#i tried to do something clever with the last sentence

[romypearl]

The Queen's Pawn - Regina George/Oblivious!Reader | II

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six | Part Seven

Summary: Everyone is interested and obsessed with Regina George, after all, she is the queen of the North Shore, so why does Y/N barely look at her? The new student, oblivious to her existence, intrigues and irritates the blonde at the same time. And she doesn't know how to deal with it.

Classification: Fluff

Warnings: Slight internalized homophobia

Word count: +2200

Unrevised

She's always liked strawberries. Sweet, soft and tickling the roof of mouth. And, coincidentally, every now and then it turns pink.

Like the remnants of ice cream that hang around the corner of Y/N's plump lips.

It's hard to ignore, is what Regina tells herself as she turns away, trying to find a random fixed point to distract her. What proves to be more than impossible, out of the corners of her eyes she watches a little speech about Greek culture, something about Stoicism and a guy called Zeno, she doesn't really know, can't pay attention in the long words, only and exclusively in that spot. How could the Miss Perfect and Retainer of All Knowledge miss something so silly? The blonde huffs and crosses her arms in frustration, how has no one seen this yet? The Plastics seemed indifferent, pretending to pay attention to the matter while typing messages, knowing that their respective partners would do all the work for them and be grateful. She had no such luck. When Mrs. Blake, inspired by the... variety of grades, announced that she was going to pair up for assignments, she was sure that had guaranteed a top mark and a pat on the back for the minimal effort, equivalent to a zero. It would have been like that, if she hadn't made Karen switch papers to have Y/N as partner. After all, if she's so clever could easily get an A for both, but it backfired.

"What the hell kind of word is Eudaimonia?" she finally asks, frowning in confusion.

"Did you pay attention to anything I said?"

"All the things you say are very boring." Regina shrugs and turns so that they're face to face "Just like you."

She waits for some reaction, ever since they started studying about an hour ago Regina teases her and pulls all the strings in search of the right one, the one that will snap her out of the calm state of mind or hit her in some way. Nothing. She's rather unreachable. And, just like the other times, totally ignores the petty comment.

"But..." she hates doing it, every lousy second "Can you tell me what it is?"

"Right! For the last time..." Y/N settles back in chair and takes another spoonful of ice cream to mouth, thinking about how to summarize what she's been trying to say for a long time "Eudaimonia is a term from Greek philosophy that means a state of happiness and inner well-being. In literal translation it is "the state of being inhabited by a good daemon, a good genius"."

"Daemon?" I'm getting more and more lost "Did the Greeks believe in that?"

"No, it's daemons, not demons." the newbie's monotonous tone becomes animated as she starts talking, which makes Regina's heart skip a beat and she doesn't like it "In Greek mythology, they were spiritual beings who occupied an intermediate place between gods and humans, they could be either benevolent or malevolent..."

Then another speech begins, this time she tries to pay attention, but gradually the words blur into disconnected sentences and all she can focus on is how they sound on the girl's lips, how she pronounces them, her tongue curling between pearly teeth, the soft sound and, still, that damn ice cream. She tries to remember the last time she ate one, it seems like months, maybe years. What did it taste like? Overly sweet and sickly? Smooth and addictive? Why did her mother have to interrupt them and offer a dozen options? And why did she have to choose just that? Tempting. Lovely. Irresistible.

Y/N gasps in surprise and freezes in place as she suddenly feels something soft pressed against the corner of her mouth, thumb rubbing something that is apparently resisting coming out and her eyes meet sky blue irises, staring at her obstinately. The touch is long, almost purposeful, and they don't realize they're holding breath, unaware of their surroundings, too caught up in each other to notice the curious gazes of the two lackeys.

To everyone's surprise, including her own, Regina rubs the stain, picking up some of the gloss in the process, and brings to her lips, sucking it off. She has to hold back a groan and fight against her body to keep composure, pretending not to be shaken by her own impulsive, totally thoughtless, act.

"If my face was so dirty, you could simply have warned me." she says after a long, thoughtful pause, unable to find any conceivable reason except that "But I appreciate your gesture, it was really kind."

Kind? Has anyone, at any time in life, used that word to refer to her? Maybe her dad, once, just after Kylie was born and before they lost control completely. But there was nothing kind about what she had done, quite the opposite.

"Do you want more?" the blonde points to the almost empty bowl, anxious to mask the situation quickly.

"No, thanks!"

"How about Doritos?"

"I think I've eaten too much junk food today, it can't be good for me." Y/N jokes and opens a big smile, making cheeks stand out along with dimples that are almost imperceptible to inattentive eyes.

"We have strawberries." she says immediately, not stopping to think about those soft lips around the red fruit. When Gretchen looks at her in confusion and frowns, trying to subtly point, the plan comes back to mind and she decides to put it into practice "Also blueberries, raspberries, blackberries. Whatever you like, sweetie."

"You really like berries."

"You can't blame me..." Regina leans on the table, one hand on chin, long eyelashes batting slowly and a smirk, the same one that has won over every boy she's ever wanted "When is your color."

"What do you mean?" the other asked, without even looking up from the papers, missing all the theatrics.

"Red is your color..."

"My favorite color is yellow." she finally abandons the notes, only to find George defeated in front of her, about to slam her head on the glass table to get out of this nightmare "Can I use your bathroom?"

"Of course!" Regina snorts and points towards the corridor "Second door on the right, don't get lost."

Secretly, George hopes, wishes, that she really would get lost so that she could finally have the opportunity to guide her through something, or simply talk to her without two ticks on their backs. When she wants to, Gretchen can be very... clingy and insistent, often taking the brunette as a side effect, not unexpected considering how insecure she is about herself and the stability of her position in the hierarchy of North Shore, a drone that takes pride of function. Most of the time it's acceptable, in fact her presence barely matters to the queen bee in ordinary situations, but now all she wants is for the two of them to disappear at the snap of a finger.

"Karen, Gretchen, I need you to do me a favor." Regina is direct, in a casual tone.

"Of course! What do you need?" Wieners replies promptly, always eager to please.

"Can you go to the convenience store and get some Redbulls?" she smiles and stands up, taking one of the credit cards out of the purse, tossing it for them to take "All the flavors you can find."

"Now?"

"Yes, now. And get some more ice cream too."

They exchange glances, but don't dare deny Regina anything, even if it means half an hour's walk "Right, we're going."

The pair get up and leave quickly, holding their tongues to avoid questioning her about the sudden request, nor about what seems to be an interest in the newbie. Right from the first day, they listed her as a loser, with no social sense and who no one would have the courage to touch without a ten-foot pole, so they didn't understand why she insisted on winning her over. And they had no idea that she would have her as a partner in history and now visiting the George mansion.

Regina smiles triumphantly. The living room is finally quiet and she can turn her attention completely to the plan, she didn't feel shy or pressured to succeed around them, but didn't have all the attention from Y/N as she can have without silly questions and random celebrity gossip. It's the perfect moment.

She stares at herself in the mirror above the fireplace and fixes the smallest details of appearance so that she looks flawless.

"Gina!" her mother calls out from the kitchen, walking briskly into the room, and she rolls her eyes, before feeling blood run cold at the sight of her companion "What a adorable girl! She even offered to help me in the kitchen."

"Mom..." she mutters between teeth, trying to keep composed as her mother steps forward, arms around Y/N's shoulders "She's here to study."

"Oh, of course, of course! Studying is important." June says with a mischievous smile and finally lets her go "Studying what? Human anatomy?" and winks suggestively at her daughter, causing a wave of embarrassment and annoyance.

"Mom!" Regina exclaims, face burning with embarrassment, hoping that the girl won't pay any attention to her mother. At least she didn't offer condoms like last time, which didn't embarrass her like it does now "It's history."

"And philosophy." Y/N adds.

"A lot less interesting, but still important." the woman continues, not letting herself be put down, and turns to the visitor "Darling, would you like something to drink? Juice? Lemonade? More ice cream?"

Y/N, not at all affected by the expansive and slightly invasive personality, nods and opens a shy smile "A juice would be great, thank you."

"Perfect!" June hurries off to the kitchen, but not before taking one last meaningful look at her firstborn, who blushes visibly.

Regina sighs heavily and sits down at the table, this time next to her classmate, trying to regain control of the situation.

"Sorry about that. Sometimes my mom is a bit much."

"It's okay!" Y/N replies, settling into the soft chair, and goes back to concentrating on the notes scattered across the surface. In an almost imperceptible movement, she adjusts her glasses, which the blonde hadn't even noticed were resting on the top of head, and puts them on face, completely transforming her appearance "You're lucky."

It's Regina's turn to gasp, barely feeling the surprised sound escape between her lips. She'd deny it to anyone who asked if she thought the girl was beautiful, deny it to death, but there's something differently captivating that prevents her from lying now. The lenses enhance the Y/E/C eyes, making them more penetrating, as if she could see into the soul through them. The sight makes the older's heart race and her palms sweat, having to concentrate not to let it show, let alone appear enchanted.

"Do you wear glasses?"

"Yes, for years, but I was trying to get used to contact lenses." the newbie says, adjusting the frame correctly, sighing with relief "Which turned out to be a disaster."

"They look... good on you." she comments, trying to sound casual and not too anxious, failing miserably as she stares "Your eyes are beautiful."

"Thank you!" Y/N finally lifts her face and catches the queen bee with a simple glance behind the lens along with the amused smile, rare occasion, the same one Janis gets "But they don't work."

Regina laughs at the witty response, finding her perspicacity and humor interesting, very different from what surrounds her in everyday life. She's not afraid to make a joke about herself, when any of the trio would rather fight a bear than do such a thing, making themselves the material for silly and light-hearted jokes. Y/N seems to be completely oblivious to the effect she is causing, Regina's flushed cheeks being nothing more than the result of the warm weather, the friendly laughter aimed at everyone and the hospitality something routine, perhaps an apology for the not so pleasant first meeting. All the compliments, overly embellished and full of hidden intentions, simple acts of politeness, so she remains unaffected and continues to read the manuscripts, without giving the blonde what she so desperately wants.

"You know, the text isn't going to write itself." she laughs and points to the long-forgotten laptop "And I've already made it clear that I'm not going to do everything myself."

With a disbelieving nod, Regina goes back to work, trying to ignore the signals her own body gives off in the presence of the other. It's hard not to be affected by the sweet perfume emanating from inviting skin, the taste of ice cream she wants to try again, the way she seems so at ease and unimpressed in her house, lips puckering as she encounters a paragraph incomprehensible at first reading and now pushing up the stubborn glasses that insist on slipping down her nose. God, all of this is messing with Regina's head in a way she can't explain, there are no plans that could infiltrate all the sinful thoughts that invade her with this privileged view.

She forces herself to concentrate on the task in hand, which tingles as she feels their arms lightly touching, but a part of her desperately craves more of these moments of closeness, even if it means ignoring the voice of reason that screams in her mind that she's not a dyke and wouldn't be for Y/N. It's just a fucking plan. Nothing more than that.

Taglist: @reginassweetheart @chaengluva @avelynpye @bianchiniomg @royalityofmultifandom @lottiematthewsceo @notjaexiee @mayles @l1lass @bridkesby @newyork1432

Join my taglist here ^^

[definitelynotafurinasimp]

Chiori and Yae with a reader that tries to slack off all the time

characters: Chiori / Yae Miko x gn!reader (separate)

a/n: Chiori is such an asshole and I absolutely adore her. She’s like if they gave Stannis Baratheon hair and a second sword.

(I wrote this like... 2 months ago and finally finished it. A total henry move to write 90% of smth and then let it rot in my WIP folder for months, if you ask me.)

Anyway, hope you enjoy!

Chiori

While the two of you matched when it came to radiating calm energy, the way they came out in quite contrasting ways. Where the Seamstress worked hard at following her passions, you were easygoing, where she was direct and brutally honest, you were charming and always said what the other party wanted to hear. Where she was Chiori, you were you.

So when you once again found yourself in her Boutique, chatting away with customers and somehow managing to make them spend more than they had planned, only to up and vanish from one moment to the next, Chiori couldn’t help but feel like she had an inkling of an idea to as were she would find you.

“What are you doing here?”, Chiori’s voice suddenly rang out, waking you from your slumber as you slowly looked up at her, your eyes still half closed and yet still managing to make out the vexed look on her face.

“I was taking a small break. Do you need me for something, Chiori?” you asked in a completely innocent tone, an unwavering smile plastered on your face as she stared you down before signaling to the once locked door.

“And where did you get the keys for the room?”

“They were in the door, so I let myself in. Oh- Was I not supposed to go here?” You realized with widened eyes, glancing between her and the door before shooting her an apologetic smile.

“Yeah no, don’t do that again. The next time you want to take a nap, do it at home”, came her response almost immediately.

Putting the whole “sneaking off and going into a locked room to take a nap away from people” situation aside, what annoyed Chiori even more was how impossible to read you were. If she was sure you were lying to her, she’d have thrown you out long ago. Were you really clueless enough to let yourself into a room or were you simply playing dumb? 

“Ugh. If you want to stand around and do nothing, come with me. I’m in need of a model right now.”

Yae Miko

While you were certainly far from being as lethargic as a certain ninja-girl loitering around the shrine every so often, you had your moments of supreme languidness. And while there were times she felt the urge to help you out by giving you a bit of motivation to get your day started, more often than not, Yae found herself amused by the lengths you took to go unnoticed by your superiors.

“Oh my, you look exhausted. You must have been working hard to get all of this paperwork finished. I do hope I’m not being a nuisance right now”, Yae observed as she entered the room, her voice both soft in nature while masking her mischievous intentions, letting herself into your office only to see you half-slumped over your desk with finished paperwork surrounding you.

That being said, Yae had no doubt it didn’t take you as long as your dramatic rendition of an exhausted warrior would suggest, considering the clever ways you found to make your work easier. So often had you inadvertently impressed her with your way of working that she wouldn’t put it past you to reinvent the wheel if it could shave off a few seconds from your work.

“No, I just now finished my work”, you were quick to soothe her worries, and yet by the way you rubbed your eyes awake, the Kitsune couldn’t help but doubt your words.

As expected, you had learned from your mistakes. The last time you were caught finishing early, you got a few sentences of praise and an extra load of work, the way your self-satisfied smile turned into one barely holding on as you tried to mask whatever emotions washed over you on the inside, being exactly the kind of subtle reactions she loved to watch people go through.

“You should know that you are truly a commendable employee. So, to reward you for your hard work, I should give you a promotion”, Yae spoke before shooting you a small smile as if to praise you, and yet by the time her words registered in your brain, your mouth was left hanging wide open.

“Thank you, but that’s really not necessary. I can think of a dozen people more suited than me-”

“You’re selling yourself short. I’m confident you’re more than qualified for the position”, Yae quickly cut you off, her expression unchanging as she slowly turned around. “Or… Is it that you do not want more work?” She added as her smile grew wider, barely hiding her enjoyment anymore.

“No… thank you”, you responded with a meek sigh, realizing the futility of fighting it.

Once you’d take a closer look at your new privileges and responsibilities, you’d surely realize that she made sure most of your new workload wouldn’t take nearly as long as your current one if handled in an intelligent manner, and yet, when she saw your current reaction, a part of her found herself hoping you wouldn’t realize anytime soon.

By the time Yae reached the door however, she found herself halting in her tracks, quietly humming to herself as she seemed to think about something before finally turning to face you once again.

“I do suppose you did work well today. Take the rest of the day off.”

[randomshyperson]

R U Mine? - Heart Shaped Series

Chapter Summary: A game of cat and mouse begins between an Avenger and a criminal. But perhaps there are no winners, as they both fall.

Warnings: mentions of typical canon violence, hints of abusive past and unhealthy work dynamics, some superhero routine lore, more shapeshifter power mentions, mutual pining, forbidden relationship, some teasing, (first) kiss and then a lot of kisses and steamy make out, some fluff and comedy. | Words: 6.965K

A/N-> How many references to Killing Eve can one put in a story. And also, references to the Witch's Road comics. This here is the extra chapter about their first kiss, enjoy reading.

General Masterlist | AO3 | Series Masterlist

-&-

Before.

"I know what you're doing."

Three weeks prior, Natasha's sentence would have made her jump with fright. Perhaps she would have tried to hide all those files and lie and lie again, until she could convince herself the whole thing was about the job.

But today? Wanda was tired. She had spent the last few hours stumbling into dead ends, no progress on whatever she was trying to do with all that vague information Shield had on you.

So she lifted her face to the redhead who appeared in her room late at night, two cups of coffee in hand, and chuckled weakly at the statement. It was obvious that the drink was an invitation - perhaps even a sign of 'hey, I'm not trying to start a fight. I want to help,' and Wanda accepted without hesitation.

"It's not like I'm doing a good job of keeping it a secret." She retorts to Nat, who smiles before taking the empty space on the bed. Practically all the Shield files - now labeled Avengers - about you are scattered on the mattress. It's a mess, and to Nat, it makes sense that Wanda hasn't made much progress.

"To be fair, for a first-time Investigation, I think you're doing all right." Says the widow after a sip of her coffee. "You covered your tracks and even used an official justification for researching her. Your mistake was involving Vision."

Wanda sighs. "Let me guess, he talks under pressure?"

Nat chuckles, nodding. Wanda rubs a tension point on her forehead. Taking advantage of this, Natasha gestures to one of the files. "I'm not going to tell you what you can and can't do, Maximoff. But this doesn't seem very healthy."

Wanda gives a sad smile, and Nat expects her to defend herself. But instead, the smaller girl sighs. "I know." She murmurs sincerely, forcing a faint smile at the widow. "But I need this, Nat. It's the first time in months that I've managed to think about anything other than Pietro. And I know it doesn't look healthy, but it's all I've got. I'm an Avenger now. Maybe it's just time to get to work, and arrest villains or something."

Natasha frowned at her, absorbing the confession for a moment before rebutting: "Is that what you want to do with Y/N, though? Lock her up?"

Wanda swallows dryly, looking down. "Of course, Nat."

"You're a terrible liar."

The brunette sighs. "I mean it!"

"And I don't believe you." Nat insists in a good mood despite everything. "Look at all this, Wanda. You've been at it for days. Studying her. Did you even remember to eat anything in the last few hours?" Wanda snorts, gesturing to the breakfast leftovers on the dresser in the corner of the room which makes Natasha let out an incredulous laugh. "Wow, a nutritious example you are."

The witch tosses her hair back. "If you've come here to try to babysit me, please leave."

Natasha rolled her eyes and ignored the other woman's stubbornness. She put her coffee down between her crossed legs and started organizing the files.

"You're naturally perceptive and clever, Maximoff. But you lack experience and practice. You need to put together a timeline and find the gaps." The widow began, and masterfully, all the security camera photos, reports from shield agents, and unexplained crimes related to thieves with no identifiable faces began to connect and make sense. "But I must warn you, I did all this years ago. When I started at Shield, your little friend was already some sort of the goose that laid the golden eggs, or stole the gold for the saying to work."

"She's not my friend." Wanda murmured, her gaze fixed on the files so Natasha wouldn't see her blush. The widow ignored the comment and continued talking.

"My point is that I didn't get very far." Nat says with a sigh. "To be honest, it was an insult to my ego. She was just a kid back there. And she managed to flee much more experienced agents. She had endless, untraceable disguises. She doesn't need to impersonate, you know? She can create faces. It makes her almost impossible to monitor. When we met for the first time, it was she who found me." Nat says, swallowing dryly at her own memories. Wanda's eyes widen softly, listening carefully. "I never told this to anyone, but when Clint first met me, he told me that he felt something. As if he knew I wanted to escape. And when I saw Y/N, I had the same feeling."

"What did you do?" Wanda asked and Nat sighed.

"I couldn't do what Clitn did for me, Wanda, I'm sorry." Said the widow sincerely. "She attacked first. And I had to defend myself. It wasn't just protocol, it was all I'd learned to do."

Wanda frowns. "Why are you telling me all this, Nat?"

The redhead sighs. "Because it's important. It means that she doesn't trust easily, and attacks when she feels threatened. She reminds me of both of us, to be honest." Nat comments, getting a small smile from the witch. "Besides, I want you to be really careful if you do dig into this."

"I will."

"I'm serious, Wanda." Insists the redhead. "Careful not to miss a gun hidden in her dress." She remembers the last official report Wanda made, regarding her first mission, the night she simply couldn't stop thinking about, especially after your secret vision to the compound, and the witch swallows dryly. Nat doesn't mind her hesitation. "Careful in a way that you'll use your powers if necessary."

Without looking the widow in the eye, Wanda retorts between her teeth: "I get it, Nat."

"You're not going to carry this on until you look me in the eye, Maximoff. And swear it."

Wanda's stubbornness falters, and she returns her attention to the widow, looking at her seriously. Nat gives her a small smile as she adds, "It's not just Clint who cares about your safety. We all do. I'm not going to allow you to throw yourself headlong into something dangerous just to escape your grief, Wanda. Swear that you'll be very careful, and you'll walk away if it gets too dangerous."

Wanda is surprised by the tenderness, and a little embarrassed. It takes a moment but she finally nods. "I swear." She says before adding. "I want to help Y/N. Like Clint helped you. Not lock her up, like I said before."

Natasha chuckles. "I know, kid. I know."

With the Black Widow’s blessing, she kept digging those files. And Nat didn't lie, you're untraceable. Every time you meet, it's clear that you've let yourself be found. Even with handcuffs on your wrist, you keep smiling as if it was all part of the plan. Judging by the way you always escape from prisons, later going public that some confidential information for the police was stolen, this is easily confirmed.

The Avengers are getting used to the strange persecution, very much because each of them has their secrets. And just like his protégé, Steve Rogers had side missions to pursue Bucky. It would be hypocritical of him to hold anything against Wanda for being after you.

And Wanda couldn't stop. Even after hundreds of dead ends and ridiculous escapes. She had to meet you, and have less than five minutes in your presence with another twelve agents and the whole Avengers present every fortnight when they manage to track you only for you to escape again. She didn't know why, but she had the impression that you looked forward to these moments as much as she did.

Like a little private game of mouse and cat, only you and her were part of.

-&-

There are a hundred things to do in the Capital of Crime.

The most complete list of gambling games imaginable, right down to a mural of targets to be captured.

All these things are at your disposal, and all you can think about is the new addition to the Avengers team.

Wanda Maximoff was born in the country that fell from the sky around the same time that Baron Strucker was playing Pinky and the Brain with your cells in a secret laboratory of the now-destroyed Hydra. A Stark bomb made her an orphan, and after bouncing from orphanage to orphanage, often expelled for getting into trouble with her twin brother, Wanda embarked on protest groups in search of civil rights until she was finally recruited into a human experimentation program that turned her into an enhanced version of herself. She was the only reason for the first time in your life that you wished you hadn't split with Strucker so soon - If you'd still been his puppy instead of the clients he got, you would have met her. You may have become friends.

"She's doing it again." Xu Xialing whispered to Layla, the two engaged in a game of Beat the Hero - a competition of colored cards that contained electronic figures detailing the abilities of real-life superheroes. It was, in a way, training for possible battles in real life, where they learned about their enemies by playing. The two of them were sitting in opposite armchairs, while you were practically lying on the sofa, drinking with a lost look on your face. According to them, fantasizing for the tenth time in a row about the Avenger you met in Italia weeks ago.

Layla giggled when she saw your expression before turning her face to Xu Xialing again. "You know, they say Maximoff has psychic powers. Maybe Y/N is under a spell."

"A love spell, that is." Mocks the Chinese woman, getting a laugh from the other.

You only came out of your trance of thoughts about Wanda with the bell from the private room you were in. Your face changed before the curtain opened, and Xu Xialing was the first to look at the security guard entering, somewhat annoyed at having her private time playing games with friends interrupted.

"Forgive me for intruding, madam. The Countess is here and requests the Sage to join her." The man said, and Xialing nodded in understanding. She turned to you, but there was no need. With a soft leap from the sofa, you got to your feet and took one of Layla's cards from her pile - you threw it on the board and helped her win the game, taking the opportunity to leave the room while the two of them discussed whether the assisted victory had been fair or not.

The Golden Daggers Club was as packed and vibrant as ever. The next round of betting for the fights was due to start soon, and there were a lot of people shouting their bets to the judges, and joining the fight cages, so you had to make some effort to follow the venue's security guard into the special area of the place - where federal agents were given even more privacy to be around.

Contessa Valentina Allegra de la Fontaine was waiting for you alone, but behind a door with six security guards guarding her. Each of them gave you a look of contempt, but you walked past them without any reaction until you were with Valentina in a room with no windows, every inch of which was covered in priceless works of art, many of them stolen throughout history, which you and Layla recovered together in the service of the Ten Rings.

"You wanted to see me, Countess?" was your greeting, softly snarky. You weren't in the best of moods, especially since Valentina had interrupted your rest.

The woman gave you a false smile from the armchair where she was sitting waiting for you. A closed file and a glass of wine lay on the corner table.

"Oh, what a surprise, after your last defeat, I thought you'd given up on Sage." She comments with a certain venom on your disguise, the same one you wore two weeks ago when you went on what she called a streak of bad luck in the Club's fighting competitions, but which Xu Xialing called a distracted lovesick puppy. You try to disguise your clumsiness by clearing your throat.

Checking that the door is closed, you return to your real appearance and Valentina gives you a small but genuine smile.

"What do you want?" you insist, and in response, she pats the file resting on the table. You sigh. "What's this?"

"Last month has been very busy, but I've finally had time to review some of your late missions reports." She begins and you hide your nervousness, knowing full well where this conversation could end. "I apologize for taking so long to check them, darling. I hope you don’t think I’m jeopardizing your learning progress."

"Stop stalling, Valentina, just tell me what the problem is." You retort grumpily but she chuckles, her fingers tracing the paper before she grabs the file.

“Normally, I trust your experience, but I've heard that you've been particularly... antsy in your last few operations. Of course, you've successfully made it out of all of them, after all, we're having this conversation, but for a master of disguise, the increased number of encounters with the Avengers attracted my curiosity. I thought I'd take a closer look at your original encounters with them, and found an interesting passage in your report on Italy two months ago."

The page is already marked and in the next moment, she begins to read;

"My exit was interrupted by the presence of a new Avenger. A woman, perhaps the same age as me. The new, improved one from Sokovia. Average height, brown hair. Green eyes. Intense. Hypnotizing."

You swallow dryly, looking down at your feet. You're grateful to have control over your own body, or Valentina would be able to watch your cheeks blush.

She continues reading. "We faced each other briefly. The girl doesn't have complete control of her abilities, it was a quick fight. I immobilized her and departed in the getaway vehicle. No disguise was compromised, no other witnesses." Valentina narrates, finally raising her eyes from the file to you. "You know what's funny, sweetheart? The Avengers submitted their own report on Sapienza, and Wanda Maximoff describes the encounter with a Shapeshifter in detail. My question is, why are you lying for someone who didn't hesitate to use her special abilities to show her team your real appearance?"

You're caught off guard. A conflict of emotions rises in your chest, from anger to disappointment. It hurts. It's confusing and suffocating, and you feel the urge to start crying. But none of these emotions floats over your expression, your nails digging into your palm are enough to keep everything well buried.

With a soft sigh, you look Valentina in the eye.

"I don't trust the CIA."

Your boss chuckles, closing the file and crossing her legs. It's not exactly her best lie, but it seems to work on her.

"If this is about the Hydra clean-up in the public sector, I can assure you that we're safe." Valentina says. "Besides, your job is to trust me, Y/N. Not the CIA, or the Ten Rings, or any of your contractors. Only me, dear child, must you trust."

You bite your tongue hard, tears almost escaping this time. 

"I just..." You try, not knowing exactly what to say. "There was a conflict, and the girl, she beat me. Effortlessly. That energy she possesses revealed my disguise immediately, I had no chance to try another one. So I made a choice, and I omitted the part that I thought would do me any harm. Isn't that what you taught me to do?"

Right answer. Valentina grins, before sighing and standing up. You don't want her to touch you, but she puts her hands on your arms and you resist the urge to pull away.

"I'm proud of you, you're getting cleverer every day. I want you to be this way, Y/N. Strong-willed, resourceful." She compliments you, her hands moving up to your cheeks. You try to smile, but Valentina squeezes your skin tighter. "That doesn't mean you will lie to me. Understand?" She asks but doesn't expect a vocal response. Your nod is more than enough for her to give you a fake smile and loosen her grip. "You're my most valuable employee. I don't want you to put yourself in vulnerable situations without a reason."

Valentina steps away, and you decide to take a chance.

"She's like me." It's more hesitant than you'd like, but it's enough to make your boss raise an eyebrow at you. Swallowing dryly, you continue. "Wanda and her brother were also Strucker's experiments. We are the same. I thought I could-"

Valentina interrupts with a spiteful chuckle that makes you cringe like a frightened child. "The same? Is that what you think?" She retorts in a mocking tone that makes you feel too ashamed to even broach the subject. Leaning her waist on the table, she looks at you. "I know you've been digging through my files on her, Y/N. I don't blame you for being curious, but by now, I imagine you know very well the conditions of the experiments Miss Maximoff was part of. How she volunteered for all that. How can you say you're the same?"

You hesitate uneasily. "I don't mind that she volunteered. War called for desperate measures. I just... I've never met any other of us. Another who survived the Baron. I've been thinking if I could just see her-"

Valentina bursts into laughter, and you fall silent, concentrating so that she can't see your red ears. "See her? Now what's that, huh? Romeo and Juliet of the supers? What an absurd idea, child!" Refutes your boss, still chuckling as she walks away to the table. She finishes her glass of wine in one long gulp, and to your surprise, throws the file in your direction. You catch the item flat against your chest. "The notes the Avengers made about you are on page 24. Read what she said about you, and draw your own conclusions about who you call an equal. I came here to confirm your mental state, and this conversation was enlightening. I'll arrange an assessment."

"Val-"

"It’s not open for discussions Y/N." She cuts you off, a car key already in hand that makes you groan to yourself impatiently. "You're not going back to work until you talk to Doctor Grand."

She leaves without saying another word and you're left alone with the file in your hands. Without hurrying, you flip to the page mentioned earlier and sigh when you find a photograph of Wanda wearing a uniform with the Avengers crest embroidered on it. Below is her statement about the mission.

You trace your fingers over the passage "An extraordinary and dangerous skill from an equally impressive fighter" but hesitate when you read the passages about how she felt scared and unsafe. About how she thought you were aiming at her. About how she felt she failed by not bringing a high-risk criminal into custody.

Your tears finally fall, staining the page before you quickly wipe them away, closing the file tightly after ripping Wanda's photo out.

It was time to wrap up loose ends and get back to your perfect record.

-&-

In the fake drawer hidden on the floor under your bed - safeguards for someone whose apartment is frequently visited by a two-faced countess - you kept some personal things. Hydra's last record of you, small souvenirs from missions, and a photograph of Wanda Maximoff.

And this morning - and any other morning really - you were supposed to ignore that drawer, leave any weapons at home, put on a presentable outfit, and meet Valentina in the lobby promptly at 10 o'clock. She would take you by car to Dr. Grant's office who would do a standard assessment of your mental state that would tell whether or not you were fit to return to work.

But instead, you took the photo of Wanda out of its hiding place and put it in your pocket. You stood up, walked through your closet, and chose the least flashy backpack you owned. Then you armed yourself with three different types of knives and two pistols in a chest holster, very similar to that of American detectives. And speaking of the police, your drawer of false documentation provided by Valentina was studied without haste until you had in your pockets the identity of a Shield agent who never existed but was meant to be a little tribute to the job you were performing today.

With your disguise ready, you left the apartment two hours before your scheduled meeting with Valentina, and you had barely boarded the ferry when she called you.

"Our appointments aren't something to be skipped, young lady." Stated the woman seriously, but you gave her a weary sigh.

"I don't wish to see Doctor Grant."

Valentina chuckled, as you handed your ticket to the clerk passing in the corridors. On the other end of the line, she then spoke;

"You're not getting away with this, Y/N. I'm not authorizing your return to work until Roland confirms to me that your mental state is stable for you to continue."

You prop your feet up on the seat, switching your cell phone to another ear. "Val, I'm not running away, I promise. I just needed a break. Give me a few days, okay? Reschedule the visit, I'll be there. I'll even be there early."

She pauses thoughtfully, you can hear her breathing. And then she sighs in defeat and you smile. "Okay. If it's any encouragement, your next service is already being prepared. It's something you've never stolen before, and I'd like it to be yours. Of course, if you prove suitable."

A few weeks ago, the temptation would have been too much and you would have turned around and gone to the appointment just to win Grant's approval and be cleared for the job. To prove not only to Valentina, but to the world, and to any other colleague, that you could complete that mission. 

But now you let out a short laugh, and that surprises Valentina enough for her to keep quiet. "Reschedule for the end of the week. I guarantee that I'll have Dr. Grant's approval and you'll have your order in no time."

The promise seems to be enough for her, and after another sigh, Valentina hangs up. You put your cell phone away and return your attention to the now-stamped train ticket to New York.

The trip didn't take long, and within a few hours, you were in the bustling city. Especially today, at the inaugural Heroes of Earth celebration event, Manhattan was almost chaotic.

With fans and journalists from all over the world filling the streets that had been closed off for a sort of open-air Comic Con, you had no trouble at all going unnoticed in the crowd. You wore a disguise, of course, but you didn't have to. A few minutes into the fair, you really did look like a tourist, with your Avengers sweatshirt, cap, and colorful glasses.

The knives in your backpack were well hidden under the amount of superhero souvenirs you got.

You were trying to choose between an Incredible Hulk smash-burger or a portion of Thor's worthy chicken when the bell announcing the photo session with the Avengers was about to start.

Your appetite disappeared, anxiety taking over your whole body at once.

It was time to move.

The queue was huge, as was to be expected. At least, most of them were there for the best-known Avengers. Thor wasn't even on Earth, which meant that the other five originals were competing with each other over who got the most autographs. The new members, like Wanda, the Falcon, or Vision, were given presentation stands but had much more free time at the event.

You tried to ignore the pang of pride when you saw that among the new members, the queue of people to see Wanda was the longest. A considerable number of children were very excited to ask her to do magic tricks.

Your strawberry milkshake - Black Widow's Special - almost fell out of your hand when you finally saw Wanda leave the curtains dividing the dressing rooms and join the autograph table.

She wasn't wearing the soft hoodie with the Avengers symbol from the photograph you sneak a peek at almost every night, nor was she wearing the pathetic disguise she wore the first time you saw her. No, somehow, she managed to look prettier. Like all her teammates, she was wearing an outfit similar to the official fighting uniform, probably designed just for the event. With a black tactical outfit covered by a red jacket, the gloves that didn't cover her fingers were probably your favorite part.

Despite her relatively unfriendly uniform, Wanda offered such lovely smiles to the people who came to greet her that you thought the milkshake made you sick, judging by the way your stomach and heart were unsettled.

When the Meet & Greets began, you had to go to the ticket booth and buy a single ticket in cash; to meet Wanda, of course.

It would take place back in the fair's improvised dressing rooms, and after waiting for almost forty minutes, you were finally guided inside. Your backpack wasn't searched, perhaps because your weapons were hidden by Ten Rings technology, a gift from Xu Xialing on your last assignment, and when it went through the X-ray at the entrance, all they detected were the countless fair toys you had acquired. And the knives hidden in your body, well, it's obvious to say that when it comes to changing aspects of your anatomy for any situation, passing a security search was quite easy.

"Miss Maximoff will be here in a minute. She had a little problem with her costume, the children who came in before you caused a little milkshake accident."

One of the organizers informed you, and you gave her a kind smile, commenting that the Black Widow special was essential, even if it might cause minor accidents. The employee chuckled before going to answer a call on her communicator that could have been your intentional flooding of one of the toilets to occupy as many of the staff as possible.

Wanda's dressing room was the most intimate environment of hers you've ever been in. It didn't have many things, of course, but for someone who only had access to government documents, it was paradise.

Curious fingers traced all the belongings you could reach, from more comfortable pieces of clothing for her to change into during the event, to different types of tea and books, until you found a music device. 

The password protection on a Stark Industries MP3 player made you laugh to yourself. "What a distrustful little witch." You murmured affectionately, stowing the item in your jacket pocket and moving over to the schedule board.

You had already read the row that marked the start of the Meets, probably described there and in all the other dressing rooms, when your gaze caught a small notebook forgotten in one of the armchairs.

You got the chance to take it in hand and smile at the sketches on the first few pages before the item was suddenly lifted and pulled out of your hand.

"Sorry, but this is private." Wanda grabbed the item out of the air, but you stood there, static like a frightened animal, unable to breathe properly under her gaze. She seemed to realize that she had been too harsh and huffed out a laugh, the notebook clutched tightly against her chest. The sound made you swallow. "I shouldn't have kept you waiting, I guess you got bored. Sorry about that. Let me put this away, and we can, um, get started."

She didn't use magic to return the book to a safe place, you didn't know that yet, but Wanda was still learning to trust her powers. And if she could help it, she usually didn't use them.

She approached you, to put the book away in a bag that you didn't have a chance to peek into, and the sudden movement made your body react in alarm. Your back hit the schedule board, and Wanda frowned, stopping in her tracks with an almost hurt look on her face.

"You don't have to be scared. I'm not going to hurt you, you know." She murmured with the tips of her ears red. "I'm just going to put my notebook away, you see." The backpack floated towards her with a tug, and Wanda hardly met your gaze after that. She tossed the bag into a corner of the room and fiddled uncomfortably with the edge of her blouse.

She was no longer wearing the outfit she'd worn before, she was wearing a comfortable set, too soft and domestic for you to be calm-minded about anything.

You forced your brain to work because you thought the whole thing was getting ridiculous.

"I'm not scared." Your voice comes out very hoarse, so you clear your throat. Wanda raises her eyes, finally, and the green irises make your cheeks warm. You don't hide it from her. "As a matter of fact, I'm not the one who usually gets scared when we meet, am I, Maximoff?"

Taking the time she needed to understand, you removed your colored glasses and cap, your face changing back to its original appearance. Wanda sighed shakily as soon as she recognized you.

"Hi, Y/N." She greeted, too sweet for you to do anything but smile shyly, forgetting for a moment exactly what you had come for. 

"Hello, Wanda." You tried to sound just as gentle, but you must have done a poor job, to blame it on your body that doesn't seem to be working properly. Wanda swallows dryly, her hands moving slowly in the air. You watch the unhurried gesture - the way her fingers draw the air, and how the items of disguise float away to the armchair, and in your hands appear handcuffs that don't prevent you from moving them, and don't hurt either. The most you feel is a tickle.

"I've come all this way, just for you to put me in chains, little witch." You try to tease her, and you think it's a victory the way Wanda tries to hide a smile, approaching with her head down until she's close enough to touch you.

Her hands should be gripping the magical handcuffs, but instead, they hold yours. Wanda sighs. 

"You can't be here." She whispers, meeting your eyes, and you think it's ridiculous that you made any plans at all. You could never do anything to harm Wanda, and that was just the truth. "Then why are you?"

Unlike her, you don't hide your smile. You shrug as if your heart wasn't thumping in your chest, and revel in playing with Wanda's buttons.

"I was in the neighborhood. Wanted to say hi." Your casual reply makes her snort impatiently.

Her hands release yours, and you raise an eyebrow at Wanda's audacity to start searching you. 

"Wow, take me on a date first, love." You joke, but despite the new color her cheeks acquire due to the joke, the fond nickname, Wanda doesn't stop. She gropes in your pockets, reaches into your jacket, and grimaces with disapproval at every illegal item she finds. The false documents, the Shield badge, the guns. The MP3 is in the front pocket and Wanda gets a little closer to reach it, enough so that you have to lick your lips trying to control the instinct to break the distance. She just looks so kissable and smells so good.

She offers you an incredulous look at the stolen item, which floats back to the table as she gropes for the other pocket. Finding the train ticket, she lets out a short laugh.

"Six hours of travel is not being in the neighborhood." She comments, raising her eyes to you. 

"What do you want me to say?" You retort with a little smile, discourteously glancing between her eyes and her lips. "That I couldn't help myself and had to get on the first train to see you again? That I can't even go back to work because I can't stop thinking about you?"

There's this thing that Wanda's eyes do. The pupils get huge, and the green darkens. And she looks at you as if you were something to be devoured in every detail as if you were worth admiring. As if you were worth any of her time.

She speaks again, so low and hoarse that you wouldn't be able to hear her if you weren't close.

"Your thoughts are loud. Are you always so hard on yourself?" 

You swallow dry, caught off guard. Your hesitation makes Wanda sigh. She looks ready to apologize when you nod.

"It doesn't matter, every time we bump into each other, you make me feel different. Better. You look at me as if you can see more. What do you see, Wanda?"

She sighs deeply, and her hands move to touch your face. It's too gentle, and affectionate in a real and true way that you never experience. Your body goes rigid, not knowing how to handle the tenderness, but Wanda doesn't catch any request for her to stop touching, so her hands continue to hold your cheeks.

"I can see your anger, just as I can see your fear. I see the thief, and the murderer, but I can also see only you. No disguises, no lies. The person you are underneath it all." She says, swallowing dryly as she lets her gaze fall to your lips. "This is the person I let get away. And the person I'd like to meet, if you'll let me."

Your chest is heavy with confusing feelings. Your traumas beep in unison, your defenses beg you to push Wanda away and flee before the rest of the Avengers decide to show up. 

But instead, you return watery eyes to Wanda and gasp softly; "Why? Why do you care?"

And Wanda tries to lie. "I think you could use a friend."

You chuckle dryly, pulling away from the touch. "Hard pass." You mutter, but Wanda doesn't let you move away entirely. She decides to risk everything.

She grabs your chin and tilts your face towards her. It's a miscalculated kiss, you both flinch and gasp at the first contact of your lips and being taken by surprise makes you lose your balance in the middle of the movement to get away from her.

You fall into the armchair, and Wanda should apologize, but she doesn't even bother. She pushes your tense shoulders and straddles your lap, this time, when her mouth meets yours, it's much hungrier and more determined.

The handcuffs disappear into thin air with the first gasp that leaves her lips, and you waste no time in grabbing her waist, roughly pulling her down and holding her tight against you as your mouths move together. It's a passionate kiss full of urgency, charged with all the tension you've built up.

Your tongue slides into her mouth without warning, more experienced than Wanda, you manage to get a whimper out in no time. She wants to shrink away from the sound, but your hands slide down to grab her ass and pin her down onto your front, and suddenly all she can do is moan.

It seems absurd that you've gone a lifetime without kissing Wanda Maximoff when you both seem molded to do this with perfection.

You don't even move apart to breathe, a battle of restless hands and hungry mouths panting against each other. Wanda begins to grind herself into your lap in search of friction and you let out a sound you didn't know you could make.

Everything is suddenly so hot that Wanda doesn't hear her surroundings. She doesn't hear the curtain or the footsteps. But she definitely hears the machine man's surprised exclamation.

"Oh, forgive me, Wanda." Vision's back is turned the second he catches a glimpse of what's happening in that armchair.

Wanda jumps away as if she's received a jolt, and you groan in displeasure at the interruption. Despite the way every cell in your body seems to be vibrating with euphoria, you manage subtle changes in your face that prevent the Synthesized from recognizing you if he decides to turn around. "I didn't mean to interrupt-"

"Vis, please leave." She demands with ragged breathing, her face bright red. Wanda looks neither at you nor at Vision.

The man clears his throat, stuttering. "Of course, Wanda, I'm so sorry." He says, but although he mentions leaving, he doesn't. Stopping just before the curtain, he risks a glance over his shoulder. "There was a forced distraction with criminal indications in the western sector, the fair has already been interrupted. The captain has asked everyone to gather for a patrol check, in case there's an attempted attack. I just wanted to warn you. It would be appropriate to send your... friend away." explains the machine, exchanging a quick glance with Wanda before leaving the dressing room.

You'd like to kiss her again, but Wanda sniffles at Vision's departure and you frown in a mixture of concern and confusion.

"That's why you're here, isn't it?" She deduces annoyed. "To try a bloody attack on a children's fair? God, I’m so stupid. You’re obviously using me to distract your partners-”

But you stood up with an impatient sigh for the anxious and nervous conclusions of an avenger who has been caught in the act.

You grab Wanda again and kiss her hard enough for her to lose her balance, and she ends up pressed against the schedule board, and then the coffee table, each kiss more desperate and heated than the last.

Your thigh presses between hers, and Wanda practically meows at the friction. You love how responsive she is to your touch, and you try to push a little further under her clothes, quickly addicted to attracting more sounds.

And you're almost to the edge of her bra when you're interrupted again.

"Jesus, Maximoff, what the hell is going on here?" Unlike Vision, Natasha Romanoff is much more serious and determined to put an end to the whole thing. And she cares little about what was happening against the table. You hide the change in your features on Wanda's shoulder, while also trying to control your own breathing, somehow much more aroused than before. "We're working, Maximoff. There may be terrorists on the perimeter and you're here, well, I'm not judging, I'm just saying there's an appropriate time for everything. I'm sure your friend will survive if you let go of her mouth for a few hours. Who knows, maybe next time you can meet in a more appropriate place?" 

When you finally look at Nat, you can see that she's hiding a teasing little smile. You're glad that Wanda is making friends.

And unlike you, who doesn't mind having been caught not once but twice by the Avengers, Wanda looks like an embarrassed tomato who nods quickly while her magic does the work of adjusting your half-open clothes and leaving the objects you bump into in order again. 

"Of course, Natasha, I'll send her away. I'm sorry." Wanda practically pushes you out, dragging you to a more secluded area at the back of the dressing rooms.

She tries unwillingly to resist your eager hands or the quick but intense kisses you steal from her on the way.

"You have to go." She struggles to gasp, her hands pushing your shoulders to stop the whole thing or she wouldn't be able to think.

Wanda with her hair disheveled after a proper make-out session, her face flushed and her lips swollen is too much for you.

"Fuck." You gasp and she swallows.

"What?" 

You don't know what to say, nothing seems enough. She's awakened something in you that you didn't know existed. Suddenly, the idea of staying away from her seems an impossibility.

"When will I see you again?"

She frowns at the question, laughing nervously. "We shouldn't have seen each other even today."

But your hands pull her by the waist. "Nonsense. We should definitely do this again.” Your lips trail down her jaw, to the sensitive points on her neck that you're trying to memorize. She sighs, and struggles to keep her eyes open, but only for a moment before she pushes you away again, laughing shyly.

"Please, darling, I need to get back, my job-"

"There's no attempt attack, I flooded a toilet so I'd have time to see you." You clarify quickly and Wanda has to shake her head and laugh incredulously.

"You're nuts."

"Honestly? Yes. I think I've figured out what was wrong with me over the last weeks. You’re driving me nuts, Wanda Maximoff. I can't stop thinking about you." You retort quickly, not caring about the irregular beating of your pulse, nor the way she blushes heavily. "I need to know when I'm going to see you again."

She looks back into the dressing rooms and can see that Natasha is coming out through the curtain. She approaches you at once to give you one last intense kiss and whispers goodbye on your lips as you part.

With every inch of skin that Wanda touched vibrating and your heart pounding in your chest, you only remember to regulate your powers and return to a disguise a good few minutes after she has disappeared from sight, and hope that no security cameras saw you there.

[arafilez]

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ▰ ▰ ✶ WØRLD EPISØDE FIN: WILL ⪨

ㅤㅤ➛ ㅤiv.ㅤ ARRIBA 𒉽 kang yeosang❛ 𓇿

🥂̸̤ㅤㅤMDNI smut e2lㅤ ✸ㅤyou are sick and tired of this mission but you will do it, you will kill himㅤㅤ───ㅤㅤ w: weapon usage, blood, extreme injuries, sex ㅤㅤ»ㅤㅤ wc: 4.5kㅤㅤ𠈔ㅤㅤ moodboard

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ❛ lacuca racha, step in step cha cha . ❜

“Oh for fuck’s sake send someone else,” you scream at your mission email and threw your head back in the chair. This is stupid, this is absolutely and horrifyingly stupid. You have done this mission two times now and failed.

And it frustrates you.

You have never failed any mission and this new one which you have tried two times in the last month has brought you nothing but failure. It also made you injure badly at your waistline which is still in its healing phase but at least you can run and combat now. But suddenly the same mission is handled to you again after four weeks of resting period.

Kill Agent ‘K.Ys’ from Ateez.

Just on the day you come back.

Terrific.

You stand up kicking the chair in rage as it slams into the wall behind you and walk towards your boss’s office. Knocking on the door, you don’t bother waiting for a ‘come in’ as you strut inside and slam the papers on his table.

Your boss doesn’t turn around and maintains a calm demeanour as if he is expecting you and it infuriates you more as he slowly turns around to see you.

“Well, I see you got your mission,” he grins and you roll your eyes visibly.

“Sir, I am obviously injured, I have failed the last two times I tried this, you should be sending someone better,” you reason calmly even though just a few seconds ago you slammed the door.

He chuckles and you shiver at the underlying sarcasm in it and you look at him as he stands up. “For an agent, you are obviously not very clever, are you y/n?”

“Sir, I don’t understand,” you stutter out getting nervous at his figure. His eyes search your face and you shiver lightly at the thoughts which you are aware he is plotting in his mind.

“You are our best agent for this, you have done it two times, so you can do it again. The third time is a charm, as they say,” his voice suddenly turns sweet and cheerful and your doubts increase at his sickly tone, why is he behaving like this?

You decide not to question and nod your head wordlessly working your way towards the door as your hand lingers over the knob.

He was just being nice, right? Even though he did say you are stupid and suddenly changed his sentence to something better.

You turn around murmuring a quiet, “I will not disappoint you, Sir,” and leave. He is definitely up to something. And that something includes you.

You wear your tactical suit and make sure the guns and the knives are in place along with the small loop earring that acts as a laser. You carry another gun too this time because you don’t know how your meeting will go with K.Ys this time.

K.Ys and you are known for your notorious encounters. Your past meetings have been rather interesting.

Apart from your missions to kill him you have seen him multiple times in your stakeouts. The known-for-his-words seducer, the model-faced seducer of Ateez. As an enemy agent it went way beyond your ethics how the girls just lay on his feet.

K.Ys, whose real name is still unknown to you, is a man who has a way with his words. The amount of times he had tried to rope you in with his sweet words, and seductive language and the equal number of times you had almost twisted a knife in his body. Like is he hot? Yes, maybe, probably, definitely! But lying on his feet for that? Absolutely not, where are people’s dignity nowadays?

“One more sentence from that mouth of yours and I will twist you to death,” you warned him.

“I would like to see you try, my love,” he spoke with an enamouring smile that you had half the mind to slap it off.

So when you were finally assigned to eliminate him a month ago you could have never been happier. Finally you will get to see him shut up that too under your mercy. Too bad, he was actually really hard to kill.

The first time you were finally assigned to kill him you had walked past the wired barriers and quietly entered the abandoned factory you were given information as the temporary base for Ateez K.Ys. You had backup waiting out for your signal and you entered the password for the door only to be hit with an ‘Access denied.’ Your brows furrowed in confusion and you tried it again but the same red light popped up. You racked your brain and spoke through your earpiece about the problem only for your boss to yell that you were the one wrong and he should have sent someone better.

Getting annoyed at his continuous comments you yanked off your earpiece, put it in your pocket and tried again. Same result!

“What are you looking for sweetheart?” his deep voice interrupted you as your hands hovered over the lock. You turn around swiftly push him to the door and hold a knife to the person’s throat and he merely chuckles. The dim light showed off his perfect features as you tried to scan his face and there he was, in all his glory, K.Ys of Ateez.

You internally cursed yourself for tugging over your earpiece but maintained a stern stance as you spoke up, “Well, you are a lot more tolerable when under my knife, Agent K.Ys.”

He merely chuckled at your sentence and paid no heed to the knife in front of his throat as he said, “What a pleasant surprise!” His demeanour had a dangerous edge to it and you felt him scanning your face with his eyes he spoke up again, “I assume you are here to kill me?”

“Yes,” you shrugged and took out your gun to eliminate him. This was easy, your boss was worried for nothing. You hold it at his head and just as you were about to pull the trigger K.Ys vanished. You gasped out visibly confused and before you could act someone came behind your back and slashed you with a knife. The warmth oozed your skin as you groaned and turning around you saw the same man now smirking. The superficial cut was in the back of your mind now, as you ran and punched him in the face as he held your fist easily.

“Drooling over a hologram sweety? That’s how handsome I am, aren’t I?” he whispered and twisted your arm as you groaned in pain sitting on your knees. You definitely should not have pulled off that earpiece.

You slid on the ground kicked his shin and picked up your gun from the ground. “Too cocky, aren’t we?” you smirked swirling your gun in your hand.

“Oh darling, you should not try to kill me,” his voice increased in his pitch of seduction and you rolled your eyes kicking his stomach again and he groaned from the contact. Chuckling at him you aimed your gun but before you could shoot something hit the back of your head and you blacked out.

The second time, you were in disguise. You had information about the club he was going to and used his seducing skills for information and you readied yourself for it. A red sleek dress with a thigh slit, red heels, red lips, and red highlights in your hair. You put on a face mask and wore the thigh chain which would work as the recorder, hid the gun in your dress and attached a katana inside your shoe.

You walk inside the club getting induced by the smell of alcohol and sweaty bodies. Emotionless, meaningless conversation filled your ear and made you wonder why you took up a job in this dimension.

Not wanting to dwell with your thoughts you made your way towards the back room and entered it. The first scene you saw made you roll your eyes as a girl ground on K.Ys as he whispered in her ears and she repeated it.

Suddenly his gaze fell on you and dark eyes glazed your body and you tried to discard the heavy feeling under his eyes checking you out. On the good side, your plan was up and working. You smiled through your face mask and he smirked back suddenly the person in front of him was of no use anymore as he made her get off his lap. You snickered to yourself as you saw her leaving without even one release and made your way towards him rocking your hips lightly.

“Oh babygirl, you found the right person for you,” he whispers as you straddle him and he circles his hand around your hips. His heated gaze made you light-headed as you scolded yourself and you’re hormones for it but you returned it back and slowly kissed the corner of his lips.

“Teasing me now?” he voiced out as another hand caressed your waistline and you pulled your hair to the side exposing your neck area. His eyes landed on your neck as he kissed your collarbones and made his way up. You pulled up your leg and circled it around his waist and the katana was almost out. You just have to push it inside him.

“So pretty,” he kisses your jawline and starts sucking on it as you moan out a little too loud for your acting but tighten your hands around the katana. You had to kill him.

Your eyes widened as you felt a dagger pierce your waistline making you limp against his figure. It is twisted in and a strangled cry left your throat as you fell. You looked up through hazed eyes and watched him leave before backup arrived.

Your mind fills with hatred towards him and the way you felt your weaknesses emerging and you decide that this time you will do it. You will kill K.Ys.

You walk inside the alley with the white cloak wrapped around your body and head to kill K.Ys for the third time. To say you are desperate to kill him is wrong. You are more than desperate. You are sick and tired of your boss treating you like a toy, sending you on the same mission and trashing you when you return unsuccessful.

This is stupid in more ways than one.

You look around subtly keeping a watch for him and clutch the gun at your hips. You have to do it, you have to kill him. And you have to get out without getting hurt.

Yeosang knew you were coming, all courtesy of Wooyoung and his twin’s hacking skills and he smirks to himself as soon as he hears Wooyoung through his ear-piece point out which one is you. He watches carefully as you go past him and shakes his head to himself. You are subtle, he will give you that. But he was able to notice your ministrations and continuous fidgeting.

He tilts his head to his side and walks towards the end of the alley and he is aware of the subtle footsteps behind him. He confidently goes towards the storeroom and doesn’t bother to look back.

You see him not turning as you pick up your pace and walk behind him. He opens the sliding door and slowly turn around and lock your eyes with him. Your hood is down as you take in his features slowly, the mint highlights below the black hair, his sharp nose bridge, a remarkable face and the sheer suit he was wearing.

And you run.

He only watches, one eyebrow-raising at you and you take your gun and click the trigger multiple times. Yeosang simply dodges the bullets and you run faster and enter the storeroom.

The door shuts behind you and your senses click. This was a trap and you walked right into it. Nevertheless, you clutch your gun and look around.

You click on your gun lightly and discard the cloak. Crouching below you hide yourself behind the numerous boxes and your feet silently trudge the ground.

“You are the pawn again, y/n?” you hear K.Ys’s voice boom through the factory and he somehow knew your name. You resist the urge to get up and get a look at him and shoot the bullet.

Yeosang clicks his tongue and continues, “But you are too pretty to be killed.”

Your blood boils at his words and before you can think with your mind, you get up and fire a bullet in his direction. He dodges it pretty easily and chuckles saying, “Don’t use up all your bullets, babygirl.”

You walk towards him as you say, “I will if it means you will be dead for good.”

“Full of spite now, aren’t we?” he smirks tilting his head and walking towards you. Your eyes travel down the muscles twitching under his sheer sleeves and your eyes wander on them a bit before you regain your posture and cock your gun at him.

“Oh darling, you may not want to kill me,” he says his voice turning sickly sweet and you let out a sarcastic laugh and say, “Keep repeating those sentences K.Ys and-“

“My name is Kang Yeosang, love, learn it,” and as soon as he says that you push him towards the boxes as some of them tumble behind and hold the gun to his head.

“The only difference between the last times you said those sentences is that you lived and today you will die, Kang Yeosang” you reply, your eyes glazing over the man at your gunpoint, a satisfied smile tinting your lips.

Yeosang tilts his head in amusement and swiftly yanks your hand on the gun towards him making you stumble over his figure for a millisecond and suddenly you are the one pinned to the boxes. You two keep fighting with good amounts of defence. You kick him on the knees making him groan after some seconds but he quickly gets up and pushes you to the nearest wall glaring at you.

You glare back at him and as if a switch goes on inside Yeosang he says, “Are you sure you aren’t here just to have a good time? Did your boss send the good girl to have a taste of my dick?”

“Shut the fuck up, I hate you,” you grit out pushing him but to no avail and he laughs looking at you, his deep laughter echoing through the storeroom. He pins your hand behind you stands up against the wall properly and hovers over your figure.

“And I hate the way you laugh so much at your useless teammates’ lame jokes, but we are not on complaining basis now, are we?” he challenges and your eyes scan his face. In all your six months of countless encounters of his arrogance and your stubbornness you might have realise that, in fact, he really is good looking.

“Playing hard to get won’t get you anywhere, darling,” he purrs and you whimper as your mind travels places. Blame Yeosang’s seductive words, or his deep voice, or you not being able to get a good fuck for years now your mind pauses to think. You feel yourself getting lightheaded at his words.

He is a seducer for god’s sake, of course, he is good, and you are here to kill him so get your priorities straight, your mind screams at you. A pathetic whine leaves your throat when you feel Yeosang lightly kissing the skin behind your ear, his hands hovering over your waist hovering a bit.

Fuck priorities, you scream internally and your reactions amuse Yeosang as he grips your hips tighter and you moan at him whispering right into your ear, “Just as I thought, you are all talk and no bite.”

You gasp loudly and open your eyes to see him. The well-lit storeroom accentuates his features as you see his dark, lust-filled eyes boring into yours. You take in his face that looks like a sculpture and you curse the Gods for making a man this beautiful.

“I hate you so much,” you breathe heavily and watch his eyes run all over your face before grinning, “That’s not new, tell me something I don’t know.”

“You can’t get information from me, Kang,” you glare at him and you see a shift in his eyes as it locks with yours, “Are you sure you want this?” You stare at him dumbfounded, you mind clouding at the thought of his hands being pressed to your body, his mouth leaving warm, open kisses and you a whine leaves your throat. “Fuck yes,” you say.

He smirks at your answer pressing his lips at the base of your jaw. You feel his nose brushing along as his soft lips imprint on your skin and you throw your head back to the wall. Your hormones are acting up too wildly for your own good.

“Yo-You are fucking insane,” you breathe out and he merely smirks saying, “You are the one falling apart when I have barely touched you princess.”

“I need you,” you whine pathetically, the thoughts of killing him at the back of your mind. You can kill him after he fucks you for all you care. You will think about your dignity some other time too. Right now you just need him inside you.

He sucks your neck harshly at your words, his teeth clashing on your skin making you cry at the contact. He pulls back shortly admiring his work and presses his lips to yours. You kiss him back and the kiss is everything but soft, tongues fighting for dominance, teeth clashing and you groan as you fill him manoeuvre you by clutching your head and pushing it closer to his.

A string of saliva interconnects you two as he leaves your lips and presses light kisses, unsure fingers hovering over the zipper of your body suit. His breathless features and messy hair send a rush down to your core making you grow impatient by every second.

“Yeosang just take it off,” you whine and he is quick to tear it off your body and drinks in your sight. He feels himself getting hard as he slides off your panties and inserts his digits pushing them in with no mercy.

A strangled cry leaves your throat at the sudden contact while Yeosang pushes his fingers inside scissoring you open. “Fuck princess, so wet, only for me isn’t it?”

Your malicious words dry at the back of your throat and you can only mewl, he smirks at your fucked out state saying, “You were talking big a moment ago, what happened now?”

A half-whine half-gasp leaves your throat at his words and he continues, “Boys here can’t fuck you like this can they, princess?”

“N-no they can’t, oh my god,” you gasp as Yeosang’s finger hits your G-spot repeatedly making you dizzy and you hear the slick sounds of your clit filling the room. Pressure builds up in your stomach and Yeosang can feel it too with the way you are clenching around him making him pull away,

A disappointed grunt leaves your lips and you mutter, “Asshole.”

“Keep talking like that and I will leave you here to fend for yourself.”

“You are so full of yourself.”

“And you are about to be full of me but you don’t see me complaining do you?”

You shut up soon and feel your mouth watering as he takes off his suit and you stare at the bulge in front of you. He smirks at your reaction pushing you back to the wall.

You cry loudly as he pushes his cock inside you and grip his shoulders and he gives you time to adjust. As soon as you nod he thrusts into you repeatedly broken whimpers falling from your lips. He groans himself but still takes his chance as he intakes your figure and says, “I wonder what your boss’s reaction will be after he knows his ‘best agent’ got fucked senseless by K.Ys.”

Your nerves heighten at his words, at the knowledge of your boss, at the fact that you are in fact supposed to be killing and you mewl a quiet “faster” to him as he pounds into you relentlessly. Your throat feels dry and you can’t even form a proper sentence as he abuses you hole, hitting in the right place every time.

“Come on princess, don’t be so quiet now. Show some gratitude for being fucked as you deserve and moan my name,” Yeosang hoarsely speaks up and you let out broken and loud moans at his words.

“That’s right, nobody can fuck you as I do, can they babygirl?” you scream at his words saying, “No, o-only you.”

“C-close,” you mumble at him, your senses at the peak of not getting your release earlier and he pushes himself in again saying, “Yeah? Well, I don’t know if I should let you come yet.”

“Shit, Yeo please,” you cry out at his words and a teasing smile lingers on his lips at the nickname and he whispers, “Okay love, cum, let go for me.” A loud moan of his name leaves your throat as you finally get to release and he thrusts himself through it coming soon in the condom after you.

You pant heavily your legs feeling like jelly and he pulls himself out and murmurs a small “I got you”. He holds your waists, makes you sit down and kneels in front of you carefully.

“What the hell are you doing to me Kang Yeosang?” you whisper as you see him cradle you, your head falling on his shoulders as he picks up your gun, katana and suit and keeps them beside you.

“You are supposed to kill me,” you whisper but Yeosang pays no heed to your words as he scans your body for any mark that would hurt. His eyes stop on your own, and you feel delusional as his soft brown ones hold your gaze. No way in hell is he now going all soft on you!

“Why do you always let your boss treat you like a pawn?” he whispers and you rest your head on his shoulders again. Your eyebrows furrow at his sentence and ask, “What do you mean?”

“You are like a suicide bomber to them, they send you to lure me and then try to kill both of us,” he says softly, one hand caressing your hair but suddenly you hold the hand and yank him away. You glare at him, the light constriction in your throat becoming worse every second. Just the time you thought he is being nice!

“Stop with the brainwashing, if you want to kill me do it now,” you grit your teeth, eyes seething with anger and he sighs handing you your earpiece. “Listen for yourself,” he says but you ignore him. You put on your suit hurriedly and he watches you as you put on the earpiece.

Your ears feel the familiarity of the machine as you are about to pick up your gun and suddenly your boss’s voice floats in your ear.

“She is dead already I think, easier for us, you know K.Ys is in there so kill him, go.”

You stop dead on your track and suddenly everything hits. Your boss’s weird change in behaviour, his fake smiles, him handing you this mission specifically. But how did Yeosang know?

“Yeosang, h-how did you know?” you look up at him and he watches you slowly pick up your hand, clutching the gun so tight he can almost see your knuckles whitening.

“I saw them attack you both times and we saved you the second time,” he speaks nonchalantly as if saving your enemy agent is the most normal thing ever. Your eyes float with confusion and thus Yeosang explains it in short.

Yeosang saw the figure behind you hitting your head and he quickly called for their fighting team. Before the person can even touch Yeosang, San jumps in and kills him. His eyes moved to you and Yeosang shrugged confused as to why your people were trying to kill you. Seonghwa quickly pulled him out of there but his eyes lingered on your figure but left you there.

The second time Yeosang looked up in horror when the same man who slashed your waistline pounded on him. Yeosang had skills and fought the man and soon was assisted and after they made sure he was dead he looked at you.

“They keep sending her as a pawn,” Seonghwa voiced his thoughts and Yeosang contemplated sometime before saying, “Should we bring her back to base?”

“Hongjoong is gonna kill you,” San whispered but looking at your unconscious face he sighed saying, “Fine, we will treat her and then leave her at her house with a sedative.”

Your house was pretty easy to find, all courtesy to the push-and-pull couple of Yunho and Wooyoung’s twin, as they treated you fast. Hongjoong seethed with anger but got defeated when Yeosang told him the plan. He has never seen Yeosang this worked up for anyone and even though it worried him, he knew he was treading another fire himself.

Yeosang, with the help of Mingi, had dropped you off at your house, with a perfectly clean bandage and with one last lingering look your way they had gone away.

“Is that why I was at the doorstep of my house?” you ask him softly and he nods unable to meet your eyes and you exhale. You were a pawn to them, a person they would happily kill for their sake. You, their best agent, were just prey to lure the predators.

“I might have hated your guts when we met a few months ago, but I don’t let anyone get treated like a pawn, and besides, you are not a bad person,“ he says, his mind hovering over his outburst at seeing you injured. He was very close to killing everyone who tried to kill you.

“Can I join you guys, take revenge here and go back to the A-dimension?” your sudden question makes Yeosang look up at you. He didn’t question why you were here in the first place but nodded.

“You still have to meet Hongjoong though,” he trails off unsure as he steps in front of you. A mixture of his cologne and sweat hits your nose and you sigh contently. You could get used to this. You could get used to him.

“I think he will like me considering how good I am at combat,” you smile lightly looking at his face and he shrugs, a light laugh falling from his lips as you continue, “And considering his seducer actually fell for one woman.”

“That’s a lie,” he scoffs but can’t resist it when you press your lips against his encasing him in a soft kiss. He kisses you back, his hands caressing your cheeks and you smile making him smile too.

You pull back staring at his eyes, deep in affection, and say, “Right, because you wait for consent and kiss the informants like this after too?”

“Shut up,” he groans and you laugh at his shy demeanour.

Holding his hands you say, “Call your fighting team, I want to show these Z-dimension bitches what their ‘pawn’ can do.” 

✸ㅤ ara's notesㅤㅤ───ㅤㅤ yeah, this one is changed, i improved it lmao ㅤㅤ»ㅤ series mlistㅤ ateez mlist ㅤ main mlist ㅤ naviㅤㅤ𠈔

✸ㅤ taglistㅤㅤ───ㅤㅤ @haneagerr @tunaasan @evidive @huachengsbestie01 @philijack @atiny-lizbeth @chxnnii @nakiiko @therealcuppicake ㅤㅤ»ㅤㅤ comment here or in series mlist to be added or removedㅤㅤ𠈔

© arafilez on tumblr. please don't copy and repost my work as your own ▰▰ ✶

[11thsdoctress]

“make me human..” [Eleventh Doctor / Reader]

Fandom: Doctor Who

Ship: Eleventh Doctor / Reader

Word Count: 1021

Summary:  Recalling some fun memories comes with remembering the bad ones, and since the brain does not know how to shut up, it got the best of you, til the Doctor found you in that vulnerable state.

Author’s Note: Okay so I wrote this fic with my brain half asleep, and this was a request by @/deathgripz on AO3: “ can you write a story where the reader has a panic attack and the eleventh doctor tries to distract/comfort them? thank you sm if you can!!!"

“For the last time, stay here in the Tardis, I don’t want you to get hurt again.” The Doctor commanded as he shuts the doors,

You just sigh as you sat on the stairs and try to relax, you wanted to join him on kicking Dalek circuit butts, but he wanted you to stay this time made you slightly upset and guilty on starting that argument in the first place.

Remembering some adventures and memories of you and the Doctor going on multiple time periods and planets had gotten you hooked to the adrenaline and the adventurous spirit, even to the point that you would join in almost every day.

Remembering some good memories comes with also remembering the bad ones,

At first, it was just the embarrassing moments, like the one time the Doctor had walked in on kissing your then partner, or the time where He was plainly changing his clothes right in front of you, as an alien was on its way back to earth.

You brushed it off again until the more unpleasant memories fueled your nagging brain,

You could vividly remember each small detail, your brain scrutinizing every detail, the time when you and The Doctor almost died multiple times from the Daleks, and you hated the times when the Doctor had to put himself in danger just to save you from the various dangers of space and time.

Each unpleasant memory came with the feeling of re-living the emotions and stress of each moment, replaying the thrill and anguish of how many near-death moments had happened and trying to fathom the feeling after the said moment.

The more unpleasant memories are recalled, breathing became harder to do, and you were trying to ground yourself, however, your brain got the best of you, and you started to overthink, blaming yourself,

“He almost died so many times because of you”

“You’re just another burden to him.”

“You should’ve stayed at home.”

The voices in your head were beating you down so much that you sunk to the floor, burying your face in your knees, not wanting to see the TARDIS’ surroundings, breathing became almost impossible as your hands were starting to shake, and you were feeling lightheaded.

As you were about to try to make it to your room in the TARDIS, a sudden barging sound made you flinch,

“The Daleks could never outsmart the one and only-” The Doctor’s proud and happy look dropped when he saw your state, 

“I’m sorry… You shouldn’t see me like this..” You say softly as you looked away in an effort to hide your tear-soaked face, and spare yourself from the possibility that this would be another embarrassing memory to think back to.

Not saying anything after that, you tried to stable your breathing, but the scary part was not hearing the Doctor talk for a bit,

You were silently blaming yourself, for letting him see you like this, but suddenly, your world stopped when the Doctor kneeled down and suddenly pulled you into a hug.

“Dear, I’m sorry you had to feel that way, but please tell me if something is bothering you, it kills me that you can’t tell me if something is killing you.” He gently says as he plays with your hair for a bit.

You nodded, “I-it’s just that…. I think that I might be just a burden to-”

He places a hand on top of your mouth, shutting you up instantly,

“Don’t say that about yourself, I want you to be here, You are my companion, and I am your Doctor, again, I want you here, not just to witness me looking so clever, but to make me feel human.”

You look at him as he said the last sentence,

“It sounds a bit selfish, and I’m not the best when it comes to comforting another human, but you make me feel and sound sane, and you make me believe that I have the capacity and ability to care for someone, After all, I’d be a terrible Doctor if I left you for dead.” he leans forward connecting both of your foreheads.

“All I want now is for you to relax and get out of your own head, okay?” He looks at you, waiting for your answer.

“Alright.” You say weakly, “But can we stay like this?” you ask shyly, blushing a bit.

“As long as you want.” he plainly replies as he gently brushes and plays with your hair.

He just held you as the TARDIS drifted away in space as you slowly fell asleep in his arms. Noticing this, he smiled a bit as he carefully carried you to the bunk beds on board, instead of placing you in your upper bunk, he placed you in his bed on the lower bunk.

After placing you on his bed, he just sat on the edge of the bed for a bit, making sure you were fast asleep, not wanting to breach your privacy, he stood up, but stopped as he felt your hand grabbing his wrist.

“Please stay.” you ask, “I want you to rest as well.”

“You know I don’t sleep, right?” he scratches his head.

“Don’t care.” you pulled him into the small bed, making him lay next to you,

Blushing, he just stayed quiet, and slowly, both of you slowly fell asleep.

Bonus: 

You wake up with arms wrapped around you tightly, you look over to see the Doctor’s peaceful but asleep look, moving a bit to adjust, he suddenly mumbles, “don’t move, 5 more minutes, love.” he sleeptalks, making you blush a bit.

Gently waking the Doctor by shaking him a bit, “I thought you wanted to explore and kick Dalek butt?” you whispered as you didn’t want to be too loud.

“Nope, I like this, and I changed my mind, I want this to last longer so shush.” He was awake but didn’t bother to open his eyes, as he pulled you closer.

You just quietly giggled and rolled your eyes as you just stayed there, enjoying the peaceful moment, making it a core memory with your Doctor.

=============================

Author’s Note:

I hope ya’ll like this fic I wrote when my brain was half asleep and was trying it’s best to form words and sentences that make sense. so yeah, hope to catch up with the requests aaaaa

[fullstcp]

"Rags" Sentence Starters

ME AND YOU AGAINST THE WORLD

"Put your heart in it."

"You can go the distance."

"We did it for love."

"We tried and we won."

"We'll never give up."

"It's me and you against the world."

"To my heart, you got a key."

"I was lost, then you found me."

"You didn't care what they said."

"You stood by me instead."

"Together, we're a stronger team."

"It feels, like we both are certain it's the real thing."

"Nothing beats this feeling."

"Who cares what they say?"

"They can't get in our way."

"We fight together."

"We're down forever."

"We stick together and it gets better."

SOMEDAY

"I'll follow my dreams."

"You'd think they were nightmares the way they scream."

"I'll make them believe."

"Someday, I'm gonna be the next big thing."

"I never doubt my dreams."

"I just need someone that I can make proud."

"I can't wait for that someday and that someday it is coming."

"I wanna share my life with someone who loves me just for me."

"I wanna wish up to the stars I can."

"I wanna see the lights and the crowd in the stands."

"Everything I want I'm gonna get it at last, okay."

"I was really having fun, too cool about it."

"Now I see everything a little different."

"The world looks bigger and the sky is the limit."

"I didn't come this far to stop now."

"Everything will be okay."

"You can follow me if you wanna go."

LOVE YOU HATE YOU

"I love you so much."

"I hate you so bad."

"I don't miss you."

"You know that's not true."

"When I say I'm leaving I don't mean it."

"I just want you back."

"Always said that no matter what we would be together."

"I want you back now more than ever."

"You think you're clever."

"Tell me a way we can make this better."

"I want you back now forever."

"You only want me when you're lonely."

"When I want you you don't know me."

NOTHING GETS BETTER THAN THIS

"Nothing gets better than this."

"Everything is better."

"Not going home, not ever."

"Look around you'll find everything you can describe."

"Just bought my girl a diamond ring."

"Not going home tonight."

"Everything here just feels right!"

"I'm so much better now."

STAND OUT

"Is this really me?"

"That's the person I should be."

"I know once they get to know they'll see what I see."

"I'll make 'em all believe the story."

"Happiness is what I can't live without."

"It's time to stand out."

"I'm getting better everyday."

"I've got too much to change."

"I'm holding on to what's real."

HANDS UP

"I can't wait to hit the floor."

"It's tonight."

"I don't want it to stop."

"Tonight I'm having a good time."

"I'm not stressing it no more."

PERFECT HARMONY

"When I first saw you, didn't know what to think."

"Something about you is so interesting."

"I can see me and you being best friends. The kind of friends that finish each other's sentences."

"I would of never thought I'd be here with you."

"I've never met someone who had so much in common with me."

"I can look into your eyes all day."

"Sometimes in your lifetime, you look and search for someone just to care."

"You got me, I got you."

LOOK AT ME NOW

"You see what I see."

"I can see all that you want from me."

"Are you talking to me?"

"When you feel you took your last breath, I promise you got more left."

"There's a chance if you take it."

"There's no time to stop now."

"Can you look at me now?"

"Nothing's impossible."

NOT SO DIFFERENT AT ALL

"I'm just trying to make it."

"Won't you come take a closer look?"

"Come a little bit closer."

"We're not so different at all."

"You looking at me, tell me what you see."

"I see you on the big screen."

"We kinda do the same thing."

"We're not so different, are we?"

"Together we can do this."

THINGS AREN'T ALWAYS WHAT THEY SEEM

"Things aren't always what they seem."

"It's easier out here on my own."

"I just hope your memory's proud of me."

"I might cry myself to sleep and imagine that you're here with me."

"It's hard enough to find someone to trust."

"It's easier to live life scared to love."

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 2/27/2024

this is the longest ive ever been unemployed and media is only doing so much to beat back the horrors. so let’s talk about the media instead of the horrors

listening

Come Up For Air by We The Commas, off i think one of the autogenerated spotify indie mixes?

sort of a rollicking modern little surf rock thing, they describe themselves as "surf and alternate rhythm and blue" which is pretty bang on imo. they're all brothers (their last name genuinely is Comma, which i salute as a fellow weird last name haver), and cite john mayer (i don't really hear it) and the beach boys (yes i hear this very much) as some of their influences. a song i had on loop for an entire forty minute drive and did not get tired of. spotify

-

reading

three books that MUST go back to the library tomorrow bc their autorenew is up and i was emotionally unable to get a library card without tooling around and getting a stack of books a month ago.

thank you philip.

i really only liked the Carmilla adaptation by Amy Chu, bc it really gets at what i didn't realize was the heart of the original 1872 lesbian vampire novella: a toxic gay housing situation you have fallen into and can't get out of bc your area is so so so expensive and housing is so so so tenuous. i have read the original but not in a while, this is an excellent modern adaptation centering around a nyc social worker in the late seventies that presupposes no knowledge and intertwines the original novella in the form of a stolen rare book. (nonconsecutive pages)

i don't have much to say about the DC young adult comic about the circus career of one of the Robins (Dick Grayson). i didn't love the loose artstyle and am not in its intended age range plus it had a bit too much therapyspeak, but it did have a clever use of a very limited color palette.

let's yank the amazon description for the detective novel, which i grabbed bc it vaguely pinged something in my brain about one of the fallout 4 sidequests and i've picked books up for worse reasons (SPOILERS):

Jacob Rigolet, a soon-to-be former assistant to a wealthy art collector, looks up from his seat at an auction—his mother, former head librarian at the Halifax Free Library, is walking almost casually up the aisle. Before a stunned audience, she flings an open jar of black ink at master photographer Robert Capa’s “Death on a Leipzig Balcony.” Jacob’s police detective fiancée, Martha Crauchet, is assigned to the ensuing interrogation. 

i simply fucking hated this authorial style and tone and ditched it two chapters in. i don’t currently have the patience for reading about a clinically insane mother and hate crimes against Jewish people. despite the fairly dark premise, the first two chapters veer into cozy mystery with very short sentences, which do not a noir make. now, it does not advertise itself as noir or neo-noir, but as an homage to noir. it is for me unbearably smug. in my most unkind heart of hearts i want to say it's like if wes anderson tried to make a noir. this is a book that wants you to know it has read other noirs. yes thank you ive read several others, that’s why im reading this one, stop reminding me of better books i could be reading.

there's some weird descriptions of womens' bodies in here. chandler (my beloved) is certainly guilty of this as well, but he lavishes a sort of equal opportunity eye on the men in his mysteries. cf the infamous daniel lavery description.

when i read a chandler description of someone’s physical appearance there’s a fruity bisexual aftertaste in my mouth. Howard Norman, below, saying a woman takes great care of herself puts my hackles up. i understand the difference between an author and a character believing something and i don’t want to read a book where either the author or the character have this sort of pitying condescension towards a woman’s body. im feeling extremely terrible about my own body right now due to the various maladies, and another sort of breaking point for me is when an author repeatedly describes "naked breasts" (exact wording) pressing against someone's torso. it feels so juvenile. that's the sexiest thing you can possibly think of??? that's the sexiest way you can think of to describe an early mornign moment of intimacy???? augh i read the NYT review and it gets worse.

shut the FUCK up. i left my apartment at 1130 PM to go put this book in my CAR. i don't want it in my HOUSE.

-

watching

Bullitt (1968, dir. Yates, free on Tubi). the baddie in this is Robert Vaughn (who i know from cowboys), a guy i fucking love to see. i can take or leave Steve McQueen but he does such a killer job parallel parking in this movie and i wish all driving movies made their leads parallel park. shockingly realistic hospital, morgue, and police work scenes, apparently was one of the big films to popularize blood squibs. also love to see a haunted man splash water on his face and stare into a mirror.

if you asked me how long the famous car chase was i would have said like 2:30? substantial but snappy. no!!! eleven minutes!! (video a bit trimmed). also a rare movie that makes a foot chase through an airport as exciting as that eleven minute car chase!!!

the mob dodging plot was a little hard to follow, but i was operating on like four hours of sleep and a rum and coke. this has got to be a tremendous movie to watch when you’re home and sick on the couch huddled under a blanket. i mean this as a compliment, as someone who watches Escape from New York whenever i feel very sick

-

playing

really wanted to get to 69 shrines before writing this post and finally did it. all the little divine beasts walking along the loading screen are SO cute i've never gotten all four before

all the divine beasts are unlocked and the champions laid to rest! im feeling some type of way emotionally speaking about all of them telling link IMMEDIATELY that it wasn't his or zelda's fault they died

rudania has the worst boarding mission (in order of ones i most enjoyed it's camel [SO fast and SO fun], bird [lots of time to think and plan and aim], elephant [did not make me do a tedious stealth mission but i am bad at locking on to rapidly moving things behind me, much like in real life], and lizard. the lizard stealth mission is simply unpleasant). however, my brain really clicked with the puzzles in rudania: i had to consult a walkthrough once for an optional chest. in order of interior beast puzzle enjoyment for me it's lizard, bird, elephant, and camel. really got stuck for a long time on the waterwheels with the elephant before consulting a walkthrough.

the yiga clan stealth mission was not as hard as i thought it would be. i don't know why i put that off for two real life weeks but i will not learn my lesson and i will never improve. this boss battle was just silly.

the vah naboris interior puzzles were not fun. idk what it was about them or my brain that made me have such a bad time, but i spammed revali's gale and skipped a lot of chests bc i was not having fun. this is why god invented the walkthrough but sometimes. shit is just too fiddly.

i did succeed on the thunder ganon boss battle first try, but i came in with extra hearts from mipha's grace, used another mipha's grace in the fight, went through five fairies and seven hearty simmered fruits that were 5x durians (which gives you 20 extra hearts or some shit). fucking nightmare. i was stuck on one hit left on ganon for like five minutes bc he got stuck in the very fast flurry attack cycle. unpleasant. deeply grateful it only made me smack him with the magnesis pillar once bc that was also really fiddly with my poor reaction time + poor fine motor skills + previously mentioned ancient controller with some drift. in order of boss battle enjoyment i think it's lizard (made me think and kept me on my toes a little but i did have to look up how to break the shield), elephant (you can just kind of tank it), bird (same), and camel (extremely not fun).

this was WITH a fully upgraded gimp suit btw. that shit (ganon) just hits hard.

shrine shenanigans:

crowned beast very fun, i have one or two of kass' songs left and then i hope i get to see him back in rito village with his family??? a little nervous bc i went right to the jungle spring without hearing his song first so idk if that will. count??? or softlock me.

the MOUNDS of failed cooking attempts around this shrine on the grasslands side of the gerudo barrier mountains were SO funny.

unlocked all the spring shrines. what a fun mission. what a fun climb.

went to my FAVORITE shrine!!! going into what you think will be a normal cave and discovering it is DEEP with a BIG WHALE INSIDE is top three video game whale moments (the other two are diving with the whales in ABZU and meeting the last whale in the first dishonored).

other bits and bobs:

eggman rocks???

this quest was really cute and i wish there was a corresponding quest for the guy hanging around the broken heart pond, but it always makes me laugh whenever a dragon shows up in the background of a screenshot. a really great touching moment but watch out for the elemental orbs rapidly approaching us

also made me chortle. get it together barta.

i wish the helm was upgradable but i think making me kill a molduga in order to borrow it is a pretty fair trade actually.

-

making

i originally had a really long thing here about litterbox trials and tribulations but i have decided to spare you all. you're welcome.

many balcony improvements, including putting up trellises and installing bird spikes to hopefully keep a very persistent orange tom off my balcony and away from my girls.

there are a goofy number of obstacles in the way of me making a proper planting diagram (sketchbooks buried deep in closet. flung the seeds in a box on a shelf i need to find my stepstool for. can't find pencil sharpener) so for the second week in a row that's not happening. however, sprouts.

baby italian lettuce blend

bush beans in the front and cucumbers + sweet peas in the back.

[goodluckclove]

Various "Failures" From My Google Docs

Good morning! I'm at my usual coffee shop and got inspired by the troubles of a few friends to embarrass myself.

Sit down with me. I'm enjoying my usual blended chai. There's room on the couch if you'd like to join me.

So I've written thirteen novels. I think thirteen, I've actually lost count. Let's say, like, five full-length plays and twelve to fourteen finished novels. Impressive, right? Maybe. I'm realizing that I consider that not much of a brag, if only because I know the amount of trips and stumbles it took to get to one completed project.

I've ditched a lot of ideas. A lot. If I need to I can dig into my old hard drives to find all the doc files from my youth, but I also have the same Google Docs I've had since middle school.

It's mostly plays and ghostwriting assignments, but if you did you'll find some snippets from my constant attempts at growth.

Some stuff like this is okay. The line "hair slicked back/suit black silk" is pretty good, but a little too the writer thinks they're clever for me now. I don't really remember where I planned to go with this. I think the narrator was somehow going to be given the identity of Roy Fontaine. I was really fixated on the surname Fontaine at the time. I don't know why.

But then there's also a lot of stuff like this:

Hey look it's Fontaine again! I guess he's a doctor, too! Also I am astounded by how casually the main character just pulls out the Necronomicon. He pulls it out? From where? His pocket? Is it a zine?

I don't know why, but something about how suddenly this jumps in terms of dropping specifics makes me think that Sonic the Hedgehog is about to show up. I can't explain it.

This is the only thing in a Doc titled "Psychosis". I have zero memory of what I was planning on doing with this. What's kind of crazy though is that I wrote this in 2014, and six years later I'll use essentially this exact bit in a finished novel without even realizing it.

Another bit from 2014. No clue what I planned to do with this. It's hilarious to me that something stopped me from finishing the sentence. What am I, Franz Kafka writing The Tower? I didn't die. I wasn't raptured. I just apparently tried to think of something a large oak door would do and immediately gave up. It was 2014 I had finished, like, four novels. And this idea was fully stalled by what had to be a fucking huge oak door.

My favorite part of this radio play I tried to write is that somehow, believe it or not - when I wrote this I did not fully understand the Quantum Suicide thought experiment. And for along time I still kind of thought that this could be salvaged into a good idea, until last night when I asked my wife to put on a video describing the experiment and I immediately found it so dumb. Just ridiculously stupid. The only good thing about Quantum Mickey is that the title kicks ass and I'm definitely keeping it for something.

I've written a lot. A lot. I've earned the severity of carpal tunnel I currently have. If I had to put it into a statistic, I'd say maybe seventy percent ends up finished. fifty percent ends up polished to be read or published. Thirty percent actually ends up being read or published. I'm okay with this, because I enjoy the work. But for me, part of enjoying the work is not panicking when a project doing work.

If I need to end a project in the middle of a sentence, I do. I've clearly proven that I do. Sometimes I write for thirty pages and lose interest, other times I get a paragraph in and get distracted forever. That's okay.

That's okay. As long as you're doing something.

I could've included segments of Carnation, my first novella that was supposed to be a novel but I never finished it. But I fucking guess that's getting it's own post when I hit 150 followers so I hope you're prepared for what the type of stuff I enjoyed in middle school.

There's an Irish child that speaks exclusively in slang. You aren't ready.

[may--hawk]

passive aggressive (ineffable remix)

XVIII. Passive Aggressive - Placebo

Every time I rise I see you falling

Can you find me space inside your bleeding heart?

Aziraphale’d been there when Crowley had Fallen. All the angels had. They’d all been called to witness the ranks of rebel angels, vanquished and manacled, backed up to the very edge of Heaven as their sentence was proclaimed: eternal damnation, torn from Love, no hope of forgiveness. They had been weeping. All of them, the angels and the fallen angels. Gabriel. Uriel. Michael. Aziraphale. Even proud Lucifer. Even Crowley.

Aziraphale had sought him out in the crowd: no longer so springy, so sure, but just as bright and beautiful as before. A cut across his cheek. Aziraphale just couldn’t understand how something so lovely, so clever, so clearly Her creation could stand against her. Aziraphale had wished the angel would look at him for the last time, had wished he won’t. It would have been the last time. He stopped just short of a prayer, because prayers by angels had a way of being heard.

Their sentence was proclaimed, and the angel who would later become Crowley raised his eyes one last time, mouth parting slightly, as if to speak. Aziraphale almost cries out, stepping forward. Aziraphale will never see this angel again; this angel, cast down, will never see the stars again -

And then the entire Heavens shook and shuddered as if crying out in despair, and the rebel angels were Falling, long streaks of light. Aziraphale turned away, unable to watch.

An eternity went by, or perhaps not. Time hadn’t been invented yet. Aziraphale thought of the angel often but tried not to. He was a demon now, the enemy. The angels still in Heaven were told all kinds of things about the demons trapped down in Hell, the prison created specially to hold them. They were told of the rebel angels’ evil, their depravity, their ceaseless machinations to pull Heaven down to their debased level. What hurt Aziraphale the most was hearing that they were monstrous now, half fallen angel, half beast, remade into things that crept and crawled and groveled, a rejection of Her image, Her grace. Aziraphale tried very hard not to think about it. He told himself there must have been something wrong with the other angel, or God would not have cast him out, surely.

And then Aziraphale was sent down to Earth, and the demon was there, in the Garden, and Aziraphale glanced at him once, twice, each time looking away, not wanting to see this beautiful creature’s degradation. Not the new form: Aziraphale found the snake lithe and graceful, the demon’s eyes a beautiful marbled yellow. No, Aziraphale was afraid to look into his eyes and see what he was told he would see: malice, disgust, evil. No trace of the angel that had been all that time ago amongst the stars.

But he found he couldn’t help but look, and look again, and again. For despite what the demon - Crawley, then Crowley - said - he was still himself, still the same angel Aziraphale had met among the stars. Aziraphale could see it with his many eyes. Throughout the years, he looked and looked all over, but every examination, every angle showed the same thing: the angel’s heart, still present, almost exactly the same. A little tarnished, perhaps, but largely unharmed. Merely encased, protected, but inside cracked open, raw and bleeding.

So he reminds Crowley, over and over again, even when Crowley doesn’t want to hear it: reminds Crowley of his past, of his goodness, still so present in him. He forgives Crowley as often as he can, bestowing his one blessing the only way he can, knowing Crowley is incapable of doing the same.

Perhaps Crowley did not see him there, in Heaven, watching, and doing nothing. Perhaps Crowley does not even remember him. Oh, but he remembers Crowley.

Every time he looks at Crowley, he thanks God, because what he has lost has been returned to him. He will not lose it again.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/52878844/chapters/136955758

[naneun-no]

🎈Happy birthday Namjoon 🎈

One of my favorite things he’s ever said, and he’s said a lot of intelligent, thoughtful things, was a comment he made during their hiatus announcement video last Summer.

I’m gonna paraphrase, but he essentially said that out of the myriad of realities in the multiverse, he genuinely believed (or wanted to believe) that he was living in the best possible one. That he was living the best possible outcome of all the random realities for Kim Namjoon that there are.

And wow, that hit me.

At first, it didn’t. I had recently lost a pregnancy, painfully and traumatically; I was grieving that and watching the world seem to fall apart around me, and struggling to find the will to keep going, to keep caring, to keep watching all the girls who were pregnant at the same time as me have healthy, beautiful babies and to click the “❤️” button rather than scream at them to shut the fuck up about how “blessed” they are.

So for a second I scoffed at him, like, “well no shit he’s living in the best reality; he’s a famous, successful and beloved celebrity with more money than he knows what to do with.” I mean — that’s the alternate reality we all would like to wake up and find ourselves in at least some days, right?

And, well, fair enough. But his words stuck with me, and the more I thought about them, the more I realized his words were deeper than that. I think they were about cultivating joy, and gratitude, and intention, and putting effort into making the life you’re living, no matter what it looks like, the best it could possibly be, out of all the random dice rolls in the universe.

And that’s a powerful fucking decision to make.

There are forces outside our control, of course there are. There are things we can’t escape, realities we can’t change. But there are almost always more things that we can change than things we cannot. And one of the biggest ones is our perspective.

What would the world look like if we all decided, individually, to make this right here our best reality? To stop wishing we were someone else doing something else somewhere else. To instead wholeheartedly believe that this is the chosen life, the one that deserves all of our effort, all of our passion, all of our attention. I think it would be transformative.

I encourage you to try it, even just for a day. Believe that your life is charmed, that it is destined and fated to matter. I’m not talking about manifesting, I’m talking about choosing.

Since hearing those words from him, I’ve tried to make small changes, everyday changes, but intentional ones, to enjoy the life I find myself in. To appreciate it, really appreciate it, despite its hardships, despite its ugliness, despite its many, many imperfections. To write more, to feel more, to forgive more, to listen more. To smile and dance around in my kitchen to KPop songs more. To tell my husband I love him more.

I can promise you that while my reality has not changed much at all since last Summer, it has nonetheless risen in my esteem. I can agree with him now; I can say that I too, am living in the best possible reality, out of the myriad of them that there may be, floating out there in the ether.

Maybe in one of them I am smarter, cleverer, notable for accomplishing something great. Maybe in one of them I’m more popular, more loved, more lauded.

But in this one, I am me, right where I am. And I choose to believe that that is no accident.

When he gifted those words to me that day, it was just that: a gift. And maybe I’m silly to read so much into a throwaway sentence from a pop star, but I’m not sure that’s what it was. I think it was vulnerable, thoughtful encouragement from a man who has enough power and wealth to be anything but vulnerable and thoughtful. And yet, he chooses to be.

Thank you, Namjoon. And happy birthday 💙

[azaleapaperpad]

Red Curtains and Chandeliers

Phantom of The Opera (Broadway version)(Merik) x GN! Reader (Part 4) WC: 1249

Upon Opening Night, you and your best friend were getting your costumes set out and ready, minutes before the last rehearsal. You had dusted yourself off and waited for your friend to finish up so you could walk to the rehearsal hall beforehand. As you walked through the halls, you noticed policemen, heading towards the stage. Your friend made a face at you that indicated the question you were both thinking. What on earth are they doing here? 

The realization hit you like a freight train. They were here for him. Fear, worry and anxiety overtook you, making your breath hitch at the revelation. Your friend seemed to notice and catch on, and took your arm so you could move out of the way faster. Your vision was blurring, sending you into a panic attack. You couldn’t bear to hear that the man you loved might lose his life tonight, you just couldn’t handle it. Your friend, however, noticing this was one of your panic attacks, snapped you back into reality.

“Darling… darling I need you to focus on me!” They said, sternly and somehow gently at the same time. You looked up at them, tears threatening to meet the bottom of your eyelids. They shook their head to try and reassure you. “They aren’t going to hurt him. Your Phantom is more clever than that, we both know it. He’s eluded the eyes of most everyone here, he’ll be okay.” Your friend said, trying to comfort you. Your head was still racing, but you tried to ground yourself in their words, and nodded slowly, agreeing with them. You leaned on them a bit for comfort, and they wrapped their arm around you. 

You stood there for a good minute, before you were able to compose yourself enough to go and carry on with the rehearsal. He will be okay… He’ll be okay… You kept telling yourself so. Eventually, you and your friend arrived to the rehearsal room, and Madame Giry was not happy about you two being late. She made an announcement about the policemen. Her cane slammed on the floor with a loud thud.

“As I’m sure, most of you have seen the policemen here. I would like to remind each and every one of you to pay them no mind, and focus on the production tonight.” She punctuated her last part of the sentence, glaring around the room. Her eyes landed on you and your friend last before she signaled to start the first act. 

As you all carried on with rehearsal, suddenly you all hear a bang. Your heart dropped to the floor, your knees became week, and the rest of you joined your heart. A few of the ballerinas screamed, mostly the girls of course. Madame Giry slammed her cane on the ground once more and told everyone to carry on. She walked over to you and gripped your arm to bring you back up, using her cane to steady herself, and she pulled you to the side. 

“I suggest, you center yourself more on dancing, young one. You’re not easily startled, so keep on your feet. And stop thinking about what’s going on outside this room.” She warned, barely whispering. She let go of your arm and gestured for you to go back to your spot. You did so, slipping back into your spot. 

Rehearsal carried on, and eventually came the Opening Scene. You shook your nerves off and began dancing in the first act. The show carried on relatively smoothly, and when the latest act was over, you finally caught a break. You rushed with all the other ballerinas to the dressing room and changed, as well as found something to drink. The shot you heard earlier, still ringing in your mind. Your friend approached you, and put a hand on your shoulder. You two barely had time to catch up between the rehearsal and the show, and currently, you two had a few minutes to spare before the finale. Your friend tilted their head to find somewhere a bit more quiet, and you followed suite. Once you two found yourselves in a more secluded area, they spoke.

“I heard from some of the other ballerinas that he’s still alive. He merely taunted Rauol and the officers. So he should be okay.” They explained. You sighed in relief. 

“Are you okay mon cher?” They asked gently. 

“Y-yeah… just shaken. I was worried there for a while-” You were rudely interrupted by someone knocking at the door. It was a policeman. Tall and fit, it seemed, with blonde hair and hazel eyes. 

“Pardon me you two, but could you direct me to box 2? I was making the rounds and… I seem to have gotten lost.” He asked, a little bashfully. Your friend stood straight up and all but ran to his side. 

“Ah, yes monsieur, right this way…” Your friend started leading the officer to said box, and turned to you and winked. Flirting fool you thought. At least they stayed long enough to make sure you were okay. You stayed in the room by yourself for a few minutes, processing the new information and thinking of what to do next. 

Since you had confessed to your best friend, you felt a weight off your shoulders, and quite possibly forcing you to realize just how strong your feelings were for the Phantom. The mere thought of him, especially in a state of pain or possibly even dead… you just wouldn’t know what to do with yourself anymore. You missed his gaze and instructions for choreography, the witty comments he would produce, and the ones you fired back at him. Looking back, you thought it might have been foolish to just leave him instead of just confessing your feelings when you had the chance. You seemed to be his friend for a while, his confidant, and you left him because you felt jealousy overpower you. 

After coming to this revelation, you realized it could be now or never to confess to him. After all, Christine would likely leave after this show, giving you the perfect opening to tell him your true feelings. As you came to and realized the time, you saw a shadow pass the door of the room you were in, a black cloak. You assumed it was Piangi, getting ready for the final act and hurrying to the stage.You decided to try and catch up with him to see if he’d walk you back to the dressing rooms. You swiftly left the room, and called out.

“Signor Piangi, wait! Would you possibly mind walking me back to the dressing rooms?” The cloaked figure turned his head momentarily, still unable to see his features. You took note of just how much weight he had lost for this role, and you meant to congratulate him. As you stepped closer, the cloaked figure turned on his heel and sped up his movements. Confused, of course, you decided to go after him. 

“Sir Piangi, please wait for me!” You called out as you almost sprinted to catch up, but he turned a corner. You caught up to the corner, but didn’t see him down the hall at all. You huffed out, still puzzled as to where he could have gone to. There weren’t many doors down this hall, and certainly not any dressing rooms. You decided to shrug it off, perhaps he was anxious to get to stage for the next scene. You wandered back to the dressing room and finished up for the last act.

[vic-draws-sometimes]

La messe

Ghost had never been much of a nations man. Sing to the country, hail to the queen. Follow the orders so you can die a hero. It was never for him.  

The fight? Now that was his language. A punch in the jaw could do much more than an hour of reprimanding.  

‘’So what, you just follow every order? What are you, a robot?’’  The words had struck Ghost for many years. A robot? No, just a lowly man who loved getting orders. Now... Well now he got it. As he shrugged off a bullet wound to finish the mission, stepping over bodies of people he used to know... He gets it. He feels the pain. He feels it just as anyone else would. He feels the longing of people he could’ve know, if he tried harder. Could've grieved.   He feels the blood seeping through his clothes and make his skin shiver.   But the order take priority.  He’s a damn good soldier. If he doesn’t do it, someone else will. Someone else will suffer his pain and will do the job right. Might as well be him.   That’s how he got through childhood, torture and so many mission. He came out of it alive because of the mission. The order.  

When the adrenaline wears off and he’s in a bed, wounds patched up and body recovering. That’s when it hits him.  

The pain, the grieving.  

He cries until there are no tears. Scream until he has no voice.  

And then another order comes in and soothes his soul.  

If he just gets through that. If he can just be useful, then maybe next time off he’ll feel alright.  

After years of wondering if it’s worth it, the answer came to him. It wasn't a sentence, like he imagined. Or a medal, like so many suggested.  

No, it was something much simpler and more naïve.  

A damn smile.  

Johnny’s smile.  

Kyle’s smile.  

John’s smile.  

If he can protect them, if he can protect all the people that can smile like them. Then maybe this is the answer to all his hardships.  

It wasn’t, as it turned out. Those smiles disappear for reasons outside of his own doing. He could punch and stab and fire, but he couldn’t smile back. He couldn’t do everything so they could be happy all the time. That was simply impossible.  

He felt helpless. Sitting on that dirt road waiting for death, grilling in the sun. He’d lost so much blood he couldn’t safely give a transfusion.   And in a couple of minutes the enemy would arrive and shoot him for good. They wouldn’t even take his tags. It would take a week for Price to send someone new to discover his corpse, eaten by the animals of the area.  

An entire life, 30+ years of fighting, and for what?  

Usually, the initial order would drive him. He would ignore the pain and weakness and get up, find a weapon. But now...  

He was wondering why.  

Why would he get up only to be sent in another fight? Lose that sunly smile of his Johnny?  

Johnny...  

The thought of him made him want to cry, if only he was hydrated enough. He was tired, so tired, and only wanted to go back around him.  

Wanted... Now that’s new.  

He wants to go back to him, see him again and finally say those words outloud. It would be crazy. Johnny would tell him so, tell him he can’t just quit, can’t just go back to being a civilian. And it’s true. They can’t.  

But what if they tried?  

Wars are endless and soldiers are sent to be killed. If they come back alive, they’re just sent again and again until they’re finally KIA.  

Simon is nothing without Ghost. But Johnny... Johnny has a family to come back to. Simon wants to meet them. He wants to go to Scotland and see the sheep and chickens. He’s never seen a chicken. Not alive at least...  

Before he knows it he’s back on his feet, ignoring the pain for one last time... 

Title : the mess, so like a messy room but also the religious gathering, get it? I'm so clever /j

But yeah this is a mess of thoughts just spiraling in my head. I do believe that Simon is the type to just stop functioning when he's not around people and is driven solely by orders. He's not a robot he's just autistic

And if you're about to say ''you're stereotyping autistic people aren't robots!1!!'' I'm autistic and exactly like that. I'm far from being a robot I feel so much all the time, it's just not showing in ways you folks can understand

And this gets with the thing of ''I like the military for the structure but I hate what they do'' thing

[blasphemecel]

Guido Mista — Clever

PAIRING: Guido Mista/Reader WORD COUNT: 1.4k TYPE: Humor

After a few blinks, some contemplation, and a massage to the bridge of his nose, Fugo demands, "What the fuck is wrong with you, Mista? I mean-" then words seem to escape him because the sentence trails off until it halts completely.

Mista frowns.

Narancia, to help the situation, or maybe to make it worse, says, "Well, I thought it was pretty funny."

"Guys, you're not helping."

"I don't really know what you want us to do," Fugo says in a distasteful tone before he nudges your unconscious form with his toe. You're alive, sure, but Mista will probably be dead to you after all this.

Narancia finds more amusement in the situation. "[Y/n]'s such a pansy, fainting after that."

"I didn't think this would happen," Mista says under his breath before he glances away with an emotion that one can vaguely describe as guilt, or something adjacent.

"You made it look like the police came over to [Y/n]'s place. We're in the mafia. What, exactly, did you expect to happen?"

"I thought it was pretty common knowledge they only do that 'outlining the corpse' thing in movies!"

Narancia bursts into another fit of laughter. Cries and holds his stomach and flails around, even.

"And you," Fugo starts, snapping his neck in his direction with a motion that's more fitting for an alien than a human. Then he thrusts his index finger forward like he's weaving a lethal weapon. Narancia staggers back as he tries to avoid getting his eye poked out. "You helped him. You helped him do this. What were you thinking? What were you both thinking?"

"Chill, chill," Narancia says with a wave of his hand. Once more, he's determined to be the least beneficial party in this conversation. Fugo sneers in response to his dismissal, but that stays irrelevant when Narancia takes a long step to avoid pressing his foot to your face and approaches the crime scene. Or, well, it's a fake crime scene, but with the state you're in, it might look like a real one to bystanders now.

He traces the note Mista wrote with his finger and opens his mouth to read it out loud, but it proves too absurd for him, and the only things that come out are strangled noises and spit bubbles until he rolls over in an exaggerated attempt to stifle his giggles.

At this, Fugo raises an eyebrow. He didn't really bother reading what the note comprised since he thought Narancia and Mista were pulling a prank on you or something, and so he didn't consider any other possible... motives for this. With mild intrigue clouded by indignation, he squints his eyes and cranes his neck, only for Mista to grab him by the shoulder and try to stop him. "No, no, man, don't-"

After getting over his fit, Narancia wipes away a fake tear and recites with a flair of sick, sadistic glee in his expression, "I've just been dying to go out with you!" Then he laughs some more at it. He would do great as a paid actor in the audience of a comedy show.

The betrayal causes Mista to freeze, clam up and gawp like a fish. Whatever happened to friendship?

Fugo spares one more bewildered blink until his gaze turns judgemental and full of contempt towards Mista's game, or lack thereof.

As a defense mechanism to this embarrassment, Mista quits grimacing altogether and now appears to be repressing the last fifteen minutes, during which his way of 'confessing' gave you a panic attack and made you black out, and the subsequent bullying when he asked his so-called comrades for help. "So, do you guys think this is salvageable?"

So, he may or may not have asked Narancia to draw his outline in front of your house, then placed the note there. He thought it was clever, and he thought Narancia agreed, but apparently all Narancia wanted to do was make fun of him. Then, when he picked you up from where you were at, instead of throwing yourself at him in exaltation or something, you... passed out. You didn't even read what it said. Or maybe you did and assumed you have an unhinged stalker.

Fugo kind of had a point when he asked him what he was thinking.

"That's crazy," Narancia says, a wide grin on his face, still not entirely recovered from his hysterics. "It's crazy you just said this."

Fugo says Mista better pray you got amnesia from the fall, but Mista argues he didn't let you hit the ground when you actually fell.

He reiterates, "You better pray [Y/n] got amnesia from the fall," with a twitch in his eye and his lips sloping with condescension.

___

"The pigs are coming to get me!" you declare when you awake, clutching fabric in your hands. You look down. It's one of your blankets. Like one that you recognize and own.

Interesting.

For some reason, Narancia, Fugo and Mista are at your house.

"Heyyy," says Mista with a smile that shows too much teeth and resembles a flinch. Narancia turns around to do something that suspiciously looks like doubling over and laughing. Fugo's giving the wall the Kubrick stare. "How are you feeling?"

"We were outside?" you say, as you recall, he was standing somewhere behind you when you saw that thing in the yard, and Narancia and Fugo weren't there at all.

"You... Fainted on the way here... And were having a nightmare. I don't know," he offers after a while of staring and crinkling his eyes, and he's also sweating profusely, like he's hiding something.

Fugo had cleaned the chalk from the concrete. It should be fine.

You rub your chin. "Yeah, well, whatever." What follows that statement is a shrug after you throw off the blanket to rot in the corner of your room. Fugo is trying really hard not to scold you, on account of your probable concussion.

"What, just like that?" Narancia asks in surprise at your recovery time.

"We'll be going," Fugo says, then grits his teeth, which makes his next words sound more ominous than they needed to. "Mista will stay around with you to make sure you're fine. Right?"

"Erm, yes, totally," he confirms.

"Why are you scratching your head?" you ask, confused. "You're always wearing a hat. Does it feel like anything? Or are you itchy because it makes you sweat?"

Your remark makes Mista quit the sheepish behavior. The line of questioning feels like you're throwing boiling water at him.

"Do you have dandruff?"

"Uh," Mista says with what he believes to be a disarming smile on his face. A prolonged moment where he leafs through a book you keep lying around before closing it again and putting it back down despite not reading a thing passes. "Do you want me to do anything? For you?"

He's unusually fidgety. Now that he has abandoned the book, he's tapping his fingers against the table to produce a sound that's only mildly grating to your nerves. You realize Fugo and Narancia are no longer here when the front door clicks, and that makes your face light up with something sinister.

"Yeah. I mean, obviously."

"Oh, what is it?"

"We've got to go on a date now, right?"

Mista's eyebrows pinch together, though he doesn't understand. Even then, embarrassment catches up to him, at the possibility you're teasing him or...

Wait.

"Were you pretending?" he asks, incredulous, but also with a begrudging respect for your evil genius.

Of course, you recognized his hideous handwriting immediately when you first saw it. You nod in the affirmative.

"Why? I thought something happened to you. I was so worried-"

Before Mista can ramble any more about how concerned he was despite his readiness to girlboss and gaslight his way out of the situation, as you saw, you raise your hand and your palm faces him rigidly. "To punish you for being a cornball, duh." But it's fine, you suppose. You like that about him.

"Damn, was it that bad?" He leans down onto your chair and almost slides out in his dramatics.

"Well, no. I was going to stop, but then you called Fugo and I got curious about what you'd do. Anyway, are we going?"

"I mean, give me a second," Mista says. All date ideas he had prepared flew out of his head when you collapsed. Maybe it shouldn't be Narancia who becomes a paid actor, but you.

You're a little evil, Mista thinks while he watches the way you're observing him with self-satisfaction written all over your face. It's alright, though — he likes that about you. Kind of.

[sin-sidejob]

Shadow Prisoner!JR Scheimpough x Prison Wife!Reader

- @mollicutes bullied me and encouraged me so here take this of my pathetic imprisoned baby girl + spoilers for part 2 of Inside Job

- it’s incredibly bittersweet to have had him again, after losing him, and have JR in your life. He was with you at work, with you at home, able to spend your days with him and not have to worry all that much. Until the end of reality comes caving in.

- you can’t catch a break.

- the initial action that landed him in Shadow Prison was stupid, I mean c’mon, invezzlement? But what landed him back wasn’t really all too upsetting, you understood it more than anything. He just broke.

- the final straw out of having to crawl his way back to living, freedom and life and you was how Rand in his efforts to reverse reality to get his family back, wiped out JR’s. The second the tattoo he had done and inked on his skin with your meaning behind it vanished in tandem with his wedding ring, that last thread of morality went with you.

- JR didn’t know and didn’t expect to make it back to you, didn’t think anyone would manage reversing reality back to its original course. But it happens, without him, but he still shoots at Reagan in the process. By the time he’s stepping foot back in Cognito Inc, the company he helped build, you’re there, searching for him and he sees that brief shift in relief at seeing him fine and okay transition into concern, fear, and grief once you see the cuffs he’s locked in. There’s a part of him that wishes he hadn’t seen it and another, bigger part that wishes you hadn’t seen it.

- He’s sent back to Shadow Prison, locked up tight and away from reach and it breaks your heart all over again. The second you get him alone he explains and you understand because you would’ve done the same thing had you lost him, had to see your entire life with him fade and vanish as if it were smoke and mirrors and the years meant nothing. You’d have gone insane. You make sure he knows that you don’t blame him. It helps.

- it’s hard though, having lost him, gained him, only to lose him again. But you make do. Bribing guards for more unmonitored or longer visits, the occasional conjugal visit, and sending packages when you can of things that don’t get swiped for contraband.

- you send in snacks and goods like cookies, he usually has to give a share to the guards monitoring his cell as penance but hey, they like you at least. He gets letters and photos that he can tape to his side of the cell, see you when he gets up and goes to sleep.

- JR tries to hide the death arena from you as something he has to deal with and it goes as well as expected — poorly. You find out and are terrified of losing him fully after having such a small portion of him left. But then again, the man’s incredibly fit, clever, and creative. He handles it each and every time and comes back because he knows he needs to make it out to get back to you.

- the duration of his sentence is something that gets shortened over time, through good behavior and your own work at trying to appease the robes and carrying out tasks JR doesn’t even know are being asked of you. He never will.

- on the bright side, you’re reaping the benefits of being a prison wife. People were already terrified of you as is, and after JR went to prison it got found out that you two were married, and now you’re able to do anything you need to, access to whatever’s within hands reach and beyond. The guards love you, you’re the hottest wife of the prisoners on the cell block, and JR wins bets on that every time. You chit chat with the guards and ask about their spouses and kids idly and it makes things much smoother.

- JR gets brownie points for both having and keeping such a great, hot, powerful wife and gets an easier time throughout just for that. And when he gets out? Gets to come home on parole, not allowed to work at all anymore with a non-compete order placed down by the robes, he relishes in how he gets to throw his weight around.

- he’s a tatted criminal who survived and made it through shadow prison, kept maintained his relationship with the love of his life with a bond now that is even stronger, and now he can scare the shit out of people and doesn’t need to be the one on his knees all the time. Only for you though

- in general, it’s not too bad, you get him back eventually and he more than makes up for the long wait. JR shows you just how much he appreciates you and how much your sacrifice means to him

[taggedmemes]

SENTENCE MEME ⟶ SAINTS BLOOD by SEBASTIEN DE CASTELL / ch18 - ch27 always feel free to tweak the sentence to fit your muse.

'a fellow tried to use that line on me yesterday.'

'this is why i prefer to spend my time dealing with people who want to kill me.'

'is that all you think i'm good for? information?'

'is there no one in this country with anything better to do than concern themselves with my love life?'

'i can tell when you're remembering her.'

'she's not a ghost. she isn't haunting you. this isn't some curse you're under.'

'there's a rage inside you.'

'be calm? what the fuck is there to be calm about?'

'even i can feel something's very wrong here.'

'i was woken in the middle of the night by a rather strident visitor.'

'she has the right to whatever comfort is available to her now.'

'perhaps she saw me at the tavern last night and is now so lovestruck that she's left her husband and family behind, just to come and declare her love for me.'

'your story has a hole in it bigger than the one i'm going to put in you if i don't get a truthful answer.'

'don't tell me how to fight.'

'you know, i really am more comfortable when we're outnumbered.'

'if he were here, he'd probably tell you that you don't have long to live.'

'we fear neither pain nor death.'

'we don't know how many might be waiting for us.'

'war is an even greedier god than death.'

'do those gods of yours /really/ love you?'

'that was unnecessarily cruel.'

'that isn't cruelty. come with me. i'll show you what cruelty looks like.'

'he never mentioned anything about his family.'

'there was some sort of ritual to all of this.'

'you aren't fine. you're shaking...'

'he hides it, he holds it in.'

'i don't know if you're genuinely stupid, or just tired of life.'

'you don't get to talk to me like that any more.'

'it's possible that you've been beaten, poisoned and tortured one too many times to ever hope to stay sane.'

'well, you're not dead, so that's something.'

'you're drifting off again.'

'i don't know who you are, but i know why you've come.'

'i'm going to choose to ignore that command.'

'don't stare at me like that. i know i look stupid with blood on my face.'

'well you smell like the backside of a horse.'

'you're getting maudlin in your old age.'

'go with them. kill anyone who tries to touch them. /anyone/.'

'it's what i do best. now you need to do what you do best.'

'we need him alive so we can interrogate him.'

'he'd get annoyed and threaten to have my tongue cut out for him to wear as a necklace.'

'that's a nice story, but you're lying.'

'true, but i'm in a lot of pain, so it's possible that i forgot.'

'i'm sorry if my aim was off, but kindly go fuck yourself.'

'there are seven hells for those who would kill children and i will make sure that you find yourself in the worst of them.'

'do they /like/ it when people try to have them killed?'

'you need to get yourself under control before i let you go into that room.'

'look at your hands: they're still shaking. and don't pretend it's just nerves.'

'you're scared and you're frustrated and you're so full of rage you can't even feel it any more.'

'you always look like you want to kill someone to me so it's hard to see the difference.'

'it turns out we're both terrible actors, so we have that in common.'

'stop taking the blame for /everything/.'

'i'm not some little girl in pigtails.'

'what's happened to the world when you can't even count on rapacious murderers any more?'

'you're fast and you're clever -- but you'd make a lousy politician.'

'you're not going to die.'

'she's alive. trust in that and stop imagining her death.'

[greenerteacups]

following the last ask, i have a series of draco questions?

- what are your favourite draco tropes?

- what dramione fics have the best written draco OR best draco characterization?

- what’s your pictured plot line for draco post war : career wise, character development wise, and romance wise?

What a treat of a question. Always love an excuse to talk about Draco.

Favorites: mean, clever, and competent. Morally, I like him a touch darker than charcoal, a shade lighter than oil. He's supposed to be pretentious and snobby, and a little too quick to resolve problems with force, mainly because he's lazy at heart and doesn't want to put in the work to do things by the book. (Later in life, I see this informing his instincts as a duelist — forget niceties, what's the quickest way to end this fight in my favor?) Impatient as anything; Ice Prince when you don't know him, Unrepentant Brat once you do; the platonic ideal of an Only Child, jealous, fairly possessive, but charming enough that he gets away with it. But those are all double-edged traits: he's loyal, ferociously defensive of what's his, and once he's extended his own sense of This Is Mine to include something, he'll raise hell to keep it.

Best Draco: I think Disappearances has one of my favorite Dracos, because he feels textured and real. There's this one scene where he's talking to Hermione about how purebloods flirt, and it was life-changing. I also recently ate up The Light Is No Mystery, which is a slow burn like trying to cooking an egg with a pocket lighter and a cast-iron. I like the Draco of Bending Light, which is my latest feel-good No Tears Just Vibes cheer-up fic, largely because "fuck it, give him a motorcycle" is the kind of baller authorial move we as readers need more of. (And for the record, in the real world, he would be one of those rich boys who collects really nice Ducatis and smashes them up doing things he really shouldn't.)

Post-War Plans: It depends entirely on how loyal we're being to canon, because if we're shackled to the Epilogue, then it's uninspiring — he becomes a sort of idle philanthropist type, marries Astoria (weird and also why, Daphne is literally in his year, she was right there) and has Scorpius soon enough for him to be in the same year as Rose Weasley. That means he probably didn't go to Azkaban, because if he did, he'd have to be in and out in time to meet, marry, and have babies with Astoria in the same timeframe that Harry/Ginny and Ron/Hermione do, which ranges between "kind of hasty" and "physically impossible," depending on his prison sentence. And that's all we know.

Here's what I think it gets right: Draco probably marries young, because purebloods/rich people generally do; I very much doubt he marries a named character from Hogwarts, because he'd probably try to get as far away from his reputation as possible; and I think he tries to clean up his act. That means philanthropy, general PR work, and possibly getting a high-profile role in reconstruction. I think he'd marry someone "suitable," and have a kid. And I think he'd be a good father. In fact, I think he'd err on the side of spoiling his kids. (As he was spoiled; I tend to think Lucius was a decent father, if maybe not a great one. I don't think Draco acts like an abused kid, just one with the misfortune of being born into the most incredibly fucked-up murderous dynasty of weirdos in history.)

But if I could choose an ending for him, I'd probably make him an auror, or maybe an Unspeakable/something cool in the Department of Mysteries, like curse breaking. I'd like him to end up with Hermione, somehow, although it'd probably take them a lot of time (think years) to get there.