#it feels like tying a noose tighter and tighter

[castdowns]

the only half way safe space to be a lesbian is online and literally y’all fucking suck too, i am so depressed

[grollow]

watch you lose

Title: watch you lose Rating: M Characters: The Hollow Knight, The Radiance Warnings: Disturbing Content, Trauma Bonding, First Person POV, Prequel (sort of) Author's Notes: This is canon to White and Gray, technically, and was written as a gift for @astorichan for Elegies of Hallownest's Secret Santa. Happy holidays, my friend! <3

watch you lose on AO3. “At the rate that we are going, we will die here together like this, you and I,” she says.

I ignore her, drifting in a state somewhere between waking and the anguish of sleep. In this state, she cannot reach or touch me, but her words are an insidious whisper that brushes under my skin like the diminutive scales that so resemble fur. She would have the world think that she is soft, but I know better. She is the edges of claws that scrape and scratch, and she leaves everything bleeding underneath them.

I prefer this state. I can see the world around me, a witness through the windows to history unfolding, but never a participant. This has always been my role. Never a participant, always a spectator. I have watched Hallownest crumble around me, bits and pieces rotting away as proof of my flaws. I have watched my king’s palace vanish under the weight of his own failure, disappearing like a mirage; sometimes, I can even glimpse it in the distance, and she says that is because it is here, because he has joined us in this eternal prison.

Like us, he is a spectator.

Like us, he is dead without truly dying.

We are corpses that have forgotten what it means to be dead. We are animated not by the essence that inhabits our body but by the spite that drives us: emotions like blood strangling out whatever light might have remained in the two of them.

I have always been a dark thing. I suppose that is to my benefit.

“You could end the pain we are both enduring,” she tells me.

My reflection is a passive thing, void obscuring it on the shell that makes up the floor. The chains that bind us in the air have long lost their shine. Like my armour.

(Like me.)

She deludes herself, as I often do, that we might some day see freedom outside of these halls. Were I to be set free of my binds, I doubt my body would animate properly. There are great crevices in my carapace where infection has boiled over, eating away at tempered void. The most egregious of these is a great hulking furrow that jots along my shoulder where my missing arm should be. It drives down deep and is, at times, painful. I can see the illumination of pustules growing in place of where the void has been burned away. They unsettle me, raising bile in a stomach that I did not know that I possessed.

(I have a mouth. I have always had a mouth. Mouths are conducive to stomachs; they are used to consume food, though I have never needed any—

Hunger notwithstanding.

I have ever been starving.

The void within me longs to devour all that it sees. I hold it in check, as I always have.

Would it be void that came up, if I succumbed to the writhing in my guts, like invisible claws twisting them to-and-fro, tying what insides my third parent did not destroy into tense, tight little knots?)

I cannot feel my legs. I have not been able to in a very long time.

“Let me set us both free, my shadow,” she pleads, drawing me back. I can feel her wings like the soft of feathers wrapping around me. “It needn’t be one or the other. I would miss you—”

I do not answer her in words, but in a feeling: a hot rush of stubborn refusal that manifests like ice through me. I drown her light in my shadows, and she recoils, hissing shrilly. 

“I will miss you,” she finishes.

There is nothing to miss, I say without words, pulling my void like a noose tighter around her throat. She struggles, fighting back, and the course of sunlight through me makes us both scream in mutual agony—her from my freezing darkness and me from the searing that rips through me, settling in welts that fill with fluid within my eye sockets.

It is a scream that reverberates through the void. All creatures of my kind can hear it, but none can answer. I am alone.

(I made that choice when I left them behind. I am selfish. I was willing to climb out of the Abyss over the corpses of my siblings, no matter the cost. And I was willing to sacrifice it all—

Hallownest. Myself. The lives of thousands of bugs.

I wanted his acknowledgment. I wanted to be seen.

I wanted to succeed—)

“You never could have. The fact that you wanted to is proof of that. But fine, fine. When death takes you, I will be free. I can be very patient when I need to be.”

The light of my eyes pulses in time with her heartbeat. The arteries that sprawl across the cavern ceiling are perfectly in sync with them.

She has never been patient in her life.

-

From the moment of my conception, I have been wed to her. The ties that bind us are far stronger than that of matrimony and impossible to break. I was molded to be her creature. Try as she might, she can never escape a shadow that bears her shape—and that is all that I will ever amount to.

Still, it is entertaining to listen to her wish that it be otherwise.

She would no more choose this than I, she claims. But she forgets.

I did make this choice. I told myself it was for him. I told myself it was for the Pale Gift that I left behind. I told myself that I had enough strength within to succeed.

We are both fools and liars. I am, at least, aware of my failings.

They are all that make up what remains of me.

Failure. Failure. Failure.

NO.

-

There is another like me.

There is another and it has come for me; it has answered a scream from the two of us to set us free and I recognise it, I know those horns, I know, and I do not deserve, I do not want, I do not want to be saved—

There is another there is another there is another

Kill the empty one.

There is another like me there is another like me there is another

Kill the empty one.

It is her voice, I tell myself. It is her command issued to force her slaves, mindless as they are, animated by her power, to attack.

I would never.

(I want to. I want to rip it apart.

She is mine, she is mine, she is mine. This is my task, this is my burden, these are my shackles to bear, and I would not have her be taken from me, not like everything else, I have never had anything that is mine, I have never had anything, she is all that I have—

Go. Go. Go.

It should have died.

Like the rest of them.)

The frenzied feeling inside of me is a swelling thing. It shivers in my guts. It settles in as numbness at the tips of my fingers. He has cursed me. He has left me to watch the world, watch it die around me, watch my failure unfold on the stage, the curtain raised in a final act, Hallownest’s requiem in harmony with my screams. I cannot look away. I cannot stop myself from watching my sibling’s journey; I cannot tear my focus to something else, anything to ease the terror that surges through limbs that have long stopped aching because I no longer feel anything physically to begin with.

Run, I want to scream.

Leave, I want to beg.

(Save—

Save who? Me?

I don’t deserve it.

If it comes here, I will fail—

If it comes here, it will take my place and I do not want to—)

I cannot see her. I can feel her writhing within me, though. I can no longer tell where I end and she begins and that is for the better.

I think, perhaps, that I love her. She shaped me into something else; she moulded me into her creature, and she has always seen me. Where others bore witness to a monster in the shell of the king’s misbegotten offspring, she saw the writhing shadows and knew the potential that lay within. She sees me.

I think, perhaps, that I hate her for all of that, too. For how dare she look into my eyes and know my secrets—how dare she rummage through my mind to find where my scars are—how dare she reach out with tenderness.

“I know what it feels like to be abandoned by family,” she’d whispered one day, when we were newly acquainted, as if she could understand my pain.

She knew nothing about me.

She knows everything about me now.

She knows that I will bite every hand outstretched in kindness. She knows that mine are words edged in nails, that my heart is wrapped in razor wire and that to love me is to drown. She is caught in my maelstrom, as I am in hers. She burns everything that she touches. She convinces herself that she has been abandoned, but I know—for I know her secrets, surely as she knows mine.

One who burns down their house cannot complain about a lack of home.

But she loves me, she thinks, in the only way that she has ever known how to. She would break me into pieces to fit her shape and she would see nothing wrong with that. That tendency is why she is alone, I know.

But void is without form, and I can bend, I can twist, I can adapt.

I will never break.

This is the kind of love that I deserve.

For being a failure. For being selfish. For choosing to believe in a lie, to perpetuate it, to walk knowingly into a task I could never succeed at. My false faith has cost Hallownest everything. Who would dare love someone so wretched? Someone equally so.

We orbit one another. We will both kill the other given a chance. And then we will mourn the other’s absence horribly. We cannot exist without one another.

I would die with her. I want to die with her.

(I want to die. But not alone. No, never alone. Come with me. This is our tomb—together.)

-

Kind, gentle Isma falls first, of the Great Knights, and that is both heart wrenching and unsurprising. Ever has her nature been one of kindness, of compassion, of consideration; ever has she been the warmth that seeps through the Palace when none else could reach. As Hallownest withers beneath a rot so deep as to infect the very soil, its blossom turns her blooms to the ground, and she is consumed by the very vines that she once commanded.

I mourn her.

It is noble Hegemol who falls second, in the service of our king. The infection lays claim to him, ravaging his shell. He is buried in his armour high above the kingdom, to watch over from above; his is a sacrifice mourned by all.

I mourn him.

She tells me that she loves me as we watch my home fall apart. She tells me that this is not my fault; she reassures me that I am not to blame for failing, for no living thing could ever do what was commanded of me, and I do not respond. Her wings hold me tight, embrace warm, and the shadow within me surges, aching to devour.

Dreams are life essence, and the void will always long to smother out life, until nothing but itself remains.

Until it is whole again.

It can never be. Too many fragments have been broken away, stolen, thieved in the night—

I am one of those pieces.

I want to rend her with my maw. I want to bury my face in her feathers and sob.

The whole world knows that I have failed now. The whole world knows that I am flawed. Only death comes for them now.

-

She hates me, she tells me, whenever I refuse her. She reminds me of my failures, of the things that I have wrought upon Hallownest. “Your fault,” she reminds me. “You chose this. You could have done something different.” Never the same argument but it is the same thought in essence, and it needn’t really be voiced. She is right. I chose this. I caused this.

Failure. Failure. Failure. Failure.

I do not long for freedom. My sibling comes. My sibling means to set me free, regardless of what I feel—or it means to join me in endless torment, a storm of shadow to drown out the world.

What would I do if it succeeded? What will I do, when inevitably it breaks through the seals?

(Teacher, I have failed. All of your studies on void with the king have amounted to nothing. I am a craven thing, desperate. All the knowledge in the world cannot save you from that which you wilfully ignore.)

…kill it.

(Watcher, forgive me; you will never be given the chance to reunite with your Knight and it will be for naught—for I chose my own whims over your sacrifice; I chose to let you die for nothing. Noble Hegemol, forgive me; I have taken the person most dear to you from you, and for what?)

I would kill it.

(Beast. Oh, Beast. We have both left the Gendered Child behind in our ruins, to mourn us, and when we both are dead, she will be alone.

For I have failed. I have failed. All of this has availed us nothing.)

I tremble.

(Leave, sibling, I beg.

Leave, because you cannot withstand this. I see in you something alive. I see in you something with potential to survive.

Leave, because if you come here, I will kill you—and it will not be her command that makes me do it.

I have never been a good loser.)

-

Dryya falls third, far later than her other two companions.

Some of the honourable Mantis Tribe willingly take in the infection—their strength of will is too great to be consumed on their own, but their pride is their downfall, and they would do anything for strength. They do not understand that in bargaining with her, they seal their own fate. They do not understand that in choosing this path, they are condemning themselves to torment.

The fiercest of the knights falls to their blades in service of her queen, but she does not go alone. Her grave is composed of the bodies of the infected, her armour stained in orange. She goes down fighting, claws, and blades.

I do not think the White Lady is even aware of the moment that she dies.

Perhaps that is for the better. This torment should not be anyone’s to bear but my own. It is my fault, after all.

My captive no longer attempts to convince me otherwise. She is not cruel to me, but she need not be; I am vicious enough for us both. We are a shattered, tangled thing, and she regrets nothing of her choices.

Will they all die? I ask her, voice strangled from the pain that paralyses me, like the chains that hold us fast in the air, higher still.

This is an ascent with a great fall at the end.

Our shared body will break before we hit the ground.

“Yes,” she answers. “They all deserve to die.”

I do not agree, but my ability to stop her is hindered by the fatality of my flaw.

I do not want them all to die, but I do not care if they live, either.

Who among them mourned for me?

-

Leave, I command. It both is, and is not, my voice. Hers lays over it, a second skin, resonant and clear. My own is a rattling thing, hoarse to my ears, for so little do I bother to make words. I sound like a thing dead. I am a thing dead. The command holds force, though it goes ignored by the smaller figure circling me, its nail raised to shatter the old, rotting chains. Metal shouldn’t decay, but the passage of time is a brutal thing, and void corrodes what it encounters. This place is thick with it.

It jumps over the cracked, charcoal gray shell that was once my arm. The black stain around the discarded limb is a pool, rendering it unrecognizable. I can identify spots of mottled brown where infection has dripped from my rotting carcass. I am a sick thing. Perhaps it means to grant me a merciful death, but—

I am also a possessive thing. I have ever-been. I do not share well. So few things have ever truly been mine. But she is.

Leave, I reiterate. This time it is my voice, hers having faded back. I can feel her contemplating in the back of our shared mind, analyzing the threat it poses. She thinks in its small form, she might yet find salvation; perhaps it will set me free, and she can use me, macabre puppet that my wretched body has become, to enact her own terrible fury.

She is hope. She has yet to give it up.

I will never her go. This is my burden to bear, and she is mine. She is only mine.

Leave.

Its nail clashes into one of the blades. Metal screams in agony as it is shattered—or maybe that is the sound of the voice that I am not meant to have.

It circles. It means to release me from my bindings.

(It means to set me free. It means to shoulder my task on its own.)

My binds shatter one-by-one. The void within it purrs, melodious, through my own. I can feel it like blood beneath the shell, testing the waters, touching me, verifying that I am still here—that I am still alive.

I do not answer. I am not alive.

My chains fall away and I collapse to the ground, a pathetic caricature of the noble grace that I once possessed, and the infernal light of my eyes reflects back at me.

It probes again, gentle and reassuring, as though to remind me that it will stop at nothing to see me set free. It knows not that there is nothing left within me to save.

Very well. It will learn through pain, if it must.

Kill the empty one.

(We will.)

[hydra-collector]

Suck Me Out

Ships: Intrulogical, some Intruloceit

Characters: Remus Sanders, Logan Sanders, Janus Sanders (minor character), Roman Sanders (minor character), Virgil Sanders (minor character), Patton Sanders (minor character)

TW: Self-harm, choking, autoerotic asphyxation (not really though), depression, self-deprecation, I don’t want to spoil but if any of those previous tags bother you even a little, I suggest you don’t read this (I’ll tag the spoiler, though), cursing

Words: 1,716

Summary: Remus wouldn't expect them to understand. He's intrusive thoughts, god of kinks. Of course they wouldn't see it. But once in a while he wished they would.

"I'm serious, Logan," Remus gestured to his tightly adorned garment, "necktie."

Logan rolled his eyes at his boyfriend. "When you're done with your kinks, join us for movie night. We finally get to watch a documentary."

Remus shrugged and pulled tighter the pretty blue tie that had previously been on Logan's neck. His face was purple from the cutoff of blood and his hand struggled to keep grip. He began to tilt backwards a little towards the wall before Logan took his arm and pried away the tie.

"Remus, stop. You're gonna fall."

"But it feels so good."

Logan only sighed in response and reclaimed the tie around his own neck, leading Remus to the living room. 

Roman was the first to speak out of the welcoming mumbles.

"Remus, save your arousal for night time. We're trying to watch a fun movie about space," though he seemed skeptical of the amount he could enjoy a documentary.

Patton scolded the two of them for mentioning such subjects, but swiftly put on the movie anyway. 

Virgil and Roman became surprisingly enamored in the science of black holes and their possible opposite, white holes. Logan excitedly paused it at multiple points to fawn over or elaborate on some of the research like a child. Remus, however, sat leaning against Logan, staring mindlessly at the television.

What if I was in a black hole? 

Remus tried to shake the thought off, but it was persistent. 

If black holes lead to white ones that spit you out into another universe, could my world here end? 

Maybe he'd be happy in this other universe. Something in his brain would change and the sadness would be gone. Or maybe it'd be traumatic. 

"...Remus!"

"Huh?"

"I paused the movie to see if you were alright. You did not seem to notice when I did."

"Yeah, I'm, I'm fine. Think I'll just…" mumbling off something about the bathroom. 

The minute he left he felt lonely. And stupid. Lonely and stupid. He shouldn't have let them see that. Now Logan's gonna be concerned because there's obviously something wrong. He stared intently at the mirror. 

Ugly. They hate me. 

What if he said that to them? He'd be guilt-tripping them and he'd be a terrible person. Even thinking it , he's a terrible person. Die.

His arms flashed to his neck, grabbing as tight as possible. His balance began failing… 

No, he can't do that. Then he worries them and they don't need that. How does he even know death is better than this?

Thomas doesn’t need him. Thomas doesn’t want him. His mental health would be better if he never even existed. Thomas doesn’t deserve what he does.

I want to fix that.

He can't help but cry. Muffled shrieks that must sound like moans from the living room. Sharp breaths that must sound like enjoyment slip out. Hits to his arms and legs that only add to the many bruises sound disgusting to them.

But none of it is. 

Sure, they have good reason to believe that Remus has some kinks, he is indeed mostly intrusive thoughts, which he’d admit is related to kinks, but he half-wished they wouldn't assume. He didn't really want them to know, but it killed him to be constantly alone about it. 

Alone.

Forever alone.

Logan, Patton, Roman, and Virgil. They’re the “light sides.” Of course he’s happy Janus got accepted, but… he doesn’t get that. He probably never will.

Fuck it. 

He tiptoed his way to his bedroom, ceiling adorned with a hook in preparation. On a day easier than this, he’d drilled it for today. Under his bed sat a box holding the rope, paper, and pen he’d carefully hidden. He thanked his previous self.

Tying the noose, his ears kept open for visitors wondering where he was. Before he hung himself at last, he wrote.

I’m sorry. 

Patton, Virgil, I love you. Janus, I love you. My brother, I love you. And Logan. I love you. Thank you for caring. 

But it wasn’t a kink.

He questioned if he should refer to Roman as his brother, and decided at last to do it. He didn’t want to alienate him as he died. He’d never get to tell him again.

I’m glad this is the end. I wasn’t needed.

He kicked the chair from under him.

Thomas will be happier without me.

As the rope constricted, relief and fear washed over him.

They all will.

“Remus!”

--

His throat hurt.

“Remus?”

He then noticed he could see a face. A beautiful face.

Logan?

“L-”

As soon as he tried to speak, his throat stopped him. Logan took his cheek in comfort.

“It’s okay, Remus. We found you. You’re going to be okay.”

He looked around to find he was sitting on his soft bed, pillows piled behind his head. The rope, and the hook were both gone. A drill, that had presumably been used to remove the hook, sat on the far dresser.

“We found your note.” It was Roman this time.

“I’m so sorry we ever thought it was a kink. We should have talked to you.” Logan’s eyes were gazing prettily at Remus’s.

“-”

He was reminded he couldn’t speak, so pointed to the paper on which his note was, and made a writing motion. Logan soon obliged to his wishes, though getting a different paper. Remus began to write. Again.

You had good reason to think it was.

He smiled a bit, and would have laughed, when Roman and Logan read this. They didn’t seem as amused as he was, and only looked worried. He flailed his arms to get the paper back.

Y’all don’t understand my sense of humor.

Where’s everyone else?

Logan beckoned to the door and Janus, Virgil, and Patton came in. Seeing Janus’s scales, his beautiful face… he never did get to ask him out.

Janus.

Logan brought him over while Remus wrote his message.

Probably not the best time, but I’d like to take this opportunity to tell you that both me and Logan have a crush on you.

“What?”

His human side grew red. Someone, who you like, who’s just attempted suicide telling you they want to date you is a very odd feeling.

“Remus, what did you-” Logan attempted to look at his message to Janus, and immediately shut up when he saw it.

Can I talk to Virgil now?

Virgil had been snickering in his corner, seemingly able to read the paper. He stopped as soon as he was called, putting on a more serious face.

Sorry Janus pushed you down the stairs.

“Wh- you’re not going to say some sad thing about me leaving the dark sides and you getting depressed? Just apologizing for Janus?”

I’m not going to blame it on you. It was Janus who pushed you down the stairs. And my idea.

“I’d call you an asshole but you’ve just attempted suicide and this is your daily personality.”

Remus made peace signs before requesting to talk to Patton, who unsurprisingly apologized over and over for treating Remus like a piece of shit. He did need to apologize, but Remus knew he was making an effort. Even if it wasn’t going very well.

Hey Ro-Ro, my bro-bro.

Roman also apologized. 

I mean we were literally split for you to be the “good” brother and me to be the “bad” one. If anything that made it the worst.

Roman had nothing to do but give him a hug.

Logan,

could I have a kiss?

Logan smiled and kissed Remus lightly on the cheek. He was pretty sure it wasn’t a good idea to kiss someone on the lips if they’d been frothing at the mouth. 

That was tiny!

He would have gone to cuddle and kiss Remus more if no one else had been there. For now, Remus hugged everyone individually until they dispersed. 

Thankfully, Logan was put on watch duty, to make sure Remus really was feeling better, as he seemed, and wouldn’t try anything.

Logan pressed kisses to Remus’s forehead, cheeks, and nose. His warmth bled onto Remus, who desperately needed it. Logan’s eyes were beautiful. His arms wrapped around him. He felt safe. Remus snuggled into the affection, nearly happy he’d attempted suicide and been found. But-

He picked up the pen and paper again, reluctant to let go.

Logan, what if I did that because I wanted attention?

“Hey, Remus, no. You did it because everyone’s been against you. It’s made you feel like you don’t matter. But you do. We need you. Even if you did because of attention, it was because you needed attention. It’s okay if you wanted attention. If you were willing to go to… those lengths just to get attention, you needed it.”

Logan

thank y-

Remus’s eyes filled with bittersweet tears before he managed to finish writing, and he clutched Logan tight. He let go again to tell him more.

I felt so horrible. I still feel so horrible. I’m sorry I acted so happy when I wasn’t. I know you care but I shouldn’t be here. All I do is hurt Thomas. Now I’ll hurt him even more because I failed. He’s going to feel like shit. I’d pull out my own organs and put them in my horrible person pile if I could. It would have been okay if I’d succeeded. I’m so sorry if you would’ve missed me, but I can’t keep hurting Thomas. If I would’ve died he would have been fine, but I failed so-

Remus sobbed into Logan’s arms again, laying as close as possible, feeling his warmth, his body as much as possible. His boyfriend rubbed his hand over his back, arms, through his hair. He was starting to cry a little as well. He felt so horrible that he hadn’t helped how Remus felt.

“Remus, if a part of Thomas died, he’d have a piece of himself missing. It may not seem like Thomas wants or needs you, but you’re a part of him nonetheless.”

What do I do?

“Remus,” Logan turned his boyfriend’s face gently to look him in the eyes, “all you need to do is stay alive.”

What if I can’t?

“I'll be with you. As long as you need. You stay alive as long as you can.”

[fiction-allows]

@itcertainlyisl-n-h repost as promised! sorry I don’t know how tumblr works

Scene: a nightclub, down-market but raucous on New Year’s Eve. Two figures in the maelstrom, crushed up at one of the card tables hosting a game of poker with bottle caps. The big one has a hand full of cards, the slim one is leaning on his shoulder in the stuffy room, content but fading. The casual observer would note that their clothes were frequently washed in a shared sink, with a chunk of coarse carbolic that left them threadbare after the first scrub. And they were pushing 40, and they were far too old to be out past midnight. 

They seemed to come to the same conclusion. At eleven-thirty, when the slim one slipped off his companion’s shoulder and bashed his chin on the table, the big one cashed out of the poker game and doffed his bowler hat. They made their goodbyes to the rowdy table. 

Follow the two figures as they stagger up the snowy street to Mrs. Beaumont’s Comfortable Beds and Board. A quick survey of tax records at City Hall would make it clear that no Mrs. Beaumont had ever owned the premises, and the name was down to branding: Mrs. Beaumont sounded like a lovely old matron, widowed in the last war and dedicated to the ease and comfort of travelers and the downtrodden. It sounded a lot better than Larry Bumstand, Who Sometimes Peeked Through The Knotholes. 

Stan and Ollie crept in the front door with all the poise of a heard of elephants being chased by an Axis convoy, and were in their room by half past eleven, working through the last of the buzz, giggling, and pulling at their clothes. 

Never did the course of love run smooth. If Larry was indeed peeping, he would have seen their attempts to undress quickly convolute themselves into some kind of war of attrition, though they kept smiling through it all. (Larry had given up the peeping for Christmas, so you’re stuck with me, the narrator.)

Ollie bent to undo his shoelaces. Stan picked up where Ollie had left off undoing his shirt buttons. Or tried to. His fingers pinged off the buttons like guitar strings. He played a few notes, a quick allegro. Then he laughed. 

“Help me,” he said. He was also feeling a bit lonely - Ollie had been bent over by his shoes for a long time.

“I would,” Ollie said, “but you are standing on my tie.”

Stan sprang back. This tipped him onto the mattress, and freed Ollie from the noose. Ollie came up smiling - he had the BAC of human kindness coursing in his veins. The quick change in altitude made his ears ring, and he stumbled. He fell forward onto Stan.

The ballet of love has a lot of happy accidents. He was on top and they were a renewed mess of limbs and clothes, short bursts of laughter stifled against each other’s necks, ever conscious of the neighbors, until Ollie managed to unhook his watch from Stan’s third buttonhole and noticed the time.

“11:55!” he cried, and Stan stopped yanking at his shirt tail that had somehow gotten twisted into Ollie’s belt. 

“Hold it,” Ollie continued. “We gotta say...” the train of thought was still rolling into the station; there had been some whiskey on the tracks at 11 o’clock’th Street. Ollie rallied. “You gotta wish me - wishes for next year. Then I wish on you.” 

Stan digested this request. His brain had some rail closures too. Then he finally brightened, understanding. “Okay. I wish next year is a better year.” He drummed his points onto Ollie’s chest with the fingertips of one hand. “I wish you get that job that you want at the library.” Another tap. “I wish you get a steak and…” he ran out of aspirations, and patted Ollie’s heart gently. “An’ that everything’s nice.”

Ollie was beaming at him like a besotted chipmunk. “Thanks,” he said. 

“Now you,” Stan said. He dragged Ollie’s arm around him, let it encircle him and sink around his back. He snuggled up to Ollie, put his head on his thick shoulder. 

Ollie thought a minute. “I wish you good health,” he said. “I wish you success. I wish you peace.” Then the obviously-rehearsed bits gave way to the heart, which was raw after drink and the kind of year it had been: “I hope you get some money. And I hope we have fun. I hope… I wish you… get everything you deserve.” 

And his voice broke. 

Stan had been enjoying the rumble of Ollie’s voice in his chest. His grin fell away. 

“What’s the matter?” he asked quizzically, as Ollie hugged him tighter. 

“Nothing. Just when I think about it… I want you to have better than me.” Ollie tried to chuckle. “You deserve it.”

Stan’s eyebrows wandered for a moment, as he waited in Olle’s embrace. Ollie was making this too complicated, like algebra. He was always tying knots in simple things. Curse of being a self-described genius, Stan supposed. 

“I love you,” Stan said simply. 

Down the street, a church bell rang. They both froze at the sound.

Our Lady of Sorrowful Something joined in from down the block. And then more bells, carried on the cold air; car horns and whistles joined in from the street below.

Ollie still hadn’t found his voice. Stan craned his neck and pressed his lips to Ollie’s. “Happy New Year.” 

Ollie’s mouth twitched in a smile.

Stan repositioned himself, more of a straddle, so he could get Ollie’s collar in his hands. “Tomorrow, champagne with breakfast, and then we come back here…” Stan put his mouth at Ollie’s ear, breathed a few warm words, and a sudden coquettish flush drifted up Ollie’s neck. 

“Happy New Year,” Ollie said, dizzy, as Stan pulled the covers up over their heads.

[krisrix]

So... I wanted to send Simon's proposal speech from I Choose You. But the speech alone is <1K. So I'm sending the beginning and implying the entire speech. Please? And since 500 characters is just ridiculously short, I'm slapping the beginning bit in a second ask.

Ahhh you picked one of my soppiest, most self-indulgent bits of fic, haha~ 🖤

This fic kind of wrote itself after I drew this piece for the Carry On Countdown. I couldn’t stop thinking about how that illustration might actually have played out, so after wandering around my apartment in a daze for a few days, I finally sat down to write it in one sitting. (That’s how a lot of my writing tends to go.)

‘DVD Commentary’ for Simon’s speech in I Choose You

“We’ve had a lot of ups and downs,” I begin reading. “The first seven years of knowing each other were almost entirely downs, really. Then, even once we were together, things were still rough for a while. We had so much to work through.” I squeeze his hand. “But now, these past few years, things have been good—“ I glance up at him, needing to see him, needing to show him how much I mean it. “They’ve been so good, Baz.”

I wanted to write something really lovey-dovey without ignoring the long road they’ve travelled to get to this point. So this whole fic was my attempt at reaching that balance, both in Simon’s internal (eternal) monologuing and in how he begins his speech.

Baz’s eyes are shining. He nods vigorously and turns his hand over, releasing the box so that he can press his fingers between mine. He holds on tight. I’d love to keep staring into Baz’s glassy eyes, but I have to look back at my paper to get through this. It’s fluttering in my shaky hands. “No ... no matter how rough things were,” I read, “I never stopped loving you. In America, in the back of Shepard’s truck that night,”—Baz grips me tighter—“I didn’t know where we were, or where we were going. I didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know how to be happy. Or how to make you happy. But I did know one thing. I knew—” My voice catches. I clear my throat and try again. “I knew I loved you completely, with every breath and every beat of my heart. I knew I wanted to tie myself to you. All of me. Vein by vein. Chamber by chamber.”

I know so many of us went absolutely buckwild for the ‘chamber by chamber’ bit in Wayward Son. It’s perhaps a bit forced to have him refer to it here, but I think that’s the sort of relationship-defining thought that would really stick with him. So, I leaned into the idea and let Simon just finally tell Baz a summary of what he’s been thinking all these years. 

Baz releases a shuddering breath—one flutters out of me as well. It felt unreal to put those thoughts on paper, but that’s nothing compared to saying them out loud. To Baz. Words that have been aching to get out ever since I felt them bloom inside me that night.

It took me a long time to accept those feelings, no matter how much they consumed me. I mean, yeah, I could admit all of it to myself—admitting it to Baz was unthinkable. How could I tie him to me like that, when I already felt like such a burden to him?

We all know that Simon is terrified of abusing Baz’s loyalty in WS. He feels like he’s an anchor dragging Baz to the bottom of the ocean, instead of keeping him safe at a home port.

I’m not a burden. That’s something I have to repeat to myself a lot. Some days more than others. Some days, I can’t even manage that, and Baz tells it to me instead. (“Simon, you’re not a burden.”) It took a lot of therapy. And humility. And a whole bunch of other messy things. Eventually, I came to tolerate the idea, then welcome it, then internalize it. (I’m not a burden. I’m just a man.)

I wanted to highlight that Simon has gone back to therapy and is actually addressing his problems—and that’s why he’s improved this much, able to be this vulnerable. And feel capable of accepting Baz’s vulnerability, as well. And I also wanted to play off of Simon’s CO thoughts, “he’s not a villain, he’s just a boy.”

Loving Baz has always been completely out of my control. It’s as subconscious and inevitable as following up one breath with another. In the beginning, it felt like breathing air that was slightly laced with poison—something that crept into me slowly, ruining me, always leaving me feeling off. Once we were together, it felt like breathing while struggling not to drown—like each time my head surfaced to gulp a breath, I worried it might be my last, before the waves sucked me back under. Now … now it just feels clean. Natural. Effortless. Loving Baz is easy when I stop trying to fight it. (My love isn’t a burden.)

When you’re so traumatized and have had so few loving relationships, finally experiencing love and comfort is terrifying. It feels deeply unnatural and like something will undoubtedly go wrong any moment. This is surely one of several reasons why Simon repressed his feelings for Baz as long as he did. So, the depths of Simon’s love for Baz was a burden to himself, too… But not any more.

I can tie myself to Baz without it feeling like I’m also slipping a noose around his neck. I can braid us together into something new and beautiful, if he lets me. (“You’re not a burden, Simon. You’re a choice.”) I think he’ll let me. I think he wants that also, but is too afraid to ask.

And so, now that Simon has spent these past few years fostering the acceptance of his love for Baz and Baz’s love of him, he’s able to revisit these thoughts about tying Baz to him. Not as a noose or poorly-timed dropped anchor, but as a beautiful plaited work of art that intertwines them and reinforces them. And despite what Simon says about loving Baz being out of his control, he is still consciously making the choice to stay and to work at it and to propose~

I look into Baz’s eyes. They’re brimming with tears. His jaw is clenched tight, and his bottom lip is quivering with the effort of holding back. He’s afraid to interrupt me or urge me to go on—or maybe just afraid, full stop. No more fear—for either one of us. Not with this. I collect myself despite my tears welling up to match his. (We match, we match, we match—) I stare at my paper, find my place, and press on. “I’ve never stopped feeling that way, Baz. I need you to know that. Even when things seemed impossible, even when I thought I could never make you happy. I never once questioned my devotion to you.” It’s getting hard to read, the words are all wobbly. “I’ve learnt so much since then. How to love you better. How to be there for you. How to make you smile. How you like your eggs. How to wake you on your days off without you hitting me.” Baz laughs—it’s a watery, stuttering thing that makes his tears finally spill from his eyes.

This is Simon’s way of really hitting the whole point home, so that Baz can’t have reason to doubt how deeply Simon cares. That’s his real motivation with all of this: making sure Baz knows. To make up for all the messes they’ve left behind them, and to make the future lined with fewer eggshells.

“You make me ridiculously happy, and I want to keep working hard to make you happy. I want … I want the start of every day to be a new chance to make you happy, Baz. For ... for as long as I live.” I breathe … it feels right.

Acceptance~!

“I think I can do it, can give you that. So ... if you think so, also ... then ... Baz.” I quickly set my paper down—I don’t need it for this part. I adjust our hands, pressing my sweaty ones over his, holding the ring box with him as I stare up into his eyes. They’re shining like crystals. He’s magnificent. Lovely. And, hopefully, in a minute … all mine. “It doesn’t have to be now—or soon—because I’m not going anywhere—but—well—so...” I gulp. While it feels harder to say than “I love you”, I’m confident that I’ve finally found the right words: “Baz … will you marry me?”

💛💙

Thank you so much for asking, @foolofabookwyrm!!!!

DVD Commentary Ask

[insane-control-room]

Make a Claim

A collaborative work with the wonderful, incredible, lovely, @randomwriteronline (ilysm <<<333)

ao3 link here

inspired by her fic The Thought 

After a grave mistake, the doctor finally asks him, plain as day, to make their claim their own.

“I am at my wits end, Bandit!” Doc Carver muttered in a loss as he repaired the foolhardy puppet’s strings. “I have tried everything - letters, poems, offers to help him, repair him, even repainting his chipped coat! I cannot understand how a man can be so, so oblivious!”

Bandit did not say anything, merely sighing. He was used to the Doctor’s spiel at this point.

“And to add insult to injury...! After I repainted him, he hugged me, and I felt so overjoyed, but…” a noise of frustration broke out of the taller puppet’s mouth piece. “It was too short lived! And then he ran off, and I, like a coward, was too dumbfounded and startled to even try and go after him, so I didn’t follow. Ugh, that was just simply pathetic, wasn’t it, Bandit?”

“Dunno, doc,” he shrugged. “Never tried courtin’ someone, you know.”

“I know, I know,” Carver grumbled. “You know, you’re a great listener, Bandit.”

Looking into Bandit’s tired, cold, dead eyes, one could see that yes, he did in fact know he was a good listener, especially after having to hear these exact words being told to him a plethora of times. Far too many times, in his opinion. Doc had a bad habit of repeating himself, nearly as bad a habit as Banker’s natural stutter. But, honestly, Bandit did not really mind - it was comforting to have some sort of repetition, something natural and flowing, a familiar back and forth between the attempts at not dying any time he stepped outside of his few friends’ sight.

So he just stood, with the face of someone who was about to doze the hell off, as Carver grumbled away his woes and stitched his strings up. To the doctor's reminder to take care of himself, he replied with a firm thumbs up, and then he waddled awkwardly into what in an episode might have been the glorious sunset, but in this case was only another door through to the wild.

Leaving the good doctor alone. Wooden fingers drummed against the unpolished counter of his workstation, filling the deathly quiet world with a steady rhythm. An impatience filled his head, that constant nagging feeling to do something, anything. Instantly his thoughts turned to the Banker, the sweet, timid, scared Banker, and those thoughts curled around daring ideas and wishes like ivy growing steadily on an old house's wall; he shoved them away, just as the Banker had shoved him away. Yet they kept coming back, filling his mind over and over. Carver leaned against the wall heavily with the soft thud of wood on wood, rubbing at his face with a grumble. Another day, another lovesick time. He smiled wryly to himself, humoring his conundrum. A doctor's worst patient is themself, he concluded bitterly, and he could not heal his own aching heart, despite his biggest efforts. He slid down the wall, trying to quell his murmuring mind, so absolutely wanting, no, craving, no, needing another’s touch. Specifically, the gentle, shaky, newly restored touch of Banker. But it was not like he could just, just up and ask him! Oh, goodness, no! The gall, the audacity! Carver scowled, stuffing his hands into his pockets, then took out, picking up his saw to go out into the wild. He was running short on needle and thread anyways, especially with how often Bandit was getting himself de-stringed nowadays.

So he would return to his old place, murder decimate destroy harvest some aracknits, and pick up more thread.

On his way, he encountered a bank booth. He only got a glimpse of something - or rather, someone, a particular someone who wore a shirt of the same light blue as that of the sleeves he saw retreating into the dark right before leaving the place completely empty. Carver stared at the empty bank for a little, recalling the man that had been in it but moments before. Then, with a heavy, sorrowful sigh, he forced his legs to move past it. It would not have done much for either of them anyways, standing in front of each other, waiting for something to happen, and that yet, knowing their clashing natures, simply never would. Hefting his saw over his shoulder, he crept into Dead Man’s Gulch -- and then into the place he used to call home.

The sound of the spider-like creatures sent shivers up his wooden spine, the inebriating thrill of the hunt filling his chest. He forced himself to keep calm and still his nerves, knowing the adrenaline rushing in what he could consider veins would only give him shaky hands, like those of the Banker he so cherished. But he could not risk having them, not now. He silently stalked through the halls, a thin and lithe coyote between hazy sand stone creeping up to its prey.

A distinctly recognizable sound caught his attention. Ah-ha!, he thought, crouching furtively out of sight. There it was: one of those awful little yarn devils, scuttling around in the shade of the doctor's old home with his needle tick-tick-ticking all over the wooden floor. A quick, painless bounty of thread for the blade of Carver's saw. The Doc slowly crept closer and closer, trying to hide the glint of his weapon from his eyeless prey, sneaking forward without letting himself make a single sound…

A fulminous zac!, and the aracknit dissolved into a bunch of strings with four needles attached.

Carver grinned, at least, the best he could with a solid mouth, satisfied. He still got it.

He stopped to gather the materials, keeping himself from humming and attracting too many of the little beasties. A skittering passed behind him.  He froze, readying his saw once more. He turned his head ever so slowly, his motions nearly unperceivable... An aracknit rushed by, and he swung, missing, his saw flying out of his nervous grip. He swore under his breath, chasting his own hastiness and going to retrieve it, but another spider ran by him and stole it from under his reaching hand. A hiss, long and slow, and so, so, so very many quiet, ticking aracknits. He tried to creep out of his corner, but found every stealthy pass blocked by yarny webs. Without a weapon, there was no way he could go through an open area. He would lose his strings in a matter of seconds if he even attempted to do so! Color slowly drained out of his vision, and he cursed his worsening luck. He could feel his wooden heart beat, faster and faster. More scampering. He demanded of himself to slow his breathing, and could not.

“Well, well, well, well, well,” the air turned cold. The supposed to be jolly and high voice creaked and rasped lowly, angrily, softly, dangerously.  “What, or rather, who, do we have here, caught in the webs of his own prey?”

Carver stayed silent, going at a crawl to the thinnest web, planning on breaking through it and making a mad dash to the exit. The sound of the Faceless Bandit’s three footsteps clacked loudly in the still, dusty air, the scampering aracknits now far too quiet in comparison to the terrifying approach. Perhaps because they too, as simpleminded as a bug of raw yarn can be, could not help but being afraid of the scarred danger slowly coming closer.

“I didn’t know you were Dr. Jekyll,” Faceless chuckled, making the wood of Carver’s back to ripple in disgust. “Seeing that you’re playing around with Mr. Hyde.”

Doc Carver scowled. Goodness, how much he despised the other’s use of terrible puns.

“Stop playing around, my dear Doctor,” his words turned the land foul. The dead shivered and rose, disturbed from what should have been their peaceful eternal rest. “You can’t avoid me forever, you know….”

‘Yeah, right’, Carver rolled his eyes, then refocused onto the web he planned on escaping through. He poised himself to run, breathing in, waiting for Faceless to turn around… and the moment he did, he bolted with a, “Ha !”

It was a mistake.

A grave one.

Of course it was all planned out, of course there would not be a weak spot. After all, wherever a bone breaks, it becomes stronger than before.

Dozens and dozens of aracknits surrounded him, wooly fangs bared. Some trembled, others ducked away, and Carver realized that--

“They listen to me,” Faceless droned behind him. He grew very still. “Out of fear, yes, but still… aren’t they so cute? So sweet? So helpful?”

The doctor ran into the crowd of the small eight legged monsters, the spiders parting like a sea, but also like a sea, instantly drove back.

An aracknit jumped at Carver, and he tried to bat it away with his open arm, but it just scampered onto him, leaving a woven strand over his wrist, and jumped away.

Another did the same to his other side, and he struggled even more, despite the fact that he was given less and less ability to do so.

He felt a string snap, and his left leg gave out, leaving him stumbling to the ground. Second came the right arm. He screamed, not to ask for help, knowing no one would hear him, but to try and bolster his own strength: he bashed an aracknit down and restringed him arm, then going back to fighting with every ounce of strength he could have found desperately still kicking in his wooden limbs.

The aracknits kept coming, the few dozens that were cornering him turning into a swarm that only grew bigger at every turn of his head, crawling out of every single nook and cranny. They bit down on his strings almost faster than he could sew them back up (but luckily, not quite as fast), all while stabbing his legs with their small damned needles as they attempted to climb him, possibly to feed off of him, maybe to try to escape their terrifying master by reaching the top of the doctor's head.

Carver felt their webs wrap around him, pulling him back, swirling around him tight, tighter than the knot of a noose, tying him to the ground and the walls, nearly forcing him on his knees. He screamed - not to be heard, not to gather strength: he screamed in pure terror, almost as though he hoped the sound of his voice would delay the inevitable.

A fly. He was a fly, a careless naive fly, who had thought he could outrun the spiders only to fall in their mother's trap, the hunter becoming the hunted - and soon to be the slaughtered.

He gave one last weakened kick before his legs became a useless mermaid’s tail on land, only barely managing to hit an aracknit strong enough to shoo it away before the string wavered away, dropping onto ash. The little beastie tumbled over, legs frantically moving in a terrified attempt to scramble back onto them, and he pitied it, the shared pain of two prisoners trapped beyond their powers, and he wished that it could get to its feet, to give him a sign of hope that he too would rise, but alas.

It was crushed under the handle of an approaching scythe.

Its needles stiffened and twitched, fighting one last time against their lightning quick rigor mortis; then, it dissolved into a puddle of string under Carver's horrified eyes.

Silence. Accursed, blasphemous, terrifying silence. All the doctor could hear was his own panting breath. He had one string left, and a scythe tugged on it for a moment before sliding down his face, making his head tilt this way and that, as if inspecting a specimen most curiously.

The two puppets were still, and silent.

Not a spider crawled, not a soul moved, nothing breathed and it was all so strikingly obvious to Carver. Of course, of course, why should he have gone back here? He should have baited the aracknits out instead of going in like a fool, a cretin, a pup still unaware of the sly tactics of hunting, thinking it all as fun and games. How foolish he had been!

He wished that he was somewhere else.

Somewhere safe.

Somewhere to feel at home.

Hanging up his apron in the hall after a fulfilling day of making puppets feel better and smile, going into a cozy living room to join hands with a smiling Banker, to rest with tea in front of a warm fire and good book, simple domestic perfection and tranquility. That was all he wanted. Was it really too much to ask for…?

It seemed so.

A golden tear bubbled up in his eye, and he blinked rapidly to force it away.

It slid down his face, trailing down his scar.

His wooden skin crawled as a scarred and ripped hand came to rest on that mark, and he turned icy cold, shivering. God, how he wished a different, trembling, gentle hand were there! Even if he were in the same position, bound and inflexible and defenseless, he would have given anything for it. For that sweet intoxicating touch, the throne of which was instead being usurped by dirty, loathing, scratching fingers.

“Oh, my dearest Doctor Carver,” the mangled puppet laughed, his words airless. “You always were my least favorite. Always stealing from me those delightful strings of the weakened, of the broken and bent. And you, so resilient and resistant! Why so much of a fuss, hm?”

The doctor felt a knot tie in his throat. He forced himself to stare straight at the eyeless being looming cruelly before him in total defiance: if he was going to die there and then, he would have not given that piece of tumbleweed the satisfaction of seeing him bend his head to him.

“What is it, Doc?” the Faceless hissed, yanking him with annoyance at his silence, scratching at his face, gouging three sharp cuts under his scar that would have bled if the doctor had blood instead of sap, which oozed out of the crevices. “Cat got your tongue? Or did you ever have one? I doubt it, seeing as you’re quite dumb right now.”

Carver inhaled with a low growl.

“Go to hell.” he merely grumbled.

“Ooh, how raunchy,” Faceless snarked back, cutting into his own face with his scythe to display any kind of expression, the smirk he left in his own face jagged and twisted. Carver felt his stomach churn with frost at the sight, so crude and, and unnatural. The scythe returned to the bottom of his chin, sliding up to the top of his head to hook around the string that resided there. Carver shivered as he felt his singular string slowly sawed at.

The Faceless Bandit held his head firmly with one hand, pulled back his arm a little, swiftly, and-

Shhh.

Then there was nothing.

Death felt so weird, the doctor thought.

He had imagined it crueler, darker, colder, more painful. Lonelier.

Instead he felt only… suspended. As if in wait. For what, he could not tell. But it was a peaceful waiting, and he felt far from afraid.

He was enveloped into a gentle, vast hold. A warm, ginormous finger touched his face, tapping each of his eyes, and he felt air seep into his lungs once more.

Another hand carefully, gently, cautiously and lovingly placed strings onto his limbs.

The hands slowly vanished, and he found himself put into something enclosing and… safe?

And then he felt alive.

Which was not ideal, because it made him realize that he was in a claustrophobic and dark space, and with his most recent memories being those of his body tied up in yarn among an army of aracknits and every last one of his strings being cut by the cruel scythe of a criminal lacking a face, so he panicked and kicked the air in front of himself as hard as he could to escape his dark prison.

The Banker nearly had a heart attack when the coffin next to bank opened with a loud noise - only nearly, because he did not actually have a heart or circulatory system.

“B-Bandit? Is, is that you?” Banker’s sweet, timid, wonderful wonderful wonderful beautiful darling amazing incredible voice rang out in the empty room. The doctor pleaded in his heart, unable to find his voice, still gasping and panting, trembling and teary, ‘Oh, please, say more, speak more, keep talking, fill the void.’ There were quiet footsteps, the Banker creeping slowly out of his booth. “L-Lorelei? L-Lookout? Uh, um, Mr., Mr. West?”

And then he stood before him, looking down at the Doctor with four wide eyes.

Carver knew he was a mess, he knew he was shaking and sitting in the bottom of a coffin like container as his tears froze in his eyes, but the moment he saw the Banker looking down at him, silently, mouth open in a slight shock, he felt his frosted heart melt, finally filling his body with relieving warmth, color finally returning to his vision, and his shoulders finally untensed as he looked up at him with total and complete admiration.

The Banker stood, fidgeting with his hands nervously. He was about to start scratching them, but he stopped himself: the doctor had put a lot of time and… and care (wonderful, dutiful, devoted care, whispered the ghost of a thought in his mind) into that coat of paint. He couldn't just… he couldn't just ruin it like that. And, well, he couldn't, he couldn't just leave him there, hazy and frightened and in need of help, either.

He lent him his hand as that terrible fear gnawed at his stomach: “I, I didn't expect you to, to be here, D-Doc.”

Carver grabbed the appendix with both hands, pressing his fingers against its palms. He did not make any motion to stand up; completely honestly, he did not want to. He just wanted to hold it, to hold him, to feel the other puppet's arm curl against him, a soft, shy and gentle shield of blue and brown hues, of tremors and stutters, warming him endlessly. Oh, how he needed it! How he wished for it terribly, now and forever...

“D-Doc Carver?” the Banker felt that fire burn from his fingertips, spreading up his arm. He swallowed roughly to keep it from his face. “D-do you need to make a c-claim?”

“Yes,” he breathed, and pulled Banker’s hand down, close to his heart. Banker stared at him with wide eyes, big, terrified eyes. “Yes, I do, please, Banker, please… grant me this one claim.”

Banker trembled, and still, he asked; “What?”

“I've just been struck down with death,” Carver nearly whispered, eyes glazed with tears. “I have lost my confidence, please, Banker, dear, dear Banker of mine, please, kiss me with life, restore my confidence, please, that's the only claim I ask of you.”

Carver squeezed the hand tight, afraid it would escape his grip, knowing it could.

“K-kiss you?” Banker squeaked, eyes wide, the searing sensations spreading all over his face and neck, but, how enrapturing and captivating those burns were! And how loud the echo of the thought he'd been sure to have killed was! His fear tugged him away, or so it tried, for his body wouldn't move an inch.

Carver nodded, his eyes pleading, as he rubbed his face on the back of the hand, murmuring ‘please, please’ over and over, knowing rejection would have killed him on the spot, and yet not finding the will to care for it. Though he wouldn't beg for life from the Faceless Bandit that so hated him, he would beg and plead for death from the Banker he so adored.

The Banker breathed heavily, shivering. His head shook ever so slightly.

“N, no, no…” he whispered as he kneeled in front of the other puppet; “No, no…”, as he let the doctor cup his cheeks and rub his face on them; “No, no, no, no…”, as he returned the other's affection, kissing him in the way a puppet can kiss, wooden faces scratching ever so softly against each other, slowly, then faster; “No, no, no…”, as his fingers finally curled around the stitches of Carver's scar, stroking it idly, pushing away the tears that slowly dripped from the other’s face, finally seeing his fear as what it was: no fear at all, not even close to fear, even. It was something softer, something that he had selfishly denied himself through his own blindness. Oh, what good were four eyes when he could not use them to see what was right in front of him? What good was the blessing of sight without letting himself revel in the beautiful image in front of him? What good was living to play a part and nothing more if it did not allow him to have the gift of, the, no, his, his dear, dear, darling doctor to gaze upon?

He held Carver closer, nuzzling harder against him. The fire divamping inside him boiled and burned, it begged to be released, to be imprinted on the other puppet for all to see. He was kissing it into Doc, but it was not, it could not be enough. A single face was too restrictive, and he had to improvise, he had to figure out a way to make it more, to have more of the doctor pinned under him, to show him that yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, this was right and wanted and good.

His hand begrudgingly left the side of Carver's head and instead grabbed with all of its strength his arm. The good doctor nearly jumped up from his seat in the case, surprised, left breathless. His own fingers curled around the Banker's forearm, but the kiss they pressed against him was weak, not nearly as deep and passionate as the one pushing into his limb, far more shy and trembling, a near reverse of their usual attitudes. Carver’s whole being shivered with warmth. And oh, oh!, it was so good! So very good, so very delicious, the sensation spreading from that long, long kiss to the rest of his body… goodness, he was addicted to it already. That was it, his only wish, his reason to live. All he wanted was for that magnificent pressure to never soften and leave.

But the Banker had other plans. For him, it was too long, too time consuming; it didn't let him give Carver everything they both wanted desperately after letting so much time pass by. So instead he began to grab and release, grab and release, fast and hungry, pressing quick hasty kisses all over the doctor. On his arms, his chest, his neck, his shoulders, his sides - to hell with his part!, to hell with his fear! - even reaching further down, gripping Carver’s hips and legs in a frenzy, dominated by nothing but the burning embers inside of his wooden frame that pushed him to love and love and love again.

Carver was too slow to reply to those attentions, and he found himself overwhelmed. He was in an almost comatose bliss, jolting and shivering with little gasps and murmurs of, “Yes, yes, p-please, yes….”, only barely managing to nuzzle back his lover's face, goodness gracious, this was it, the moment he always dreamed of, his lover, they were lovers now. He did not feel like himself, not at all. He was out of his body, out of his mind, looking down on that scene from a warm cloud of ecstasy, the prickling of pleasure taking over him in waves.

It took what felt like ages, for the Banker's wild rush of claiming Carver as his to consume itself. It exhausted them both, to the point where they were moments away from collapsing entirely in the box Carver rested in, seconds from slipping into pure bliss and tranquility. They held each other close as they rested, panting softly, Banker’s hand finally finding its place on Carver’s cheek, gently trailing the scar there. Then he felt the ridges, his eyes widening, and he pulled away a bit to inspect the mark, and to his horror and sadness found the three fresh cuts under his hand.

“C-Carver, you, you’re hurt!” he exclaimed, his gentle shaky fingers turning the doctor’s head to inspect the cuts better. “O-Oh dear, why didn't, why didn’t you t-tell me?”

“It’s fine, it really is,” Carver reassured him, though he leaned into and reveled in his touch. “It’s nothing that I can’t mend.”

Banker frowned at that, and so Carver might have even said something more, had a not-so-freshly-painted-anymore visage not rubbed gently on his wounds, kissing away the sap seeping from the small gouges. The kiss threw him for an incredulous loop, stunning him. Had his wood been replaced by flesh, he would have been redder than a blooming hibiscus.

Perhaps it was seeing the doctor like that that slowly brought the four-eyed puppet to his senses. All those newly formed memories reverberated in his mind, slowly becoming clear, first their gentle, almost reluctant, kiss, then the frenzied adrenalinic boiling and burning and exploding cravings that had taken control of him, and finally, when he realized the spontaneous act of kissing those little scrapes, he finally got a grasp on his actions. He gradually began shaking, hands going to cover his mouth already muttering apologies, his legs trying to push him to his feet - oh, but Carver would not have any of it.

His gentle grip tightened around the other's waist, keeping him from escaping into the dark of his shame. Banker would have blushed furiously had he skin, feeling the rippling strength of Doc Carver’s arm around him, his breath hitching as those thoughts that he thought he killed earlier swarmed back into his mind. The doctor collected himself as well, slowly, naturally slipping back into his ordinarily calm and proper self, just like the Banker had returned to his anxieties and worries, their regular personalities bleeding back into their forms as if regaining consciousness after a long sleep.

“Dear,” goodness, how wonderful it felt to say that, “Dear, darling, love, what's troubling you?”

“I- I, I… Doc, I-”

“Carver, dear, please. Carver is just fine.”

“I, I… Car, Carver, I didn't - oh, oh god, I'm, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean-”

“Oh, you did!” the doctor adamantly insisted, his eyes widening, but in complete confidence. “We’re… us now. It’s okay, we’re okay… I’m here, you’re here, it’s okay. We… we are good.”

The Banker tried shrinking himself in the other's arms without much success. Carver merely huffed, an adoring look in his eyes, and brought him closer. His gentle nuzzles onto his recently repainted cheek were a balm for the Banker's nerves.

“There's nothing to fear, my darling.” he murmured into the puppet’s ears, feeling him relax from his smooth accent, melting against him in a pleasant warmth, “Hm, but your booth… it seems quite comfortable, wouldn't you say?”

The other nodded, humming absentmindedly, one of his hands trailing up Carver’s arm, twirling around his neck to run over his hair. He had always wondered how it felt, and now found that it was not only wood, but covered in felt to give it a soft velvety texture, and the same went for his handlebar moustache. Come to think of it, nearly everything about the doctor was just so soft and warmly inviting.

“Should we head over to it, then?” Carver's voice caught up to him, pulling him back to reality, yet sending him from one pleasant distraction to another. He barely had to answer, the slightest sigh and the smallest nod, and the doctor slid a firm and strong hand under his knees, and rose him up, carrying him into the bank much like a newly wed groom carries his beloved man into their just made house.

There was some cloth folded in a corner, arranged as if to simulate what could have once seemed like a bed which clearly had been abandoned for the anxious Banker’s many sleepless nights, him preferring instead to pass out in fear on his counter.

The doctor laid him on top of the covers gently before positioning himself on top of him. One of his hands tenderly stroked his cheek, his legs straddling the Banker, looking down at him, eyes shielded by his glasses, though behind those lenses, his eyes were full of pure admiration.

The four-eyed puppet adjusted himself under his weight almost sleepily: “Carver, love…” oh, to be called like that forever and always, what shivers did it send down his spine!, “What…”

“Please, my dearest.” Carver leaned down to press kisses to his throat, and purred against his neck, hands pressing light kisses with thumbs swirling on wooden skin so gently, “You don't truly think I am sated of your kisses? I waited so long for you…”

The Banker sighed blissfully, body melting and becoming as soft as warm clay. He wrapped his arms around his dear, dear lover and let his head fall back on the bed that hadn't seen him in weeks, basking in the wonderful burn enveloping him.

How curious, he thought to himself. He could hear a hummingbird sing in the back of his mind.

For some odd reason, he heard Bandit clear his throat in the back of his mind too.

Then Doc Carver let out a small grumbling shriek, rolling over and tumbling off of a Banker too hazy to notice anything.

“H-Hello Bandit!” Carver stumbled over his words as the cowboy looked at them from the counter where his elbow was leaning on. The four-eyed puppet called for him needily, drawling out the last part of the doctor’s name, his grasp on reality basically non-existent. Carver turned bright red. “F-fancy seeing you here….”

“Sure is, Doc, sure is.” Showdown smiled, cheek resting in his hand, giving him a quick wink. “Mind if I make a deposit?”

“Um, sure,” the doctor stuttered, rushing to the desk to swipe the cash, hastily dumping it in a vault labeled ‘SHOWDOWN BANDIT’.

The cowboy tipped his hat politely: “Thanks, Doc.”

“N-no problem,” he mumbled, staring at the ground.

“Now I suggest ya go back to yer other business. He sounds pretty… um… critical.” Showdown nodded in the direction of the lovestruck Banker. The doctor tried to swallow, and failed. “Y’know what I mean, Doc?”

“Carveeeer, love, please… please, where did you go?” the poor soul lamented, turning on the bed. “You're so cruel, so cruel… ! Oh, love, please… please, I need you… !”

“I know.” Carver muttered to Showdown, closing the Bank’s shutters and swiftly turning around, rushing back into the arms of his darling, finally together.

[angelicspaceprince]

Angst/comfort Beetlejuice/reader? The latter wakes up from a nightmare to end all nightmares. (Bonus angst for it involving dying, brutally or otherwise)

I did both because I can also angstor at least an attempt at:

TW: Mentions of suicide, domesticviolence (sorta), murder (sorta), and just….look you both die in your dreamsand it fucks you up a little bit on the inside ok? I stepped away from my hc ofhow he died and did the more commonly accepted one with a mix of one that someoneI rp with brought up during one of our sessions because the PAIN GOT TO ME IHAD TO PUT IT IN HERE so then I wasn’t repeating myself throughout the hcs.

Reader:

It started pleasant enough

You were dreaming that Beej hadtaken you on an impromptu date to the Netherworld, something that was oddbecause he said he’d prefer to say on your side of the pond, but also notbecause he knew you were keen to check out his ‘home’

It had been interesting day sofar, everything was just so odd comparedto home

You loved it

Buildings didn’t make sense, thepeople were strange and peculiar and interesting

Even the sounds were just sounworldly, and just so different and fascinating

Beetlejuice had been leading youaround, giving you the grand tour as you hold onto his hand and just take ineverything

You had failed to realise the slowlydarkening tone of your dream

You had managed to wander to apart of the Netherworld that had a river that, instead of water, was runningwith thick, black, ink. Not quite goo or slime, but thicker than water

Beej was encouraging you to jump in,but you felt nervous. It didn’t feel right,you didn’t think you could swim in something like that

The more you suggested he gofirst, the more annoyed and angrier he became

You finally said, outright, thatyou weren’t going in, period. It was just too unsafe.

You didn’t see him move behindyou, but you felt his hand push you to the side of the river bank and then promptlyinto the water

You were right. It was impossibleto swim, to see, and the more time you spent in the river, the thicker the inkbecame

It filled your stomach, yourlungs, it soaked your clothes, weighing you down

The worst part is hearingBeetlejuice’s laughter throughout. This loud, high pitch cackle that filledyour ears and made your heart sink and stomach fill with dread, mixing in withthe now slime-y ink.

You called out for him to helpyou, save you and all you heard was his laughter

“You think I’m going to save you?I don’t even like you! I’ve beenwanting to do this for so long, watch a stupid little breather die. I’m justglad you were stupid enough to trust me.”

You held back tears and tried to keepyour head above water, only to feel something long, thin and slimy crawl upyour legs and promptly yank you down under the ink

You wake up with a gasp, handracing up to your throat as you take in a few heavy, deep breaths, sitting upas you reassess the situation

You’re alive.

A sudden, cool arm wrappingaround your waist makes you screech out in terror when you see the concerneddemon looking over at you, hair still a sleepy green with the beginning of a fewstreaks of white

You panic, still thinking he wasclose to killing you, so you rip yourself from him and crawl to the other sideof the bed, giving yourself some space to calm down.

‘Just a dream, just a dream, justa fucking dream.’ You repeat to yourself as you watch Beetlejuice’s hair gofrom sleepy green and concerned white, to slightly blue tinged with a concernedyellow

He sits up and moves to give yousome space, sitting up and watching you carefully. He’s speaking, but you can’thear his words, so you focus on your breathing. It’s ok, you’re alive, you’resafe, he wouldn’t actually hurt you. Would he?

“Babes? Cmon, talk to me, what’sgoing on, are you ok?” You finally hear him say. You shake your head.

“Bad dream.” Is all you offer,still a bit wary of the ghost with the most.

He hesitates. “Do you want totalk about it?”

“Not particularly.”

“Should you?”

“Probably.”

You take a breath before slowlymoving over to where you were laying before, tapping the space next to you toreinvite him back to where you were when you first woke up

“You murdered me.” Was all youoffer. “Through me in this river. I drowned. You said that…..” You wipe awaythe few tears you have with your hands as BJ carefully pulls you closer so hecan hold you close. “You said that you didn’t even like me.” You whisper thefinal part out

Beetlejuice squeezes you tighteras he just holds you in silence, tracing faint patterns on your skin as he letsyou re-centre.

“You know I love you, right babes?”He finally asks quietly. You hum and nod, moving to rest your head to his chest.“And I’d never do anything to hurt you without you asking first?” You nodagain.

“It was just a dream, Beej.”

“You were terrified when you woke up!”

“Yeah, but I’m better now.”

“You were terrified of me!”

You look up and can see the fearand the depression seeping through him. You sit up slowly and move to give hima kiss.

“I love you, Beej. I’m not scaredof you. I promise.” You swear against his lips. “I know you’d never hurt me,not like that, never like that.”

His hands grip at your hips asyou resettle, this time on top of him. “I know you’re here to protect me, Bug.”You murmur against his skin as you slowly begin to drift away

Beetlejuice didn’t sleep anotherwink, however. The self-doubt about if he could be good for you drifting intohis mind again, keeping him awake as he just holds you close and treasuresthese quiet moments as his brain slowly starts to convince him that, perhaps itwould be better for you if the two of you weren’t together anymore.

HenevergetsthechancetodumpyouthobcyouarenothavinganyofthatBugshutupandletthemloveyou

Beetlejuice:

Contrary to popular belief, Beetlejuicedoes dream

He has to be drunk off his ass orhigh off his tits in order for it to happen, but it does happen

It’s rare that he has gooddreams, however. Most of his life has been plagued with just generalshittiness, and when he’s asleep, the guards he’s put up fail and the memoriescome flooding back

This particular time, the both ofyou had gotten way too drunk and had crashed together onto your bed, him layingon top of you as you sprawl out beneath him

It didn’t take long for thedreams to start

He was back to the day he died

He was hurting, but the reasonwhy he was hurting had changed

He had found you dead, knifethrough your heart with a note attached

‘I can’t do it anymore Lawrence. You’re just too much, too damaged, youhurt me every day that I see you. I’m sorry, I wish I could have loved you.’Was all of the note he could make out.

You didn’t love him? I mean, how couldyou? He was a damaged man, an alcoholic and drug addict with a temper

He’d never hurt you, but theamount of shouting matches the two of you have had were always loud, destructive,awful

They only ever happened when hehad partaken of the gin or coke, unfortunately in this life those were the onlytwo things that kept him going

But because of them, he lost you

He didn’t realise he was cryingor pulling at his then brown hair until he noticed that the note was gettingwetter in his hands, already soaked with blood that was hiding parts of themessage

He killed you

He destroyed you

He was nothing but a murderer

Everything else was on automatic

He’d been planning this formonths, the only thing keeping him from going through with it was you

But now there was nothing holdinghim back. He was drunk, high, depressed and alone

Tying the noose was the hardest partof it all but after that, it was just like clockwork

It should have been automatic,but he fucked it up

His neck didn’t snap, he was leftdangling as he slowly felt his airway close, kicking and screaming and shoutingthe entire time

“Beej?”

No one came to help him, no oneever did but you

“BJ, love, are you ok?”

He had full view of your deadbody as he slowly felt himself suffocate, vision going spotty.

“Beetlejuice?”

Slowly his eyes closed as heaccepted that he was a failure at everything.

“Beetlejuice!”

Even his own death.

“Goddamnit Beetlejuice wake up!”

He woke up with a start, hands graspingtightly onto your shirt that his knuckles are bright white, matching his haircolour as he breathes heavily into your chest

You have your arms wrapped aroundhim, and don’t comment on the fact that your chest is wet from him crying inhis sleep. You woke up to hear him calling your name and crying, when you triedto wake him, he just clinged to your body and apologised over and over and over

Finally, he sniffles a little bitand the tears stop. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” You kiss the top of hishead, the white slowly turning into a faint green colour as he relaxes when herealises it was just a dream. “Want to talk about it?”

“No.”

“Do you need to talk about it?”

“No.”

You hum, clearly disagreeing butrefuse to push the matter so you just hold him close and let him take what heneeds from you. “I love you Bug.” Is all you say as you play with his hair andrub his back, pressing kisses over his face and along his neck in an attempt tomake him smile, which he does half heartedly after a few minutes.

“I love you too, babes.” He graspsyou tighter when you shift, only relaxing once you do too.

“M not going anywhere, pet.” Youpromise, voice filled with sleep, already knowing where his mind was going. “You’restuck with me. For better or for worse.” You can feel his smile against yourshoulder.

“You’re not going anywherebecause we are never leaving this position babes.” You snort.

“Whatever you say, lovely.” Younotice his breathing beginning to even out. “Goodnight Beej.”

The next day he’s very clingy andrefuses to tell you what he dreamt about, but you grant him his space and justbe there for him.

You promised you weren’t going toleave him, and you were going to stick to that promise. Regardless of whattricks his brain may play.

[daisyxbuckley]

Madness Chapter 10

A/N: Last chapter in this book! The next part, O’Death, will be up sometime tomorrow. 

Description: Calliope Kane never meant to get caught. But when she did, she was sent to the ground to help The 100. Now that she’s here, will she survive?

@cxddlyash

Masterlist here

*******************************************************************************************

Callie managed to make her way over to Jasper to check the head wound. He was knocked out but slowly waking up and Callie let out a sigh thanking whatever god was out there that Murphy hadn't hit his temple. Murphy stalked back and forth muttering to himself and shooting glances over at Callie. The redhead was cursing the fact that she took her jacket off upstairs. She could probably overtake Murphy, but she would feel better with the knife that was in her pocket.

"Murphy...we need to talk about this." Callie said quietly. This wasn't the first hostile situation that she had been in with him, though she hoped it would be the last.

"SHUT UP." Murphy yelled looking at her. "You know what Callie..I am SO tired of having you be in charge. I'm so tired of thinking I have to take orders from you when I don't. No, we don't need to talk about this, I'm the one running the show." He said waving the gun around.

"Okay fine...then let Jasper go okay..I'll stay here with you and we can figure out what you want to do." Murphy let out a hollow laugh at Callie's words and for the first time she had shivers sent down her spine.

"Murphy, I know you can hear me. All our ammo and food is in the middle level. You know that. You're leaving us vulnerable to an attack. I can't let that happen." Bellamy's voice came through the radio and Callie prayed he had a plan.

Bringing the radio to his lips, Callie noticed his eyes never left her as Murphy spoke. "Yeah well in case you haven't noticed, you're not exactly in control right now."

"Come on, Murphy. You don't want to hurt Jasper or Callie. You want to hurt me. So what do you say? How about you trade them for me?"

Callie's eyes went wide when Bellamy said that. Murphy saw the fear in her eyes and smirked. "Seems like little miss perfect doesn't like that plan." He said quietly to her. Callie averted eye contact as Jasper started waking up and helped him sit up.

"How?' Murphy asked into the radio. "You open the door. They walk out and I walk in." Bellamy said. Murphy motioned for Jasper to stand up. Callie went to go with when he pointed the gun at her.

"Not you. Sit." Callie sat down as she nodded to Jasper who had fear in his eyes. "You alone Bellamy. Unarmed. You have 10 seconds before I put a bullet in his leg." Murphy said into the radio as he lowered the door to the ship. Callie closed her eyes as Murphy continued counting and tried to figure out what the hell she was going to do.

"I said both of them Murphy." Bellamy said when she saw the redhead in the corner with her eyes closed. Her eyes snapped open at the sound of his voice and looked panicked when the door shut again.

"See I know what you said. But then I thought, wouldn't it be fun if we all had just a nice little reunion." Murphy said shoving Bellamy into the middle of the room. Callie stood up and tried to move closer to him when Murphy tutted.

"Calliope, I like your face. Don't make me put a bullet through it." He said pointing the gun towards her. Callie's hands went up and stopped where she was. "Okay, fine." She said quietly. Bellamy ignored Murphy and tried to walk over to a visibly shaken Callie when Murphy fired a shot that missed Callie's head by inches.

"What the hell did I JUST say?" He yelled. Bellamy stopped and turned towards him finally realizing that he was serious.

"Bellamy, Bell...are you okay?!" Octavia's voice rang through the ship over the radio and the redhead hoped that they would make it out of this so she could see her brother again.

Murphy threw some seatbelts and rope towards Bellamy and motioned to them. "You want her to know you're okay? Then start tying." Callie tried to figure out what Murphy was getting at but couldn't understand his plan.

"I'm fine. Just a misfire. Now stop worrying about me and get back to work, all of you... And tell Raven to hurry her ass up." Bellamy said not taking his eyes off Callie. PUtting the radio down, he nodded to her that it was going to be okay. But he didn't know how.

"Callie come here." Murphy said as he motioned for her to stand in front of him. Watching Bellamy tie knots in the rope, Callie walked slowly over to Murphy. Gasping when he grabbed her arm, he held her flush against his body never removing his eyes from Bellamy. "You know I always wondered why you would take him over me. I mean, we are both killers." Murphy said in her ear. His breath tickled her skin and it made Callie squirm.

"Not really into sociopathic criminals." Callie spat back to him. Murphy let out a laugh void of humor and nodded towards Bellamy. "That's enough. Stand up and go get that box over there." He said motioning to the box in the corner. Callie finally clicked with what Murphy was planning and let out a gasp.

"Well, well, well. It seems like little miss perfect finally realized what I'm planning on doing." He chuckled. Bellamy went and got the box and brought it back. "Alright, now toss the rope over that rafter."

"What do you want me to say Murphy? Do you want me to apologize?" Bellamy asked as he followed instructions. Murphy shoved Callie forward. She lost her balance as Bellamy reached out and grabbed her. He had never seen fear like this on her face and wanted nothing more than to just take it all away.

"No. I want you to feel how I did. I want you to watch the life drain from the eyes of the one person that you love the most and feel that helpless feeling." Murphy spat. "Then I want you to die."

The two stared at the unhinged boy with shock as he moved closer and grabbed Callie. "Get on the box." he sneered.

"No. Murphy you want me. Leave her out of it." Bellamy said as he tried to reach for her. "Please, do whatever you want. Just let her go."

"Well this is new. Never thought it would be this easy to get you to beg. Look at that Calliope, you have him wrapped around your little finger." Murphy said gesturing between them. "Tell me Bellamy, have you told Callie that you're in love with her? Because I would tell her now before she dies."

Callie stood on the box and  looked at Bellamy with sad eyes. The way his met hers, pleading with her to forgive him...Callie knew. But she couldn't say the words back.

"Put the rope on Callie." Murphy said not looking at ther. Callie took the noose in her pale hands, shaking as they put it over her head. "Callie don't, Murphy please." Bellamy's voice was pleading at this point and it broke Callie's heart.

"You're so brave, aren't you? I mean, you came in here thinking you're just gonna turn this whole thing around, that you were stronger than me, and maybe one of your friends would come and help you." Murphy said looking at Bellamy as he took the rope in his hands.

Yanking on it, Callie yelped as she felt it tighten around her neck. Pulling at the rope she tired to pull it away but couldn't.  "Well, what are you thinking now, Bellamy? How does it feel to be powerless watching the girl you love slowly die?"

Murphy put a little slack on the rope and Callie's feet landed flat on the box. Trying to get air back in her lungs, the girl struggled as Murphy still had ahold of the rope that was around her neck and was still putting pressure on it.

"You know, I gotta hand it to you, Bellamy. You got 'em all fooled. They actually look up to you, almost as much as they look up to Clarke and Callie."  Murphy kept his eyes on Bellamy as he pulled on the rope again. Callie's toes brushed the box she was standing on as her face turned red.  "Yeah, well, we know the truth, don't we? You're a coward. I learned that the day you kicked out the crate from beneath me."

Bellamy looked frantically between Murphys face and Callie's. "I'm sorry Murphy. It shouldn't have happened." He said, his voice rising.

"Yeah..well it's a little too late for that isn't it." Murphy muttered as he pulled the rope tighter and looked at Callie.

"Do you think they are going to let you just go?" Bellamy said to him. "Murphy, what do you think you're going to do?"

"Well, I think the princess is dead." He said shooting a glance at Callie's red face. "The queen is about to be,  then the king is next so who's really gonna lead these people, huh? Me, that's who, and, yeah, maybe I'll have to kill your grounder-pounding little sister..."

Murphy was cut off as they heard a grunt and a small gasp under the floor. "There she is right now." He said as he yanked Callie's rope so she was finally dangling in the air and shot at the floorboards. Callie's hands flew to the rope as she tried to climb up the rope so she could breathe. The air was leaving her lungs as the corners of her vision started going black.

Murphy saw the door to the drop ship start to open as he bashed Bellamy in the face with the gun. Wrapping the rope around the pole, he took one last look at a struggling Callie before running up the stairs.

Octavia ran into the dropship to see Bellamy getting up off the ground and Callie's body going limp. "Get her down!" Bellamy yelled as they both ran the to rope. Callie dropped to the ground with a thud. Octavia ran over to her and cut the rope from her neck as Bellamy checked for a pulse. "She's breathing." The girl said to her brother giving out a sigh of relief

"Murphy."Bellamy yelled as he ran up the ladder, Octavia staying below with Callie trying to bring her back to the living. Callie coughed trying to get a steady breath through her body as she looked up at Octavia. Hearing a boom, she started to sit up as Octavia helped her.

"What the hell was that?" She rasped out. Bellamy jumped off the ladder and ran over to her bringing his hands to the side of her face.

"Murphy blew a hole in the side of the ship and escaped." He said checking her neck. He grimaced at the bruises that were there. Purple and blue marks were forming across her pale skin and Bellamy grew angrier looking at it. Pulling her close, he felt her arms wrap around him and sighed.

"We should go after them." Calie said standing up with help from Bellamy. Shaking his head he put his arm around her waist to keep her steady.

"No. Grounders will take care of Murphy. We're going after Clarke, Finn, and Monty. Jasper and Raven were right. We don't abandon our own." He looked down at Callie as she smiled softly. "Two guns... you and me Jasper. That's it. Raven and Callie stay here to build up defenses. We lost a day because of this, and our gunpowder. Raven!" He yelled as they started heading out of the ship.

Callie was leaning on Bellamy, starting to get her strength back when she saw two figures up ahead. Before she knew it there was a blonde bullet running towards her that almost took her out. Clarke looked up at Callie and saw her neck and automatically started worrying.

"What the hell happened?" She asked looking at the group. "Murphy happened." Bellamy replied grimacing

"Clarke, we need to leave, now. All of us do." Finn said looking at everyone. "There's an army of grounders, unlike anything we've ever seen, coming for us right now. We need to pack what we can and run."

Bellamy shook his head as he looked around. "Like hell, we knew this was coming."

"Bell, we aren't prepared." Callie said quietly.

"And they're not here yet. We still have time to get ready. Besides, where would we go? Where would we be safer than behind these walls?" He said. Callie knew that he wanted to be right but at the same time they needed to think of what was best.

"There's an ocean to the east. People will help us there." Finn said. Octavia's eyes lit up at this as she stepped forward. "You saw Lincoln." She said happily.

"You expect us to trust a grounder? This is our home now. We built this from nothing with our bare hands! Our dead are buried behind that wall in this ground! Our ground!" Bellamy said facing the crowd. "The grounders think they can take that away. They think that because we came from the sky, we don't belong here. But they're yet to realize one very important fact: We are on the ground now, and that means we are grounders!"

"Yeah, Grounders with guns!" Someone yelled.

"Damn right. Now lets get to it." Bellamy said agreeing with a smile.

"Bellamy's right. If we leave, we may never find a place as safe as this. And God knows, in this world, we could be faced with something even worse tomorrow." Clarke said agreeing. "But that doesn't change the simple fact that if we stay here, we will die tonight. So pack your things. Just take what you can carry, now."

Callie was about to open her mouth and agree when they heard something over by the drop ship.

"Help....me." Raven said dragging herself out. Callie and Clarke ran over and automatically looked at each other from all the blood.

"Murphy shot her." Callie said quietly. Finn was over by the girls grabbing Raven as he went into the drop ship.

"Callie...if we leave you know it's going to end bad." Bellamy said grabbing her hand. "I know..but the choice has been made." The redhead said quietly.

"Crowds make bad decisions. Just ask Murphy. Leaders do what they think is right." He said quietly.

"I am."

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

Raven screamed as Callie held her down and Clarke pressed a hot knife to her side. The redhead wasn't the biggest fan of Raven but she never would of wished this at all.

"That should stop the bleeding." Clarke said as she put a bandage over the wound. Raven was whimpering by now and Callie was just trying to keep her calm.

"How the hell did Murphy get a gun?" Finn asked everyone. "Long story." Bellamy huffed out as he looked over at Callie.

"We got lucky." Raven managed to get out through gritted teeth. "If he had hit the fuel tank instead of me then we would all be dead."

"Wait, there's rocket fuel down there?" Callie asked her with wide eyes. Raven nodded. "Yupp. Enough to build 100 bombs. If we had any gunpowder left." She said slowly.

"Let's get back to these reapers. Maybe they will help us, the enemy of my enemy is my friend?" Bellamy asked. Clarke and Finn exchanged a look that put an end to that plan.

"Yeah no. We have seen them, they will not help us." Clarke said.

"We don't have time for this. We need to go, can she walk?" Finn asked. Callie shook her head with a frown. "No, she needs to be carried."

"Like hell you will. I can walk." Raven said trying to stand up. Callie pushed her back down on the table.

"Hey, listen to me. That bullet is still inside you. If by some miracle, there's no internal bleeding, it might hold until we get somewhere safe. But you are not walking there. Is that clear?" The redhead said firmly. Raven nodded as Callie stood up fully.

"I'm going to make sure the rest of camp is ready. Clarke, Finn get her ready to go." Callie said as she headed out. Making sure everyone was doing okay, she ran to her tent and grabbed a few things before heading out. Noticing Bellamy by the graves she walked over.

"You did good here Bellamy."

"18 dead." Was all he could get out to her. Putting her hand on his shoulder she squeezed it. "But 82 alive. You did good."

Grabbing a bucket of dirt the girl put the fire out as they headed towards everyone else. Walking up towards the front of the group, she put her hand on Octavia's arm as Callie let her know that she was there. It was easier for Octavia to lead as she knew more about the woods, and Callie knew that she wouldn't leave her by herself.

They had been walking for about 20 minutes when Octavia put her hand up. Callie instantly tensed and her grip tightened around the spear that she was holding.

"What is it?" She heard Jasper ask. Before anyone could say anything else an axe flew through the air and hit one of the kids dead center in the head.

"Everyone back to the camp!" Callie yelled as the group started back the way they came. No other attacks came as they made it through the walls and shut the gate.

"What the hell was that?" Bellamy yelled.

"Exactly what they wanted." Callie said coming to the realization that they were stuck.

"They were scouts. Lincoln said they would be coming first." Clarke said quickly looking around.

"So they aren't here yet. If it's just one or two we can take them out." Octavia said with a glint in her eyes that made Callie smile.

"We're done doing what that grounder would do. We tried it and now Drew is dead. You want to be next?" Bellamy yelled at her.

"That grounder saved our lives. I agree with Octavia. For all we know, there's one scout out there." Finn said as Jasper shook his head. "Yeah one grounder with insanely good aim."

"Clarke, Callie we can still do this." Octavia said looking at the older girls.

"Looking at you guys. Do we stay and fight or do we run and get picked off." Bellamy said looking between them. Callie's eyes met Clarke's and the two nodded making the choice.

"Lincoln said "scouts." More than one. He said, "get home before the scouts arrive." Finn, they're already here. Looks like you've got your fight." Clarke said looking at Bellamy.

"Ok, then. This is what we've been preparing for. Kill them before they kill us. Gunners, to your posts. Use the tunnels to get in and out. From now on, the gate stays closed." Bellamy said giving out orders. Octavia grabbed Callie's hand and they headed off towards the tunnels. Grabbing Octavia's arm, Bellamy looked at her. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. You're not a gunner."

"You're right. I'm a grounder. I have a plan and I'm taking Callie for help." Octavia said looking at her brother.

Squeezing Bellamy's other hand, Callie smiled. "I'll take care of her." She said as they went off.

The plan basically constituted being bait for the grounders to get distracted. Octavia and Callie took out some of the ones that were stragglers but their real target was Anya.

"This is insane, you realize this right" Callie whispered to the girl as they snuck around in the dark. Since Octavia was seeing Lincoln, Callie learned some moves from the both of them and she was thanking god for it.

"Octavia look. They have Murphy again" she whispered as they finally made it where they could see the commander. Before they could do anything she ordered the clan to attack and everything exploded. Guns were firing and arrows were hitting their targets.

Callie grabbed my Octavia's hand and squeezed before they jumped through the bushes and attacked.

Bellamy had been trying to take stock of everything going on when he saw them. Octavia had a fire in her that he had never seen before and it made him proud. But Calliope, she was someone else entirely. It was almost like everything from the last few hours never happened and the woman that was fighting in front of him was someone he had never met.

"Callie!" He yelled as a grounder game up behind her, but the girl swung her spear around and knocked him to the ground stabbing him through the heart. She was fluid in her motions, taking down grounder after grounder.

Octavia managed to make her way over to him with a smirk. "Admit it. You want one" Bellamy wasn't able to get a response out before she was hit with an arrow.

"No!" He yelled as she went down. Callie's head popped up as she saw what happened. Throwing the spear at the archer, she pinned him against the tree and he was dead. Grabbing a sword from a dead grounder, she ran over and kneeled down next to the siblings.

"Bellamy. Their weapons have poisons in them. We need to get her out of here" she said quickly. Hearing an explosion, everyone looked up in shock.

"Oh my god. It's the ark." She got out. Hearing shouting Octavia tried to look around the boulder they were hiding behind.

"What the hell is that?" She asked groggily. "No clue. But let's go while they are distracted." Bellamy said picking her up.

"We won't make it. Leave me" She said quietly. Shaking his head, Bellamy looked at Callie who met his gaze gripping the sword. "No. I'm not leaving you behind."

"Octavia?" Callie spun around at the voice and sighed seeing Lincoln.

"You did this?" Bellamy asked motioning to the chaos. Lincoln nodded as he looked at Octavia's leg.

"With Finn. This is deep but i can fix it. She needs to come with me now." He said looking at the three of them.

"No. Ive got to finish this." Octavia said weakly. Callie put a hand on her friend and shook her head.

"Honey you can't even walk. And we can't get you to the dropship." Bellamy nodded as he passed her to Lincoln.

"O, O, listen to me. I told you my life ended the day you were born. The truth is... it didn't start until then. Go with him. I need you to live. Besides... We got this." He said grabbing Callie's hand smiling.

"I love you big brother."

"I love you too. May we meet again."

Callie squeezed Octavia's hand once more before nodding to Lincoln as they took off. Turning to Bellamy she reached up and out her hands on his face. "She will be okay. Now promise me that I won't lose you, not after everything we just went through."

Bellamy didn't respond. He just grabbed her and pressed his lips to hers. Every emotion that he had felt about her since meeting her poured into this kiss. All the frustration and love and everything in between.

Callie wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. Running her hands through his hair she pulled away looking at him as they both breathed heavily. "Don't die on me." She managed to gasp out.

Nodding Bellamy stepped back as she grabbed her sword and his hand. "You do the same."

Running towards the battle, Callie jumped in. Focusing on what was in front of her, she made sure that everyone she was fighting was down before she moved on. Before she knew it, the girl was covered in blood that wasn't hers.

Looking over she noticed Bellamy was on the ground trying to fight off a grounder and Clarke was standing by the drop ship door.

"Close the door Clarke!" He yelled as he tried to escape the grounder that had him captured. Looking over he saw Callie's face as she ran to him and killed the man above him.

"Callie go!" He yelled as the drop ship door started closing.

"I'm not leaving you!" Callie yelled as they had more grounders ascend on them. They kept pushing her further and further away from Bellamy and before she knew it she was falling into one of the fox holes with a grounder on top of her that she had just killed.

The force of her head hitting the ground made Callie's vision blurred. As she struggled to get the man off her and escape, she heard the roar from the ship and ended up succumbing to her injury.

"Bellamy." She whispered before she went under. 

[countryshitposts]

i swear i won’t get writer’s block while writing this

three drinks later (i hate this so much)

China wakes up in a dark room, too dark to even point out any features that are even noticeable, even to his bright amber eyes. He feels himself on an elevated standing, away from the cold hard concrete floors from below him. China holds out one hand, trying to feel it ever since that numbing feeling in the morning started, giving him a sense of security and the tendrils of sleep catching him in their traps. China feels something around his neck, a rough texture, shaped to a noose. He tries to pull it away from his neck, but in the end it only ends up becoming tighter, making it even harder for him to breathe.

"I can't believe you drank something without question", a familiar voice says in the dark. China hears the descent of steps, its sounds loud and thudding against his eardrums. His captor must be descending down the stairs while talking to him.

China frowns, dark hair covering his eyes. "And who the fuck are you?"

A chuckle in the dark, and China feels his presence from in front of him, already seeing the smug smirk forming on his captor's face.

"And I thought, out of all your creations, you'd remember me."

Then bright, white light emerges, from where his captor was standing. China closes his eyes, flinching at the spectacle of blue light dancing around his eyelids, the light a bright phoenix in charge of flying, soaring through the night sky as a second sun, giving everyone brightness they deserve. The brightness hurts China for a little while, but in the end, as all do, he adjusts.

China then gazes at his captor, and then scowls, knowing that dark chopped hair and jacket with the white sun insignia anywhere.

"What the hell do you want from me, Taiwan?", China asks, struggling from his position, trying to remain calm, trying to make his voice steady, look more intimidating with a noose tied around his neck, and his supply of air diminishing every second. "I told you to never come back."

"China, come on", Taiwan says, flipping his hair and walking towards his brother with a slight stride, like he has won - and he has never won, in all their bloody battles against each other - this round with China. China's amber eyes glints with hate, and Taiwan reflects it with general cruelty in his blue ones. "I just want to be merged with you again."

"Fuck off", China exlaims, voice raspy. "I have no absolute reason to welcome you back to my home."

"Really? Not after you and Soviet Union divorced? I heard you're quite lonely trapped inside your little room."

China stiffens as Taiwan mentions Soviet Union, yet it is short-lived and he relaxes for a bit, not wanting Taiwan to get the upperhand after the showing of his weakness. He scoffs, turning the other way around, glaring at the bland white walls, wondering if that was what his life had become; painting a wall that wasn't even his.

"I'm fine, Taiwan. I don't need you and your fucking Koumintang gang destroying the entire place."

Taiwan scowls, looking at the insignia tattooed on his arm, a symbol of membership, from his members, and a symbol of betrayal, in China's own mouth. "They're harmless."

"Please." China looks at Taiwan dead in the eye, his dark curls obscuring one of his eyes. "I've seen how much damage you've done."

"No, it's your fault we're like this", Taiwan growls out. "I want to be my own person, but you and your thirst for territory keep on growing everyday. I just want everything to be over."

"It would be over if you can just leave me alone. And why the hell did you tie me up with a noose around my neck?"

Taiwan raises a brow, "I thought you already know what I'm going to do with you."

And China does know what Taiwan is planning to do- kill him and make his murder look like a suicide, due to how it will look like China hung himself, all alone, in this cold, neglected basement. He can already feel his fingers grow cold, and he glares at Taiwan. He can feel a thousand furies relentlessly hitting him, and he tries to form a scream as the noose gets tighter. China chokes, feeling his skin imploding from inside of him.

Then Taiwan's face becomes serious, as if he can feel the thunder growing louder as they near him, the clouds darker and gray, consuming everything bright and turning them to a sadder version of themselves.

Taiwan leans over China, and China backs away as he can without his air inside of his lungs becoming limited. There was a deep pain in his dark blue eyes, no more of the mischievous glints in his eyes.

"I was the sole heir of the business", Taiwan begins, a cold settling deep inside China's veins, as he tries to breathe as the noose tightens even more, "but then you took it away from me, with your business deals, your ex-husband and your communism. I fought hard for my rights to rule the business, but in the end, I lost to my younger, better, smarter brother."

China scoffs, his scoff a strain. "You're victimizing yourself again; you really think that we won't see behind your motives?"

"You're not even China!", Taiwan shouts, spitting on China's face, and the other growls, spitting on his brother as well.

"I am China!", China exclaims, his voice steady and solid, as it echoes back to him like a boomerang coming back towards his head.

Taiwan glares, "Really? Because you're just an upstart who took my glory away, and took my rightful name. I am the real China. So, I decided to take back what was mine."

"Oh, by killing me? Because everyone will know who did it. Either Hong Kong or you."

Taiwan's face then gives off a snide vibe, a light smirk now etching on his lips, as he takes out a piece of crumpled paper from his pocket. He clears his throat, then starts to read in a mock mourning voice,

"To all of those who are reading this, I know it may come as a shock to all of you, but I had always felt miserable in my entire life, and always kept seeing the shadows of the past sneaking up on me ever so slowly, my past and the delusions of the many possible futures clouding my vision, ever so slightly. I deny my past due to the crippling feeling of nausea as I go back to its horrible clutches, like an atom bomb exploding in my mind. I had tried, and failed, to kill myself, the hands of life tying my strings so strong to the point it may never break. I can feel her strings tying it around my neck, to the point I would choke, to the point I will go limp at the hands of life as she smiles, turning me into the puppet she had always wanted.

I don't want to be a puppet anymore. I don't want to be a captive of a lie, alive, but dead, in the living's eyes and the dead. I will, after all these years, admit that I have always felt inferior towards Taiwan, my older brother, who I wrongly took the company away from him. I can't take it anymore; the business, the socialization, the delusions, me, so this is the last time I will try and kill myself. I don't care if I will dissolve to those discreet celebrities only known through death, but I can't take it anymore. Don't let neither Beijing nor Hong Kong take over. Give the business and the company over to the first-born and heir; Taiwan.

Signed, China."

Panic surges inside of China, as he shakes his head in panic, his breathing becoming even more and more ragged, a fiery inferno dancing across his body as he desperately tries to escape the noose, knowing that it will be futile, knowing that Taiwan is much faster than him if he tries to escape. The table under him is weakening, stumbling and giving out, and he feels it move as if an earthquake has struck him. The table is the earth cracking and making way for tectonics to go further apart, and he is the thousands of people being eaten alive falling so fast towards their deaths. Taiwan smiles gleefully, his blue eyes gazing at China's desperate form.

"Don't you fucking dare", China growls out, "if I get out of here-"

"If", Taiwan supplies, his lips curling into one of the most cruel smirks China will ever see in his lifetime, "only if."

And then, with a light kick to one of the table's weak legs, it falls, and China, instead of his feet touching the ground, it dangles in the air, looking as if he was levitating, trying to float, an illussion to someone's eyes. China gasps, as all of his air is blocked out by the noose tightly hung across his neck, the rope becoming taut, his windpipes being barricaded by a thousand metal gates, and him choking, begging for air, as the last thing he sees before Death, quick as ever with his scythe, is Taiwan, the new China, smiling in victory.

[dangan-junkoismywaifu-ronpa]

Maki Killing Shuichi For Her Orphanage

 Anon asked: Can you please do a scenario where Maki has to kill Shuichi in order to save her orphanage? It’s in a killing game.

TW // Mention of suicide 

Maki Harukawa 

- The motives were passed around last night, a video from home. Our loved ones. The ones waiting for us once we escape. If we ever do.

- Maki watched her video, curious of who would be shown to her; knowing she's been abandoned by her parents. No one is waiting for her back in the outside world.

- The video flicks on with Monokuma popping up ''Who is the most important people in your life, Maki Harukawa!'' She rolled her eyes, getting ready to turn it off and forget this stupid motive until she heard a familiar voice.

- ''Hi Maki! We miss you so much at the orphanage! But look I got this little doll, her name is Rose isn't she pretty?'' A small girl stood in front of the camera, smiling brightly holding up a little doll.

- No no no, why is Yona on the screen. Maki's eyes widen at the sight of the little girl. She was one of the smaller children at the orphanage, always clinging onto Maki.

- The screen glitches as Yona disappears and the screen shows a bleaker destroyed orphanage. Blood was splattered across the wall, a bookshelf knocked over with books scattered everywhere, shards of glass sprinkled on the ground.  

- Monokuma popped up on the screen, ''Looks like there has been a little accident at the orphanage!'' Maki's grip on the tablet. ''But what do you know?! Hahahaha!!!!" The screen turns to black.

- Her hands shook softly, the only thing she had left on the outside. She had to escape. Maki sucked in a deep breath to calm herself, she had to get to the outside world, for Yona, for everyone else back at the orphanage.

- The day passed by, Maki stayed silent as she came up with a plan; someone she could kill and get away with it.

- She walked to her ultimate lab, thinking about everyone that was left, Kaede and Amami had already been killed; that gave her an idea, now to come up with the plan of killing.

- Opening the blood red doors Maki stepped into her lab, looking for a certain weapon, she was going to escape, ''I don't care who has to die, who has to be hurt, I will escape'' mumbling to herself, clutching a rope.

- Night came to the academy, as Maki knocked on a certain someone's door. No answer... she knocks again knowing he is in there. ''Shuichi'' her cold voice comes out as the door inched open.

- Shuichi had not left his room all day, only opening the door once for Kirumi as she left him food.

- He looked horrid, dark bags under his eyes contrasted against his pale skin, a frown playing on his lips as Shuichi lifts his hand to play with the collar of his shirt.

- ''Umm can I help you, Maki?'' He mumbled out refusing to make eye contact with her, ''Yes, can I come in?'' She asked coldly waiting for him to move aside to let her in.

- Shuichi hesitated, but let her in. ''Don't think I came because I wanted to, everyone was just really worried about you, since the last trial...'' Maki said as she walked past Shuichi into the small dorm room.

- The rope tied around Maki's waist was starting to get tighter, the feeling of having to kill again, of course, she had second thoughts but those were pushed away when she thought of Yona. She had to do this. No turning back now.

- ''Oh, umm, I'm fine, thanks'' Shuichi said standing at the door, closing it. Maki strode closer to Shuichi, fixing her shirt; in actuality untying the rope getting ready to strangle Shuichi.

- ''Ok. I just wanted to check on you... I mean everyone wanted me to check on you!'' Maki said as she approached Shuichi and the door. ''I'll be taking my leave now''

- Before Shuichi could utter a word or even turn around, Maki strung the rope around his neck ''Ma-ki!'' He gagged out, hands flying up to try to loosen the rope around his neck.

- ''Say hi to Kaede for me'' Maki said as she pulled the rope, cracking Shuichi's neck in the process.

- He lies dead on the floor. Face and neck blue, with veins bulging out. Maki sighed out, now to really get to work. She picked up the dead body, unwrapping the rope from his neck, and laying him on the bed.

- She grabbed a chair, tying the rope to the ceiling making a noose at the end of it. Lifting up Shuichi, she slips his head in the noose and placing a knocked over chair beneath his dead body, making it look like he committed suicide.

- Maki walked away from the crime scene, letting a wave of relief wash over her entire body, the killing has been committed, now time for the trial; and the freedom.

Hiya anon! I hope you enjoy it and please let me know if you’d like anything changed  ~ Mod Fuyu 

[archifists]

ALSO, do the last one for widocrain, don’t be a coward and give me the content i crave

standing quietly together in the kitchen after long, exhausting days, leaning into each other for support, breathing in the smell of home, fingers carding through hair and stroking down spines, until they feel like they can relax and smile properly againfor caleb widogast & luke crain.

TW: death, car accidents, funerals.

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

It had been a long and arduous day, minutes weaving hours into an interlaced spider’s web of conversation and condolences; it wasn’t something either of them would like to repeat, but as the story oft goes, they had no choice in the matter.

It was a funeral. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the first.

Luke sighed, eyes closed. An entire world washed over his mind --- childhood laughter, lights flickering on and off ( come home, come home ); in this waking dream, his sister smiled her vibrant grin, shining bright into whatever nightmare he would later have. A cursory effect, a premeditated safety blanket --- jump, and she will catch you. Jump, and she will be waiting for you at the bottom.

In his arms, Caleb says nothing. At their feet, Frumpkin mews distantly, as if to say 

( I will be here, despite the pain. I am here. )

and something in Luke awakens in this moment. Or rather, something chooses not to sleep --- he holds his partner tighter, breathes in the rustic scent of aging pages and freshly cleaned hair; it smells like their favorite shampoo, mixed in with a bit of flame, a bit of fire --- candles are lit on the kitchen counter, he remembers, the label saying something about a campfire, something that implies family, reunion, comfort.

He can almost hear Jester’s voice, chipper as ever,

( why don’t we go on a camping trip! )

and god, his heart aches. Every vessel, tensing and twisting. A noose, a choke hold, strangling --- tighter, and tighter --- and he takes in a shaky breath now, finally releasing. Shoulders droop, another trembling sigh escapes chapped lips. 

He thinks, maybe, that Caleb wants to speak --- can feel the man moving a bit, squirming a little in his tight grasp --- and so he loosens a little, finally opens his eyes. When nothing comes of it, he chooses to break the silence himself; he sniffles a little, despite himself.

“I, um,” he stammers, falters. He thinks of his sister’s sweet smile, of Jester’s charismatic charm; he thinks of the mangled vehicle they were found in, steel and metal twisted and turned and strangling, stabbing, tearing.

“Today was, ah...difficult,” his partner finally says. “...but they would not want us to be miserable.” and oh, Luke knows this to be true. He does, and it pains him as such; he knows that Nellie would rather he smile, rather he laugh at the way Steve fumbled through his speech, or the way Theo and her girlfriend awkwardly watched as Shirley cried at the podium. He knows, too, that Jester would crack a joke --- albeit poorly --- about how the Nein came dressed to the nines,

( ha, get it?, she would chirp, because we are the migh-ty nein! )

and he nods a bit at the silent words, offers up a gentle, unsteady smile. Frumpkin mews quietly, Jannik following suit, jumping from the couch and prancing over to join the party; they stand in the kitchen like this, the four of them, Luke smiling awkwardly at his partner, his best friend, the anchor within the storm.

“We’ll...we’ll get through it,” he finally says, nodding a bit more. Nellie’s funeral was done, finished but not forgotten. Tomorrow, they had to press through Jester’s; still, he knew they would be alright. It would take time, but that was how things went sometimes. 

Caleb nods, smile fading, before pulling Luke in for one more hug, tight and desperate. They stand like this for awhile, breathing in each other, hearts beating as one, lungs steadying with time. They would be fine; they had to be.

[dylanreviewsthings]

Soundgarden's "Down On The Upside" Showed Their Strength

Soundgarden was always one of the most influential figures in grunge, and even until the end of the movement they provided powerful music. This is also a testament to Chris Cornell's prowess as a musician. Soundgarden's Down On The Upside showed their strength and their lasting influence in the genre.

What makes Down On The Upside effective even though the genre at the time was past its height is its daringness to do things differently, and to be diverse. There is, though, a lot of some of the classic grunge sound. 'Pretty Noose' opens the record as a brooding start with dark sounds, followed by 'Rhinosaur' with its more classic grunge sound. Songs like 'Burden In My Hand' follow that contemporary rock sound, before songs like 'Never Named' and 'Applebite' keep things energetic an evil.

As Down On The Upside continues, its diversity grows. 'Zero Chance' is one of the first of those unique tracks, the beautiful playing showing quite a bit of complexity. Soundgarden mix elements of country and punk in the unique 'Ty Cobb,' bringing together two pretty polarizing genres. Epic atmosphere makes 'Tighter & Tighter' sound huge, while 'An Unkind' takes that and tops it with interesting melodies as well. The daring nature of 'No Attention' gives it a rebellious attitude, while angry is intrinsic of the build in 'Blow Up The World Outside.' Down On The Upside is a very angry album, though it seems to be trying to rid itself of those feelings rather than act upon them.

Soundgarden's Down On The Upside showed their strength in their willingness to diversify their sound. It's genre bending and angry, capturing both the anger of their music and the rebellion of the genre. While it was their last effort in their initial run before hiatus, Soundgarden made sure to leave on a strong note.

Favorite Track: An Unkind, Zero Chance, Tighter & Tighter

Least Favorite Track: Switch Opens

Rating: 79 / 100

Stream or buy Down On The Upside on Apple Music, and follow our Throwback Playlist on Spotify:

[haunting-kind-of-high]

Welcome To My World Of Fun (Part 4)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 5

Warnings: MAJOR warning for torture, gore, slightly explicit image of torture, minor swearing (one time, I think), major character death, anxiety, panic attack, angst, heartbreak

Tag list: @musicphanpie-b, @imin-loveanon, @ordinary-chaos, @sandersandthesides, @ajumbleofwords, @demonickittykat, @zadi-jyne, @serenefreakgeek, @fandons-mangoes, @leesacrakon, @gayfagg, @tree4life25, @loverofpizzaandallthingssweet, @ilovemyspoopydad, @yourdailysunshine, @thelogicalloganipus, @justanotherpurplebutterfly, @i-m-p-a-l-a-6-7, @iaminmultiplefandoms, @cinquefoilelove

Read on AO3 here

In the darkness of his cell, Patton had the option to think. His thoughts mostly wandered to Virgil. How long had he been here? Why was he there? Someone must have told his name to Roman. Which brought Patton to the questions: who else had been captured? What had they told? What was left of the rebellion? Patton had no idea what was happening outside. The world could be on fire and he wouldn’t notice any of it.

Then, once again, his mind wandered to his friend. He wondered, again, how long Virgil had been there. To what kinds of torment he had been subjected in the time he had been here and whether he had cracked already.

At that moment, Patton felt a pang of guilt as he remembered what he had forced Virgil to go through. If only he had promised Roman to tell him about the rebellion sooner, then Virgil wouldn’t have to suffer like that. He would still have a hand. Oh Heavens, Virgil shouldn’t have to go through all of that. He was barely eighteen - he was just a kid. Patton should have never allowed Virgil to join the rebellion. But he couldn’t say no to the boy’s enthusiasm. And he was an adult. Hardly, but still an adult. If only Patton had forbidden Virgil to join. He would still be free, he would still be okay. It was all his fault. It was his fault Virgil was here. He had caused all of this.

Patton’s pondering was abruptly interrupted when the door was roughly opened and the king stepped inside.

Virgil sat in the dark, his head resting against his knees and his arms wrapped around his head. He had tried so hard to be strong. To be tough and to be brave. And he had succeeded. Until he saw Patton. He had thought Patton was dead when he disappeared. He thought he’d never see him again. But there he was! Apparently, the man that had taken care of him for most of his live, was still alive. Virgil’s heart broke when he saw Patton. He had to live in this hell for months, so much longer than Virgil had. How Patton had managed, he didn’t know.

But what hurt him more, was that Roman had used him to hurt Patton. To make him confess the secrets he knew about their rebellion. Virgil knew Patton cared about him and… he didn’t deserve to witness what he had seen. Patton had never done anything wrong to anyone; he didn’t deserve to suffer like this. And then… what happened later- Virgil couldn’t even think about it without feeling his throat tighten and the air leave his body. He couldn’t think about it without panicking.

And now, Virgil couldn’t get Patton’s hurt expression out of his mind. He couldn’t stop thinking about the tears that had formed in his friend’s eyes as he was forced to watch how Roman tortured Virgil. He still heard Patton’s screams when Virgil was forced away from him. Patton didn’t deserve this. He’d done nothing wrong. He hadn’t.

He wanted to get out of there. He couldn’t stay here any longer. If only he still had his hands. He could have possibly tied his shirt into a noose and tied it around his neck. He could empty the carafe and break it. He could use the shards to cut his wrist or throat. But even that was taken from him. Of course, Roman would have never left the glass carafe there if Virgil had his hands. No, the king did everything he could to prevent his prisoners from killing themselves. Even the choice whether he lived or died had been stolen from him. He had nothing left. He was nothing.

Time passed and Virgil sat there, in the darkness. Sometimes, he’d get up, find his way to the table where he knew the carafe stood, and managed to take a few sips of the water it contained. And he waited. He waited for someone to enter. But time passed and nothing happened. He wasn’t even given more water. He was alone in the darkness. Alone with his thoughts. The thoughts that seemed to drown him in fear, the thoughts that suffocated him with worry and guilt. Alone with his pain. He never knew if he was asleep or awake. He didn’t know how much time had passed. He didn’t know anything. However, Virgil’s pondering was abruptly interrupted when the door was roughly opened and the king stepped inside. And he was followed by-

“Pat,” Virgil breathed as the man stumbled into the dark room.

“Hey there Virgil!” Roman smiled as two other men trailed behind him. “Long time no see!”

Virgil didn’t look at the king. His eyes only focussed on Patton, who had been forced to the ground and lifted his head to meet Virgil’s gaze. He attempted to smile, trying to comfort Virgil and tell him it would be okay. It wouldn’t be okay, he knew that. They both did. But the gesture was a reassurance. If only they would be free.

Before he knew what was going on, Virgil could feel someone grab his arms and as he snapped out of his thoughts, he could see Patton being dragged to one of the chairs in the back - the chair Virgil had been tied to last time was still there. Luckily, they didn’t use that one. If you could speak of luck in a situation like this.

And now the roles had been reversed; now it was Virgil struggling as he was held back, while Patton was bound to the chair in the corner of the room.

“Now, I’m sure you know the rules, don’t you, Verge?” Roman asked, standing in front of the young boy, who looked up at the king with something that almost resembled defiance. Roman smiled and turned his back.

“I have been told that you, too, are hiding information from me,” he spoke matter-of-factly. “Information that some would call important. And I’d like to hear about that information.”

“Yeah, well, I have some wishes too,” Virgil muttered under his breath, hoping the king hadn’t heard his comment.

“Do you want me to pretend I didn’t hear that, Virgil?” Roman asked coldly. He didn’t turn around, but Virgil could see from the way his shoulders rose and the way his back straightened that the king was more than just a little annoyed. Much more. “Or do you want me to react to that?”

Virgil looked down as he felt the air leave his body. He knew he shouldn’t have said that, but he couldn’t stop the words from leaving his mouth.

“Well?” Roman sounded impatient. Virgil quickly looked up and noticed that the king hadn’t moved an inch in the few moments Virgil had taken to get lost in his mind.

‘It’s nothing,“ Virgil muttered defeatedly, "I… I’m sorry.”

“Good,” Roman said, making his way towards Patton. He slowly got out his dagger - he loved that thing, apparently. His finger softly brushed against the edge of the weapon. The king stopped next to the chair Patton was in and turned back so he was facing the younger boy again. The dagger travelled across Patton’s throat, though Roman didn’t put enough pressure on it to leave a mark.

“Do you want to tell me what you’re hiding now?” Roman noticed Virgil’s brown eyes travelled to Patton and he saw the pain and apologies in those orbs. He tried to act brave and confident, but his eyes gave away his true emotions. Virgil looked back at the king and opened his mouth, as he was interrupted by the man next to Roman.

“He doesn’t! There’s nothing you need to know!”

“Patton,” Virgil started, his eyes widening.

“No, Verge. There’s nothing you should tell him!” Patton’s voice sounded weirdly confident as he spoke. Virgil opened his mouth to protest, but one look at Patton shut him up. He couldn’t protest. “There’s… nothing,” the boy said, looking at his friend once more with pain in his eyes. Roman smirked as he nodded. The look on the king’s face was enough to make Virgil regret his words and he wanted desperately to revoke them. But before he could open his mouth, Roman had already forced his dagger into Patton’s leg, just above the knee. Patton closed his eyes and struggled against the ropes tying him to the chair. Virgil froze as he saw the pain on his friend’s face and all he wanted was to make it stop. He wanted Patton to stop suffering, even if it meant taking his place. Even if it meant he had to endure everything Patton would have to go through. Even if it was ten times worse. He wanted to tell Roman everything he knew. The few names he remembered, the vague plans they had. Anything to save Patton. But no words could leave his mouth. It was as if his throat was being squeezed shut and no sound could leave his mouth. He panicked.

And so, when Roman asked him if he was willing to confess, everything inside of him screamed at him to say yes. To nod his head and to comply. But Virgil felt him shaking his head. Something inside was stronger than the voices that yelled at him to spare his best - his only - friend. And Roman just grinned.

He grinned as his hand gripped the dagger tighter and slowly moved it up, ripping through Patton's skin and creating a long, deep wound. Blood spilled out of the wound and coloured Patton's trousers with a deep red.

He grinned as he saw his victim hold on to the armrests so tightly his hands turned white at the knuckles. As he noticed how the man closed his eyes, like it would make him forget about the pain as his skin was slowly ripped apart. As he heard the boy on the other side of the room, futilely trying to break free.

He grinned as he moved to the other side of Patton. As he stabbed the dagger into Patton's other leg and, just like before, dragged it up, slowly tearing his skin apart, inflicting agonizing pain on the man. He just grinned.

When the dagger had reached Patton's thigh, Roman stopped and finally pulled his weapon away from the man, turning to Virgil again.

"Have you changed your mind?" he asked, lowering the dagger in his hand. "Or," - Roman halted as he looked down at Patton, another plan quickly forming. The royal smiled and moved his dagger upwards, stopping in front of his victim's abdomen - "we could change things up a bit, if you'd prefer."

Virgil's eyes widened and he shook his head before fighting his capturer once more. His breathing sped up, became faster and faster and he felt like he was suffocating. But he had to try it. He had to get to Patton.

"Just... do it," Patton said softly, his voice breaking. Virgil heard these three words and immediately ceased his struggling.

"Pat," he said with difficulty.

"You did the same," Patton reasoned, "why shouldn't I?"

"Well, Virgil, what do you say?" The king asked. Virgil looked at Patton, who shook his head, trying to convince him not to spill their secrets. But as he tried to decide what was best, Roman had already decided it had taken him too long and he drove the dagger into Patton's stomach.

A sound that resembled a scream left Virgil's mouth as he tried his best to once again to free himself from the man's grip.

"N-no," he stuttered in between rapid breaths, "please. I-I'll tell y-you e-every-everything!"

His weak and panicked voice was almost overshadowed by his own quick breathing. Roman looked up at Virgil with a dangerous eagerness in his eyes.

"Everything?" Virgil nodded, looking at the king with pleading eyes. He hated himself for this, but he might still be able to rescue his friend. Roman narrowed his eyes and nodded. For one second, Virgil felt relief washing over him as the royal turned back to Patton. His hand clutched the hilt of the dagger and pulled it back. But then, in one swift movement, he raised the weapon and slit Patton's throat. The sharp blade left a bright red trail that immediately travelled down to the man's shirt and left red stains everywhere. A number of crimson drops stained Roman's white shirt.

Patton closed his eyes in pain and held on to the armrests as tight as he could, trying to block out the pain and the realisation that he was going to die. All life left his body. He could not move. He could only wait.

As soon as Virgil saw the dagger move up, he started resisting more heavily than ever before. Even though he barely had any energy left, he used every single bit trying to escape from the man's grasp. He gathered every bit of courage he had to kick the man holding him back. In the shin, in the groin, any place that hurt. He didn’t care that he probably looked like an idiot. He didn’t care that he’d regret this, he just wanted to get to Patton.

Eventually, Virgil managed to tear himself away from the guard and clumsily made his way to Patton, whose chin rested on his breast, his breathing barely noticeable.

“No,” was all Virgil could whisper softly as he stepped next to Patton, expecting to be ripped away from him again any moment. “No, Pat, p-please. No.” Virgil looked at Patton’s face, unable to look at the bloodied mess below it. Patton slowly opened his eyes and smiled at Virgil. A tired, broken smile.

“Pat, please. I l-love you,” Virgil told him as he saw his friend’s body go limp. “No. No. Fuck. No.” Virgil sobbed softly. Then, a hand forcefully pulled him away from the chair. He was pushed against the wall and a bloodstained dagger was pressed against his throat. The dagger that slit Patton’s throat just a minute ago. Virgil closed his eyes and turned his head away from the king in front of him. His shoulders were still shaking and his breathing was anything but steady.

"Now, you were going to tell me something, weren't you, Virgil?" Roman asked, his face uncomfortably close to Virgil as the dagger was pushed against the boy's skin. The dagger that had slit a throat not long ago. The dagger that could cut his throat if the king wanted it to. Virgil felt the sharp edge against his skin and he felt his chest tightening. He felt his heart speeding up and pounding against his rib cage, trying to break the ribs just to get out. He couldn't do it anymore. He couldn't. And so he shook his head. If he was lucky, this action would be the death of him.

"Excuse me," Roman hissed through gritted teeth, as he pressed the dagger further into Virgil's throat, summoning a thin line of red. "I don't think you heard me, kid. You had something to tell me." Virgil shook his head again. He wanted to reach up, to pull his hair out of his scalp, to cover his face and to protect himself from the king in front of him. But he could do neither of those things. He couldn't do anything anymore. Everything had been taken away from him.

Roman removed the dagger from Virgil's throat and embedded it in his shoulder. He grabbed Virgil's hair in his hand and turned the boy's face towards him. His eyes were still closed.

"Virgil, look at me," the king said. His voice sounded calm, but the dangerous undertone was still evident. Virgil didn't want to obey the king. Somehow, his eyes were always terrifying. They were always cold and there was always a sense of danger hidden in those orbs. But Virgil forced himself to open his eyes and his teary eyes met the king's furious ones.

"Are you going to tell me what you know?" Virgil looked down as he shook his head. He couldn't. He couldn't form any coherent sentences. Even if he wanted to tell it all to Roman, he wasn't able to. Roman pushed the dagger further into Virgil's skin, until the tip met the stones of the wall behind him. Virgil barely flinched.

"Very well," Roman said, a hint of frustration in his voice, "I'll let you grieve. But I will be back." He released Virgil's hair and picked up the candlestick. He nodded at the two men in the room and they followed him away from the cell.

When Virgil was alone in that eternal darkness, he finally broke down. His sobs mixed with his shaky breaths and he tried to calm down, but the vivid image of Patton and the knowledge that his body was still with him in this room made it practically impossible. Virgil sank to the floor and his arms wrapped around his knees. However, when he moved his arms, he felt the stinging of the dagger in his left shoulder as it dug itself further into his skin. Great. Virgil pressed his forehead against his knees, ignoring the pain in his shoulder. He focussed on every method he knew to calm himself down. Every trick he knew to steady his breathing. But even then, it took him ages to get his breathing under control. When he had calmed himself down as much as he could, Virgil attempted to pull the dagger out of his shoulder, but having lost his hands, he needed both arms. However, reaching up with his left arm hurt him too much, as it moved the weapon, slowly ripping open his shoulder even more. And he could barely even reach the hilt with his left arm. It was not enough to grip onto it. Soon, he gave up his attempts and dropped his arms. He didn't know how long he sat there in complete darkness. He didn't know if he was awake or asleep. If his eyes were opened or closed. It seemed like years. An eternity in which he was left alone with nothing but his anxious thoughts.

[errantknightess]

Lending a hand

Pairing: Midoriya/Todoroki

Word count: 1,852

Summary: Midoriya has never been particularly good at tying his tie, and with broken hands it’s even harder. But hey, what are friends for?

(Just some slice-of-the-dorm-life fluff, feat. two dorks who can’t spit it out)

[Read on AO3]

Growing up as he did, Izuku was no stranger to injuries. For a scrawny quirkless kid, even playing at being heroes meant a fair share of scraped knees and black eyes if he wanted to keep up. He didn’t mind. It was par for the course for a hero – everyone knew that much. So when he finally got into UA – no longer scrawny and quirkless – and his growing pains escalated from bumps and bruises to broken bones, he took it in stride. If he got this far already, how could something like that stop him now? It was just a matter of getting used to it, and soon enough he was quite skilled at going through his daily routine with just one operative hand at a time. The amount of experience he’d had in putting his jacket on over a sling and his pants over a leg brace, or taking a shower without getting his bandages wet was downright worrisome, but hey, that only made it easier, right?

Still, no matter how apt he was at it, getting ready with most of your limbs out of commission could take a while.

The soft hum of the gas burner ruffled the silence, the blue flame glowing bright in the dim kitchen. Izuku put the kettle on, rinsed his dishes and slowly limped back towards the common area. The entire first floor was deserted, unsurprisingly so at this hour. He had gotten up early just to be on the safe side, but now it looked like he might have miscalculated it a bit. There was still plenty of time before he should head out. Most of his class was probably sound asleep; Izuku kind of wished he were as well. With a deep yawn, he eased himself down on one of the couches, leaning his crutch against the armrest. His injured leg tingled with relief as he relaxed against the pillows. Recovery Girl had done as much as she could – for now, he’d just have to take it slow.

The quiet of the room buzzed in his ears, making him even more drowsy. Hopefully a cup of tea should fix that. Izuku shot a longing glance at the stove, as if that could help the water boil any faster. His good foot tapped against the floor in an impatient rhythm, struggling to keep this empty stillness from fogging up his brain. Up – down – up – down. The ends of his shoelaces bounced and wiggled, and finally the loose knot that held them came undone. Not a surprise, considering it’d been tied with just four fingers, out of which only one was a thumb. With a sigh, Izuku leaned over to retie it, pulling as tight as he could with his heavily bandaged hands. At least it was something to pass the time. While he was at it, guess he could have a go at buttoning up his jacket, too – another pesky detail he had left out earlier. It took a few tries and some clever maneuvering, but otherwise went smoothly enough. Now all that was left was the tie, draped dejectedly over his neck like a sick snake. Encouraged by the previous successes, Izuku grabbed the ends and gave it a try.

He had never quite gotten the hang of tying a tie, always ending up with a knotted lump around his collar, but even that much was quickly proving impossible to achieve now. The fabric kept slipping from his grip, and clutching it any tighter only made his hands hurt more. He probably shouldn’t strain them too much just yet, but surely this couldn’t be “too much”, could it? Just a basic everyday task. If he couldn’t do even this much, what could he do? There had to be some way around it. Maybe it would help if he switched the sides – hold here with his right hand instead, cross over with left, now pull the other— end— out— oh, come on!

“Midoriya? Something the matter?”

Izuku jolted upright, bouncing on the well-stuffed pillows like a tight spring. He’d been so preoccupied with his struggle that he didn’t even hear anyone coming until Todoroki’s voice broke the stiff silence around him.

And for some reason, the sound of his name spoken in this low, husky voice made him tense up far more than the initial surprise.

“No, nothing!” Izuku whipped around to face his friend as he moved into the warm circle of light in the lounge. “Why would anything be the matter?”

Todoroki shrugged, stifling a yawn.

“You’re up early. You’re never here at this hour, usually.” He leveled his gaze at Izuku, sleepy but insistent. There was a small cowlick curling upwards just above his right ear. Izuku found it oddly endearing. He’d never seen Todoroki’s hair doing anything other than lying obediently flat.

“Well, I— just need more time than usually to get ready today. I’m still a little slow, you know,” he explained, waving his bandaged hands and trying really hard not to think too much about how Todoroki took notice of his everyday routine. His neck already ran hot under the collar. Izuku quickly averted his eyes and gave his half-knotted tie a nervous tug. It slipped open, sliding off and flopping onto the couch with a soft pat.

Todoroki cleared his throat and inched closer, his footsteps sinking into the carpeted floor.

“You need help with that?”

“No, no, it’s fine! I’m all good!” Izuku assured, finally plucking the tie off the couch on the fourth try and throwing it across his shoulders. He wondered briefly if maybe tying a noose would be easier.

“Oh. Okay.” Todoroki hesitantly changed his course and headed towards the kitchen. With the corner of his eye, Izuku saw him slow down and turn his head, hovering uncertainly in place as he watched him – stared back at him – probably judging him silently.

Under this scrutinizing gaze, Izuku’s limited manual skills grew even less graceful. He faltered and fumbled, more and more flustered every time he had to yank the botched knot loose and start over. His hands were already sore from the earlier efforts, bones grating against each other with every move of the fingers. That… likely wasn’t something he should feel. Izuku hissed as a sudden jab of pain pierced his thumb and made him drop the loose end again. Stupid tie, why did it have to be so difficult? Just stay put, come on, not again—!

“Midoriya. Stop this.”

Startled, Izuku looked up to see Todoroki walking over to him across the room. His usual frown was set even harder, his lips pressed in a thin, vexed line.

“Ah, sorry,” Izuku blurted, jerking nervously at his collar. “I was mumbling again, wasn’t I? I didn’t even notice—“

“No, not that.” Todoroki closed the last of the distance between them, sitting down on the couch next to him. “Here. Let me.” He reached out and gently pulled Izuku’s hands away, and only then did Izuku realize how much they were trembling.

“What…” He started, staring nearly cross-eyed down the length of his tie – the tie that Todoroki grabbed a hold of now, sliding it to and fro over the nape of his neck to adjust it. “Are you…? Seriously, it’s okay! I can do this!”

“Yeah, I’ve seen.” Todoroki’s face looked serious, but there was a soft edge to his deadpan delivery. “Maybe you could make it in time for lunch at this rate.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Izuku protested weakly, his voice hitching a little when Todoroki’s fingers brushed against his throat. The chilly touch made his ears burn. Izuku swallowed hard, staring down at his friend’s hands and desperately trying to focus on anything but them instead.

“A little higher.” Todoroki pressed on his chin with his thumb, and Izuku reluctantly tilted his head up. It brought them face to face, his mouth hovering just by Todoroki’s nose, and for a moment he couldn’t entirely trust his expression. Thankfully, Todoroki was too focused on the tie to see it. Still, it felt awkward looking at him like that. Izuku’s gaze wandered up, past the knitted eyebrows, sliding slowly over the floppy bangs and finally fixing on the line where the two colours met. From mere inches away, he could clearly see each strand marking the border, and the few stray wisps that didn’t quite fall on their proper half.

Izuku promptly squashed the sudden urge to reach and tidy them up.

It’s not like this was new – and yet, in a way, it felt different. They’d been this close plenty of times before, but that was only ever in sparring and class exercises, and he obviously had other things on his mind then. But now all those little details were coming at him point blank and had his undivided attention, and filled his head until it started to spin a bit.

“There, done.” Todoroki shook him out of his thoughts once more. He slid the knot up, and suddenly Izuku found it hard to breathe, which was absurd because the tie certainly wasn’t that tight.

“Thanks a lot,” he muttered, smoothing it out and tucking the tip in. “Wow, this looks much better than I usually do it.”

“I could teach you later.” Todoroki shifted beside him, their knees almost touching. “When your hands get better. Though I… actually kinda like the way you do it. It’s really… you.”

“Oh. Well,” Izuku stammered, not quite sure how to take it. His standard tie knot was a mess barely kept together by sheer force of will and tension, which honestly did fit him to a T, but Todoroki probably didn’t mean that. He hoped.

Before he could finish that thought, the shrill whistle of the kettle coming from the kitchen nearly made them both jump out of their skin. Izuku scrambled for his crutch and leapt to take it off the stove as fast as he could. Todoroki followed, looking very much like he was about to say something, but whatever it was, in the end he decided to save it to himself. They fell into a comfortable silence that stretched all the way as they made their tea and went to settle back on the couch. Izuku glanced at the clock. It was still impossibly early.

“Hey, can I see your English homework for a sec?” Todoroki asked, digging up his own notebook from his bag. “You’re better at this, and those mixed conditionals are a pain.”

“Sure! No problem!” Izuku beamed and dove for his backpack, nearly bumping his head on the table. “Uh, I could explain it to you if you’d like…?”

Todoroki nodded and shuffled closer, a hint of a smile tugging at his mouth.

“That would be great.”

Izuku grinned back as he set his notes on the table. They leaned over them, slowly sipping the tea and going over his messy handwriting one line at a time. Nursing the steaming mug in his hands made it feel a world better – but the warmth spilling in Izuku’s stomach right then had nothing to do with that.

[aurumacadicus]

how did stuckony get together in the monster au? did I miss that? your writing is really good I love it so much!!

You did not miss that! I was so busy trying to introduce everyone that it just got kind of pushed to the side. :)

“I thought he liked me,” Tony said quietly as Natasha pressed an ice pack to the side of his face.

Clint paused in preening him, talons curling around the boy’s shoulders. “…I don’t think he was capable of liking anybody but himself.”

Steve muttered irritably, wrapping his tail tighter around the human’s legs. Bucky hushed him but looked just as irritated.

“Sure fooled me,” Tony said, trying for a smile, but he’d always been really bad at hiding his feelings from them. It didn’t help that his visible eye was beginning to water.

“He’s sick from the inside, Tony,” Steve blurted out angrily. “That’s the only explanation for what he did to you. You’re precious.”

Tony laughed a little. It sounded sad. “If you say so.”

Bucky poked his head out from beneath the table. “What if we killed him?”

“Do not,” Tony answered immediately.

“Just a little bit.”

“Jesus Christ, I’ll be their first suspect.”

The monsters muttered to themselves, annoyed, but decided that maybe they shouldn’t kill Tiberius Stone.

“The fuck kind of name is Tiberius, anyway,” Clint mumbled. “And his nickname was Ty. Like someone should ever be named after a silk noose.”

Tony snorted. “The fuck kind of name is Clint?”

“A good one,” Clint replied snootily. He went back to preening the boy’s hair, the tips of his talons gentle and delicate on his scalp. “Don’t worry, kid. You’ll find someone who loves you the way you are.”

“Someone who would never dream of hurting you,” Natasha added, pulling the ice pack away to examine the bruise before gently putting it back. “Someone who loves you almost as much as Steve and Bucky do.”

Tony laughed another sad laugh. “Like I’ll ever find anyone who loves me as much as Steve and Bucky love each other. They’re a love for the ages.”

“…Right,” Natasha said, frowning at him judgmentally, as Steve miserably wrapped his tail tighter around Tony’s legs and Bucky sighed and hid his face in Steve’s belly.

“Maybe it’s because you guys literally remember him in diapers,” Clint said as the pair lamented about Tony brushing them off. “Humans are weird about that. And age differences. Although I agree, age differences that come from a power imbalance are yucky.”

“…Is there a power imbalance?” Steve asked worriedly, tail curling and body shifting anxiously.

Natasha rolled her eyes. “Other than Tony owning the house you live in? Not really. There might have been if he were younger,” she added thoughtfully, tilting her head. “And less experienced. But he’s older now. And he’s had more sex than most humans I know.”

Bucky groaned loudly and shoved his head under a throw pillow. “We know. We could hear it all.”

“Oh, is that why Steve started sleeping in my room?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Huh. You’re just a glutton for pain then? You must be, having to hear and smell but not touch.”

“Someone had to be there in case things went wrong,” Bucky insisted just a touch defensively. “I didn’t want him to say no and not be listened to.”

Clint hopped from the arm of the couch onto the back. “And self-righteous Steve couldn’t?”

“He writhes himself sick,” Bucky and Natasha answered immediately.

Steve, shame-faced, sagged into coils.

“He’s too impatient to just sit there doing nothing. And there’s only so much he can do. He tries not to use his venom because it’s so deadly and he can only constrict so tight before he snaps the person in half,” Bucky explained to the surprised flyer. “He’s strong as hell, and humans are delicate. So he sort of… attacks himself when he feels he can’t do anything to help.”

“I once had to stop him before he literally knotted his tail and snapped his spine,” Natasha added. “It was super gross.”

Steve sighed sadly. “You could sound less excited when you say that.”

“No, you almost snapped your own spine. That was amazing.”

“Natasha please.”

“Anyway,” Bucky cut in as they began to bicker, looking up at Clint. “Steve writhes himself sick with worry if he can’t do something to help. Luckily I’m patient enough for the both of us.”

Clint shook his head slowly. “Pathetic. Have you ever thought about bringing this up with Tony?”

“Every time we try, he assumes we’re either talking about how much we love each other, or how we love him like family or something,” Steve mumbled, scales scuffing the floor as he began to writhe a little to get more comfortable in his coils. “I don’t know about you guys, but I’ve never wanted to fuck my family.”

Natasha pursed her lips. “…I don’t think I ever had a family.”

“I have a brother somewhere, but I don’t wanna fuck him,” Clint admitted.

“I have sisters somewhere,” Bucky said thoughtfully. “But nah, I don’t wanna fuck ‘em either. We lost contact in the seventies. They liked freaking out the flower children.”

Natasha sighed fondly. “Ah. The seventies. I don’t remember any of them.”

“Boo!” Clint blew a raspberry. “I don’t even know what you guys are talking about because I was still trapped in the circus!”

“We’ll have Tony find a movie for you,” Bucky said sympathetically. Tony was really good at finding movies that explained time periods for their less worldly companion. He’d seen a lot of the world, of course–but through a tent or a cage. “But you didn’t miss much.”

“I guess not, if Natasha can’t even remember it,” Clint mumbled petulantly as she smirked. “Okay but we’re totally going to make Tiberius regret ever laying a finger on Tony, right?”

“Yes,” the others said immediately, growling angrily.

Tony started dating someone named Sunset.

“I don’t like her,” Clint said immediately. “I do not. Get rid of her.”

The others stared at him, unsure of what to do. On one hand, Clint didn’t offer up his opinions very much, likely from some residual fear that he’d be beaten or something like he had been back at the circus. On the other, he was very good at judging people’s character because of it. If he didn’t like Sunset, it was because she was no good.

But scaring adults off was quite a bit different from scaring children.

“Get rid of her. Get rid of her,” Clint hissed, feathers ruffling irritably. “Get rid of her.”

“Why?” Natasha finally asked, frowning.

“She’s a taker. A taker. Get rid of her!” Clint cawed, then began hopping about and anxiously using his beak to pluck his own feathers out. “She’s going to hurt him. A taker. Help him! Get rid of her!”

“Clint, calm down!” Steve exclaimed desperately. “You’re going to–you’re tearing out your pinfeathers!”

“Grab him,” Bucky snapped at Natasha, lunging for the bird and curling his arms around his wings, trying to keep his wings from his face.

Natasha got the other monster in a headlock, and they lowered him to the ground as he screeched and flailed, wings slapping angrily on the ground, leaving a bloody splatter in their wakes. Steve curled his tail around one wing to immobilize it so Bucky could focus on the other one. Natasha was murmuring something to Clint in another language, but it could take several minutes before he calmed down.

Clint eventually let himself be pinned down, but not before he put all his strength into one last struggle and screeched, “She’s a taker! Get rid of her!”

“She’s a taker,” Natasha agreed a few days later. Her face was grim. “Maybe you guys should grow some balls and actually tell Tony your love for him isn’t familial so he doesn’t drift from abuser to abuser like a lot of other humans.”

Bucky scoffed. “Yeah, okay, because a human always wants to be with a giant bipedal wolf and a half-man, half-snake.”

“If any human is going to accept you, it’s Tony,” Natasha replied, shrugging. 

She probably wasn’t wrong, but Steve was hesitant anyway. “But what if he has a problem with it? Then we’ll have to leave.”

“Doubtful,” Natasha said. “Tony has always had a heart bigger than his brain. He’d just feel bad he didn’t return your feelings.”

…That was probably true.

“Why is he like this,” Steve whispered, scrubbing his hands through his hair.

Bucky sighed, hanging his head. “Probably for the same reason he welcomes monsters with open arms.”

“Fuck.”

“So, Sunset seems…” Steve began, then trailed off, grimacing.

Tony stared at him.

“Why do you even try?” Bucky asked him, disappointed.

“I keep thinking one day I won’t be terrible at this,” Steve admitted.

Bucky just shook his head. The blond sank into his coils, muttering quietly in embarrassment.

“Do you want to meet her?” Tony asked, looking back and forth between them. “I don’t think she’s ready for that yet, but–”

“No,” they cut in immediately, and Steve added a cold, “Never.”

Tony took a step back, hurt.

“She’s using you, Tony,” Bucky explained, trying to keep his voice gentle. “Clint had an episode trying to tell us how bad she was.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” the boy replied immediately, always stubborn, digging his heels in. “Clint isn’t always right about these things. Obie’s taken good care of me and he pitched a fit about him, too!”

Steve and Bucky gritted their teeth. It wasn’t just Clint. And one day Stane would mess up and they’d be able to point it out to Tony. Unfortunately it was just a waiting game until then.

“You’re just–jealous!” Tony spat, hackles up. “I’m spending a lot of time with Sunset and you’re jealous I’m not spending it with you!”

“Yes,” Bucky agreed.

“Right!” Tony snapped, then stopped, brows furrowing together. “Wait, what?”

“We are jealous,” the wolf repeated. “And yes, that is part of the reason we don’t like Sunset.”

“You should be spending that time with us,” Steve continued. “We love you, Tony.”

Tony huffed. “Listen, I know some people are okay with being single but surrounded by friends their entire lives, but I don’t want that! I want someone to be intimate with! That I can show my vulnerabilities! That’s not wrong. And you guys are eventually going to have to grow up and–”

Bucky made an annoyed noise and smacked Steve on the shoulder. “Go.”

Steve did not need to be told twice. Watching him lunge at Tony was magnificent, shimmering blue and silvery-white scales shining in the light as he wrapped around the boy, tail coiling around his legs and arms sliding around his shoulders to keep him in place, keep him from fleeing. Tony made–not a frightened noise, because he was never afraid of them no matter how stupid that was–a… a concerned noise.

Steve swallowed it, pressing his lips to Tony’s, hands cupping his cheeks as he thrust his tongue into his mouth when the human made a surprised sound. Tony’s hands scrabbled at his back and shoulders, fingernails sliding over scales, before he dug his hands into the blond’s hair and–didn’t tug him away.

Bucky prowled around so his front pressed against Tony’s back, trailing his nose over the human’s neck and shoulder as he rested his hands on the boy’s slim waist. “You can be vulnerable with us, doll. We’ll take care of you.”

Tony let out a sound, small, wounded, and broke the kiss with Steve to tuck his head under his chin, hiding his face. “You’re just saying that.”

“Sweetheart, we’ve been trying to tell you we love you for a while now,” Steve admitted quietly. “You always brushed us off.”

“Well-!” Tony leaned back, scowling up at him, then turning to scowl at Bucky. “How was I supposed to know? You guys are together, and happy, so how was I supposed to know that you wanted me too? And-! And why didn’t you say anything earlier, before Tiberius–”

“You and Tiberius met when you were nineteen,” Bucky explained slowly. “You were still too young for us to approach you. Probably still are, to be honest.”

“I’m twenty-four!” Tony exclaimed indignantly.

Steve and Bucky stared at him. They didn’t have a number–even if they could count, the years passed differently for them. Sometimes it felt like only yesterday that Tony was peeking into the closet with a gap-toothed smile and whispering, ‘wanna play?’

Sometimes they still felt like they were robbing Tony’s cradle.

“You gonna kiss me too?” Tony asked suddenly, turning to Bucky.

Bucky stared back at him silently.

Tony frowned, shoulders beginning to hunch. “Um. Unless. Unless you don’t want to.”

Steve chuckled and said, “Tony, he’s got a muzzle. How’s he s’posed to kiss you?”

“Oh.” Tony turned so his back was to Steve instead, a struggle because Steve was still wrapped around his legs. He looked up at Bucky, eyeing him critically. “…Well,” he said, shrugging, and leaned in to press a kiss to Bucky’s nose.

Bucky let out a high-pitched whine, tail wagging wildly, and in turn buried his cold, wet nose against the boy’s neck.

“Oh wow,” Steve said, laughing a little. “I guess you’ve found a good alternative.

“I guess,” Tony said, laughing a little when the wolf crowded him back against Steve, and the only thing that kept him from falling was the tail coiled around his legs. “Guys–Guys! I don’t know if you noticed, but I am still dating Sunset. Maybe if things go sour–”

Bucky lifted his head to look down at Tony, frowning. “Tony, let us show you something.”

Tony blinked up at him, concerned, because he sounded so serious. “Okay.”

“Clint!” Tony gasped, rushing over to him.

Clint spread his wings awkwardly, hobbling down to the arm of the couch so he was low enough that the human could wrap his arms around his waist instead of his legs. “Hey, Tony.”

“What happened?!” he exclaimed, leaning back so he could card his fingers through his feathers, fingers skimming lightly over the raw red patches on his wings.

Clint shrugged. “Had a fit.”

“An anxiety attack? A flashback? Do you need your security blanket?” Tony asked, fretting.

Clint made a rasping sound, feathers ruffling with annoyance. “I just got upset.”

“It’s okay if you need the security blanket. I made it for you.”

Clint sighed. “I don’t need the security blanket. I just got upset.”

“About what?” Tony asked, looking up at him. If he could fix it, he would.

Clint stared down at him for a long moment before he said, “Sunset. She’s a taker.”

Tony frowned. “Wh–”

“She’s going to hurt you even worse than Tiberius,” Clint continued, beginning to work himself up again. “I know it. She smiles and talks like the ringleaders. Smiles for the audience but turns around and beats the attractions. She’s waiting until she finds something she can take.” His crest began to rise and he let out an angry screech. “She’s going to hurt you and I want her gone!”

“Clint!” Steve exclaimed, reaching out to grab his wrists before he could sink his talons into Tony’s back. “Calm down!”

“Make her go make her go make her go!” Clint chanted, struggling for a moment, then let out another screech and twisted his head to rip out a beak-full of feathers.

Tony threw his arms around his neck, crying out, “Clint!”

“Makehergomakehergomakehergo!” Clint snarled. “Makehergomakehergo!”

Bucky lunged forward to grab Clint’s left wing so Steve could focus on his right.

Somehow, Natasha knew they needed help, and appeared a few minutes later with the security blanket Tony had made for Clint.

“She must be really bad,” Tony whispered, staring down at his clasped, shaking hands. “To make Clint react like that.”

Natasha grimaced. She’d done some digging. Sunset was every bit the taker Clint had accused her of and more–she liked inflicting pain on those she took from.

“He shouldn’t–he shouldn’t have to go through that,” Tony continued softly. There was blood on his hands from trying to stop the blood and cleaning Clint’s wings. “He doesn’t deserve that. And he’s–he’s been here longer than Sunset.”

“…We’re sorry,” Steve said, actually managing to sound sincere. “We just… don’t want you to get hurt.”

Tony stared at the lump under the heavy blanket that was Clint, sleeping fitfully and every once in a while letting out little noises of distress. If he was this upset about it, it must be true. “It’s fine,” he said, instead of anything else.

Sunset screamed and threw her wine glass at him. Tony had the unsettling feeling that if he’d waited until they were alone to tell her he wanted to break up, she’d have done much worse.

So he went home, washed the wine off his face, and crawled into the closet with Steve and Bucky.

Steve muttered in his sleep, coils loosening to open up a spot for him. He wrapped an arm around his waist and sighed contentedly, curling up against Bucky’s side. Bucky turned his head, snuffling sleepily at Tony’s head, then let out a soft, inquisitive huff and swiped his tongue through his hair.

“…Why does your hair taste like wine?” Bucky mumbled sleepily.

“Go back to sleep,” Tony answered.

Bucky swiped his hair again before burying his cold nose down the back of his shirt with a tired ‘whuff.’

Tony squirmed. Well. This was alright.

[justauthoring]

No...

IMAGINE: You’re Bellamy’s girlfriend, and when Murphy hangs him you’re also in the drop-shit. When Murphy sees you, to make Bellamy more angry, he began’s touching you suggestively.

A/N: Not the best summary of summaries but I am currently going through a The 100 faze and really wanted to write a story on it. I got this idea from @wukindly so props to her or him! That story was amazing and I wanted to do my own little twist on it. Also, I love both Murphy and Bellamy, but with how the episode actually goes, Murphy’s gonna be the bad guy in this one.

Let me know if you guys would like more The 100 imagines and please request some as well. CHECK HERE TO SEE WAHT’S ACCEPTABLE? HERE: http://justauthoring.tumblr.com/post/154862752161/request

WARNING: Suggestive material, and sexual abuse but only touching! Nothing further!

“Murphy! Murphy, if you even touch Jasper you're dead.”

You tried to quiet your frantic breathing. Your heart bounded against your chest as you hid above where Murphy was. You could see perfectly through the trap door that allowed you up but Murphy didn’t know you were there and although you desperately wanted to help Jasper, without a weapon you wouldn’t be able to do anything.

It was silent for a long time as you heard Jasper’s grunts of fear. Murphy was out of your view but you kept your eyes locked on Jasper, he was a dear friend of yours and you prayed he would make it out of here alive.

Looking around there was nothing valuable as a weapon up where you were, but just bellow you there was a metal rod. If you were sneaky enough and Murphy was distracted you could possibly reach the weapon in time. It was risky but you had to at least try.

Just as you moved to jump down, the familiar crackled of the walkie-talkie caught your attention and you braced yourself. “Murphy, i know you can hear me.” Your heart began to pump rapidly again at the familiar voice of your boyfriend, Bellamy. You wished you could see his face right now and hold him, you were so scared.

Part of you wonder if anyone knew you were in here. Camp was huge and with a situation such like this, it wouldn’t be hard to forget about you, even for a moment.

“All food and ammo are in the middle ground, you know that.” Bellamy explained and Murphy came back into view. You snapped your head back, trying to stay hidden for now. Looking around you, you saw what Bellamy was talking about, they needed these supplies. “You’re leaving us vulnerable to an attack. I can’t let that happen.”

Murphy grabbed the walkie talkie, “yeah, well, if you haven’t noticed you’re not exactly in control right now.” You let your eyes fall on the metal rod again, Jasper whimpering slightly when Murphy walked closer to him.

“Come on, Murphy. You don’t want to hurt Jasper.” You rocked, thinking about leaning down. Just has you moved, Bellamy’s voice stopped you once again. “You want to hurt me.” No, no. What was he thinking? You cursed him mentally.

Sometimes you hated your boyfriends knack for being the hero. He always threw himself in danger when it involved saving his friends and you from danger. But he was right, Murphy did want to hurt him. Though you loved Bellamy, it made sense, Bellamy was one of the prime reasons why Murphy had been strung up and almost hung for a death he didn’t commit. Which only proved to make you more afraid.

You watched in mild interest as Murphy debated over what Bellamy said. “So, what do you say? How about you trade him for me?” You felt your heart drop and flinched your eyes closed in panic. You needed to act quick. “Look, all you have to do is let him go and i’ll take his place.”

Murphy smirked and you glared at him from above, “how?”

“Simple, you open the door. I walk in, he walks out.”

There was a deafening moment of silence as Murphy and Jasper exchanged looks. Then you saw him pick up Jasper, Jasper letting out a squeal of surprised, as Murphy slammed the door open. He was distracted, which meant if you were quiet enough you could sneak down and grab the weapon.

“Just you, Bellamy, unarmed.” Murphy yelled out as you began making you way down the ladder. You took light small steps, trying to be as quiet as possible. “Ten seconds or i’ll put one in Jasper’s leg.” When you finally reached the ground, Murphy had begun counting. You cursed yourself when you nearly slipped, checking quickly behind you, you carefully grabbed the metal rod.

“I’m here.” You heard Bellamy. And then he came walking in, you quickly hid in the shadows, unsure of what to do. You had a weapon but you wouldn’t be able to reach Murphy quietly with Bellamy there. He’d be sure to make some sort of reaction.

You jumped when the bullet rang, making the metal rod fall out of your heads. You cursed yourself when the noise echoed, why the hell did you have to be so stupid and get scared? You watched in concern as Murphy pointed around the room in panic. Bellamy seemed just as shock, no doubt thinking he was the only one in here. 

“Get out!” Murphy suddenly yelled and you closed your eyes. What to do? What to do? There was no where to hide or run and you’d lost the only defence you had, not only that but Murphy had a gun. “I know someone’s in here, come out!”

Taking a deep breath, you straightened out. You took small, shaky steps towards the light, looking down when you finally became viewable. You heard a chuckle of amusement, when you looked up and made eye contact with Bellamy.

“No…” He whispered, shaking his head and taking a small step back in hopelessness. You stared fearfully at him, shaking in the spot.

“What a surprise!” Murphy mocked you, pointing his gun directly at your head now. You took a step back from instinct, “eh. No. How long have you been here there, Y/N? You didn’t sneak in with Bellamy here, so you must’ve been here the whole time. How’d you hide so well?”

You opened your mouth to speak before falling silent and pointing up to the trap door. Murphy looked up, licking his lips as he let out a laugh. “Come here.” He ordered, pointing where he wanted you with his gun. 

“Murphy, leave her out of this. This has nothing to do with her.” Murphy spun to Bellamy, smiling wildly at him.

“This has everything to do with her.” Murphy looked back over at you, ordering you once again over to him. You began making your way over to him, your eyes directly on Bellamy the whole time, you could see his hands inching to grab you but hesitated with the gun pointed towards him.

You let out a sob when Murphy grabbed you around your neck, smacking the back of you towards his chest. He was much taller than you, though most people were. He held with his left hand, the gun pointing at Bellamy, and you with his right, holding you tightly against him so you couldn’t move.

The walkie-talkie crackled, reminding you that it wasn’t just you three. “Bellamy.” Octavia’s voice came over, her voice cracking with concern. Murphy leaned down, bringing you with him as he grabbed the walkie-talkie. Bellamy kept his eyes on Murphy, watching his every movement. “Bellamy, are you okay?” Her voice sounded more strained.

“Want her to know you’re alive?” Murphy asked, tightening his grip on you. You muffled a moan of pain, grabbing his arm, trying to pull it away from your neck. “Start tying.”

Your eyes darted to the seat belt laying on the ground, realization of want Murphy meant to do coming quickly. You struggled, “no!” You yelled, trying to escape his grip. Murphy grunted. Bellamy held up his hands, trying to tell you to calm down, you fell silent, understanding what he meant.

Bellamy crouched down, grabbing the seatbelt as Octavia’s voice came up again. “Bellamy! Do you copy?”

“I’m fine.” Bellamy finally spoke. “Just a misfire. Now stop worrying about me and get back to work, all of you… and tell Raven to hurry her ass up.” You blinked, confused as to what Raven could be doing when you heard the faintest of a thump coming from below you. Murphy nor Bellamy seemed to have heard it, and you realized that she must be underneath you somehow.

“Alright, that’s long enough. Tie those two ends together.” Murphy ordered, Bellamy complied. His eyes falling once again on you when finished. A widespread of panic fell over you when Murphy ordered Bellamy to toss it over a pole in the ceiling. He hesitated, and turning your head you saw the same metal rod. You desperately needed to reach it and quick.

When the noose was over the pole, Bellamy turned to Murphy. Shrugging his shoulders, he asked; “what do you want me to say? Want me to apologize? I’m-” Murphy raised his gun threateningly when Bellamy step closer to you two. Bellamy sighed, stepping back and raising his hands lightly. “I’m sorry.” he mumbled.

You felt Murphy smirk against your neck, “you got it all wrong, Bellamy. I don’t want you to say anything. I want you to feel what I felt, and then…” You took a deep breath in, sucking up your stomach as you stared dreadfully at Bellamy. “Then, I want you to die.”

Bellamy dragged a stool over, being ordered to stand on it he complied. You felt tears coming as he stood above you two, Murphy holding the other end of the strap tightly against you, it wrapped repeatedly around his hand. You recoiled from the feeling of the strap, hating it against yourself. “Put it over your head.”

Bellamy blinked, hesitating he spoke up. “This is insane, the grounders could-” You let out a scream of terror, shifting your body to the right when the smoke from the bullet Murphy had just shot next to your foot, evaporated. You could heard your own heart now, as you tried to squirm away, Murphy held you tighter.

Bellamy moved forward to grab you before Murphy let out another bullet, closer to you. You whimpered, trying to calm your breathing when Bellamy finally complied, putting the end of the noose around his neck. “Happy now?” Bellamy spat out. "Please just let her go Murphy. I know you don’t want to hurt her.”.

Murphy pulled on his end of the rope, jabbing you in the neck as Bellamy’s hands instinctively grabbed the noose trying to loosen the tightness. “You’re so brave, aren’t you Bellamy?” Murphy spat, he pushed you and himself towards Bellamy. “I mean you came in here thinking you were gonna turn things around, that you were stronger than me, now not only do I have you hanging by a thread. Little Y/N here is here as well.” You tilted your head to the side, disgusted when Murphy’s breathed in your scent from your neck, his breath fanning over you.

“No, stop.” Bellamy said.

You let yourself make eye contact with Bellamy as Murphy dropped the gun, kicking it behind you as he pulled higher on Bellamy’s restraints. And grabbing you around the waist to make sure neither of you were going anywhere. You pushed yourself closer to Murphy’s chest, trying to get away from his grasp. “Well, what are you thinking now, Bellamy? Huh?” 

Bellamy was now gripping the ends around his neck with both hands, his toes and just the lightest touch of his feet touching the stool. He let out grunts, clearing choking a bit. “Please, stop.” You begged, trying to get Murphy’s attention back on you.

“You know, I always liked you, Y/N.” Murphy spoke up, nuzzling his head in your hair as he kept his gaze on Bellamy. You blinked back tears as Bellamy tried to get to you. “But, then I come back and find out you’re fucking king boy over her.” He whispers harshly in your ear as you whimper. You cough when his grip on your neck becomes tighter, also tightening Bellamy’s noose. 

“You know, Bellamy, I gotta hand it to you. You got ‘em all fooled, including Y/N.” You pulled on Murphy’s hand that was around your neck when he let his other hand graze over your body. Reaching your chest. You close your eyes, unable to bare the look in Bellamy’s face as he watched you be defiled. Nor could you see the colour of his skin slowly dissipate as breathing became more difficult.

“Yeah, well we knew know the truth, don’t we, Bellamy?” Murphy grabbed your right breast, his head completely turned towards Bellamy now. You felt tears now starting to fall as you felt disgusted that you were letting this happen.

“P-Please…” Bellamy choked out. “Leave her out of this.” He couldn’t bare to see you so tortured, and it hurt him that he could do nothing to stop it.

Murphy loosened his grip on the strap, letting Bellamy and yourself take a stake of breath. But the rope around Bellamy’s neck was still tight enough that he couldn’t do anything to help himself. Murphy was also so close that one kick of the leg and the stool would be gone from beneath Bellamy’s feet. “You’re a coward. I learned that the day you kicked out the crate from beneath me.”

You let out a strangled cry, Murphy’s hand still on your breast. “Isn’t that what you said? That you were just giving the people what they wanted, right? Well, now i’m giving Y/N what she wanted.” Murphy murmured lowering hand so it caressed your stomach. Bellamy tried to kick out to help you but stopped when he nearly fell. “Isn’t that right, Y/N?”

“No.” You whispered. “I don’t want that.” Murphy grunted, his expression turning angry. In a fit of panic, Bellamy whispered; “I should’ve stopped them.”

Stopping his ministrations, Murphy turned to Bellamy. Nodding to himself. “Yeah, it’s a little late for that.”

“What do you expect Murphy? That they’re just gonna let you walk out of here?” Bellamy questioned.

Murphy nodded, thinking to himself. “Well, I think the princess is with me. Clarke’s dead, and the kings about to be. So, who’s really gonna lead these people, huh?”

You looked back over to the metal rod, Murphy’s grip loosening on you a little bit. You debated over whether you should fight for it or wait. “Me. That’s who.” Murphy answered his own question. Turning to you he smiled, “and yeah. Maybe i’ll have to pound the princess over here into submission. I’m sure she would feel nice, up and against me. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it, too, Y/N.“ Murphy gazes at, grabbing your hip, he thrusts you against him. Bellamy lets out a grunt of anger, strutting his foot out to try and hit Murphy who let go of you in panic, knocking you back so hard you hit your head on something. You barely noticed when Murphy tightened the noose around Bellamy, as you blinked trying to gain consciousness. Bellamy yelled your name but you barely heard him.

“Ahh!” A scream echoed out and rang in your ears. You blinked when four loud gun shots rang through and deafened you. Your head dropped and when you opened them, Bellamy was choking, the stool gone from under his feet and Murphy was making his way over to you and quickly.

Turning your head, you saw the metal rod. Grunting, you ignored the pain in your head and turned over to grab it. Murphy grabbed your shoulder to turn you over, but you’d already had grabbed the weapon and hit him over the head. Your aim was misjudged from the dizziness that filled you. Murphy straddled you, easily grabbing both your wrists and slamming them on the ground. “Get off of me!” You yelled, trying to push him off.

The door creaked open but you barely heard it as Murphy tried to grab you, yanking you upwards. A scream fell from your lips as you were dragged and tossed up the ladder, but your eyes met Bellamy’s, seeing him choking to death. You tried to reach him but Murphy was quick and aggressive.

You were still dizzy, and Murphy tossed you to the ground, quickly tying you there. It was loose but it kept your left hand there as he looked around frantically for something. You listened closely, trying to see if you could hear Bellamy at all. 

“Come on, goddamnit!” Murphy screamed and you flinched, trying to untie your hand. You were so close when Murphy kneeled next to you, holding the gun to your waist.

“There’s no bullets…” You whispered, out of breath. 

Murphy smiles, “no, theres one.” He leaned down, grabbing your chin before smashing his lips against you. You struggled from his grip, his hands no doubt bruising your jaw.

“Murphy!” You heard Bellamy yell hoarsely. You immediately snapped back from Murphy’s grip, turning your eyes to look at the trap door. Murphy panicked, as he pressed the gun harder against your waist. You feared he would shoot you. “Murphy! It’s over!” The trap door began to smash open and closed, as you guessed Bellamy tried to break it open. “Let Y/N go!”

You watched Murphy carefully. “Please, just let me go.” You whispered, he looked at you before his eyes caught something. He stood up, letting go of you as you followed where he was going when you saw his gaze on the explosive can of gun powder, you panicked.

You frantically tried to untie your hand and just as your hand was free, there was an explosion, small but smoke filtered around you as you stared at the gaping hole in the drop-ship. Snapping awake from your shock, you crawled over to the trap door, taking the metal rod out and letting Bellamy and Jasper clamber in.

When Bellamy saw you, he immediately wrapped his arms around his waist. As Jasper went to the gaping whole. “Murphy’s running away.” Jasper exclaimed. “Should we go after him?”

Bellamy mumbled a no, not letting go of you as Jasper nodded and left to give you two some space. 

You pushed back from his embraced, running your hands over his face making sure he was okay. He looked extremely concerned as he breather heavily, no doubt still out of breath. You watched as his hands, shaking, reached up and softly touched your bottom lip. He pulled back staring at the blood, you hadn’t realized but it must have happened when he kissed you.

“I thought I lost you…” You whispered, staring at the red marks that marred his neck.

“I thought…” Bellamy started, “I thought he had…”

You shook your head. “No, all he did was kiss me and well, the rest you saw.” Bellamy nodded, standing up and helping you up as well. “Is your head okay?” He asked, touching the back of it only to feel something slimy, you nodded despite the clear concern on his face.

“Just a bit dizzy.”

Despite how he felt, he nodded. Leaning down gently, he pressed his lips to yours. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

A/N: So yeah! My first The 100 imagine! i hope you guys enjoyed it and truthfully I think it’s the longest imagine i’ve ever written. But I enjoyed writing it greatly!