it.”

Caroline looks at Harry and looks at her white knuckles clutching the steering wheel, the little crescents starting to form in the cushion of the wheel. Guess it’s better that it’s the wheel rather than my thighs, she thinks. There is so much harm that could come from being Harry Styles’ partner, Caroline’s decided. Harry Styles doesn’t understand her mental health, firstly, and he likely never will, based on his reactions and interaction in the first conversations and dialogues they’ve shared. Harry Styles is pretentious and rude, secondly. Harry Styles, thirdly, thinks he’s the very best thing to walk the planet and knowing Caroline’s father, that would be the furthest thing from the truth.

“Honestly, Harry, I can’t,” Caroline says truthfully, shaking her head and grabbing the gear to shift into reverse and back out of the parking lot, Harry quickly moving his feet to avoid being run over with the impatience she’s exhibiting. “I’ll be talking to Rigsby on Monday about a new partner.”

* *

Caroline is angry. Angry is the only way to describe the way she feels, right now. Angry, specifically, with a man by the name of Harry Styles.

Donald Rigsby refused to change their annotation partner, insisting that Harry Styles would make the best pairing for the intensity of the course load that they would be doing throughout the semester. Donald Rigsby said, and Caroline could quote, “Harry Styles is a charming young man that is an excellent writer and I’m sure it’s all a misunderstanding.” Caroline wanted to roll her eyes, to tell him that he’s an asshole that doesn’t understand empathy of any sort. Caroline wanted to say so many things, and instead, she nodded her head silently, forced that famous smile that everyone knows and loves, and walked out of his office with a slight stomp to her feet.

Caroline immediately grabbed her phone and wrote a very calculated worded email to Harry Styles, saying:

Harry,

Unfortunately, and though I tried to talk him out of it, Rigsby has insisted on us being partners, for some reason unbeknownst to me. He has expressed his opinion thoroughly about the topic and would like to not hear further about it. He believes that we will make a great team working on annotating Shakespeare’s texts, based on our work ethic and our talent as writers. Although this is not what I would have wished for, I am hoping for the best, as we both have to graduate at the end of the year, and very much need this course to pass our degrees. I am sending this email as an offering of peace for the time being until we can meet again.

I am free again on Saturday for another annotation meeting for the second act of the play. Is that time going to work for you? Let me know as soon as possible. Thank you.

Callie Ryan

Caroline waits two days for a response from Harry. Two. Whole. Days. Caroline waits for two days, and the only response that she gets is infuriating, absolutely maddening, totally and completely frustrating.

All Harry says is this:

Caroline,

Apology accepted. See you on Saturday.

Harry x

Apology accepted? Apology accepted? Is Harry so dense in that thick skull of his that he thinks that Caroline was apologizing for what she said to him? Absolutely fucking not. Caroline would never apologize for what she said. Caroline wouldn’t apologize for saying that she hopes Harry never falls in love with someone like her, especially. Caroline meant all of it, every single word, from the beginning to the end. Adding onto the fact that she meant all of it, it is her best commentary to this day.

Caroline walks out of her shift at the local bookstore with steam whistling from her ears, her eyes reading over the email again and again, silently wishing that she’ll look at the screen of her phone once more, on the off chance that she clicked the wrong email and it’s not actually what was sent to her. Harry couldn’t be that ridiculous, right?

There isn’t any way that anyone can be that pretentious and uptight. There simply can’t be. Caroline refuses to believe it.

* *

Caroline waits at the coffee shop for nearly six hours, on the day of their meeting, waiting for Harry. Maybe a bit less than that. Maybe a bit less than that because it took her three hours to gear up to meet him with her anxiety and the episode she’s been suffering through. Caroline struggled to get out of bed, to even make it to her car, barely functioning to brush her teeth and thread her fingers through her hair. Her hair has been tangled in a braid for three days, and it’s beginning to look a bit dishevelled, although she has run water through the baby hairs flying around her forehead.

Caroline’s medicine is all out of whack. Originally, it was working for a while, making sure the episodes were manageable and taken care of throughout each stint of the rollercoaster, the lights on and lights off as she’s called it since the earliest age of twelve. However, now, it’s like the medicine isn’t even doing anything to her system, and she’s hitting the highest highs and the lowest lows for weeks without any remorse. Caroline can handle it usually, but with the stress of her father’s anniversary coming in October, the horrible partner she’s been assigned in her annotations course, and the overall overwhelming sensation of graduation lingering around the corner, there’s a bit too much to be able to handle the highs and lows every two weeks.

Caroline is in a Lights Off week.

Caroline can tolerate a lot. Making that clear to people is something that she prides herself on. Caroline can tolerate most things: running late, cancelling, having to reschedule because of a conflict of some sort. Caroline cannot tolerate skipping a meeting entirely … without any warning.

Harry doesn’t show one hour, two hours, three hours, four hours later.

Caroline checks her email twice, maybe even three times to see whether or not he’s emailed her last minute to say that he couldn’t come. Nothing. Not a word from Harry Styles.

Caroline waits around for another hour waiting for Harry, completing the annotations for Act II of The Twelfth Night and finishing the “Act II Discussion” Rigsby posted online earlier that week. Hatred and anger rush through her veins as she thinks about how this should’ve been done with her “partner”, today, and the way that he’s not even had the courtesy to tell her that he had to cancel their meeting and do the work on his own. Caroline gathers her belongings, taking out her phone and dialling her best friend’s number, ready to rant and rave about this person that she’s being encouraged and more so, forced, into talking to daily, that clearly doesn’t respect her or her boundaries for working environments. That may be what makes Caroline even more angry. Harry doesn’t respect her. If Harry does respect her, he surely doesn’t know how to show it.

Caroline clicks on Liv’s number, tucking the phone in between her shoulder and her ear, and gathering her things to take to her car, waving goodbye to the workers that know her by name and shuffling to her vehicle parked in the very first space outside. Caroline makes everything a habit, from where she frequents to the minuscule habits that only a boyfriend or girlfriend could catch onto, like the way she washes her hands twice before dinner and compulsively types her notes on her computer to avoid rewriting after lectures. Caroline is comfortable with her life, with how she lives it, and she isn’t going to let one person get in the way of the peace that she’s brought to her life over the last year without her father around, a feeling of tranquillity that he would have wanted for her.

“Hey, Callie. How’s it going?” Liv says when she answers the phone, a smile evident in her voice and Caroline can only assume she’s with her significant other by the extra voices in the background. “Did you finish your annotations?”

“Of course. Guess who didn’t fucking show, again?” Caroline grumbles, climbing into her car and waiting for the phone to connect to the speaker for her to leave safely. Caroline shakes her head angrily, the utter disappointment and upset building inside of her chest making her want to scream and cry. Could someone really be this insensitive to someone else? Could Harry really be this ridiculous? Donald Rigsby is wrong about Harry Styles. Very wrong. “Things would be fine, I would be fine, if I wasn’t losing my fucking mind over the workload for this class,” she continues, shaking her head and carding her fingers through her hair frustratedly. “I don’t understand how anyone could be so insensitive towards others. It’s absolutely fucking ridiculous. I can’t stand him, Liv. I don’t care what Rigsby has to say about him. I think Harry Styles is the worst person on the planet.”

“Callie,” Liv says softly, warningly, almost and it makes Caroline go silent. Caroline knows what Liv is about to say and she is simply praying that she wasn’t on speaker phone. “Callie, Harry’s here with Niall.” Caroline goes deathly silent, now. Liv walks out of the room, eyeing Harry apologetically, and making her way into her bedroom to talk to her best friend and hopefully calm her down before she comes home. “Cal, Harry was here because he broke up with his girlfriend and needed to talk to Niall.”

“Harry could’ve messaged me,” Caroline mumbles, closing her eyes momentarily and soaking in the silence that overwhelms her car, the moment of silence where her brain is finally quiet and there is nothing to be heard from anyone. Caroline knows it won’t last long. Caroline’s brain is never nice to her for very long.

“Harry says you didn’t give him your number, only your email.”

“Well, yeah. Why would I give a stranger my phone number, Liv?” Caroline sighs, turning into the car park and grumbling when she sees a vintage car parked in her space. Caroline doesn’t need to know anything about anyone to know that a pretentious asshole would have a car, like that. Most certainly it’s Harry’s. “Motherfucker parked in my space, now, too. God damnit!”

“Callie, are you okay?”

“Fine, Liv,” Caroline breathes out, pinching the bridge of her nose and leaning her head back on the headrest behind her. Momentarily, Caroline makes the decision that she’ll take herself to her boyfriend’s house for the week, not really wanting to be around her best friend and his boyfriend and the subsequent asshole that is making himself known around their apartment. “Think I’m going to go to Max’s for the week, this way you and Niall can have the apartment. Getting my things from my car and then I’ll come and get my things.”

“Don’t have to do that, Callie,” Liv sighs, heaving a heavy breath into the speaker and pursing her lips together, trying to find a way to relieve her best friend’s anxiety and the tension creating itself in their conversation as they continue to speak. Caroline always gets angry so easily when her mood is like this, and Liv knows why, she’s not angry over it, she knows what she’s done to make her best friend so frustrated with her and the situation at hand. “I’ll kick Harry out if he makes you uncomfortable, Cal.”

“Olivia,” she says, shaking her head and turning off her car, opening the driver’s door and stepping out onto the concrete, “it’s fine.”

Caroline walks up the steps to their apartment and opens the door quietly, trying to make as little noise and draw as little attention to herself as possible. Harry is standing in the kitchen, laughing with Niall about something unrelated and turns to look at Caroline, his eyes widening at the way she immediately walks straight past him, nudging his shoulder along the way, and to her bedroom to start gathering her belongings that she’ll need to take with her to her boyfriend’s house.

“Caroline,” Harry says, earning a smack to the arm from Niall and a deathly look from Liv. Harry doesn’t care what they say, her name is Caroline, that’s what he’s going to call her. “Can we talk outside?”

Caroline looks at Harry questioningly, her eyebrows coming together in the center of her forehead as she contemplates telling him off right then and there. Harry has an ego bigger than his head, the privilege that exudes from the way he views mental health making her skin crawl with disgust, and an attitude that extends much further than what Caroline could rightfully handle. Could anything good come from a conversation with Harry? Likely not. Has Caroline impulsively decided that this conversation can be her time to tell Harry to go to hell? Yes.

Harry walks outside first, holding the door open and waiting for Caroline to lay her things on the tile flooring near the front door and follow him outside. Harry’s eyes travel across the expanse of her figure, and he’s well aware that it’s wrong, and that she has a boyfriend, but there is something about her that he can’t get his mind to wrap around, that he has an infatuation with.

Anna Marie and Harry broke up this afternoon. That’s the whole reason that Harry came to Liv and Niall, in the first place, to tell them that she’s gone, and they wouldn’t have to deal with her anymore. Niall cheered and Liv smiled knowingly, telling him that Callie and Max were still very much together. Harry assured her that that wasn’t the reason why that he had no intentions of pursuing Caroline, but Liv knows better. Liv knows boys better than that. Harry just shrugged her off and went about his conversation with Niall, talking about the way Anna Marie insisted she was breaking up with him, instead. Harry let her have her way, as long as it meant he wasn’t with her anymore. Could that be considered something that an asshole would do? Likely so. Did Harry care all that much? Not really.

Caroline nods in a halfway ‘thank you’ at Harry as the apartment shuts behind her, knowing fully well that Liv and Niall are waiting on the other side to hear what they have to say to each other. Caroline ignores it, knowing that she’ll get an earful from her best friend whenever they have time alone for being too harsh or mean to her boyfriend’s best friend. Caroline shakes her head at the notion, thinking to herself how ridiculous the whole situation is.

If Harry had just shown up on time, showed a little bit of respect, maybe respected other people’s boundaries, then this wouldn’t be happening. This wouldn’t be a conversation that they have to have. Caroline wouldn’t hate him the way she does.

“Okay,” Harry starts, shrugging his shoulders and leaning against the railing so that his shirt tightens against his chest and the muscles in his arms are on perfect display. If Caroline found him attractive, maybe this would distract her, cause her mouth to go dry and her comebacks to weaken. Good thing it isn’t that way. “Caroline, you think of me as the worst person on the planet?”

“I do, yeah,” Caroline states flatly, leaning against the door and trying to keep her eyes on his. Maintaining eye contact has never been one of Caroline’s strong suits and doing so when she’s obscenely angry is certainly not making it any easier. “Harry, you’re kind of a piece of shit.”

“All this anger because I missed an annotation meeting, and I didn’t tell you?” Harry sounds like he’s mocking her and it’s making Caroline even more angry than she already is. Gabriel Ryan would never tolerate this behavior. “Is that really it, love? Is this something more going on?”

“Don’t ‘love’ me, with your accent, and try and patronize me,” Caroline says through clenched teeth, shaking her head and crossing her arms over her chest to add to her frustrated nature. “That was just icing on the cake, Harry. I really don’t like you.”

“That’s such a shame, innit? ‘Cause I like you.”

“Harry, you don’t even know me!” Caroline is so frustrated she thinks she might cry, tears beginning to gloss over her honey eyes and make her vision blurry. “God, you’re just some privileged guy in my literature class. That’s all you are! Honestly, nothing I say will get through to you! This whole conversation is pointless and useless and a waste of my fucking time!”

“Have you gotten it all out, now, Caroline?” Harry teases, clutching the door handle that Caroline reaches for, blocking her into the door and hovering over her face, his lips merely inches from her mouth, teasing the way her plump flesh entices him for only a second. “Have only one idea on how or what we’re going to do about it to make it better, Caroline. Kiss?”

“Hah! Over my dead body, Harry Styles. Only in your wildest dreams would I ever kiss you.” Caroline slinks beneath Harry’s arms blockading her in and opens the door, frustratedly grabbing her belongings and making her way out of the apartment. “Bye, Liv. Bye, Niall. I’ll see you later.”

“Caroline,” Harry says calmly, reaching for her wrist and grabbing her gently, taking her hand in his and trying to have her attention for more than a moment. Caroline immediately flings her hand out of his and reaches for the keys to her truck. “Meeting this week, maybe? Can get some work done earlier than the weekend if you’d like. I don’t have anything tying me down, now.”

“Harry Styles, you and I are no longer working together. Get this through your thick head. I’m not working with you. I’m not speaking to you. Rigsby never has to know that we didn’t work together. I’ll lie. I don’t want to see you. That’s it. End of story.”

Home.

Home is where many things happen for Caroline and Harry. Home is where Caroline and Harry sing and dance in their kitchen at three in the morning when Caroline is wide awake and needing to be distracted from the intrusive thoughts that are overwhelming her brain. Home is where Harry started his business ventures. Home is where Caroline started writing her novel. Home is where Caroline and Harry kiss beneath the sheets and touch each other intimately and know their way around each other’s bodies, caressing and touching in the most loving way. Home is where the heart is, they say, and that would be true in Caroline’s case.

Harry is home, wherever they are.

Caroline looks at Harry with tears in her eyes, drawing the covers back and gesturing for him to lay in the tiny makeshift bed with her, ignoring the shaking of his head and smirking at the way he sighs and gives in, pushing himself out of the lounger and walking over to her with his notebook in hand, knowing well enough by now that she’ll want him to continue to read to her until she’s sleeping and unable to listen any longer. Her legs are stretched out over his thighs, her cheek laying on his stomach, smiling at the slight pudge that’s accumulated there since they started cooking more meals at home with the bookstore right beneath them. Caroline’s arms circle around his waist, not caring whether or not her arm will fall asleep in the middle of the night or not, and his hands intertwine themselves in her hair, brushing through the straight locks soothingly. His touch is gentle, nurturing, and Caroline suddenly is reminded of when her father used to do the same thing to her when she would have a nightmare or couldn’t sleep.

Harry is like Gabriel in a lot of ways, Caroline recognizes. Maybe, just maybe, that’s why she’s fallen so head over heels in love with him. Caroline never thought she would find a man as good as her father, previous relationships included, and yet, here she is, with one right by her side. Harry is patient and kind, loyal and generous. Harry understands her mental health and never blames her for an episode, good or bad. Harry works with her, and makes sure that she knows that he’s there, no matter what the reason may be. Caroline searched high and low for someone like him, someone that would accept her for the way she is, and even in previous relationships, she never found someone to do it as unconditionally as Harry has. Caroline will be forever grateful for the way they met, although not particularly ideal, because it meant that they met at all.

“Thought you’d be asleep by now, baby,” Harry says softly, brushing his fingers through her hair and kissing her head. “I can read more if you’d like. Do you want to talk instead? Is there anything you want to talk about?”

Caroline’s fingers trace over the pattern on Harry’s shirt mindlessly, the speckled design on the shirt making her frown, realizing that he never had the opportunity to change when he came home. All because of how Harry found Caroline – unconscious in their bedroom. Lying on the floor by their bedside, with her eyes shut and her lips slightly parted. Harry is in his airport clothes, likely reliving the trauma that she’s given him for the rest of his very life.

“Callie,” he says sweetly, taking her attention away from the shirt by lifting her chin and making her eyes meet his, “you don’t have to worry about me. I’m okay.”

“Harry, I should’ve called and told you. I thought I could handle it on my own, that it wouldn’t bother me because there have been so many other times where she rejected me. This time, though, it broke me.” Harry can feel the tears from Caroline’s face soaking into his shirt and trousers and he doesn’t say a word, only turns his body slightly so he’s facing her, and his thumbs can wipe away the tears recklessly falling down her cheeks. “I don’t understand what I did to make her not want me, Harry. All I ever did was be myself. That was too much for her? Am I too much?”

“Never,” Harry says, shaking his head adamantly and pressing his thumb to where her eyebrows have furrowed together and gently rubbing across her skin, kissing her forehead soothingly and lingering there for good measure. “Lucy has a very British way of thinking, Cal. That’s not a great thing when it comes to mental health and all that. Hell, I had a very British way of thinking, at first. There’s a reason we didn’t get along. There’s a reason my friends wouldn’t share things like that with me.” Harry looks at Caroline sincerely and says, “Until I met you.”

Caroline doesn’t say anything for a minute, and Harry thinks that she’s finally fallen asleep. Until an audible breath echoes through the quiet room and Harry looks to see Caroline beginning to wipe tears from her cheeks, once more. “Do you think that we should postpone the wedding? Until I’m better? I’ll understand if you want to delay the wedding, Harry.”

“Caroline Elizabeth,” Harry breathes, shaking his head frustratedly and sighing as he delicately grabs Caroline’s chin and brings her face to meet his. Harry’s thought about delaying the wedding. Of course, Harry has. Although, it’s certainly not because of what Caroline thinks. Harry’s worried that she’ll have another episode in the meantime and want to cancel the wedding altogether while they’re trying to make final preparations and there will be nothing that he can do to change her mind. “I’m marrying you in three months. That’s final. I don’t want to hear another word about it from you. I’m marrying you, I’ve been wanting to marry you, and I’m ready to marry you. Okay, Cal?”

“Okay.”

Harry sighs and kisses her forehead soothingly, gently scratching at her head and kissing a line from her forehead to her nose to her mouth. “I love you, Caroline.”

“Know you do.”

Harry smiles at that, gently turning his body over and laying on his back, allowing Caroline to make herself comfortable. His hands reach for his journal on the makeshift bedside table, opening to a marked page with a poem that he wrote on the plane the day he left, the day everything went wrong, thinking about how much he would miss her and want to be with her every day until they were in each other’s company. “I’m happy that you know.”

“Have you got any clue how much I love you, Harry?”

Harry turns his head to look at Caroline, her eyes slowly shutting and her lips slightly parted as she sucks in deep breaths and gives way to the sleep that’s been nagging at her eyelids for nearly an hour. Harry’s heart is so warm and swollen with Caroline in his arms that it makes him almost forget to answer her. “Have some idea, yeah. It’s a lot. Love me a lot, don’t you?”

“More than anything.”

“Feel the same way about you, Callie,” Harry says honestly, scratching lightly at her scalp and letting his mouth linger with a kiss on her forehead for a while. “Love of my life, you are.”

Harry always means what he says, Caroline knows this. Caroline knows this, even though her brain is bombarded with intrusive thoughts telling her that he’ll leave her like everyone else, eventually. “Falling in Love” is a hard concept to truly understand, to make one’s brain believe they’re worthy of deserving. Caroline has waited a long time, a very long time, to feel like she is worthy of love. Caroline knows why the relationship never worked out with her ex, with Max – because she didn’t feel worthy to be loved by him. Caroline isn’t sure what happened with Harry that made the switch, which made her feel like maybe this one will show her that she’s worthy of it.

Certainly, it’s because of how Harry loves. Harry is the perfect way to learn to love yourself because the way he loves is so unconditional and pure. Harry loves with his whole chest, with his whole might, with a ferocity that makes you feel like you’re the only person on the planet that means anything to him. Caroline, although obsessed with him, certainly hasn’t always felt this way. Caroline certainly couldn’t stand to be around Harry for a while, which made it nearly impossible to see how she could have fallen in love with him. Of everything, their relationship is everything but a mystery, of a circular moment of hatred to love, of infatuation to lust. Harry is the perfect example of the quote, “But our hatred is almost indistinguishable from our love.”

Caroline looks to Harry and simply stares for a while, not saying anything, soaking in the way his fingers brush through her hair and his perfect lips are pursed together in thought as he mindlessly watches the reruns of a television program on the clunky machine shelved in the corner of the room. Caroline doesn’t necessarily want children, for the sake of genetically passing her brain to another human, but looking at Harry, right now, and the way that he is with her, she thinks that it wouldn’t be so horrible to have another version of him toddling around. Caroline knows she’s in love, then – when everything changes because of him.

Harry says something suddenly, his eyes still trained on the television, his fingertips scratching Caroline’s head softly to gain her attention to reality. “Callie, I think you’re incredibly brave.”

Caroline smiles softly, shaking her head and nudging further into Harry’s embrace, threading her leg through his thighs and cuddling closer to him, whispering, “But it is not bravery; I have no choice. I wake up and live my life. Don't you do the same?”

“All the Light We Cannot See?”

Caroline nods with a smile. Harry knowing the novels she references has always made her feel warm inside. “Can you read me one more?” she wonders, nodding towards the poetry journal in his hands and the marked pages that are bending out of the cover. “Only one.”

“Only if you promise to go to sleep,” he says sternly, opening the pages and turning towards the one that is the most recent, the most freshly how he’s feeling. Harry’s been writing poetry about Caroline for so many years that it seems almost impossible that there are things he has forgotten to say or neglected to say. And yet, nearly every day, there is something new that he wants to find the words to express about the love of his life. “Have all those doctor’s visits in the morning, Callie, and the psychiatrist is coming to check on your medicine before we can leave.”

“Fair enough.”

“Only one,” Harry warns, clearing his throat and opening the page, smiling at Caroline’s eyes are already squeezing shut and ready to let his voice lull her to sleep. “Goodnight, my love.”

“feeling you against my chest // my heart is beating, undeniably a mess // you are everything all at once // and i’d do anything for you to see // that you are all i ever need.”

𝚝𝚊𝚐𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝: @goldenbabys-world, @burberryharold, @stylesfics-xx, @grace-ful-gold, @summertimestyles, @laur-sogolden, @yourhsficsplug, @morethanamelodyy, @truckerhatharry, @plzplzme

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ramblings-of-a-mad-cat · 4 years ago

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(sees another fandom that I can ask you about and cheers) Orphan Black! Thoughts? I don't know Dr Who but Tatiana is one of my favorite actors period.

Anon you are so sweet! I'm always happy to chat about fandoms and characters and whatnot, and I will never not appreciate the majesty of Tatiana's acting. That is one of the greatest parts of the show hands down.

Orphan Black, to me, is a show that had incredible potential, but didn't really live up to the excitement it created. (Loooong post ahead.)

The thing is, Orphan Black builds a chilling mystery and background, the world it gradually creates as it goes for about the first two seasons, got be very invested and made me wonder a lot about where it was going to go and what the answers were. The setup is brilliant, right from the start with that iconic cold open of Beth's suicide. The unknown is what really helped this show get as thrilling as it was, because the actual answers behind the unknown were kind of hit and miss, and it seemed like far too often, the show just wasn't interested in telling it's story. Hijinks where the clones impersonate each other in slice of life events? That's fun at first and it really works well as they're still getting to know each other. But after a while, it gets tedious, and it seems like the show would rather fuck around and have dance parties (seriously, that scene was such a #BigLippedAlligatorMoment) than focus on the story and the threat that the sisters are facing. Virtually all of Allison's plotlines are like this, they feel like they belong in a different show, and for some reason the writers insisted on giving her one of these storylines like, every season. After Allison passively murders her own friend out of suspecting that she's spying on her, I just don't feel like an arc about her running for some PTA office position even matters. It doesn't feel right.

Speaking of that, here's another example: Donnie. Why did the end of the first season suggest that he was this secret mastermind working for Leekie? The whole idea just deflates in Season 2 and doesn't really go anywhere. He just goes back to being the bumbling sweetheart he was before. Why even have him be the spy? Maybe it should have been Ainsley. Do you want to know the exact moment that I think Orphan Black went wrong? Like, the specific scene? When Leekie was killed off. The character who had thus far been the Big Bad, gets taken out in the stupidest possible way, a literal accident on Donnie's part, and it's even played for laughs. After that point, the show really struggled to regain it's footing, though I don't think it completely went off the rails until about Season 4, and it was still generally hit or miss. Like, some stuff was really good. The introduction of the Castor clones, the development of Rachel's character (I'll get to her, trust me.) and the reveal of Kendall Malone. But it seemed like so much else was just forgotten or otherwise not resolved. Whatever happened to Cal? Sure, the show wanted to focus on the sisters...but Kira deserves to know her father if she wants to. That's just one example. It's a crying shame because this show is sometimes incredible. The metaphor that I always use for situations like this, is a card game. The show has all the right cards in its hand, they're just not being played.

The two strongest characters, at least to me, were Rachel and Helena. One of these characters was superbly written and went through a devastating arc. The other was Helena. We need to talk about her. In Season 1, she really cemented herself as a memorable presence with her trademark accent, her scars, her whole damn personality (again, hats off to Tatiana) and of course, that iconic screechy theme music that accompanied her. Which at first made us jump, but eventually made us cheer. I adored Helena, and I loved the development of her relationship with Sarah. Who went from shooting her in Season 1, to being deadset on rescuring her in Season 3, being furious with Siobhan for betraying her. (This is unrelated but Siobhan has the same " twist villain fakeout" at the end of Season 1 that Donnie does, and it's quite frustrating.) And yet, I swear, the writers just didn't know what to do with Helena half the time. They put her on a bus for long stretches, including one point where she just up and leaves Allison's house in Season 4, for no given reason. And the characters just kind of...don't care. The same thing happens when she gets arrested. No one cares to try and find Helena, even though she's unstable and often a danger to those around her. Even though she's by herself with no real ability to function in society. Even though she's pregnant. There is no excuse for this, and no Sarah, that "I'm sorry, I avoided you" scene in Season 5 is not going to cut it. It's such an afterthought.

I'm being rather critical, but I hope you can tell that this is from a point of passion. I genuinely enjoyed this show and getting to watch it. Just that sometimes it didn't feel like the show cared that I was watching. However, this was not true whenever Rachel was onscreen. Look, I'm a Merula Snyde stan, so you can probably already guess how I feel about Rachel. Despite her crimes, despite her constant slipping back the dark side, I felt so bad for Rachel at the end of it all. That scene with Kira really sums it up. "Who hurt you?" "All of them." And no scene is more intense than when she stabs out the eye cam. Like, I'm sorry, I pitied Rachel pretty much from Season 2 on. Her parents were horrible to her, and I'm supposed to think Ethan is the good guy here? He kills himself in front of his own daughter, telling her that she doesn't deserve him. And then Sarah shoots a pencil through her eye, causing brain damage and requiring a long recovery. I'm not saying that Sarah was wrong to do what she did, just that if I were in her shoes, I'd still feel a degree of guilt for Rachel's condition. In the end, I'm devastated that she was barred from Clone Club, when she made the right decision at the point it mattered. But there's just too much history there, and Sarah won't ever forgive her. (Though again, I do feel as though there's blame to share.) Rachel is my favorite character and I never expected her to be. But she's just so complex. Side note: "Enjoy your oophorectomy" is so damn quotable. I don't know why but I love that line.

So, Rachel's my favorite. Who's my least favorite? It might surprise you. It's Delphine. I'm sorry, but I just...I couldn't get on board with C*phine. Not after Season 3. I was waiting for the point that the show would push to finally redeem Delphine for her turncoat role, for all of the hell that she put Cosima through. By Season 5 though? I realized that as far as the writers were concerned? She already was redeemed. Even though she did nothing to earn it, except be presumed dead by Cosima. The way she treats Cosima in Season 3 is actually disgusting. Her reasoning for breaking up with Cosima is circular. She has to love "all the clones" in order to be with Cosima, and the way to do that is to take over Rachel's job, which means they can't date anymore? I'm not the only one who thought that didn't make sense, right? Oh and let's talk about how she stalks Cosima's date, breaks into her house, and threatens her life. Red. Flags. Cosima even says the line, "If you're not going to be with me, just let me go." I'm sorry, that should not be something she has to beg for. Delphine's behavior made me want her to stay far, far away from Cosima. Who is, incidentally, a sweetie and I absolutely adore her. I legit have trouble remembering that Tatiana's playing her because she just looks and acts so different. That said, even though I immensely disliked Delphine, I am so very glad that they made one of the clones gay. Just like I'm glad that they made one of them trans. (Though...Tony wasn't handled especially well.)

In general, I do think the earlier seasons were stronger. The Brightborn arc, while interesting, didn't really contribute much to the overarching narrative. We got the backstory on Beth's suicide and finally learned the truth about her, I suppose. Still, even though Beth is one of my favorite of the clones, and I never expected her to be either...I feel like the actual reason given for why she took her own life was rather illogical. She apparently did it because the investigation was putting the clones in danger of another Helsinki. Okay, but just because Evie Cho says you should off yourself, doesn't mean you have to. You could just, like...stop investigating. And if you die under mysterious circumstances without explaining anything to the sisters, they're not going to be put off from the investigation. They're going to look into this even more, because they don't know why they're not supposed to. The reveal that she and Art fell in love toward the end adds an extra gut punch, but it also doesn't make sense because wouldn't Art have referenced it during the period that he thought Sarah was Beth? On the other hand, Season 4 also introduced MK. And I have such a soft spot for her. I adore that sheep-masked sweetie. Everyone always asks "Which clone would you date" (because fandoms can think of nothing else I guess) and I never see anyone give any love to MK. Her death absolutely tore me apart. I am glad Siobhan avenged her even if she went down at the same time. Side note, her last word being the affectionate "Chickens..." Broke me.

Season 5 was a strange beast. In general, it seemed like we were finally getting some answers to the questions that were hanging over us. Exploring the deep mythos. But then they kind of turned it around and made it just be a Wizard of Oz style fraud twist. Westmoreland isn't really inhumanly old, he's a charlatan. I don't know why that was necessary in a science fictional show. I've seen the interviews and I get what they were going for, it just feels like it would have been cooler and far creepier if he was actually that old. The puppet master pulling the strings the whole time. We also finally get some answers for Kira's superhuman healing abilities (though we never learn how she's telepathically connected to the clones) and I'm loving it, but the trouble is, it's inconsistent. Ethan "Why is this guy so popular, he's an asshole" Duncan told Rachel specifically that Sarah being able to have children was a fluke, that the clones were "barren by design." I don't know, the whole concept of Revival and of the "magical island" was really foreboding and tied in with the earlier references to The Island of Doctor Moreau. Especially that song about "Revival's Children" just...the shudders, man. But just having it be a regular old scam is...a letdown. I know it may be more realistic, but I don't always need realism in my scifi. The finale is interesting, in that it's mostly an epilogue. I'm glad the clones (sans Rachel) got to live happily ever after, but there are two gut punches right at the end that are total nitpicks but they bother me. Helena naming her kids after Art and Donnie? And writing a memoir that she names "Orphan Black?" Those two tropes can go die in a hole. They can enjoy an oophorectomy, because I'm so sick of them.

The potential of Orphan Black was practically infinite. The results of Orphan Black fell frustratingly short.

#Orphan Black #Alison Hendrix #Rachel Duncan #Helena Orphan Black #Sarah Manning #Cosima Niehaus #Long Post #Beth Childs #Ramblings #Veera Suominen #Donnie Hendrix #Aldous Leekie #Ethan Duncan #Delphine Cormier #Siobhan Sadler #Clone Club #Arthur Bell #Tatiana Maslany

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practicingmedicine · 4 years ago

Text

Practicing Medicine: Chapter Seven

(+)7

2075 ROBCO(R)

LOADER V1. 1

EXEC VERSION 41.10

32K RAM SYSTEM

14302 BYTES FREE

HOLLOWTAPE LOADED: "THE-WORST-THING-EVER"

INITIALISING….

SUCCESS!

STATUS

Battery Level: 42%

Wireless Signal: (?)

Operating Temperature: 92F

HEALTH

BP: 170/130

SPO2: 100%

Temp: 99.5F RR: 28

HR: 185

TIME

Day: 24 SEP. 2279

Time: 16:10

CLIMATE

Current Temperature: 76 F

Atmospheric Pressure: 750 mm

Background Radiation: 1.321 RAD

WARNING: Dangerous wasteland creature in range!

Yeah, no shit, Sherlock! Why don't you tell me my chance of survival as a percentage too!

I'd been tipping back in my chair when the wall exploded, so now I was sitting on my ass in a state of total mental shock, slowly butt-scooting my way backwards. The NCR soldier who I'd been sitting beside popped up, knocking his stool over in the process.

"Ayuda!" he shouted. He was shooting his rifle, but it wasn't making any noise. He screamed something about shit ammo and started yanking on the charging bolt.

Amongst the wreckage, Tandi tried to stand back up. How she survived an impact like that was beyond me, but I wasn't about to point that out. She turned her head to look at Gram.

"Gram, get the-" she started. Before she could finish, the big white reptile threw itself directly at her, knocking over the entire table and crushing Cook and Jas as Tandi rolled out of the way, trailing pink insulation foam behind her. Gram sprinted past me and started clambering up the stairs to the second floor, leaving poor Chomps sitting in stunned silence.

The deathclaw reared around to face Tandi, who had drawn a six-gun from her hip.

"Fuck off, cyka!" shouted Tandi, and emptied it directly into his face, shattering his jaw and blasting off his nose.

The gunshots, the shrieks of the injured beast, the dust that was gathering in the air... it was all so overwhelming! I'd never been so close to anything so dangerous, and my whole body was screaming at me to run for my life, but I just couldn't send the signals to my muscles. I couldn't move, couldn't shout, couldn't breath...

The beast lunged at Tandi again, and she caught him by his arm and snapped it against her leg, then grabbed onto his broken jaw and forced it into the back of his throat. He immediately swung his other hand at her, impaling her through her forearm and thigh. He probably would have disemboweled her in the next motion, but was interrupted by a sudden hail of gunfire.

My eardrums pounded as the soldier fired shot after shot from his now-functional rifle, striking the deathclaw all across it's back and arms, poking lots of inconsequential little holes in the thing. By the end of the magazine, I couldn't hear anything but a loud ringing, so I didn't even get to hear the soldier's scream as the Deathclaw reeled around and folded him against the wall, taking all the life out of his body and sending him tumbling to the ground in a way that made it clear that he'd not be getting back up. The beast stalked over to him...

And in Came chomps like a goddamn pro wrestler, swinging a stool over his head like a sledgehammer. The beast didn't even bother to turn around as it raked Chomps across his entire upper body with its good claw. I could see the blood running down his face as Chomps stumbled backwards into the fallen table and fell onto his back, trying to figure out which of his massive wounds to clutch as he writhed about with his legs in the air.

Then, the thing turned it's whole upper body to face me. Our eyes connected.

Have you ever been so scared that you choked on your own spit? Because, as the beast stared at me with its one remaining eye, I distinctly remember gagging so hard that I started choking on my own spit.

It started walking towards me- a big, ghost-white beast, stained all over with its own blood, all its parts hanging loose- and I involuntarily let out a mix between a wet cough and a squeal. More logic-defying noises escaped my mouth as I scrambled for the stairs, trying and failing to stand up in the process. But it wasn't me who the deathclaw was keying in on now- It was Gram, standing behind me on the stairwell with a laser gun.

"Cover your ears, Boy!" He shouted over the ringing, and I followed his advice. I pressed my hands against my ears and shut my eyes.

Next thing I felt was heat on my skin- wasn't no light, but there was heat alright! Heat and a noise like a can of sarsaparilla taking a fifty cal right in the center! Drops of hot liquid splashed across my skin.

Next thing that hit were the smells. Burning fat, a delicious dinner and clouds of gunpowder, pools of coagulating blood and bodily fluids; The sounds- screaming, shouting, sobbing, and there was that damn ringing in my ears! My head hurt too, and my skin was all hot and prickly. I swear I could feel my chest caving in, I was breathing so hard…

"Isaac! Isaac, get moving, people are dying! ISAAC!"

Someone hit me in the back of the head, so I turned around and bit them as hard as I could. I could taste blood so vividly, as they pulled their hand back, putting them off balance. I grabbed the wrinkled, bleeding hand and yanked it forward, pulling its owner down the stairs and onto the floor. Someone walked up to me and tried to say something to me so I started screaming as loud and hard as I could, until they backed away.

Then it struck me- the deathclaw was dead. It's head had been hollowed out, pieces scattered all over the room. No one was even paying attention to me as I beat the ever living shit out of Gram, who had probably just saved my life. They all had their own problems.

I was hyperventilating, I realized, and it was making my vision go dark around the edges. I tried to regulate my breathing as I scanned the room, wondering what the hell I was supposed to do first. But it was hard- so, so hard with all the ringing, and the prickly hot feeling on my skin and the static in my head!

Where to start? I started compiling a mental list of all the problems that I had to fix, or "doing triage," as my father would have said. In my head, it looked something like this:

I'd hurt Gram after he hit me in the back of the head, but he was already getting back up.

Cook was lying underneath a table, wheezing and trying to get it off her chest- she was probably having trouble breathing, but Jas was helping her at the moment, and she was making noise so it couldn't be that bad.

The NCR soldier was in a bad way, probably got his back broke. I couldn't tell if the blood all over his back was his or the deathclaws, which warranted a closer look, but there was still air going through his body so I'd put him on the back burner for now.

That left Tandi and Chomps, the two with the nastiest wounds. If the claw had hit his throat, Chomps would be dead very soon, if he wasn't dead already. I decided to deal with him first. Ignoring Gram's muttered insults, I stalked across the room and fell down on one knee beside the old man. There was a frightening amount of blood pooling around his head, and my heart rate picked up when I dragged him on his side and gave him a quick once over.

Three parallel gashes- One deep wound across his stomach, one relatively shallow one across his upper chest and collarbone, and one across his forehead that was bleeding profusely but which had stopped at the skull. I saw no signs of life-threatening bleeding, though his intestines were poking out through the stomach wound. I motioned towards Gram.

"Gemme a wet towel." In spite of what I'd done to him, he didn't argue with me, disappearing into the kitchen without a word. I looked back at Chomps. I'd been an idiot and left my medical kit in the cart, so my emergency treatment was going to have to be improvised. I didn't like that, but I wasn't about to leave any of the people in the room to go get the kit. I'd have to make do for the moment.

First step would be to remove the clothes around the evisceration. How was I going to do that? I couldn't just pull off his overalls. I'd have to cut through them. What options did I have for cutting? My utility knife was in my medical pouch. But, when they'd set the table, there had been steak knives…

Find a steak knife, I told myself, and started scanning the floor. I could faintly hear the back door open as Gram headed outside to pump water on a towel, which I'd use to dress the evisceration. Steak knife, steak knife…

Amidst the debris, I found a fork and steak knife lying together, so I took both just in case I ended up needing the fork for something. After putting a quick gash in the pale, unfeeling strip of skin on my forearm to get a feel for the knife's cutting edge, I leaned back over Chomps and slid the knife against his blood-soaked denim. It took a bit of force, but once I had cut through the tough edge, it became a lot easier to run my knife through the worn material. I cut out a rough square of cloth all around his chest, and carefully peeled it off his sticky, bloody skin. Poor man was conscious, I noticed, but he wasn't saying nothing. Just watching.

"Don't try and move. Your guts weren't ripped, but they might be if you start squirming. No matter how much it hurts, you gotta stand still," I said, tearing off the loose strip of overalls and bunching it up into a makeshift rag for later. It wasn't sanitary, but it'd have to do.

Gram came back in shortly after, carrying several ragged towels soaked in water. I gave him a nod of acknowledgment and held my arms out for Gram to drop the towels into. Not stopping to check his trajectory, Gram tossed the load in my arms, and continued walking until he reached Tandi. He knelt down beside her.

"Toss me the pip boy!" He shouted. I was confused for a second, then remembered the medical profiles I'd created. Quick as I could, I logged off the pip-boy, and tossed it underhanded to Gram. I didn't wait to see if he caught it.

"Remember: Don't move," I said, laying the wet towel across Chomps's jutting intestines. He winced as the towel touched the wound, but he didn't squirm. Don't think there was much that could've made Chomps squirm.

"You're doing great!" I told him, securing the towel around the edges. I checked the rest of his wounds. His airway was swell, and the leaks in his forehead and chest weren't gonna kill him. Which means he was as stable as he was going to get, without a stimpack. "I'll come back to you soon. I need to check the soldier…"

"No, Fuck that guy! Tandi's been thrown through a goddamn wall!" shouted Gram, but it sounded quiet next to the ringing in my ears. I rubbed my temples. Jas had gotten the table off of Cook, and was doing what I guessed to be a misguided attempt at CPR on her, for some reason. Probably because she was complaining about breathing? First things first, I needed to put a stop to that

"Jas, does Cook have a pulse?" I asked, barely able to hear my own voice. Jas nodded.

"Yeah, but she says that she can't breathe, so I'm doing-"

"Stop doing that! CPR is for dead people!" Jas didn't complain no more, instead standing up and going to examine the NCR soldier. If Gram was telling the truth, I didn't have time to worry about how Jas was going to screw him up, so I ignored her and hurried over to Tandi. Surprisingly, she was still conscious. She gave me a weak middle finger as I sat down.

"Helmet off- stop moving it if she complains about her neck," I said. Gram complied immediately. Tandi didn't have anything to say as the helmet came off, revealing her sweaty, mutilated face. There were no new injuries there, though it was still as shocking as ever.

"Where's it hurt, Tandi? Is your back okay?" I asked. She looked up at me like I was stupid.

"No, I'm completely paralyzed. Dumb whore..." I rolled my eyes.

"Surely, I am as dumb as they come! But, the pip-boy says you've got internal bleeding, and it's still figuring out where. Where're you hurtin' at?" Tandi laughed a little.

"Internal? Then it's in the right place." I shook my head and inspected her pip-boy image. There were so many warnings that it was impossible to try to interpret them all. I suddenly really wished I could read, even just a little more.

"Tandi, this is life or death! Where did it-" Suddenly, the image on the screen changed. The pip boy beeped, and a blinking warning sign appeared dead in the center of her character's chest. The BP stat, I noticed, was down from the last measurement.

"Y'have no idea how often people say that. Anyways, he hit me-" she started. I began to pull off her coat. I elbowed Gram in the shoulder, and pointed at the stricken woman.

"Strip her down. Tandi, please help as much as you can!" She gave me a suspicious look.

"And what if I don't want you exploring all up in my nooks-and-crannies?"

"Tandi, something is very fucking wrong! Help me take the armor off!" She clutched her wounded leg and growled at me.

"...Aggghhh, Fine! But I'll kill you afterwards."

Gram worked on taking off the armor supporting her back, while I removed her dented chest-plate. Once I'd gotten that free, I took off her shirt, Gram removed her baggy jeans, and we got to work freeing her armor harnesses. When one of the clips got stuck, I picked up my steaknife from the ground and sliced through the whole strap. It was surprisingly easy to cut through, I guess for emergency situations like this. Once I got that off, Tandi was left in her sportswear. I removed her chest wrapping on account of some bruising in that area. Her knickers weren't covering nothing up, so I left those alone.

The full picture was distressing, real distressing. Amongst Tandi's considerable collection of old scars, there were several huge, rapidly swelling patches of yellow, purplish skin all over her body, the biggest of which was right over her heart. I pulled my stethoscope off my neck and plugged it into my ears- had em backwards, got them in the right way and then checked around for her heartbeat, and got back a faint, muffled noise. Combined with her wormlike neck veins and the fact that I couldn't even get a pulse on her femoral at this point, that made Beck's Triad. Father always told me I'd never be able to diagnose tamponade like that on a real clinical exam, but here were all three symptoms, sticking out like a compound fracture.

"Oh no," I breathed. I tried to compose myself, but panic was already overtaking my mind. Before I even spoke, I could hear my voice cracking. "Jas! Get- uh, break into the wagon out back, and grab the orange bag and the other one, the other emergency-looking one. Bring em back fast!" Jas looked at her fallen companion, who she had sat up against the wall, then at the door, then at me. Slowly, she stood up, walked away from the unconscious soldier, and exited out the back door, picking up speed as she went.

Preparing myself for what came next, I placed the cold knife against Tandi's bare, swollen chest, and started counting ribs. One, two, three, four, five... The tip came to a rest beneath her right breast.

"What are you doing?" She asked. I pressed the knife a bit harder, seeing how hard I'd need to press to cut her sweaty skin. Not very. A drop of blood seeped out from under the knife.

"There's blood gathering in the lining around your heart, Tandi. I gotta open your chest up to fix you." Tandi's eyes opened wide.

"What- NO!"

I felt her grab onto my wrist, but she was late; I'd already abandoned any doubts that might've been left in my head and punched my knife through her chest, right by her sternum. A primal scream filled my ears as I dragged the blade through the layers of skin and fat, all the way to her shoulder blade. I shoved my hand into her intercostal space.

"Spread her ribs and hold 'em," I grunted. Gram made a face.

"Oh, Christ..." Tandi continued to shriek in pain and squeeze my wrist as Gram spread the wound like a clam shell. I tried to wrap my fingers around her pulsating heart, but couldn't quite get at it. I pushed her lung aside.

"Stop it! Da idi ty, fuck you! Otvyazhis'!" Tandi cried, but I didn't stop. I couldn't. It had to be done, or her pericardium would fill up with blood and squeeze her heart til it stopped beating. I kept digging around as the blood coursed over my hands and arms; I was slick up to the elbows with it.

"Anyone got a flashlight?" Gram shook his head. I swore and spit on the ground. That was gonna make this next part a lot harder.

Tandi kept on hollering and thrashing as I tried in vain to get a grip on the pericardial sac without also grabbing the throbbing heart inside. My fingers were too slippery to pinch it, so I pulled the dinner fork out of my pocket and hoisted the sac up that way. It slipped off the fork a couple times before I could get it in a good position, but once I had it pulled taught, I didn't waste any time opening it up between the phrenic nerves- Tandi was dying quick. She looked like she'd been drained by a vampire, and her shrieks of pain had already quieted down to confused sobbing.

"Ah hell Isaac, I don't know how long I can hold this! Could you hurry up?" grunted Gram. I could see the muscles straining beneath his skin, bulging in his face and neck. His arms were quaking.

"Yeah, sure! Now help me turn her over…" I put my hands on Tandi's back and worked with Gram to move her on her side, so the blood could leak out of her cavity. The floor was covered in the stuff by now, and it had streaked and smeared where she'd been struggling. I tried to ignore it as I got down on my hands and knees and stared into her wound. "Great. I'm gonna peek down here again, try and figure out where it's-"

Before I'd even finished my sentence, a gout of bright red blood sprayed out the cut I'd made in the pericardium, all over my chest and face. It dripped down my glasses like some sort of cheesy horror-movie effect.

"Doc! Hey, Doc, I've got the stuff!" I looked over my shoulder to see Jas stumbling in through the back door, carrying both the stimpack bag and my medical bag in her arms. I motioned for her to set them down next to me. "Um, there's a few stimpacks here, which should I-"

"Fuck it! It don't matter!" Something like a laugh rattled through my chest as I snatched the syringe out of Jas's hand. Tandi's heart coughed out another gob of blood, but I'd already moved to the side, and soon my hand was in the clamshell wound again. My fingers clawed for the source of the blood.

"I'm hurting bad!" grunted Gram. I started probing with my stimpack.

"Well don't let go, use a- I don't know, use anything!" I was hardly paying much attention to Gram at this point. I could feel the blood coursing over my fingers as they brushed over some artery, can't say which one, and I figured pretty quickly where the rupture was. I jabbed the stimpack in.

And Missed.

I tried again, and missed. Which gave me that sinking feeling that you get in your stomach when you realize that you've not got much time, and your body just isn't the right machine for the task. Usually that came with a certain embarrassment, that telltale hotness of the skin, but not this time. This time, the hair on my arms stood up straight, and the sweat on my skin grew cold.

I looked over at Gram. His eyes were jammed shut, he'd bit through his upper lip- and his hands, shaking more than ever. My hands were shaking too. The animalistic energy that'd been carrying me through this had gone. For a moment, I was just a kid again, in over his head and scrambling for a way out.

But it was only a moment. Like a lumberjack throwing all his weight behind an axe, I took three more passionate stabs with the needle before piercing the artery. I had no hope of suturing it now, so I just hoped to high hell that pushing stimpack juice through the pipe and pinching the rupture shut with my nails would actually work. I'd made so many choices based on pure hope already, what was more on the pile?

The moment I pulled my hand out and discarded the empty stimpack, Gram grunted and collapsed on top of Tandi. He'd stopped holding the site open, but his fingers were still buried in the bleeding wound. His lungs rattled with each jagged breath.

"What- what should I do? Do you need help with her?" panted Jas, and I waved her away. I was panting too, panting and hot and covered in sweat and blood and god knows what else. I could feel my heart beating in every crevice of my aching body.

But was Tandi's heart still beating?

Her eyes were open and unreactive, her skin was pale and waxy. Seemed like she was breathing, but the hairs on my arms still stood up as I prodded around for a pulse near her groin; there was nothing at first, then a faint squirming beneath my fingertips, and then nothing again. The skin felt cool as glass. I put my hand on Gram's back.

"What's her- check the pip boy, what's her BP say?" Gram lifted his head up just slightly to look at the pip boy screen.

"Seventy six and fifty." There was a solemn silence. "Is that…?"

"That's good. Better, I mean.

I wiped some of the sweat off my brow again. It was pointless, seeing as how I probably deposited a bunch of blood when I did it, but I had to let out all that relief somehow. I hadn't even been able to get a femoral pulse when I'd checked last time, which meant that her pressure had been somewhere below seventy. A jump back up to seventy six was good news.

Of course, Tandi's troubles weren't over- her pericardium was slit, she still had herself a gaping hole in the chest, and the cavity was still full of blood in spite of my efforts. I grabbed my hand-suction pump from out of my bag and hooked up the reservoir, plunged in the tip, and got to work squeezing. An onlooker might have thought that I was still putting in my all, but at this point, my mind was elsewhere. I glanced over my shoulder.

"Jas, you wanna be helpful, right?" I asked. I didn't wait for a response. "Prepare the worker's quarters for all these patients. I want beds, I want chamber pots, whatever we can get. And when you're done with that, you and me are gonna haul these folks upstairs."

Jas might've said something to me after that, but I couldn't hear it over the fuzz in my head, the static of stress. I looked around the room one last time, and I don't think I have to tell you the specifics of what I saw; just that I could tell right then that this would be, without a doubt, the longest night of my life.

[+]

#fallout #fallout fanfic #fallout fanfiction #fallout fandom

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adrischrv · 5 years ago

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REGNUM [L.H] - Chapter 3

Author´s note: Hi! Here´s the third chapter! English is not my first language so lemme know if there are any mistakes.

Word count: 2,902

Introduction. C1. C2.

The morning after the ball was quiet. The lack of Queen Susan’s joyful life was as strange as the King’s laughter and everyone in the palace could feel it. Even, though I only knew them for a short time. I remembered finding my mother talking on the phone with the Queen about nonsense to serious business matters, I was infinitely grateful to the Queen for taking my mother away from a couple of lessons.

Gardenstone has a particular way of saying goodbye to its loved ones: people would write a word describing such people on an acorn, they would gather and water them all over the forest. A nice old lady explained to me that different trees sprouted like the oak tree and when they grew up a person was also born with the written word in a way that reflected the impact you have on the world even after you die. She could assure me that people with good intentions would come out of the words of Queen Susan, King Robert, and Prince Jake.

“Fifty delivered and about… sixty more arrived.”

Luke nodded, tired. I left the piles of papers on the big desk in front of him and took a seat on the other side.

After he had been appointed King and after the farewell, thousands of petitions from citizens and nobles had arrived in the early hours waiting to be authorized. Seeing the load of papers, I offered to help Luke and avoid the collapse of my neighboring country. My mother decided to do the same on her own by talking to the dukes and duchesses who feared for the future of Gardenstone as it was justly uncertain.

“I slept for two hours… and everyone wants me to approve petitions, I don’t understand why.”

Luke had spoken more to himself, but that didn’t stop me from laughing a little.

“What’s so funny?” He asked, paying attention for the first time all morning.

“Of course they want you to approve petitions. They’re taking advantage. Since your father, may he rest in peace, is no longer the king, they expect you to approve everything he didn’t. But I hope you have not approved many, parliament will have a lot to discuss and it will probably be exhausting.”

Luke was stunned, looking for the right way to hide his inexperience.

“It’s parliament’s job, exhausting or not.”

“They wouldn’t give the same importance to every role and something important might be disapproved of or something unimportant might be approved, it’s risky.”

“If you know so much, why don’t you do it?”

Clearly, the regulation of his tone had a flaw causing it to come out more aggressively than planned.

“It would be a pleasure. I firmly believe that I can do it better than you, Your Majesty.”

Luke let go of the pen in his hand and crossed his arms. If I didn’t think it was funny I’d say he was trying to be intimidating but suddenly he relaxed his gaze.

“I’d like to check that out. Oh, and also about approving petitions, princess.”

I clenched my fists but like him I relaxed my gaze, ready to give an intelligent answer.

“I’m sorry I dared to think I was talking to a king, when it is clear the long road you have to be considered one.”

The slamming of the door interrupted Luke from saying - surely - something stupid.

“Busy, Your Majesty?”

Calum’s brown hair peeked out, smiling at the sight of me.

“Go ahead, did you get any sleep, Cal?”

Calum snorted at Luke’s question, taking a seat next to me at the desk, and took an exhausted stance, dropping his hands down his pants.

“Are you kidding? Mom keeps calling, I had to turn off my Jhin just like Dad. Who, by the way, sent me to find out if you had authorized his request.”

The “Jhin”, modern devices from cell phones that had the option to call among other things, and characterized by a function that allowed an easy finding of information about any individual, in the past there were social networks that were eliminated in the International Revolution and changed by the Jhin.

“You find it in this rubble and I’ll authorize all the requests you want” Luke sighed leaning back in his seat and pointing to the papers in front of him.

Calum looked at him sorrowfully, none of them in the mood. Said and done, Calum managed to find the petition he recognized by the notorious “H” for “Hood” in one corner of the paper, leaving it on top of all the others.

Luke took it, signed it without hesitation, and took a second to read.

“You should read it and then sign it, you know?” Calum mentioned, gaining the satisfaction I hoped to get from correcting Luke.

“You have my absolute trust, you know?” Luke replied in the same tone without taking his eyes off the document, opened his big eyes, and handed it to Calum who accepted it immediately. “Are you my Diplomatic Adviser? What about your father?”

“After what happened last night, he thinks it’s time for me to take his place. I would eventually, but it seems to him that I need to be by your side now to support you and test my training,“ Calum replied, noting the anguish in his friend’s expression.

I had nothing to say so I got up and directed my interest to the books on the shelves pretending not to pay attention.

“I suppose your father went with your mother to his village…”

“You guess right,” Calum paused for a moment. “Hey, I know you’re not well. It must be hard to lose your family… I can’t imagine waking up without my parents and my sister… but you’re not alone, I’m here if you need to talk.”

Luke smiled sideways, quietly accepting his proposal.

“You need to take a break, it’s all happening so fast,“ Calum said, almost reading his mind. “The kingdom needs you to be in good shape.”

Frustrated Luke rose from his seat to sit in the corner of the desk.

“I don’t know what else the kingdom needs, and that will be your first task. Also, stop sending in paperwork, close down the possibility of sending in a petition until further notice.”

I was going to tell him how reckless it was to shut down the arrival of petitions but I finally stopped to think about the matter I had provisionally ignored: I had no power in Gardestone and I didn’t know what was going to happen to the alliance.

“His Majesty, His Highness, young Hood” A guard appeared at the door with cards in hand which he dealt to the three of them. “Their Majesties King Ashton and Queen Lauren of Lauxwell would like you to attend a dinner they have arranged for themselves tonight.“

“Are those harpies still in my palace?” Luke raised an eyebrow. The poor guard did nothing but nod. “Get rid of them. I want them out.”

“Are you crazy?” exclaimed Calum, clearing his throat as he realized the mistake he had just made. “I mean, are you sure you want the Irwins out? As your royal advisor, I don’t think it’s true to your word, your majesty. King Ashton won the duel and the terms-”

Luke raised a hand to stop Calum from talking.

“Guard, I need privacy, if it’s not too much trouble…”

The Guard bade farewell with a bow.

“You too, Princess,” said Luke, “you can request as many maids as you need for tonight, but that’s no reason for you to stay here another second.”

I blinked uncertainly as to how to respond to his insinuation… or insult. I was still debating what was most appropriate.

“Did I not make myself clear? -Or would you rather stay here and stare at me a little longer?”

“I can’t ask my eyes to meet this turtle,” I answered, in the most pleasant tone I could find and advanced to the door.

“Are you sure? I can turn around if you need to,“ I heard him scream from the hall.

Halfway down the hall, I decided that I had to set certain limits for “his majesty” if I was going to live with him and his insufferable attitude for one more second. With that in mind, I changed my direction back to the office and stopped short when I heard my name in the conversation.

“-I’m serious, Cal Amberly is unbearable!”

Eavesdropping had never been something I enjoyed, much less needed. I knew there was nothing good about it… and yet I stuck my back to the wall outside the office.

“-the whole kingdom is depressed. Just by spreading the word about Princess of Maredale’s temporary stay they have begun to produce the best quality products, the children went out to play again” Calum debated. “Your people feel the comfort they have not received from their king.”

“Is that what they want? Miss “I got a lesson in something important” and “I can run a country on my own”?” Luke asked, trying to imitate my voice. “Nonsense! I bet she can’t choose which well-known book to read without help, so many classes have been useless if she can’t speak for herself and waits for her mother to do all the work for her. A babbler! that’s what she is. Even that Ashton idiot has more courage than she does.”

I thought I’d walk through that door to tell him how wrong he was. I could even make a scene and choose to tear all of his fine clothes into pieces that would be scattered all over the palace.

But I didn’t. Because deep down I knew he was right.

I spat cautiously. My eyes were threatening to drop the tears.

“Please, Luke. You don’t know what you’re saying,“ Calum replied. “Queen Elizabeth is going to be back any minute and I don’t think she’d like to hear the way you express about her daughter.“

“If the Queen does anything, it will only show what a coward the Princess is.”

Without realizing it, I was walking with a strong step to my room.

Luke was telling the truth, what was the point of taking classes and lectures if I couldn’t speak for myself?

Ashton had said it too, though much more subtly. He implied that I could take charge of my destiny and it must not be like my mother had planned all along.

Courage- I didn’t have it. I wanted to find it and show it off like a new toy, but that’s not how it works.

“Princess, I was looking for you.”

Lidia interrupted my walk into the room, looked into my eyes that were probably already a little red and wet. She gave me a warm smile and took my hands and led me into the room. I sat down on the edge of the bed and talked, holding back my sobbing.

“Lidia, I was about to do the same thing, but…”

She hissed as her hands were lost in the closet.

“Quiet, from the look of your beautiful face I can tell you heard something…”

Lidia stood in front of me with a bright ruby red dress in her hands, a golden ribbon, the colors of the Gardenstone, all around. The silk fabric adjusted perfectly to my body, falling to my feet with a discreet opening at the side of my right leg; the waves of my hair embraced me. Suddenly it did not seem that I had been crying for the fool that the King was.

“….and by the look of you in this dress, I can tell you will shut the same mouths that said something about you.”

The main dining room shone on its own even though the green decoration was quite noticeable, it looked like Christmas. The red walls looked soft, smooth, and warm, I liked to think that and the spruce chairs had been Queen Susan’s idea. In the center I expected a long table with food, a lot of exquisite food, I didn’t think I had seen those delicacies before, I assumed they were typical of Lauxwell. Around the table, the guests - mostly servants of the palace - had already begun to enjoy the food, while the nobles were talking and eating slowly.

I took a breath, looked up, and entered the dining room.

Lauren saw me first, smiled for a second, and went on with her meal. At her side, Ashton adjusted his tie and looked at me for a few seconds directly in the eyes as if he wanted to tell me something. My mother, who had returned from her talks, nodded approvingly. Calum took his attention off a plate, looked at me, and elbowed Luke. Luke did not flinch.

“Sorry I’m late, go on with your dinner.“

“Princess, please sit next to me.” Ashton stood up, offering a chair.

“No, sit next to me.” Luke did the same. “You are a guest in my kingdom, after all.“

They shared a challenging look, Luke just wanted to annoy Ashton and have the satisfaction of being able to ignore me all night.

Luke’s eyes were fixed on me, seeking a truce not to favor Ashton.

“I am flattered, your Majesties,” I smiled innocently, “but I find the company of King Ashton more… appropriate.”

I took a seat next to Ashton. He politely placed a glass of red wine in my hands, for a moment our fingers brushed and I felt my cheeks warm slightly.

“Your Majesty Luke,” called my mother, “I am proud to report that all the dukes and duchesses are now calm again in their respective states. I have said some flattering things about you…”

“Thank you, your maje-”

“I hope I’m not wrong…”

I looked for my mother’s look on the other side of the table along with the opportunity to tell her that she was wrong, so wrong…

“I hope my daughter has contributed something today.”

Too late to talk about Luke.

I alerted the blond man’s intentions, as dirty as mine a few seconds ago. He had the luxury of taking a sip of red wine before responding.

“I found the company of Princess Amberly a bit… “ He looked me straight in the eye “…Comfortable.”

I took a bite of my food, waiting for him to cut off eye contact. He didn’t. The urge to stick something into those blue eyes increased with every second…

“If you find it so comfortable I can suggest that you keep it with you for a while longer.”

My mother’s words not only interrupted the discreet discussion between our eyes but also took us both by surprise.

“What do you mean by that, Mother?” I asked.

“I am going back to Maredale, and seeing first-hand the opportunities you have at Gardenstone to demonstrate your potential, I think it is necessary for you to stay here. If His Majesty Luke approves, of course.”

“Of course I approve, Queen Elizabeth. It will be a real… pleasure.”

I didn’t look at Luke, I didn’t look at anyone. I released all frustration of such a decision at the plate in front of me.

Lauren told a story about a night she had decided to stand guard at a volcano on the Lauxwell border near a funeral home. She described it as a bleak, lifeless place too cold for even the heat of the lava to drive away. A giant beast with big legs and a wet muzzle with traces of blood was found, a wolf big enough for her to have faced it alone… but she had done it, she had hunted the beast and divided the skin among her friends in her kingdom. There was something so horrific about her story that made it interesting and kept us all at the table expectant and eager to hear more.

Throughout the dinner I felt an extra pair of eyes on me, I had the luxury of finding the owner, and the simple fact that they belonged to a certain self-centered brat brought a smile to my face.

“-that’s how I took my father to the bandits who threatened the kingdom. They will rot forever, end.” She took her cup up and drank it to the bottom. Everyone around her applauded, sighs of relief and fear sounded as well.

“Thank you, sister. With these stories full of courage, we thank you for attending this dinner.”

Ashton extended a hand indicating to the servants to leave the dining room nicely, some stopped and thanked him, others took leftovers from the table mistakenly hidden between napkins and took them away.

“Ridiculous, we have never forbidden them to eat. I guess we’ll have to start.“

Luke mumbled to Calum, he laughed but his face was afraid, he thought Luke was capable of it.

Seconds later the two left the dining room followed by Lauren who walked with her head held high despite being under the influence of alcohol. I admired her in silence.

A black hair stood in my way, accompanied by a wide smile.

“Amberly, would you accompany me on a night walk in the gardens?”

“Of course.”

Our arms intertwined, I tried not to blush at the sudden closeness as we got lost in the garden with the moon guiding our every step.

#5SOS #5 seconds of summer #5sosfanfic #luke hemmings #luke hemmings fanfiction #luke hemmings fic #luke hemmings imagine #luke hemmings series #luke fanfic #king!luke #readregnum #ashton irwin #ashton irwin fanfic #michael clifford fanfic #calum hood fic #michael clifford #calum hood #5sosfam

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my-name-stitch · 5 years ago

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Okay so I'm just gonna throw this in the dark. Might catch something, might not, but at least it'll be out of my head. (And if someone is actually gonna see this and respond, please don't include hate for me or the characters - just be kind. I'm on mobile so no read more option, rip.)

Where the FUCK is River's body?? 😭 Silence in the Library, right. She uses her brain as the matrix or whatever to get all the 4022 (or 4023 if you wanna include Donna) safely transported back out of CAL. Supposed to get her brain, NOT her body - like I've watched specifically for mentions of what would happen to her body, like if it'd get fried too, and there are none. But her body isn't seen again after she tells 10, "You watch us run." It's simply not there (and specifically needs to be missing bc her body would've been hiding the port 10 eventually plugs her Sonic into) and sure. It's a kid's show. Little dark to keep her dead body there (but not quite unheard of, I'd argue, but I'd also accept there's not a real obvious precedent in NuWho for darkness at this point). But why not throw in a line of how her body would be fried too or something.

Is her body "saved" like the 4022 others, the most obvious answer? I'd accept that. Yet this is River's "death." We see 10 plug in her Sonic to CAL to preserve her mind (nevermind where that comm device came from lmao - presumably it was in her Sonic and she didn't know it was there all through Darillium, which would imprint her mind on it, but it's technically never said). So would that not be reconnecting her mind and "saved" body? Why not be able to bring her back out since she should be whole? It's not like the others that got eaten by the Vashta Nerada. Only their minds got scooped up into CAL, kinda right before their death (I think Miss Evangilista said how when talking to Donna, but I forgot). So we know it's possible for CAL to save minds without bodies. Presumably River's mind would've been lost bc of brain frying. Except the Doctor had her imprint on the comm device (again, wherever it came from) - and the episode heavily implies THAT is what gets her uploaded to CAL (which, yeah a body without a mind isn't really gonna do much, even in CAL, but still). So her mind is definitely in CAL and fine/functioning/saved. But WHERE is her BODY. Where did it go??? And if her body got uploaded into CAL, why didn't the Doctor then bring her back out?? (Sure, 10 might not have, bc he was just figuring things out and we know 11 started off being scared of River, but 12 knew what would happen (obvi) and would have every reason to go back during the confusion of 4022 people trying to get off planet for the 24 hours granted by the Vashta Nerada. 12 could 100% avoid seeing 10 in that mess, esp bc 10 and Donna kinda didn't stick around bc they were both "all right." 😭 Obviously that clashes with the Data Ghost River we see with 11. But arguably 12 could still go back to the Library, after the 1000 or so years had passed, and gotten her out then. He's got a time machine that would be personally invested in getting River back and could probably appear in the core by CAL and have a forcefield out (like the one 10 constantly used against Daleks) if all else failed and there weren't lights down there anymore (or just... Produced light herself lol). And yeah 12 is like emotionally compromised and all, bc he saw how far he'd go for a companion and compromised himself/his morals that way. But this isn't "cheating" death anymore than he already "cheated" it for River, and he's not stealing anything or forcing anything on anyone but River (who, let's be real, probably wouldn't enjoy being in CAL for very long bc it's kinda not in her character). So getting her out isn't bad and wouldn't have bad moral repercussions of anything. Plus we know Nardole goes back at some point anyway to retrieve her diary for 12, so the TARDIS has no qualms of going back herself.)

I mean, the question got a bit bigger there, but ultimately... Where's River's body??? Where the heck did it go? :( Like all of this could've been easily explained in about 20 seconds by a new line of dialogue when 10 and River were arguing, but it wasn't included. So. It leaves me with Questions. Even if they're stupid. I just... Wanna know... :(( And if the audio books or something answer this, rip. ☠️

#river song #this is what i think about at night #tiny plot holes #ugghhh this is suoer bothering me tho #fr

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malgal7777 · 4 years ago

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Hiking with Tracy 2021: ��Put it on the board...YES!

I did it!!!! Woo-Hoo! I walked 100 miles - almost in the whole month of April. Since the last weekend of April was a bit of a snow bust, I had to finish my 100 miles this past weekend 5/1-5/2! And what a way to finish...

I was feeling defeated last week when I wasn’t able to complete the 100 miles up in Tahoe. I ended up being 17 miles short! Can you believe that? 17 miles!! And I have a friend, let’s just call him “Barry” who was going to give me the whole $1000 if I was able to do it. So I really felt down knowing I had blown it. Blown all that training and blown it for the Ride4Reason fundraiser. But “Barry” said hey, finish it up this weekend and you’re still in the running. So I went back to the drawing board to find another route that would push me over the finish line. But it was Bob who suggested I hike San Francisco. AND, if I hiked SF, he would be encouraged to join me. Bob’s a city slicker. If he goes too far from being able to purchase a newspaper out of a metal box, he gets hives. So, we mapped out a 10-12 mile route (I had to go easy on the guy) starting from the Ferry Building and walking the circumference of the SF peninsula to Ocean Beach. It was FAN-TAS-TIC! WOW. Just WOW.

We started at Justin Herman Plaza and since it was May Day we were hoping to find a rally or march happening. And in perfect SF fashion, we were not disappointed! Sure enough a large rally was gearing up to head down Market. I’m going to assume the march was for workers rights, but it was actually unclear to us what their message was. Not a good sign for a march/rally!

This first stretch of The Embarcadero was a bit sad. Covid and the lockdowns have definitely taken their toll. I know it was early and a weekend, but a lot of these businesses are still shuttered and closed. And there’s a couple of homeless encampments taking over the street car kiosks. The homeless. Sooner or later I have to go there. I can spout my love for California all I want, but it’s California’s biggest shame. It’s no longer a skeleton in the closet, it’s all out in the open for all to see. And I have no answer for it. It’s always been here, since I’ve been here. And it definitely has gotten A LOT worse within the past 10 years. And it’s not just one issue, it’s the perfect storm of multiple issues coming together: not enough affordable housing; not enough livable wages; mental instability; drug addiction; nomad living lifestyle - yes that’s a thing. I don’t think California is doing nothing. There’s just too many people. And you can’t just throw them in jail or put them onto a bus to make someone else’s problem - like other regional areas have done, there has to be some compassion and humanity. But these encampments are not humane. They are breeding grounds for disease and despair. What does that say about you as you walk on by? Trying to ignore the garbage and filth these people are living amongst. But I have no answer. I don’t even know where to begin to help these people. So for the time being, I’m going to continue to stick my head in the sand and hope that California will rise to the challenge and find some solution, sooner rather than later.

The Embarcadero curves around and leads you to the touristy part of the city...Fisherman’s Wharf. I personally hate this part of town. It’s just too much: too many people; too many lame chain restaurants; too many cheesy chotchkie stores. My parents on the other hand love it. When they come to town all they want to do is come to Pier 39 and Alcatraz. My dad would live on Alcatraz if he could. One of these days I just may lock him in one of the cells. Today though, things were different. I loved seeing that Alcatraz tours are once again up & running. AND not a lot of people yet...wink wink wink...for those of you who've tried to go but weren’t able to get a reservation. It was early, so the area was just coming alive. The street vendors setting up their wares or street performers getting into character. Then there’s the abundance of colors of all the flashy stores and restaurants. The sounds of the sea lions barking at the tourists watching them. The marina with the famous “Rocket Boat!” I was digging it. Fisherman’s Wharf also has some great views of Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge. It wasn’t so horrible. Bob showed me Scoma’s restaurant, a tiny seafood restaurant that’s been here for years and is supposed to be pretty darn good. There’s even a chapel for the local fishermen. Then of course there’s Musee Mecanique. A museum of antique slot machines, animations, coin operated pianos and the like. It’s pretty cool and I believe most of the games are still functioning, so you can play. Unfortunately it is also closed because of the pandemic. You can donate to help keep it open though. Just go to https://museemecanique.com.

Then we hit Aquatic Park. An interesting cove at the West end of Fisherman’s Wharf. This is where crazy people swim in the freezing waters of the bay, most without wet suits. On this cold, windy morning we found a group of children being taught how to acclimate their bodies to the water so they can grow up to be crazy people. Horrible way to spend a Saturday if you ask me!

We continued to go around Aquatic Park and up and around to Fort Mason. There’s a great trail that we’ve never taken that gives you an even better view of the GG bridge and Fort Mason below. And once you get on the other side, you’re in local land of OZ! Where the curtain is pulled back and the locals are enjoying the real SF. Now for those tourists who spend their whole time at Fisherman’s Wharf and The Embarcadero, more power to you. Just don’t say you’ve been to San Francisco. Because you haven’t. Once you get over the hump, one of my favorite scenes of SF...the buildings. Squat, square homes of multiple pastel colors rolling like waves along the hills of San Francisco. In other areas of the city, the hills are rolling with colorful victorians. The colors are what I love best about San Francisco.

It was here that I realized I was hiking with Cher. We had to make yet another stop so Bob could make a wardrobe change. It’s also kind of a production with him narrating what he’s doing. I got to hear all about the ins and outs of why he rolls his flannel rather than fold. Why he’ll wait to take off the thermal leggings. Where to put his first UO sticker. Yada, Yada, Yada. Good thing he’s pretty cute. As he was changing, we noticed a statue of an older man in a suit but no plaque telling visitors who he is. I thought he looked like Rodney Dangerfield. But why would anyone put up a statue of Rodney Dangerfield in SF? That would be the ultimate “no respect” though, a statue but no plaque. Ends up it’s a guy named Phil Burton. He was a US Congressman from California who is responsible for 87,000 acres of the SF Bay Area being designated as a National Park. I was basically ending my hike in a National Park thanks to this man. He deserves a plaque god damnit!

So once you pass Fort Mason, you are now in the Marina district. It’s where Cal Berkeley students go after they graduate. They mutate here on the hollowed grounds of Crissy Field. Like yuppy gremlins. Working out or drinking Philz Coffee. The homes along Crissy Field are gorgeous. Huge picture windows with a front row seat to the Golden Gate Bridge. Each one is architecturally different and once again, the colors! Beautiful. The only downside was the wind. It was pretty darn windy along this stretch. But Bob had his windbreaker and I had my knit cap. I can endure the wind if I have my ears covered.

It’s a long stretch from Crissy Field to the Presidio. The old barracks of the Presidio on one side and the entrance of the Bay on the other. The GG Bridge is the main attraction here. It’s majestic. Great time to get over there. Parking was plenty and not a bad way to have a picnic. There’s a climbing gym, a trampoline park and under the bridge is Fort Point. I have been here before, took my parents. I was able to slyly divert their attention from the bells and whistles of Fisherman’s Wharf with the chance to view history! They are suckers for historical buildings. And Fort Point is a National Historical Site. It was built during the Civil War in 1861. It’s been awhile so I don’t remember too many of the details, but definitely worth a visit.

Now we began our assent to the Jewel of this hike...The Golden Gate Bridge. It’s a National Icon and San Francisco’s mascot. As you climb the hill and get closer to the bridge there are a bunch of tunnels and “hide outs” along the way. Remnants of the military presence that once dominated San Francisco. But the absolutely coolest thing about this hike was I had NO IDEA you can actually walk underneath the bridge itself...like right below the huge steel red frame!! It’s literally a wind tunnel, so hold onto your hat! But super duper cool!! If you have any engineers or construction people in your circle, this would be a great spot to bring them.

As you continue around the bend, you come to Baker’s Beach. Not sure if it’s still a nude beach, but it used to be. The unfortunate thing about nude beaches is the people who SHOULDN’T be nude are the first ones to get into their birthday suit. But that’s my problem, not theirs! Some nice trails along this stretch, but nothing too exciting to report.

We soon came upon the neighborhood Sea Cliff. Now this is where the really rich people live. Like Robin Williams had a home here; Nancy Pelosi I think lives here. Mansions with a view of the Pacific. Bob & I had to walk through right? I am happy to report the other half live very well. I stopped to smell the roses (literally) but I noticed that all the gardens actually smelled horrible. The fertilizer was strong here. Bob & I laughed that that was how they kept the riff-raff away, by surrounding their homes with a shit moat. Worked for us! We high tailed it out of there.

Now we came to our last stretch...Land’s End. A labyrinth of trails along the coastal edge. We needed to stop for another wardrobe change. This time his leggings were going back on. Which meant he needed to get down to his underwear. Let’s just say a whole group of people got a little more than they were expecting that day!

Finally we made it to Sutro Baths and the Cliff House! Fantastic! Unfortunately the Cliff House closed due to the pandemic and is not reopening. I cannot imagine this space will be closed for long. Fingers crossed. We decided to head down to Ocean Beach and end our hike by having lunch at the Park Chalet. We were both famished and Bob was getting cranky. Needed to feed him STAT. I have more to report here but Bob might get mad at me, so if you see him again, just ask him about our new friend Franklin!

BTW, Sunday I did my final 4-5 miles back at my MacArthur Trail. I brought Stella this time and she loved it. It was as fabulous as ever!

I’m still going to hike y’all and write about it. So check in to see where I go next. I enjoyed writing my thoughts and feelings down. Even if nobody reads it, it’s my journal to this wonderful life I’ve been blessed with. Why not tell the world!

Thank You to all who have donated to the Ride4Reason fundraiser and have endured reading these ramblings. But, That’s All Folks! (for now). xoxox

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drethanramslay · 5 years ago

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Hand that you hold

Pairing: Kamilah x MC (Dakota Rivers)

Summary: Marriage is a beautiful union of two souls. When two people whose soul's sing for each other, it's then you know that that person is worth keeping around.

Word count: 3.4 K words

Warning: NONE. Its pretty much fluff and a bit of swearing

Masterlist

Taglist: @miyakokurono @trappedinfandoms @vampiregirlsblog (lemme know if you want to be tagged)

Song: Hand that you hold by Dan Owen

Forgive me for any mistakes 🥺

"I swear on my fangs Justin, if there is even a decoration out of place, it's your ass on the line." Dakota spoke into the phone with a cool voice. Lindsay was going around her like a mother hen, making the final alterations to her wedding dress.

Today was the day and things were already going berserk.

"Ummm I don't know what are you talking about...?" Justin Mercado spoke, with a tremble in his voice.

"Oh really? So whose employee was the one who flipped a fucking table in her blind rage, hmm? And I had asked you to leave the cobblestone path alone, but some dumbass on your team went ahead and put roses. ROSES?! That's so damn cliche and I specifically asked for non cliche and unique things. What had I asked for?"

"Non cliche and unique. We are already cleaning that up." Justin audibly gulped.

"When I had last come down, the fairy lights were not up and the podium where I am supposed to get married, does not have the flower arch up yet?! It's six in the fucking evening, the moment the sun sets people are going to start coming. The greenhouse doesn't have the floating lights yet. Just because we are supernaturals and have heightened senses doesn't mean we to drink and socialize in the dark!!"

"Yes ma'am we are almo-" Justin began but Dakota cut her off.

"When I asked for your services, I was promised the best. The only thing I am getting best is problems.... and an amazing wedding dress."

Lindsay blushed as she looked down at her feet. Dakota gave her a small encouraging smile.

"Ma'am that was a...a honest mistake. The decorations are all set, the tables have the pastel flower basket centre pieces. The food caterer reached and have started plating the appetizers. The bar is open and well stocked with blood and alcohol. We are good to go for your first guest."

"Good. I want this day to be perfect for my wife. For the love of the moon, if anything else goes wrong, I will skin your hide and make a carpet out if it. Got it?" Dakota threatened him. She hung up the phone and Lily snickered in the background.

"God Dakota you are such a bridezilla." Dakota just sighed, "I just...want it to be perfect. Agreed it's a small and intimate ceremony but still."

"It's gonna be lit af. The talk of the century. So don't worry. You just worry on sitting still and looking pretty." Lily said as she went into the adjacent bathroom to change.

Dakota sighed, for what seemed as the millionth time, as she turned towards the mirror to see herself. The person in the reflection had the same grey eyes and pale skin. But, she looked gorgeous. Almost like a different person.

She had decided to throw the traditional white wedding dress out of the window and went for something more unique, just like their love. She had opted for a baby blue wedding dress with layers of chiffon, making it look like ballroom gown. It was sleeveless but the neck of the gown extended till her midriff.

God Kami is going to lose her mind... Dakota thought, smiling slyly.

There were pastel colour flowers embroidered into the net like material which made her look like a blossoming flower. Just like after a long harsh winter, spring comes, causing the flowers to bloom, similarly, after three grueling years of fighting off the bad guys and loosing so many people, they finally have happiness and peace.

And there is no other way she would like to commemorate this happy occasion.

Her blonde hair had been tied into a low bun, stubborn strands of hair escaping it. Lindsay helped her put on the blue stone 'ridiculous' tiara, which Kamilah had bought her after the harrowing fiasco.

Dakota smiled to herself as she wore it, reminiscing the day in the empty jewelry store. "I'm such a pretty, pretty princess, dammit." Dakota spoke, from her memory.

"Yes that you are, Ms. Rivers. I must say that you are one of the most prettiest brides I have ever seen. The henna tattoos on your hands are just making you look so unique...IN A GOOD WAY." Lindsay spoke, as she flushed.

Dakota looked down at the henna designs on her hand. She wanted to respect Kamilah's Egyptian heritage so they both got henna tattoos on their hands just two days before the marriage. As they got them done, they laughed and swapped stories.

It was such a pleasant experience.

"Thank you so much Lindsay, this wedding dress is just perfect. Wouldn't have been possible without your hard work." Dakota said earnestly as she squeezed her hands, as a sign of gratitude.

Lindsay flushed and dipped her head and walked out of the dressing room. Dakota sat down near the large mirror and checked her make up. She was just finishing up her touch ups when Lily stepped out of the bathroom in a black suit. She was wearing formal trousers and a blazer, which showed the valley of her breasts. She had paired this with a golden pendant, which went till her midriff. She finished of her look with a pair of black stilettos.

"Damn Lily, you looking hot." Dakota told her.

Lily smiled and she walked to the mirror and placed her hands on Dakota's shoulder. "You are looking so gorgeous.... I am so, so happy for you. You deserve all the happiness in the world."

Dakota reached and held her best friends hand, unable to say anything because of the intense emotions she was feeling.

"I just wish Jax was here..." Dakota said as tears pooled on the corner of her eyes.

Lily sighed. "I bet he has got first row seats to this function. Being the boomer he is, he would end up coming an hour earlier than the starting time!!"

Both of them laughed out loud, making the sad atmosphere, a little lighter.

"C'mon girl. Let's gets you on the podium so that you can watch your sexy wife walk down the aisle."

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Justin had not screwed up.

Which was a huge relief.

Kamilah and Dakota had decided that they would have the ceremony in a private garden. Nothing to big. Dakota had made several mood boards about the way she wanted to decorate the garden and the adjacent greenhouse.

The greenhouse would be the place where food, drinks and the reception would be held.

The greenhouse was like a magical place of its own. It was a mix of glass and wood which complemented each other perfectly. Green vines hung from the roof, over the tables. The hanging lights amidst them made it look enchanted. The tables were covered with simple white tablecloths but the center pieces along with the tealight candles, really made the entire venue colorful.

The party favours had been placed on each chair. Kamilah decided to order baklava and give it out as party favours. Dakota hundred percent agreed because she may or may not have had a box or two of those sweet, sinful delights.

Everything looked perfect.

The guests were already present when she came down to the greenhouse. They were laughing, drinking and mingling. When she entered the place everyone stopped their conversation and turned to look at her. Even though she was one of the most powerful vampires of their time, the person who slayed Rheya, the goddess, she still felt so awkward when everyone's eyes were on her.

Dakota shyly waved before speaking, "Hey guys! Thank you so much for coming. The appetizers are being distributed and the bar is open. We will be starting the ceremony in half an hour."

Nikhil was the first one to come up to her. "Ah Miss Dakota! You look as ethereal as a fairy. I'm in awe."

"Thank you so much for your kind words Nikhil. I must thank you for helping in finding the venue."

"It was my utmost pleasure Miss. Go on, greet your other guests. If you need any help, I am at your beck and call."

Smiling Dakota headed to meet the other vamps. Serafine had donned a beautiful evening gown. Adrian was standing there with a drink in his hand, wearing a black tux. When she reached them, they stopped their conversation and turned to greet her.

"Hey Sera! Hey Senator Adrian." Dakota said with a teasing smile. Adrian groaned while Serafine let out an elegant laugh. "Oh my love, you look so gorgeous. Kamilah is indeed a lucky woman to have met you." Serafine said as she hugged Dakota, and kissed her cheeks.

"Thank you for coming. I know you were busy with the opening of your nightclub." Serafine just waved her hand. "Ah those things come and go. But seeing Kamilah settle down, never. Couldn't miss it for the life of it."

"Kamilah was saying that you managed most of the decorations. Must say that they look beautiful." Adrian complemented her. "Thank you Adrian. Can't say it was easy. I may or may not have threatened four people today." They laughed and Adrian checked the time in his watch.

"Gotta go and check on Kamilah. I hope she doesn't have a breakdown. It wasn't fun the last time." Adrian grumbled as he gave Dakota a side hug.

Dakota then headed to the New Orleans gang who were laughing loudly. "Hey Cal, Krom, Ivy."

"EEEEE!! Thank you for inviting me. I may be dead but all these cute ceremonies almost make me feel alive." Ivy said as she hugged Dakota.

Krom groaned. "Can you go one day without the death jokes?"

"Over my dead body." Ivy shot back.

Krom just threw his huge hands up with defeat. "I can't win. I give up."

"Congrats Dakota! Still can't thank you enough for helping me escape from the weirdo's place." Cal said as he shook her hands.

"Cal... We sang karaoke together. I think we are past the 'thank you stage'."

"Oh. My. God. Cal you did karaoke?!" The petite girl with ombre hair beside him squealed. Cal started cursing under his breath. "Yeah babe. It was before we met."

"Can you please send the video to me? Also how rude of me. I am Alex Reyez-Elrich." She extended her hand and Dakota shook it.

"Wait, are you the heir of lord Elrich? I have heard so much about you!! Shit, should I call you 'lady' or 'duchess'?"

Alex let out a laugh. "Don't worry Dakota. Lady is the title they use for my step mom. And, I could say the same about you!! I can feel the power in your veins. And I have read about how you revolutionized the entire vampire- human coexistence. I'm impressed."

"Thank you for coming. By the way, where is Garrus?"

"Behind the bar obvio. You can talk to him later. It's time." Ivy said as she took a sip of her whiskey on rocks.

It's time for my wedding. Dakota smiled at that thought.

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"Kamilah if you continue pacing around the room I swear I will put your ass on the ground." Adrian groaned.

"You wouldn't stand a chance against me." Kamilah shot back.

Kamilah sighed as she sat down near the dressing table, staring at her reflection. She had decided to wear a suit instead of the usual gown. It was porcelain white, and it fit her perfectly. There were occasional patches of embroidery on the blazer which made it look so elegant. Her hair had been left open, looking glossy underneath the yellow tinted lights. Her lips were painted red and she had put minimal make up. She was wearing her brother's pendant. She reached to touch it, wishing that he was watching over her from heaven.

Henna tattoos designed her hands and she smiled looking down at them. She would have been happy even if they got married in a courthouse, but she appreciated the gesture. Dakota was so incessant to follow the ritual and she just couldn't say no to that beautiful face.

Letting out a breath she didn’t know she was holding, she wore the white stilettos and stood up.

"Last chance to escape. Tell me and I will be your getaway driver." Adrian teased.

"Shut up Raines. It's not helping."

Adrian laughed before he clasped her shoulder. "Kamilah you deserve a happy ending. Dakota is perfect for you and I can see how much she loves you. You don't have to doubt her or her love for you."

"I'm just so nervous.." Kamilah wiped her palms on her trouser pants.

"And that's totally normal. I remember when I married my wife, I was so scared that I jumbled up the vows!!" Adrian laughed.

"If this is your way of comforting me, please shut up at this instant." Kamilah said as she picked up her bouquet of wild flowers, tied with a blue ribbon.

He offered his arm to her and Kamilah grabbed it and walked out.

"Thank you brother...for everything."

Adrian smiled and squeezed her arm. "Let's go and get you a wife."

I'm getting married to the love of my life, my habibti. Kamilah thought as a beautiful smile stretched on her face.

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"Fuck." Dakota breathed out as she saw the fairy lights darken again. "Goddammit! Justin get your ass right her-"

Dakota was cut off as Alex tapped her shoulder, in the dark.

"Dakota, if you don't mind... I can help with your light setting. I don't see it getting better anytime soon."

"Thank you so much Alex. I owe you a bottle of wine after this."

"Mention not." Alex whispered under her breath and rubbed her fingers together and snapped. A ball of yellow light started growing on her palm. It kept on growing until it was the size of a basket ball. Dakota was in awe.

Alex threw her hands up into the air and clapped, resulting in the giant glowing ball to rise in the air and split into its smaller counterparts. Alex waved her hands and the the small light balls spread all over the garden and gazebo, illuminating it in a soft yellow light.

"Yeah that should do it." Alex said as she winked at Dakota.

"Damn girl..." Lily breathed out before regaining her composure and clapping to get the attention of the guests.

"Hey people! Please sit your asses down, we have to get my girl married on time." People took their places and Dakota climbed up the steps of the gazebo.

The cobblestone path led to the gazebo. There were white chairs on either side of it which were slowly being filled by the guests. The gazebo had a teal blue roof which was supported by the white wooden pillars. There were intricate designs on the railing. The entrance of the gazebo had a beautiful flower arch, decorated with pink and white wildflowers.

Everything finally came together.

The Wedding March played and Dakota stood straighter, clutching her bouquet of flowers, to hide how her hands were trembling. She was so nervous. Her heart was racing and she could feel sweat on the back of her neck. She let out a breath, to dissipate her nervousness.

Her eyes landed on the aisle and when she saw Kamilah, all the breath in her body vanished.

Kamilah was walking with her head held high. She was clutching the bouquet and held Adrian's arm. She looked at the gazebo and she was in a trans.

It wasn't Adrian who was holding her, but the grey eyes that tethered her to this world. Reminding her that this was real. She felt like she was floating in a sea of euphoria, but the woman in front of her anchored her. Even if a nuclear missile were to fall out if the sky, or a unicorn was to show up here, she still wouldn't be able to take her eyes off Dakota.

Her love. Her baby. Her habibti.

It was the same thing for Dakota. Time seemed to slow down, people began to vanish until it was just Kamilah and her. Tears welled up in her eyes, by the sheer beauty of this moment. She knew, that this would be the one moment she would never ever forget till the end of time. How her Kami walked down the aisle to her.

Her soulmate. Her rock. Her Queen.

Adrian handed Kamilah to Dakota and patted her shoulder. "Take care of my sister Dakota. Congratulations." Dakota dipped her head. Kamilah reached the podium, and Dakota could see tears pooling in Kamilah's eyes. "Why are you crying?" Dakota joked through her tears.

"The same reason you are habibti." Kamilah answered, with a bright smile that illuminated the entire room. Dakota giggled and reached for Kamilah's hand. They held hands and turned towards the priest.

"Dearly beloved, we are gathered here this evening to witness the beautiful union of these women in holy matrimony. Please sit down." The priest said and the guests sat down.

"If you have your vows written, please tell them."

Dakota turned towards Kamilah and started saying her vows. "Kamilah, before you my life was empty. I never really cared about love, but now, here I am, with you. I see these vows not as promises but as privileges: I get to laugh with you and cry with you, care for you and share with you. I get to run with you and walk with you, build with you, and live with you.

"I’ve seen your kindness and your strength. I’ve seen you patient and frayed. We have been through everything. Through thick and thin. And I know, what a great team we make. Together we are so strong and exquisite."

"You are my favorite person, and I choose you to be my partner in all of eternity. I vow to take you as my wife. Let's be awesome together, even when the world isn't so awesome at times. My heart is yours. Forevermore."

Kamilah took a deep breath, as tears of joy rolled down her face. Smiling, she began her vows. "Love...was something that I never understood. It was a question unanswered. Though I have been with different men and women, deep down I knew, that it was not love. I didn't fall in love with you. I walked into love with you, with my eyes wide open, choosing to take every step along the way."

"I want nothing more than to share my future with you—my triumphs and my challenges, my joys and my sorrows. Together, I know we can accomplish the life we both dream of living. You are beautiful inside and out. You warm my heart and make me soar. You are my queen, and now my forever best friend."

"You are my first, my last, my everything. You are mine until the end of time, and I am yours for as long as you'll have me."

Dakota was crying. Her heart was bursting with overwhelming love for the Egyptian grace in front of her.

Lula, the ring bearer got the rings. Kamilah slipped the elegant diamond ring on to Dakota's ring finger. Dakota slipped a dainty platinum ring with diamonds on it into Kamilah's ring finger.

The priest continued. " If anyone objects this marriage, speak now or forever hold your peace."

Dakota gave a hard glare to the guests, daring someone to say something. The power emanating from her veins was so strong, that Kamilah's eyes widened and the priest shivered. The guests looked as if they were going to suffocate.

Silence.

Dakota rolled in the power, reducing the intensity so that the priest could speak without wetting his pants.

"Do you, Kamilah Sayeed take Dakota Rivers as your wife?"

"I do."

"Do you, Dakota Rivers take Kamilah Sayeed to be your wife?"

"I super do."

"With the power vested in me by the state of New York, I now pronounce you wife and wife. You may seal this union with a kiss."

Kamilah bent down and kissed Dakota chastely. Dakota wrapped her hands around Kamilah's waist and hugged her. It felt as if fireworks were going off in her heart and the feeling of her wife, in her arms was such an amazing feeling.

My wife...never going to get old of that. Kamilah though as she kissed Dakota under the starry night, a promise that she was going to stand by her wife’s side forever and always.

I think my heart melted. UWU

lowkey sad that bloodbound ended but hey! we got to marry her :))

like, reblog and let me know how you liked the one shot :))

#choices #playchoices #choices stories you play #choices stories we play #BloodBound #bloodbound mc #bloodbound 3 #bloodbound dark solstice #bloodbound book 2 #kamilah sayeed #choices kamilah #bb kamilah #kamilah x mc #adrian raines #serafine dupont #lily spencer #Anushka writes

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