#it's like a table with one wonky leg

[bitter-winter-adult]

who doesn't like tumblr? we have the liars and the crazy people and no one fucking cares! Someone could be like lmao I want to shove a hydrant up my ass just to feel something and ppl would reblog and go #mood #same #I can feel this on a personal level AND NO ONE WOULD BAT AN EYE

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

Steddie Upside-Down AU Part 36

Part 1 Part 35

Will’s skin feels tight, stretched over his bones as he tosses and turns into the morning. It’s a relief when the sounds of Mom burning breakfast filter into his room.

“Shit, shit,” she says, pans clattering as she moves them from one burner to another. 

WIll crawls out of his bed, limbs lethargic. His socks have gone wonky in the night – all his tossing and turning making the heels twist to the front of his ankles. He slides them around on the carpet, shifting them around without having to bend over.

He shuffles into the kitchen, settling quietly at the table, feet up on the chair, chin on his knees as he watches his Mom cook. 

She’s scrapping crisp scrambled eggs onto a plate, muttering to herself as toast pops from the toaster. 

Jonathan stumbles out of his bedroom, drawn by the sounds. His pajama pants are too long, trailing across the floor, making him trip on the hems. He grabs the toast without a word, plucking the butter from the counter and coating them liberally before bringing it over to the table.

“Sleep okay?” he asks, sitting down beside Will.

Mom turns, holding the burnt eggs and mushy hash browns on separate plates. “Oh, sweetie,” she says, hurrying over and putting her own bounty in the middle of the table. “How long have you been here?”

“Just got here,” he says, looking down at his knees.

It’s not that his Mom hasn’t always paid attention to him, but it’s grown sharper in the days since he got back from the Upside-Down. Like she needs to catch his every word. Like if he leaves her sight, he’ll disappear. That’s how she’s looking at him now.

Jonathan goes to grab forks and plates, heaping food onto Will’s plate before getting his own. 

The eggs are rubbery, over-cooked and under-salted, and the potatoes are more water than starch. Will eats it all.

There's been a pit in his stomach since he got back, like no matter how much he eats, there’s more space to fill. The doctor’s had said that was normal – just his body's shock response to food scarcity. It’d go away.

“Can I go see Steve?” Will asks.

Steve’s been so still, every time he’s visited. They’d shaved his head, and it made him look young and small and washed out; nothing like the boy with the gun or the boy with the broad back, always standing between them and danger.

But, maybe that’s never who Steve’s been. Maybe he’s always been small, and tired, and scared, just like Will. He just wishes Steve would wake up.

He hasn’t, not since Eddie’d brought him back. No one would tell him what happened, but the way Eddie refused to leave the room entirely said enough. Will isn’t sure he wants to know anything more.

He just wants Steve to open his eyes.

“I have to work,” Mom says, lips pursed. 

She hasn’t been to work since Will got back. Neither has Jonathan, and money’s got to be running thin. 

“I can take him,” Jonathan says, meeting his Mom’s eyes. Something Will can’t parse passes between them, before his Mom slowly nods, reluctance in every move.

Jonathan drops Mom off at work, and then they go, Will crawling between the seats to settle in the passenger seat. 

“Do you think he’ll be awake?” Will asks, staring out the windshield as Jonathan parks the car.

“I don’t know,” Jonathan says, unbuckling his seatbelt, not looking WIll’s way. “I hope so.”

They’ve been here enough that they don’t need directions to Steve’s second floor hospital room.

Eddie’s sitting beside Steve’s bed, like he has been every time Will’s come by. He’s wearing blue scrubs like the nurses do, and there’s no blood on his face. He looks tidier than Will’s ever seen him. 

Steve’s laying down, oxygen tubes taped below his nose.

“Will.” It’s Steve’s voice, scratchy and tired, but Steve’s. 

Will rushes to his bed. Eddie’s blocking access, so Will clambers over his legs, accidentally crushing his toes in the process. Steve looks washed out and tired. But his eyes are open and he’s smiling up at WIll.

Will bursts into tears. Steve holds up his arms in offering, and Will burrows carefully into Steve’s chest, keeping most of his weight on the side of the bed, unsure of where the injuries lie.

“Steve,” he hiccups. “They wouldn’t tell me anything.”

He’s not sure if he’s talking about the doctors, or his Mom, or Eddie himself.

“It’s okay,” Steve says, clutching the back of his head. “I’m fine.”

Will laughs, “liar.” Someone’s hand runs up his back. Jonathan’s or Eddie’s, it doesn’t matter. Everyone he cares about is safe. Everyone in this room is safe. 

They’re home.

When Will calms down, shuffling back awkwardly from the boy he barely knows, Steve smiles up at him, and it’s like something clicks into place. Steve is Steve. That’s enough.

Jonathan is sitting next to Eddie, shuffling uncomfortably before clearing his throat. “Thanks, man,” he says. When Will looks back, Jonathan’s looking down at his lap, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “For saving my little brother. I don’t know what I would’ve done if–” 

His voice breaks, throat clicking as he looks down at his fumbling hands. Steve clears his throat. “Hey, man. Your brother’s a badass. He would’ve been fine.”

Will thinks about the endless hours alone in that dark, quiet place before he’d run into Steve and Eddie, and doubts it. It was like each second there sucked a little bit more out of him, leaving silence in its wake. He’s not sure what would’ve crawled out of the Upside-Down in his place. 

Will smiles down at his shoes as Eddie chimes in, “yeah, baby Byers definitely saved my life.” 

He can feel his cheeks flushing.

“Well, still,” Jonathan says. “Thanks.”

Steve clears his throat. “Anytime.”

Will sits on the side of Steve’s bed, unwilling to leave now that he’s here. It’s like, when he’s with Steve and Eddie, something comes back that the Upside-Down scooped out of him. And everything else is purgatory.

He’ll be trying to sleep, or talking to the party, or listening to music with Jonathan, and it’s all hollow. He’s just waiting.

But right now? Will’s here, and he’s staying as long as he can. 

Part 37

[dckweed]

THE DEATH OF PEACE OF MIND ➺ bob floyd

summary: In which bob floyd gets himself into a bit of a pickle and calls on his hot, recently single neighbor to help him out, the situation is mutually beneficial..in more ways than one.

warnings: fake dating, violence, domestic violence mentioned, nicknames, slowburn, eventual smut.

this is an x reader fic where reader is referred to as sunshine or sunny as a nickname, also i know the moodboard is a lil wonky no one say anything im gonna fix it! i made it on my phone half asleep lmao.

comment below for taglist!

wordcount: 2260

 PART ONE - THE LIE. 

The music was soft in the background for once, his friends laughter the loudest thing in the room. Bob couldn’t help but to laugh along with them as he took a swig of his third beer of the night, a little more than tipsy but not completely drunk. He knew he was a lightweight, and this was the only time he ever preferred to drink, in the comfort of his own home surrounded by people he trusted. His friends were all gathered around his coffee table, some of them on the couch, some of them sprawled on the floor as they laughed and goofed off, the NHL game they had all gathered to watch together no longer a top priority. 

Bradley and Natasha had been talking about the blind dates they had been on recently, set up by each other, each of them pointing out the flaws in the others choosing with racious laughter as they knocked back their alcohol and made a mess of Bob’s coffee table as they playfully fought each other, Bradley flipping over the bowl of potato chips that was sat out as he kicked his leg across the table from the floor to hit his friend. Bob laughs at the scene, not minding the mess because the situation was just so funny and he was for once in his life, enjoying being in the moment. 

“Look what you did, numbnuts! You spilled all the chips!” Hangman shouts, tossing his couch pillow at them from where he lay on the love seat across from Bob. Bradley catches it mid-air and tosses it back to Jake, a terrible throw and a clear enough window into how drunk he is because it doesn’t get any air and knocks clear into the row of open bud lights, knocking them over and causing what was left to slosh out onto the floor. Javy groans, slipping out of the chair he was sat in to pick up the bottles as Bob gets up to get a towel to sop up the wet beer from his outrageously expensive rug so his little shih tzu, Cosie wouldn’t go licking it up when he passed out tonight. 

He was only gone for a few moments but by the time he came back the subject of dating had suddenly been turned to him. He shakes his head, trying not to think to hard about how he was way more than tipsy by that point because the whole room started to spin when he did that. “No, not dating right now.” He says, kneeling down to start cleaning up the mess as Javy comes back from throwing away the bottles. 

Jake scoffs from next to him taking a long drag of his own beer, and Bob braces himself for whats coming next. “Of course not,” He says, a small bit of disdain in his tone, but Bob knew it was all just friendly teasing, even if it did hurt him. Even if he was so tired of constantly hearing from everyone about how he needed to get out into the dating pool. Truthfully, he was tired of being single, but he didn’t need these jack offs meddling in his love life the way Natasha had been doing with her blind dates with girlfriends she’d made off base. It just didn’t work out for him, it never did. 

But god, he was tired of hearing it from Jake about how he was ‘too afraid of girls’ to actually go out and date one, they were grown ass adults, weren’t they? Why did it matter what he did with his personal life outside of work and the friend group? He didn’t like to date around, he liked relationships. Besides, he wasn’t afraid of girls either. That one was starting to piss him off, wither away at that self control that his mama swore he was born with too much of. Not that any of them needed to know that..so why then, did he feel like proving them all wrong?

He knew in the back of his drunk mind that his next choice of words was not a good one to make, and he had just dug himself into a terribly deep hole that would haunt him for the rest of his life (good god he would probably have to change placements if they ever fucking found out, or better yet, retire from the navy altogether). But Lord help him, he opened his mouth anyway and let the words out. 

“I don’t think my girlfriend would like me seeing other people.” He says, taking a kind of sick pleasure in hearing Jake snort beer out of his nose as he sits up so quickly he falls off of the couch, his words catching the attention of his other friends too. “What?” He asks, looking around at all of their gaping faces. He regretted his lie immediately. “Is it so hard to picture me with a girlfriend? I am capable of getting one, you know.” A dig at Jake just for the fucking fun of it. 

There was a long moment of silence before all of their voices were flooding his ears at once, questions coming from all directions. It was almost as if the news had shocked them sober. 

What did I just do? 

THE WEEK PREVIOUS- 

Sunshine Y/L/N, was many things, a bitch, a whore, a liar, a psycho (all depending on which of her ex-boyfriends and family members you asked),..but a fool was not one of them. You were not foolish enough to let a man raise a hand to you and cower away and accept his apology because you thought you deserved it or because it would placate him. And so when the asshole you had been in the midst of arguing with because he swore to god that you were fucking the bouncer at work (you would never, you weren’t in to bald men who looked like broke versions of mr. clean) cocked his arm back and slapped you across the face so hard that blood splattered from your nose, you clenched a fist and let all hell break loose. 

You had screamed, and screamed and screamed and had thrown anything that you could get hands on, drawing blood on his forehead as an empty flower vase shattered against the wall that she shared with her neighbor. “Look what you did, you crazy bitch!” He yelled, holding a hand to his forehead, offended that you had dared to retaliate against him. 

You sucked in a deep breath, fists clenching. There was nothing you hated more than being called crazy. You were not crazy. You were not fucking crazy. “Get out.” You breathed, a surprisingly steady hand pointing towards the door that was being banged on from an outside source. The man looks at you as if you were a bull with three heads. “Are you deaf? I said get the fuck OUT!” You had bellowed, grabbing him by the collar of his shirt and dragging him to the door, it took all of three seconds to throw open the chain locking the door before tossing the sorry fucker out, straight into your neighbor, Bob, who had very obviously been banging on the door. 

“Woah-” The tall, lanky man had said, catching the rat bastard who had been flung out at him. He pushes him off of him, noticing the blood on his face and looks at you, the blood streaming from your nose. “Are you okay?” He asks, his immediate thought on his neighbor as watched the guy storm off towards the stairwell at the end of the hallway. 

You sniffed, jaw clinched as you nod, watching the jerkoff walk away before running back inside. Bob follows as you yank open the window in the living room before running back down a hallway, to the bedroom he assumed. Bob had looked around at the mess of glass and blood splatters on the floor, wondering what the fuck had taken pace. He had heard yelling, and glass shattering and had run over trying to open the door. “Mother fucker, DON’T YOU EVER COME BACK HERE!” You scream, tossing a heap of clothes out of the window and down onto the street, Bob heard a mans yell and knew they must’ve landed directly on the offending asshole. “Stupid fucking son of a fucking bitch.” 

“Um, Sunny,” Bob says, placing a gentle hand on your slender shoulder. You were shaking, with fear or anger he isn’t sure but he wants to help. “Are you okay?” He doesn’t know what else to ask, what else to do. He’d never been in this kind of situation before. 

He watches you raise a hand and use the back of it to wipe your bloody nose before turning around to face him, your friendly neighbor whose dog you often watched when he had to work overnights at the base or when he had been on his deployment for the uranium mission. Blood smeared across your upper lip and cheek as you look up at him, eyes watery and full of an emotion he couldn’t quite decipher. The smile on your face is terrifyingly sexy. “Just peachy, bobby,” You whispered, blinking the tears in your eyes away as you set your shoulders squarely. “My step-daddy didn’t raise no fucking bitch, a man like him wants to hit me, he better be prepared for me to hit him back ten times fucking harder.” 

Bob didn’t know what to say, so he resulted for saying a simple okay and stayed around to help you clean up the mess that littered your normally spotless living room. He had even ordered you pizza while you were in the bathroom cleaning up your face, paying for it without telling you because he knew you would argue. He knew you made good money in your line of work, he knew you liked paying for your own things, but he was a gentleman nonetheless and wanted to take care of a neighbor who was clearly in some kind of need of support. He had stayed until you had fallen asleep, silently letting himself out of your apartment and the pair of you hadn’t crossed paths until a week later, granted, you hadn’t left your apartment much (you couldn’t very well go to work with a bruise on your face, it certainly wouldn’t bode well with your bosses nor with your customers) for your paths to have crossed to begin with. 

You were surprised to say the least when a knock sounded on your apartment door early in the morning on Saturday, and even moreso when you opened to find none other than your adorable next door neighbor (and, in a way, your savior) standing in your doorframe, hands in the pockets of his jeans and a cute little crease in between his eyebrows as he looked up at you from where he was looking at his shoes. “Hey Bob, everything okay?” You ask, wiping the sweat away from your forehead. You had been doing an intense pilates session in your living room, a good way to keep you limber and fit for your job. “Are you going on deployment or something? Do you need me to take Cosie?”

“No, no..” Bob shakes his head, he felt stupid for coming over here, for not just immediately fessing up to his friends about his dumb lie. He should just turn around and go back to his apartment and call it a day, and he was going to until his fuckin’ phone buzzed in his pocket and he was reminded of why he had told the damn lie in the first place. “Um, actually, do you think I could come in? I have a favor to ask of you, and it’s..a big one.” 

You were confused but allowed him to come in nonetheless, shutting and locking the door behind him as he did. What could he possibly need from you that wasn’t watching his dog while he was away? You couldn’t say you weren’t keen to find out, you were bored out of your mind and you couldn’t help but wonder what he needed from you of all people. Bob had literally seen you at your worst last week, and yet here he was inside of your apartment with his hands awkwardly shoved into the front pockets of his boot cut jeans, his pretty eyes flitting about, finding anything to look at that wasn’t your breasts that were pushed up in your slightly too small lulu lemon top. 

“What’s up, Bobby?” You asked, headed to your kitchen that over looked the living room. You grabbed a bottle of water out of your slowly emptying fridge and twisted open the cap, taking a hefty sip. 

“Um..” He says, his lips pursing as his eyebrows furrow together somehow even deeper. He blows air out of his nose and finally looks up at you, taking his hands out of his pockets only to place them on his hips, awkwardly. “I need you to be my girlfriend.” He says and you snort your water out of your nose on accident, choking on it at the first mention of the words as you tried to process them. “Oh fuck-” 

TAGLIST-

@mamachasesmayhem

[genshxn]

✤ 𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐦𝐨𝐮𝐜𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐫𝐜: 𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐢𝐜𝐤

mild(?) spoilers for 3.2 archon quest (but probably everyone knows it by now let's be honest)

written pre-3.3

author drivel. what's up, i've got covid and a head full of cotton and I'm making it your problem too, so here's some unsolicited 'fluffy' scaramouche word vomit. as such, please excuse any egregious spelling/grammar mistakes or consistency errors because lord knows i'm gonna fuck something up with my negative braincells rn.

sorry about the lack of consistency with scaramouche's name. there are so many bloody things you can call that lil piece of shit

synopsis. under kusanali's order, you're in charge of scaramouche's domestication. for now, you've fallen sick with a tenacious cold, and as part of his 'training', scaramouche has to look after you.

contents. y/n has a cold (and the shivers), scaramouche being scaramouche, slight crack, fluff, and scaramouche screaming.

w.c. 2.2k

HEY HEY YOU CAN READ PART 2 HERE

You let out a prolonged, melodramatic groan. Colds suck. You were piled under blanket after blanket, nestled in amongst a halo of pillows, banished to your quarters near the Sanctuary of Surasthana. Despite being half buried alive, you were still trying your best not to shiver. Your fever has rotated to its chills period, and nothing was helping.

You sigh. The low-lit room and radio silence weren't helping your awful feeling. Curse human fragility and its ability to fall victim to microscopic beings not even really considered "alive".

"Augh, I feel like shit..."

The door slams open. "You look like shit." In walks Scaramouche—the man of many names—with a tray of food in hand and blankets strung over his slender shoulders like an oversized, pompous collar. Same as ever, he speaks with a sharp tongue. It's not so much sarcasm aimed at you rather than it simply being the puppet's nature.

"Yeah, thanks Bowlcut." You cough back in reply.

"How many times have I told you to stop calling me that?" He huffs, gently setting down the tray on a small table next to you, contrary to his grouchy demeanour. Next, he sheds himself of the blankets, sticking them at the foot of your bed.

"As many times as I've told you to not announce your arrival with 'n insult aimed a' me." You grunt out, voice stuffy and croaky from your sinuses feeling like they're about to blow up. "Try your opening line again, Bowlcut."

With a dramatic roll of his eyes, he belligerently changes his greeting. "I brought your food." He dramatically gestures to the table beside you, sarcastically showing off the dishes with the added pizzazz of some jazz hands.

"Much better." You pathetically sit up, cascades of green blankets falling off your form. The movement makes your wonky head spin slightly.

"If you don't hurry up and eat it, I'm gonna eat it myself." He pulls a chair up from behind him and sticks himself down on it, leaning back with one leg crossed on top of the other. "It smells good." He looks between you and the food expectantly.

"I'd love to be able to smell it, but unfortunately it feels like a slime's taken refuge in my sinuses right now." You shuffle over to the edge of the bed to get closer, still wrapped in a thick, fluffy blanket. You shudder at the loss of warmth. "Thanks for bringing my food, Scaramouche."

To your surprise, you're met with silence from him. Normally he has some sort of surly quip to fire back at anything you say, but not this time it seems. "...What're you gawking at?" He notices your blatant staring.

"You feeling alright? You're unusually quiet."

"I should be the one asking you that question." His half-assed sarcastic tone betrays his actual message with that line. He stares at some point on the floor in front of him, unable to meet your gaze. "I-it's— um... just..."

"Just what?" You blink, tilting your head slightly.

"Can you not call me that?" His voice is much quieter than normal. He sounds almost... defeated. A very uncharacteristic tone for someone who refuses to accept defeat (despite it being the only thing he's been faced with in recent times).

"You mean Sca—"

"Did you not hear what I just said?" He quickly cuts you off.

"Ah, sorry." You look down at the same spot on the floor for a moment. "What would you like to be called then?"

He doesn't answer, still looking downcast.

"I think I've heard you use Wanderer once. I could call you that."

"What? Don't call me that. I just said that because I couldn't think of anything to say to some rando, like... one time!" His expression is right back to his usual self: a look of confused contempt.

"What about your other name, Kunikuzushi? I could also call you a shortened version, like... Niku?"

"Do not call me that. Niku means 'meat'. Of all things, you picked out that?" He throws his arms up in response. "Kunikuzushi or whatever works, I guess... Just don't call me Scaramouche. Or Bowlcut. OR NIKU." Upon the final word, he crosses his arms over himself like a child having a tantrum. "Now eat your food or I'm gonna take the halva for myself and feed you the... other thing... myself."

"Alright, alright." You turn to look down at the food. As you've had with your past meals, there was a dessert side of Halvamazd, made specially by Nahida for you, but curiously, the main dish itself was different than the usual Sumeran cuisine. It looks like some sort of Inazuman dish that you're not sure you've ever seen before. You stare at it curiously, and he notices.

"What, do you not like it?" Kunikuzushi frowns, staring intently at your face. His voice is unexpectedly intense.

"Oh, nothing like that, I just wasn't expecting an Inazuman dinner today." You wave your hands around slightly beneath the blanket.

"I-if you wanna blame anyone, blame the Radish," he says, sitting back, crossing his arms again. "It was her idea..." He trails off suspiciously, looking off to the side.

With that reaction? "Yeah right."

"It was!" He exclaims defensively. "Gods, are you sure you're sick? You're still as annoying as ever."

"Either way, it looks really good. What is it?"

At your words, Kunikuzushi calms down with a sigh. "It's my take on chazuke. Rice with some tea poured on top, plus some toppings. I made it, so of course it's going to be delicious." He declares confidently, puffing his flat chest.

"You made it for me?"

He stops in his tracks, lavender eyes going wide once he realizes he just blew his nonexistent cover. He sputters out some unintelligible nonsense before ultimately slumping down and crossing his arms grumpily for the third time. "Yes. Yes, I did. There, are you happy? I made it for you and it was my idea."

"Thank you very much, Ku. It looks delicious." You smile warmly at him. He looks at you with wide eyes, expression almost unreadable. His mouth parts, maybe to say something in response, but nothing comes out.

You unsheathe your hands from the blanket and begin to eat the dish. While your senses of smell and taste have been dampened by the cold, you can still taste the softly bitter and sweet flavours of the dish dancing over your tongue. It's the perfect temperature, to boot. Hot, but still cool enough to not burn your already shredded throat. Because your appetite isn't quite what it normally is, the light dish hits just right. The whole time, Kunikuzushi carefully—almost nervously—watches you wolf down the dish.

Once you finish it, you place the bowl and utensils back on the tray. "That was so good. Exactly what I needed." You wrap the blanket back around yourself, pulling it tighter to try and preserve your limited warmth. "You'll have to make it for me again when I'm better so I can really appreciate the taste."

"...Sure." He says shortly. His response isn't curt like normal, but just... awkward. You sit there awkwardly as well, trying to gather up all your layers of blankets again to reassemble your blanket cocoon. You're putting in a bit too much effort to try and not shiver. Kunikuzushi watches you for a minute, and then wordlessly moves to pick up the extra blankets he brought from the end of the bed.

"Oh, than—" Instead of simply handing them to you like you thought he would, he layers you in them, wrapping them around you himself. He kneels on the bed, torso close to your head. As he piles on blanket after blanket, his hands brush all over your shoulders. He's so close that you can feel a faint warmth radiating off him. An idea cha cha slides into your head.

"You look all... not even pathetic, just sad when you're sick and cold."

You've been around the grumpy puppet long enough to know that what he's really saying is that he doesn't like seeing you look miserable. Once you're suitably wrapped, he places one final blanket on top, draping it over the top of your head like a hooded cloak or veil. He takes a step back to examine his blanket-wrapping handiwork. Suitably happy with it, he decides to return back to his chair. But before he can get too far, you manage to grab his slender wrist, earning a shocked sputter from him.

"The blankets aren't enough. I'm still cold."

"What?! What else could you possibly need to—"

"You can't get sick, right?"

"No, not from colds or viruses or whatever, hence why I'm he—wait, what're yo—" Kunikuzushi squints at you suspiciously, aware of sinister things lingering in the air.

"You're warm. Be my heater for a bit."

"H-has your fever turned you delusional?!"

"Probably." You try to suppress a shiver unsuccessfully. "But c'mon, you said that you wouldn't get sick. Please?" You look at him expectantly,

Kunikuzushi looks at you with all sorts of conflicting feelings flitting across his twitching, reddening face, bubbling up until he finally concedes with a massive sigh. "F-fine." He puffs, eyes completely avoiding your gaze. He's too embarrassed to look anywhere near you. "At least let me do something first..." He sits on the edge of the bed and sheds his loose-sitting kimono and robes, leaving them folded neatly on the edge. Now he's in just that semi-transparent undershirt and regular shorts.

You stare at him with slightly raised eyebrows.

"What? I don't wanna overheat." He frowns, turning away from your gaze slightly. "If you're really going to... c-cling to me or whatever, lose at least two of the blankets."

"But 'm cold."

"That's your brain gaslighting you into thinking you're cold. Your 'shivers' will dissipate once I'm under there with you. If you overheat, your brain will become even more fried, and then you'll be completely useless."

Now it's your turn to let out a massive sigh with a reluctant "Fiiiiine." The outer two layers of your blanket cocoon come off, discarded to the floor next to you. You shuffle back to your original position, lying under the covers, wrapped in blankets. Kunikuzushi shuffles up next to you, hesitates for a second and then pulls the new outer blanket up a little to sit it just on top of your head. That was the second time he did that.

"What's the point of that?"

"What?"

"Move the blanket on top of my head?"

"...Um. I... do it sometimes. I like the feeling of it. I don't know, I thought you might—"

Instead, you cut him off by reaching out and putting part of the blanket on top of his head as well. He immediately goes quiet with wide eyes.

"Come on heater, get under the blankets. You talk a lot."

He makes a miffed grunt and shuffles under the covers, finding his way through all the blankets until he was right against you. You rotate your body to face him for optimal surface area coverage and close your eyes with a content exhale.

The two of you remain like this for a while, you lying next to the slightly stiff but warm Kunikuzushi. He doesn't move much and is completely silent aside from the very faint sound of his gentle breath. (does he breathe? idk lol) He must have fallen asleep at some point, because he seems to loosen up a little. You smile faintly at the thought, but it's quickly wiped from your face and replaced with a confused frown because he turns to face you and places his chin on top of your head. You can feel his soft breath on top of your head. Your eyes are as wide as saucers, staring right at the view in front of you—his neck. But oh, he's not done. Next, he pulls you slightly closer to him and then takes your hand in his own and gently laces your fingers with his. Your heart is going to beat out of your chest.

Next, he begins to mutter to himself. There's absolutely no way he's asleep—he must think you're asleep.

"Damnit... Fuck you, (Y/N)..."

You have to try SO hard to remain silent and not get offended and hit him with 'Bowlcut', but the dizzying polarity between his actions and his words is enough to keep you silent for now.

"Making me feel all this shit... Not even the Radish really knows what these feelings are."

You blink, eyes wide. You feel a cough coming on. This is not good. Your cover's gonna be blown.

"You're gonna be the end of me. Toying with my already shattered heart like I'm your plaything... Your smile, now calling me Ku... all these promises and things you do... I want to hate you, but I can't."

You can't hold it in anymore. You quickly push off his chest and jerk your head in the opposite direction so you don't have a coughing fit right on his chest. When you finally finish and turn back around, you're faced with a red-faced Kunikuzushi, looking absolutely mortified.

"YOU WERE AWAKE THE WHOLE FUCKING TIME?!"

You bit your lips together awkwardly.

"AND YOU HEARD IT ALL?!"

You cough again. "Yep."

Instead of having a response that could somehow qualify as normal, his stare simply goes blank for a second until he proceeds to konk out, eyes closing and head flopping down onto the pillow.

He short-circuited.

[sommerregenjuniluft]

@jegulus-microfic january 9 - write - 946words - feat. fem!harry because i was craving girldads

(this one also esp goes out to @veryinnovative)

“Papa?”

“Yes, mon chou?” Regulus responds, shaking a curl out of his eyes to look over his shoulder as he keeps stirring.

Harrie is still bent over her artwork, crayon held in a tight fist, pigtails standing askew with half her hair falling out of them and in her little face anyways.

“Will you help me write my name?”

Regulus lowers the temperature of the stovetop to let the sauce simmer as he puts on the lid, “Of course. I’ll be right there.”

He crouches down to check the potato wedges and veggies in the oven, satisfied when they look according to the alarm he set, and gives his hands a quick rinse before he saunters over to his daughter.

The soles of his plush slippers are a faint noise against the whirring of the oven and the soft bubbling of the pot. The air smells warm and cozy with the home-cooked meal and the drying clementine peels that are still on the table from Harrie’s earlier snack.

Regulus bends over her to regard her painting, nose buried into her wayward hair, inhaling. It smells like her Strawberry Shortcake (the kid’s show) shampoo, like James’ cologne and still that distinct brand of baby that Regulus is utterly obsessed with and hopes she never loses. Well, at least as long as she’s small enough for him to still pick her up.

Harrie is unperturbed, keeps drawing little blue petals around a flower besides what Regulus assumes must be their cat, Mochi. Or maybe a very oversized ant. His little artiste.

“Can I give you a kiss?” Regulus mumbles into the crown of her head.

“Yup.” 

Harrie squeals when Regulus plants a loud smooch on her chubby cheek. She smells like grapes and walnuts there too. James must’ve packed them for her lunch in kindergarden.

She tapers off into a hearty giggle when Regulus keeps peppering kisses before he lets himself fall into the kitchen chair beside her.

“So,” Regulus says pointedly, making a show of granting her his undivided attention.

Harrie nods her head, making little, silly Mhm-mhm-mhm noises. Like she’s trying to convey the importance of what follows. Or like she has a tune stuck in her head. Regulus bets his money on both.

He grins, tucking a strand behind Harrie’s ear that just falls right back into place. “Where do you want your name?”

A tongue pokes out of the corner of his daughter’s mouth and she turns her pen to point at the top edge with the end of it, “Right here.”

“Alright.”

Harrie chooses another color for her signature and then they begin to write together.

“An H. Huh—as in house,” Regulus makes, Harrie repeating the sound automatically. “Two straight lines down and then one across the middle. Good job.”

“Then Ay,” Harrie continues. The beginning of the alphabet she’s already got memorized.

“That’s right, mon chou.”

“Ha-rrr.”

“An R—that’s a straight line, with a bump on top and a leg on the bottom. That’s it. We need another one of those, remember? Your name has two.”

Just as Harrie sets onto the next letter Regulus hears a car rumble up into their driveway, head instinctively swiveling around to the window.

When he looks back down the second R isn’t entirely correct. “Whoops—look, this one has its leg on the wrong side, honey.”

“Oh,” Harrie makes, eyebrows rising, and she goes to grab her eraser.

She corrects her letter and then proceeds to draw the I without prompting from Regulus, adding a wonky heart on top.

“Good job. And an—”

“E–like eeeraser,” his daughter sings, adding the three horizontal lines to the last letter, right as Regulus hears a keychain jingle against the front door.

Harrie is now drawing a little star next to her name as James comes into the kitchen with Mochi in his arms, a leaf sticking to his paw.

“Daddy,” Harrie yells, scrambling down from her chair and hasting into James’ arms, Mochi already fleeing for his cat tree, presumably.

James hums delightedly, smiling as he squeezes their daughter to his chest, “Mm, mi amorcito.”

He’s still in his coat and beanie from outside, glasses fogging up—though luckily for him, he’s had the mind to slip out of his boots at least.

Harrie rubs her palms along James’ stubbled jaw when they pull apart, making him chuckle. “Missed me?”

“A little,” Harrie shrugs.

“Oh, only a little, huh?” James challenges, whisking Harrie up and whirling her around in the air, twirling himself and making her scream with joy.

He sets her against his hip after he successfully lost one of her hair ties on his little escapade, never to be found again or for Mochi to play with.

“Smells amazing, love,” James says warmly, gazing at Regulus before helping Harrie gently pull out the other hair tie too.

Which reminds him Regulus to check on the sauce again. 

He smiles sweetly at his husband and wanders back over to the counter, grabbing the lid with a kitchen mitten and stirring the thickening sauce as he gets hit by its savoury tang and hint of black pepper and parsley.

At his back he hears Harrie and James babbling, conversing about something or the other as she takes her seat again. Something about finger paints and Ron and tea cup and pee accident.

Regulus is just stretching to get some plates when there’s strong arms wrapping around him from behind, prompting his lips into another immediate smile.

“Mi vida,” his husband mumbles, pressing a soft kiss behind Regulus’ ear.

James is warm and smells like caramel latte and outside air and the same hint of cologne found in their daughter’s hair.

[bea-ce]

If only I could make you believe you deserve everything

pairing: kaveh x reader (can be read platonically or romantically)

genre: hurt/comfort, angst

summary: life is awful at times. very much so that you end up falling back to bad habits to get you through it. luckily, you have kaveh to help you guide back to the right track.

word count: 4.2k

notes: hii!! first post! (and its hurt/comfort RAHHHH) kaveh might be a little ooc as i havent gotten to him in the archon quest yet, so i apologize for that in advance! i poured my heart and soul and my own personal experiences into this,,  i apologize if the comfort is a lil wonky.

title is inspired by Nicole Dollanganger’s song “Please Eat”.

trigger warning(s): mentions of ed/having an ed, descriptive experience of having an ed, mentions of relapsing into unhealthy coping mechanisms, self inflicted harm (self harm), descriptions of self-contempt, descriptions of feelings of unworthiness.

let me know if i missed any warnings

It had been a while since the last time you’d done this. The thought of even returning back to this state was beyond you. Everything had been going so well it seemed. Sure, life still threw inconveniences towards you, but you handled them just fine, you thought.

Clearly not, as you’re now back to restraining yourself from eating and indulging yourself from something that’s vital for you to live. You knew the risks of refusing yourself food, you’d read all about the consequences and health risks of starving yourself.

Yet that is the precise reason you’re doing this.

You know how harmful this is and you know it’s bad. The knowledge of the dangers and harm in doing it is exactly why you continue doing it though: It’s your punishment. A sigh escapes your lips as you try concentrating on the paper that lay before you instead of the numbness that starts taking over your legs and the quivering of your hand. There isn’t any way for you to not notice how your body is screaming out for something to eat. It’s constantly reminding you as your vision is clouded with dark spots whenever you move and how your body shakes as you do any everyday task. Despite its cries for food, you ignore it and open the lid to the water bottle beside you and empty half of it to ignore the ache in your stomach due to its emptiness. 

It helps, somewhat, as it fools your stomach for sometime at least. In a shaky motion you place the water bottle beside the pile of assignments you have to finish before the end of this week. 

It’s difficult to get anything done when the ache in your stomach extends to the rest of your body, making the most simple task like reading over the text presented in front of you and writing down notes feeling so incredibly demanding on your body. A groan escapes your lips as you lean back into the chair and drag your hand across your face in annoyance. You need to finish these assignments, yet you can’t. Everything feels so hazy and your mind is blank, unable to think of anything other than the feeling of hunger growing more intense.

The bustling from the kitchen can be heard all the way into your room. Usually at this hour you’d sit by the kitchen table and eat with Alhaitham and Kaveh, but you’ve locked yourself away in your room, drowning yourself in work to ignore the deep wretched feelings that linger within you. A faint knock on the door echoes throughout the room as a voice calls out from the other side. It’s Kaveh’s voice, calling out to you. "(Y/N)?" Your name is muffled by the closed door as you turn around in your seat to look at the source of the sound. There stands Kaveh, holding a plate with food in his hand while the other one is still gripping onto the door handle.

Your eyes quickly scan his face before they dart down to look at the plate he’s holding.

It’s too much, you think as you look at the contents of the food. Numbers appear inside your head the longer you stare at the plate, feeling repulsed at the thought of putting anything in your mouth and fulfilling your hunger at the cost of the imaginary numbers going up.

You turn around to face the paper you’ve been staring blankly at for the last hour, waving Kaveh off. “I’ve already eaten.” You answer courtly. You haven’t, but telling him you weren’t hungry wasn’t an option. Kaveh would be reluctant had you answered that you weren’t hungry and placed the food by your table instead. The thought alone that he might do that makes you want to cry and scream in panic. You can’t risk letting yourself indulge in the food that he’s made: You must go through with your own punishment.

Kaveh sighs and grabs the door handle, about to leave and close the door before the sound of your stomach growling bounces off the walls. He stops in his tracks as his grip on the plate tightens. You can feel his eyes boring into your back as you tense up at how your stomach contradicts your words from earlier. A deep terror stirs within you as your thoughts wander off to all the possible reactions you might receive from the blond man at the revelation. You hear how he shuffles behind you and closes the door behind him as he approaches you. You dare not to turn around to look at him, instead you hold up your face above the paper and stare intently onto it, trying to focus on the words that dance around across the paper to ignore Kaveh’s look of pity and concern.

Kaveh is standing right next to you, his grip on the plate is so incredibly tight that his knuckles have gone white. His eyes are soft and laced with worry as he looks down on you, and to be honest; he’s not sure how to handle this situation he’s being faced with right now. He places the plate next to your bedside table instead of the table in front of you, knowing better than shoving unwanted food up your face. It’s not what you need right now.

Kaveh sits on the side of your bed, boring his eyes into the back of your head as he waits for you to do the first move, to begin the conversation. He doesn’t want to scare you off now that he’s found out. He can feel the pain within you. He can see the hurt and the desperation, but he has no words to fill the silence. He doesn't know how he could possibly help you, but he wants to. More than that, he wants to try.

“I’m fine” you try to subside the situation, playing it off to only being a one time thing when it’s clear to the both of you that it isn’t. 

Kaveh interrupts you. “You’re not fine.” Kaveh still has the same gentleness to him, but there’s a certain amount of firmness to his words too. It leaves no room for you to slither your way out of his confrontation. “Are you hurting yourself? Are you starving yourself?”

The words feel like he had just physically assaulted you, as if he had pulled out a knife and stabbed you in the chest while twirling the knife around inside of your heart. The words feel as if Kaveh had just falsely accused you of a crime you hadn’t committed. 

But the two of you know better than that. You both know that the reason you feel so attacked is because Kaveh is calling you out, and rightfully so.

“No! No. I am not starving myself.” The words come out much harsher than you had intended them to be, sounding defensive and giving yourself away to Kaveh. The pile of paperwork that needs to be done stares at you mockingly as you look down on the paper in front of you that is still blank.

“I’m just- I don’t want to eat.” It’s half the truth. You do in fact not want to eat, but it’s for all the wrong reasons you don’t want to eat. Kaveh sighs as he gets up from your bed and walks up behind you. For a moment he almost reaches out to you, but he draws his hand back and places it on your chair instead of your shoulder, like he had intended to. He’s reluctant to touch you. In this moment right now, you’re fragile, and he must tread carefully so as to not break you.

“Do you think I don’t see it?” His voice is gentle, but there’s a certain edge to it. It cuts right through any excuses that might slip past your mouth to escape this conversation neither of you want to have. The words have you cornered, and as if you were reliving an experience much like this -where you were confronted and you admitted, only to be rejected from the care and help you needed- you feel a need to run away from him. To run away from your home, from the house, run, run and run. But where would you run? There’s no way for you to run away from him, and even if you did: Where would you run? 

Would you even have the energy to run away from him with the way your vision would cloud with black spots covering your sight and with the way your legs feel numb?

Reality hits you like a brick as you realize that Kaveh has you cornered and at his mercy.

A hitched breath escapes your lips as you feel your hands and feet going cold along with being overcome by dreadfulness as the situation you’re in slowly sinks in.

“This is unhealthy, and you know it, don’t you?” It’s not much of a question really. His voice is firm, trying to cover up his own shakiness as your condition dawns upon him. “Please.. could you talk to me?” he pleads, letting his hand fall from the chair, down to your shoulder giving it a comforting squeeze. The contact makes you flinch as it pulls you back from your swarm of thoughts, back into the present with him. The words seem stuck in your mouth, suffocating you and preventing you from voicing your thoughts and feelings that you’re left only shaking your head at his request of opening up. Kaveh lets out a sigh as he lets his hand fall from your shoulder. For a moment, you think he’s given up on you and will leave you alone to deal with your misery by yourself; the thought causes you both pain and relief. Instead, he walks around your chair and crouches next to you as he looks up to you from below.

“Please. Talk to me.” he begins as he balances himself on the armrest all while tilting his head up at you. “What can I do to help you? You can tell me anything.”

“I don’t know!” you finally exclaim as your face falls into your hands. You inhale shakily as Kaveh continues to inspect your face for something, anything.

“I don’t.. know.”

Everything around you spins like an unpleasant merry-go-round ride as your vision becomes clouded by the black spots appearing before you.

One of the consequences of not eating, you suppose.

How you wished that you could’ve kept this secret from him a little longer. Long enough for him to not have to have this confrontation with you right now.

Kaveh can only feel pity as he looks at you. You look so fragile right now, so weak. It hurts him to see you so, to see your body shaking from your hunger.

He has a question that he wants to ask, but he feels afraid to. You don't owe him anything, he supposes. 

"Why are you doing this to yourself?" How do you ask someone why they are harming themselves? How do you say that without it coming across in a terrible way? Kaveh had an immense sense of empathy, but even that had its limits.

"I deserve it." 

The words slip out your mouth with ease, as if the question had no other answer but that. Tears that you had been holding back from the moment your secret was out swell up in your eyes and threaten to fall down on the blank, empty paper sheet that should’ve been filled in by now. The dripping of your tears resounds in your head and you pray that Kaveh doesn’t hear how you’re covering your paperwork in tears.

"I deserve it." You repeat the words shakily this time as a sob finally manages to escape your mouth. All you want to do is make yourself as small as possible so you can just vanish from the earth’s surface. But you can’t.

So you do the next best thing, which is curling yourself into a ball while you let the tears flow down your cheeks as your entire form tenses up and shakes from the anguish you feel inside of you.

Several feelings washes over Kaveh. Ones of confusion, concern and guilt.

You don't deserve this. 

Nobody deserves to feel so low. And you are so, so very low: starving yourself just as a punishment.

He can't help but feel pity for you. The words come out before he can even stop them from slipping past his lips: "Why do you deserve it?"

He's trying to be kind and supportive, he really is, but it's painfully hard for him to find the right words. It’s difficult seeing a loved one tear themselves apart in front of him all while thinking they deserve to suffer and break.

His question is one not even you can answer. It’s a question that you’ve pondered about whenever you’ve come to your senses after having breakdowns much like these, and each time you’re left with no answer. There's only that part of you, that little tiny voice in the back of your head that tells you that you deserve nothing less than pain and suffering. That this is the only way for you to get rid of the mental turmoil you experience on a daily basis. 

That the only way to get rid of the emotional and mental pain is to double the physical pain, and what easier way is there to feel physical pain if it isn’t to inflict it upon yourself; by yourself?

How do you help someone who believes that?

It's not like you can just tell them that they don't deserve it. How could he ever convince you that you’re wrong? How can he convince you that there's a better way than starving and hurting yourself? 

How is any of this supposed to be okay for you?

"(Y/N)," he calls out your name, the sound of his voice pleading yet somehow still kind, "(Y/N). There is no reason to hurt yourself. You deserve better."

As if you weren’t already curled into a ball you only manage to make yourself smaller as you cry, your entire form shaking. It's not till now that he's so up close to you that he sees how your body is covered in goosebumps and the bruises that linger across your body. They look self-inflicted and Kaveh can't help but let out a wince as he looks at the bruises that cover your skin.

He tries his hardest to contain his horror at seeing what you’ve done to herself. It looks so painful, so terrible, but it's clear from your shivering, from your shaking, from the way your face crumples - from the way you curl up into a ball so easily - that this isn't your first time.

You’re hurting, and at your own hand.

He doesn't know how to process that. He has never seen anyone do this to themselves. He can't imagine how any of this could be good.

Your grip on your legs only grows tightens as you cry into your knees, on the verge of wailing from feeling how your heart aches. It’s as if someone is tightening their grip on your already fragile heart, and it hurts so very much.

You could handle feeling hungry, and you could handle inflicting pain upon yourself, littering your body with bruises to show for it. Yet you couldn’t handle the feelings inside of you that were crushing you and tearing you apart. You had learnt to handle your inner turmoil by ignoring the feelings until they grew so great that the only way to rid yourself of the demons surrounding you was to hurt them through yourself.

The relief was only temporary, sure, but you’d do anything for the moment of peace in your inferno called your own mind.

He sighs heavily, the sound filled with regret and pity. Kaveh doesn’t say anything and remains looking up to your face as you quickly unravel before him. 

This is beyond him. He doesn't know how to comfort you- how to help you. He has no idea what to say or what to do. It’s all so overwhelming - all these feelings of fear and confusion and pity and care - that he doesn't even know how to begin to process, let alone express.

He places a gentle, comforting hand on your knee as you continue to cry. You’re so up in your own thoughts and emotions that you can’t get yourself to pull away from his touch.

It’s not that his touch wasn’t comforting. It was very comforting. And that was exactly why you wanted to pull away from his touch.

You don’t deserve that kind of comfort.

"I'm sorry.." the words come out so weak, putting your broken state on full display for Kaveh. A sob escapes your mouth as you try your best regaining your composure to no avail. Each breath you try and take control over gets interrupted by a sob or a gasp for air.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry” you repeat as you burrow your face further into your knees. Your words are slurring as you’re choking back your cries to get the words out of your mouth.

Kaveh doesn't even understand what you could possibly have to be sorry for. You've done nothing wrong. You've committed no sins worth feeling so terrible for. 

But how does he tell you that? How could he convince you of the truth that appears so clearly to him but isn’t as obvious for you?

He doesn't.

How does he convince you to get past these terrible feelings of wrongness, when you’re so very convinced that it's your punishment? How does he convince you to give yourself kindness and care, when you believe yourself so unworthy? How does he make you realize that this isn't your fault, that you haven't done anything that deserves all of this?

Kaveh moves closer to you - so carefully, so slowly. As if you’re something fragile, to be treated with respect and care. Because you are fragile. You’re hurt, and you’re so, so small. All he wants to do is to hold you, to bring you comfort, to hug you, to hold you in his arms. He just wants to lift your heavy burden off of your shoulders. But he doesn’t reach out to do any of that, it doesn’t feel appropriate to do so right now as you’re sobbing in front of him and curling yourself into a ball.

"You have nothing to be sorry for," he says quietly. "You're hurting yourself, and that can't be okay. Please," he adds, his voice pleading, "Let me try to help you. You don't have to do this. You don't deserve to do this."

You had always had a hard time accepting other people’s kindness and comfort, it was extremely difficult for you to understand and wrap your head around the concept of being treated with decency and care from another being without expecting anything back in return. The feelings overwhelm you and you feel how you want to throw up from Kaveh’s attentiveness, it’s all too much for you.

You’d rather have him walk out on you and leave you in your pitiful state to fend for yourself. It’s what you’re used to. And when he breaks what you consider a norm, your world falls apart with it.

The tears flow down your cheeks as if they’ll never come to an end. 

Kaveh can see it from the way you gasp and wail when his words of care finally register.

It’s written all over your face - your pain, your hurt - it’s clear that you’re not used to being treated with such care and attention. It’s clear that this isn’t something you’re used to; it’s clear that you’re not used to having someone trying to help you.

It breaks Kaveh’s heart to see you struggle like this. He doesn’t know how he can get you to accept this treatment from him, from anyone.

He wants nothing in return; he only wants to help. How can he get you to understand that? How could he ever assure someone that they’re deserving of unconditional care and love when that very someone is so fully convinced that they deserve pain? 

"You need help," he says quietly. "Let me help you."

Why do you deserve to suffer, to hurt yourself, when you’ve done nothing wrong? Why are you so cruel to yourself? Kaveh lets the thought wander in his head for some time before he shakes his head in disbelief. He can’t come to any reasonable conclusion as to why you’d be so cruel to yourself. He could only speculate.

Is this why you hurt yourself? The thought intrudes him, as he tries to stay focused on comforting you.

Because you feel like you don’t deserve kindness?

But why? Why wouldn't you deserve kindness? This isn't because of any mistakes you’ve made, is it? Has someone made you believe this? Or is it something that you’ve always thought? Either way, you’re wrong. You deserve kindness. You deserve the world. 

You deserve to be treated well.

"You deserve so much better," he says quietly, "You aren't pitiful. I promise you that you are so much more than what you tell yourself you are." 

Kaveh places his hands on top of yours as he rubs comforting circles with his thumb on the back of your palms. Another sob escapes your lips at his attempts to soothe your ache. He can feel the way you tremble under his hands as he gives you a gentle squeeze of comfort to stabilize your quivering form, even if it's just by a little bit. He keeps rubbing, still trying to help you. Neither of you say anything and the only thing to be heard in the room is the sound of your rapid breathing and hitched sobs. And while the tremors still persist, your sobs are becoming less frantic. He thinks he might be comforting her just slightly, but it's good enough for now. At least it’s a start. 

Kaveh wants to say something, but he doesn't know what to say. He's never been in a situation like this before. He doesn't want to sound like an idiot. But he also doesn't want to stay silent.

He cannot bear to see you like this, and he doesn't want to imagine how much pain you’ve been carrying for you to end up here like this. 

He wants so badly for you to be okay. He wants nothing more than to give you his care and comfort. Kaveh gets up from his crouching position and feels his legs tingle from sitting like that for so long, but he ignores it. It’s not important right now. What is, is you and your wellbeing. 

He assumes that if you responded positively to having him rub your hand, then maybe you'd respond better to affectionate comfort. Kaveh is reluctant at first. A hug is much more personal, much more intimate than drawing circles on someone's palm. So he asks.

"Is it okay if I hug you?"

You tense up at the request reluctantly. Granted, you and Kaveh would usually greet one another by giving a quick hug with a pat on the back before getting to it. But this was different. Much different from those lighthearted moments you’d share before you go off to wherever you had planned on doing for the day, whether that was taking a walk amongst the streets of the city or just enjoying one another's presence as you work deliberately.

You’re hesitant, and Kaveh is about to reassure you that it’s fine if you don’t want to until he sees a small nod coming from you. Your eyes quickly dart down to meet his before you avert your gaze from him, feeling the shame and embarrassment crawl along your back amongst the other feelings that roam inside of you.

Kaveh is quick to act as he pulls you into his embrace. 

He holds you protectively, as if he just holds you close enough to him he'll be able to shield you from the cold, cruel world that's hurt you so. You just want to hold on to him. Just wants him to hold you, to hug you and hold you close to him. 

The warmth is so comforting, so very comforting that the little voice in your head tells you that you aren't worthy of this kind of affection. That you don’t deserve to be cared for like this, and a part of you still holds onto that truth. Despite that, you cling onto him as if he were your lifeline, the very last thread that was keeping you from floating away. You want this- you’ve been yearning for someone to hold you like this, and even though a loud part of you disagrees- that part of you that tells you that you’re not deserving of this- you can’t help but bask in his warmth that he provides for you.

The plate on your bedside table catches his eye, long forgotten. The food had obviously gone cold by now. Whatever, Kaveh thinks. It doesn’t matter, he can always just warm it up later. What matters is that he helps you back on your feet and support you through this. 

You don’t have to fend for yourself anymore. He’s here now, and he’ll help you through it. He may not be capable of chasing away your demons for you, but you’ll always have his endless support.

He’ll spend an eternity if it means he could make you believe that you deserve everything.

[wolken-himmel]

In which Riddle decides to properly introduce (Y/n) to Che'nya during a tea party.

Little do the attendants know that these two have been dating for a while now.

Request by anon.

The Heartslabyul garden was as perfect as ever — with these accurately trimmed hedges, and the soft sound of the flamingos playing in the distance. And you were able to enjoy this peaceful atmosphere from afar, in a gazebo with a cup of steaming and delicious tea in your hands.

This was the life.

Well, until Riddle turned to you and shot you an expectant look. "Prefect, thank you for joining us for tea today. We are glad you could make it," he said with a polite smile decorating his face.

You nodded, although your smile seemed a little bit wonky around the edges. Something about the entire tea party now seemed off to you; normally, Riddle would never smile at you like that. Thus, you shrank a little bit into yourself and tipped the last remaining droplets of tea down your suddenly dry throat.

Trey noticed and picked up the kettle. "Would you like more tea, (Y/n)?"

"Sure, Trey. Thank you." And again, after your cup had been refilled, you resumed chugging down the tea to quench your thirst and your nerves.

From the corner of your eye, you noticed how Riddle looked at you with a curious gaze. After a while of leaving you alone, he finally placed his cup onto the saucer with a loud clank — your doom was near. "However, aside from enjoying your company, there is also another reason why we have invited you to have tea with us today..." the dormleader trailed off hesitantly. "At the annoying insistence of one of our old childhood friends, who very much wanted to meet you properly, (Y/n) — we have decided to properly introduce you to each other. You already know him from the few times he appeared during our gatherings without an invitation."

Deuce had a nervous frown on his face. "Do I really have to do this drum-roll, Cater?" he asked and pointed to the set of drums in his lap. He clutched the sticks nervously as he looked at his upperclassman for guidance.

"Yes!" Cater assured and patted the blue-haired student on the shoulder. "There is no fun without a little bit of dramatisation, no?"

"Okay..." A hefty sigh escaped Deuce's lips before he brought down the sticks. His drumming was clumsy, but he managed to drum a rhythm worthy of a memorable entrance. "Drum-roll for— Che'nya!" he announced and let the stick collide with the drum for one last time.

First, a floating head appeared in the middle of nowhere. Then, a body beneath it slowly started to manifest and become visible. It was none other than Che'nya who wore a wide grin on his face. "Thank you. Thank you! Thank you all for the generous invitation." He strode over to the gazebo with proud steps, his nose held high and his tail swishing around enchantingly.

Your eyes grew to the size of saucers when he took a seat right across from you. The grin he wore on his face was solely directed at you, and he even wiggled his eyebrows mockingly when you continued to gape at him. And well, who could blame you for such a reaction? The cat-beastman sitting across from you was none other than your boyfriend. Now you were stuck in the strange situation of your friends introducing you to your boyfriend? Yes, this was absolutely absurd. Perhaps keeping your relationship a secret had been a mistake.

"A-Ah, it's nice to see you again, Che'nya," you stammered out and forced a smile onto your face.

The RSA student seemed to enjoy basking in your awkward stiffness, quietly snickering to himself all the while. "Likewise, it is wonderful to see you again, dear!" he exclaimed and clasped his hands together innocently. "How have you been?"

"...I've been adequate," you seethed through clenched teeth when you could feel his foot gently kicking your leg beneath the table.

This entire meeting must have been his doing! He was trying to tease you... see how far he could take it before you would explode with awkwardness.

Riddle, however, seemed to take no notice of your strange disposition towards one another. Instead, he raised his hands and began introducing you to one another, "Che'nya, (Y/n). (Y/n), Che'nya. I'm sure you'll get along splendidly. Che'nya is just like your other troublemaker friends, prefect..." A disapproving sigh escaped the dormleader's lips.

"Hey, (Y/n). Are you alright?" Trey asked in concern when your finger curled around the handle of your cup so much that he was worried about you breaking the porcelain. He furrowed his eyebrows. "You look tense."

"No need to be so nervous, dear!" Che'nya cooed and bared his teeth playfully. "I don't bite~"

Your hands clenched into fists beneath the table, you put on the politest of smiles you could muster. "I'm just... really excited to meet you for the very, very first time properly. I mean, you disappeared the last times before we could even begin a proper conversation. I... I absolutely know nothing about you! How about we fix that now?"

"Sounds like a marvellous idea," Che'nya drawled.

A little bit out of the loop, Riddle merely regarded the two of you with a strange glance before he slowly began, "As you may already know, Che'nya, (Y/n) is the magicless prefect of the Ramshackle dorm—"

Che'nya feigned to listen intently, yet he never broke eye-contact with you. "Aha. Aha." A little grin decorated his face when he noticed you squirm in your seat. "Hm... I see," he continued to occasionally comment whenever the dormleader thought he wasn't listening anymore.

"And as you may already know, (Y/n), Che'nya is a second-year attending Royal Sword Academy—"

You stayed entirely silent through Riddle's introduction of Che'nya. All the while, however, you were too stubborn to avert your gaze — no matter how uncomfortable you felt. Instead, you replied to his grin with narrowed eyes. By then, every other attendant of the gathering was staring at the two of you and your absurd telepathic exchange.

"Are you two alright?" Deuce asked in utter confusion. "Is there something we're missing?"

"No, continue," you both replied unanimously.

"(Y/n), you should stop glaring at Che'nya like that..." Ace whispered into your ear, laughing, "...or else he will fall off his chair as a dead man in a second."

You waved him off, still staring at the cat-beastman. "Pff, serves him right."

"What's gotten into you, dear. You look like someone stepped on your tail," Che'nya said and wiggled his eyebrows.

"As you can see," you said with pursed lips, "I have no tail to be stepped on."

Che'nya merely began laughing at your attempt at sass. "It was a figurative way of speaking," he said and clapped his hands in delight.

"Perhaps someone stepped on your tail?" you retorted while taking a sip of your by now cold tea.

"Perhaps! Yesterday, I had a visitor over... and then they simply didn't look where they were going and stepped on my tail," Che'nya explained and tapped his chin. "But, it was no biggie. I was rewarded with head-pats afterwards. Did you guys know that (Y/n) gives the best head-pats?"

At once, Riddle furrowed his eyebrows and suspiciously muttered, "It seems like you're implying something, Che'nya."

"Oh, me? It's nothing!" He let out a gasp and jumped to his feet in a dazed panic. "Oh my, it looks like it's time to leave now... Before anyone back at home notices that anything is amiss."

Although Trey looked taken aback, he merely nodded and gave their leaving visitor a friendly wave. "Oh... It was nice having you with us, Che'nya."

The second-year in question nodded and shot the entire round of attendants a mischievous smile. "I enjoyed the party immensely!" Then, without a warning, he turned to you and bowed teasingly. "I hope you did, too, (Y/n) dear."

Still on edge about your boyfriend spilling your secret to your Heartslabyul friends, you clutched the fabric of your blazer and let out a stiff chuckle. "...It was certainly nice to meet you properly for the first time," you said, your voice suspiciously going up and down in pitch.

"Ta-ta! Farewell, my friends~" Che'nya disappeared into thin air with a grin on his face and a swish of his tail. First, his body became invisible, then his grinning face as well.

"That was strange," Riddle muttered after a while of confused silence. "Even for Che'nya."

"You're so cute," someone suddenly whispered into your right ear, "when you're annoyed, (Y/n)~"

A startled scream escaped your lips, and you whipped your head around to find the source of the speaker — but no one stood behind you whatsoever. "Who said that?!" you cried out and rubbed your right ear in embarrassment.

The other Heartslabyul students at the table eyed you in concern, and eventually, Deuce gained enough courage to ask, "(Y/n), are you alright? Nobody said anything." A little gasp escaped his lips when he realised that, in your panic, you had jumped to your feet and bumped against the table. "Oh no— you spilled the tea all over yourself... At least it's not boiling hot anymore."

You pursed your lips in shame, but perhaps this was the perfect opportunity to excuse yourself from this awkward tea party. You had already made a fool of yourself, anyway. After having taken a deep breath, you announced, "Oh... sorry, guys. I'll have to take my leave, as well— tea stains are hard to get out of these white shirts." You forced one last time onto your lips. "Thank you so much for the fun time, though. See you around!" Then, you turned around and dashed away without another word.

Ace crossed his arms in suspicion. "Oi, there's something we don't know about these two."

"Oh, they're in a relationship, didn't you know?" Cater asked casually while editing the pictures he had taken of the tea party.

"What?!" the entire table cried out at once.

Surprised at their extreme reaction, Cater almost dropped his phone. However, he didn't, and with great care, he put it back into his pocket before facing the round of flabbergasted Heartslabyul students. "Yeah, so you guys really didn't know, huh? Che'nya's tail can be seen on a lot of (Y/n)'s Magicam posts if you look a little bit more closely. It's not an all that well-guarded secret, even if they want it to be." A sheepish smile appeared on his face as he rubbed the back of his neck. "That's why I was so confused when you said that this was their first proper introduction to one another, Riddle."

The dormleader looked like he was about to explode with how red his face had turned. "He played us, again... Like a fiddle!" he cried out and threw his hands into the air.

Likewise, Trey shook his head in disbelief. "What else did we expect from Che'nya..."

[ronearoundblindly]

Hit By Fate

a Steve Rogers x Reader life lesson

[This is my own entry for my 1-1-1 Challenge, but also is a very belated gift fic for @itickledthesleepingdragon. May we all remember that we are worth care and consideration!💜] WC 2365

Recommended links: Habibi Through The Years--The Old Guard fandom, Joe/Nicky (Ao3) Invaluable--Star Wars fandom, dad!Obi-Wan

Summary: It's just an accident, and you're totally fine. One handsome man, however, does not agree.

It’s not their fault; it’s just bad luck.

You should have texted to confirm this morning, but since Syd told you she’d text you if anything changed, you didn’t want to pry. Your friends make enough fun of you already for never coming out. You didn’t want to give them one more story in their long list of times you bailed. They already think you’re allergic to fun, so tonight you were going to show them.

You’d rushed to the restaurant after work. You even woke up early to do your hair before work so that you’d still look nice. You brought a purse to transfer your wallet and keys and makeup into so as not to carry your much larger work bag around. You even drank less water the entire afternoon so you wouldn’t be rushing to the restroom and slowing down your cross-city commute.

But then you arrived and there was no reservation.

Not under anyone’s name.

The hostess seemed outstandingly indifferent to your situation. You stepped aside for other patrons, sneaking peeks through the wonky glass dividers to catch a glimpse of your friends at a table maybe, and you texted one.

>>Hey.

<<Whaddup? Tiff replies.

>>You guys here yet?

<<Where?

You give the name of the restaurant and feel your guts crash to the polished wood floor.

<<We were there earlier. Yeah. Why?

Your hands start to shake with anxiety and a touch of rage.

>>I thought we were meeting at 7

The dots show up and disappear. The hostess huffs, staring at you while striking through a line on her paper. You’re blocking one of four total doors to enter the building, but apparently, that’s still taking up too much space.

<<Syd and Karol got off at 4 so we just had drinks early

<<TGIF

<<On a pub crawl now

They know you still work tomorrow. They know you likely would barely drink at dinner. You know exactly why no one would bother asking you if you could get out of work early, and you know they would not try any spontaneous fun for your first time out in months. They didn’t ask because they knew you’d say ‘no,’ or even worse, they knew you’d say ‘yes’ but be uncomfortable the entire time.

You try to call Syd, a last-ditch effort to get a lock on just how drunk or how far away they are. You tell yourself that if they are close and seem relatively coherent (and if the bar serves some small plates of something because you are hungry) then you’ll go. You will absolutely go.

Syd doesn’t pick up. You try Karol. No dice.

Fine. You turn to ask the hostess if there is space at the bar to eat, but she looks at you with such annoyance and a raised finger while she handles a couple who clearly out-rank you in some way.

Defeated, you leave instead.

This whole thing has taken so little time that you’d have to wait another ten minutes for the next bus back. You just walk, staring down at your phone, willing one of them to talk to the other, willing one of them to realize they’ve left you behind.

Do they even care that they’ve done it? Are they even your friends anymore?

The sad part is that you don’t go out much, but these are the friends you go out with the most. It just so happens that’s a few times a year, and that is you trying. This is you pushing yourself.

It’s not good enough.

Just as the WALK sign lights up at the street corner, the dots show back up under Syd’s message, and you shove it closer to your face.

You don’t see it coming.

A cab’s bumper smacks your left leg and bats you sideways. The solid hit feels like a tumble on the ice rink. It spins you, your phone flying out of your hands, and you’re scrambling not to fall. Your muscles tense every which way that’s not natural, probably looking klutzy.

You shoot back up too fast and look around, wondering if people are staring at you now, but the few other people crossing simply walk on by.

The cabbie only rolls down his window.

“You okay?”

Not actively concerned. Not getting out of the car. Not even apologizing.

But if you’d kept walking, you’d be across already. If you weren’t just standing there, the cab would be able to turn and so would the several others behind him.

One honks.

“Fine,” you say quietly, waving him on for emphasis and stepping back to find your phone.

All the effort of the day, all the preparation mentally and physically, and you are stranded on the wrong side of the road, exactly where you started, metaphorically and near-actually run over.

You have to crouch down by the curb and pray your phone didn’t slide into the gutter, wincing at a particular angle that shoots pain up your left thigh. Maybe you aren’t fine.

“Miss?” a tentative, low voice calls above a classic pair of Converses on the sidewalk. “Think this is yours.”

A man in glasses and a ball cap hands your phone back, the screen mercifully intact.

It’s such a tiny blessing in this string of unfortunate events.

The breath you take turns into a whimper and ends in a sniffle. Tears sting your eyes as you start to think about what happened—what really happened—in the past minute.

“Thank you,” you choke out, snatching the device. The gesture seems aggressive after the fact. “Sorry. Thank you,” you try again.

“You okay?” How the same two words can sound so different from two people, you’ll never know, but the difference floors you harder than the car’s impact.

With the utmost care, the stranger’s hands lightly touch your shoulders and guide you out of the road.

“I’m fine.” You’re an automated recording, retreating to a quiet and lonelier space in your mind. “I’m fine. Thank you.”

“You got hit by a car,” he says bluntly.

“No, just a—“ you look up into the man’s face, his blond hair, his blue eyes, his strong jaw, his height “—graze.”

“Yeah, you got grazed by four thousand pounds.”

“You’re…” All you can do is point at Captain America’s chest and blink.

He frowns and whispers. “You recognize me?”

Somehow that’s the strange part?

“Shoot. The glasses usually work. Don’t…please don’t make a big deal, but I…I’m sorry I couldn’t pull you out of the way.”

Steve Rogers buries his hands in his jean pockets, folding himself more into the cover of his hoodie and leather jacket.

“You wanted to help me?” you croak.

He ticks his head in confusion, respectfully indicating that you’ve asked the one and only dumb question known to mankind.

“Why?”

You don’t even know what you’re asking about now. Why me? Why today? Why now? Why not? You don’t notice your hands are shaking until he grips them gently.

“I can take you to the hospital,” he offers.

“I’m fine.” The repeat earns you another frown. “I’m not…hurting,” you clarify.

“That’s called shock, sweetheart.”

Steve seems to catch himself and sighs.

“Sorry. What I mean to say is let’s find you some water and somewhere to sit, okay? I’ll check you out then.”

You nod immediately. He’s only half-turned when Steve spins back around.

“Not check you out check you out,” he mumbles, “just like a once over. No, not…” he sighs harder. “I am going to make sure you are alright.” Every word is strategically emphasized.

He leads you to the nearest bench. His head stays down the entire way to a newspaper stand to buy you a bottle of water.

You can tell by the way Steve monitors every move of the bottle to your lips that he fights doing it for you. From his overly attentive posture, you’re surprised he waits a whole minute to ask how you feel yet again.

Still stunned, honestly, but it’s not just your left leg that aches, it’s your whole body. That seems too pathetic to admit aloud, but if you say the ‘fine’-word one more time, he’ll surely carry you to the dang ER. He has that look.

Instead, you admit, “I’m hungry.”

A smile blossoms over his features. “I can help with that.”

The boyish glee with which Steve Rogers walks you (gingerly) to a nearby, hole-in-the-wall pizza parlor is endearing. You’re not a patient for those minutes, and when he orders for you both (there are three lines on the board and that’s the menu) while you claim a teeny tiny booth, you’re not a victim of your day.

When he tells you how he found this place originally, how it’s almost like the pizza he remembers from long ago but better, you’re not alone anymore.

“Were you going to get food when…” Steve trails off.

Maybe it’s the shock wearing too thin to mask the rest. Maybe it’s the hot cheese warming your insides and melting your anger. You spend the next ten minutes blabbing about what happened with your friends and explaining what you were doing when the cab hit you.

“So you weren’t even okay before the car?”

His words throw you for a loop.

“No, I mean, it was just a misunder—“

“You’re doing it again,” he cuts in. “You’re diminishing you in the picture.”

You take a long swig of your soda while staring blankly at him. You watch Steve realize you aren’t even going to impose on him for an explanation. He drops his slice on the plate and holds out his huge hands as props.

“The whole picture of your day, right?” His arms are wide, then he points at things on the table. “You told me about Syd and why it’s ‘fine’ that she changed plans for her own convenience. About Tiffany and Carly—“

“Karol,” you sputter mid-sip.

“Carol, right, sorry. Everyone has a -y in their names now. I just assumed.”

“Karol with a -k,” you add.

Steve…ponders whether that’s some sort of joke before waving his hands to regroup. “You told me how your other friends—using that term loosely—rationalize leaving you to eat or even navigate the city alone—“

“I don’t need a chaperone.”

“Debatable,” he chuckles. “And then you tell me about how the cab driver probably didn’t need the hassle of dealing with some minor injury he inflicted on—and I quote—‘someone.’”

His eyebrow pops up over the rim of his glasses as if that will drive his point home, but you’ve got nothing.

“Where are you in the picture?” he finally blurts. “It’s your time and your effort and your body and your safety, and you just told me everyone else is more important. They all deserve consideration before you in your own life. Including some driver who could have killed you!”

He’s getting visibly agitated the more he talks, and you shrink in the seat, not out of fear but out of guilt for taking an evening of Captain America’s time to yourself. If your friends couldn’t even stand to spend a meal with you, it makes sense that Steve would be annoyed with your company.

“Wait, there,” he points directly at your face, “what was that thought? What did you just think?”

“I—I’m sorry I—“

“What do you have to be sorry for?” Steve asks bluntly.

He must see your eyes glisten with more unshed tears because his whole body visibly softens.

“You showed up at the place you all agreed on—“ he counts on his fingers “—at the time you were told, and walked across a street with right of way.” He does what you are beginning to think of as his signature sigh. “Am I missing something?”

All you can do is chew on your bottom lip.

It takes you what feels like an eternity to notice. “I could have really been hurt,” you mumble finally. “That’s not okay.”

Steve stretches his long arm across the tiny table, opening his palm to await yours.

“I hate to tell you this. You don’t have to be torn open to be ‘really hurt,’ sweetheart.” This time he says the nickname with firm intention. He squeezes your hand. “Now, I’d appreciate it if you’d come to the infirmary with me and get some industrial-grade salve on what’s sure to be a nasty bruise.”

You smile sadly, still pushing away errant thoughts that you’re imposing on the Captain.

“And by the time that’s over…it’ll be time for a late-night dessert before I take you home.”

In the fluorescent light, you can see him blush fiercely.

“As an escort—escort you,” he corrects, “to your door, I mean. For safety.”

He shrugs uncomfortably to adjust his layers of disguise, hanging his head, this time to hide his face from you.

“If you ever wondered why I’d go out to pizza alone,” Steve whispers, “wonder no longer.”

He scoots across his side of the booth to stand.

You think for a long moment.

This is important. This is one of the most important men in the country—nay, the world—begging you to be the protagonist in your own life. He wants you to want that.

You deposit the last grease-crumpled napkin onto the stacked plates and clear your throat. “I like this picture,” you say first, but it’s not enough. It’s not loud enough. It doesn’t hold weight or take up its due space.

You try again.

“I like being in this picture.”

He’s tall and his gleaming white teeth are perfect and his bright blue eyes are framed by long lashes and he’s staring right at you. How could you not shoot your shot?

“I’d—“ you fight the urge to look away “—consider seeing a sequel, too.”

Steve pushes up his fake glasses and nods, still pink in the cheeks. His hesitation reads as shy, not polite, not dutiful.

He juts out an average, hoodie-covered elbow for you to balance on.

“S’pose that means I should know your name, miss, and what your favorite flavor of ice cream is.”

Ro's 1-1-1 Challenge Details

A/N: In case you were wondering, the life lesson I wrote Steve Rogers teaching us is one that I constantly struggle with, too. This is an everyday, uphill battle to recognize our own worth and know that taking care of ourselves is not selfish. I hope this serves as a wee reminder!

Taglist: @supraveng @1950schick @patzammit @whiskeytangofoxtrot555 @yiiiikesmish @bucky-fricking-barnes-reads @fallinallinmendes @deandreamernp

[Main Masterlist; Light Masterlist; Ko-Fi]

[xxsabitoxx]

Merlot 🍷

CEO Shinobu x AFAB! Assistant Reader

Warning: public sex, finger fucking, alcohol consumption, cunnilingus, bathroom sex, squirting, sadistic Shinobu / Dom Shinobu

A/N: a last minute pride fic, since June was a wonky month for me lol. Regardless, we’re queer year round on this blog and I have plenty of WLW ideas. This fic was honestly self indulgent lmfaooo 🥴

Word count: 3.1k

The red wine in your glass creates a bubbling sense of warmth in your body every time you take a sip. Your cheeks feel warm, your legs feel heavy, as if you’d never want to move ever again. You’re only half paying attention to whatever the man before you kms droning on about. Some sort of business proposal for the Kocho Family Pharmaceutical company. You can tell by the way your boss is sitting beside you, she’s not interested at all. 

Kocho Shinobu, the youngest daughter of the Kocho family and also the heir to her father’s company. Her older sister, Kanae, respectfully declined her “birth right” and passed the heir title on to a more than willing Shinobu. You swirl your wine glass, bringing the contents to your lips and hoping it will eventually dull the insistent blabbering. You glance sideways at Shinobu, a similar wine glass sits before her on the table, but her hands are resting on her lap, leaving the contents untouched. 

You let your eyes wander a bit lower, focusing on her chest. How shameless of you, you nearly chuckle as you pull your eyes away to look at the man once more. He’s not as fun to look at as your boss is, especially when she’s wearing a low cut dress. It was deep purple, just like her eyes, just like the ends of her hair. How the man before the two of you could even focus you weren’t sure, then again you’d rather his eyes not linger on her for more than necessary. Even then, you seemed oblivious to the fact that he was focusing on you more than Shinobu. 

To make it even worse, you seemed to be painfully unaware of the growing agitation from the woman beside you. 

Delicately, Shinobu moved one of her hands from her lap and placed it on the leather booth below. The gap between your rights was no bigger than six inches, if Shinobu could have it differently, you’d be squished together in the booth. Curse fancy restaurants and their attention to detail. She listened to every word the man uttered, she knew within five minutes of the dinner that she wouldn’t accept his offer. Yet, it’s been an hour and she’s letting him drone on so she can sit beside you, enveloped in the perfume she gifted you. 

She glances at you, she can tell you’re completely uninterested in what is being said. Shinobu’s eyes linger, trailing down the column of your neck, ghosting your shoulders and collarbone, dipping even lower to your cleavage wrapped tightly in a satin black cocktail dress. The sight makes her mouth water. She shifts focus, her hand still resting on the leather separating your thighs. She finally reached for her glass, sipping it carefully. She times herself, setting the glass down a little harsher than necessary as she moves to rest her hand on your exposed thigh. 

Her plan worked, you jumped a bit as her hand made contact with you, but it was masked as you being scared by the sound of the glass hitting the table. “Oh~ don’t mind me. Continue.” She ignores the way you eye her, cheeks warm from the wine and now from the shock of her hand on you. He shrugs it off, continuing with his blabbering. Shinobu is careful, her fingers tapping idly on the flesh of your thigh. She enjoys the way it bounces slightly under her touch, it’s just as soft as she envisioned it to be, lucky her. 

She’s a little less careful as she squeezes your supple flesh, watching your fingers twitch as you grab your wine glass. She’s proud of the fact that you know enough to keep your reactions to a minimum. This wouldn't be the first time she toyed with you during a business meeting, but she intended this to be the farthest she’s ever taken it. Shinobu is the mood to see how far she can go before it’s too much not only for you but for the party that is forced to sit through it. She’d fuck you right here on the table if she could, but there are too many lingering eyes for that. 

Your breathing is a little more ragged, the urge to take deep breaths is nearly overwhelming as her hands creep further upwards. Shinobu doesn’t stop once she meets your dress, going as far as to pull your thigh towards her, not stopping until your knee meets her’s. You keep your eyes trained on your wine glass as her perfectly manicured fingers scratch at your inner thigh. She’s teasing you, her fingers merely inches away from your sex but she won’t touch you just yet. “So, what do you think so far?” The direct question didn’t faze Shinobu as much as it did for you. 

You swallow, blinking as you force a smile onto your face and look over at your boss. For the first time since sitting down, the two of you made direct eye contact. Shinobu smiles at you, nodding. “I think we’d like to hear more from you.” You’d never guess she wasn’t interested. He seems more confident, going into another spiel about the benefits combining both companies would have. All the while, Shinobu’s fingers are kneading the flesh of your inner thigh. Your brain goes back to autopilot, tuning the man out as Shinobu toys with you. 

You’re aching now, an uncomfortable wetness becoming more prominent due to the air reaching your cunt. You feel your arousal, clinging to the fabric of your panties, it’s making you squirm. You feel warm, the sticky sensation making you want to get up and run to the bathroom but Shinobu’s fingers tell you otherwise. She’s using one finger to swipe up your slit, the material pressing further into your sex and collecting more arousal. You reach for your wine glass again, sipping the nearly black looking  liquid in hopes of it hiding your struggle.

The last thing you expected was for Shinobu to play with your pussy while you sat in a fancy restaurant for a business proposal. 

Then again, you were pretty naive for not expecting it. She continued like that for a while, sliding her finger up and down your covered slit until she could tell your panties were soaked. You set your glass down, fingers clenching as you moved to settle them in your lap. Though it was a bit of a struggle considering Shinobu’s hand was playing between your legs. You knew better than to touch her hand or even try and move it away. 

Any sort of movement on your part would immediately bring attention. So you let her do as she pleased, just as you always did.

It was nearly agony, but it seemed Shinobu was feeling generous with you. Two slender fingers dipped under your panties, making contact with your bare heat. You swallowed, throat drying up as you reached for your wine, as if the liquid would do anything to quench your thirst. She continued the same teasing motion, sliding her fingers along your slit until they were slick with your arousal. She ghosted your clit, sliding over the sensitive bud before dipping lower, prodding your entrance. 

Your legs fell open just a bit more, allowing her more space to do as she wanted with you. “Sir, could you repeat that last part?” Shinobu smiled sweetly, feigning innocence as she pushed her two fingers knuckle deep into your cunt. You nearly choked, watching the man’s attention shift from you to her and repeat whatever bull shit he had just uttered. Much to Shinobu’s dismay, his eyes returned to you after he repeated his sentence. Her annoyance made itself known in the way she roughly curled her fingers. You take a shaky breath, eyes nearly watering as she rubs against a sensitive part of you. The pleasure is building as she curls her fingers and scissors you open, completely avoiding your clit. 

You’re thankful for the ambience in the restaurant, or else you were positive the man sitting across from the two of you would be able to hear the slick squelch of Shinobu’s fingers working you open. It’s embarrassing, to an extent. But the idea of getting caught also has your body reacting to her touch. Shinobu pauses her thrusting, pressing up against various parts of your walls until she finds that one particular spot. She knows she’s found it when your thighs immediately tense. To make matters worse, she takes the time to massage that particular spot. She watched your hands shake as you brought the glass of wine up to your lips again. 

Your breath fogs the glass, barely able to let the liquid escape the cup as she forces a soft moan out of you. Your wine glass seems to swallow it whole, though the tiny smirk on her lips tells you she heard it. You put the glass down, the lingering taste of cherry and plum making you feel parched. Slowly, the heel of Shinobu’s palm roughly massaged your throbbing clit. You knew you were a goner the moment she started, the build up in your gut felt like a dam was about to burst. You could feel sweat forming on your brow, suffocated by the environment around you as Shinobu finger fucked you at the dinner table. 

“Pardon me, but is your assistant feeling alright, Miss. Kocho?” You barely process what he is saying, rather you’re trying to steady your breathing as Shinobu’s fingers never falter. “Oh! She’s fine, you’ll have to forgive her sir. After one glass of Merlot she gets a bit dazed…” Shinobu glanced at you, jaw clenching slightly when she noticed how far away you looked. Perhaps she was taking it a little too far, she failed to consider the wine you had in your system. “If it’s not too much trouble, do you mind if we run to the ladies room?” Shinobu’s fingers were still thrusting in and out of your cunt as she spoke, the heel of her palm stroking your clit. 

“Oh, I see.” He chuckled softly, it sounded almost predatory. “By all means, take your time ladies.” Shinobu forced her smile, pulling her hand away from your cunt entirely. “Thank you so much.” She was motioning you out of the booth, watching as you seemed to recollect yourself pretty quick. You were nearly running to the bathroom by the time Shinobu got out of the booth. The women’s room was dimly lit, just like the rest of the establishment. Luckily the music was much louder than in the restaurant, the stalls were closed off rooms. Nobody would see nor hear you. Perfect. 

“Aren’t you risky…” Shinobu purred as she guided you into one of the stalls. “M-me? You just…” you couldn’t even say it, your face warm and body aching. You had been so close to coming and she had stopped, all because that oaf noticed your dazed look. Shinobu rolled her eyes, pushing you up against the tiled wall. “My pretty girlfriend is gaining too much attention…” Shinobu cooed softly, her body flush to yours. “I don’t like it, I’m the only one allowed to look at you that way…” you’re panting, completely engulfed in her. “Girlfriend, huh?” You teased her for the title, but it sent a wave of excitement through you anyways. This was the first time she had called you her girlfriend. 

“Yeah, my girlfriend. You’re mine, if you haven’t figured that out already.” She huffs softly, there was the Shinobu you knew and loved. You lean forward, kissing her deeply, your hands roaming to her hips and holding them tightly. Your tongues swirl around each other, the lingering taste of merlot wine was intoxicating. Shinobu busies herself with your dress, pushing it all the way up and revealing the lacy panties she had been feeling rather than seeing. Your hands moved lower, the intentions to do the same thing clawing at your mind. “Ah, Ah.” Shinobu pulled away, cheeks flushed and lips swollen from the kiss. “You can worry about me when we go home, back to my place I mean. We can do whatever you want when we get there.”  

She chuckles softly, thumb rubbing circles on your bare hip. “For now, let me have you… I won’t be able to turn that idiot’s proposal down properly if all I can think about is you and your pretty cunt.” You nod, lips finding hers again as she tugs your underwear down to your knees. The kiss doesn’t last nearly as long as you want it to, but you can’t complain as she drops to her knees before you. Your boss…girlfriend?… was about to eat you out in the stall of a fancy restaurant’s bathroom… while a potential client was waiting patiently back at the table. “Fuck…Shinobu are you sure this is…” the words die on your lips as her tongue licks a fat stripe up your inner thigh. “A good idea? Yeah, I’m positive it is.” 

She can’t stop now, not when your kiss is lingering on her lips, the taste of your wine sitting on her tongue. She glances up at you one more time before pulling your hips forward. Only your upper back is braced on the tile wall, your hands fidgeting and unsure where to go as Shinobu grips your thighs. Her nails dig into the flesh of your thighs deliciously, violet eyes roaming over your needy cunt. She doesn’t say anything as she moves forward, lips connecting with your sex as her tongue prods your slit open. You whine immediately, chest heaving as your heart races. Shinobu’s tongue focuses on your aching clit, flicking the sensitive nub until you’re mewling. She lets go of one thigh, moving her hand lower. 

You’re watching her with blown out pupils, breath catching in your throat as her fingers enter you again. You let yourself trust the music, moaning loudly as she searches for that particular spot again. This time, Shinobu finds it almost immediately. “F-fuck… carefully w-with that…” your voice is weak, especially when she begins massaging that one spot. She hums, sending vibrations through you as she switches from flicking your clit to sucking on it. “S-Ah-Shinobu…” you choke, the build up in your gut has returned tenfold. “I-I’m serious… Nobu… I’m gonna make a mess.” You’re squeezing your eyes shut, embarrassed because you know what’s coming. She didn’t slow, she moved quicker. 

Sweet noises tumbled from your lips as your fingers found stability on her shoulders. Your thighs trembled with effort to keep yourself upright, but you were slowly losing that battle. Shinobu’s lips continued to suck on you harshly, her fingers massaging what you assumed was your “g-spot” until it felt like you were about to burst. “S-Shinobu… please… it feels like you’re gonna make me… pee.” You squeal, face warm as you feared what was to come. Shinobu seemed to laugh, vibrating your cunt. She wanted to tell you to just let it happen, that you wouldn't actually pee, but if she stopped, she was positive she’d lose what she’s accomplished so far. She was going to ruin you, here and now. 

So, she kept going, pretending not to hear your desperate pleas. You felt tears burn your eyes, pleasure making your body shake as your orgasm was dangled right in front of you. You couldn’t stop it if you wanted to, Shinobu’s relentless pace made it hard to think straight. “S-Shinobu please… I’m gonna cum…” you wailed loudly, not caring if anyone heard you at this point. Again, too occupied to properly respond, she manages to pick up her already brutal pace. You stood no chance, body convulsing as you came. You’re gasping for air, legs nearly giving out as you blink away the spots in your vision. You had barely processed the shining puddle below you. 

“O-oh fuck did I…” you’re still breathing heavy, embarrassment flooding you cheeks. Shinobu pulls away from you, her lips and chin shining with your arousal. She smiles, looking smug as she brings her fingers to her lips and sucks your arousal off of them. “You didn’t pee. You squirted.” Her tone dripped with sarcasm as she uttered the word. Somehow, you felt more embarrassed about squirting. “Don’t look so scared, it’s pretty fucking hot.” She smiles down at the mess you made, some of it is still leaking down your thighs. “If I was in the mood to be nice, I’d bring you out to the car and have you wait while I turn that idiot’s proposal down…” 

Shinobu moved closer, managing to avoid the mess on the floor as her body pressed flush against yours. “But I’m not in the mood to be nice…” her tone was seductive, you’d even go as far as to say it was sadistic. “I want to see you squirm, pretty girl.” Her dainty fingers reached down to tug your panties up, watching as flinch when the cold material met your heat. “You can survive a little more, right? Listen to him drone on and on while you sit in your arousal slick panties? Your pussy aching and leaking…” you swallowed, her unfiltered language had you feeling hot all over. “C’mon, use your words, pretty girl.” You blinked. 

“Y-yeah…” she shook her head at your weak response. “Now, that’s no way to talk to me…” she fixed you with a stern glare, her lips hovering over yours. “Y-yes ma’am, I’ll be good and wait.” You choked out, head moving forward on its own to try and close the distance. Shinobu smiled, one that was genuine. “Good girl.” She purred softly before closing the distance for you, her teeth sinking into your lower lip so you were forced to open them. You gasped, tasting your own arousal on her tongue mixed with wine, your hand cupping her cheeks to keep her from moving away. It was your longest kiss yet, perhaps your sloppiest too. Shinobu pulled away for air a moment later. 

“Now, save the rest for later. We have a long winded proposal to turn down.” She smirked, tugging your dress down and taking your hand. “Shouldn’t we…clean that…” you look down at the mess then back at Shinobu. She shook her head “don’t worry about it.” You had a funny feeling she liked seeing how embarrassing it made you, but then again, you couldn’t be mad at her for it. “Whatever you say, Miss Kocho.” Her grip on your hand tightens, eyes narrowing as she looks at you. “Call me that again and we may never leave this bathroom.” It wasn’t a threat, rather, it was a challenge. “Miss Kocho…” it was your turn to purr, smiling smugly as she shut her eyes and inhaled deeply. 

“You’ll be the death of me.”

[lostquinn]

Happy holidays

Christmas with Ghost

Simon 'Ghost' Riley x gn!reader

Summery: Simon always hated Christmas, you always loved I but he loves you, so he's willing to celebrate with you on Christmas eve.

It's been a while since I posted but I figured you guys deserve a nice fluffy Christmas pierce with Ghost <3

Word count: 857

You'd been dating Simon for a while, having caught his eye since you joined Task Force 141 as a demolition expert. He loved your explosive personality, they way you cared about everyone no matter what.

You knew and understood that he didn't like christmas, it was one of your favourite holidays and you both respected and understood one another's feelings on the holiday.

Currently, you stood in a safe house, watching as Johnny and Gaz attempted to make a tree they had cut down stand up for you. They had cut the base wonky and were shocked when the tree itself was wonky, but they managed to make it stand.

Price was sat on the edge of the table, fighting with a set of lights you had dug out and trying his best to untangle them. He cursed softly as he pulled a knot tighter.

Simon sat in an armchair by the fire, his mask resting on the arm of the chair as he watched everyone and sipped his large mug of tea.

"Told you it was wonky," Johnny teased Gaz, punching him playfully on the arm.

"I told you to help rather than sit and watch," Gaz argued before the two of them went to help Price.

You turned to Simon, crouching down by him with a concerned expression on your face. He met your eyes with a soft, loving smile, his eyes lit up by the fire.

"How're you feeling, darling?" You asked softly, your hand on his knee.

"Cingulomania," he responded quietly. "Know what it means, luvie?"

You shook your head no, searching his face for any trace of an answer.

"It's... it's a strong desire to hold a person in your arms," he murmured, patting his lap for you as he put his tea down.

You grinned, nodding as you climbed up and sat in his lap, your legs dangling over the arm of the chair. He wrapped his arms around you and squeezed you tight, nuzzling his face into the crook of your neck with a hum.

His stuble pricked your skin as he held you tight. It felt like home, being on his lip as he held you. After a few long moments of holding you, he kissed your neck before bringing his lips to your ear.

"I love you, ya know?" He grumbled into your ear. It was the first time he'd said it, the first time either of you had even mentioned love.

Your heart melted in your chest, and you wrapped your arms around his neck as you cuddled into him. A soft blush filled your cheeks as a grin spread across your face.

"I love you too, Si," you murmured against him.

"Oi, lovebirds!" Price chastised as him, Gaz and Johnny held the now untangled lights across the room. "You joining us with the decorating?"

You hesitated, glancing between Price and Simon for a moment as his hands rested on your hips, gripping your skin.

"Yeah, yeah... we'll be right there, old man," Simon chuckled.

He wanted to decorate with you, to celebrate Christmas with you despite his own reservations with the holiday. He squeezed you again before holding his hand up slightly, helping you stand up before standing next to you.

Johnny and Gaz grinned and chuckled, shoulder barging each other out of the way as they approached the tree with the lights.

Simon laughed as the two men struggled to put lights on the tree, smiling down at you for a moment. He put his hand on the small of your back and pressed a kiss to your temple before pressing on and helping them.

The three of them quarrelled as they attempted to decorate the tree together. Eventually, Price threw some tinsel at them, and the four of them laughed and teased each other as they decorated the tree for you.

You had your arms crossed, a grin on your face as you stood watching them, filled with joy. You noticed Simons jumper, discarded on the armchair and slid it on over the top of your shirt before stepping closer and joining them.

Johnny nearly elbowed you in the head as attempted to put a decoration high up and Simon smacked him in the back of the head playfully before pulling you close.

"You know I loved it when you wear my stuff," He murmured as he kissed where Johnny had elbowed you and snaked his hands around your waist.

Price disappeared off for a moment, returning shortly with an angel ornament for the top of the tree.

"Who wants to finish it all up?" Price grinned, looking between everyone.

"I think it's only fair my angel puts it up," Simon grinned as Price nodded and passed you the decoration.

"Look at 'em, pipsqueak can't reach!" Johnmy chuckled.

Simon grinned as his grip tightened, and he lifted you up, giving you the height you needed to put the angel on the tree before dropping you back to the floor.

"Looks great, everyone," Gaz grinned.

"Best christmas ever," Simon smiled, squeezing you before scooping you up in his arms and carrying you off to bed.

[insult-2-injury]

A Worthy Distraction

Header by my wonderful and talented friend @drawlypsy. Please go check out their work, they're fucking amazing.

AO3 Link NSFW Dottore/femReader, murder couple, dirty talk, fingering, questionable coping mechanisms, over the pants feelies, villains will be villains, trauma

[This is a Genshin OC one-shot I wrote for friends and then rewrote into a reader insert. Some tenses and stuff may be a little wonky here and there, but I think I caught most of it. It is only a tad OC-centric, as reader does have a backstory, but it's minor and shouldn't make a difference. Idk. There's smut.]

The lowdown: reader has anemo vision w/ pyro delusion, has one metal claw hand and PTSD to match

~~~~~~

You lay on your side, sprawled out across an uncomfortable-looking exam table like a cat in a patch of sun, yawning and stretching as you awoke from a short nap. Head twitching to the side, Dottore acknowledged your entry into the waking world with a rigid nod and a tiny quirk of his lips, something that could almost be categorized as a rigid smile, before turning back to the subject on his table. 

You shot him a cheeky grin, unruly tufts of your hair falling across your face as you did so. Your socked foot tapped a rhythm onto the metal beneath, warm now with the prolonged heat of your body. Your head thumped back against the metal… Bored. So bored.

Archons, you were just as ambitious as he when it came to testing out new ideas and just as prone to getting lost for hours in the mental process of it all. But he had been at this experiment for days, barely sleeping, hardly eating. Your best friend Ana was off on some secret Fatui mission, his more tolerable clones were deployed in Sumeru, and chatting up the locals was apparently a non-starter. Besides, it wasn’t your fault anyway that the local creperie burned down. And, unrelated, what kind of creperie ran out of fucking crepes?

You were bored. So completely and utterly bored. You sat up, criss-crossing your legs beneath you in order to better watch the Doctor work.

Dottore was a straight line– seemed perfectly content staying in one spot for an entire day, his mind single tracked and obsessive. You, on the other hand, took the path of a crack of lightning, your interests branching and changing rapidly, new revelations branching into new ideas and new ideas springing into new experiments and it was a wonder you ever finished anything at all. You always did benefit from someone who could help organize the near constant fusillade of inspirations in your head. 

You used to have someone. Now they were the ghost in every corner.

You needed distractions. And a man possessed could provide no such thing. Your fingers twitched and the pyro delusion warmed on your hip. Then burned. You inhaled sharply, your heart rate picking up.

You blinked away at the encroaching visions that threatened to steal you, usher you inside. The disembodied voices and the ghostly feeling… the familiar mourning of the fiercest kind of love expanding in your chest but with no vessel, no discernible memory to hive it away in. So full yet so terribly out of reach and–

“You’re fidgety tonight,” Prime said calmly and you gasped, your eyes shooting open in time to catch the fire blossoming at your fingertips, having singed a small hole through the thin fabric of your shorts. Cursing, you swatted at the smoke as he continued evenly. “Go take a walk outside if you must.”

You allowed the span of a few centering breaths to pass as your gaze fell upon Dottore’s raven mask laying on the counter behind him. Your gaze darted back to his uncovered features and you found yourself drawn in, and not for the first time. It was a recent breakthrough, one he’d made no announcement of despite the shock when he’d removed the thing in front of you; a promising sign of trust from a man who so lauded in the unsettling air of mystery he exuded.

You fiddled with the mask in your own hair as you observed. The ancient scar that crossed the bridge of his nose and extended up to his right temple, eyes untouched, the rest of his face pale, smooth, and unscathed. The scar that he could easily remove with his scientific prowess yet he kept it just the same. You’d always reckoned it was a reminder of something; a tether of sorts.

And Celestia knows a mind without a tether was a dangerous thing. Yes, you thought, Celestia would know, indeed.

You let out a sudden shriek of laughter, unprovoked.

“Ah, shucks. You’re always trying to send me away,” you chided finally, rolling the singed fabric between your thumb and forefinger. “Besides, it’s the middle of the night, bozo.” 

The stiff, weary shake of his head was indicative that he was now only slightly bothered by the plethora of nicknames that you’d coined to get under his skin. Good, you thought with delight, he’d better get used to it.

“I mean, heck,” you continued, throwing up your arms, “who knows what kind of monsters are skulking about out there?”

Dottore’s piercing, crimson eyes latched onto yours and you smiled at the clear meaning within.

Worse than me?

A familiar shock of yearning racked the length of your spine. You gnawed at the inside of your cheek, noting the way his eyes flicked to the motion of your lips before slowly drawing back up, almost expressionless. But you knew his little intricacies by now; the indiscernible twitch of his eyelids when you toed the line with him, the drumming of those long, elegant fingers against any available service whenever he was in deep thought. 

How he studied you when he thought you weren’t paying attention.

You had always been attracted to the dark; where flame cast light upon a brick wall you were drawn to the shadows that slid effortlessly in between, morphing and making their quiet nests within the cracks in mortar. Yes, Dottore was indeed a darkly beautiful thing, you thought, not allowing your gaze to stray from his.

“I was under the impression you could handle yourself,” he said coolly, but the bladed glint in his unflinching stare was bright and calculating, even beneath the eerie shadows cast over his features by the medical lamp above. “Was I wrong to think so?”

Hmph. All work and no play made the Doctor cranky. Your nose twitched and you cocked your head, lips curling coyly.

“I can handle myself just fine,” you said, baring your teeth. “But you’d miss me, wouldn’t you?” You placed your chin in your palm to drum fingers against your cheekbones but didn’t wait for his answer. “So I’ll stay right here. For the good Doctor’s sake, of course.” 

You winked.

“For my sake. Of course,” he murmured, examining your wide, inciting grin and the butterfly flutter of your eyelashes. A tiny quirk of his lips betrayed his forced impassivity before he put a pin in the expanding balloon of tension by turning back to the body on the table silently.

You swallowed down the uncharacteristic dryness in your throat.

There were different routes you could take to get your desired result, one that would ease the ache between your legs and provide you a worthy distraction from the ghosts in every corner. You were used to people winding up putty in your hands, pliable and needy; even the self righteous ones. You just had a gift about you, an impulsive need for control in all senses of the word that people just responded to.

Except him.

To have Prime in your greedy clutches would be nothing short of euphoric. But there was something ancient and omniscient about him that made him effortlessly superior to them all, as if he would slip like sand through the fingers of anyone who tried to hold him. He was patient, unhurried; a lone viper coiled atop its rock, full-bellied and confident in his supremacy, so many leagues above that he had all the time in the world.

Your lips twitched. But, so did you now, didn’t you? Cursed with immortality and ironically bestowed the power to alter time; a power that centuries ago you would have used to pulverize the very forces that had granted them to you in the first place. But time just wasn’t enough for you. You were a creature starved. You wanted to devour and destroy each moment now until nothing remained but the burning foundation. And even that must go.

Your mind strayed again and you fought to ground yourself. All must go.

You hissed between your teeth, leaping off the table to take up space beside Dottore, shoulder pressing into his as you studied his bloody work. You viewed his profile in your periphery; his bladed nose, the soft, steel blue curls that framed his face, the slight, disapproving curl of his lips downward as he was jostled.

“Need any assistance?” you said brightly.

“I do not.” His hands began to move carefully across the corpse, but you knew enough about his craft and were observant enough to see that his focus wasn’t on the experiment before him. 

 “Hm… You want a drink or something?” 

“No,” he said shortly, and then as if remembering himself, “... but thank you.”

“Well, you must be hungry at least.” Your long fingers dared to wrap his elbow, fiddling with the rolled up arms of his blue linen shirt before trailing up to his bicep, squeezing. “Goodness, you’re all skin and bones, crazy you can even hold that scalpel like you are. It’s almost like… like… like holding a flimsy little test tube…”

Dottore’s chin dipped, the slope of his nose tipping down toward your mocking countenance, which faltered slightly when his gaze dropped briefly to the two fingers now trailing over the sharp buckles of his arm bands. You hadn’t touched Prime before besides the occasional brushing of shoulders and on the surface, he didn’t seem the type to enjoy such things. Maybe all it took was the right button.

But Prime only hummed, crimson red eyes rising.

“Your actions suggest you desire to take this man’s place.” His voice was soft but rife with danger. Your tongue darted out to wet your lips and you cocked your head to the side like a mischievous crow. You seemed to share the same steady breath back and forth as you studied each other for a short moment.

“Suit yourself, old man,” you chirped, conjuring a gust of anemo to tousle his loose, hanging locks of unruly hair before releasing his arm abruptly and in a blur of motion swinging around to his other side. “You’re loads of fun, you know that? Have your harbinger friends ever told you what a dream you are?”

Friends. Maybe there was a segment of him that had what one could call a friend but Prime, you had observed, seemed to have no interest in any social dealings that didn’t involve the business of sinister diplomacy. The only person who came around here often enough was Pantalone, and you could hardly call a wallet a friend.

Not that you had many tried and true friendships besides Ana. There was, of course, the pink-haired stick bug that was a package deal with your best friend and he seemed to be warming up to you a bit, but on the whole, people just seemed to tolerate you. Not your fault. Social skills were a fucking bitch.

“Has anyone ever told you how exasperating you really are?” he retorted and then continued, softly mocking, like he was speaking to a child. “This experiment is a particularly sensitive one that requires a certain amount of space and time to complete. Space and time that you seem unwilling to provide.”

“Provide?” You giggled and leaned in close, voice a low purr in his ear. “You get awfully mean when you’re frustrated, Doctor.” And you swung from him, sauntering away.

On a shelf across the room, a little radio sat playing quiet soul music. With one slow stroke of your forefinger across the dial, you turned the volume up, wiggling your hips to the music as you bent across the counter. But when you peeked over your shoulder, he was paying you no mind. Worse, he was turned completely around, vials clanking as he fiddled with something in the depths of his cabinets. Your sly grin turned into a wrathful frown as you glared.

Taking the radio beneath one arm, you spun around to bow comically low, your free arm splayed out like the spread wing of a bird about to take flight. A gust of anemo slammed the cabinet door in his face and he paused, hand still mid air. Then, terribly slow, he turned, eyes hooded and serpentlike but otherwise expressionless. You waited for his full attention with a feral grin on your face before you flicked the volume up another notch and spun out of the stance.

Your socks slid clumsily across the rubber floor as you moved with exaggerated motions, using the radio as a dance partner, swaying to the egregiously loud music. And to add insult to injury, you sang along, too, belting out the words like you were doing all this to save your own life. 

Dottore’s eyes were all that moved as they followed, crimson glowing in your periphery as you twirled. And even if he had raised his voice above the cacophony, you wouldn’t have been able to hear him. But his gaze challenged just the same.

You shrugged, turned the volume up to max and watched his eyelids twitch in contemplation before he started to carefully put the corpse before him away, zipping them into a body bag before rolling the table away and into the walk-in freezer. He returned, surprisingly gloveless fingers casually brushing down the front of his pants.

All the while, you danced closer, singing and laughing with frenzied glee, winding up to perform a full running slide toward him. But a small, abrupt twitch of Dottore’s wrist paired with a warning, devilish tick of his lips had you dropping the radio in order to conjure your polearm, spinning it elegantly above your head. 

The cogs of a clock rotated before your eyes, a secondhand wheeling at an impossible speed. With practiced ease, you whirled it swiftly back, resetting the clock. You slid to a steady halt in front of him.

The giant needle, half the size of you, that would feasibly have torn into your flesh floated innocently now beside his head, gleaming in the fluorescent light. You searched him with razor eyes, a cocked grin on your face as you reached out with the deadly point of a clawed finger to prop under his chin while the other wiggled beneath the center strap of his harness to pull his face closer. “You weren’t actually going to use that little pin trick on me, were you? I was looking for a dance partner, princess,” you tutted, “not a fight.”

And not taking your gaze off his, you stretched out with your free hand to slowly turn the point of the intimidating needle away from yourself. “Ooh, that is sharp, though!” you remarked. “Very impressive, doctor, I should fashion you up a fancy shmancy corkboard to match. Because you know, I’m nice like that. Now, wanna tell me why you’d go and ruin my good fun?”

“Your good fun…” He hummed regretfully. The finger beneath his chin dug in and he chuckled, a dark blaze of interest in his eyes. “You are right, my dear, I may have overreacted. Well, I am sorry, for all that my word is worth. I simply had the strangest inkling you weren’t listening to me. But now…” The corners of his lips twitched just slightly. “Now you must think me quite uncivil.”

You grinned and met him in the middle of the playing field, the claw beneath his chin falling to round his neck. “You did forget your manners there for a second, huh?”

Dottore hummed, leaning unexpectedly forward and into the grip of your unmoving talons. It seemed every segment of the Doctor favored a nice side plate of anguish, and Prime was no different. They really were just flowers plucked from the same garden. 

The talon of your thumb dug into his pulse point and he let out the softest groan, his breath tickling the strands of hair across your forehead. 

One of his hands peeled your hold carefully from round his neck, holding it instead against his chest. You swallowed down a secret, hidden delight born of being held by a being who did not often seek out the pleasures of touch. In this moment, he was yours. Your Prime.

“Don’t worry your pretty little head, Doctor,” you said, “I can think of several ways to atone.” 

Clawed hand laced beneath his, your free hand trailed down to his lower abdomen, pausing so as to peer up at him through your eyelashes. His breathing remained practiced and steady but there was no mistaking the muscles that twitched and jumped beneath his shirt as your fingers danced innocently from hip to hip. His tongue darted out to wet his lips and his eyes rose to meet yours.

“I shudder to think what punishments a mind such as yours could dream up,” he said lightly. 

Too lightly. Too unbothered. 

“I’d only give as much as you’re able to take, of course.”

“Ah, of course.” 

Dottore huffed out a dark laugh, his free hand rising up to almost tenderly stroke the ticklish outline of your jaw before falling to cup beneath. “I’ve been told I’m long-winded but you don’t give up do you? An admirable trait in some circumstances, I suppose. But you are a horribly impatient thing.” 

His thumb pushed into the plush of your bottom lip, quietly admiring the give of it, the shades of red warping under his shifting pressure. “Although I suppose I have been quite busy, haven’t I?” he crooned and you felt a bright flicker of irritation at the implication that your entire time here had thus far revolved around a one-sided pining for him.

No, no. That wouldn’t do.

You had intended on taking him quick once he showed interest, but something bright and oddly delicate within the depths of your chest had you slowing down. Besides, you supposed a bit of teasing wouldn’t hurt. 

“Being elbow deep in your funny little corpses all day makes you awful ornery. I just think you could use a break.”

Your hand dropped those final fatal inches, brushing along the front of his pants, fingers dragging a slow, lazy rhythm across the twitching hardness beneath. Archons, he was big. And he knew it, too. Had no reservations about pushing his hips forward and into your grip just to watch your eyes widen.

With a centering intent, you located and swiped across the tip, pressing there to savor the bead of precum wetting slowly through. His grip tightened painfully on your jaw and his own thumb jerked forward, sliding between your teeth. His eyes dipped closed almost as if to center himself, his finger resting on the pad of your tongue.

Dottore’s crimson gaze reemerged and fell transfixed upon the digit you pinched between your teeth before releasing. His voice was surprisingly even when he spoke again. “Tell me what you want.”

“You on your knees,” you said candidly, stroking along his length again, so hot against the palm of your flesh hand. “Some begging would be nice.”

His chuckle was a roll of thunder, sinister and foreboding. “Oh? How forward,” he remarked.

“And just a liiiittle bit of your time. Since like you said, you’ve been so busy. Then we can go back to pretending you haven’t wanted this since the very beginning. Is that so much to ask?”

The slow, wicked curl of Dottore’s lips would have sent anyone else running for the hills, but not you, a vicious thread of want unspooling between your thighs at the sight. To have such villainous lips pressing not only to yours but to your legs, your breasts, your everything.

The thought gave you pause, if only for a moment, a lapse that he took full advantage of as he dragged his palms up your sides with the leisure of a man with unlimited patience, his presence hot and solid, thumbs brushing, swooping purposefully along the outside swell of your breasts before trekking back down to settle on your hips. 

“You just want a little bit of my time,” he repeated, nodding, “of course.”

You frowned. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. With a sudden, urgent need to unravel him, you yanked his hips closer with a tug of his belt buckle. “Then why don’t you kneel, hm? Or better yet, pet, why don’t you get on all 4’s for me?”

Dottore’s chest rumbled against yours. “You know,” he said gently, “you were right about me.” Something about his tone had your brows knitting with unease, stomach twisting.

“Was I?”

“I do get mean when I’m frustrated.”

With a single toss of his head, three things happened in sequence. 

One, the needle beside Dottore’s head, the one your elemental skill had been holding in place, impaled into the tile behind you with a deafening crack. Two, there was a terrible sound of something whirring to life. And three, a cloud of winged darkness descended upon the two of you.

Ravens. Too many to count. With bright turquoise eyes and mechanical cries. They were jet black with gold stitching; the man couldn’t help but put signature pieces of himself into every one of his creations and these were no different.

A sudden, predatory step forward by Dottore sent you pedaling away, movement stalled by the backs of your legs hitting against the flat head of the embedded needle, too low to sit on, too wide to skirt around. Instinctively, your fingers found a stabling purchase in the center strap of his harness before you could topple backwards as he drove forward still.

In a terribly awkward mimicry of a ballroom dip, you hung off him, head whipping to the side to ward off the flurry of winged creatures that swept viciously past your faces like an ocean riptide. Spinning, they.painted an almost ethereal backdrop of black wings behind him for but a moment before they fell in a swirling formation around the two of you.

A tempestuous wind, one that matched the power and complexity of your frenzied mind, built with a vengeance around your feet as you swung your sharp gaze to his. Your taloned hand gripped into the blue linen of his shirt as you found an awkward balance, teetering backwards still, knuckles digging punishingly into his chest as you glared up at him.

“This isn’t fun for me,” you complained. “I’m not having fun.”

“Pity.” A thick laugh at your expense flowed like a dark lullaby from his chest as he addressed you with a sharp-toothed grin, ignoring the anemo tantrum even as his hair swept wildly across his face.

“Do you like control?”

“Yes,” you wheezed up at him, neck straining from the effort of holding your head up to glare at him. “I do. I really, really, do.”

“As it happens, so do I.”

“Oh well boo you, you absolute bore. You know, I was wondering where you kept that backbone.”

Both time and an unquelled fury had afforded you the capabilities to destroy a village with a single spin of your polearm. You both knew you could level the playing field if you wanted. And quite literally, too. But despite the terrible yearning to pin him into the nearest wall, to see him come apart at your hands, the storm remained strangely controlled. Even as you clung to him while he explored the notches of your spine gently, the movement clashing with that familiar lilt of cruelty with which he spoke.

“What was it you were searching for, hm?” he crooned. “For me to shirk the integrity of my research just for a meaningless dalliance? You seem to quite fancy the notion of vexing me into compliance, seeing how you’ve been trying to get this spine of yours bent over one of my exam tables for how many weeks now? You spoke of punishment earlier, well I’d like to subvert that notion entirely. Of what use are you having around at all if you only seek to meddle in my work?”

“Four,” you said simply and then in the following silence supplied, “four weeks I mean. And you’re in no position to be tossing around death threats. Not with those arms.”

“Aren’t I?”

Punishment came in the form of his fingers withdrawing from your spine, instead languidly dragging around to your lower stomach. Crimson eyes observed your reactions carefully as he slid a wriggling middle finger across the thin fabric of your shorts, mapping out and nestling between the hidden folds there. His eyes darkened with hunger at the intoxicating sound of your breath hitching. He pressed upward with the pad of that finger, carefully avoiding where you needed his touch most, circling your clothed entrance and basking in the heat emanating between your thighs.

“Shall I proceed?”

“Shall I proceed?” you mocked in a gruff voice. “What is this, open heart surgery? Pass me the scalpel, Doctor.”

“That could be arranged,” he responded, voice tight.

A quiet whine loosened from your throat when his arm slid around your lower back to better support his endeavor as he pressed his thumb into your clit. In a launched counterattack, you slashed four thin strips into his shirt with a flick of your wrist, then hoisted yourself up to his ear by wrapping the back of his neck.

“You want to look at my brain, too?” you said breathlessly. “You can finger fuck that, too, if you want.”

The arm around your back tightened painfully. He continued his exploration of the shape of your cunt, picking up a slow rhythm with two fingers circling your clit. The hand on your tailbone dragged up until it tangled into your hair, holding you there in the crook of his neck while he turned to whisper against your cheekbone.

“I wouldn’t put such temptations into my head, pet.”

“Nothing that wasn’t already there.”

“You are dangerously drawn to the profane, I’m afraid. Hm. What to do, what to do… I think the only way to silence such a perverse mind is to deprive it of what it craves most, wouldn’t you agree?” 

He paused in his ministrations.

You were sure the glare you yanked back to sear him with could've taken out a small village. “No. I would not.”

Dottore chuckled low, but the tone was something you’d never heard, so tattered and almost restrained. Your eyes flicked down to the space between them and you smirked when you saw just how restrained he really was. He snatched your jaw and pulled your focus back to him, squeezing into the meat of your cheeks when you bared your teeth at him.

“You’re not incorrect, though, I have weighed the merits of studying such a specimen as you.”

“Ooh,” you grinned. “Intimately?”

He turned your face to the side to examine. “By and large, people are just a complex sum of their parts but you…”

You’re a person of jagged, scattered pieces I haven’t quite figured out yet.

“-You’ve been useful to me thus far. But all things fade and my patience wears thin.”

The murder of ravens dove back toward you with the command of an unseen signal and you closed your eyes and giggled as talons caught in the mask in your hair, knocking it completely off your head. But when the cold strike of metal wings slit into the sleeve of your shirt, slicing a thin crimson line across your shoulder, your eyes narrowed onto his with a deadpan, lethal focus.

“Do you want to know what happens if you keep pushing? Hm?” His fingers retreated until they splayed across your lower stomach instead.

“Do tell.”

“The bite of a single raven is painless when compared to, let’s say the bite of a scalpel against unsuspecting skin,” he murmured and his lips curled into a razor smile in response to the shiver that drove down your spine even as you vowed not to react. 

“But just imagine in that creative head of yours… the onslaught of hundreds of tiny blades clipping away at flesh. Talons tearing into skin, muscle, perhaps even bone, reducing you to nothing but your base components in none but an instant. A deplorable thought, isn’t it.” The birds dive bombed again and you vibrated with the strangest kind of fever, your eyes fluttering shut as you teetered with the adrenaline, the hypnotizing lull of his voice as he spoke of Death.

Death. That big old thing with wings. Shy and sweet - that shadowed creature that flitted just there at the corner of your eye. Always there, gone no matter how swiftly you turned to look. Soft and unforgiving, a small comfort, as light as the feather of a single raven. That’s all they were, just feathers across time. 

“Open your eyes.” You did with a whine, locking onto Dottore with a furrowed brow, your hands trailing up to bury into his shoulders, recentering yourself with reality. “After all, those would go first, I’m sure. Ravens are inclined to burrow, build their nests in high places. Ah, perhaps I’ll put your skull on my bookshelf. What a pretty sight that would be,” he crooned. His thumb swept up and smoothed across your brow almost comfortingly, circling down to rest on the crest of your cheekbone. Your head buzzed and a deadly impatience gnawed at the place his hand rested unmoving on your belly.

“It is a pain beyond the bounds of human comprehension, to die in such a way, at least from what I’ve borne witness to. Is it Death that you crave? I wouldn’t allow a creature such as yourself a tedious end, you know. No, you deserve something more… remarkable.” With an uncharacteristic bout of submission that had his head cocking in satisfaction, you allowed his hand to wrap your neck, the experimental squeeze like a trigger, your hips rolling needily into his. 

“So I’d beg you the question, what comes next?” he asked. “What happens if you continue to push and push?”

Dottore’s erection dug into the soft of your stomach when you pressed forward, your palms rising to cup his face in wonder. Your eyes followed the track of his swallow. 

Such a beautiful distraction he was. 

“Oh, Dottore… Oh, please, Dottore,” you sang out like a damsel in distress before lightning quick, you wrenched his head to the side to hiss in his ear. “So poetic. Romantic, even. Death by a thousand cuts and all that. Listen, I’ll tell you what happens,” you panted, a pyro fervor rising quickly to the surface of your skin. “Birds or no birds, if you don’t make me cum, I’ll call every last scrap of power you so sweetly bestowed upon me just to incinerate this place to nothing but the ashes of your hard work. What a fucking waste that would be, hm? No punishment quite like the consequences of your own actions is there? Oop! Hello karma, let me introduce you to my good friend the Doctor!” You tittered when the muscles of his jaw clenched beneath your grip.

“And then, Doctor, when we’re both standing here in the rubble of this archon forsaken place, I will go out of my way to abuse the laws of time just to make sure you suffer over and over again and then I will burn you, Prime, I will burn you if you don’t move your fucking fingers right now-”

The rest of your sentiment was cut off by a fist clenching into your hair, tearing your lips away from his ear and crushing them against his own. With a shattered groan, he poured his frustration down your throat while he did exactly as you requested, picking up an intensely fast rhythm against your clit that had you clawing at his biceps, startled from the sudden friction, your squeal of surprise swallowed whole by the violence of his kiss.

There was nothing gentle about the way he moved against each you, hips grinding a relentless rhythm, lips bruising yours as he nipped and licked, hand fisting so tightly in your hair you swore he’d take a good bit of it with him if he ever decided to remove himself.

And nothing could have prepared you for the peculiar sensation - an uncharacteristic feeling of being completely unsure of what came next. Of being knocked completely sideways whilst never feeling more balanced. Like there was a pulsing thing in your sternum running parallel to your heart, some melancholy sensation that centered and secured. 

That tethered.

Wind howled around them. Birds cried. And somewhere, somewhere in your addled mind, there was quiet.

Pleasure recycled from your mouth and into his as he drove you toward a climax that came fast but ferocious in its intensity. The borders of your vision faded until all you could do was wrap your arms around his shoulder and hold on as you shook against him, a high pitched whine spilling from between your lips. And his crimson gaze, glazed and almost desperate, remained open to study the way in which you unraveled; how your eyes screwed shut, your fingers finding purchase in his own hair, tugging it terribly hard to prove some semblance of control over him even as you came apart with nothing but his fingers.

Time, with no assistance, seemed to stand still as you came to, your nose pressed into the soft crook of his neck, arms still wrapping his shoulders. Papers were scattered, tables overturned. Some ravens flew still, riding the leftover anemo current above, while some perched, eyeing the two of them with a cold, mechanical disinterest.

A song played on that little radio somewhere, broken and skipping but still pushing through as he swayed back and forth.

“Are we… dancing?”

“Quiet.”

Soft wings brushed across the hollowness in your chest and you nuzzled further into him without much thought. Holding your breath, you dragged your fingers down his chest, intent to undo him in the same way, his cock still hard and insistent against you, but he swatted your fingers away. Once, twice.

“Hey. You haven’t even-”

“Be quiet.”

“Why do you get the lead?”

Dottore didn’t say a word, but his weary sigh tickled the back of your neck and you fell into the silence that comes with newness.

“Did you know ravens usually work in pairs to acquire their food?” you said suddenly.

There was a long pause. “...I did.”

“Hm.”

You said nothing else, and if he noticed the unsubtle way in which you stole back the lead, he didn’t say a word.

[shares-a-vest]

"My taaaaape!"

Steve bolts from his office desk tucked away in the corner of his bedroom, down the hallway and into the living room to find Joanie kneeling on the floor, staring at a static television.

She senses his presence and lets out a dramatic whine.

"My tape," she repeats, gesturing at the TV with such force her whole body shakes. "It stopped working!"

She chokes out the last word and lowers down until she is face-down on the carpet. Joanie isn't really one for tantrums per se, but she does possess Eddie's theatrics.

Yeah sure, Steve knows she's upset but the silence as she lays on the floor is made all the more a show as their black cat Ozzy sniffs around her slippers before walking off nonchalantly.

Steve chuckles before stepping over his daughter so he can kneel in front of the TV unit.

"What are you doing?" Joanie asks, curious and suddenly breathing down his neck.

"The tape is jammed," he replies, looking through the flap.

He presses a few buttons, then holds down the eject button, his go-to troubleshooting method.

Nothing.

"Tell me what happened?" he asks, moving to sit criss-cross on the floor and bumping straight into Joanie who, also like Eddie, has no concept of personal space.

"Lumiere was about to sing 'Be My Guest' and it stopped!" she frowns and folds her arms with a huff. God forbid technical difficulties interrupt Pyjama Sunday, aka the day Joanie has the run of the house while Steve catches up on work he has neglected.

He places his hands on Joanie's arms, gently rubbing them as he smiles, "Good thing I used to work at a video store."

Eyes lighting up like a Christmas tree, she beams, "You can fix it!"

And yeah, their daughter might have also inherited Eddie's lack of volume control too.

Eddie arrives home from his impromptu studio session later than he expected. He lowers his keys into the bowl on the hallstand, stepping carefully and trying not to make a noise. At least for long enough to muster up something to charm Steve into not being annoyed about him coming home after dinner time.

But there is silence blanketing their apartment. Too much silence.

"Damn it!" comes Steve's voice from the vicinity of the kitchen.

Then Joanie chimes, "You swore!"

Eddie frowns as he hears a coin drop in the swear jar.

Steve mutters something. Then silence again.

Eddie tsks under his breath. Whatever is going on, it sounds like the family swear jar is being abused. Steve originally brought it into being (one of those glass candy jars that is like an old person's rite of passage) as a way to stop Eddie from cussing so much in front of their daughter. But, her being a little shit (and yeah, the brief mention of the money eventually going towards a puppy) has led to coins going straight into the blasted jar for anything Joanie remotely considers a swear word. Including replacements for swears like 'blasted'.

He grumbles as he toes his shoes off, working quickly in order to go rescue Steve from Joanie's militant, penny-pinching authority.

He walks into the kitchen to find both Steve and Joanie hovering over what looks like the VHS player, now in parts scattered across the dining table.

"Hello," he says, dipping his head two separate times in a feeble attempt to gain their attention.

But they merely squeak out high-pitched hums in unison, not looking up from their patient. Considering the doctor's headband squished onto Steve's head and the plastic stethoscope around Joanie's neck, it all looks more like a surgical procedure than a fix-it job.

He glances over to the kitchen sink, spotting evidence of a quick cereal-for-dinner and sighs with relief. Looks like Steve has been too distracted to fuss about dinner anyway.

He slips onto a seat and Joanie finally looks over. He jumps as Meatloaf clambers up from her lap, wiggling around as the poor little thing attempts to paw his way up onto the table.

"What's the prognosis, Doc?" he asks, taking the little brown cat and scooping him up to cradle his wonky back legs.

"Did you know dad worked at a video store!" Joanie beams with wide-eyed facination as she props her chin on her elbow.

"Thought Keith was the resident handyman at Family Video?" Eddie chuckles, caging Meatloaf to his chest to stop the little critter from squirming around because he isn't in Steve's burly arms.

Steve shrugs, finally looking up as he shoots back, "I fixed stuff too!"

There's probably a long-hybernating argument in there somewhere that involves Robin and Steve's Family Video video tech prowess, but he doesn't press further as Steve dives straight back into his handy work, poking his tongue out in concentration.

"We went to the Hi-fi store and got a new one of these!" Joanie offers, holding up some spindly socket thing he assumes is some internal mechanism for the player. "Then we got ice creams on the walk home!"

It must have been an adventure because by the time Steve has the VHS player plugged back in and working, with Beauty and the Beast playing after a dramatic play-by-play of the day's events as told by their overly-excited daughter, Eddie finds himself squished on the couch between two snoring and squirmy beans with tousled brown hair.

Plus Meatloaf tucked in the crook of Steve's arm, rolling around trying to gain the attention of the only other creature remotely conscious.

More of Steve, Eddie, Joanie and their menagerie of cats HERE (I'm thinking of expanding this little AU out a little more for a bit)

[greenorangevioletgrass]

Paper Rings with TS-type reader and Bradley?

It started innocently enough. Bradley is babysitting his 5-year-old goddaughter Flora for the evening and has got himself wrapped around her little glitter-polished finger. He’s been through all the phases with her—the princess phase, the dinosaur phase, the Lego phase… although this one might be the toughest yet.

The little girl and the big man are much too preoccupied to hear you come in, sitting cross-legged on the living room floor, elbows resting on Bradley’s bespoke coffee table with colorful papers strewn around. You hear Flora’s adorable posh English accent from the hallway.

“So you just fold like this… and like so…”

“Wait, wait, wait. Slow down!”

“Come on, Uncle B. Don’t be a slowpoke.”

“I got big fingers and the foldings are really small. Hold up, Flo,” Bradley huffs.

You stifle a chuckle, but failing, and both of them turn to look at you.

“You’re back!” Flora gets up to her feet and runs up to give you a hug. “Did you write a lot of songs in the studio today?”

“Yeah, actually. What are you guys doing?” You stroke her hair a little before guiding her back to the living room.

“Flora’s teaching me origami,” Bradley smiles wryly, leaning up to you for a quick kiss.

“Aw?” You give him a peck on the cheek.

“She’s a very good teacher.”

Flora grins and gushes, “Show her what you made for her, Uncle B!”

“Oh! Uh…” he scratches the back of his neck sheepishly, then presents the pink little thing to you so delicately by holding it between his fingers.

“Bradley…”

“Sorry it’s a little wonky…”

“No! It’s perfect.” You extend your hand so he can put the wonky paper ring on your finger. “Thank you.”

“And now you’re engaged! Yay!” Flora pipes up chirpily.

You and Bradley turn to her in panic. “What? No!”

He reddens in the face. “I mean, not yet—” he looks at you and realizes this isn’t something you’ve discussed in the three short months you’ve been together... “Shit! Oh— don’t tell your parents I said that. In fact, don’t tell them anything, okay?”

Flora blinks at him, puzzled.

You suck in a slow breath. “Who wants ice cream?”

[love-and-monsters]

The Ship and the Alien Pt. 3

M alien X GN reader, 5,478 words

Next chapter, whoo! The chapter after this might take a bit, since my birthday is next week and I might be taking a little time off then. I hope you're all enjoying! Now, let's make planetfall and see what the centaurs have planned next. Read part one here and part two here.

Content warnings: Mentions of medical examinations and procedures.

The shuttle trembled under your feet as soon as you entered the atmosphere and you clutched the straps of your seat tighter. You didn’t feel particularly secure there, which was because you weren’t particularly secure. The seats had all been designed for centaur body plans, with a flat seat, almost like a bed, with straps for the legs to be secured with. They’d needed to change it around for you, which meant you were strapped on your back on a table that was slightly too small for you with too-loose straps. It was probably secure enough that you weren’t going to get tossed to the ground, but it didn’t make you feel particularly safe.

“Three talcs to landing,” your centaur said, the little translation device buzzing by your ear. You gritted your teeth. ‘Talcs’ were slightly longer than minutes, so it was going to be a little bit before you hit the planet. Your stomach was already swarming with nerves and the violent shaking, which was getting worse by the second, was not helping.

The ship groaned ominously and the shaking started to taper off. The engines groaned, the air pressure went wonky enough to make your ears pop and ache. You could feel the acceleration slowing in the swoop of your stomach and you swallowed back nausea.

Everything went dizzyingly still. Your head swam, your ears still throbbing from the air pressure. How was it these people had invented sustained space flight and were still struggling with air pressure?

The other centaurs around you didn’t seem particularly comfortable either, but they gradually started to walk around, clearing things up as the door in the back of the ship opened. Your centaur walked over and clicked the straps open. “Doing all right?”

“Define ‘all right,’” you muttered. Your centaur made a sympathetic noise.

“I don’t like the landing, either,” he said. “Can you stand?”

Mostly just to prove you could, you shoved yourself upright. It was a little dizzying, but you’d been doing better with things like ‘standing’ and ‘being functional,’ so it wasn’t awful. Your centaur made a pleased little trilling noise.

As soon as you felt stable enough to do so, you headed toward the door with your centaurs. It scrolled open and you squinted in the blinding light of the sun. It was the first time you’d seen actual sunlight in… in how long? You weren’t even sure how long you’d been on The Ship, now that you thought about it. It could be hundreds of years. It could be thousands.

You were shocked out of your melancholy thoughts by the sound of intense chattering, thumping, popping, and other noises you recognized as hallmarks of the centaur language. It was hard to see beyond the brilliance of the sun, but the noise alone indicated there was a crowd.

Your centaur guided you out into the light and your adjusting eyes revealed what you already thought was the case: there were a lot of centaurs. It wasn’t the biggest crowd you’d ever seen before, but there was a fair amount, and as soon as they caught sight of you, they surged forward. A group of centaurs wearing what looked like dark green uniforms waved the crowd back, some of them making almost aggressive gestures when members of the crowd tried to surge forward. You pulled back against your centaur automatically and his tail came forward to swing around you in a defensive gesture.

Right in the front of the crowd was an enormous centaur, the biggest you’d ever seen- not by a big margin, but still. But their horns were the biggest by a decent margin, stretching back from their head so far you wondered how they actually managed to get their head through their clothes. They had to be several inches long. They were holding two long, lacquered and brightly colored, sticks in their arms, though when you saw them step forward, you realized what the sticks were- they were crutches.

They made their way forward slowly, other people parting with respect. Even the crowd seemed to calm down, like they were embarrassed to be acting up in front of this well-respected centaur.

“Ma’am,” your centaur said. He drew himself up as soon as she started approaching. He recognized her, but you couldn’t be sure if he knew her because he knew her or if he just knew of her.

“Hello,” she said, barely looking at him before her gaze swapped to you. Her eyes, dark as the night, bored into you. You felt the urge to straighten your spine. “You’re the new species.”

“Uhhh.” You glanced at your centaur. “Y- yes, ma’am.”

She lowered herself further to stare directly into your face. You blinked back into her dark, fathomless eyes. “Good to meet you,” she said after a moment. “I’m Celebration.”

More of those weird centaur names. You give her yours. She nods slowly, then turns away, her tail curling behind her. “Come, then. We have much to discuss.”

You and your centaur followed her as she stepped through the crowd. They seem mostly mollified by her presence, although a smaller centaur, one you assumed was relatively young, abruptly lunged forward and made to grab at your hair.

The reaction was immediate. They snagged only the cloth of your sleeve, but it was startling enough that you yelped and instantly tried to pull away. Your centaur lunged, baring his teeth- they were bigger than you had realized, with the canines on the bottom wickedly sharp. The centaur that had grabbed you jumped back, making a noise that was either frightened or amused, and as soon as they lost their grip on you, some of the uniformed centaurs closed in, hauling them off. You clutched at your arm where the centaur had grabbed- you hadn’t been hurt, but the entire experience had been unsettling.

“Come on,” your centaur said, ducking his head close to you so he could speak in a quiet, soothing voice. “We have to go, okay?” You stumbled along as he ushered you along. He’d been quite close before, but after the attack, his body language is highly protective.

It wasn’t much longer before you managed to escape the crowd and stepped into what resembled a cross between a bus and a car. It was smaller than a bus, but it had the same sort of tall, rectangular structure. The steering wheel was also designed more the like yoke used to steer a ship, and was positioned more centrally than the steering wheel on the busses you knew.

There were no seats. Apparently centaurs could lock their legs, like horses, and they would then be latched onto the floor by shoe-like structures, so their feet didn’t slide when the bus moved. Naturally, there were no straps that fit you, so you just held onto your centaur as the bus rolled out.

The scenery that rolled by was fascinating. Admittedly, you weren’t a botanist, so you couldn’t really tell most of the plants apart, but there were flashes of animals that definitely looked different from creatures on Earth. There were tiny, scaled creatures that zipped and darted around in the sky almost like birds or miniature Pteranodons. Sometimes you caught sight of a strange, moose-like creature reaching up to pull the branches of a tree down toward its muzzle with a hooved hand. There was even a lean, foxlike creature that slipped out from the undergrowth in pursuit of a smaller creature that was difficult to see. It snapped out a clawed forelimb, puncturing the creature in a single motion, then skittered away once more. Apparently this wasn’t a common sight, because your centaur murmured with excitement when he spotted it.

“Volk,” he said when you asked what it was called. “They’re shy creatures, and they don’t come near civilization often. But they’re signs of good fortune when they do- they hunt almost exclusively pest animals.”

Good fortune. You could use a little of that. Hopefully the rumors about such a creature were right.

The ride wasn’t long, thankfully, and it ended at a massive building. The entire thing seemed to be constructed of wood and some clear substance that resembled glass, but wasn’t- it looked too matte and didn’t catch the light correctly. It was quite low to the ground, as were the few other buildings surrounding it, and used primarily rounded edges in its design as opposed to the hard, rectangular angles you were used to. Or, had been used to, before The Ship. Everything had been rounded there. All the better to fly through space with.

You winced. The Ship. The rest of The Ship, more accurately. There were other people out there. Not people you knew, but other people regardless. You needed to find them. If these people were supposed to be saving endangered species, then certainly they’d want to find more of your kind, right? It wasn’t like you could reproduce on your own. Without any other humans, you’d be… You’d be…

You didn’t want to dwell too much on that thought.

“Are you all right?” Your centaur nudged your side with one of his arms and you startled. You’d been walking through the building on autopilot, and completely missed when everyone else turned.

“Yes,” you said, hurrying back to his side. “I was just thinking.”

Celebration (it was weird to think of that as her name- sort of My Little Pony-esque) stopped in front of a room and gestured for you to go inside. You hesitated. The entire thing was about the same size as a walk-in closet, much deeper than it was wide. There looked to be about standing room for one centaur in there. “You want me to get in there?” you asked, apprehension making your voice pitch upward. “Why? What is it?”

“It’s a shower,” Celebration said, matter-of-factly. You gaped for a moment, then practically bolted inside. A shower! A real, actual, water-based shower and not the ‘cleaning gel’ that just kind of sloughed the dirt off your skin and made you feel sticky for ages afterward no matter how well you toweled off.

“Take off your clothes and press the button here to start it. It will run on a natural cycle, so there’s no need to touch anything else.” Celebration leaned back and started to talk with your centaur, but the translation bot had already drifted out of the chamber and before you could even tell it to come back, the door was sliding shut.

The enticement of a good shower didn’t let you dwell on that discomfort for long. You stripped, pressed the button on the wall and waited.

There was a humid mist, then nozzles inserted in the walls sprayed jet streams of water at you. It was a little more powerful than you’d expected it- the water made you stumble for a second before you could properly brace yourself against it. It also wasn’t just water- your nose picked up on a slight chemical scent to the air, and when you rubbed the water into your body, it foamed a little. After a couple of minutes, the soapy water petered out. A moment later, it was replaced with another jet of clear water, which rinsed you off. You felt great you’d been shaved before going into the pod. The only hair on your body was short, so it didn’t take much effort to wash.

Eventually, the water clicked off again. You had a couple of seconds to spit excess water out of your mouth before there was a low whirr. Fans kicked on and you threw your hands over your face as the air blasted you dry. It wasn’t comfortable, like being trapped in a hair dryer, but it did get you dry quite efficiently.

The shower went silent, except for one of the nozzles gently dripping water. It was quite humid in there, with condensation still clinging to the walls. You walked over to the door and pressed your hand to it. There was no knob. How were you supposed to open it?

You glanced around the room. There was only the little button that had started the shower, not any other ones that might open a door. Hell, the shower wasn’t even particularly well-lit. You could barely see the outline where the door was.

What the fuck. Had they trapped you in there?

Your first instinct was to pound on the door, but the instant your hand met the hard metal surface, you yelped in pain. It hurt. You hadn’t even hit it that hard- had the hibernation made your body weaker overall. You considered kicking the door instead, but you couldn’t imagine it would go any better, and it would be hard to walk on a broken foot.

Despite the little rectangle being quite warm, you started to shiver. You were alone. Trapped in this little space. What were you going to do? Why had you even gotten into this damn square in the first place? For all you knew, the shower had been a trick and within a moment the nozzles were going to spray you with an anesthetic and you were going to be dragged off to be dissected and analyzed and, if you were lucky, put into a zoo, and if not-

The door scrolled open and your little translator drone zipped in just ahead of your centaur. He blinked at you. “Are you all right? I head a bang-”

You slammed into his chest before you consciously realized you were running toward him. He didn’t stumble, but he swayed a little with the movement. One of his arms came up a little awkwardly to mimic the hold you had on him. Did centaurs even hug, usually? He was at least trying. That was nice.

“Are you all right?” The little clicking and thumping noises he made were almost louder than the translated voice the robot offered. “Did you get hurt?” He gently pried me off of him, or at least tried to. His arms seemed to be weaker than human arms, and his wrists lacked the same mobility, so he couldn’t get a good grip.

“I’m okay,” you said, letting go of him. He glanced you over, clearly trying to check if you weren’t really injured, and you abruptly became aware that you still weren’t wearing anything. And you had hugged him. Whoops. “I, uh. Couldn’t open it from the inside. I panicked a little.”

“They automatically release,” he said. “These ones are older, so the release is a bit slower.”

“Oh.” You felt ridiculous. You had panicked over an automatic door. In a desperate effort to save face, you changed the topic. “Where’s the other lady? Uhh. Celebration, that was her name, right?”

“Celebration?” There was a bit of a pause and your centaur’s face scrunched a little. Crap, was that not her name? Was forgetting a name extremely poor etiquette here? If it was, you were so fucked, you couldn’t remember anything ever.

“Oh,” your centaur said abruptly, like he’d finished whatever internal conversation he’d been having. “I see. Yes, Celebration, then. She’s gone ahead to speak to some of the other leadership. I’m supposed to bring you to them.”

You shuffled a little. “Do I get clothes before that?”

He laughed a little. “They only transported some of your clothes here, but I’m sure we can find something that’ll fit.”

He took you to a small room packed with transport boxes. You recognized them- they were made of the same space-safe material as everything else on The Ship. Your centaur popped one open and offered the box to you. It was packed tight with an assortment of clothes- mostly the same standard hospital-gown like stuff, but there was warm weather gear when you dug a little deeper, and even a few normal t-shirts and shorts. You chose that outfit, since the planet had been warm when you’d been outside. It was nice to have an upgrade from the hospital gown you’d been wearing around.

Once you were dressed, your centaur let you explore the rest of the boxes. There were boxes of spare parts, farming tools, medical supplies- most of the stuff you’d expected on the ship. There was only one noticeable absence.

“Where’s the seed crate?” There was a crate in each section of the ship that was more or less the pod version of a crate. It kept all the seeds in a carefully climate-controlled box to keep them preserved, so even if we landed on a mostly-deserted planet, we could still terraform it with plants we had. There had been a desire to do that for the animals of earth, as well, but there had been no good way for reviving them from DNA once we landed, and we couldn’t spare the space for all the live animals we would need to keep the species alive.

“It was kept up there.” Your centaur pointed toward the ceiling. Still in space, probably. “It was kept there for quarantine- We don’t want potentially invasive seeds hitting out planet. It’s more likely they’ll be harmless than harmful, but there have been records of only a few accidental seed releases destroying ecosystems on other planets.”

That was sensible enough. The seeds could last in stasis for a long time, and maybe they would eventually come across a planet that could support them.

Your centaur’s clothes beeped and he pulled a small, thick device from his pocket and glanced at it. “Oh.” He tapped his foreleg nervously against the ground. “Hm. It seems they’re ready for us.”

“Ready for us?” Your centaur turned toward the door, gesturing for you to follow him with his tail.

“The council. They want to talk to us. Well, to you.” He glanced back to me. “We don’t want to keep them waiting.”

“Right.” You followed him, almost tripping over your own legs in your anxiety. You were about to speak to some ‘council’ that was going to decide your fate. Maybe even the fate of humans in general, if they decided to abandon the ship. Your heart felt like it was pounding out of your chest and swelling to constrict your throat at the same time.

Your centaur led you through the building to a large doorway. He paused, giving one final glance back at you, before stepping forward and, without so much of a knock, opening the door.

Maybe it had been melodramatic, but you’d been expecting a large, shadowy room, maybe with large, court like furniture to complete the aesthetic. It was not that. In fact, the room was a little more like a sunroom combined with a nice meeting room. There was a lot of sunlight from the massive windows set in the roof, there were a few pillows, cushions, and other soft objects scattered around the room, and the centaurs milling around all seemed relaxed and cheerful. It wasn’t quite the intimidating scene you’d expected.

As you and your centaur entered the room, several people looked over at you. They expressions were nakedly curious. Celebration, the only centaur you recognized out of all of them, drew herself up and made loud thumping noises, pulsing them from deep in her chest. The other centaurs dropped what they were doing and gathered close. Your centaur guided you to the middle of the room, then backed away. You glanced at him, worried, and he gave you a reassuring look.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Celebration said. “I’m certain you have much that you’d like to ask us, but I think I will start with our most pressing concern first: How do we ensure your continued safety and health?”

You stayed silent for a moment before you realized the question was not rhetorical. “You’re asking me?”

“You would be the person who would have the best knowledge of such a thing,” Celebration said. “We would like for you to be able to express your needs here.”

“Then…” What did you need most? The answer came to your head with surprising ease. “Then we need to find the rest of the humans. The ones in the part of The Ship that wasn’t destroyed. That’s what will help me.”

There was a pause. It hadn’t been the answer they were expecting, you were sure of that. Celebration turned to murmur something to the centaur next to her, who pricked their ears in interest. The translator didn’t pick any of that conversation up. You turned to see your centaur’s gaze. He gazed back encouragingly.

Celebration turned back to you. “The search for the remainder of your ship is already underway. It is highly recommended that you do not participate in it, however. Your status as the only member of your species currently living means you are in a delicate position. We cannot allow the risking of your life for this- and scrolling for lost ships in unknown space is always dangerous. That is not a risk we are willing to take.”

“Not a risk you’re willing to take?” The words practically exploded out of you. “It’s my life! It’s a risk I’m willing to take! What’s even the point of protecting me as the last of my species if I can’t get to the other members? I’ll just die out in, I don’t know, forty to fifty years. Without other humans, there’s no point.”

“You life is more valuable than you give yourself credit for. Even as an endling, you still retain great knowledge of your own species, of your customs, of things that are unique to you. Even if we never find the rest of your species, you are still valuable and we do not want you to die.” You squeezed your eyes shut, trying to block the tears that were welling up. “Of course, we understand you want to seek out members of your own species. I am sorry that you cannot do that. But it is dangerous and you are too valuable to do so. We will do our best to bring them to you as soon as possible. We promise.”

You gritted your teeth, stiffened your shoulders, and stared down at the ground. You didn’t speak. You were going to cry if you spoke. And you did not want to cry in front of all these strange aliens.

Celebration shifted her weight between all her legs. Clearly this was making her uncomfortable. Good. You felt some bitter satisfaction. “We would like your input on what would make you feel more comfortable while you’re staying here.” Her voice was gentle. You clenched your fists.

“I told you already what would make me more comfortable.” Your voice was tight with your efforts not to cry. “I don’t know of anything else.”

There was long pause. Celebration rumbled quietly, though her expression was unreadable and there was no translation to help you out. She turned and spoke quietly to the centaur next to her. Finally, she turned back to you. Her voice was softer than you expected it to be. “Very well. We will continue our efforts to bring your people back to you. In the meantime, you’ll be staying here. We will provide you with room and food until we can set up your own home for you to stay in. Materials will be translated and provided to you for you to learn about our culture and way of life in this community. You may ask us for anything you wish, as long as it makes your stay more comfortable. We will be working to make your area as comfortable for a human as we can.”

You nodded once. Your eyes still had that heavy, overly full feeling, like you were going to cry at any moment and you didn’t want to. You didn’t want to cry in front of them.

There was a long pause, like maybe she was waiting for you to add something else. She rumbled softly when you didn’t say anything else. “Grove-peace.” You blinking in confusion before your centaur stepped forward, head lowered. “You will continue seeing to the human’s needs, yes?” He lowered his head and bent his forelimbs in a show of submission. “Please, do so.”

Your centaur trotted over to you, placing his body between yours and the other centaurs of the counsel. But he didn’t push you along like you thought he was going to. Instead, he stood by your side, like he was waiting for your signal. A few of the other centaurs murmured and rumbled to each other, maybe in irritation, but despite his ears folding back against his head, he didn’t move. Finally, you gathered yourself enough to move forward and waved at him to do the same.

He trotted ahead of you as you left the room, taking the lead to guide you along the half to what was presumably your room. He was patient even when you came to a stop a few times to calm your wobbly breathing.

“I’m sorry,” he said to you as you headed deeper into the facility. You bit your lower lip as the stinging tears welled up again. You didn’t want to cry. “I… I wish there was something I could do. You’re right, it’s not fair that you can’t go with them to look for your people. I know why you can’t but…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “I’m sorry.”

You didn’t say anything, and he didn’t try to start a conversation after that. He just kept his gaze locked forward as he walked.

Eventually, you came across a room. It was prettier than the rooms you’d been allowed on the spaceships you’d been on. The walls were made of a dark brown wood, with tiny splashes of green and deep blue. The bed was clearly designed for a centaur, and presumably an injured one at that, since it was larger than you needed. But you didn’t mind. You crawled into it, barely sparing a glance at the other parts of the room. You wanted to sleep.

Your centaur, Grove-peace, you needed to remember that, padded across the room, silently inspecting things. You could hear him shift a few things around, examining things from all angles. Half of you wanted to tell him to just get out, to leave you alone. The other half wanted him to stay, almost desperately so. Please, I don’t want to be alone, I don’t want to, why am I alone, how can I not be alone ever again-

You curled further into your bed, burying your face in the blankets and squeezing them to your chest like a stuffed animal. Tears dripped down your face, smearing against the cloth you’d buried yourself in. It was smothering but you couldn’t bring yourself to leave.

It took some time, but eventually, you fell asleep. It wasn’t a restful sleep- in fact, you felt far more exhausted when you woke up than when you fell asleep. Your mouth was dry and sticky and a heavy lump of nausea swirled in your stomach. You unburied yourself, the cool air pleasant against your overheated skin. The room, small enough that you could see all corners of it from the bed, was empty. You couldn’t tell if you were okay with that or not.

There was a slightly-ajar door across the room leading to what you assumed was a bathroom. It was probably a good idea to go there. Relieve yourself, get a drink of water, even if you had to slurp it up straight from the tap. But you couldn’t get your body to move. Even relieving physical needs wasn’t enough motivation to get out of bed. Maybe you could stay in there forever.

Time was like a thick sludge- it slipped by slowly, in clumps, indeterminate in length. There was no clock in the room. Or maybe there was, but it just wasn’t recognizable as one. You shivered under the covers of the bed. Was the room cold, or was it just you? Your fingertips felt oddly tingly and numb.

There was a hiss-click noise and the door opened. Grove-peace trotted inside. His expression was weary, though when he saw you staring at him, he perked up a little. He was carrying a bag looped over one of his arms. “There you are. Did you just wake up?” He trotted closer and locked his legs next to the bed. “I brought you food- sorry, the meeting went on and I had to go back for a little while. They’re looking for a place to get you set up with a home- a real home, not just staying here. They’ll probably be asking after you for your preferences in a few days, seeing if you want to live close to a town or a city or more on your own, but I said they should let your rest for now.” He took in another breath, to continue, then let it out in a sigh. “Ah, sorry. I’m rambling, and it’s late. You must be starving.” He offered you a few of the dried food rations. “I got you some options.”

You picked up one of the fruit and nut bars. It wasn’t like a granola bar- it was more like a slurry of fruit and nuts mixed together and dried into a jerky-like stick. Very chewy, but sweeter than anything of the other dried options you had. Barely even bothering to sit up, you unwrapped half the bar and crammed it into your mouth.

It was weird- it didn’t taste any different than normal. It wasn’t stale (if such things could go stale, since they’d never been fresh in the first place) and it wasn’t rotten (again, if such things could become rotten). But it tasted like ash on your tongue and swallowing it was like swallowing pebbles. Your throat convulsed around it like your body wasn’t sure whether to accept or reject it.

Grove-peace watched you, ears drawn back. “Are you all right?” His voice pitched anxiously and he fumbled through the bag. “Here, have some water.”

You swallowed a few sips. The water didn’t taste bad, either, maybe a bit too hard. But it was still an effort just to get it through your mouth and throat. Grove-peace’s ears ticked anxiously. He plied you with a few more bites of food, but you didn’t eat. You couldn’t bring yourself to.

He ran a hand along your head. There was a tremble to his fingers. “I’m going to go get a doctor, okay? I’ll be right back.”

His footsteps headed toward the door. They were significantly faster than when he’d come in.

As it turns out, ‘get a doctor’ had been sort of an understatement. Because he ended up getting several doctors. And there were a couple others milling around outside the room, like they were just waiting for a chance to come in and inspect you as well. The poking and prodding wasn’t significantly invasive, and you couldn’t bring yourself to resist. You let them roll you over, scan you with machines, compare all of them against whatever data they’d gathered from The Ship. Eventually, they came to some kind of conclusion and most of them filtered out of the room, probably to go fight over who got to be the primary care doctor for the fun new species. Grove-peace and another doctor stayed in the room and spoke quietly to one another for a moment. Grove-peace seemed upset, but you couldn’t make out what they were saying. The translator hovered next to you, apparently uninterested in helping you out. Not that it really mattered what they were saying. Know it or not, you clearly didn’t have much of a say in what happened to you.

The last doctor left after a while of a quasi-arguing with Grove-peace. Once the door closed, he swayed on his paws, scrubbing at his face with a wrist. He looked tired, now that I was getting a proper glance at him. His legs wobbled and he had to quickly correct his posture before he fell over a couple of times. It was a bit late, wasn’t it? How long had the doctors been here for? You hadn’t been really paying attention.

“You should go home,” you said from under the pile of blankets you were housed in. He started, glancing over his shoulder at you. Maybe he hadn’t been expecting you to be awake.

He trotted over to the bedside and folded his legs in a kneel. “I think I’ll stay for a bit longer,” he said. “If you don’t mind.” He looked at you, waiting for your answer. Huh. He was really asking. If you didn’t want him to stay, he wouldn’t.

“No,” you said, letting your eyes drift shut. “You can stay.”

The room was a little more peaceful with him around, after all.

Part 4 here

[abiiors]

Edinburgh

A/N: Anon who's sent me two more requests, if you're reading this one, I'm so sorry I'll get to that one I promise 😭

Matty Healy x Reader

‘How am I supposed to live, laugh, love in these conditions,’ you groan into the pillow. 

‘Come on,’ he laughs, ‘you’ve got a broken leg, baby. It’s not the end of the world.’

You shoot a glare his way at that. ‘We were supposed to be in Edinburgh this weekend. I was supposed to be walking down cobblestone streets.’

‘Well, you’re the one who decided to “rescue” that cat from our roof.’

‘Because I thought it was stuck!’ you defend vehemently. 

‘You just jumped at the opportunity to kidnap another cat.’

There’s no point denying it. Your attempts at getting as many cats as you can aren’t exactly subtle to him. So you just huff in silence and mutter a few words about being bullied. 

‘Besides, Edinburgh will still be here in three weeks when your cast is off.’

This is a childish grudge, you know it is, yet you cannot help but pout at him, ‘well, what if it isn’t!’

‘Then I will personally, with my own two hands, build you a new Edinburgh. Brick by brick, I promise.

‘Melodramatic,’ you laugh; finally crack a smile for the first time that day and his whole face softens at that. 

He scoots closer to you on the bed and takes your broken leg in his lap. It’s covered in a very cheerful-looking yellow cast which makes you hate it even more. He’s also taken to doodling on it whenever he feels like it. So far it has—a cat, a very wonky-looking box with 1975 written inside (courtesy of George), “get well soon” messages + signatures from all four of them, and what looks like a flower? (it could honestly also be a sunny-side up). 

He grabs the marker he keeps on the bedside table for this explicit purpose and starts drawing a few lines. You strain your neck to see what it is and soon it becomes clear that he’s trying to draw the Balmoral Clock. 

‘The artistry, mmm, outstanding!’ you giggle. 

‘Stop teasing me, I am trying to bring Edinburgh to you.’ 

You lean back again and let him continue. His lips are parted in concentration and his curls keep fighting to escape the headband he’s put them in. One, in particular, manages to escape and falls on his eyebrow in just the most spectacular way possible. It feels like a scene from the movie, this. The bed is messy in just the right way and the sunlight that streams through the window creates the perfect soft halo around him. 

‘What are you thinking,’ he asks without looking up.

‘That I should auction that cast on eBay once they take it off,’ you snicker as he gives you an unimpressed look and goes back to putting the final touches on his magnum opus. He even goes as far as drawing a very elaborate M that’s surrounded by tonnes of little hearts.

Then he bends down to place a small kiss on your cast, just above your broken ankle. 

‘Hmm, Healy, is there a kink I should know about?’ you tease.

‘You twat,’ he chucks the marker cap at you in response, ‘I’m never doing anything nice for you again.’

‘Aww no! Okay, I will frame the cast once it’s off, I promise.’ 

‘You better,’ he says as he crawls back next to you and presses his lips onto yours. 

[coldresolve]

Moneymakers, pt.xl // Sway

Previous / AO3 / Wattpad / Masterlist / Next

“I’d like you to walk to the kitchen. We’ll get some food in you, then walk back, and that’s it for today.”

On the bedside table, last night’s dinner sits untouched still. The low woosh of the wind outside, the path Conrad’s mind has been wandering along since he woke up, ebbs and flows like tides on a shore. He can feel his heart beating against the tight bandages on his arm, the warmth that radiates from there, whatever heat-inducing process happens to wounds in the first few days of healing. He wishes he wasn’t becoming so familiar with that warmth.

He doesn’t feel like speaking, but he does it anyway, eventually. “I can’t,” he says.

“Yes, you can,” Davin counters, matter-of-fact. Conrad looks at him. Arms crossed in front of his chest, standing in the middle of the room, stray hairs tucked behind his ears. No trace of last night on him. “It won’t be pleasant, but you can walk.”

Conrad looks back down at his hands, scraping his fingernails for dirt that isn’t there. “Why?”

Davin lets out a breath. “Take your pick at the risks associated with being sedentary after something like this,” he mutters. “Blood clots, infection, sores, prolonged healing. Pneumonia, ironically enough. I pushed it by not having you do this yesterday, but I could barely even get pills in you then, so.” He shrugs a shoulder. “C’mon, one step at a time. Sit on the edge of the bed – we both know you can get that far, at least.”

Conrad glances at Davin’s feet. Takes a deep breath and slowly untangles himself from the duvet. His movements feel somewhat sluggish, almost dream-like in a way. Like moving underwater, he’s never really sure where he’ll end up.

Shivering in the cold air, he scoots across the mattress, first letting his good leg hit the floor. He puts both hands around his knee and lifts the bad one over the edge as well. The sole of his foot against the hardwood feels normal enough, but the numbness in half of his lower leg is still something he’s getting used to. The way he can’t tell whether those muscles are moving without looking at them directly, and even then, it’s hard to tell.

“Do you need help standing up?”

“No,” Conrad bites out, a little too quickly. He takes a breath to compose himself. “I just - I’d like it if you didn’t touch me.”

Davin purses his lips. “That’s fine.” He still uncoils his crossed arms, though, and Conrad finds himself freezing. But all Davin does is pull the desk chair over to him, the back facing him, before he stands back again. “You can use that for support, then.”

Conrad swallows, nodding.

When he has finally gathered the courage to push himself off the bed, one hand wrapped around the top of the backrest, he rises steadily, leaning all his weight on his good leg, careful not to accidentally use the muscles in his thigh. His balance feels wonky, which is probably just another effect of the pills, but as long as he’s going slowly, he can manage it.

There’s a point, though, before his bad leg has straightened out fully, where the pain starts to get bad again, where it starts to override the pills. That sharp, piercing kind of pain in the back of his thigh that makes his whole body tense up. He winces, gritting his teeth. Pauses there for a moment, taking deep, slow breaths, praying it’ll die down. Which it does – eventually.

He knew it’d hurt. That’s why it feels strangely foolish to mourn it now, to agonize over the inability just because it’s starting to show itself, when he already knew, and has known for days, that it wouldn’t be the same. But he can’t straighten his leg out all the way without it feeling like his thigh is splitting apart, and that fact makes his throat close up, make his eyes prick with building tears.

Davin watches him, hands in his pockets. “Try to take a step,” he suggests.

Conrad’s grip on the backrest is hard enough for his knuckles to turn pale. He shakes his head.

“You’re not going to pull the stitches just by walking,” Davin says gently. “It won’t do any damage.”

Doesn’t mean it won’t be a source of agony.

Sniffing, Conrad carefully puts the foot of his bad leg slightly forward. He has to take several deep breaths before he grits his teeth and limps, a fraction of a step, leaning as much weight as he can on the chair.

The pain is enough for him to make a low whine this time, tensing up again, one hand letting go of the chair just so he can dig his fingers into his thigh in a vain attempt to alleviate the wave. His head is bowed as he waits for it to pass, breathing through his nose. Just this small effort, and he’s already starting to sweat.

Frustratedly wiping tears from his eyes with the back of his hand, he lets out a shaky breath. “H-how long is it, is it going to be like this?”

“A few months,” Davin mutters. “Nerves heal slower than bones. But the pain should subside over time.”

New tears threaten to build at that, and Conrad grits his teeth against them, trying to will away the tightness in his throat. “I’m not, I’m not going to make it to the kitchen.”

Davin meets his eyes. “You are,” he says evenly.

Maybe it’s just Davin’s misguided attempt to sound encouraging, but his tone is ambiguous enough that Conrad can’t tell if an or else is implied or not. Given the wider circumstances, it’s probably best to assume that it is.

So he tries to wash away his despair with apathy, takes a few more breaths to steel himself. And he forces his broken body to take another small step.

It sends him reeling again. Makes his back seize up, makes his hands tremble. Threatens to make him spiral, make him sob at the thought of months of this lying ahead of him. Apathy, apathy, apathy, like a prayer. But dissociating yourself from your body when you’re in pain is so, so difficult. It just drags you right back in, commands you to feel every second of it.

He manages to drag the chair forward across the floor, and he limps again, a sound rising from his chest. Folds forward. There’s no point in trying to curb the flow of tears anymore; maybe it’s better to just let them fall. The pain shoots up into his back, like a live wire connecting the cut to his lower spine, lighting up everything in between. Months of this. Months.

Eventually, he reaches the table – just about six feet from the bed – and lets out an involuntary breath of relief. It’s short-lived, though. All Davin does is step further back, giving him space to walk through the door.

How long to the kitchen from here? The guest bedroom is the first down the short hallway, and the dining table is right in front of the entrance to it. Fifteen, twenty yards?

It feels like miles.

Conrad’s hands are clammy. He grits his teeth and pushes on, switching the chair for the table, and then balancing with his hand on the wall. Steps that only get him a foot or so forward, pauses in between as the waves of pain grow and subside. He starts to find a method – how to position his leg and foot, how quickly to limp forward, how long to wait until he can take the next step, how to balance his weight through it all – that makes it more bearable, even if progress is slow, even if his good leg tires from having to bear the brunt of his weight for so long. It becomes more of a rhythm, and less of a constant oscillation between stopping and starting.

The light sound of Davin’s footsteps following along next to him starts to strike him as a form of mockery in and of itself. He wonders if Davin is aware of it, too - how his ease becomes Conrad’s mirror image, a hyperbolic contrast that just serves to drive the point home further. Last night, Renee called him a cripple. Now, Davin nonchalantly walking next to him actually makes him feel like one.

It feels like hours have passed before he reaches the end of the hallway, but a more reasonable guess would probably be five minutes or so. The first thing he sees is the wooden panel on the window, blocking the light at the end of the dining table. A plastic sheet covers it, secured with duct tape all around the edges, probably to keep the air from slipping through the cracks between the panel and the window frame. There’s a pile of glass outside, on the corner of the wooden deck, swept to the side but not removed entirely.

The second thing he sees are the plates. A bag of toast bread, butter, cheese, ham. A skillet with scrambled eggs and bacon, and a handful of those little sausages. Cartons of orange juice and milk.

The little display almost distracts from the stains.

Those are what make him halt in place. On the table about a third of the way down, and on the oak floor directly beneath it.

Somewhat breathless, hand still balancing on the wall, Conrad feels himself slipping the moment he sees them, almost like a veil comes down in front of his face. The way the eyes are both focused and unfocused, seeing clearly but only processing certain aspects. The physical, completely disconnected from memory. From anything, really.

“Do you want coffee?” Davin asks.

Conrad is lightheaded. His gaze trails to the other, somewhat confused, and he forms an n on his tongue before he realizes he can’t speak. So he shakes his head instead.

Davin nods, but still heads for the kettle.

The eyes return to the stains. They have different colors. The one on the table is rust-colored, but more ruddy than orange, unlike actual rust. Its edges are sharp and defined, the middle parts somewhat paler. You can see the streaks along the table’s edge, the trails where it ran down the side. The way it spikes out along the grain of the wood. The stains on the floor are a dark greenish grey, almost black looking, more noticeable. Some are as small as single round drops, but some are larger, more abstract shapes.

“Sit down,” says Davin’s voice, somewhere behind the kitchen island.

The limp from wall to table – the seat farthest from the stains – makes Conrad shift between being there for the pain, and being gone whenever the wave passes. He has a brief moment of gratitude once he finally sits down, but then he disappears again, almost imperceptibly, like a small light in the distance silently turning off.

It's habit. Physical habit. The body breathes. The stains are to its left, so it looks to the right. The kettle grumbles. Time sort of slips, like water through a sieve, leaving no trace of itself behind.

Davin sits down across from it, mug steaming from his hand. Pauses, looking at it with a sincere kind of expression. “Eat, Conrad.”

The body looks at the food on the table, unmoving.

Davin waits, but nothing happens. He nods in understanding. “You’re a bit far away, hm? Do you want me to help you out?”

The body looks to the floor on its right. Manages to shake its head slightly. In the next moments, it mostly forgets why it did that.  

“You haven’t eaten a full meal in three days. No offense, but you don’t exactly have the reserves to…”

The body breathes. That’s what bodies do. They breathe, and they stare at things. They stare at the floor to their right. They don’t hear the words of the men who maimed them. They drift, somewhere in open space, disconnected and s—

A loud thud shakes the cutlery and makes the plates clink, and Conrad flinches, shying backwards in his seat.

Davin’s fist is still on the table. “Sorry,” he says with an apologetic smirk, “but you’re still going to have to put some effort in.”

Conrad’s good leg begins to bounce beneath the table. “I’m n-… I s-sh-…”

“Put something on your plate.”

The room still tilts slightly. Conrad is grimacing as he leans forward, reaching across the table to grab the bag of toast. His movements feel clunky, inelegant. He doesn’t bother finessing with the butter knife, just skips butter altogether. A slice of cheese. The thought of eating meat right now makes him even more nauseous.

There’s a crease on Davin’s forehead, almost like concern. “One slice of white bread isn’t a full meal,” he mutters.

Conrad grimaces, teeth gritted. “Just, just let me start with this, okay?”

Davin raises a brow, holding up a palm, as if conceding. He picks up his phone and leans back, slow scrolling only interrupted by the occasional sip of his coffee.

Conrad eats, slowly. One small bite at a time, hardly more than nibbling, but he’ll get nauseous if he bites off more than that. The bread has a texture, but it tastes like nothing, like air. The cheese tastes like salt, and it clings to his teeth. As he chews, he looks at the floor to his right again. He tries to will his eyes to become unfocused, tries to push himself away.

There’s a sound behind him. A door that opens, footsteps he recognizes, although they’re heavier than usual. The sound of something being dragged along the floor.

Davin looks up from his phone, mug halfway to his lips. “Rise and shine,” he remarks dryly.

Renee’s only response is a low grunt. His short hair is ruffled on one side of his head, some parts pressed down tightly, others sticking straight out. Dark circles under eyes that still have a bit of that glazed-over look to them that they had last night, right at the end. He’s shirtless, wearing the same jeans, nearly-faded bruises mingling with faint pressure lines from his bedding mingling with his tattoos. Fresh scratch marks up and down both his forearms. He’s holding his jacket by the collar, sleeves trailing behind him. Doesn’t pause at the table, doesn’t even spare a glance in passing, just grunts and lazily trots through the kitchen to the sliding door in the living room area. He’s going out to smoke.

As Conrad continues to eat, he finally slides again. It’s better to drift. There’s no anxiety when you’re drifting, no despair, no thought spirals to run circles in, which get tighter and tighter the further down you go. There’s barely even a ‘you’ to begin with.

The whole world is foggy, like a bathroom mirror after a warm shower. The body barely notices the men around it, shuffling along through their own noons, in their own ways. It pays no mind, nibbling little by little, with automated movements. Bite, chew, swallow. The kettle grumbles again. The wind outside comes and goes, picks up and dies down. Voices take turns, and then quiet again. A mug being placed on wood, just out the corner of its eyes.

A chair scrapes loudly across the floor, and Conrad tenses up again, eyes drawn to the noise. Renee dumps down at the end of the table, still wearing his jacket over a bare chest, and rests his elbows, one hand rubbing across his forehead while the other flips the phone in its hand upright. His eyes are hooded, face blank with exhaustion.

He doesn’t usually sit down with them.

Davin doesn’t bat an eye at it, but Conrad has to swallow down his unease. Keeps his eyes fixed on the plate in front of him.

Nothing happens, at first. Renee just sits there, lazily scrolling through his phone. Eventually, though, he takes a deep breath through his nose, and lets his phone topple in his hand, until it falls screen down to the table.

“Listen, ah…” He clears his throat. “Serious question. My memory is a bit…” He pokes his temple, chuckling softly, but it falters just a little too quickly. “Did either of you – last night, I mean – did either of you two see me take some pills?” He winces at the last word.

Davin purses his lips for a moment, looking into his coffee. “No,” he says.

Conrad shakes his head a bit, although he doesn’t meet Renee’s eyes.

Renee nods, pensively scratching at the table, jaw working “It’s just… When I woke up today, it felt… This just doesn’t feel like a normal comedown, it feels like…”

“Diazepam,” Davin says.

Renee is halfway through nodding again when he hesitates, looking at Davin like he has to do a double take. “How…?”

Davin sets his mug down, fingers tracing the rim of the ceramic. Meets Renee’s eyes. “It’s what you give to someone who’s overdosing on cocaine.”

Conrad can’t put to words the expression on Renee’s face then. His mouth opens slightly, and what little color was in his tired face seems to drain, gaze becoming sharper, somehow. “Did—” he says, but he stumbles over himself, has to take a breath, blinking rapidly. “Davin, did you give me…?”

“You were feverish. You were having seizures. Conrad can attest to that last one.”

Renee stares for a long time, unmoving apart from his breathing, which is steadily picking up its pace. “You gave me valium,” he whispers eventually.

Davin nods calmly. “I had to.”

Letting out a breath, Renee’s face contorts in something like a smile, but it’s joyless, just exasperated. “Are you insane?” And he stands up, walks a few steps away from them, rubbing his face. Stops in his tracks, turning around. When he holds up a hand at Davin, Conrad can see the small tremors in his fingers. His voice too, sounds unsteady, as if he’s trying to keep the pieces of a crumbling composure together. Teeth clenched so hard, the muscles of his jaw protrude. “Why the fuck would you give me that? Huh? Why?”

The shift in Renee, and how quickly it’s taken place – the anger that has overpowered whatever drowsiness he felt, and now threatens to breach the surface – makes Conrad grab the seat of his chair, leaning away, almost bracing.

Davin’s face is expressionless, but his eyes, too, keenly follow Renee’s movements. “You were overdosing,” he repeats.

Renee’s teeth are gritted so hard, the muscles of his jaw noticeably protrude. He’s breathing hard now. “You should’ve given me something else.

Davin smirks. “I didn’t have anyth—”

Renee kicks a chair hard enough to send it tumbling across the floor, hitting the wall with a loud thud. The noise is barely enough to cover Conrad’s startled yelp, as Renee begins to scream. “You should’ve let me fucking overdose, then!” A sharp inhale. “Two years! Two fucking years!” He paces a few steps backwards, hands folded on the back of his head, breathing through a wince. He looks genuinely pained, in a way Conrad has never seen before. Renee looks on the verge of breaking into tears. “And you knew,” he hisses, voice breaking. “Don’t even try to pretend you didn’t, you’ve done your fucking research, right? You knew!”

Davin looks at him for a long time, as if weighing his options, before he finally nods. “I did.”

Renee shuts his eyes at that, turning his back again. He lays his palms flat against the counter of the kitchen island, leaning his weight on it, rocking slightly. Lets out a low growl. One hand moves, and it’s hard to see while his back is turned, but from the angle of his elbow, it looks like he’s rubbing his chest right above his heart. He gives a sharp shake of his head, tilts his head back, letting out another sound, a hah. “I was clean,” he croaks, “I was fucking clean…”

Conrad sees the way Davin pauses then, the way his head slowly tilts to the side, hair falling forward, dark eyes still following Renee’s movements intently. “Were you?” he asks.

The ragged breaths veer into a strange, distressed sort of laughter. Renee turns his head, hand still pressed against his chest. His eyes are wide. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

Davin just raises a brow.

Another semi-laugh turns into a sneer, Renee baring his teeth. He drops his hand, balling it into a fist by his side as he steps closer. “Nah, tell me. Tell me what the fuck you just said.”

Davin snorts softly. “You get pretty defensive about this topic, don’t you? But you don’t have to posture. I know.” And then he picks his coffee back up, turning his attention back to his phone. Relaxed, as if Renee isn’t shaking with rage five feet away, staring daggers at him.

It's enough to make Conrad mope.

Renee starts laughing again. That sick, vaguely desperate laugh, face contorted in more of a grimace than a grin. He nods to himself, pacing a few steps toward the living room, before he turns around and walks back toward the hallway, breathing quick.

Conrad should’ve seen it coming, but it still makes him flinch when Renee lets out a wordless shout and punches the wall. Fragments of plaster coated in white paint rain to the floor, grey and white dust drifting down in its wake.

A moment later, the door to Renee’s room slams shut.

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