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#it baffles me that every pair was in their movie before the younger one was born
kalinara · 1 year
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I'm so baffled by the way this whole thing has blown way out of proportion. People sending hateful messages to each other AND to the actors?? Totally unnecessary! It makes no damn sense.
Not to be an anti on main, but I genuinely believe that shipping changed somewhere along the way, into something that's a little disturbing.
I'm of course not going to say the old days were perfect. Racism, sexism and homophobia have always been issues and fandom has always been notoriously resistant to dealing with such things. And it's not like Shipwars are new. I remember the Ray Wars in Due South and fans older than me can tell fascinating stories of fanzine wars between Han/Leia and Luke/Leia fans before the Internet was even a thing for most of us.
But I still feel like a change happened somewhere along the way. There's this bizarre sense of entitlement now. There's this idea that a ship HAS to happen or it doesn't count somehow, and that we as fans can harangue the creators and MAKE it happen. (Voltron being the most extreme reaction I can think of).
And I mean, I get wanting representation, but it seems to go beyond that. Look at any 911 discussion thread about Buddie. Despite the fact that the show has multiple important queer pairings, they don't count because it's not the pairing the fans want.
I think this also plays into why we have so many puritan shippers. I don't agree that someone's ships reflect their real world morality. But I do get where a lot of younger fans are coming from, when so much of fandom seems to involve going "no, see, it will happen on screen and it will be AWESOME!". Not every show is Game of Thrones, after all. And nowadays, I do think a shipper probably does need to specify "no, I don't really want Thor and Loki to fuck in the movies directly aimed for kids", because of the rabid behavior of OTHER shippers. It's not fair, but we seem to have created this mess.
We used to joke about a "fannish hivemind" but nowadays, that seems less and less funny. I love shippy meta as much as the next person, but there's a difference between making an essay detailing all the moments that could be used to support a ship and making an essay detailing all the reasons why these moments ABSOLUTELY MUST MEAN MY SHIP WILL HAPPEN AND HOW COULD ANYONE POSSIBLY THINK OTHERWISE. And that attitude seems more and more prevalent nowadays.
We need to get a grip. We need to keep in mind that the creators of the show may not see it the way we do. We need to keep in mind that someone else makes the decisions about the story, and we might like or dislike it. We might want to consider, for example, that an actor who was once on Saturday Night Live, who repeatedly referred to a female co-star at that time as a "platonic soulmate" might actually not be setting up a romance between these two very tightly paralleled characters. That doesn't mean the characters WON'T get together, of course. I'm no mind-reader or oracle. But I point that out because nothing is a guarantee.
But seriously, there's nothing funnier than someone going on and on about their literary credentials when they write their long passionate analysis, because no one stops to wonder, do the creators share those literary credentials? What if all of these patterns really are accidents? Or they mean something else entirely?
And leave the actors alone, for heavens sake. They're just the face of the character. They've got nothing to do with any of this! If THEY want to engage, they're more than able to do that. Hell, the internet is anonymous, maybe they're here right now. But let that be their call. You wouldn't want someone coming up to you saying "I love imagining you and your co-worker having sex!" would you?
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starchild--27 · 2 years
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Tag Game ✨️
thank you for tagging me @joon-rkive - i loved reading yours and i always enjoy doing these~ 😊💕
i tag: @heartcravings @kafkascupcake @cxsmicmyeon @byuns-coco @xiu-bee @ladyliliah - only if you guys want to of course ♡
What book are you currently reading?
She and Her Cat by Makoto Shinkai ♡
What’s your favorite movie you saw in theaters this year?
Everything Everywhere All At Once, like 10000%. this movie is so good. everyone go watch it if you can. 💫
What do you usually wear?
a t-shirt (plus a hoodie/flannel shirt if it's cold), a pair of jeans (two if it's cold), a pair of socks (two if it's cold), chucks (or boots if it's cold)
How tall are you?
~ 178cm / 5'10 but i'm slouching horribly xD
What’s your Star Sign? Do you share a birthday with a celebrity or a historical event?
i am a Taurus (or so the birth chart says, i don't really see it tbh), aaaand my birthday is on Beltane, the Gaelic May Day festival. Or if we want to be political, Labour Day.
Do you go by your name or a nick-name?
irl usually by my name, only online people and sometimes my mom call me by my childhood nickname (which i find really cute btw ^^). and my sister has her own set of nicknames for me xDD
Did you grow up to become what you wanted to be when you were a child?
i think to some extent i am the person all my younger selves wanted to be xD but career-wise not all. my childhood dream was to be a writer, only at 14 or 15 i started to think about my current course of study and also quickly dismissed the idea again back then xD
Are you in a relationship? If not, who is your crush if you have one?
i'm not. and currently i have no real permanent crushes either, only the quick kind where i spend twenty minutes imagining a relationship with a stranger i've seen for like 3 seconds xD (but yeah speaking in terms of kpop, i have an everlasting crush on park chanyeol, today especially the one from the photoshoot that was teased today, and i have had it bad for han jisung from stray kids the past months too xD)
What’s something you’re good at vs. something you’re bad at?
i'm good at.......language stuff (idk why this came to mind first but i have crap self-confidence so i can't really think about anything else); i'm bad at...i guess, being organized, keeping routines and getting things done efficiently, stuff like that. 😬
Dogs or cats?
both :c (but gun to my head, i'd say cat. because i have a cat.)
If you draw/write, or create in any way, what’s your favorite picture/favorite line/favorite etc. from something you created this year?
choking on brown sugar and sweetened milk / wrapped in a flannel shirt cause i hate silk / need a neurosurgeon to cut out my brain / need to take a deep breath, i'm not going insane (which, yes, technically is a verse. the first verse of my song brown sugar actually, and i really love how it turned out)
What’s something you would like to create content for?
ohh i think The Case Study of Vanitas, which is my favourite manga series (no i haven't seen the anime (yet?)), i really want to write a fanfic about Vanitas and Noé because no wayyy they don't kiss at night xDD
What’s something you’re currently obsessed with?
always obsessed with exo xD then again, i think Ocean Vuong still has a hard grip on me right now. i recently finished reading On Earth We Are Briefly Gorgeous and i am reading his poems every now and then and boy... i think that guy himself invented language
What’s something you were excited about that turned out to be disappointing this year?
mmh... i think the fact my two bestied from school and i planned to meet at least twice and it never worked out - i met them separately, but i miss hanging out with my two favourite crackheads :/ (we'll probably meet over the last days of december tho, so...soon)
What’s a hidden talent of yours?
i dunno, it's not really "hidden" but i've baffled people with is before: i'm really fast at recognizing songs, probably because i know many songs that i don't particularly like listening to as well, i guess i just can memorize sounds quite well.
Are you religious?
i am agnostic, so i'm not strictly religious, i have always been really interested in religion tho. like as a kid i went to religion classes voluntarily despite noone in my family is religious.
What’s something you wish to have at this moment?
a different brain hahahah :') jkjk i guess what i (quite childishly) wish for most is everything to be alright again, life to be less shit, generally. that's probably a crap answer but the most honest one i can give right now.
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devilishly-stupid · 2 years
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Say what you will about star wars but the people who do the casting never miss
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Finding His Voice
Request by @lespaceboi
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Pairing: Lindir x Reader
Word Count: 640
Warnings/Disclaimers: None.
A/N: I going to be honest. I have never written for Lindir before and had to do some research. Hopefully I did him justice. Set during the events of The Hobbit. I tried to make this as gender neutral as possible. There is a part where Kili uses “My Lady” when addressing the reader. It’s the only time it is brought up and is used during the joke ripped from the movies that dwarves can’t tell the difference between male and female elves. Feasibly, the same argument could be applied for Kili and the reader.
Masterlist
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The ever stoic, purse-lipped Elrond always had trouble hiding the warm smile that threatened to overtake his face when he came across you and Lindir together tucked away in the library while looking over ancient texts or one of the numerous gardens to gaze at the flowers as though they were starlight. Nearly every time, he would spy your fingers intertwined with one another. Yet, the moment a new presence was known, you would separate as though you had never been close in the first place.
You two thought you were clever in keeping your relationship undisclosed. Elrond, however, knew Lindir all too well to not notice the subtle change in his demeanor when you were around, and it was his closeness with the ellon that allowed him to understand why there was such secrecy. Lindir was much too shy. It had already taken him decades to ask you. That much Elrond knew. He had played a discreet hand in nudging Lindir in the right direction, one that did not involve the younger elf shielding himself behind Elrond’s shoulder. But also making the relationship public at the same time? The poor boy would have keeled over from all the praise and attention.
Yet, in this moment? Retaining a straight face was even more difficult with Thorin and his company running amuck. Lindir sat across the table from you, jaw clenched harder than mithril and ears redder than the strawberries on his plate, as the dwarf Kili (or was it Fili?) attempted to charm you. As much as he was annoyed by the dwarves’ behavior since their arrival, Elrond still found himself greatly amused.
Perhaps now, Lindir would finally announce your courtship.
“I must say you are the loveliest elf here, my lady.” Kili inched closer, a wide grin splitting his lips. He gestured towards the musicians playing at the other end of the table. “Even lovelier than the lady playing the harp.”
By the Valar, it took everything in Elrond to not choke on his wine with laughter.
Your lips twitched, threatening to curl into a smirk. “That is my brother,” you deadpanned.
He wasn’t.
The brazen dwarf was wearing down your polite attitude. Your quip had barely caused Kili to pause his conquest.
Elrond could see a couple of scenarios playing out. Either you would calmly excuse yourself from the table or you would allow this to continue before you-
“She is spoken for.” Lindir shot to his feet. His voice was nearly devoid of its usual timid nature.
Realizing what he had just admitted, the rouge of his ears bled to his face and dusted his cheeks. Silence filled the end of the table. Your eyes grew wide and lips parted in shock. Then, a kind of fuzzy determination filled his eyes as his gaze locked with yours.
“M-meleth nin,” he stumbled in recovery and cleared his throat. “Would you c-care to join me in the library?”
After a moment of processing, the tension that gripped your body from the start of dinner melted a way to be replaced with a bright smile.
“That would be wonderful.” You eagerly leapt to your feet. “I recently archived a few new books you might be interested in.”
Lindir met you as you rounded the table, leaving behind a baffled Kili. You linked your arm with the ellon who looked as though he had been blessed directly by the Valar.
As he led you away, Elrond could not hold himself back anymore. He raised his wine goblet, prompting the table’s attention to turn to him. “To Lindir finding his voice!”
The guests erupted into a cheer led mostly by Thorin and company. Elrond took a sip of wine, hiding the smirk that he allowed himself as he witnessed Lindir quicken your journey down the hall to the library.
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whereisten · 4 years
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Heal
A Kun fic that’s part of our Halloween Series!
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Summary: Doctor Qian Kun is a young and successful doctor who works miracles. And you are no exception when you become his patient.
Pairing: Doctor! Kun x female reader
Genre: romance, angst, fantasy, horror
Word Count: 5.6k
Warnings: blood, manipulation
(A/N: Thank you guys so much for your support with our Halloween fics! Hope you enjoy the adventures of y/n and Doctor Kun!)
___
You were no stranger to visits to the Neo Hospital in your hometown. When you were a baby, you basically lived at the hospital. You were prone to colds and fevers. You always experienced body aches and fatigue. You were born with a chronic autoimmune disorder that left many doctors baffled. They were only able to provide you with medications to alleviate your pains temporarily. You were confined to stay at home, to be homeschooled by your parents, and make friends online. Your childhood was far from normal.
You were a college junior now and you’ve been strictly online. If it wasn’t for the Internet, you probably would’ve lost your mind by now.
You had contact with the outside world but not physical contact. It’s what you longed for the most.
You resented your family. Your older and younger siblings could go out whenever they pleased. How did they get so lucky? Why were you the only sibling that got the short end of the stick?
Everyone in your family always interacted with you carefully, using hand sanitizer and always washing their hands prior to helping you with something. They treated you like a fine, porcelain doll that had to be preserved. It was irritating on your best days and unbearable on your worst. You felt like an abomination sometimes.
However, throughout the years, you would rebel. You would run away from home when your parents eyes wandered for a moment. The farthest you’d get before getting caught was the park. You were lucky that you didn’t develop any harsh symptoms from those times you ran away. However, you would be punished for taking such risks. You’d get your phone and internet privileges taken away for a month every time.
Last week, you succeeded in your most ambitious escape yet: you made it to Target to buy the new Ariana Grande CD. You thought that the one trip to Target couldn’t hurt you. By no means was it crowded and no one got into your space.
Well, you were wrong to think that you’d be fine.
Now you came down with a fever and you’d been placed on bed rest at your all-too familiar Room 1196 on the eleventh floor of the hospital.
You resented your body. A lot of people could recover from a fever and carry on with their day-to-day lives but you? Not so much.
Your parents made a whole spectacle of getting you to be seen by the best doctors but these doctors couldn’t help you the way you’d hoped.
However, this time, you awoke the next morning after your intake and felt...nothing.
Like you never had a fever in the first place.
You spent the morning checking your social media. Your crush/online classmate Sicheng was on a weekend hiking trip with his friends. He was with a bunch of beautiful, healthy people in North Carolina. You were even more bummed to be in the hospital now.
You wondered what life would be like if you didn’t have your condition. Where could you have gone? Who would you be now?
You’ve always wanted to go to the beach by yourself. To the supermarket. Hell, across the street. You wanted to go somewhere. Anywhere. Without anyone coddling you and watching your every move.
You wished for freedom from the body you were born with. To find a new one, somehow.
Because you had no hope for your current body to change.
“Y/n? Can I come in?” A male voice was heard from the door.
“Sure.” You sat upright on the bed.
The person at the door entered and he was the prettiest healthcare provider you’d ever laid your eyes on. He had warm, brown eyes and a radiant smile. His dark blue hair was wavy.
Suddenly, you regretted not brushing your hair that morning.
He donned a lab coat with the hospital’s name on it. His name tag was in a lanyard: Dr. Qian Kun, MD, DOM, PharmD.
He looked very young...And to have all of those titles? Your head was spinning.
He frowned as he saw how confused you looked. “Are you alright?”
You nodded. “I am.”
He sat on the chair beside your bed. “It’s nice to meet you, y/n. I’m Dr. Qian Kun but you can call me Kun.”
You blinked a few times. “Are you really a doctor?”
He laughed, confused. “What?”
“You don’t seem that much older than me…”
He sighed. “I get that a lot. I’m twenty-four. I graduated early from university...Earned my titles...Now here I am.”
“That’s amazing. You are probably the youngest doctor ever.”
Kun shook his head. “Afraid not. Bala Ambati became a doctor at seventeen.”
You shook your head. “Still...You have three doctorates. That means triple the sleep deprivation. Hats off to you.”
Kun chuckled as he looked at your information in his clipboard. “Your vitals have improved a lot since yesterday.”
You looked down at your hands. “Yeah...That’s impossible…”
Kun shook his head, noting how down you looked. “It is possible, y/n.”
You met his gaze. “How?”
He smiled. “Are you familiar with oriental medicine?”
He sure was charming, you thought. You reminded yourself to answer his question. “No, I’m not.”
Kun got up from his seat. “Well, there are many different practices that a doctor of oriental medicine can utilize, like acupuncture, meditation, and herbal therapy...To restore harmony to the human body. I specialize in herbal therapy.”
“I see…”
“I have created an herbal mixture that has worked efficiently to get my patients back up on their feet.”
Incredulous still, you managed to say, “That’s great, Doctor.”
He lifted an eyebrow.
“I mean, Kun.”
Kun resumed, “And I‘ve provided you with the herbal mixture and from the looks of it, the results have quickly taken effect.”
You were speechless. “That’s…”
“I know it’s hard to believe, y/n. But sometimes doctors fail to find other alternatives to help their patients. Which is why I’m glad I’m your primary physician now.”
“Wait, what about Doctor Morris?” Doctor Morris had been your primary physician since you were five years old.
“She’s retired. I’ve been taking on a couple of her patients now.”
“I see…”
Kun looked out your room’s window and smiled to himself. “You don’t trust me.”
“Don’t take it personally. I don’t trust any medical professional. No one has been able to understand my condition yet so…”
Kun replied, “You’ve been let down too many times.”
“Exactly. Doctors just can’t figure me out.”
He turned to you and grinned. “Allow me to prove you wrong, then.”
___
At the recommendation of Doctor Kun, you were assigned to stay in the hospital for the next few weeks to see how the herbal mixture would affect your body if you took it for a longer period of time.
Every passing day, you felt more alive. It was weird to say this but you felt more alive at the hospital than you did before. You were beginning to suspect that Kun’s herbal mixture was actually working.
The herbal mixture was made of feverfew among other medicinal herbs. It had certainly done the trick to reduce your fever overnight. You wondered just what this mixture was made of.
You just finished your online linguistics lecture and closed your laptop. You found Kun waiting at the door. “You free?”
You nodded. “Yes.”
He sat down next to you and pulled some of your favorite candy out of his pocket.
He put the candy bar in your hand. His fingers lightly touched your palm. Your face warmed up at his proximity. “Happy Halloween, y/n.”
Your eyes nearly bugged out. How did he know you loved Twix? You took the candy bar into your hand and almost cried.
“Y/n?” He asked, worried.
You wiped a tear away. “Sorry...It’s just that this time of the year is hard because...I want to celebrate it. Go out and trick or treat...I know that time has gone for me but I hate that I missed out, you know…”
“Y/n…”
You sniffled and took a bite of the chocolate bar. “My parents never wanted me to feel like I was missing out so they would bring the holiday home to me. I was never in need of M&Ms, Skittles, Twix, or Sour Patch Kids…They even helped me make the best Halloween costumes. We would watch a bunch of horror movies all month long...But I wanted to be a kid. I wanted to go out with my friends and go door to door…”
Kun’s heart went out to you. He hated seeing you so down and so deprived of a life that everyone should have. “Y/n, you will be able to do all of the things you want to do in life.”
You looked at Kun and he had a determined look on his face. “How can you be so sure?”
“I’ve worked with people with conditions like yours...They thought they would be attached to the hospital forever one way or another. But with my methods, I was able to help them turn their life around. And now they’re living normally and fully.”
You sighed. “I’m happy to hear that...I just don’t think I’ll be one of them.”
Kun placed his hand over yours. “Trust me, y/n. I won’t let you down.”
You met his eyes, then, and you smiled. “Thanks, Kun. I’ve gotta hand it to you. You’re my favorite doctor.”
He beamed. “Is that so?”
You nodded. “Yeah...None of the other doctors ever gave me so much as a lollipop Even though that seems to be the norm on TV…”
Kun chuckled. “There’s more where that came from, y/n.”
___
It has been a month since you’ve entered the hospital. The medical bills were covered by an anonymous benefactor. Your family didn’t have to worry about the financial strain of your hospital stay.
Your family came to visit you and they were stunned at how radiant you looked. They were surprised at how much more ALIVE you looked when they expected you to be weak and miserable because you were at the hospital. Something about you was different.
“Doctor Kun is a miracle worker, isn’t he?” Your dad asked.
“I heard he’s a sight for sore eyes, too...Don’t you think so, y/n?” Your older sister Sydney teased.
You mom shook her head and helped fluff your pillows. “How are you, sweetheart?”
You smiled. “I’m better, actually. I think Kun’s methods are working.”
“Oh, are you two on a first name basis?” Your sister joked.
You rolled your eyes. “He told me to call him Kun. If you saw him, you’d feel weird calling him Doctor, actually.”
“He’s quite young, y/n. He graduated from a top university in Beijing at age 10. Then, he went to medical school right after. He’s been a practicing doctor for a couple of years now. He’s unbelievable,” you dad said.
Kun entered the room, then. “I hope I’m not interrupting. I’m Doctor Qian Kun. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
Your mom was in love with him. Your dad was in shock at how young he was. Your sister wanted his number. You broke their stunned silence. “Kun, these are my parents Donna and Andrew. And this is my sister, Sydney.”
Kun greeted them. “I’m glad you are all here so I can tell you the good news.”
Everyone was shocked at the phrase “good news”. What good news could he possibly have to share?
Kun continued, “Y/n, your vitals are working at optimum level and we want to see how well you can fare by discharging you.”
You asked, “What?”
Kun smiled. “You can start having a normal life...In which you can attend in-person classes, go to the supermarket, take up a sport…”
You weren’t sure about the last thing he offered but everything else he suggested made you jump out of your bed. “Serious?”
Kun’s smile grew. “Yes.”
Your parents gave each other looks.
Your dad started. “Doctor, are you sure about this...y/n has lived all of her life in our home. The only outside world she’s ever known is our backyard and this hospital.”
Kun nodded. “I am sure. I’ve worked with several patients with similar cases as y/n’s and I would like to put the effect of the herbal mixture to the test. If there is any risk, she will immediately be brought back to the hospital and I will up the dosage for the herbs.”
After a few more minutes of discussion, your parents reluctantly agreed to take you home. To alleviate their concerns, you promised to consult with Kun once a week so he could monitor your progress.
You would be going home tomorrow and you had been given the green light to live a normal life. Outside. Go to classes. See your friends. Go to the beach. Buy fruits at the grocery store.
You packed up your belongings and Kun visited you one last time before you left. “Hey.”
You smiled brightly at him. “Hi!”
“How are you feeling?”
“Better than I ever have, honestly. And I have you to thank for that. Look, I’m not sure if this will work out in the end but the fact that I can take the chance and go out there...Thank you.”
Kun ruffled your hair. “I’m here for you, y/n.”
You did admit to yourself that you’d had a little crush on Dr. Kun but who were you kidding? He was so out of your league. You’d had a friend in him and you would always be thankful to him. “I have something for you.”
Kun’s eyes widened. “For me?”
“I wasn’t sure it’d get to my house in time but my mom got the package today. I told her to bring it today when everyone visited so…”
You pulled out a small gift bag with Kun’s present inside.
Kun smiled. “You didn’t have to get me anything.” “You’ve done a lot for me, Kun. I may have my doubts but I don’t doubt your intentions. And they're nothing but good. You’ve been doing so much for me. You’re setting me free...In a way.”
You handed the bag to Kun. He pulled out a little wrapped box from inside. He looked at you as he mocked suspicion.
He removed the wrapping to find a pair of AirPods. He gaped. “Y/n…”
You smiled. “For whenever you need to escape the noise…”
Kun had told you that sometimes he would get overwhelmed with his duties at the hospital and you’d asked him what gave him comfort. He told you it was music. So you figured something as light and portable as AirPods could help Kun calm down whenever he needed it throughout the day.
He smiled brightly at you and surprised you by wrapping his arms around you. “Y/n, thank you...You shouldn’t have…”
You froze. Kun’s toned body was against yours and you could feel the racing of his heart. Your heart probably beat twice as fast. You felt yourself get warmer and warmer. You pulled away from him, his hands on your arms.
He blushed. “Sorry…”
You cleared your throat. “Don’t worry about it…”
Your dad returned to the hospital room. “Y/n, you ready?”
Perfect timing, dad, you thought.
“Yeah, I’m coming.”
___
It may have been the second semester of your junior year but you felt as nervous as an incoming college freshman as you entered Neo University’s grounds for the first time. You were meeting some of your friends for the first time ever.
It was one thing to see them on the screen but your heart accelerated thinking of what it would be like to see them in the flesh.
You’ve been doing well so far with the herbs Kun had sent you home with. You were able to go grocery shopping with your mom. She was still considering whether or not you could go to the beach yet. You hoped that your progress would continue so she would say yes.
You felt healthier than ever. You could breathe well through your nose. You felt no body aches. You were ready to cartwheel across the quadrangle.
First, you had to learn how to cartwheel, though.
“Y/n!!!!!” Jungeun called out to you.
Your blonde best friend ran up to you and jumped you from behind. “Ah!”
“Jungeun!” You gasped.
She laughed. “You said I could touch you so I wasn’t about to hold back.”
You hugged each other tightly.
“Y/n, it’s so good to see you!”
You and Jungeun have been friends since middle school so you were already a sobbing mess on your first day.
“Stop crying, y/n or else I’m gonna…” She started crying, too.
“Enough with the tears, already,” Dejun added.
You and Jungeun hugged Dejun to bother him, then.
He laughed. “Y/n, welcome to Neo U.”
“Thanks,” you said, smiling.
You three went to your seminar together and you were just so in awe of being in a classroom, you had trouble focusing on the lecture. You were even more distracted when you saw that Sicheng was in the same class.
He recognized you and waved. You were yelling so loudly on the inside.
Before this semester, you had the occasional online class that you shared. You saw Sicheng for the first time a year ago and your crush on him grew from there. He was one of the most popular guys on campus, according to Jungeun. You had a group project with him last semester and he was so...Perfect.
He was intelligent and down-to-earth. His smile was so sweet and his eyes pierced into your soul. He was talking poetry. It felt like you were seeing your favorite celebrity in person.
When class ended, you went to lunch with your friends and Sicheng joined you.
“How are you, y/n?” He asked.
“I’m great. Never been better,” you replied.
He smiled. “I’m glad. If you ever need anything, please let me know. You have my number.”
You nodded. “Of course. Same here. If you ever need anything. I’m here for you, too.”
Sicheng chuckled. “Great.”
When you finished lunch, Jungeun couldn’t stop poking fun at you. Sicheng left early for a club meeting. “I’m surprised he didn’t ask you out, then!”
You rolled your eyes. “Ask who out?”
Dejun added. “Me, of course.”
Jungeun continued. “The ‘you have my number’ couldn’t have been more obvious. He wants you in his dorm yesterday.”
You frowned. “And what would we do? Fix his bed?”
Jungeun and Dejun laughed. Jungeun added, “The opposite, y/n.”
Your face heated up then. “Oh.”
Since you have basically spent most of your life either at home or at the hospital, you never even considered the possibility of a love life. You tried to convince yourself that dating sims would’ve been enough.
“Don’t worry, y/n...You and Sicheng can take it slow...He’s no incubus who is trying to take your soul,” Dejun offered.
“True,” you said.
That was if Sicheng saw you that way in the first place.
___
A few weeks had passed. You’d been seeing Kun regularly to check in and everything had gone as expected. You were fine. You weren’t exhibiting any flare-ups. So long as you kept taking the prescribed herbs, you would be fine.
“How is everything, y/n?” He asked.
“Pretty good, actually. School is still school, even if it’s in person. But I got to go to a skating rink for the first time.”
He laughed. “How was it?”
“I am terrible.” You showed your legs. “It explains these bruises.”
Kun shook his head and chuckled. “I’m glad you’re getting out more, y/n. Try and take it one step at a time.”
“Oh, geez. I wish you said that sooner. I already joined a blood cult and I’m getting married next week.”
Kun rolled his eyes as he finished taking notes from your consultation.
“How is everything with you, doc?”
Kun’s eyes widened. “Me?”
“Surely, you’re not always at the hospital.”
Kun sighed. “Well, y/n...it just so happens that I’ve taken residence up on the top floor. The whole floor is my apartment. Don’t really get to spend much time there because I’m almost always on call.”
Your jaw dropped. “What? Kun, that’s abuse. You shouldn’t be working so many hours. It’s against the-“
Kun couldn’t help his smile appearing.
“You sneaky bastard,” you said.
You both laughed, then.
Sometimes you forgot Kun was a successful doctor. Sometimes he felt like your infinitely smarter senior at college.
He was a million worlds away from yours.
Kun answered, “Well, I’m doing fine, y/n. I meet up with friends once in a while and go white-water rafting.”
“That sounds like fun!”
Kun shook his head. “It’s challenging but exciting. I get a rush every time I go.”
You thought out loud. “I’d love to try it sometime…”
Kun pat you in the back. “When you are at one hundred perfect, I’ll give you the green light. Sounds good?”
You nod.
___
You’d wrapped up your midterm and you were ready to head home and take a nap. You walked through the student quad.
“Y/n!” Sicheng called out to you.
You turned around and found Sicheng running towards you.
You smiled, already warm in the face. “Hi.”
“I was wondering if you were free right now…”
“Really? Me?”
He smiled, confused at your question. “Yeah, you. Want to go to the movies with me?”
You nodded. “Absolutely.”
Sicheng drove you guys to the movies. He bought the tickets and the snacks. He let you pick the movie. You picked The Blair Witch Project. It came out over twenty years ago but the theater was doing a limited time screening of it.
You and Sicheng couldn’t shut up throughout the whole movie as you whispered to each and made each other laugh. You’d almost gotten kicked out of the theater.
You left the theater together and he asked you to dinner. You said yes. You were starting to think that this was a date.
“Y/n, this is a date, right?” He asked you at dinner.
You stopped eating your chicken parmigiana and looked at him with big eyes. “I think...Is it?”
Sicheng sighed. “I wanted it to be…”
You laughed. “Oh, thank God. I thought it was all in my head for a second. Maybe you were this nice to all of your friends.”
He pointed out, “I am not this nice to my friends, I can promise you that.”
Sicheng drove you home and kissed you goodnight before you entered your house. You felt like you were floating on a cloud now.
___
Two days later, there was a campus alert that Sicheng had gone missing. His face was all over the news. The last time he was heard from was when he told his best friend Jaehyun that he was going to ask you out to the movies. The last time he was seen was when he took you home.
Sicheng’s car was found a mile away from the dorms. The key was still in the ignition and his wallet and phone were left behind.
You were brought into the police station for questioning and you told them everything that happened the night Sicheng disappeared.
You were worried. What could have happened to him? Would he be alright? Would he be able to come back home? You missed him so much.
You took an evening stroll around your neighborhood to try and calm down. You reached the park where there was no other soul in sight.
Suddenly, you felt a tingly sensation in the back of your neck. You felt that someone was following you.  
You began to walk faster. Suddenly, you were pinned to the ground and everything turned black.
___
You woke up in Room 1196, then. Wait...It wasn’t 1196...It was a different room in Neo Hospital. The room was dark and you could only hear the sound of your breathing. It grew more hysterical with each second.
You felt a burning sensation in your neck. You cried out in pain. You cried out, “Help me, please.”
“Y/n…” You recognized Kun’s voice.
You nearly yelled out in pain but restrained yourself. “What...happened?”
“An animal attack,” he started.
You frowned. “What?”
Kun sighed. “It was good that I was there to help you in time, y/n…”
“What?”
Kun moved your hair out of your face. “I was in the neighborhood when I saw the beast attack your neck.”
“A beast?” You frowned.
“Sicheng, was it?”
Your eyes widened. “How do you-“
“You can’t hide anything from me, y/n...You know that’s not how our relationship works.”
“What are you talking about? Ahhhhh.” The pain was getting to be too much for you.
“Can you put two and two together, y/n? Sicheng bit you.”
You shook your head furiously. “No, he wouldn’t-“
Kun snapped his fingers and Sicheng entered the hospital room. His bright expression nowhere to be found. His eyes were a bright red and his lips had traces of blood on them.
“Sicheng?!” You asked.
Sicheng smiled, showing fangs in his teeth. “Hi, y/n…”
“Oh, my God!” You started.
Kun grew annoyed. “Alright, that’s enough pleasantries for my taste. Go.”
Sicheng walked away at his command.
You began, “What the-“
Kun smiled brightly at you then. This time, his straight white teeth displayed his own fangs. “Y/n...Sicheng has put you in a bit of a bind, hasn’t he?”
You tried backing away from Kun and getting off of the bed but it was almost as if the pain kept you from moving.
Kun ran the back of his hand down your cheek. “When a newborn vampire bites you, the bite is lethal...You could die anywhere between minutes and hours...It depends on the bitten, really…”
You flinched at his touch. “What...did you do to me?”
Kun inched closer to you and you winced. He lathered up the blood that leaked from your neck down to your collarbone.
“What had to be done, y/n. From the moment I first saw you, I knew that I had to have you.”
You cried out in pain. “Somebody help me, please! Sicheng, please!”
Kun, annoyed over you mentioning Sicheng, shut the door to the hospital room. “It’s useless, y/n. Sicheng wouldn’t be in this mess if he hadn’t infiltrated what is mine. Now Sicheng must endure the consequences and be at my mercy. I turned him so now he looks to me for instructions. Until I release him...Perhaps in the next millennium...”
You sobbed. “Kun, please make this pain stop! I can’t take it!”
He cooed. “I know, baby. I want to help you. Just say the word and I’ll make the pain go away.”
The pain dominated your senses so you couldn’t process how exactly he would make it go away. “Okay! Just do it!”
Kun got up onto the bed and straddled you. He leaned down towards your neck and bit into you.
You cried out again but this time the excruciating pain turned into a euphoria so glorious, you never wanted it to end. You wrapped your arms around Kun as he continued to drink your blood.
___
It was morning when you had woken up. You were in Room 1196 now. You shot up from your bed and found Kun seated right beside you.
“Good morning, darling,” he started.
You glared at him. “Bite me. Oh, wait, you already did.”
He smiled. “I see your energy is up. That’s good to see.”
You rolled your eyes. “I’m going home…”
Suddenly, you stopped right at the door and your throat started to burn. Your senses heightened and you could sense that one of the nurses was walking right past your room’s door. You wondered what she would taste like if you caught her by surprise right then and there and…
What the holy hell were you thinking?
Kun sighed. “Don’t kill Joyce. She’s the most competent nurse on the staff.”
You ran into your bathroom door and looked at yourself in the mirror.
But you couldn’t.
You put a hand over your mouth and sobbed. “Kun!!!!!”
Kun joined you in the bathroom. “Ah, yes. You won’t be able to gain access to your reflection for another twenty years.”
“Twenty years...What is going on?”
“But what else, y/n? I turned you. To save your life.”
“Turned me into what, Kun?! Say it!”
Kun smiled. “Darling, you already know. Just admit it to yourself.”
You cried. “No…”
“You’ve always wanted a new body. A new life, y/n. And I’ve given it to you. I’ve made you the most powerful creature on this damned planet: a vampire.”
You fell to the ground. You could feel your fangs against your tongue.“Kun! Why did you do this to me? What did I ever do to you?”
Kun sat with you on the ground. “Because I love you, y/n. I never want to be apart from you again.”
You spat in his face. “You made me into a monster.”
Kun, unbothered, wiped your spit away with the sleeve of his coat. “I did not. I made you the best version of yourself you can be. Time for you has become infinite. Your body is immune to all illnesses now. You can see clearly. Your metabolism is in top shape. You are a goddess now.”
You shook your head. “Kun, take it back.”
He chuckled. “You’ve seen enough movies to know that that’s not how it works, y/n...You are mine now. Forever. Just like Sicheng. Just like a lot of the staff in this hospital.”
You shook your head rapidly. “Like hell I’m yours.”
“Y/n, I have been very generous up until this point. Using my blood to help you overcome your chronic condition. Funding your hospital bills...The least you can do is submit to me....”
It was hard to process all of the truths he just delivered. “Your blood?”
He laughed. “You mean you couldn’t taste my blood in the herbal mixture?”
You were about to throw up.
He chuckled darkly. “Admit it, y/n. You loved it.”
“Fuck you, Kun!”
He smiled. “We’ll get to that…”
You sneered. “You are despicable.”
His smile faded. “And you are testing my patience…”  He snapped his fingers at you. “On your knees…”
You stayed on the floor with your arms crossed across your chest.
He frowned as he snapped again. “On your knees, y/n.”
“I don’t think so,” you said.
Kun looked taken aback. “What? How?”
You got up from the ground and looked at him. “I will never submit to you for as long as I live..” If vampires were even considered living.
You ran quickly out of the hospital room, realizing you had superhuman speed now. You were able to leave the historial without facing any temptation to bite someone.
But your thirst had to be satisfied somehow and you had to find a way to quench it without hurting anyone.
___
[2 years later]
You’d skipped town not long after you turned. You sent letters to your family without a return address so as not to risk their safety.
Dear Mom and Dad,
I’m so sorry I ran away. I had no choice. If I didn’t leave, you all would’ve been in danger. One day, I hope to explain it all to you but in the meantime, live your lives fully and love each other. Don’t take anything for granted. I love you so much and will see you again.
Love,
y/n
You had become an infamous blood bag bandit as you moved across the country, running away from Kun. He would occasionally try and track you. Or he would send his henchman like Sicheng to do it for him.
You were lucky so far. You had never attacked a human being and sustained yourself on some blood bags you were able to nab from donating trucks.
The reason why you didn’t submit yourself to Kun that day was indeed because of his blood. Consumption of his blood made you immune to his influence. He couldn’t have you like he had wanted all along.
Kun had been obsessed with you from the very beginning. When you were discharged from the hospital the time you met him, he continuously stalked you. At college, at the grocery store, at your home...It would explain why he was able to send Sicheng to attack you.
He always knew where you were back then.
Kun commanded Sicheng to bite you then and put you at risk of dying. Kun’s plan was to save you, make you his vampire queen, and control you.
It was a shame he failed to see that his creation of medicinal herbs was the one thing that would lead to his plan’s failure.
You were immune to his commands and you weren’t going to stick around and see how else he would try and “win you over”.
According to your research, in all public records, Kun was now twenty-six. A blatant lie since he couldn’t age. So you wondered how long he would remain in your hometown. You kept a careful eye on your family every now and then. You’ve made some contacts to track your family occasionally, as well.
Kun had stooped low and you prayed he wouldn’t stoop even lower to get you.
You worked hard every day to work on your rapidly growing vampiric abilities. You couldn’t stick around anywhere for too long without arousing suspicion.
Now you weren’t confined to one space anymore.
You were confined to running.
You hoped to one day bring it this madness to an end and take Kun down. Save Sicheng and Kun’s other minions.
And for you to truly be free.
[Fin]
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Odi et Amo I
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Odi et amo. Quare id faciam fortasse requiris? nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior
Catullus, 85
After a few years of working in the USA for Disney and playing the role of The White Fox in Marvel Cinematic Universe you came back to your motherland - Korea only to be greeted with hatred and contempt. To make things harder for you the universe sends you the most irritating neighbour ™. Will you be able to find your happiness and  accomplish your dream of becoming loved actress in Korea without complying with standards of patriarchal society?
pairing: Park Jinyoung x reader
genre: actor au
warnings: angst, foul language (please don’t read it if you’re not old enough)
words: 5582
A/N: Hi this is my first fanfic ever, and so there are few things I have to say before you hopefully enjoy reading it. 1. English is not my first language so there may be some grammatical errors. I’m sorry, perhaps in the future there will be someone to proofread my works. 2. I’m terribly sorry for my interpunction :( for some reason they don’t teach it here  and so it may be terrible. I am reading about it more but it’s not easy for me as I haven’t practiced enough. I’m really sorry if it’s awkward. 3. This was supposed to be long oneshot, but I was told not all people enjoy long reads on tumblr like I do, so I decided to make a miniseries out of it. Let me know if you enjoyed it and if you want me to write some scenarios, or post more of my works (i have a lot of them in the depths of my drive lol). Love, thatgirlwritingficsatnight.
***
You sat in spacious sofa in your old apartment in Korea. A sigh leaving your lips as you looked through the headlines.
"The black sheep of Korean show biz comes back after four years in USA"
"Whose heart will she eat now? National heartbreaker came back to Korea"
"Go back to USA you wh*re! - internet went wild over L/N Y/N"
"L/N Y/N comes back in outrageous style"
Most of them were a summary or perhaps a reminder for k-netizens why they should hate you; it's because you dated who you wanted to and for how long you wanted to, it's because this one time in the talk show you told off male host when he kept asking about your private life and because the other time you told another one to stop giving you all the questions about clothes and make up while your male co-star got to answer some deep questions about character development and that's to name the few reasons that came instantly to your mind. Of course some articles had to focus on your airport fashion too. The conservative Korean society had a problem with your bra, or rather a lack of thereof under your designer t-shirt. You left out an irritated groan as you scrolled to the comments. They were vicious and vulgar, you don't know what else did you expect honestly. You tossed the phone and buried your face in your hands fighting the urge to tweet something about the nasty people and how they should keep their antediluvian opinions to themselves. You sighed again perhaps if you were in a different country you'd do that, but here with systematic misogyny, where women were supposed to always smile and nod their heads, here where they got paid 60% of men's pay... you'd most likely be crucified. Then again who if not you would come to your defense? You knew the answer — no one, that realization was enough to anger you even more. The blood was boiling inside you as you snatched your phone back and went into Twitter silently mouthing apologies to your manager who'd be blowing your phone in just a few minutes.
 "Yes, I don't wear bras. No, it's not a topic for your article nor your problem. I also know it may shock some people but my dating life is not a topic for your entertainment either."
"It baffles me how Korean society thinks its country is in the group of one of the most civilized ones but still treats women as if we were stuck in 50s."
  Your phone was already blowing with notifications, you could see some new articles already popping and soon after that it buzzed as your manager tried to reach you. You silenced your phone and left it on the coffee table while you moved to the kitchen. You got yourself a lamp of wine and watched always busy streets of Seoul from a window. It was already dark and it looked like rivers of light with cars and street lights constantly illuminating them. You were deep in your thoughts as you pondered if you made a good decision. You had a good life in California. You had your best friend there, a house with a pool and many good opportunities for roles you declined. In those four years you became an international star after your role as Marvel's White Fox — a gumiho superhero. You knew in a year or two Disney would ask you to come back to make more movies and most likely you would but you couldn't stay in the USA any longer. Somehow, even though it seemed illogical considering the warm welcome you've got, you still missed your home. You missed Korea the country that loved to hate you. You weren't exaggerating when you said they loved to hate you, for instance you always played villains in Korean films and dramas and the Korean audience loved it. They loved to hate your characters and so every time you tried to audition for a role that would be first or second lead you'd always be cast as the villain. The very first time you played a good character was when you portrayed the White Fox for Marvel, they chose you because you were half American (on your father's side) and because you used to play femme fatales and that was kinda the character. You accepted the role secretly hoping that it would change the way Korea has seen you. It didn't. They said you were too Westernised and that you weren't true Korean and had their own perfect casting with actresses that weren't as scandalous as you. Well, at least the rest of the world loved you. Nonetheless, you came back. You still weren't sure if it was a good idea or for how long, or even if you'd work here or just relax; you were just happy you could eat unhealthy convenience store food whenever you felt like and that kimchi was a standard and not something you'd only find in specific shops. Speaking of, you craved some ramyun with cheese and perhaps some yakult as well. You changed your clothes into a pair of black sweats and a black hoodie and chose to wear a black cap and face mask as well. You checked yourself in a huge mirror in the corridor. Your outfit screamed two things: first was "I am a crazy murderer from drama" and and second "look at me I'm a celebrity". You sighed. Honestly what else could you wear? You decided not to change and went out to the nearest convenience store.
You walked slowly taking your time to get to the store while listening to Def Soul hoping lazy beats would calm your nerves. You bopped your head to the rhythm as you entered the store and went straight into ramyun section. You picked your favourite spicy one and grabbed some cheese, yakult and cherry coke. The girl working there seemed really young and you caught her yawning. She apologized and you smiled warmly although she probably couldn't see it through the mask.
"Don't worry about it I'm tired today as well." you said, and she smiled. You paid with a card and regretted not withdrawing any money so that you could tip her. You remember when you were just a bit younger than her, working in similar way but back in the USA; she’d appreciate extra cash. You took the ramyun to prepare it and hummed as you waited for the noodles to get soft. Food always got you to feel better. You were spreading cheese on your noodles when middle-aged men entered the shop. Soon you'd believe it's not your night or perhaps that you got some bad karma, or that you were just cursed. The men came up to the cashier and asked for a pack of cigarettes. You were about to slurp the first noodles when he spoke.
"When will you finish your shift cutie maybe I can pick you up?" He chuckled and the girl tried to smile politely although anyone with eyes could see how uncomfortable she felt. She tried to decline his advances with a small scared voice clearly she was too young to feel comfortable enough to just curse him out.
"You sluts are always the same. You smile at me flirt with me and then act all fucking.."
"Aish!" you didn't let him finish. And he turned your way surprised someone else was in the store. "I lost all appetite," you dropped the chopsticks next to the bowl and moved your gaze at the male: disgust was rolling off from you in waves, and he flinched upon meeting your eyes, "then again who wouldn't if they had to eat in the presence of trash?" You watched as his face got all red and furious, it seemed almost twisted now. "How dare you speak like that to me, you bi..." once again he couldn't finish his sentence this time you silenced him with your swift actions. You closed the distance between the two of you and grabbed his hand firmly. Then you put it behind his back and twisted it painfully enough for him to groan.
"Call me a bitch, I dare you." you said quietly, but he didn't respond, he just jerked trying to escape your hold. He smelled like tobacco, digested alcohol and grease. You scrunched your nose and took him out of the store. You pushed him lightly, and yet he still lost balance and fell. He shot you a glare full of hate and fury while you tried to remain calm. Truth to be told you were scared, yes you jumped in to help the girl, and successfully silenced him, but that was most likely only because he wasn't sober. You were silently asking universe to help you out as you mustered your courage and played your part of "fearless Y/N”.
"Leave or I'll call the police and tell them you harassed both me and the girl." He stood up and spit under your legs before he left. You sighed, a tight knot unravelling itself finally in your belly, adrenaline that was brought up with the surge of fury disappearing now, leaving you bit wobbly. You made mental note to thank the director of The White Fox for making you take those material arts classes, they came in handy. You came back to the store, you didn’t pay attention to the girl that watched you in awe. You just wanted to enjoy your noodles. Finally, able to take the bite you let out disgusted groan they got too soft. Letting out resigned sigh you opened the yakult.
"Miss Y/N.." small voice started next to you. The girl was blushing and smiling. She was cute, had long brown hair and a mole just under her left eye. You smiled back and it seemed to encourage her. "Thank you. You are like the coolest unnie ever. I will always support you and fight anyone that calls you names and.." You chuckled at her eagerness and sudden flood of words. "Thanks kid. What's your name? "Kim Seoyun." "Nice to meet you Kim Seoyun. I'm L/N Y/N." you said with a smile, and she blushed even more. You looked through the window and bit the inside of your cheek. What if he comes back when you're gone, you couldn’t risk it. "Tell me Seoyun when do you end your shift?" She took out a phone from her pocket. "Oh, in ten minutes." "Great I'll wait for you and order you a taxi." "Ah, unnie you don't have to… you already helped me enough and.." "Nonsense", you cut her off "he may come back and I'll sleep better knowing you are safe at home."
She nodded and came back to work. Leaving you with your soggy and lukewarm noodles. You thought about throwing it out but you hated wasting food and so you made yourself eat at least a bit although now it was cold and awfully soft. Ten minutes passed rather quickly and soon you found yourself standing next to the taxi with Seoyun. You gestured her to get in, but she stood in front of you and suddenly bowed deeply while extending her hands in front of you. Much to your surprise she was giving you a popsicle.
"Y/N-unnie I know it's not much but I wanted to thank you..."
You grinned at her while taking the gift. You quickly unwrapped it and tried it, it was strawberry flavoured.
"Thank you. It's the best popsicle I've ever had." You said honestly. Seoyun blushed and entered the car but before the taxi took off she lowered the car window and screamed.
"Y/N-unnie from today I'm your biggest fan! Unnie fighting!" You laughed.
"Mmm. Thank you!" After that car took off and you happily walked back home. Earphones in, phone in your hand as you decided to order some food since the ramyun sadly haven't been quite satisfying. You slurped at the popsicle even though it was the time of year when nights got colder. The taste of strawberries melted on your tongue. It was the first time someone in Korea told you they were your fan, it was also the first time a Korean fan gave you a gift. Despite the chilly air, and cold ice against your lips you felt warmth spreading from your chest. Grinning to yourself, you scrolled through different restaurants still thinking of what should you eat and then you bumped into someone or rather someone bumped into you. Popsicle fell to the ground and so did your phone with earphones brutally torn out from your ears. The man who bumped into you was in a very similar attire as your own he even wore a mask and a cap. You frowned upon realizing the gift from your first Korean fan was melting next to you. You were however about to apologize before he spoke in irritated tone while collecting some boxes scattered around you two.
"Next time watch where you're going." The blood inside you boiled the third time this evening and you snapped back at him before he could add anything else.
"Maybe you should watch where you're going." your tone was so aggressive it was clear all of the frustrations from today's evening build up in you. You gathered your things quickly.
"Excuse me..." he said straightening as he glared at you. His tone was promising a fight or a lecture at least. You didn't feel like any of that so once again today you didn't let someone finish their sentence, a habit of yours as it seems.
"Apologies accepted, asshole." you said fiercely and left him standing there with his stupid boxes in a state of shock. You got into the elevator and decided not to pay anyone any more of your thoughts tonight. You smiled at wooden popsicle stick and quickly forgot about the man downstairs.
Jinyoung was still shocked but also amused by your witty comeback. He knew he reacted upon his emotions when he was rude to you. He was just angry that he had to move the second time in the last two months. Sasaengs somehow found out about his last apartment in which he lived for only two weeks and just started feeling at home. Few days ago they found him, and he was harassed once again. Tired and angry he acted without thinking when you bumped into him and his belongings scattered. He wanted to apologize right away but you growled back at him, and he got irritated, so he wanted to lecture you or at least tell you not to interrupt other people when they are speaking, but you did just that and in very smart matter at that as well. Now Jinyoung was riding an elevator trying to pinpoint your face, he was sure he had seen you somewhere already. He entered his flat and sighed as he realized he had to unpack once again. He decided it could wait till morning.
You were woken up by both pounding and drilling in the wall behind your head. With long groan you pulled a pillow over your head but it didn't help much. You checked the time on your phone. It was seven thirty in the morning and you couldn't fall asleep till three - courtesy of your jet lag. You tried to ignore it hoping that you were sleepy and tired enough to fall asleep, unfortunately to no avail.
"Who the hell does the renovation on Saturday morning?" you asked your own walls with furious tone. You left the bed deciding to speak with the person next door. You didn't even bother to change from your PJ or brush your teeth, or hair, or even to throw something over yourself. You left your apartment in your bunny pyjama set, a gift from your best friend. Soon you were pounding angrily at the door. It took quite some time before the drilling inside stopped and someone opened the door. The man who opened seized you up and down with his eyes and coughed in his fist diverting his gaze somewhere else.
"Can I help you?" he asked his voice was a bit distressed. "I sure hope you can. It's Saturday seven in the morning." you were fuming, and he finally looked at you although he kept his eyes stuck to your face. "Ah... thank you for informing me. Are you working as personal calendar and clock for all of your neighbours or am I on some special treatment?" he asked sarcastically and smirked which made you: first bewildered and second even more mad if that's possible. "Let me rephrase that for you: it's Saturday, early morning and you are drilling in a wall." "Well, technically it was Mr Ahn who was drilling, I was enjoying myself with a book." He clearly enjoyed teasing you, there was this gleam in his eyes. "Don't you think that's a bit too early for a renovation?" your voice was seething with venom although you tried to keep your cool. "Quite contrary. I checked with the building manager, and I am only supposed to keep quiet between ten p.m and seven a.m. as you can see I even waited thirty minutes." He smiled at you and in that second you hated him, his stupid brown hair, strangely symmetrical face, weirdly tight cardigan and the fact that you couldn't do much since he was in the right. You just turned on your heels ready to storm off back to your flat when he spoke again. "Ah, and might I add I just love your fashion sense." he raised one brow and his eyes once again travelled through your body. "Excuse me?"
"Apologies accepted." Your face went from frowned and angry to shocked in a second, and he laughed at your reaction before closing the doors and leaving you cursing yourself, your luck and your best friend who thought it would be cute to buy you pyjama set which contained of hoodie with ears and a bunny tail and some shorts.
You entered your apartment, deep red setted on your face from both anger and embarrassment. As soon as you closed the doors the drilling continued. You cursed under the breath and went to shower. You stood long under the stream letting the water wash away both dirt and emotions. Once you were clean and ready for the day you’ve decided to ditch your flat for now since it was too loud for you anyway. This time you went for less sporty look but still all black. It was a turtleneck, slacks, martens and a beret. Chic and comfortable. You did  your makeup and hair and went out for breakfast. The car was already waiting for you when you got downstairs. You pulled a black mask over your face and greeted the driver who didn't talk much and so you didn't have to worry about the small talk. You scrolled through your phone checking the messages you got from your manager — there was about twenty of them and somehow each was written with different emotion: rage, irritation, sadness, hopelessness and so on. You sighed knowing that you should probably apologize for the troubles you caused him. Then again what were you supposed to do, not react when half of this country is calling you names? You signed back in your Twitter only to be greeted by thousands of notifications. Most of which were trolls and haters commenting on your tweets with occasional death threats in your DMs. You tried your very best not to read each and every comment knowing that even though you were strong it still affected you. You were; however, positively surprised when you found some supporting voices. There was your best friend (obviously) who fiercely defended you and called out everyone on their bull, he even threatened legal action and you smiled brightly at his tweets, but there were also few Korean celebrities who took your side and defended you as well. Most importantly there were few normal people, fans perhaps, who applauded you and thanked for speaking out. You smiled when you saw user "Y/NUnnieFandomPresidentSeoyun" somewhere in your notifications. Somehow traffic was still bad even on weekend and it took you forty minutes to get to the café you had in mind. Once you got there however you didn't regret time spend on travel. It was café in quiet part of town, it wasn't very popular since it wasn't in Gangnam but because of that it was one of your favourites. No paparazzi, no dispatch, no other celebrities.
The place itself wasn't very big but it had huge windows and was located in front of the park so you could easily grab a coffee and go for a walk or just stay inside and watch people and kids spending their time at the park. The interior wasn't anything special either, it wasn't one of those Instagram worthy cafés. It had simple modern style. You came in and ordered coffee and some toasts and sat in front of the window. There were few people inside so you sat without your mask freely and wondered if your friend was already sleeping. It was around nine here so in Los Angeles it was probably midnight. You texted him asking if he's sleeping, and he just responded by facetiming you right away. His black hair was still wet from shower, and he wasn't wearing any shirt.
"Yah! Y/N-ah!" he scolded you immediately. "How dare you not text or call your best friend for over a day. Do you know how worried I was?" You rolled your eyes at him.
"It's not like you contacted me either. And put some clothes on Tuan."
"Never. I know you secretly love watching my chest."
"Gross. Anyway.. I haven't called because I was tired yesterday, you know jet lag and all of that, so don't get mad at me."
"How are you now?" His playfulness was replaced by concern and it was clear he wasn't really asking about the quality of your sleep which was in fact terrible thanks to your lovely neighbour.
"I'm fine." He gave you the look. "Really. Honestly I didn't expect anything better from what I got, so I'm fine Mark."
"I shouldn't have let you go. You know what? Those people don't deserve you. Come back to the USA and let's live together again I'll even cook. Or I can come to you I'll fight them and keep you company. I'm can easily stream from there.." You giggled at him and he grinned. "You know I'm serious though you can come back I already miss you anyway. God, I should have married you maybe you wouldn't leave me Y/N-ah..." he was whiny again and you laughed. It was an inside joke between you. Both yours and his parents would always tell you to just marry already but neither of you felt anything romantic towards the other one. You'd known each other since you were two and both of you had treated each other like siblings ever since.
"You should have and now it's too late. I'll find myself new victim and feast on their heart like a true gumiho I am." you said in theatrical manner while munching on your toast.
"Honestly who the fuck writes those articles?"
"I don't know but I'm pretty sure... Oh my god. You've got to be kidding me." you said and tried to lower your face down so that the person passing in front of the window you've been sitting by couldn't see you.
"What? What? Is that paparazzi? Your ex? Is that paparazzi rented by your ex?" You frowned at your friend.
"What? No? It's my asshole neighbour." "Never heard of him. Why are we hiding anyway? You can just tell him to back off. Last time I checked you were great at that." He showed you two thumbs up and smiled broadly. "I'm hiding because I'm embarrassed and I don't want to talk to him." "Why?" he laughed. "What did you do?" "I didn't do anything it was that stupid PJ you got me..." you whispered at him while trying to make yourself as small as possible. "Oh my god. One day in Korea and you already got yourself a one-night stand. This is not how I raised you. What would your mother say?" he teased you and giggled. "For the love of... it's not like that." you said angrily a bit too loud perhaps since the men in question who was just ordering by the counter turned around and looked you dead in the eyes. His neutral expression changing to surprised before it transformed to smirk. You cursed yourself and Mark and bowed your head slightly and awkwardly before you turned around to face your now laughing friend.
"You should see your face."
"Shut up. I hate you."
"You love me."
"What a surprise." Third voice spoke up by your side and you cringed a little before you put on your cold mask on.
"A surprise indeed." You said, your neighbour moved his eyes from your face to the screen of your phone carefully placed against the glass. Mark was still there, still half naked and smirking at you.
"Am I interrupting something?"
"Yes."
"No." you and Mark said at the same time and you send him death glare regretting that you couldn't kick him right now. "I was about to go to sleep anyway. Love you."
He disappeared without waiting for your response. You let out soft sigh and reach out for phone.
"Do you mind if I join you?" The man was already sitting next to you. He was smiling at you and perhaps any other person would say it was a warm type of smile but you felt like he was mocking you. Constantly. You straightened up in your seat and eyed him closely. He was wearing the same tight cardigan, it was accentuating his broad frame and muscles hidden underneath soft, brown cashmere and simple but well fitted blue jeans. You had to admit he was handsome and had somehow angelic face which only made you cringe once you compared it to his personality or at least to what he showed you already. "I don't think that's a good idea." You said after a pause, his expression didn't change for a second, and he sipped on coffee that blushing waitress brought a few seconds ago. "How so?" His voice was sweet and melodic, it irritated you even more. "I am a celebrity, there might be an article about me having coffee with you tomorrow." You kept your tone intentionally bored as you played with the spoon. He laughed and you changed your mind his speaking voice couldn't be called melodic when his laughter sounded so beautifully.
"That's funny. I'm celebrity as well I think I'll survive." It wasn't surprising at all, he was too good-looking to not be an idol, a model or an actor perhaps. You held back another sigh. You could already see the headlines "Y/N attacks again will this man keep up with her appetite" or perhaps "One day in Korea, and she already dates — check out Y/N and her new boy toy". "Yeah I doubt it." you said but quickly added. "Weren't you supposed to renovate your apartment anyway?" "I left it to Mr Ahn it got too loud for me to read in peace."
"I can imagine." Sarcasm was basically dripping from your tongue which only seemed to amuse him even more. His eyes were now twinkling and you thought that he must be a devil in disguise. "I must say it's very lucky that I met you here. What are the odds, right?" "Ah I wouldn't call it lucky, that's for sure." You were currently planning how to escape from this conversation. "So how about we get to know each other a bit better?" He proposed with a warm smile. "I don't think so. I don't even know you." "Oh. That's harsh you do know me. I'm your neighbour and this is our third meeting." He placed a hand over his heart and frowned in pain and you wondered how can one still look handsome while frowning before he continued. "Besides I can fix that. I'm Park Jinyoung nice to meet you. See now we know each other." You fought and urge to roll your eyes and you summoned the most polite looking smile you had in your arsenal. Your phone rang before you could say anything and you've never been more happy to see your manager's face appearing on your screen.
"I'm sorry I have to take it." you said politely, and he just nodded. "Oh I wasn't expecting you to pick up." "Ah manager-nim don't be like that I haven't been picking up only for one day." "Why are you so polite are you with someone?" "Yes." You glared at Jinyoung, he was watching you with a smile with coffee in his hand. "Ok, I can call later." "No!" you almost screamed and cleared your throat trying to remain composure. "No, it's fine." "O-ok. Do you have time today? We should meet and talk I just got something that may interest you. It's really nice drama. I know you said you don't want to play in any of those romantic stories but hear me out this one is..." you'd roll your eyes if not for your neighbour's curious eyes. "Of course when and where will we meet?" You decided to cut off his rumbling. "Really? Before departure, you said you won't play in any stupid drama again." "Ah, I see. I did say that. We should meet today, text me the address then." Hanging up on him, you hoped he got the brains to follow up with text. He thankfully did and your phone barked. Jinyoung laughed again and you gave him confused look. "Did your phone just bark at you?" You blushed against yourself. Was it so weird to have a dog's bark as your message sound? "Ah... yes. I like dogs." You cringed on yourself. Somehow today in front of this man you were constantly losing your cool. He either irritated you or made you flustered enough to forget any eloquent comebacks or eloquence at all. "Anyway it was nice meeting you Jinyoung-ssi but I have to meet up with my manager."
"Oh you're leaving without even properly introducing yourself?" He cocked a brow on you and smirked. You stood up and looked at him coldly. "I'm sorry I don't feel the need." You were about to leave before he spoke again. "Ah… running already... startled... like a true bunny. Come to think of it... it does have a nice ring into it, doesn't it? Bunny. It suits you and you even have a costume already." His voice was so extremely mocking that you felt the irritation buzzing in you like electricity. Not to mention he spoke so loudly the waitress that was blushing at him before now listened carefully. You groaned internally. What if she writes about it somewhere. Media won't let you live especially that he is your neighbour they'd say he is already in love with you. And "bunny" was such a couple pet name. You were in the midst of your internal crisis before he decided to speak again.
"Have nice day bun.." You reacted before you thought, your hand slapped against his mouth before he could say anything more. His eyes got bigger, he was clearly shocked that you were so close to him, that you touched him and that you didn't really care about your language. You on the other had were fuming. You've met your fair share of fuckboys, assholes and idiots but not one of them that had similar status to yours acted with such insolence in public where other people could see you. Well, almost none, perhaps your ex was the only one. You kept your voice quiet, loud enough only for him to hear.
"Shut up. And watch your tongue before I pull it out because the universe be my witness I will and I'll do it with pleasure. My name is not kitten, bunny or any other pet name your buffoon head comes up with. It's Y/N. My name is bloody Y/N." You hissed out and his hand reach out to yours. It was hot from coffee and soft even though his grasp was firm. He took your hand of his mouth and smiled.
"Nice to meet you."
You took a step back and send him the look that must have looked like you were trying to shoot daggers at him.
"I'm sure it is. Now if you excuse me. I don't want to be late."
You rushed to counter to pay only to find out it was already taken care of by Jinyoung. You furrowed your brows and wanted to give him his money back instantly but your phone buzzed and it was your cue to leave. The driver was here.
To Mark 🐰 💙 : One day Tuan... you'll pay for this betrayal
From Mark 🐰 💙 : ILY 2 good night. P.S. He seemed hot 👀
You rolled your eyes how hot was he didn't matter if his sole personality drove you crazy only after three brief meetings. You sighed. This was not how you wanted to spend this day: enraged twice and on your way to see your manager.
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vxlkyrie · 4 years
Text
through my lens
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pairing: spencer reid x reader
genre: fluff (god so much fluff), friends to lovers!au
warning: mentions of alcohol, cursing
word count: 4.8k
summary: spencer comes up with the best birthday gift a girl could ask for – along with the best confession
a/n: hey y’all, it’s been a hot minute. i apologize for going m.i.a. for a bit and only reblogging fics and gifsets. i’ve been trying to give myself a little break from writing after finishing my classes for the semester, and then i found myself having writer’s block. but now i’ve found the motivation to write again! i’ve gotten into criminal minds during this quarantine, and became whipped for reid. so why not start writing for him? hopefully i can write more for him. and with that said, i hope you guys enjoy this fluff-filled oneshot!
everyone in the bau had their hobbies. spencer loves to read, penelope knits, hotch golfs on weekends – just to name a few. 
when you weren’t creating profiles and catching unsubs, you were roaming around d.c. taking photos of literally everything. a rose bush, your lunch at the cafe down the street from your apartment, the beautiful cotton candy sunset. you were seen always taking a picture, whether it was with a dslr, a polaroid, or simply your phone. you also took pictures of the bau team whenever you all decide to hang out. 
a night at the club? pictures of emily, jj, and penelope drunk off their asses while grinding on each other. 
dinner after successfully closing a case? pictures of derek and spencer having a mini food fight and hotch trying to stop them. 
christmas sleepover at rossi’s mansion? pictures of rossi cooking and the ladies making cookies. 
jj’s wedding? pictures of the blushing bride and groom and everyone slow dancing with each other (until derek pulled your camera out of your hand and forced you to dance with everyone). 
let’s just say you have a wall filled with polaroids of your second family.
photography has been a passion of yours for the longest time. although, when you first started in the bau, you felt like a burden you stated taking pictures of the team in their happiest moments. but over the years, everyone assured you that it was fine and even encouraged you to continue, which made your heart flutter. 
but what made your heart flutter even more is when a certain doctor asks you for tips on how to get into photography.
“hey y/n!” a male voice greeted you while you were working on paperwork. you snapped your head up to see spencer giving you a small smile as he leaned on your desk.
you became close with the doctor shortly after you joined the unit. probably because you two were around the same age, but also probably because of the similar interests you two had. 
he would come over to your apartment frequently for movie nights and whenever he just wanted to unwind after a case and didn’t feel like going back to his place. 
the first time he slept over, you had to apologize for the lack of literature books on your shelves that were filled with scrapbooks instead. he told you it was no problem and found himself getting lost in one of your scrapbooks.
“no way! is that y/n in high school?” he practically squealed.
“what?!” your eyes widened as you ran towards spencer and attempted to get the embarrassing scrapbook out of his hand, only for him to lift it high into the air and out of your reach.
“why didn’t you tell me you wore glasses? you looked so cute!” he laughed as he looked up at the scrapbook that he held above his head.
“i looked horrible! give it back!” you whined.
“only if you can reach it.” he smirked.
“fuck you. you just had to be 6′1.” you pouted as the doctor continued to go through the rest of your scrapbooks (he especially enjoyed going through the scrapbook that was filled with pictures of the team).
and even though you complained the entire time he went through your collection, you couldn’t help the butterflies in your stomach as your feelings for spencer grew.
“what’s up, doc?” you beamed back.
“nothing much. i just wanted to ask you something.” he said as he fumbled with his hands.
“yeah, what is it?” you asked politely.
“i-i want to learn more about photography, and i was hoping you could help me?” he answered softly as a tint of pink spread across his cheeks
god help me, he’s so cute.
“yeah of course!” you chuckled. spencer’s eyes lit up with joy as he smiled wider. “what do you need help with?”
“well, the basics, and what kind of camera to use. although, i’ve heard digital cameras have been getting more expensive these days. maybe it’s because more people are getting into photography. i’ve seen a lot of websites that garcia showed me where people are starting photography businesses and i- i’m rambling again, aren’t i?” spencer scratched the back of his neck. 
you weren’t one to cut spencer off while he’s talking. mostly because he looked so attractive while doing it, and it still baffles you how that’s possible.
“it’s fine spence,” you softly smile at him, which caused his heart to speed up a little. “and honestly, using your phone is a great start into learning basic photography.”
“really?” he quirked an eyebrow.
“yeah, give me your phone,” you asked, holding out your hand. he pulled it out and handed it to you. “i know you’re like a technophobe, but this little guy is pretty useful, especially when it comes to photography.” you explained as you opened the camera app, showing him the different features on it. “now here’s a grid. ever heard of rule of thirds?”
spencer shooked his head, which surprised you.
“oh really? well basically...” you started to speak.
spencer started zoning out. he already knew what the rule was, but he just wanted an excuse to stare at you.
the resident genius has been in love with you ever since you joined the unit. and his feelings grew even more after finding out you both have a love for halloween and science fiction. but of course, he never acted on it. the poor boy was already shy enough, and after being rejected several times, he especially doesn’t want to ruin his friendship with you.
oh y/n, if only you knew...
“so overall, it’s a great way to line up your photos,” you finished explaining, turning your head to see spencer spacing out. “you okay spencer?” you waved a hand over his face.
“w-what? oh yeah, i’m fine. rule of thirds is my best friend when taking pictures. got it.” he blinked, making you chuckle.
“hey pretty boy, we’re being summoned by garcia.” a deep voice said as a hand slapped over spencer’s shoulder.
“hi derek!” you smiled.
“hey sugar,” he winked. “come on reid, let’s go.” derek turned to spencer. spencer nodded at the older man and started to walk.
“thanks again y/n!” he yelled over his shoulder.
“of course! if you need anything, just let me know!” you yelled back as you continued working on your paperwork.
“anything?” derek whispered, teasing spencer as they made their way to penelope’s office.
“stop. she was just teaching me some stuff about photography.”
“you are such a sucker for her. just tell her you like her already. we all know you both are in love with each other.” derek rolled his eyes.
“she’s not in love with me.”
“you have an iq of 187 and for what? you don’t have to be a genius to know that she feels the same way.” derek said as he opened the door.
-
“ah my lovelies are here!” penelope said as she hugged derek and spencer.
“what’s up baby girl?” the formal asked.
“i’ve already told emily, jj, hotch, and rossi this, but i am planning a surprise birthday party for y/n at rossi’s place!” she clapped joyfully.
“isn’t her birthday like a month away?” spencer raised an eyebrow.
“i don’t even think she remembers that her birthday’s coming up soon.” derek added.
“which makes this even easier,” penelope smiled. “the week of her birthday, we will be going over to rossi’s house after work and we will help decorate. the night of the party, spencer, you will be driving her to rossi’s. just say that we’re all meeting up to go to a club or something.” she quickly said.
“i guess that’s possible.” the younger boy slowly nodded.
“are you sure she isn’t gonna be suspicious that reid’s willing to go to a club?” derek asked.
“hey!”
“he’s a genius, he’ll come up with some excuse,” penelope said. “okay great. let’s go team! now get out please.”
spencer slowly walked down the hall that lead back to the bullpen.
what am i gonna get her this year? i already got her the whole star wars saga collection. this gift has to be more sentimental. 
he bit his lip in deep thought.
then suddenly, a light bulb flickered on above his head.
that’s it!
-
a month passes by quickly when you're working on cases mostly every day. 
there were a few times where you would have the day off or at least the night off after a long day at work. you spent those times with the bau, whether it was having a night in with the girls, checking out the costume stores with spencer (who cares if it’s nowhere near october?), or even a spontaneous night out at the karaoke bar.
the rest of the team have managed to sneak around during the week of your birthday, gathering party decorations and gifts, making sure everything is set up correctly before the big day.
spencer worked very hard on his gift for you, adding the finishing touches as he stored it in a closet that was filled with the rest of the team’s gifts.
set up for y/n’s birthday party – check.
and in a blink of an eye, it was your birthday and the night of party. the team was flying back from a case that took several days, and you want nothing more than to knock out on your bed.
“the night is still young! let’s all go out!” emily exclaimed as you all gathered your belongings in the bullpen. derek nodded his head in agreement, catching on to emily’s little scheme.
“hell yeah, i’m in!” jj responded. “how about you, y/n?”
“i don’t know guys, i’m pretty tired.” you yawned.
“come on y/n, you have to come with us.” emily pouted.
“what’s happening?” penelope walked in.
“we’re gonna hit the clubs, you in?”
“definitely. spence, you coming?” penelope looked at him as if she had telepathically sent him a message. spencer widened his eyes.
“u-uh, yeah. i’m in.” he gave a small smile.
“look y/n, even reid’s coming! you love clubbing with us. it’s gonna be a great time!” jj said as she held your arms. you sighed.
“fine. i’ll meet you guys in like two hours, okay?”
the ladies cheered in victory.
“perfect! let’s pregame at rossi’s and then we’ll all go together.” emily said.
“great! spencer, do you mind driving me to my apartment?” you said as you turned towards him. he shook his head in response and you both headed towards the parking lot.
get y/n to come over to rossi’s – check.
-
after you got ready, spencer drove to rossi’s mansion as you sang to throwbacks.
he changed into a simple black dress shirt and jeans (and of course, his converse) while you wore a black off-the-shoulder mini dress and heels. your makeup was flawless as well as your curled hair.
spencer couldn’t help but think you looked beautiful in this moment, and can’t wait for the surprise he and the team had in store for you.
soon, you two were parked in rossi’s huge driveway.
“she’s here!” spencer texted penelope as soon as he put the car in park. he ran over to your side of the car and opened the door for you.
“what a gentleman! thank you, kind sir.” you smiled and reach out for spencer’s hand as he helped you out of your seat. you two walked to the front door to see rossi standing with a huge grin on his face.
“hey rossi!” you greeted while hugging him. he grabbed your hand and opened the door and slowly let you in, with spencer trailing not too far behind. “where is everyone?” you asked as he led you to the dark living room.
“surprise!” many voices shouted. your eyes widened as the lights turned on, only to see your closest friends and everyone from the bau and their families smiling at you. even the kids were there.
there were balloons that floated onto the ceiling. foil curtains that filled up rossi’s wall (he wasn’t a big fan of it, but he was willing to hang it up because it was all for you). tables filled with drinks, food, and gifts. and don’t forget the banner that hung across the threshold leading to the backyard that read ‘happy birthday y/n!’
you felt yourself tearing up.
“oh my god!” you patted around your eye area. “i love you all, but goddamnit you almost made me ruin my mascara!” you yelled jokingly, earning laughs from everyone (even hotch).
“happy birthday!” rossi said as he hugged you and kissed your cheeks. everyone gathered around you to hug you, take pictures with you, and say their happy birthday’s.
“happy birthday, sugar.” derek hugged you.
“i honestly forgot that it was today.” you laughed as he joined you.
even spencer gave you a bear hug and a kiss on the forehead, which made your face heat up.
“happy birthday y/n.” he smiled at you.
you were in euphoria as the party went on. you were dancing with your best friends and the bau ladies (and derek) as music blasted throughout the backyard. everyone was occupied, but they seemed to be enjoying themselves, even spencer, who was having a beer while conversing with hotch.
“so when are you gonna tell y/n you like her?” he asked spencer who was looking at you like you’re the only thing in the world. spencer turned his head towards his boss.
“soon.” he smiled, sounding very determined.
“as much as i love seeing you guys dance your asses off, it’s time for the birthday girl to blow out her candles.” rossi announced.
everyone gathered around the table as you walked towards the table, seeing a beautifully decorated cake with lit candles placed in front of you. they all sang happy birthday (with hotch recording everything), making you smile from ear to ear while trying not to tear up again. soon, you blew out your candles, followed by cheers. rossi helped cut the cake and distributed it to everyone.
“as soon as everyone gets their slice, please go to the living room so y/n can open her gifts!” he shouted. everyone obeyed and started to walked back inside. spencer’s eyes widened.
shit. 
“you okay, kid?” derek asked, approaching spencer.
“uh, yeah?” he answered, clearing his throat as an attempt to try to hide his panicked expression.
“what’s got you nervous?”
“i-i didn’t know she was gonna open her gifts in front of everyone.” spencer practically whispered.
“why? what’d you get her?” derek smirked.
“i guess you’ll see.” spencer sighed.
-
everyone sat in the living room, facing you as you opened your gifts. every time you opened one, your heart melts even more.
when you opened rossi’s gift, you thought you were gonna pass out.
“rossi, i cannot take this!” you exclaimed as you held a box that contained a new camera. “this must’ve costed you a fortune!” you tried to give rossi the box, but he simply shook his head.
“you’re like a daughter to me, y/n. of course i had to spoil my child!” he said as everyone laughed around him.
“i can assure you buying that camera certainly did not put a dent in his bank account.” emily quipped. you thanked rossi with a hug and continued to open more gifts in your seat between spencer and emily.
you were curious when you lifted a slightly heavy bag from hotch. you gasped as soon as you looked inside to see a brand new laptop sitting inside.
“hotch, you shouldn’t have!”
“i know you recently broke your laptop, so i figured why not save you the trouble of getting one. you also deserve it after being such a great addition to the team.” he said, giving you a small smile as you hugged him.
emily bought you a ton of polaroid film and sd cards, as well as a bottle of wine – the key to a girl’s heart.
“these are exactly what i needed, thank you babe.” you kissed her cheek.
jj and will bought you a vinyl player along with a few vinyls from your favorite artists. they also added a few drawings of you that henry made that had ‘auntie y/n’ written on all of them.
“i am definitely putting these on my fridge.” you said as you lightly ruffled the little guy’s hair.
derek got you a pair of headphones (from the same brand as his) so you didn’t have to borrow his during the plane ride home.
“now we can both listen to our own music with our own headphones.” he teased, hugging you as you chuckled.
penelope’s gift had you screaming. you opened the box and moved the tissue paper to see a whole lingerie set laid out. spencer’s eyes widened as derek whistled, while hotch and rossi where trying not to laugh their asses off. jj immediately placed her hands over henry’s eyes.
“how did you get my size right?!”
“i have my ways.” she winked at you.
you had one more gift to open – spencer’s gift.
“you don’t have to open mine.” spencer whispered to you. you raised an eyebrow in confusion.
“why not? i opened everyone’s.”
“it’s not as good as everyone else’s.”
“spence, it doesn’t matter how expensive a gift is. you could literally give me a fake plant and i will love it until the day that i die.” you smiled at him, causing his face to slightly heat up.
“well, prepare to be disappointed because i definitely did not get you a fake plant.” he said. you scoffed.
“come on spence, how bad could it be?” you said as you pulled out an object from the gift bag. you curiously looked at it.
is it a book?
“what is it?” you asked spencer.
“well, o-open it.” spencer shyly said.
you turn the cover to see a collage of pictures. it was a small scrapbook. you examined the pictures only to realize they were picture of you. you started blushing as you flipped through the pages and recalled where several of the pictures have been taken. you didn’t even realize spencer was taking pictures of you half of the time.
-
you were having a sleepover with the girls, drinking and crying over captain america. you heard a knock on the door.
“must be the pizza guy, i’ll get it!” you stood up. you opened the door to see spencer standing there.
“hey y/n! ready to watch the new season of doctor who?” he clenched his messenger bag in excitement as he entered your apartment, shocked to see his coworkers sitting on the couch while the tv played.
“that was tonight? oh spencer, i’m so sorry. i completely forgot.” you said, feeling guilty.
“oh, that’s fine. we can always watch doctor who another time.” he reassured.
“how about you join us spencer?” penelope chirped in.
“i don’t want to intrude on your sleepover.” spencer shook his hands in front of him.
“yeah, come join us! you’re already here, and i think you left some of your pajamas somewhere.” you raised your eyebrows at him with a pleading smile on your face.
how could he resist when you’re looking at him like that?
“fine.” he gave in as the girls cheered.
as soon as he knew it, he was listening in on the gossip as the girls did each other’s nails. you laughed as you smeared a green substance on your face.
“what’s that on your face y/n?” spencer asked, earning a few giggles from emily and jj.
“it’s a facial, spence. it’s good for your skin. you want to try it?” you asked as you held out the container towards him. he nodded. “you want me to put it on for you?” he nodded again.
spencer tried his hardest not to blush while your fingers brushed against his face. he could smell the faint scent of mint from the facial along with the lavender from your shampoo.
“okay, and we’re done. wait for half an hour and then wash it off.” you said as you both took a seat on your couch.
once you started paying attention to the movie, spencer stole glances in your direction, watching you react to the movie. he couldn’t help but pull out his phone and snapped a picture of you (thank god his phone was on silent).
he smiled to himself one more time before putting his focus back onto the movie.
-
“spencer, what are we doing here? it’s july!” you said as you two entered the costume shop.
“it’s never too early to plan your halloween costume, y/n.” he laughed as you looked at the masks that hung from the wall. he busied himself, browsing through different costumes.
should i be frankenstein? maybe i should go for steampunk this year?
“check this out spence!” your muffled voice caught his attention. he looked to see you dancing around while wearing one of the masks. 
spencer laughed at you while you continued to dance in the middle of the aisle. he took out his phone and took a photo of you, not caring that your arms turned out blurry while you were flailing your arms around.
“that was fun,” you took off the masks. “anyways, what kind of costume are you going for this year?” you asked as your ran your fingers through your hair, trying to fix it.
spencer was too busy looking at you.
“spencer?” you said with confusion. “spence?”
he slightly shook his head.
fuck, she caught me staring.
“what? oh, i don’t know yet. how about you?” he asked back.
“hmmm, i’m not sure either. i might just play it safe and be a devil or something.” you said as you tried on headbands that had plastic horns glued onto them. you looked at the section next to the devil costumes and saw a bunch of angel costumes. you took one of the halos and placed it on spencer’s head, practically jumping to get it on him. “maybe you should be an angel this year.”
“you think so? why?” he asked, suddenly feeling shy.
“well, maybe cuz you are one?” you grinned.
spencer’s heart raced for hours afterwards.
-
“happy birthday to you! happy birthday to you! happy birthday dear emily! happy birthday to you!” the whole team sang as they raised their glasses to the girl of the hour. you couldn’t help but take pictures of everyone as they downed their drinks and hugged emily.
after the team found out it was the brunette’s birthday, you all collectively decided to spend the rest of the evening renting out a room at the karaoke bar to celebrate.
“thank you guys! i fucking love all of you!” emily yelled. you could tell she was tipsy. “now someone put something on, i want to get drunk and sing until my vocal chords explode!”
“well, actually, your vocal chords-” spencer started.
“shh, not right now spence. someone give me a microphone.” emily bit back. you patted your hand on spencer’s back.
after a few rounds of singing from everyone, you decided to do a number with the rest of the girls. you were in the zone, belting out notes you never thought you could do. but with a little bit of liquid courage, you channeled your inner whitney houston as you all sang ‘i wanna dance with somebody.’
hotch was recording (as always) as rossi and derek cheered you all on.
“let’s go baby girl!”
spencer was clapping along, watching you have the time of your life. he had the biggest smile on his face as he took pictures of you singing. he knew that he had it bad for you once you started dancing. but when he didn’t see coming was when you placed your hand on his and pulled him up to his feet.
“dance with me spencer!” you giggled as you whipped your head side to side. you definitely had too much to drink.
“come on pretty boy!” derek hollered. spencer started to pick up the rhythm and moved with you and the girls. the rest of the guys soon joined in and started dancing.
at times like this, spencer is grateful that he chose not to stay in.
-
as you flipped through the rest of the pages, you felt a few tears started to form in your eyes. you skimmed through the rest of the pictures. 
some of them were pictures of you sleeping. on the jet, on the couch in your pajamas during a movie marathon, on rossi’s bed in one of the guest rooms after having one too many glasses of wine.
some of them had spencer in it. once you taught him what selfies were, he took one with you every time the team flew out of state, or even if you two were just getting coffee before work.
there were some where you weren’t even paying attention and spencer was closer to the camera and made it look like he was squeezing your small head.
and there were even a few where you had your hand close to the camera. they were pictures of you when spencer would catch you off-guard. they weren’t the best pictures, but it felt right for him to print them out.
“spence, what are you doing?” you asked as you tried to push his phone away from your face.
“i’m just taking a picture of you!” he giggled.
“why? i look ugly!” you whined.
“no you don’t!” he blurted out as you playfully shoved his phone towards him as he continued taking pictures of you.
“sometimes, i really do hate you.” you joked, ignoring the fact that he said he doesn’t think you’re ugly.
you laughed at the pictures as your heart picked up its pace. aww’s were coming from everyone, making spencer blush an even deeper pink. you got to last page of the scrapbook. instead of seeing a page full of pictures, you saw a familiar handwriting that filled the page.
is this a letter?
“what does it say?” one of your friends asked.
you looked at spencer for permission to read it out loud. he hesitantly nodded. by the looks of it, everyone already knew why he made you a scrapbook, might as well go all the way.
you took a deep breath and started reading.
for the part-time photographer, full-time badass profiler:
dear y/n,
you have been a light in everyone’s life, especially mine. you brought happiness to a team during their darkest times, and you have always been there for me during mine. 
to the girl who is always seen taking pictures of everyone around her, you deserve to be photographed. 
through your lenses, i am one of the many people that fill up your scrapbooks and walls, but through my lens, you are the most beautiful person my camera has ever captured (and even then, these pictures don’t do you justice).
you are the kindest, brightest, and most breathtaking person i’ve ever met, and i am so lucky to have fallen in love with you.
happy birthday!
love, spencer.
you didn’t even notice the small pool of tears that sat over the letter. thank god the pages were protected. even penelope, emily, and jj were crying.
“oh, spencer.” you sighed as you pulled him in for a bone-crushing hug. he immediately hugged you back, placing his face in the crook of your neck. you pulled away to look at him.
“did you like it?” he whispered as he wiped away the stray tears on your face.
you smiled at him and leaned towards him, wrapping your arms around his neck and planting a kiss on his lips. he smiled as he kissed you back. loud cheers and applauds can be heard from around the room, but the only things you can hear are yours and spencer’s beating hearts.
“my man!” derek yelled. everyone pulled out their phones to capture this sweet moment.
you both pulled away from each other, not being able to wipe the stupid smiles off your faces.
“i’m guessing you liked it.” spencer quipped, making you laugh.
“i love it. and i love you too.” you grinned. 
spencer pulled you in for another kiss, until you hear several clicks. you turned to see everyone with their phones pointed at you two. you hid your face in his neck in embarrassment, spencer laughing as he held you.
“this is definitely going in the scrapbook.” he chuckled.
232 notes · View notes
justfandomwritings · 5 years
Text
Like a Human (Erik Lensherr - Part One)
Pairing: Magneto/Erik Lensherr x Mutant!Reader
Word Count: 3.5k
Warnings: none yet.... spoilers maybe? Do you have to warn for spoilers for movies that are old? This takes place entirely inside Days of Future Past
Summary: “Our roles are nothing more than how the times choose to cast us.” -Magneto
Notes: The summary is just an epigraph of a Magneto comics quote, but it does more to explain the inspiration of this fic than a proper summary would. This one goes out to some of the 38 Magneto fic requests I got when I put up a post asking for some.
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Charles had wanted to go himself.
Charles knew the world Logan was going back to. He knew what he himself was going through, where Erik was, how Mystique thought. Had Charles gone, he needn’t worry about Logan convincing him of the future, pulling him from his despair, reuniting him with his abilities. Had Charles gone, he would have been in control of his own body. Breaking Erik out and stopping Mystique would have been far easier. 
It was with a heavy heart he admitted that Logan was best suited for the task at hand. The task before Logan was more monumental than he knew. 
The three of them, Charles, Erik, Logan, they were all very different men at the time.
There was no telling where Logan would wake up, what situation he was in, how far he would have to travel. He was no one to Charles, and Charles may as well have been no one to him. Logan would have to convince a total stranger he was time travelling to save the universe. Not to mention if the link broke too soon, they would be throwing a wild, unpredictable man into the heart of the action and could leave the situation far worse than they’d found it.
Charles was without his abilities, and he was a long way from getting them back. He was weak, depressed, and alone; even with Hank around, he was alone. He would need to be rescued from the brink in a way Charles wasn’t sure Logan would be capable of, not because Charles doubted Logan but because he doubted himself. Logan would turn up on his doorstep, and Charles wouldn’t know if he was lying or not. Charles would need to be convinced of everything, and even if Logan managed that Charles would be of almost no help whatsoever unless he stopped his treatment months before he ever had in this timeline. 
And Erik? Erik was miles away from Charles. He wasn’t just miles underground; they were miles apart emotionally. They blamed each other, hated each other. 
It had taken a miracle to get them speaking again. 
A miracle with a name.
“You’ll need help,” Charles voiced the thought before he could stop himself. “You can’t do this alone.”
Kitty sat up in her seat, back rigid as a board. “Charles,” her tone was warning again, “I can’t send you back. Even if I could send two people…”
“You won’t need to.” 
Charles wheeled his chair around to face the corner. Bedecked in all but his helmet, Magneto sat on the sill of one of the window, looking out into the blizzard without really seeing anything past the glass. “Erik,” Charles called to his friend.
Magneto didn’t turn at the name. He didn’t break the glaze that seemed to have washed over his face. Wherever he was, it wasn’t in the room. 
“June 1973.” 
The rest of the room was silent. They’d been bustling around. Iceman had been barricading the other entrances for what good it would do. Storm had been agitating the sky, bringing in mountains of snow for some kind of cover from the approaching army. Warpath sat at the doors, watching for anything that might be coming, and Kitty and Bishop had been explaining the process to an unflappable Wolverine. 
There was something about the way Charles spoke. Whenever he opened his mouth, they all stopped to listen. His words were for Magneto, but for some reason everyone felt the need to hear them.
Magneto turned his head, meeting Charles’s gaze. They sat like that for a moment, watching each other. Those who didn’t know them, would be forgiven for thinking that was all they were doing, but the subtle nods and gentle shakes of Charles’s head told the rest of the room that they were talking amongst themselves. 
Whatever they were discussing, it seemed to be frustrating the older mutant. Magneto’s face contorted in further discomfort at every hint of movement Charles made. They spoke without words, and Magneto clearly didn’t like where the conversation was heading.
Only Magneto seemed to know what Charles meant by telling Kitty, ‘You won’t need to.’ All the rest were baffled, not only at what Charles could be implying but at how Magneto had understood it instantly from nothing. 
They argued in silence, and it was unmistakably an argument. Magneto was more on edge with every moment that Charles stared. 
“She could help, Erik.” Charles pleaded quietly. “June 1973.”
There was another long pause as the men squared off, the other occupants waiting to see whose will would bend first. 
Magneto sighed and pushed to his feet. It seemed a sign of resignation. The desperation still touched his brow, but he was done debating. 
“After you find me,” Magneto addressed Wolverine, even though he still faced Charles, “Stop in London, on your way to Mystique.” 
“What’s in London?” Wolverine asked.
“A girl.” 
Not a very helpful explanation. There were many girls in London; Logan would even wager there were many mutant girls in London. “How will I find her?”
“You won’t.” Charles rolled back to Logan’s side with a sad smile. “She’ll find you.” 
“Why does he need her?” The question came from Kitty. It was probably one Logan should have asked, but in truth it hadn’t occurred to him. 
Magneto walked over and shared a long side-eyed look with Charles, as if they hadn’t whispered in front everyone enough that night.
Charles answered, hedging on how to explain without giving Logan too much. “She may well be one of the greatest mutants to ever live. If you find her, she could save you all.”  
Magneto’s lips twitched up, only slightly, into a sneer. “She’s more than that,” he argued before turning to Logan. “She’s my wife, or at least she will be.” 
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“Are you Logan?” 
The man came running up to their group while they exited the plane. 
Logan paused on the steps as the man approached Hank at the bottom of the stairs. 
Hank glanced back up the steps towards the rest of the group, clearly pleading for help, for how to respond.
“I’m Logan,” Logan pushed by Magneto and made his way down to join the worried Hank.
“Of course you are. I should’ve known.” 
The frazzled young man, clad in a jacket that labelled him ‘landing crew’, was clearly flustered. He fumbled around, patting over his chest and down to the pockets of his jeans. 
“Here,” He tucked two fingers into his back pocket and produced a piece of paper. “She told me to give you this message.”
“She?” Logan snatched the paper from the man’s hand and unfolded it quickly.
‘It’s rude to yank things from another person’s hand, Logan. Do apologize to Tim, but make it quick. You need to meet me at the address on the back as soon as you can.” 
“How did she…” Logan froze. He read the words twice, mumbling them under his breath to make sure he got them right. “I-I’m sorry,” Logan half-heartedly said to the man, side stepping past him onto the tarmac, “but we have to go.”
“Yes, she said that too,” The younger man pointed into the distance where a black van was speeding off the road towards their chosen hangar. “That’s for you.” 
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The van pulled to a stop in front of a block apartments not far from the airport.
“Third floor,” The driver didn’t bother to turn around but instead pointed up at the building just behind his parking spot. 
“Do we even know who this woman is?” Magneto growled as he slipped out of the car.
Logan eyed the peeling yellow facade of the apartment complex. He stuffed his hands into his pockets to hide the claws that were slowly beginning to push out of his skin. “I think I have an idea,” or at least he had the start of one, and it was not at all an idea he liked.
Charles, Hank, and Magneto filed along after Logan through a heavy metal door, which the metal wielder pulled closed behind the group.
They slogged up to the third floor where Logan glanced down at the paper the airport employee had handed him. “317.” 
“This way,” Charles pointed out a sign and headed off away from the landing. 
Apartment 317 was six doors down on the left. It was the only number placard that hadn’t been defaced with some form of graffiti or stolen all together. The otherwise dingy hallway was slightly brighter in front of the door, underneath the only bulb that was actually shining as opposed to flickering out its last burst light. 
This was the sort of place Logan was used to before he met Charles Xavier. Shady tennants, dirty floors, questionable facilities. This was the sort of place most mutants were used to outside of the school. Even, apparently, the incredibly powerful ones.
Charles lifted his hand, but before he could knock a voice inside shouted, “It’s open!” He hesitated for a moment before he tested the knob.
The door swung wide on an incredibly bare apartment that looked just as old and lackluster as the hall outside, albeit far cleaner. 
There was nothing more to the room than an oversized couch shoved against the opposite side of the room and two doorways, both open, on the right-hand wall.
The old wooden floorboards squeaked in protest when the men stepped over them to enter the living room. 
“In here,” A voice called from one of the open doors.
Logan caught Charles by the shoulder as he made for the voice. “Behind me,” Logan whispered, stepping ahead of his would-be mentor.
Logan led Magneto followed by Hank and Charles into the room from which the voice had come. 
Instantly, the smell of food overwhelmed them.
The kitchen was similarly bare to the living room. A stove, an oven, a fridge, and a hodgepodge of mismatched counters took up most of the tiny room. There was only just enough space for the rickety round table and the five chairs shoved under its lip. A door against the back wall, no doubt, couldn’t be opened without entirely removing the nearest seat from the room.
In amongst the shabby appliances was the back of a young woman. She moved busily between two burners on the stove and the plates and utensils cluttering the table. As they entered, she turned and deposited a healthy portion of eggs on each of the four plates. 
Her eyes didn’t even look up at their approach. It wasn’t like she could’ve missed them. The floor groaned and creaked with every move made by any of the men, a built in alarm against intruders if there ever was one.
“That really wasn’t necessary Logan,” The woman didn’t bother to check who was in the doorway and continued cooking. “I don’t bare Charles any ill will.”
Seeing there wasn’t an immediate or hostile threat, Charles took an uncertain step around his new found bodyguard and asked, rather skeptically, “Then do you mind telling us what we’re doing here?”
“Well,” The woman picked up a pan and began dispensing bacon onto three of the plates, “You’re in London because Charlie wanted Logan to come and find me, and Erik told him where to look.” She dropped the empty pan back on the stove. “And you’re in my apartment,” speaking absently, she fiddled with the knobs to turn off the burner, “because I know none of you have eaten since you broke Erik here out of his cell.” 
The woman in question wiped her hands clean on a dish rag before finally turning to properly face the group of men for the first time.
She was pretty. Most people would even call her beautiful. Though, she was by no means otherworldly as Logan had been expecting; there was nothing about her appearance that conveyed to him that she was a mutant of any real power. 
Logan wasn’t particularly enchanted by her voice or drawn in by any of her features. Sure, she had a kind smile and an even complexion, lips colored a shade of red that could go from sophisticated to sinful in a heartbeat. But she was just a woman, a beautiful young woman, a seemingly normal one at that. She looked human.
“Telepath?” Charles asked, moving cautiously towards the nearest chair. “How else could you know where we just came from?”
The woman laughed, though it wasn’t a very hearty sound. It tinkled half-heartedly then died in the air. “If I was a telepath, I would’ve had to read your mind across the Atlantic for Tim to be waiting for your plane to land.” 
“Then what are you?” Hank asked.
He and Erik both moved to join Charles at the table. Their steps were both slow, cautious. Neither of them trusted this woman, and while Hank’s expression seemed worried and concerned, Erik’s was deadly.
“A mutant, like all of you.” She chirped. 
“And do you have a name?” Erik stood behind the seat he’d claimed. 
Something told Logan he was waiting for everyone else to sit down, waiting for everyone to be well within range of the metal knives their host had placed on the table. 
“(Y/n),” The woman slumped into the chair without a plate in front of it and motioned to the empty chair. “Do join us Logan. You’re not actually worried about me killing you. We both know poison couldn’t do the trick.”
“No,” Logan agreed, taking one deliberate step after another, “But I’m pretty sure you can.” 
A smirk tugged the edge of (Y/n)’s lip, but it was gone as quick as it appeared, and Logan took his seat. 
“Bold assumption,” She mused, “Would it settle you at all to know I have no intention of hurting any of you?” 
“No, not even if I believed you.”
“Fair enough,” She shrugged.
With the rest of the table occupied, Erik took the final chair at the woman’s side and an uncomfortable silence settled over them.
No one made a move to eat, and no one seemed to know what to say to fill the silence.
No one except (Y/n), perhaps. She lounged comfortably in her chair, pushing it up on the back two legs. There was a content grin on her face, and she was inspecting her nails with a deep interest that Logan was fairly sure was fake. Something in her expression told Logan that she was amused by all of this. A glint in her eyes as they scanned over her fingers, an arch of her brow. 
Over the years, Logan had, out of necessity, gotten good at reading people, and he didn’t need any powers to do it. She was enjoying this, he could tell. How uncomfortable she made Erik and Charles, she was revelling in it. 
“I know who you are.” Logan pressed her. They didn’t have the time for these games, or at least he didn’t think they did.
Her eyes flitted up to him quickly. “Well obviously,” she hummed, “you wouldn’t be here if they didn’t send you.” 
Logan leaned in, hovering over his plate on the table, as if getting closer would help get his point across. “I know who you are, what you did. Erik told me everything.” 
There was a loud bang as the front two legs of her chair came crashing to the floor. Even as she brought herself crashing back to earth, (Y/n)’s expression didn’t change. Her features froze as they were before. The life didn’t leave her eyes, but it seemed, for a moment, to pause its merriment. 
“Then he really must be in dire straits.” Her tone had cooled off, slipped into an emotionless droan of words. 
“Would you mind,” Charles cut in, “explaining it to the rest of us?”
(Y/n) trailed her eyes over Charles, “It’s sad you have to ask.” (Y/n) let her sentence hang in the air with genuine grief before she pushed to her feet.
Charles, likewise, looked down, pained.  
“Eat while I talk. This will take some time, and we don’t want to waste a moment.”
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(Y/n) returned to the table with a paper and pen and set it out before the men who were hesitantly chewing down breakfast. 
“So,” She drew two parallel lines coming up from the bottom of the paper, “Think of time as a road, and we, the universe, are a car.” A boxlike shape joined her sketch between the lines. “The road is one way, and while we’re on it, we have to be moving forward.”
As she talked, (Y/n) began to add roads, branches coming off every inch on both sides of her original path. “Everyone, young and old, is inside the car and has a hand on the wheel.” Some took steep angles away from her first road; others ran virtually parallel to it; others still branched off from the branches she was adding. She was, slowly but surely, making a web of lines across the page. “And every time any of us make a decision, we turn the wheel.” 
She traced an arrow from the car up one of the roads running parallel to it. “Most decisions have little effect on the world beyond the person who’s made them. We’re so close to where we were before that when we look out the window the scenery and direction haven’t changed, and none of us can tell the difference.”
(Y/n) continued  arrow, this time following a branch off the parallel that took a far steeper angle. “Other decisions, turns of the wheel, change the world so emphatically that everyone feels the effects, and our course is forever altered.”
(Y/n) went back to doodling in lines, slowly filling up the bottom of the page as she carried on. “Every turn off the first road is a decision someone made, and every decision someone makes results in a turn. The only question is how drastically it removes us from where we began.”
Ceasing her doodles for a moment, (Y/n) drew their attention by circling three times around a section of road she had just added, two parallel roads in the bottom corner, both taking a sharp curve away and off the edge of the page. 
“There are, however, some things that are beyond decision. Bends in the road, as it were. Things that, by virtue of being on the road we are on, will happen; things no one decided and no decision can avoid. Call it karma or fate, whatever suits you, but they’re there. Some of them are small, only happening on a few paths we create. Others are so colossal,” (Y/n) vigorously shaded in a strip of paper an inch above the end of her highest road, “that by virtue of moving forward in time, we will encounter them, and they will happen. The difference between a bend around a hill, only taken by roads that come at it from a certain angle, or the inevitable need of a bridge crossing over a river.” 
(Y/n) drew in a road, a bridge presumably, going over the shaded strip and continuing up to the end of the page. 
Her pen ran off the top of the page, and with it she went silent, and a long moment passed as she stared at it, unseeing.
She hadn’t looked up or ceased once during her entire explanation, not as they ate, not even when Hank let out an audible huff.
“This is an interesting theory of time, but what does it have to do with why the future sent us here?” Hank pressed. There was a subtle inflection to the way he said the word theory. He was far too kind to call anyone wrong to their face, but Hank was a scientist in heart and in mind. He didn’t generally stand for rambling misinformation. 
(Y/n) returned his expectant look with an equally expectant smile, as if she’d already known the answer to his question before he even thought to ask it. “Darling, I’m the map.”
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Next Time on Part Two…. Coming Soon
Taglist
Forever Taglist:
@maybe-a-fangurl / @libbymouse /  @geeksareunique / @deathbyarabbit​ / @spilltheearlgrey / @ryanbarnesrogers / @bloodorangemoonlight​
Marvel Taglist:
@the-high-queen / @iamverity / @darktownairspeed / @radicalstars​ / @hermione-is-my-queen 
638 notes · View notes
anika-ann · 4 years
Text
WINSoD - Pt.4
What You Need (Is What I’m About)
Type: series, soulmate AU series  (part 1, part 2, part 3)  
Pairing: Steve Rogers x reader, one more ;)  Word count: 3400
Summary: In which fate has a strange sense of humour, the Maximoffs appear and... well. 
Warnings: brief violence, mention of death, messing around in one’s brain, language, cutesy and fluff (yep, it’s all there)
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Part 3
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You watched the kettle quiver as the temperature of the water climbed towards the boiling point. You’d like to say your blood was reaching it too, but despite the warm hoodie (Steve’s, naturally), you were feeling coldness seeping into your very core.
You hated waiting for him. You had never been a fan of it, sitting on your ass and stressing until he returned from a mission, bruised and usually bloody, but this time it was something else. This time, you had more than just a vague idea of what he was fighting; you had witnessed it first-hand. An army of fucking robots.
The team had left 43 hours ago, but who the hell was counting, right? Certainly not you. And you had certainly not been feeling the urge to ask Jarvis (R.I.P., my beloved A.I.) like every half an hour for any updates. You weren’t that desperate. You weren’t that scared-
Yeah, not even you were having your bullshit anymore.
You were shivering in cold from losing sleep, terrified and over all out of your mind. Nothing helped to ease your worries. Definitely not the fact they hadn’t made any contact ever since they had left.
They consisted of the usual Avengers team; Nat, Clint, Tony, Bruce and Thor, plus Bucky. All of them under Steve’s attentive command.
Surprisingly, Matt Murdock – also known as a freaking vigilante (a blind lawyer!!) – did not join the quest. He had said that robots were way outside his territory. You would beg to differ, because he punched the robot like a champ, yet you didn’t quite blame him for refusing. Bottomline, you still thought he was pretty swell (not to mention easy on the eyes, but that was beside the point). He had saved your life though, so you might be a bit biased. A lot biased.
Sam Wilson might have fought once too, but he would sit this one out as well. It was not helping your anxiety.
The soft click of the kettle brought you back to reality and you grabbed the handle to pour water into your mug, only to see you failed to actually put a teabag in it.
To be fair, you would have sworn you had done it, but that was just another prove of you losing your mind. At this rate you were about to burn the kitchen down – not that you felt like cooking… or eating for that matter. Steve was out there, in his own sci-fi movie that had somehow become reality and-
You sighed and set the kettle down, reaching for the box with chamomile tea. Taking one bag, you felt a strange gust of wind and curled into the hoodie as a shiver ran down your spine. Was the air-conditioning misbehaving…? Perhaps it was an aftermath of what they called the Ultron mess-
You shook your head, scolding yourself for getting paranoid and went to finally finish the simplest task of making yourself tea.
Only for your blood turning to ice when you noticed the teabag was missing. You had just put it there half a minute ago, you were sure of it. Your heart started hammering in your chest as you spun on your heels, your eyes scanning the room.
The cupboard behind your head clacked and your head swiftly snapped back to it. Feeling your own pulse pounding in your temples, you forced your brain to come up with a rational explanation.
You were losing your mind, you were imagining things, you hadn’t slept in almost two days, your mind was playing tricks on you-
Another gust of wind and the kettle disappeared from your hands, a shriek escaping your lips. On instinct, you opened the drawer and pulled out a knife. You were probably useless with it, basically offering it the potential attacker as a weapon, because they would be able to disarm you and use it to their advantage, but you didn’t give a shit. You felt better being armed.
What the fuck was happening?!
A man suddenly appeared by your left hip, like a hurricane inside of the room, and your body acted on its own, driving the knife in his side.
Or you attempted to; the knife met something solid that could not have been a body and the blond – he was a blond man, younger, hell, looking younger than you, dressed in a jumpsuit – stared at you with his mouth hanging open.
It was only then when you registered a strange red matter--- no, something unsubstantial, like an energy, swirling and changing, hovering around the blade that had stopped an inch from the man’s torso.
“Taka se ubivate, kolibri,” a female voice sounded from the other side of the room, nearly sending you into a cardiac arrest.
Yet, you couldn’t tear you gaze away from the strange man, whose face was now twisted in annoyed grimace as the woman seemed to be scolding him.
What kind of a language was that anyway?
Really not relevant.
There were two strangers in the Tower, in the very same room as you, they could be talking about how to kill you the most painful way and you wouldn’t even know, and for fuck’s sake, why couldn’t you catch a break-
“Ne ti e zabavno, foĭerverk,” he hummed back, his lips spreading in a smile, baffling you to no end. “Zdraveĭ, krasavitse.”
Your hand still on the handle of the knife that was no longer under your control, of which you refused to let go though because you were not a complete idiot, you had no idea what to do.
The man sounded almost friendly, but then again, villains often did. Sleazy. You would know.
A tremble ran through your body and out of nowhere, you made a lightning-fast decision of kicking the man in the crotch.
Your knee only brushed his manhood when your leg was no longer yours. With horror filling every cell in your body, you realized it was caught in the freaky red spiderweb of energy and you couldn’t move it no matter how much you tried.
Tears filled your eyes and suddenly you were free, the man several feet from you. A gorgeous young woman, dressed even more strangely than him – crimson leather jacket, black and half-torn leather leggings with high boots with way too many straps, her outfit completed by sleeves peeking from under her jacket –, stood next to him, cuffing him in the back of his head.
“Idiot!” she hissed and in the back of your mind, the one tiny corner that was not occupied with the fact you might die in the next second, you thanked god for some words being international.
Then, the girl with long wild red hair smiled at you apologetically, her eyes twinkling with excitement.
“Hello. Sorry for startling you,” she spoke with thick accent which you identified as Eastern-European and shot her companion a murderous look. “My brother is an ass and doesn’t know the difference between being funny and scaring people.”
She didn’t sound menacing at all; in fact, you saw every responsible older sibling annoyed at their younger family member in her. You blinked away the sting in your eyes and attempted to focus despite the ringing in your ears.
“Huh?” slipped from your lips intelligently, utter confusion gradually replacing your despair.
The blond rolled his eyes, which only earned him another clip round his ear.
“See what you’ve done? This is all your fault!”
“I was just messing around!”
“Do you have any idea what she’s been through? You scared her to death!” the woman hissed, effectively sending you back to the spiral of dismay, your slowly calming heartbeat skyrocketing again.
What did she know about what you had been through?!
With your knees wobbly and not to be trusted to keep you upright on their own anymore, you gripped the counter behind you with such force your muscles cramped.
“Who- who are you?” you breathed out shakily, catching the attention of the supposed sibling duo once more.
The woman smiled warmly, patronizingly almost.
“My name is Wanda and this is my brother, Pietro. We are of Sokovia. Your Captain and the other Avengers found us, showing us that we were fighting on the wrong side of things. Would you like to see?”
Her words echoed in your suddenly dull skull, the meaning escaping you.
And because her last sentence was what made sense the most and yet the least, you nodded.
Later, you would realize just how stupid and trusting you had been when agreeing, mostly because Steve gave you his look of disappointment and horror, but at the moment, it seemed right.
Somehow, on a level you couldn’t quite comprehend, you already understood they weren’t a threat to you.
“See how?”
Wanda smiled.
*Like this,* a ghost of her voice sounded somewhere deep in your mind, making you dizzy. What the hell-? *Please, don’t judge me. I thought I was doing the right thing.*
Before you could question such statement or the fact her lips were not moving while you heard her voice crystal clear, you were thrown into a vortex.
༻༺༻༺༻ღ༺༻༺༻༺
Ultron had been sure they were coming; he left a bait for them, an easy track to follow. The track they could follow towards their end.
Wanda wasn’t one to enjoy killing or hurting people in general, no. She hadn’t even considered herself a strong person once, but that had all changed with their parent’s deaths. She had had to rely on herself – on herself and on her brother. Where an opportunity had risen, to step up their game and possibly to get revenge on the name still haunting them in their worst nightmares, they hadn’t even hesitated.
Wanda had once been a weakling. It had been the tempering in fire, in a burning pain of experimentation with the sceptre that had made her the woman who she was now.
And she had a mission; she and Pietro had a mission, their chance at revenge finally gaining a shape.
She had already played with Stark’s mind, with the scum only interested in money and destruction; now she could do the same to all of them.
Bursting in with a crash, they clearly hadn’t expected such livid counterattack. A response so… nightmare-like.
Just a flick of wrist and a little concentration on Wanda’s part and they were dropping like dead, trapped in their own minds.
Black Widow, locked in a scary base, ballet dancers, martial art training and merciless killing, her fresh fears creating a horror picture of aiming her gun at her current lover’s head, at her soulmate.
“I should have known you’d never change. You’re nothing but human reduced to a murder machine…”
Thor, oh so mighty God, travelling back to his home planet to a feast, legends messing with his headspace, confusion and helplessness, thunder and lightning all around and out of his control.
“You’ll kill us all! See, son of Odin, close your eyes and see!”
The righteous captain, trapped in his own mind, folded like a house of cards under his soulmate’s dead eyes, anger and accusation blossoming into hate and finally indifference.
“You cared about your 40’s sweetheart more, anyway, didn’t you? If it was her in my place, you would have chosen her before the thousands. You wouldn’t let her blow up… but if I’m nothing to you, then you are nothing to me…”
Satisfied with her work, with only a nudge to their consciousness and their own brains doing the work for her, Wanda smirked as she noticed the busy archer. Now what tricks his could mind come up with? What hardship would he get caught in?
As she slowly sneaked behind his back, a voice snarled behind her, causing her heart to stop from more than a simple fright.
“Kak mozhe neshto tolkova malko da prichini tolkova nepriyatnosti?”
Her first reaction to her blood crystallizing in her veins with horror and rage towards the whole fucking universe, was a snarky reply.
How dared he to call her small? Implying she was weak? Underestimating her and saying that she couldn’t cause any real trouble? Oh, she would show him… that arrogant bastard! She would show him trouble-
“Laĭna…ti mi narichash nepriyatnosti?” she hissed back, carelessly losing the sight of the archer, not interested in him in the slightest all of sudden. “Vie ste strana s greshni khora!”
This stranger, this—this man-machine radiating pain as her powers barely brushed the surface of his mind on instinct… he was the real trouble as she didn’t hesitate to tell him. He was on the wrong side of things! Fraternizing with a mass murderer, with her parent’s killer-
“Pone te sa kho—” he wanted to argue, but they his mind stopped before it started screaming, punching her telepathic powers she seemed suddenly unable to turn off.
Memories, a dozen of his own memories, the way he looked at his soulmark in a mirror, the pain, the sorrow, the torture… his encounter with the Avengers, living with them; with the band of heroes she just put down, one by one, teasing and laughter, compassion and acceptance, even from the man who was supposed to be nothing but a cocky heartless bastard-
“What the hell did you just say?” Bucky rasped, astonished and horrified.
He realized it too then. Everyone always did, didn’t they? Because every person with a soulmark awaited a moment like this; the moment someone would finally say the words matching the ones on their skin, met their expectations or not…
But Bucky Burnes was the farthest from Wanda’s dream when it came to a life-long partner.
Strength is tempered in fire, she remembered reading once. She had once found a special irony in the fact that the treatment by the sceptre felt exactly like that. Wanda’s soul turned to steel with the games the fate had played with her.
So why did her hands fell from their defensive position to her side, limp and drained of all strength and determination they had known, tears stinging her eyes.
Her life was shit and she thought she had made her peace with that. But judging by the deep ache in her chest, she had been holding out for her soulmate more than she had thought. Because why else would it hurt so bad when she found out he was an enemy?
“And I thought Romeo and Juliet was just a lot of crap,” she chuckled bitterly, switching to English when he did.
His thoughts scream at her, disbelief, caution, pain, confusion, regret and hope— ambivalence. He had no idea what to do and he hated her for what she had done to his friends, but the knowledge of her being his, supposedly, it torn him in half, reaching out with willingness to forgive her if she fixed it, because if anyone understood fighting at the wrong side it was him--
Unable to resist, she dug deeper into his mind, baring his very soul, fascinated.
Pietro was still fighting with the archer and Stark, dodging the lame attempts at attack of the Avengers lost in their minds, but for two people, the time stopped.
They stood against each other, staring and motionless, and Wanda was confident she saw more than him. His mind was a tangled mess of emotions and desperate desire to get a hold of them and think rationally, bundle of memories and hopes colliding with reality and rock-solid facts and Wanda felt a pang at her heart, a crushing sensation in her chest when she finally embraced everything his headspace had to offer, getting lost in it.
Lost in him.
James Buchannan Barnes had a beautiful soul. Torn and glued together with little kind gestures from his friends, sweet memories of his sister and everlasting friendship with Steve, his no-longer-little-but-equally-stubborn Steve, Steve’s soulmate, his teammates that accepted Bucky with surprising ease and less judgement anyone would deserve… and the careful way he was giving away the pieces of the very same heart that was barely together, in gentle smiles and good-natured teasing, silent self-declaration of giving his whole life for every single one member of his new-found family.
And Wanda understood. In a fraction of second she looked under the illusions she had helped to build in the Avengers’ minds and saw the truth.
*Pietro, spri!* she cried out straight into his mind, begging him to stop fighting. With another flick of her wrist, her enemies were free of her handiwork, shell-shocked from the experience, too lost to find their footing. “Brat, spri! Pietro… greshim. They are right.”
The battle froze as if the time did and for a second, Wanda felt like she was in her brother’s skin, moving so fast that the world around her stopped turning. The stunned silence was only broken by a soft gush of wind when Pietro appeared by her side.
The Avengers seemed so baffled at her admission they didn’t try to attack them.
She exchanged a look with her twin, hoping her face spoke volumes as tears gathered in her eyes. She was far from convinced that Anthony Stark was a good man; but she knew he was better than the creature they had sworn to assist. And her mother always used to say that a man should be judged by the company he kept. From what she had seen in Bucky Barnes’ head, Stark had one bunch of fine people around; and their imperfections seemed to be balanced by the good they all wished to do.
Pietro understood. Of course he would. More than he could read her expression, he must have felt the change in Wanda’s aura, the transformation touching their bond as well.
He graced her with a reluctant nod of agreement. Via their mental connection, he whispered he trusted her. Her lips curled up in a tender smile.
“Are we just gonna stand here? Are we fighting together or against each other or what?!”
No, Tony Stark was by no means a man she would call good. In fact, she already found out he was an ass. But now, he had become her ally.
From all the eyes on their duo, she chose to meet her soulmate’s.
“Together, Anthony. Because there’s bigger malice in this world than you are.”
༻༺༻༺༻ღ༺༻༺༻༺
Wanda nearly cut you off right then. The rest of what she showed was a blur of images, fear, pain and determination, destruction and cooperation, all of that leading to this very moment. It all resembled waking up from a very intense confusing dream, being pulled away into consciousness by the first sunrays of the dawn.
You blinked heavily as the world swayed off its place, the counter seemingly in a peculiar angle from your point of view.
Why was the lamp not up, but on the side? Why was it spinning?
“Oops. Sorry. Never made the connection for such a long period of time-“ a voice reached you, breaking through the hush of blood and your own heartbeat in your ears.
You squeezed your eyes shut, trying to get a fucking grip on both your body and thoughts.
Bucky had a soulmate?
No, not relevant, the images were too unclear for you to be sure everyone made it out alright, you needed to see Steve first, you had to-
By the time Steve’s figure appeared in your field of vision, you were certain you were steady on your feet and finally managed to control your mouth.
“Steve!” you cried out excitedly as you sprang his direction, relief mixing with delight, because he was alive, he was not bleeding visibly, he-
-was suddenly graced with an identical twin, two loving tired smiles blending into one and splitting into two the next moment, swimming in your vision and you felt something solid grabbing your body and positioning it right into his strong arms.
You gazed at him in haze, melting into his warm and firm embrace, spotting a swirl of red energy flow around you.
Oh. Wanda’s work, no doubt. Sweet.
“Are you okay, doll? Are you sick? What happened?”
Wanda’s guilt was nearly solid in your reach, but you only let your head lull onto Steve’s shoulder, plunging into the fluff of love that his presence provided.
“Nah. I’m fine… just drunk on you…” you mumbled.
The girl’s bubbly relieved laughter rang in the room, bringing a satisfied smile on your face.
Steve’s kiss landed on your forehead, corners of his own lips upright despite the concern in his voice.
“Alright, sweetheart. Let’s just get you to bed…”
༻༺༻༺༻ღ༺༻༺༻༺
Part 5
༻༺༻༺༻ღ༺༻༺༻༺
Thank you for reading!
I chose Bulgarian, just to avoid traditional Russian this once. Bucky is a Winter Soldier after all and he should know how to speak 30 languages or so :D just thought this would work. Google translator used; apologize for any mistakes.
I hope you had an okay start to 2021 :-*
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lonelyandlovelorn · 4 years
Text
Meddling
A/N: I’m back with some Wanda because I really love her. 
Genre: fluff, stupidity
Warning: maybe a little swearing?
Word count: 1700
Pairing: Wanda Maximoff x fem reader
Summary: You’re pining and Nat and Clint decide to meddle. 
Masterlist
You zone out again. You’re looking at her again. You snap out of it before anyone notices, you hope. 
This keeps happening. You get bored in a meeting or you lose focus while reading, and every time you come back to reality, your eyes are on her. You don’t think anyone has noticed yet, because no one would miss the opportunity to tease you. But maybe no one thinks anything of it; heteronormativity is a hell of a drug, after all.
You’re pretty sure you’ve managed this whole time without anyone noticing the way your eyes linger on her, and then Clint pulls you aside one night after dinner.
“So, Wanda, huh?” You want to be shocked that he begins the conversation completely tactlessly, but you’re too busy drawing on any and all of your training to avoid the conversation.
“I don’t know what you mean,” you respond, face blank. Unfortunately for you, his training was longer and better than yours.
“C’mon, kiddo. Everyone else might be blind, including her, but you stare at her constantly.” Knowing you don’t have a shot in hell at deceiving him, your shoulders deflate and warmth rises in your face. “If it’s any consolation, I think you’ve got a shot.”
You raise a skeptical eyebrow at him. “What makes you say that?”
“Just a hunch,” he says, smirking and walking away. You’re confused and baffled that he doesn’t press you further or even make an attempt to mock you. It almost makes it worse somehow.
--
Clint doesn’t bring it up again anytime soon, and the rest of the team still seem none the wiser. Of course a spy can keep a secret, but you also know the man to be less mature than an eleven year-old. The fact that he noticed though has you nervous, catching yourself before you can stare too long or sometimes even leaving the room she’s in when you feel spacey. 
The issue is mostly that you’re the two youngest, besides Peter, so you tend to stick together. You have movie nights in your room, you go out for breakfast together sometimes, and you talk to each other all the time. And of course, none of this is the actual issue. The actual issue is that because of this, she notices when things change. She shows up at your door for movie night, dressed in pajamas and looking ready to relax, but she looks troubled. When you ask about it, you kind of wish you hadn’t.
“It’s nothing really it’s just… I feel like you’ve been avoiding me.” The surprise must register on your face because she continues before you can respond. “I don’t know what I did, but you leave the room sometimes when I walk in, and I feel like we don’t hang out as much.” 
You feel terrible that she thinks it’s her fault somehow, but how do you tell her that it isn’t. ‘Oh yeah, don’t worry about it, I’m just worried you and everyone else will figure out that I’m practically in love with you.’ Not likely. Finally, you settle on, “You haven’t done anything, I’m sorry I made you feel that way. I’ve just been a little distracted lately.” Not a complete lie, just not really the truth.
“Are you sure? We’re okay?” She sounds so hopeful, so worried about your friendship, that it makes you feel guilty for even letting the thought pass through your mind of ruining that by searching for more. All you can do is shoot her a smile and tug her onto the bed beside you, nodding and turning to select a movie. 
-- 
You’re wandering through the halls of the compound, half the team off on mission. Unfortunately for you, Natasha is not one of those people. Unfortunate only because she nearly scares you to death as she walks up from behind and begins speaking before you even notice her presence. 
“I didn’t know you were into women.” You jump half a foot in the air and let out a shrill shriek as you spin quickly to face her. 
“What?” you ask before you even have time to process what she said to you. She just watches you as her statement sinks in. You know denial is futile, but you don’t feel like straight up agreeing with her, as you knew that she often said things just to observe a reaction. In a moment of admitted stupidity, you don’t respond to her statement at all and simply attempt to walk away.
Of course that doesn’t stop her and she grabs your arm gently to stop you from escaping. “I’m not asking you to profess your love for her, I was simply observing something interesting. Besides, did you really think Clint was the only one who figured it out?” She looks unimpressed, but you hardly notice at your attempts to hide your panic. Did everyone see it? Were they all just ignoring it to not hurt your feelings? Did it make some of them uncomfortable?
Obviously she sees what you so horribly failed to hide and you see her expression soften. She has this habit of mothering you, even if you aren’t much younger than her, but it felt nice sometimes. This is not really one of those times. “Sweetie, you’re not so obvious that the rest of the idiots in this building will notice, if that’s what you’re worried about. And if you’re worried about them not being supportive, you ought to know better than that.” You can’t help but nod at that. These people are your family, of course they would be accepting. “And if you’re worried that she’s noticed, she hasn’t. I really think you should tell her though.” Your eyes widen comically.
“Why on earth would I do that?” 
“Because you like her and you won’t know if she likes you unless you do something about it.” Her response is matter-of-fact, but that does nothing to convince you. 
“Doing something about it could ruin one of the best things in my life. I’d rather stay friends forever and stare at her from a distance than risk friendship for some feelings.” Nat doesn’t seem satisfied with your response but doesn’t push any further. 
--
Two weeks went by filled with longing gazes from you and unimpressed looks from Clint and Nat. You were resolute in your decision to do nothing about it. Besides, if it is in any way mutual, she can make a move just as well as you. 
You’ve finally stopped worrying about Clint and Nat when Nat asks you to meet her in a conference room. You have no idea what for, but figure it best not to argue with her. When you walk into the room, the only one inside is Wanda. The door closes behind you, and you hear the tell-tale click of a lock. You look to her again, only to see your own confusion mirrored in her face. After a moment of thinking you realize what Nat and Clint are doing and panic sets in. You’re almost positive that they’ve locked you in here together to force you to do something about your pining. You pull out your phone to see a message from Clint that confirms it, only to see Wanda check her phone as well. 
You let out a breath and sit down across from her at the table. She finally breaks the silence, which is uncommonly awkward. “Do you know what’s going on?”
“Sorry it’s my fault. Well, it’s not my fault, it’s theirs. But it’s because of me, I guess.” Your response does little to clear things up, as even you confuse yourself. You huff out a sigh to settle yourself before speaking again. Might as well rip it off like a bandage so at least you can both escape this room sooner rather than later. 
“I like you,” you say quickly, your eyes tightly closed and your entire body tensed. 
“You- What?” She sounds just as confused as you would be in this situation. 
“I like you, and they figured it out and locked us in here so I would tell you. And now I’ve told you so they should let us out.” You still don’t look at her as you speak. You continue to stare at the table until the silence stretches on for too long, and you have to look at her. She looks confused still, but it’s different than what you expected. 
Suddenly, a small smile appears on her face and lights up the small room, even as it has you staring in befuddlement. 
“You like me?” All you can do is give a meek nod as she lets out what sounds like a disbelieving laugh.
“I thought they locked us in here because of me...” she then softly tacks on, “for the same reason.”
Understanding dawns on your face as you join her in laughing. “So what you’re saying is that they both knew and were tired of us doing nothing.” You’re still red from embarrassment, but you can feel the lightness of knowing your feelings aren’t one-sided. It fills you like a drug and you keep looking over her smile and similar blush to reaffirm it. 
In a moment of confidence, you reach across the table for her hand. You’ve held hands with her before, but this is different and you can both feel it. You rub your thumb gently across her knuckles before speaking. “How would you feel about going out tonight instead of movie night?”
“I would love that.”
-- 
When you come back from your date that night, you walk her to her door and press a sweet goodnight kiss to her cheek before walking in the direction of your room, a stupid smile on your face. Clint intercepts you on the way, only to say, “Great job, kiddo,” with two thumbs up and a grin. You lightly swat his arm but can’t wipe the joy off your face as you walk away from him. 
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Text
Omoi yo Hitotsu ni Nare
Feelings, become One
Part 1 of 2
Writer's block is being rough on me, so the only thing I was able to create lately was a short story of my MC Clover and Leviathan. It shows their adorable friendship as they experience an idol live show together.
Enjoy 🧡
One evening, the demon of Envy, Leviathan, made his way to the human exchange students' room. The human girl Clover had borrowed a manga from him, but it happened that Levi needed that exact book right now.
As he was strolling through the hallways, finally he reached the door, so he knocked like a polite creature before coming in.
"Hey" Levi called out into the room. "I need that Ruri-chan manga back for a sec. Some idiot Normie posted stupid fake information on the fanclub's Devcord server and is not believing me when I tell him he's wrong, so I need screenshots to prove what a fake fan he is lolol."
As he had been more eyeing his D.D.D. than paying attention to his surroundings, he only noticed at the end of his comment that a pair of unpleasantly surprised eyes were staring back at him. Levi raised his eyebrows, puzzled, looking back at Clover sitting on her bed, only being illuminated by the small lamp on her bedside table.
Just so making out her reddened eyes, paired with how she was hugging her legs, the demon immediately understood that she was crying.
"C... Clover?"
"A-ah, Levia-tan..." she mumbled, quick to put away the used tissue in her hand. Sniffling shortly, she sprung up in the next moment, walking over to her desk. "I didn't get to read this chapter yet, so I'd like to have it back after you've shown that peasant what a real Ruri stan looks like..."
Handing him the manga, Clover put on a very unconvincing smile.
Unsure how to react, Levi took the book but kept giving her a worried look. "Are you... okay?"
The girl only gave a nod.
"B-because you look, uhm..." Levi could have punched himself for being so bad at social interactions. "Were you crying just now?"
A flash of panic crossed Clover's face, but in the end, she assured him she was fine.
"It's embarrassing but I was, uh, crying over a stupid video. So nothin' to worry about, really!"
Holding the door open, she kind of gestured for him to make his leave, so Levi stepped out into the corridor again.
"Now go get that loser's ass", she cheered, but as she closed the door, Levi caught a tiny glimpse of the frown that was forming on her face.
The demon had planned to go back into his room, yet somehow he found himself in the kitchen instead. Turning his head to the fridge, he spotted Beelzebub head-deep in the ingredients for tomorrow's lunch.
Levi's younger brother noticed his presence when Levi let out a troubled sigh.
"Huh? Levi?" Beel shot him a glance. "Are you hungry, too?"
"Like there would even be anything left for me to eat!" Levi hissed, mustering how Beel's cheek were filled to the brim like those of a hamster. "No, I..." He let out another sigh. "Did something happen to Clover? She seemed really down just now and behaved all weird."
In an instant, Beel stopped his scavenging and closed the fridge to turn towards his brother.
"So you think so, too..." Beel said. "I noticed it when we returned home from RAD today, so I wanted to cook something to cheer her up."
Levi let out a huff. "Doesn't look like you had success in doing that..."
However putting his sarcasm aside, he asked whether Beel knew any reason for Clover's sadness.
"I think she had some stressful days" Beel explained, scratching his head as he actually began to prepare said food. "She had a lot of projects to hand in for her additional courses lately. And it seems the grades she got weren't quite what she expected. Or what she deserved for the amount of work she put in, honestly."
Nodding to himself, Levi indeed remembered that the human girl had been working until late recently. He crossed his arms. "But their grades aren't really that important to the exchange students, right? There's no need to cry over that."
For a while, they remained silent, listening to the veggies sizzling in the frying pan.
Then, Beel spoke up again.
"You know how she is" he said. "She was very passionate about it, and now beats herself up for not doing well enough."
Frowning, Levi narrowed his gaze. "But then why didn't she tell me about it? I thought we were friends..."
Beel had returned to the fridge, originally to grab the next ingredients, but ended up stuffing half of that into his own mouth.
"I thought you of all would understand her reasoning the best" he grumbled into the fridge.
"Huh? What do you mean?"
So Beelzebub shot him another look.
"Aren't you afraid of people thinking low of you, too?"
That evening, Beelzebub continued to take care of the human girl. He had managed to cook her a delicious meal and stayed with her to watch some movies.
Levi was amazed to see how easily his brother had managed to lift her spirits. Overall, it had surprised him to hear how well Beel knew about her feelings in the first place.
But what troubled Levi the most were Beel's last words before he had knocked on Clover's door:
"She'll probably stay this sad for longer. It would be great if you could help, too."
The next day, the avatar of Envy didn't feel like gaming at all. He forced himself to do his daily log-ins to his thirty-ish online games, but his mind kept wandering off to the happenings of the last evening.
Why would anyone think low of Clover because of school grades? Why would she be that sad, even if she put a lot of work into it?
She was his confidant. His friend. That alone meant she had to be a person worthy of one's time.
So... Why would someone like her ever worry about not being good enough?
Lying in his bed/bathtub/really-unsuited-sleeping-spot, Levi bit his lip.
He understood what Beel had meant now. The more he tried to understand Clover, the more he spiralled into self-loathing, toxic thoughts that he knew all too well himself.
And just the thought that Clover might be pained by this nonsense made him so angry that he couldn't focus on anything else than searching for a way to cheer her up.
Grumbling and brainstorming, his messy thoughts suddenly saw a spark of hope when he read a notification on his D.D.D.:
'Aqours 4th LoveLive! ~ Sailing to the Sunshine ~ -- Tickets for sale NOW!!'
Eyes wide, he had this hesitation of "that's too good to be true" when his thumb lowered to press the "see more" button.
But the second after, his otaku mode activated. Baving opened his five favourite websites for booking concert tickets in an instant, Levi was determined to get two tickets for this live show...
Naturally, the period of buying tickets and the actual concert were painfully far apart.
At first, Leviathan wanted to keep it a secret that he had obtained two premium seats for the Aqours concert.
However, Clover's state seemed to worsen as time went by. New things kept piling on her head, and one disappointment set the requirements for her to fail whatever she aimed to do next. It might not seem that bad to others, but as someone who is struggling with his self-worth himself, Levi could guess that Clover's mindset had to be suffering more and more.
So one day, he decided to tell her about the tickets.
Spam-calling her until she would angrily stomp into his room, Levi was waiting for her, the tickets ready in his hands.
"Levia-tan, I'm BEGGING you, if I tell you 'I'll be there in a minute', please don't call me another fifteen times to make sure I wasn't ly-"
She went silent the second her eyes landed on the tickets.
The demon couldn't hide a cheeky grin.
"You were supposed to hurry, Normie" he mocked. "Feeling your concert tickets the second they're out of the printer is a NECESSITY!"
Clover wouldn't respond.
In all honesty, she COULDN'T respond.
Every time she opened her mouth, she was too baffled to press out a single tone.
"Here, this is yours" Levi said as he handed her one ticket. "It's still long until the day of the live show, so make sure to keep this somewhere safe! Ah, you know, actually... If you store the ticket in your room, Mammon might find it and sell it, so it might be for the best if I keep your ticket here with mine... C-Clover?!"
The girl had taken hold of the ticket, staring at it while Levi was rambling. But she had puzzled him when suddenly, tears were dropping on the piece of paper.
"I-is... Is this for real...?" Clover asked with an incredibly thin voice.
"W-wah..." Levi panicked, softly tugging the ticket out of her shaking hands. "It's all wet now... But I guess I can just print it out a second time..."
"Am I... really... going to... Japan...? To... a live show of... of A-aqours...?" Clover asked with a trembling lip.
"You bet!" Levi cheered. "I've been trying to get these tickets for HOURS! It was really tough, but you should never underestimate my Otaku skills!"
"I've... I've always dreamed of... experiencing a live show in person..." Clover continued to mumble. "And now you're being... So kind... What did I do to deserve this..."
Grabbing his phone, Levi tapped on his messenger app to show her something else.
Confused, Clover was looking at Levi's chatroom with Solomon. In his own excitement, Levi had to tell it before Clover could finish reading.
"And don't worry about the language issues. You'll be able to understand it all!" He babbled. "Solomon will do his best to mix you a potion to help with that! See it as subtitles, but send directly into your brain lolol."
The demon grinned from ear to ear,
and, well, expected that the human would do the same...
Or at least, he really didn't expect for her to suddenly burst into loud sobbing, pressing her hands against her face as she couldn't stop crying.
"O-oh..." All colour left Levi's face at once. "Are... Uhm... Are you not happy?"
Looking back and forth between her, the tickets and his phone, he was frantically trying to figure out the reason for her outburst.
His heart broke into pieces as his own toxic mind gave him an answer.
"Oh..." Levi pressed out. "I didn't ask you if you even want to go there if it's with me..." Now he felt really stupid. In all his preparation and anticipation, he forgot what a yucky creature he was. "Uh... I guess... I mean I can understand if you don't want to, it must be really embarrassing to go outside with someone like me, so, y-you can... take someone else along i-if that will make you stop crying... I was looking forward to it, but making you smile again was my utmost priority, so I would... You can... go with, like, Beel or som-"
"L-levia-tan?" Clover suddenly pressed out, not looking up though.
"Y-yes? Are you mad at m-"
"Can I hug you?"
"... Eh?"
"P-please...!" Clover's head shot upwards as she met him with a pleading, crying face. "I d-don't know how to respond to this... this wonderful gesture... I'm..." Not able to hold herself, she engulfed Levi in an embrace.
"I'm so happy..." Clover sobbed into his shoulder. "Thank you so much... Levi..."
Now Levi was the one at loss for words. With cheeks painted a bright pink, he awkwardly wrapped his arms around her body.
"S-so... You're okay with going with... with me?"
"Of course! I'm flattered that you'd even thought of inviting me..." The girl pressed out, slowly letting go of him.
And finally, a grin was spreading on her face again."Please teach me everything I need to know about lives, Levia-sensei!"
The sight was so contagious that Levi was smiling himself.
"Yes! Leave it to me!!"
For the following weeks, the two of them spent huge parts of their free time preparing for the live show.
Leviathan taught Clover all there is to know about using glowsticks: from the shaking technique that destroys your arms and wrists the least, to ultra orange glowstick usage and cycloning. They listened to Aqours' songs so much that at some point Clover remembered all their lyrics perfectly despite not even speaking the language. Additionally, they looked into older live shows to learn where the crowd would engage in which kind of chanting.
"Waah, no, I can't that part of the first live show... I'll cry, Levia-tan...!" Clover had whined.
"Ah, do you mean the performance of 'Omoi yo Hitotsu ni Nare'? Where Rikyako messed up her piano play?"
"Yes... It was so brave that she learned playing piano from scratch just for that song... But then the poor girl was so stressed, messed up and started sobbing... That part just kills me, especially when the rest who were performing the dance came to comfort her... Ugh I love them all so muuuuch..."
The house of Lamentation was glad to see the human girl had regained her joyful energy. Even if, after a few weeks, their patience was being put under the test...
To give a short input:
When greeting the audience at the beginning of the live show, each idol introduces themselves and engages in a unique call and response with the crowd to get everyone pumped.
And so one day, Levi went to Clover saying this:
"We also need to practice our responses to their character introductions! From this day onwards, I will randomly initiate one of the girls' calls, and you have to respond correctly!"
So... Yeah. The other inhabitants of the house didn't quite understand what any of those "Ganbarubyyyy"s or sudden "BUU BUU DESU-WA"s meant, but eventually, even they remembered some of the call & responses.
... Just that not everyone was so amused by the whole ordeal as Leviathan seemed to be.
Not when Clover was preparing breakfast with Satan in a great hurry (because SOMEONE ate what they had prepared earlier...).
You can imagine that, when already stressed out, Satan wasn't really happy over his older brother dashing into the room, shouting a random "KAN KAN" from the top of his lungs.
"Mikan!" Clover had correctly responded, however quiet as she was fully aware of Satan's anger level.
However, as this particular call & response repeated three times, Levi continued to animate the human girl, going once again even louder: "KAN KAN!"
"M-mikan..."
"Come on, I can't hear you... KAAAAN, KAAA-"
He couldn't finish his chanting as Satan had thrown a devil-blood orange right into his face with such force that it pulled Levi off his feet.
"HERE, HAVE YOUR FUCKING MIKAN AND LEAVE!!"
[Mikans are small, japanese oranges (´ ∀ ` *)]
Finally, the day of the concert had come.
Asmodeus had made it his mission to plan Clover's outfit so she'd be as "dazzling as the girls on stage". Levi had been prompting her to go with comfortable, practical clothes instead, so they had to find a middle where neither of them would complain.
Once all done, some of the brothers came to muster the soon leaving duo.
"Hm... Are you sure you don't want to put on any make up, darling?" Asmo asked Clover after doing his final check.
"Absolutely. I will be in tears the second Aqours' enters the stage, so there's no point in that."
Standing in the doorframe, the avatar of Greed gave a huff.
"Isn't that skirt a bit too short? And that whole outfit... No, you can't go out like this."
"Huh?" Clover turned to him in confusion. "Why not?"
"It's way too eye-catching!" He grumbled. "What if some filthy human makes a move on you?"
The girl gave a slight chuckle. "I go to school with incubi and succubi, Mammon. I think compared to that the human world should be pretty safe."
"B-but...!" Mammon wanted to protest, but Beelzebub covered his brother's mouth to silence him.
"I think you look cute" He beamed Clover an encouraging smile. "But be careful nonetheless. Levi, take care of her."
"Y-yes! I will!"
-- to be continued in part two --
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robin-the-enby · 5 years
Text
Beautiful to me
Pairing: Diaval x OC
Summary: Rhea is a daughter of a lumberjack living near the Moors, a forest which everybody fears. It is no wonder that she became Aurora's first best friend.
Warnings: body insecurities
A/N: As I've said, I've never seen the whole movie, but Diaval is such a sweetheart and...well, this happened. So I'm sorry that this maybe won't go as the movie does, for example, I couldn't find a clip on youtube about how Aurora first got to the Moors, so I changed it.
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Pictures found on Google
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Everybody feared the Moors, because they believed that a great evil lived behind the great wall of thorns.
Only one family was brave enough to live near the place. It was a lumberjack and his wife. They have never been afraid of the strange part of the forest. Everyone deemed them crazy when they answered their curious questions with: "There is no need to be afraid. If you'll respect the forest, it'll leave you alone."
When news spread that the lumberjack's wife was with a child, people were baffled to hear that they aren't moving from their cozy little cottage near the dangerous Moors.
And after nine months, a baby girl was born. Her loving parents named her Rhea. She had black hair, like her mother and beautiful green eyes like her father.
Rhea was a curious, happy go lucky child. Taught from early age to respect those around her and do no harm until she was the one harmed, she grew into a kind young girl. Her parents treated her with love and kindness and so she didn't see a reason to ever disobey them.
One day, Rhea was walking by the edge of the forest, which grounds she knew better than the back of her hand. The 'normal' part of the forest, the one where her father worked, was surrounded by meadows full of flowers and beautiful little creatures.
She listened to birds chirping and bees buzzing as she skipped along the secret path she found for herself, her little hands gently caressing flower petals of all colours.
Rhea heard a laugh. It wasn't her laugh, but it was a child's laugh. It sounded like a little girl. Rhea looked all around her, trying to see who exactly was laughing, but couldn't see anyone. That is, until the tall grass started shaking, little giggles escaping between the rustling.
Rhea kneeled on the ground and pushed the grass aside, so she could see better.
At first, she thought she's seeing things. But at a second glance she recognized the creature she mistaked for a fairy as a young girl. But what a beautiful little girl!
She was a few years younger than Rhea, but too young to be left alone. The little girl hasn't noticed her yet, so Rhea softly called out "What are you doing here little one?"
The little girl gasped and turned to face Rhea. It took little to no time for a big grin to take over her face "Pretty girl!" she squealed.
Rhea blushed. Nobody, aside from her parents, had called her pretty. She never really felt pretty and thought that her parents told her that just because they were her parents. But there was something about this girl that looked so sincere. Maybe it was how her eyes shone brightly or her big smile.
It didn't look like the girl wanted to wait for Rhea, her attention was grabbed by something else. As she waddled away, Rhea called out to her "What's your name little one?" and ran after her.
The girl stopped to examine a catterpillar crawling on a leaf and when Rhea caught up with her, she repeated her question. "Aurora." the girl said without turning her head. Rhea thought it was a really strange name.
The rest of the afternoon Rhea spent by Aurora's side. The younger girl hopped around, fascinated by every little thing. Rhea patiently walked behind her, looking after Aurora, so she wouldn't hurt herself. She wondered why was she alone? Did her parents not care for her? How could they?? She was such a sweet little thing.
"Pretty flower!" Aurora exclaimed happily, plucking the flower from the ground and twirling it between her little fingers. This caught Rhea's attention. Everything Aurora saw she called pretty. Pretty flowers, pretty bees, pretty clouds...
Rhea felt a little sad at the thought that for Aurora 'pretty' didn't mean anything special. But she quickly chased the thought away. Why should she be sad about such a trivial thing as beauty? They were in the forest, she didn't need to be beautiful! Wait, the forest..?
Without her noticing, Aurora led her straight through the forest to the thorn wall. She looked at the big branches with even bigger thorns in awe. Strangely, she didn't go to feel it with her tiny hands.
For the first time in the whole day, Aurora turned to Rhea, pointed at the barricade and said "Pretty bush!"
Rhea couldn't help but smile. Pretty really wasn't a meaningfull word for the little girl. "It sure is magical, isn't it?" Rhea came to stand by Aurora's side.
Flapping of wings and cawing could be heard and both girls turned to look at the tree where the noise was coming from. It was just a raven.
There was something strange about the way it looked at Rhea. Almost suspiciously...
"Pretty bird!" Aurora said laughing, clapping her tiny hands. Rhea smiled at the little girl. It's just a bird, there's nothing to worry about.
Rhea grabbed Aurora's hand, gaining the girl's attention. She crouched down next to her and pointed at the raven "That's a raven. You mustn't mix ravens up with crows. They may seem similar, but they are different none the less."
The bird's eyes softened and it cawed happily. It caused Aurora to laugh in a childish glee and Rhea tried to mimick him. The raven turned its head to the side a little, amused by the girl's attempts to make the younger one laugh. So it played along, Rhea and the raven cawing at each other, just so Aurora would laugh.
After that, everywhere they went, the raven was with them. And every time Aurora set her gaze on it, she immediately called out excitedly "Pretty bird!" And so, the name stuck.
The years flew by and the girls became best friends. Some would even say they were as close as sisters.
Every day they would spend the whole day together, Rhea usually teaching Aurora about nature and in return, the younger girl invented the best adventures, while Pretty bird, who Rhea always brought treats for, watched over them.
They both grew into beautiful young women. Aurora was just as lovely as she was when she was a child, if not more. She had the beauty of a fairy and the heart of a playful bunny. Rhea matured and grew into the kindest and most generous woman far and wide from the Moors.
Rhea admired Aurora's beauty, as if she couldn't see her own. And it was true. While she thought everything around her was beautiful, she 'could never compare' as she'd say.
One day, which Rhea was going to remember in great detail long after, they stayed outside longer than usual, the sky was getting dark and night was slowly falling upon the land. But they didn't care and kept on walking by the thorn wall.
"I wonder if you can get through it somehow..." Aurora wondered, gently petting the bush, careful as to not cut herself. Rhea turned to look at the wall and just silently nodded her head.
Maleficent was, like many times before, looking after Aurora. She watched the two girls chat and wondered how much the girls have grown. If she wants to see the Moors so bad...I can grant her that wish. Maleficent thought to herself and with a quiet chuckle put a spell over the two girls that put them to sleep.
She cleared out a path for herself that went through the giant thorn bush and carefully levitated both girls behind her as she entered her kingdom.
Next, she gently laid them on the ground and hid in the shadows and crooked tree branches and undone the spell. Now I just wait until they wake up...
The spell wore off pretty quickly. The first one to sit up was Aurora, while Rhea tiredly blinked her eyes. "Rhea, do you see that?" Aurora asked in disbelief, standing up. "No." Rhea croaked tiredly "What should I see?" she slowly sat up and looked around.
"We're in the Moors!" the younger girl exclaimed happily, giggling. Aurora twirled in place, taking everything in with fascination. Rhea rubbed the sleep from her eyes and joined her best friend.
Curious eyes looked at them from behind the rocks and tree leaves. Blue heads poked out from their hiding spots and tiny blue creatures slowly and cautiously floated to the two strangers. Both girls slowly extended their palms and let the fairies touch their fingers. Before they could properly introduce themselves, the fairies looked around in panic and fright and quickly scurried off to hide again.
Aurora felt presence behind them and turned to face the shadows. Nothing but a pair of yellow eyes could be seen in the darkness. "We know you're there. Don't be scared." Rhea came to stand by her side and took her hand.
"I'm not scared." it chuckled darkly. Rhea noticed its voice was smooth, cold and rich.
"Then come out." Aurora prompted the voice again.
"Then you'll be afraid." it said again. It sounded like it was making fun of them.
"No we won't." Aurora defended them bravely, her cheecks puffing out a little.
It seemed like the voice complied. The pair of glowing yellow eyes moved from the shadows. It had the moon behind its back, so only a silhouette could be seen.
Aurora gasped softly at the sight of the big horns and Rhea stepped protectively a little in front of her.
Maleficent then stepped into the light completely. Instead of screams of fear that she expected, Rhea's breath was stolen away by the fae's broken, dark beauty and Aurora just laughed.
"I know who you are." she said with a smile "You're my fairy godmother!" Rhea was used to Aurora telling her about the shadow that looks after her. But she, as beautiful as she was, didn't look like a protector. More like a predator.
"What?" Maleficent asked, clearly thrown off by this comment. "Your shadow. It's been following me everywhere I went." Aurora's smile didn't falter.
A raven landed on a branch next to its mistress. Both girls turned their heads to look at it. "I remember you." Aurora said and with Rhea they both giggled. "Pretty bird." Rhea said and the raven turned its head to the side. "This is Diaval." Maleficent said, not even looking at him, waving her hand, after the raven bowed politely to the girls.
And suddenly, their Pretty bird was now a man. A very handsome, young man, Rhea observed. His hair and eyes dark like the night around them, black tunic, that showed off his chest, as well as black trousers and black boots. On his temples, his neck and the exposed parts of his chest were scars, from what Rhea would love to know.
Diaval went to closer to Aurora "It's nice to finally meet you." and kissed her hand gently "I knew you since you were a little one." Rhea quietly snickered to herself. What a strange thing to say.
But then he turned to her and she found herself lost in his eyes. Apart from his scars his face looked really smooth. Just like his feathers looked smooth when he was a raven. "My my, what a beauty you've grown into." he said and kissed her hand too, while looking her directly in the eyes. Rhea felt like she couldn't breathe. His skin felt so smooth where he touched her but his voice was so deliciously scruffy, she couldn't wrap her head around it all. "This must be a dream." she said quietly and Diaval grinned, still not letting go of her hand, but neither of them noticed.
"I know right?" Aurora squealed excitedly. She started ranting about how beautiful the Moors were, overwhelming Maleficent so much, that she had to put her to sleep again.
When Rhea saw her floating friend, she wondered So that's how we got here, huh... "I think that is enough for today." Maleficent stated "Diaval, take Rhea home."
A small mutter of 'yes mistress' could be heard from him and as he went to lightly bow to her he realized he was still holding Rhea's hand. He immediately let go, embarassed and showed her the way.
He insisted to take her all the way to her cottage and held her hand every time there was any obstacle in the way, small and large ones. "We're in a forest. If you want to be gentlemanly like that, you can just hold my hand and not let go." Rhea giggled, but Diaval took it seriously and, deciding it would be a good idea, grabbed her hand, making her cheeks turn pink.
Days went by and they were all spent in the Moors. Aurora played with all the fairies, often including Rhea or even Diaval. Maleficent usually stood on the sidelines and watched them. Rhea noticed the fondness in the fae's eyes and sometimes she'd catch a glimpse of the tiniest smile.
If they were not playing with Aurora, Diaval and Rhea also stood on the sidelines, chatting and finding out more things about the other every day. Aurora and even Maleficent noticed how close they became.
It was a beautiful night. The stars shone brightly, the moon was big, nowhere a cloud in sight and the temperature was just right. Perfect for stargazing.
Rhea needed time to herself. Her mind felt heavy, burdened with negative thoughts and doubts.
"Why are you frowning at the stars?" a voice above her asked. Rhea smiled a faint smile "Hello Pretty bird." "Why do you keep calling me that even when you know my name?" "Because you are a pretty bird." she shrugged. "I suppose you're right." Diaval said proudly and laid next to her, their shoulders and hands touching.
He could see something was troubling her and he wanted to help. He never liked seeing her sad. It made his heart clench. When it first happened, Rhea found a dead baby bird, fallen out of the nest. He thought he was deathly ill and came to Maleficent immediately, panicked. She just stared at him and whispered something strange "You're in love."
She left abruptly, not saying anything else. He wasn't mad. After he processed the words, he realized she probably needed time to ponder if she is going to do something about it or not. He could see how conflicted her thoughts on love were as of late.
He came to terms with it a few days ago. Those days leading to this one were spent consciously pining after her.
"Just...my parents." Rhea started slowly. But he didn't mind, he would listen to her patiently for years if it meant helping her. "They told me I should start looking for a nice man, since I'm the right age for marriage right now."
He swallowed hardly. Was she in love already? What if it wasn't him? What would he do if it wasn't him? "And what seems to be the problem?" he forced out of himself, as if he didn't even want to know the answer.
"I don't know anyone!" she cried out. It wasn't entirely true though. Her heart already picked a certain raven someone, but her insecurities blinded her so much she didn't even consider him liking her back as an option.
"I'd have to go out and impress someone and...to be honest, who in the world would be impressed by me." the last word harboured so much disgust in it, it made Diaval frown deeply.
"What do you mean?" he asked, genuinely confused. Rhea sighed sadly "Look at me. Look at everything else around us. How can I compare to the beauty that is this world? How can I impress someone when I'm just...so...ugly."
Oh no. She didn't. No, no, no, no, he wasn't going to let her talk about herself that way.
Diaval gently grasped her chin and made her look at him "Listen here Rhea and listen closely. You can't compare to anything? For me It's more like nothing can compare to you, because you're the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. Prettier than any flower, star or even the moon itself. You are better than flying, everything about you is so otherworldly I can't put it into words."
His voice lowered to nearly a whisper "You don't have to impress or catch anyone's attention. You already have. I'm afraid, Rhea, that you've captured my heart. I don't know if I'll be a good enough suitor for you, but I will try my best...if you'll have me?" his eyes filled with hope met hers filled with tears.
She couldn't get the right words out, she just nodded her head and hugged him tightly.
And as they laid there in a tight embrace, under the starry night, she whispered to him "I wouldn't have anyone else."
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fanaticit · 3 years
Text
Just hold me for a while
Summary: Izuku has nightmares after being kidnapped, and Shouto comforts him.
Pairing: Todoroki Shouto/Midoriya Izuku
Genre/themes: Hurt/comfort, romance.
Possible CW’s:
Kidnapping/Trauma from Kidnapping Fainting Injections (not graphically described in any detail) Pain (not very graphic, and not because of injury or illness) Hallucinations/Visions/Nightmares Moral Dilemmas (character forced to choose who survives an encounter) Death by train (there is a brief description of blood but nothing further than that) Panic attacks/being unable to breathe/anxiety and coping
Word count: 1592
In the movies, kidnappers always used chloroform on a cloth, or put a bag over somebody's head. The victim would struggle, then dramatically pass out and go limp. They'd fall to the floor and wake up in a dark basement, tied to a chair.
It wasn't like the movies, though. Izuku had only been tapped on the shoulder. It was like fainting-- he used to be prone to fainting, and it was still a bit of a problem when altitude or temperature changed quickly.
When Izuku fainted, it wasn't like all the books. All the novels would say "And then everything went black." But fainting wasn't like that. He didn't remember the act of fainting just as nobody remembers the exact moment that they fall asleep. Izuku didn't even remember waking up, he only remembered opening his eyes.
He remembered how bright it was, but when his eyes adjusted, it was actually very dim. He was in someone's kitchen, on a stool. His shoulders were slumped over the counter. Someone had probably set him into the stool and laid him on the counter since there wasn't a backrest.
Peculiarly, he wasn't tied up. At the time he was confused about why they'd leave him free, but he learned why later. There'd been several injections in his arm while he was out. Temporary quirk canceling, and something that made his limbs pliant and tired for days, even after his rescue.
And the other injection. The one that had caused all of Izuku's nightmares recently.
The doctors were pretty sure that the injection hadn't actually caused the visions. It was probably the effect of a quirk, and it just needed a substance to be injected in order to work. That was Recovery Girl's theory. She'd been in charge of Izuku's recovery.
He'd slumped right back onto the counter after opening his eyes, head pounding. He felt burning in his veins. Whatever they'd injected was in his bloodstream, pumping hot needles throughout his body.
Izuku didn't remember fainting again. Like before, he only remembered the slim light between his lashes as he opened his eyes. It was really bright, but it didn't hurt his eyes this time. Maybe that should've clued him in, but it didn't.
It was a railroad track. Izuku knew this track. He'd taken the bullet train here when he was younger, on a trip to see extended family in Kyoto.
He remembered the platform. He'd gotten blueberry flavored bubblegum in tiny packs. He'd also gotten a lemonade from a vending machine, and his mom had gotten a canned ice coffee from a vending machine near the entrance.
There were big doors, and if he'd gone up the stairs, he could've found the entrance. He was on a raised platform between two tracks. The rails came from the same source but broke apart at the platform.
Now that he thought about it... where was everybody? The platforms were usually incredibly crowded, but there was nobody in sight.
And then Izuku noticed the people on the tracks.
On one side of the platform, there were at least a dozen civilians. They were ordinary in every way, all of them complete strangers. It was almost like they'd fallen off the platform onto the tracks, but they didn't seem at all concerned. They weren't speaking, but they looked at each other and sort of... mingled.
It didn't make any sense. Why weren't they getting back onto the platform?
"Izuku."
Izuku saw a familiar face out of the corner of his eye. He turned and noticed someone on the other side of the platform, standing on the tracks nonchalantly. It was... Todoroki? What was going on, and why was he here?
Baffled, Izuku looked from one side of the platform to the other. Well, Todoroki was definitely smart enough to know how to get out of a platform. He was training to be a Pro Hero, for goodness sake. Izuku made his way to the group of civilians. He had to get them back to the platform.
"Izuku!"
A bullet train was tearing towards the civilian's track.
Izuku somehow knew that it was going full speed, that it could kill them all in seconds, but time seemed to slow down. Why weren't they moving? Why weren't they doing anything? And then something appeared in front of Izuku's hand.
It was a lever, with red letters right in front of Izuku, even though it hadn't been there before. It read "divert train" in a loud and bold font.
And suddenly, Izuku understood everything. He'd heard riddles like this before. "Two railroad tracks, and a train speeding towards them. There's a lever, you can choose to divert the train. Choose between a group of strangers or one person you love."
He realized that the civilians were staring at him. They had fear in their eyes. Neither they nor Todoroki were even trying to move.
Everything was clear now. Izuku couldn't even see the civilians or Todoroki very well, but he knew with every fiber of his being that they were tied to the tracks, that they couldn't escape even if they tried to. And Izuku would have to choose.
He was almost positive about his choice. Todoroki had done years of hero training, he could get himself out of this. It was Izuku's duty to save the civilians. He'd just have to trust Todoroki to rescue himself from the tracks.
But then he heard it again. Someone calling his name in the background noise. He realized that somebody had been yelling for him this entire time, and he hadn't even registered it. "Izuku." He knew that voice. Shouto's voice shaking, desperate and terrified.
He froze. He couldn't move. He heard the citizens screaming as the train hurtled towards them. Time seemed normal now.
Half a second passed. "Izuku."
The train was so loud that the screams and death weren't audible. "Izuku!"
The only sign the civilians had been there was the blood over the tracks. "Wake up!"
There was pressure on Izuku's cheek. He jolted, flinching away and gasping for breath. His eyes shot open again. He was... in his room? That made no sense. He was at the tracks. Maybe he'd passed out again? Where were his kidnappers? How the hell had he gone from being kidnapped to being in a railway station to being in his room?
He couldn't breathe. He gasped through his mouth, but the air seemed to slip away from him as soon as he got it.
"Breathe with me, Izuku." That was... Shouto? Yes, there he was. He was sitting next to Izuku on his bed. Izuku felt hot. He couldn't get enough oxygen, his lungs felt like they weren't even taking it in.
He slung his legs out from under his duvet and crawled his way to the floor, leaning against the bed frame and sitting on the cool hardwood floors.
"Izuku, are you alright with being touched?" Shouto said slowly. Izuku kept gasping in air, and it took a moment for his head to catch up to Shouto's question. He gasped out an affirmative and reached out his palm, taking Shouto's extended hand.
Shouto brought Izuku's hand to his chest. "Can you feel my breathing, Izuku?" he asked. Izuku frantically nodded. "Concentrate on my breathing. In, and out. You feel it. Try to breathe with me." His breathing was slow and steady, but Izuku could feel Shouto's heartbeat too, and it was fast.
Izuku tried to match up their breathing. It wasn't working, which made him panic more, which made everything worse. He was disappointing Shouto, he couldn't calm down, he couldn't breathe. Izuku grasped Shouto's fingers with his other hand, lacing them together. He used it to pull himself into Shouto's arms.
"Shouto, I can't. I can't. I don't want you to die, I don't want anyone to die, I can't choose!" he wailed, burrowing his face into Shouto's neck and shaking. "It felt so real. It always feels so real. I haven't got even a night of sleep since that villain's quirk made me imagine all those awful moral-testing scenarios."
"I can't do this, Shouto. I don't wanna sleep at all if I see this every night." He was gasping, and tears were streaming down his face. They were soaking into Shouto's sweater, but neither of them noticed.
Shouto was whispering reassurances into Izuku's hair, holding him tight. "Shhh, love. Just breathe with me, I promise. I'll be here with you every night if you have nightmares. Just let it out, you're doing well." He held Izuku's hands between their chests and squeezed them.
Izuku leaned heavier on Shouto's chest, needing to be as close as he could at that moment. "I just need you to hold me," he gasped. "Just hold me for a while."
"Of course. As long as you need, I'm here," whispered Shouto. They shifted a bit. Shouto turned off the bedside lamp and grabbed a blanket, and Izuku pulled a pillow closer. They shared the pillow, heads next to each other, just holding each other.
Izuku felt the rise and fall of Shouto's chest again when they were next to each other. His breathing slowed after a little bit, and his tears changed into quiet sniffles and a bit of shaking. He occasionally remembered little details of his experience and panicked again, but Shouto just held him closer.
Everything was silent in the darkness, except for the quietest rustle of Shouto's fingers running through Izuku's hair as Izuku fell asleep in Shouto's arms.
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thylalock · 4 years
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Title: The Shoe Game By: thylalock Characters: Tom Blake, William Schofield, Sepoy Jondalar, Sergeant Sanders Pairing: William Schofield/Tom Blake Summary: “Who’s more likely to say something embarrassing—” Tom raised his cherry bouquet, prompting the crowd to burst out laughing. “I was going to say ‘in their sleep,’ but I think we’re quite convinced now.” Tom and Will had a shoe game on their wedding day. Additional Tags: modern AU, blakefield, jondalar is our host, the convoy boys are present and occasionally making hilarious remarks, instead of shoes blake uses a cherry bouquet and scho uses a handkerchief, sergeant sanders is blake’s landlord and is our narrator A/N: as told by Tom’s landlord, Daniel Sanders.
“Ladies and gentlemen, and now onto the most anticipated part of today’s event where we can glimpse into the couple’s lives: The Shoe Game!”
The crowd cheered, prompting Daniel Sanders, Tom Blake’s landlord, to chuckle to himself. Sitting at the edge of the crowd and nursing his drink, Sanders allowed a small smile to play on his lips. Thomas Blake and William Schofield sure did take ages just to admit to themselves they were in love with each other, frustrating the poor old landlord who had been trying to knock some sense into the the boys’ head, but looking at the couple’s happy faces, blindingly bright with joy, he could almost say it was worth it. 
It was a small wedding, not too crowded, with only the couple’s most dearest people invited. Though Sanders only knew a handful of the guests there—Tom’s mother and brother, Will’s mother and sisters, Will’s landlady, and a bunch of Tom’s friends from uni and work who would come to pick him up for drinks on Saturday nights—it was unmistakable that the couples were loved by those closest to them.
The venue was quite simple, not overly decorative or extravagant, but it was visible that Tom and Will’s personality bled into every inch of the place. The walls were decorated in white linen sprinkled with warm fairy lights here and there, giving the whole place a sense of warmth and welcome and the feeling of being home—Will’s idea, no doubt there—but at the edges, adorning lamp holders, snaking around pillars, and blooming in the middle of every table, were plants and vines and bouquets of cherry blossoms—Tom’s side. The whole event, including the way that Tom was dressed in a light grey suit and Will in sharp black, was a beautiful display of the contrasting natures of the two. 
Two chairs had been placed in the middle of the front space, facing away from each other, and on each of them was a bouquet of cherry blossoms and a plain white handkerchief. Sanders didn’t even need any explanation to tell which one was whose. 
It was quite funny to see the two of them sitting with their backs on each other, with Tom grinning widely at the crowd and Will looking quite calm himself, as though acting like each other’s antithesis.  
“Okay, I should think this one needs no explanation for you two, but I’ll explain it nonetheless,” the host, a tall handsome man with an Indian look, who Sanders had gathered to be one of Tom’s friends too, said. “I’ll read out a few questions and if you think the answer is Tom, you can raise the cherry bouquet, if it’s Will you can raise the handkerchief.”
Sanders and a few of the guests let out a soft laugh as the host turned to the crowd to say, “yeah, he’s modest that way.”
“Alright, let’s give it a go shall we? Who does the dishes more often?”
Tom and Will brought up their handkerchiefs in an almost mirroring movement it was almost comical, as though without any doubt. 
The host smiled, laughing in a low voice over the mic. “That was a test—we all know Will does all the dishes, but good to know you’re getting the hang of the game!”
At this Sanders let out a hearty laugh along with the rest of the guests. True—even in his own flat he had caught the younger man letting Will do the dishes when Sanders passed by his door, and on more than one occasion no less. 
Tom was visibly turning quite red on his rosy cheeks, a trait which Sanders had always found adorable because it gave away the younger man’s emotional state the way a ten years old boy couldn’t hide his feelings, but he was laughing nonetheless, accepting defeat. Will, on the other hand, smiled and began chuckling, a sign that the host had successfully broken the ice. 
“Question number two: who has the bigger wardrobe?” 
This time, as sure as the first question, the couple raised their cherry bouquets in unison—Will with a comical expression of defeat on his face and Tom with a rather smug smile on his lips, taking pride in his sense of fashion. No surprise there—the idea of having the grooms dressed in contrasting suits were probably entirely Tom’s idea.
“Who is more likely to cry during a sad movie?”
One of Will’s little sisters said, “Will?” but then covered her exploding giggling when the couple brought up their cherry bouquets.
The host joined the guests in laughter, turning to face her to acknowledge her earlier comment. “So much for thinking Will is the sentimental one, right?”
Sitting beside her, Sanders could see a man, who Sanders recognized as Tom’s brother Joe, shooting back a reminder, “give him dog movies!”
A low buzz of chuckling spread around the small crowd—apparently everyone was familiar with Tom’s love for dogs. Sanders himself had to deny the young man his request to get a dog in the flat at least a dozen times, reminding him that he worked almost all day long and wouldn’t be there to actually take care of it. 
On the front, Tom feigned defeat. “No! Not dog movies!”
The host gave a good-natured laugh, before carrying on, “who's more likely to say something embarrassing—”
Tom raised his cherry bouquet, a confident expression written on his face as though accepting that particular side of his nature, prompting Sanders and the rest of the crowd to burst out laughing. Even the host had to double over to hold himself from laughing too loud into the mic. 
He gathered that the host hadn’t finished his question, but that was fair enough. Even as a landlord, Sanders had witnessed how Tom’s carefree and honest and uninhibited personality had contributed to some embarrassing remarks said by the young man. 
The host walked up to pat Tom on the shoulder. “I was going to say ‘in their sleep,’ but I think we’re quite convinced now.”
At the finished question, Will brought up his handkerchief, saving Tom and bringing the crowd to another round of laughter. 
“I’m sure we’re all tempted to ask what, but that’s got to be for another time,” the host said. “Next question: who takes longer in the shower?”
There was a unanimous shout of “Tom!” coming from Tom’s friends, all clustered together on one corner of the crowd, and at Will’s approving wave of his cherry bouquet, Tom brought up his own bouquet in confirmation. True—sometimes even Sanders had been left with the job to entertain the boys who had come to pick Tom up because the man took forever in the shower. 
“No surprise there,” the host said, smiling as he peeked into his question list. “Who is the better kisser?”
When Tom and Will visibly took their time thinking and smiling to themselves, the crowd began cheering and the boys actually wolf-whistled. Sanders could barely hold himself from covering his face in his palms at the way the grooms slowly brought up the other’s attribute slowly, as though they were bashful twenty years old lads again, completely in love and aching for each other, driving the poor landlord insane, and not a couple getting married today. 
The guests went mad. 
One of the boys actually cried out, “oh my god, get a room!”
He was answered with a playful remark from another boy in the group, “shut up, Cooke!”
“It’s okay Cooke, they’ll get a lot of that in the following days,” the host interrupted, taking it as his cue, although he was still laughing. “Moving on: who is a bigger baby when they're sick?”
Again, there was a unanimous vote of “Tom!” from the boys, rivaled only by Will quickly shooting up his bouquet. 
No surprise there either for Sanders, considering how many times Will had knocked on Tom’s door, bringing hot foods and basically taking care of him like a husband even before they were together. 
In front of the hall, Tom smiled bashfully as he brought up his bouquet in admittance. 
“Who will kill the spiders in the house?”
Tom quickly shot up his handkerchief, waving it as though they were in the bathroom and it was a cry for help to kill the spider under the sink. On the other side, Will didn’t bring anything up for quite a time, laughing to himself. 
The host turned to Will. “No one? Will, you’ve got to turn around, he’s basically crying out SOS.”
Will turned around and Tom waved his handkerchief at him, raising his eyebrows and prompting the older groom to laugh. 
“I guess that would be me,” Will admitted, bringing up his own handkerchief. 
“Well, someone’s always got to kill the spiders, even if they don’t like it,” the host concluded. “Who is the better driver?”
This prompted the guests to giggle because Tom and Will brought up their own attribute for this. 
They each turned around, an expression of surprise etched to their faces as they found out they both took the credit. 
“You can’t even find the nearest chemist!” Tom  gave a jesting argument. 
Will replied something in return, but it died amidst the laughing guests. 
“Will said Tom can’t parallel park, which is true,” the host chimed in, earning a playful smack from the younger man. Sanders had to agree with the host though, it always baffled the landlord how Tom could get his driving license when he always parallel parked his car in such a mortifying angle in front of the flat. 
“Next question: who is the better cook?”
Unequivocal vote of “Will!” from the boys, to which Sanders agreed. Tom shot up his handkerchief while Will took his time raising his own handkerchief, as though not quite certain of his cooking skills. Sanders smiled to himself—the man was being too modest, everyone was a chef compared to Tom. 
“Who is in control of the remote?”
Both brought up their bouquet, which did not surprise Sanders. 
“Who will be most likely to wake up grumpy?”
There was a divided vote for each groom from the guests, but ultimately both Tom and Will brought up their handkerchief. 
“When you first met, who made the first move?”
Tom shot up his bouquet quickly, looking quite smug, while Will only laughed before he brought up his bouquet in agreement. 
“Who said I love you first?”
With more confidence, the couple raised their handkerchief in unison as the crowd cooed in soft “aww.”
“Who proposed?”
This drew a round of cheering and clapping from the guests, as Tom and Will both raised their handkerchief and bouquet. Sanders himself had his jaw dropped. He remembered that particular day because Tom was both too excited and nervous and bubbly that morning, and far too jittery than what he could face later that night, but he didn’t know this was what happened. It was almost comical to see that they didn’t even need to turn around to know that the other was raising both of their attributes. 
The host was visibly surprised, barely containing his own laughter. “What? How did it happen?”
“I was planning to propose,” Will said. “but it didn’t quite turn out the way it was supposed to, but apparently Tom’s also planned to propose on the same day. It was crazy.”
“We both had our rings that day,” Tom chimed in. “We end up wearing each other’s.”
“Oh, what wouldn’t we give for something like this, eh?” the host commented, earning a round of laughter and  ‘aww’, especially from the ladies guests. 
“Now, moving on to the last but most important question,” the host made a dramatic pause as he looked up from his question cards. “Now that you’re married, who’s more likely to say: it’s high time you start taking out the bins?”
Tom and Will brought up their handkerchief, and a nice round of applause closed the game in a nice wrapping. 
“And now, ladies and gentlemen, please join me in inviting the grooms to dance their first dance as married husbands!”
Fin
A/N: Prone to say embarrassing things, taking forever in showers, being a baby when they are sick, can’t cook to save their life? Basically, Blake is me. I’m sorry for embarrassing him a lot, in a way it’s me confessing my sins AHAHAHAHH
HFJDKHFJKDHFKD I do hope things didn’t come out too cringey because this honestly the first time I’ve written anything other than angst, and a humour no less, so really if you can’t finish it I really won’t blame you ahahahahh
However, constructive criticism is always welcomed! This is honestly my first attempt at humour, so if it’s not working I really won’t be offended if you say so. Thank you nonetheless for reading! What am I doing running away from Celestial, lol!
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malereader-inserts · 6 years
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Rumour Has It
Fandom: Avengers Pairing: Peter Parker x Male!Reader Summary: The Avengers don’t like you, rumour has it. Word Count: 1,729 Request: “If your taking request can you do a peter parker x male reader where peter introduced male reader to the Avengers.”
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The Avengers don’t like you, that’s what they agreed within their little circle.
No, they haven’t met you, yet, but, they just don’t like you.
Dating their youngest member of the team, it’s kind of a big deal. Peter, barely an adult yet, had been especially happy lately. It wasn’t too noticeable at first, the boy is a walking ray of sunshine, but then they started to notice that Peter was skipping out on Friday movie nights every other night.
Peter usually kept a disorganised schedule, often times running out the lab to meet his Aunt, but now, he checks the clock every five minutes and leaves five minutes than intended. He never comes to the tower with an empty stomach like he used to, then they found out that he had been dating someone. 
It was the laughter when he was staring at his phone, every small noise that comes from his phone to check if there was a message from you. 
“So, who’s the girl?” Sam asked, one day, it was in the middle of preparing for the movie night as Peter tap on his phone.
“Hmh?” Peter hummed, looking up to see some of the Avengers looking at him, “It’s not a girl.”
“So, it’s not that girl - what’s her name?” Tony started to click his fingers as Peter looked at his mentor with an amused look.
“MJ?” Peter offered, “No, it’s not her nor is Ned.”
“Then who’s got you all flushed up, Parker?” Natasha calls out, leaning against Clint, who was sipping on his beer with a fond teasing smile at Peter.
“Just my boy, my man, (Y/n),” Peter commented before his attention was quick to return to the blue screen.
It didn’t clock into their minds that Peter was completely referring to you as his boyfriend, but at the time they just thought that Peter made a new friend recently, someone he was very fond of. It was until Peter left, in the refusal of Happy’s drive, in another person’s car that the team had realised that either Peter just got kidnapped or Peter had a boyfriend.
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They were indifferent about you, barely heard anything from Peter. But, they were glad that things had started to return to their normal routine. But, they heard that Peter Parker was dating some kid called (Y/n) (L/n) that was the youngest son of Stark Enterprise rival company. Successful in making the latest technology.
And there were some hefty rumours about you.
“(Y/n) the next new loverboy on the scene?” Headlines would stream, social media flowed with the headline.
Peter scoffs when he reads the headline, ignoring the media and enjoying being in the arms of you. Meanwhile, the Avengers hated it. They thought this was a red flag for you, Peter should immediately consider his choices and leave. You were a flirt, a young adult with charm and money.
Tony Stark could see his younger self in you. Young, rich and charming, that made everyone swoon. Tony Stark is a player, everyone knows that, so why couldn’t you. You’ve been in public having a couple of dates, some significant others, the media had been tracking your dating life. More so compared to your siblings.
Then again, you were a pretty face. You could easily take up modelling if your family business was too tiring for you. Then that caused another rumour to spark, it was from Ned one time. He had come along with Peter to the tower, he begged Peter to come to see a movie on Saturday night but Peter politely declined.
“I’m going to a party,” Peter answers as Ned raises an eyebrow, “With him.” 
“What? (Y/n)?” Ned was baffled, “You hate parties and I heard the parties he goes to are wild, they do the crazy stuff.”
Steve was the one to overhear the conversation and replayed the message to the team. The party that Peter seemed to be attending with you could be filled with drugs, people doing vape and heavy drinking.
“I don’t like who Peter is hanging around,” Bruce mentions, cleaning his glasses, “Who is (Y/n) anyway?”
“Youngest member of (L/n) Corp.” Pepper started, “Highly intelligent, only eighteen years old. But, he comes off much like his older brothers.”
“Egotistic, party animals and a manwhore,” Tony completed, “He’s going to break Pete’s innocence.”
“As if there is much left of that,” Clint commented dryly, “Listen, why don’t we give the kid a chance? You’ve said it before Stark, media is pretty heavy with opinions and lies.”
Tony sighs, nodding, “I guess so.”
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Avengers were invited to your family party, Steve was dreading the thought of it. He wasn’t ready to be faced with loud music, drunk and high people. But, Peter only laughs, shaking his head.
“It’s just a normal party? What are you talking about?” Peter asked, a soft happy smile on his face, “Like Tony host.”
“But, that’s the party you’ve been going to with your boyfriend!” Bucky exclaimed, but the confused look Peter shows meant otherwise.
“No, I haven’t, I hate those types of parties. I’ve only been to one and that was the time of homecoming.” 
The Avengers still attended with their chosen plus one. Aunt May was excited to see you, already meeting her after a few weeks of dating Peter. She was really charmed by you and taken a great like to you. The team all dressed up for the party as Peter was practically jumping up and down, scanning the crowd of people to find you.
“Peter Parker!” You greeted, a smile on your face and your eyes lit up ever so perfectly, Peter swooned.
Your hand lands and rest carefully on the lower parts of Peter’s back. You softly kissed his temple, with you being taller - though that wasn’t too hard with Peter. Peter beamed at the rest of his team and his Aunt.
“Welcome to our humble abode, Avengers,” You spoke with confidence, the team cringes inside. 
Peter look at you with such fondness as you spare him a glance, amused but in love. May was quick to engulf you into a hug, in which you happily accept. You point her to your aunt, she was quick to make friends with your family member when she and Peter came over for family reunion dinner one night.
“Guys, this is my boyfriend, (Y/n). (Y/n) this is my team,” Peter introduced, you nodded as a greeting but the friendly smile never leaving your face.
“Peter talks an awfully lot of you,” You commented, “Especially you Mr Stark, he fawns over you.”
“Shut up!” Peter whines, nudging you as you chuckled, even bursting into fits of laughter when Peter turns red.
“Oh, well I hope they’re all good things,” Steve said.
“Definitely, he’s a big fan of you, he did grow up with superheroes,” You complimented as you clapped your hands, “Please, food will be served soon, the bar is open - no worry you won’t need to pay anything, there is a restriction on you, Peter, however.”
“What!” Peter exclaimed as you raise an eyebrow at him and shook your head.
“We let you drink a bit, you’re an emotional drunk Pete. You’re lucky that I’m here to bring you home, but I’m sure May have some funny videos of that night.” 
“What?”
“Oh, yeah, you really wanted to find an Iron Man costume and parade in the night with it. Then, you showed me your hulk pyjamas, which are adorable.”
“Excuse me, Hulk PJ’s?” Bruce asked, baffled but somewhat touched by the simple gesture.
“Oh, yes, Dr Banner. I have pictures, would you like them?” You immediately fish out your phone, “Now that I recall, Peter has a lot of embarrassing pictures on here.”
You stride towards to the team, they didn’t miss how your lock screen is Peter and you in the carnival, hues of blues, red and orange were mixed as flares. It was aesthetically pleasing to view. You tap on your photos and scroll to a folder name “Spiderboi ❤” Typical teenage behaviour. 
There were pictures of Peter in a bubble bath, bubbles to his chin and his hair stuck up in a mohawk but holding up Captain America action figure in one hand and a Thor action figure in the other. The team looked at each there, wanting to burst out in laughter. 
Whilst there were many embarrassing pictures of him, there were many pictures that you adored with all your heart. Pictures such as Ferris wheel pictures together at the top, or a picture of Peter him riding a horse like prince charming on the carousel. Pictures sure as him simply looking at items on the Santa Monica Pier, when you took him to LA for a week.
“You’re really cute together,” Sam said, not realising what had been said.
“Thanks! Peter is my first real relationship, I intend to make sure he’s stuck with me.”
Peter rolled his eyes, “Trust me (Y/n), it’ll be you wanting to leave not me. I love you too much to let you go.”
“You sap,” You shoved lightly with your shoulder, “Come on, mom is dying to make plans with us and May.”
The two of you walk away, with Peter grasping your hand and jokingly swinging it back and forth obnoxiously. Tony cleared his throat and straighten his jacket, grabbing a drink that was on a tray that was being carried around and offered.
“Seems nice,” Clint concluded, “I like him.”
The team murmured in agreement. Natasha takes a deep breath, ready to mingle for the night, ready to walk off with Pepper by her side
“Do you think he knows that we didn’t like him at first, do you think Peter knew?” Sam asked.
“Oh, he knew,” Peter spoke, making the team jump at his arrival, he grins at them as he grabs a drink from a waiter’s tray, “Rumour has it, so does (Y/n).”
With that Peter finally walks away, the team shifting uncomfortably in their spot. Peter wanted to tell the team to loosen up and integrate themselves with the guest as well but managed to catch the conversation and left feeling both entertained and unamused.
“We’ve messed up our first impression, haven’t we?” Steve winced, as you sharply turn your head away.
“Yup,” Bruce answered.
“Then, we better get into fixing that.”
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wiener-soldiers · 4 years
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operation omega - naked (iii)
summary: years after the avengers dismantle HYDRA, the group remerges more dangerous than ever. their modus operandi? infiltrating foreign governments, stealing and reproducing their weapons, and selling them to terrorist groups. when the us government approaches the avengers for help on a secret operation with a secret asset, they are reluctant to agree. it isn’t until their quinjet almost gets shot down in the middle of nowhere when the understand that omega means business.
pairing: bucky barnes x SEAL!reader
words: 2.5k
warnings: mild sexual tension, they’re kinda all naked
a/n: this is still exposition haha. also i barely edited this
taglist: add yourself here!
OPERATION OMEGA MASTERLIST
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Omega, Bucky quickly learned, was nothing like the Avengers.
They weren’t independent, rather they were the collective asset of the allied nations.
They weren’t public figures, rather nearly no one knew they existed except for the people who can directly order them to go on missions.
They didn’t really have private lives; they were stationed at their base for months on end and were only allowed back home for a few weeks at a time.
And most noticeably, they weren’t superheroes, but they were badasses.
Omega had ex-Navy SEALs, Green Berets, Delta Force, CIA, and Air Force. Everyone on the Avengers, including the enhanced, were pretty intimidated by the lineup.
Bucky also noticed how they were all much more like a family. Not like the Avengers-dysfunctional-type family, but one that actually cares. He notices that despite prepping for missions, they still have happy hour on Friday night, movie night on Saturday night, and they actually enjoy training with one another.
One minor thing Bucky also noticed is how little clothes they all wear.
He honestly shouldn’t be that surprised. Though being in army camps seemed like a lifetime ago, something about the atmosphere screamed the lack of necessity for shirts.
And honestly, who wouldn’t want to show off how fit they all were?
The first instance he realized this fact was when he was in the medical wing to get his physical. Captain Y/N insisted that all the Avengers go in for a physical exam done by their in-house doctor, Dr. Marge Dean—who also happened to be an ex-Green Beret and CIA operative—just in case there were health issues that needed to be fixed before they went in the field.
Bucky’s appointment with Dr. Dean was scheduled for noon, but he got there five minutes before. Knocking softly on the door, a soft female voice said, “It’s open” before he pushed his way inside.
Dr. Marge Dean wasn’t alone in the room. Sergeant Dominick Stone, ex-Air Force pilot, was also there. He sat on the exam table across from Dr. Marge with his right hand heavily wrapped. The duo looked up at him and offered him a smile. He tries to ignore the fact that Dr. Marge was wearing nothing but short track shorts and a sports bra and Dominick was wearing nothing but boxers. If they’re comfortable with each other, then it can’t be that bad, Bucky tells himself.
“Afternoon. Doc, Sergeant,” Bucky nods at both of them, returning a smile.
“Please, James. Call me Marge,” Marge tells him softly as she finishes wrapping Dominick’s hand. “My abuella’s a doctor. I grew up with everyone calling her Doc, I guess I just haven’t gotten used to people calling people me that yet either,” she giggles softly.
Bucky smiles at her, “Marge it is.”
“I would shake your hand,” Dominick says as he hops off the exam table and waves his bandaged hand in the air, “but it’s a little hard right now.”
Bucky chuckles, “Don’t worry about it, Sarge. What happened?”
Dominick sighs and Marge chuckles as she cleans her equipment, prepping for Bucky’s physical exam. “It’s stupid,” the Sergeant sighs.
“Oh come on,” Marge starts, “I think it’s funny, Sarge.”
Dominick sighs, “I was sharpening my knife and I accidentally cut my hand really deeply.”
“A combat knife?” Bucky asks curiously.
Dominick sighs, “A kitchen knife.”
Marge bursts into another fit of giggle before patting the exam table, signalling to Bucky that she’s ready to start his exam. “Dom’s Ma is from Ghana. The first time we went home for our break, his Ma gave him the family fried rice recipe. He makes it for us every week,” Marge starts as she starts Bucky’s physical. He surprised at how calm she acts around his metal arm; whether it’s a telltale sign of a good doctor or a good person, Bucky doesn’t really care—the simple action allow Bucky to trust her.
“I was sharpening the kitchen knives because no one in this damn place will do it—”
“You said you found it relaxing, so we let you do it!”
“And I was distracted for a second and my hand slipped,” Dominick rolled his eyes and gestures to his hand again. “It’s not big deal. No stitches needed; I’ll be good in no time.”
Marge finishes monitoring Bucky’s breathing and moves on to taking his blood pressure. “All those extra bandages are just to make him feel better,” she jokes.
Bucky takes a deep breath, allowing his walls to come down a bit. “Well, Sarge, I’d love to try it sometime,” Bucky says with a smile that reaches his eyes. “Ya know, after your hand has healed an all,” he adds an on, jokingly.
Sergeant Dominick grins, “I go by Dom.”
“Fair enough. I go by Bucky.”
The second instance he realized the unspoken, no-clothes policy was later that week. That morning marked the second week that the Avengers were working with Omega. Slowly, they were fitting in with their new partners. Despite looking crazily similar, Bucky’s hunch that Steve and Jack may want to one-up each other was proven false. Steve and Jack bonded surprisingly fast from their shared interests in history, art, and their war experiences. Wanda got along really well with Dr. Marge as soon as the two girls realized they both had a passion for cooking and baking. Natasha got along with Second Lieutenant Abigail Lee, the resident engineer and ex-Green Beret weapons specialist, as soon as Natasha found out that Abigail loved stand-up specials as much as she did. Clint and Sam got along really well Sergeant John McBueller after drunkenly one night, John taught the two how to salsa the same way his mother taught him how to when he was younger. Tony gets along with the ever-so-clumsy Sergeant Dom because Dom is secretly a nerd about everything about the Iron Man suit and Tony thinks Dom is like a younger version of Rhodey.
The unlikely group of friends found themselves in the kitchen that morning. The ex-military individuals were still used to a waking up early so their training sessions normally takes place before breakfast, whereas the Avengers training sessions normally took place later at night, as the team is full of insomniacs.
Bucky, Steve, Tony, Clint, and Sam sat in the kitchen that morning. Tony was tinkering with a new gadget Bucky couldn’t even begin to comprehend, Steve was hunched over a tablet analyzing reports, Clint was looking over flight logistics, and Sam was switching his attention between sipping his coffee and making breakfast for everyone.
Bucky’s attention was concentrated at the laptop in front of him where he was analyzing old Avengers briefs for HYDRA missions. A fit of chatter take his attention away from the laptop. Salsa-dancing John McBueller and Dr. Marge walked into the kitchen, easy chatter flowing between them. His eyes widened at their wardrobe, John was wearing nothing but grey sweatpants and Marge only sported a sports bra with her leggings, sweat dripping off the both of them.
In comparison, every Avenger was very clothed.
“Morning guys,” John called out, following Marge into the kitchen. Marge busied herself by making a protein shake for her and John, not noticing the stares both her and John were getting.
“Morning…” the Avengers mumbled.
“John you want banana in your shake?” Marge asked, not giving a care in the world.
“Hmm, yeah sure. Also, can you add peanut butter too?” John responses, easily as care-free.
“Are you guys always like this?” Tony asks, baffled at how casual they are.
“What?” Marge and John ask at the same time. Bucky chuckles at his expression.
“This…naked,” Tony says bluntly.
Another loud chuckle is heard down the hall and Dom and Abigail enter the kitchen next. The corner of Bucky’s mouth quirks upwards as soon as Tony’s eyes widen even more. Abigail was wearing nothing but a swimsuit and a flannel to cover up, her hair still wet from the laps she swam in the lake that morning. Unlike John, Dom was wearing a shirt, but his dripping wet swim trunks and open flannel—with nothing on underneath, to add—made his attire barely passible.
“Jesus, is your dress code basically nothing?” Tony remarks. He wasn’t surprised that every member of the Omega team was absolutely shredded. He was used to it in fact, as it usually isn’t surprising for Steve or Bucky or Sam to walk around shirtless. He was just surprised about the bluntness the Omega team had.
“Morning,” Bucky hears a final mumble. The group in the kitchen turns towards the sleepy voice; it was Y/N with Jack trailing into the kitchen behind her. Though he was used to seeing his new teammates so naked, his eyes widened at the sight of her. She wore nothing but pajama shorts and a lacy bralette. Jack shuffled in behind her, wearing nothing but boxers. Jack gently put a green flannel around her shoulders and Y/N mumbled a thanks.
“Sorry we woke up late and missed training. Pulled an all-nighter analyzing more intel and I didn’t realize I missed training,” Y/N mumbles.
“Jesus Christ, you guys are shameless. I dig it,” Tony says, mostly to himself.
Bucky can’t help but feel his cheeks heat up at the sight of Y/N. He normally was fine around naked girls. He was nowhere near the level of confident as he was when he was younger, but we was rarely flustered at the sight of one. He really tried not to stare, but the view of Y/N in nothing but comfy clothes wrapped around a flannel, laughing softly at something someone said over a cup of coffee was something that made Bucky’s stomach flip.
Oh, fuck. She’s so beautiful, Bucky thinks.
Bucky hears a soft chuckle behind him. He tilts his view backwards and sees Wanda (he isn’t exactly sure when she woke up and made her way to the kitchen) smirking at him. His eyes widen, Stop reading my mind, asshole.
Wanda’s smirk only widens.
Early the next morning, Bucky woke in a cold sweat. The hairs on the back of his neck stood as he looked around the unfamiliar surroundings before he slowly realized that we was in the Omega bunker, not his room at the Avengers’ tower.
Fucking nightmare, he sighs. His metal arms cramps, a symptom of the Phantom Limb Syndrome that he feels every now and then, especially after he has a nightmare. Bucky sighs and glances at the time: 5:11 AM.
He decided that sleep is so far behind him at this point, so Bucky rolls out of bed, pulls on a pair of workout shorts, and trudges out of the room.
As soon as he walks out into the hallway, the goosebumps on his bare bake perk up. Still, Bucky continues trudging towards the kitchen. He starts a pot of coffee and digs around the fridge for some food.
“Bucky?” someone calls out to him, startling him. He tries to lift his head out of the fridge, but he accidentally hits his head.
“Fuck,” he hisses, grabbing the back of his head.
“Shit!” the voice calls behind him and he feels to warm hands wrap around his neck. “Are you okay?”
Bucky turns around and face Y/N, who’s hands are still on his neck. Bucky can’t help but notice that she’s wearing nothing but a sports bra and sweatpants. He gulps and trains his eyes on her face.
“Yeah, I’m fine. No biggie,” he says weakly.
Y/N smiles softly, letting her hands fall. “What’re you doing up?” she asks softly, side-stepping around him to grab a banana from the counter.
Bucky exhales softly, hoping his breath isn’t shaky. “Nightmare,” he states bluntly, too tired to lie.
Her eyebrow raises, “Oh?”
“It was about, uh…how I lost my arm,” he says quietly, not meeting her eyes. “The dreams, I’m used to. It’s the pain from Phantom Limb Syndrome that usually wakes me up.”
“Biofeedback,” Y/N says simply.
“I’m sorry?”
“Talk to Tony about adding biofeedback and haptics to your metal arm so you can feel touch in that arm again,” Y/N responds, stepping closer to him. She reaches out for Bucky’s metal palm and drags a finger down it. Bucky doesn’t flinch; he knows what the feeling is supposed to feel like but it pains him that he can’t feel it. “I read an article talking about how biofeedback helped some patients overcome their Phantom Limb Syndrome…” she trails off, hoping she didn’t make it awkward.
“Thank you,” Bucky says sincerely, searching her eyes for any sign of discomfort.
Y/N doesn’t say anything, but the comforting look in her tired eyes say it all, you’re welcome.
Bucky continues to make his coffee and a breakfast omelette while Y/N sits at the island silently, eating her banana and observing him. It was 5:30 AM already, meaning she should have been out the door and starting her run. Instead, she watches how his back muscles contract as he cuts vegetable combined with the soft mechanical whir of his metal arm to create a mesmerizing scene.
Bucky speaks up, snapping her out of her trance, “What about you? What’re you doing up?”
“I normally go on a run right now,” she told him, casting her gaze towards his face. She notices how his unkempt hair dangles in front of his eyes and how she do desperately got the urge to push the hair out of his face to stare into his eyes.
“Don’t let me stop you then,” Bucky jests.
Y/N smiles at him, “Didn’t feel like it today. I like going on runs because it’s calming. Sitting here and watching you cook, it’s also…calming.”
Bucky had nothing to say to that, surprised by her honestly. Y/N is equally as surprised and hopes she didn’t make it weird. Apparently, she hasn’t because moments later, Bucky slides a serving of omelette for her as well.
“Thank you,” Y/N mumbles before digging in.
“Don’t mention it,” Bucky replies with kind eyes.
They eat in silence. Not an uncomfortable one, but a perfectly, intentionally quiet one—like if one of them spoke, it would ruin the calming and intimate emotion draped over the kitchen.
They both finish their meals and clean up the dishes. As Bucky is about to round the corner and head back into his room, Y/N calls out, “I would love to run with you, if you want.”
Bucky pauses mid-step and glances back at her, waiting for her to continue.
“There’s this trail that I made when we first moved here. It leads to a beautiful rock formation and a waterfall. I run there every morning,” Y/N gushed out. Bucky fully turned to look at her this time. “You’re welcome to join, if you want.”
Bucky smiles at her.
Bucky got a long really well with Captain Y/N Y/L/N after their quiet morning breakfast and confessions. Waking up to run with her is what make Bucky excited to wake up every morning.
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