#modern inheritance asks

[modern-inheritance]

Woe, question be upon ye! How do the mic characters uhhhh umm uugh how do they sneeze. Thats it thats the question.

Heheheh I actually did a poll on this once.

For one, Angela never sneezes. She's never sneezed in her life.

Arya either sneezes in that sorta closed off 'HhchnCH' noise, or, and I'm blatantly modeling this after myself, slams her head forward when she sneezes, nearly bending 90º. Yes, she's hit her head on desks multiple times. No, you should not extrapolate anything about my own experiences with desks from this.

Eragon sneezes like a Farmer. Loud, can be heard for miles. But mostly out of his mouth.

Brom won the poll for most impressive sneeze. Fus Ro Dah Dad Sneeze.

Murtagh goes into his hands. Very dainty. 'ChnK. Bless meh.'

Nasuada also does Fus Ro Dah sneezes but only does so incredibly rarely.

Saphira? Fire sneeze. Every time. If Eragon sneezes, duck, because Saphira's not far behind, and vice versa. It's something all Dragon Rider pairs do.

Thorn does big ol dragon sneezes, but he uses his tongue to stop any fire from coming out his mouth. It chimney's up his noise instead.

Firnen is um...not all that adept at sneezing properly. He sticks his tongue out, typically accidently bites it at the same time, fire squirts out the sides of his mouth, his nose, his ears pop, it's just....it's so undignified.

Islanzadi would have you believe she has never sneezed in her life. Until Arya points out the dent on her work desk and loudly proclaims 'HA! SO I GOT IT FROM YOU!'

Glen is the only person around that sneezes normally. Except his arm can fall off by accident.

THANK YOU FOR THE QUESTION! :D

[modern-inheritance]

Reblogging via the MIC account because I don’t use the WeirdPonytail one for writing anymore.

Uh ha. Hahaha. Uuuh. Lemme go take a look. We um…Tonz you KNOW what I usually write.

Oh god yeah no I’m not linking that to a reblog chain.

Uuuh…

Here! I’m counting dialogue between quotation marks, no matter how many sentences between them, as a single sentence as it is technically a ‘single thought’ when I write them.

This is a part of a multi-section series I’m doing for Brom being lowkey kidnapped by his friends and forced to sober up and go through alcohol withdrawal because he got just a leeeeeetle close to a cliff edge while yelling about how much of a failure he was. Everyone comes to have their moment with him and try to help him through it, but around the end Arya comes to him for help with a problem of her own.

Glassy, not all there, flickering in minuscule, panicked adjustments to stay locked on as shadows flitted across them, but her eyes were staring into his. A sliver of a gap in the Recall’s walls.

“Good. Good!” Brom ran his thumbs along her cheekbones, trying to push through the touch another link to the physical, present world. The change in placement should have drawn her attention, furthered the anchor he was building through his voice. “And if I’m here, you can’t be there. Remember what we said about my ugly mug being in your hallucinations?”

Iunno just usual MIC stuff. @cylieria-the-dragonrider @shows-up-naked-covered-in-bees @archangelsunited y’all’s up!

Last Six Sentences

Share the last six sentences you’ve written. Like this!

Thank you @sinvulkt for the tag! The past few days I was mostly editing, so I have no idea if these are really my last six sentences. Also, I like being ~mysterious~ so no translation for you here, haha. If you want to use any kind of translator: all personal pronouns should be he/him. (Hungarian has no grammatical gender, translators can't really deal with that.)

Last six sentences from an Inheritance Cycle story

– Újra és újra rácsodálkozom, milyen sok közös vonásod van apáddal.

Felfordult a gyomra. Utálta, hogy minden alkalommal meglepte, utálta, hogy csak azt nem tudta, mikor tudja oldalba bökni őt ezekkel a derült égből érkező hasonlítgatásokkal.

Utálta, ha megsimogatta, még jobban, hogy ez jólesett neki, hogy oda kellett telepednie a lábához. Azt akarta, hogy mindenki eltakarodjon végre, és úgy kezelje őt, ahogy szokta. A szidása legalább őszinte volt.

Tagging without any pressure: @kiir-bee, @weirdponytail, @andreacsenge, @oldfritz, @umunschaas, @3stike (except you, you must feel the pressure), @lordmorzan

[willowbilly]

Hi!

Do you have any recommendations for resources on Inuit names in the mid 19th century? I’m working on a post-canon The Terror fic and I want names for OCs.

Ii, sure thing! I don't know of any Inuit name databases in modern standardized orthography, specifically, but I have some resources!

Most important is to keep dialect, orthography, and the kinship system in mind. If your OCs are Ugřuliŋmiut, Qikiqtarmiut, Natchiliŋmiut, or any other speakers of what may possibly be termed a Nattilingmiutut (sub)dialect, I'd suggest hewing toward phonetically modern Natchiliŋmiutut in the way that I think the book ᐊᒡᓗ | Aglu | The Breathing Hole does for its Inuktut starting from Act One in 1535 onward, resulting in intervocalic [h] rather than [s] and so on, as this way one can more closely rely on available resources that reflect today's modern language. If one uses modern standardized orthography, then try to standardize all the names alike into the same qaliujaaqpait, for example by representing the voiced velar nasal [ŋ] phoneme with either /ŋ/ or /ng/ throughout all names; otherwise, keep period-typical spelling for all the names, and note that you may need to “de-update” names from modern standardized spelling so that they meet the same nonstandard standard. “Aglukkaq” is spelled in modern standardized orthography; “Aglooka” is in period-typical nonstandardized orthography. Modern standardized orthographies for Inuit languages are highly phonemic, meaning that the spelling systems' graphemes more consistently correlate to the languages' phonemes, and usage of modern standardized orthography in the historical setting could imply that the POV character is better able to discern how the language actually sounds. Kinship terms would be usual in place of speaking a relative's name, and people adopted into a community would be given kinship terms or, with a name, the kinship terms that correspond to their namesake. Inuit names are all functionally unisex!

Inuit naming is a brief article by Peter Irniq. He mentions the -nnuaq and -nnuałłuk postbases as the Natchiliŋmiutut ones preferred over other Canadian dialects' -kuluk.

Janet Tamalik McGrath's master's thesis Conversations with Nattilingmiut elders on conflict and change: Naalattiarahuarnira touches on the kinship system's traditional usage.

I highly recommend going through The Netsilik Eskimos: Social Life and Spiritual Culture by Knud Rasmussen, wherein his census record as many names as he could in his own orthography, influenced by his fluency in Kalaallisut. The name “Orpingalik” from his orthography may be modernized to “Uqpiŋalik;” “Qaqortingneq” to “Qakuqti’niq;” “Uvlúnuaq” to “Uplunnuaq;” “mane·lAq” to “Maniilaq;” “kiɳmiArtɔq” to “Kiŋmiaqtuq;” et cetera.

Modern Inuktut language surnames are all derived from traditional given names, so looking at prominent Inuit figures, and at who is portrayed and credited in media such as on IsumaTV, can yield great results! Though note that some names will be dialect-specific, and many surname spellings predate standardization. Thus, surnames such as Louie Kamookak's and Sammy Kogvik's would be standardized to “Qamukkaaq” and “Qurvik” respectively.

The Natchilingmiut Uqauhingit | Natchilingmiutut Dictionary is indispensable, both for with which to double-check one's spelling, and for the nouns therein that may make for suitable names! Common nouns like tuktu “caribou,” ujarak “rock,” and kuplu “thumb” are all solid choices. If one is feeling daring, one may even combine a verb root with the intransitive indicative mood singular verb ending +ř/tuq (+řuq after vowels, +tuq after consonants) to make a noun participle. Postbases like -nnuaq (noun-to-noun; “the small Noun”) and -’ř/-rřuaq (noun-to-noun; “the big Noun”) may additionally be incorporated so long as one is confident of one's grammatical synthesizing.

To that aim, the sites uqausiit.ca and tusaalanga.ca are really very wonderful, uqausiit being a dictionary, tuhaalaŋa having a glossary with more than a few audio entries, and both holding extremely useful grammar basics on several central Canadian Inuit language varieties that include Natchiliŋmiutut! Other great sites I recommend are inuktitutcomputing.ca (grammar and some Natchiliŋmiutut in the dictionary); inuinnaqtun.ca (closely related language Inuinnaqtun resources); and inupiaqonline.com (Alaskan Iñupiatun language dictionary)! The Inuktitut Magazine archive is available online for free as well!

Everyone should also read Aglu, because I hath saith. One should cry for Aŋu’řuaq, that good bear. (Natchiliŋmiutut translation included!)

Any mistakes herein are mine; if spotted, feel free to please correct! (A variant by the qakuqhi- in the dictionary may be Qakuqhi’niq…and perhaps Qakuqhinniq would furthermore be the better standardization as I am unsure as to whose precise subdialects assimilate the latter [t] in what I presume is the ∓tit- morpheme into /’/ versus /n/, and so on…) I do hope this is helpful!

[umunschaas]

Why was Morzan holding a frog in his hand in your fanfic "Side by Side"? 👀

(He sounded like a little kid who wanted to show someone sth cool he had found)

(How do I answer questions about my weird ideas that stab me out of nowhere and absolutely have to be in the fic because otherwise my brain will pout?)

In part, it was a nod towards another fic of mine (where teen Morzan dropped off a bunch of frogs in Oromis' office, together with a bowl of water. Where the hell did he find all the frogs in Ilirea? I don't know.). But I also hc him as liking animals in general, with a few exceptions like bugs (and horses, depending on the AU). The frog might have gotten trapped somewhere and Morzan was carrying him back to the pond... or maybe he was showing him the garden xD. Who knows.

[someobscurereference]

i love love love the way you write fates/awakening trio and i'm curious how (if) you decide who their variable parents are in fic! any personality preferences? plot conveniences? gen 1 ships?

Firstly, thank you! I’m so glad you’ve enjoyed my writing! :D

Secondly, regarding their parents, over the years I’ve ended up falling into the same grooves again and again based on what I think is funniest/what makes sense. For example, I’ve seen a couple different posts from others on how Henry!Inigo makes sense (and some side dialogue from him about wild laughter on the battlefield in Fates intimidates enemies when he’s losing, which reminds me of Henry), so I end up going with that combination a lot. Plus, I imagine Inigo as a little below average height, so Henry (short) + Olivia (maybe taller than Henry but short) makes short Inigo imo.

Severa/Selena has such perfectionist fears because of her mom, so I think it makes sense to give her another parent who may accidentally exacerbate those concerns. Frederick is a perfectionist in many ways himself and it may not be on purpose but I do like the idea of Frederick!Severa as the other parental standard she has to live up to. So I tend to default to that (though I think I ended up with Vaike!Severa in play through before and actually liked that too. I’ve just never written it.) Plus, Severa tends to nitpick behavior and tell people what they should do. This gets a bit better in Fates, but I can imagine Frederick as a first time parent still lecturing other parents on what’s right and how the house should be always organized even if you’re exhausted, making home made baby foods, etc. So Frederick works for me.

I’ve written Henry!Owain a few times before as well because I also find that funny (Lissa and Owain are both so similar, even if they don’t always see it, that giving Owain an even more “out there” parent than Lissa that he thinks is so normal is funny to me), but I more often default to Lon’qu!Owain because their default outfits are the same. Since Owain idolizes his parents canonically and it’s easy to imagine him as a swordsman because he takes after swordsman parent, Lon’qu seems a good match. (I don’t know that I ever published it, but I have at least one other WIP where Maribelle & Lissa raise Owain and Brady with Lon’qu just as a genetic donor who is somewhat involved in their lives too. I guess I’m really flexible on Owain’s parentage, lol.)

So Inigo’s father is chosen for personality in battle + height (and white hair aesthetic, so Henry), Severa’s father is chosen for her picky personality + worsening her perfectionist insecurity (Frederick), and Owain’s parents are chosen based on Lissa dynamic (Maribelle) + funny (Henry) + aesthetic/imitation behavior (default to Lon’qu).

That said, even if I have reasoning for the above choices, these aren’t set in stone and I’m always willing to change to what’s funniest, lol. So if I’m presented with a funnier dynamic than any of the above or it makes sense in context, I’ll absolutely swap parents for any of them.

Thanks for asking! I can always get more specific with questions if needed if I didn’t answer enough here, lol.

[rainphee]

Eragon Shadeslayer transfem headcanon. Talk I need to know more.

GLADLY

so the thing about the inheritance cycle is that it's about eragon's personal growth and identity. she discovers a lot about herself over not very much time, from figuring herself out as a dragon rider to being adopted by multiple other races and even having her body suddenly changed via magic (a process that strongly mirrors starting HRT). all of these things become much more impactful and powerful when they're viewed through the lens of her being trans. and to me, she's specifically a transfem lesbian, because there's a LOT of times where she reacts to the concept of being attracted to other women in a way that echoes lesbian feelings far more than someone who's expected to be attracted to the opposite gender.

actually there's a TON of stuff in the books that slides perfectly into place if you read it as trans. but it's kinda hard to visualize; you'd have to do something crazy like copy down all four books and painstakingly edit all of eragon's pronouns in order to see it fully realized.

...

anyway here's the link to read my transfem eragon edits of all four books in the cycle + the fork the witch and the wyrm

ALSO HERE IS SOME OF MY ART OF HER BECAUSE I LOVE HER VERY MUCH

[winged-eggers]

hello! this is random but i just wanted to say that I really enjoy the spec bio/sci-fi angle you take in your kirby designs! i was drawing your elephant seal jambandrans earlier and it just struck me as a really creative and fun direction to expand into from hyness' base design.

i am now realizing that i think you have ask-images turned off so i can't show you the drawings but they were fun to make regardless. unrelatedly i also really like how you draw elfilin :)

awww thank you for the kind words! I wish I had the continuous focus to actually condense my ideas into actually readable Things more regularly so I can show everyone more of the shit, I'm glad what I've managed to show is good :) Like as an example of some of the more specbio-angle stuff I had I was working on a huge post about modern Halcandran phenotypes and basic gene inheritance but I tripped over a few details and haven't gotten around to everything I wanted to include

As for images you could post them and then @ either here or @clannfearrunt ! I'd love to see them, I just don't like getting images directly in my inbox ><;

[ofdreamsanddoodles]

if i was to ask someone if magical girl animes had magical boys in it most people would say probably not, but there are still a fair amount of like, 90s magical girls that had male counterparts that were in some way tied to the magic in question like card capturer sakura, sailor moon, & shugo chara. even tokyo mew mew gave aoyama a magical form, though the circumstances were kind of different.

it's definitely always been more common for the team to always be girls, but most don't really bother to give a REASON for that unless it's a parody or deconstruction of the genre, though madoka's explanation is moreso that it has to be a very specific group of girls because of the emotions they face & yuuna yuki is a hero has the whole sacrifice/shrine maiden metaphor so textually, it has to be girls Because We Are Saying Something About Gender. but then when you get to modern animes like magilumiere it's more like "oh well men just don't have the right kind of magic to be magical girls" (tho in their defense, that's mostly a technology issue). now that the genre's so well known, it's less "we're telling a story about magical girls" and "i have something to say about magical girls, so all the characters have to be women."

[uh-mxtx]

Modern-au Binghe who inherits Tianglang-jun’s massive fuck off mansion with like 4000 rooms after living on the streets/foster system after his adoptive mom died (idk i just need him to have big house) and he goes “what the hell am I supposed to do with this” and Meng mo (cant be a demon here ive decided he’s a weird homeless guy who gives him advice. That or a schizophrenic hallucination) goes “fill it with women” and binghe who knows he is gay goes “no”

But then he hears some girls complaining about the safety of some of the campus housing/thier boyfriend or parents kicked them out/ect and he’s like “well, i can fix that” and offers his mcmansion up as apartments. He’s loaded so he barely asks for rent and he just keeps inviting women in hard times, like his mother used to be.

But his real calling is cooking so he keeps feeding his tenants and asking what they like. He’s got a youtube cooking/home ec channel and they’re his taste testers. And they start inviting their freinds over like “hey wanna meet our big gay himbo landlord who feeds us” and their freinds are like “boy do I”

Binghe is absolutely gleefull about this. More people to feed. Fuck yeah he gets to be housewife. The gossip sessions are unmatched. He ends up making a full banquet every night and you can either show up in your pj’s or a ballgown to match the decor.

And eventually all this snowballs and hes got a whole sorority in his mcmansion. and they casually call him husband/boyfreind/sugar daddy as a joke bc Binghe is JACKED and they can get rid of men real fast if they pull their six foot seven guard dog out of the crowd. For the sign off/video end the taste testers on Binghe’s show kiss his cheeks as thanks. Binghe doesn’t know half the people in his house. Some girl he never met (came out of SHL’s room and is COVERED in hickeys) just smacked his ass and stole a stack of pancakes. He doesn’t even react he just makes more. This is the best for his touch starvation.

And oblivious people(you know who) dont realize most of them are lesbians using him as a beard, (ignoring the makeouts and pride flags in the background of some videos) and they absolutely believe Luo Binghe seduced a crowd of women into a harem by the power of cooking, cleaning, and great sex.

Cough cough, Shen Yuan

[anneapocalypse]

The fundamental difference between Zenos and The Warrior of Light as Written--something that exists regardless of any particular WoL's disposition or motivations, all things subject to personal headcanon--is that the TWoLaW engages deeply with the world around them, and Zenos does not. The fundamental quality of Azem the Traveler, and the quality that is suggested to have been inherited by TWoLaW (and by Ardbert), is that they are deeply engaged with the world, and with its people.

Is it true that TWoLaW is disposed toward violence, sure, absolutely, for reasons of video game mechanics if nothing else. But I fundamentally disagree that violence is the core of TWoLaW regardless of how we roleplay them. At the core of TWoLaW is their engagement with the world. Yes, as a result of that, TWoLaW is willing to go kill people and things because they were asked to. You know what else they're willing to do because someone asked them to? Talk to people. Fetch things for them. Gather resources. Make things. Deliver gifts. Facilitate trade. Learn skills. Build community. Cross the seas to help a new friend. Explore. Uncover ancient mysteries. GO TO SPACE! And if you see Zenos as a foil for the player rather than the character, all this still very much applies.

You can roleplay the most curmudgeonly, antisocial, misanthropic WoL possible, you can even reject all side content and stick solely to MSQ, and you will still find yourself inhabiting a character who, as written, is fundamentally engaged with the world. They don't have to be happy. They don't have to be nice. They don't have to do any of what they're doing out of altruism. They're still making the choice to connect with other people, to invest themselves in the struggles and passions of others, to have a personal stake in shaping the world around them, because that is what the character is written to do.

Zenos's tragic flaw is his inability--and yes, perhaps, on some level, unwillingness--to connect with the world and the people around him. He finds no meaningful engagement with the world except to enact violence upon it. He has no personal investment in the Garlean Empire except as it allows him to enact violence, and by this disengagement he basically singlehandedly allows the entire empire to collapse because he doesn't care about it, only about fulfilling his own desires. The funny thing about Zenos as a foil for the protagonist is that he would make a terrible RPG protagonist. The archetypal RPG protagonist is so defined by their willingness to say yes to menial tasks that are only meaningful to some minor NPC that most modern RPGs end up lampshading that fact in some way, and it's endlessly memed upon. I struggle to imagine Zenos making it through the Company of Heroes fetch quests in ARR without getting bored and stabbing someone.

So all-encompassing is this worldview for him that even upon calling the WoL his only friend, he can find no meaningful engagement with them beyond "let us enact violence upon one another." Even the one person in the world he finds interesting enough to engage with, he is seemingly incapable of understanding on any other level. (And if you play a WoL with a desire to connect with Zenos on any other level, I think there's potential for a really interesting tragedy there! Because he either won't or can't.)

And we don't ever really get to challenge him on how narrow and stifling and miserable his engagement with the world truly is. Maybe there's a flicker of it at the very end, an acknowledgement that his life was fundamentally unfulfilling. Perhaps Zenos even sees, on some level, what the WoL has that he does not; maybe unconsciously in pursuing them, he seeks to figure out what that thing is. But then he dies, in his chosen manner, after getting the same one thing he's been pursuing as long as we've known him. That's what's sad about Zenos on a narrative level. Not that he dies, but that he dies unchanged and unchallenged.

And this is why I just can never quite get behind the idea that the core of the WoL is the same as the core of Zenos--no matter how many people the Warrior of Light has killed. I just don't believe that. When I look at TWoLaW, I see a character deeply engaged with the world. When I look at Zenos I see a character who never truly connects with anyone or anything outside himself.

[modern-inheritance]

Arya belongs to her mother's house? Wouldn't Islanzadi ask her to honor her father by using his name?

Evandar's house name isn't given either! It's never explicitly stated how house name transfers considering that elves don't marry, but as children are basically the be all, end all concerning monogamy among elves (if you have a child with someone it's pretty much a sign that you both love each other beyond anything fleeting, as raising an elf child can take decades and family bonds, etc etc etc.) I think that many would choose one or the other's house and be folded into it on an individual basis.

I would think that Glen would be from Evandar's side of the family. Islanzadí is definitely a spitfire in her earlier years, but we have her as the sister of Kialandí here and whatever house he was from would be her birth house, and I feel like the wild/feral streak both Arya and (to a slightly lesser extent, he's very good at hiding it and tamping it down when needed but letting it out when it's time) Glen have come from somewhere in Evandar's line. Though, honestly, that whole wild/feral energy is the 'dragon blood' and a sign that both of them were likely to be Riders, they were just born at the wrong time. Hell, Glen missed being tested by a single year, being around just the later half of his 19th year when the Fall began. And Islanzadí in MIC has at least two known Dragon Riders on her bloodline, so....

Sorry, I got off topic. Basically, whatever house Evandar is, Islanzadi joined. So if we go by that rule, Evandar's family in MIC would be of house Svanran, though technically Evandar's direct family line (mother, grandmother, etc) splintered off as they've been monarchs for several generations as far as we know.

[junojoel]

Woman Inherits the Earth

Ellie Williams x fem!Reader, 6.6k

Summary: You came to Jurassic World for industry connections, a killer CV, and maybe a LinkedIn flex. You didn’t expect to fall for the raptor girl.

Warnings: dinosaurs (scary (not really)) and fluff

this came to me in a fucking vision. i love jurassic park so much and i love a nerdy dinosaur girl even more. HAPPY FUCKING PRIDE MONTH.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

You’d never seen trees this green.

Even from the window of the ferry, long before the first monorail glided into view, Isla Nublar looked like it had been pulled from a storybook. Unreal and mythical, lush in a way that didn’t seem modern. Like you’d time-travelled, or stepped into a planet no one had touched yet.

But of course, they had touched it. Touched, branded, monetised.

The first thing you saw when you stepped off the dock was a smile. Big, toothy, perfect. The kind that came with corporate training and a contract. The greeter handed you a cold drink and a pamphlet with a map of the island, the Jurassic World logo shimmered in glossy blue foil.

“Welcome to paradise,” they chirped.

You smiled back, polite, but your fingers clenched just a little too tight around the strap of your bag.

This wasn’t what you’d imagined when you applied for the communications internship. You thought you’d be documenting field conservation work. Real science. Camera in one hand, clipboard in the other, boots deep in the mud beside palaeobotanists and wildlife biologists.

Instead, it came with air conditioning, swipe access, and a smoothie bar. Your badge still felt surreal in your hand, no matter how many times you’d read the word COMMUNICATIONS next to your name.

You slung your bag over your shoulder and headed toward the staff gate, trying not to feel like an imposter. A monorail train whirred overhead, casting a brief shadow across the sun-bleached pavement. In the distance, a long-necked sauropod lifted its head above the treetops, and a group of tourists shrieked in delight.

It felt like a zoo.

“You lost?” came a voice from behind you, dry and amused. You turned. She stood with one hip cocked and a clipboard tucked under her arm, chewing the end of a pen which was leaving ink on her lip. Her uniform shirt was rumpled, sleeves rolled up, collar open like it’d been yanked loose. Her name badge was clipped to a carabiner on her belt, hanging with a mix of keys and decorative chains.

ELLIE WILLIAMS       RAPTORS

A velociraptor had been doodled beside her name, the first you’d ever seen with sunglasses on. You glanced up at her, blinking once. “Uh, yeah,” you admitted. “Trying to find Admin.”

“Figures.” She jerked her chin toward the path curving behind the guest welcome pavilion. “You’re going the wrong way. That’s the tourist route and you want the staff tram.”

You followed her gesture. “Thanks.”

Ellie took a few steps down the path, then paused and turned to look over her shoulder. “You coming or what?”

You scrambled to follow her, jogging a few steps to catch up.

It was quieter here, just beyond the sound radius of the tour groups and audio guides. Jungle air hung thick and damp, fragrant with wildflowers. You could hear insects buzzing, cicadas thrumming like a heartbeat.

“Comms intern?” she asked eventually, as you both ducked under a low branch.

“Yeah, PR.”

Ellie snorted. “That’s cute.”

You looked at her, frowning. “You think that’s funny?”

“I think cloning ancient apex predators to entertain tourists and using PR to make it seem ethical is kind of hilarious.”

You narrowed your eyes. “So why do you work here?”

She stopped walking to turn to face you.

“Because they’re not monsters,” she said simply. “And someone needs to be here who sees them that way.”

Her voice changed when she said it. You saw the passion then—not just behind her eyes, but in the way she spoke. Devout, almost. She didn’t talk about dinosaurs like exhibits, she talked about them like people talked about art, or music, or something ancient and breathtaking and alive. She started walking again, but slower this time, allowing you to catch up.

 “I’ve been obsessed with them since I was eight,” she said, almost absently. “Used to sleep with an encyclopaedia under my pillow. Drew feathers on every T Rex I saw in books and got in trouble in school for correcting my science teacher.”

You laughed. “Sounds familiar. I had an entire binder dedicated to Stegosaurus migration.”

Ellie looked at you sidelong. “You know they’re not actually that dumb, right? Their brain-to-body ratio is small, yeah, but that doesn’t mean they were stupid.”

“You’re preaching to the choir.”

 Her smile—just for a second—was radiant.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

The staff dorms were nestled behind a canopy of flowering trees, shaded and still. Just far enough from the bustle of the park to feel like their own little ecosystem. Your room was on the top floor of Dorm C, down a quiet corridor that smelled like lemon cleaner and warm pine. No roommates, just you and the view—a forest stretching endlessly beyond your window. Ellie had walked you there herself your first afternoon, pointing out the vending machine that never worked and the communal washer that always overflowed. She stood in the doorway while you unlocked the door, arms crossed, a little smirk on her face when you looked around and said, “Not bad.”

She’d only said, “You’ll get sick of the crickets,” and then wandered off.

That next morning, you reported to the marketing branch’s main office. The main conference room was glass-walled and aggressively minimalist. Every surface gleamed and succulents lined the windowsill in matching white marble pots.

Inside, women in sleek neutrals sat around a long matte-black table, each one with a tablet or stylus in hand. No one looked particularly stressed. They didn’t speak much, just tapped and swiped in perfect silence, like synchronised swimmers in Lululemon. Their hair was glossy, their nails minimalist. Someone sipped a matcha from a branded Jurassic World cup that probably cost more than your entire lunch budget for the week.

You lingered just outside the doorway, unsure if knocking was too formal or if speaking would ruin the mood. You opted for clearing your throat lightly.

“Hi,” you offered. “Marketing intern. Here for assignment placement?”

A woman near the head of the table looked up. She wore a navy linen suit that probably had a brand name you hadn’t heard of and her gold-rimmed glasses caught the overhead light. Her name badge said AUBREY in minimalist font, with the word STRATEGY underneath it. No drawings like Ellie’s.

“Oh, right,” she said, her voice creamy like the oat milk in her latte. “You’re the PR girl?”

You nodded, already regretting whatever energy you were bringing into this room. You felt too loud.

“Well,” Aubrey said, turning her tablet with a soft tap of manicured nails, “good news and bad news.”

You resisted the urge to sigh. Of course there was bad news. There was always bad news.

“The bad news is: you’re not in this building often.”

Of course not. You didn’t fit in here anyway. These women looked like they did Pilates before and after work. Like they carried moon water in their tote bags and gave each other skincare advice. You doubted any of them had ever gotten dirt under their nails, much less had a real conversation with a field biologist.

Aubrey gave a pleasant, symmetrical smile. “The good news is: you’ve been assigned to our highest-profile initiative.” A few swipes, and your personnel card floated across the screen like she manifested it. Your photo was awkward.

“We’re launching a new engagement campaign—Humans of Jurassic World. Emotional branding with candid moments with our top experts.”

You tried to picture the slide deck that had birthed that phrase. Probably beige, with animated transitions from Canva. You imagined the words relatability and authenticity in bold, overlaid on a stock photo of a tranquil-looking intern smiling at a stegosaurus.

“We want content that connects,” Aubrey continued. “Emotion-forward, but not messy.”

God forbid it ever be messy.

She tapped your card into a new category. “You’ll be shadowing Ellie Williams.”

Your mouth opened before you could catch it. “The… raptor girl?”

Aubrey blinked, her expression unchanged but visibly cooling by half a degree. “She prefers animal behaviourist,” she said. “And I’d watch your tone.”

You nodded, swallowing the embarrassment. Noted. No jokes. No personality, either, apparently. Not here.

“She’s a little...feisty and... temperamental,” Aubrey added, delicately. “But she’s one of our key experts. The higher-ups want her front and centre.”

You couldn’t tell if that was a compliment or a warning.

So, the highest-profile assignment on the island… and they were sending you into a paddock where you might get bitten. And there’ll be raptors there, too.

You gave a polite smile, even as your stomach folded itself neatly in half.

“Great,” you said.

Because what else could you say?

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

That afternoon, Ellie knocked and let herself into your dorm room like it was nothing.

“Hey,” she said, stepping inside without waiting. “I was… in the area.”

You turned from your half-folded laundry on the bed, one eyebrow raised. “This area?”

She leaned in the doorway, grinning like a cat in a sunbeam. “Okay, fine. I came to see if you had a clean towel. Mine’s still soaked from yesterday, and I figured you’re probably the organised type. Please, I need to dry my hair.”

“You could’ve asked literally anyone else on the floor.”

“Yeah,” Ellie said, shrugging. “But I didn’t want to.”

Your stomach fluttered. Weird. Probably nervous that she’d found out you were assigned to her and she’d come to bite your head off about it. Temperamental, remember.

You wordlessly walked to your wardrobe and tossed her one of the folded ones from the top shelf. She caught it with both hands, smiling with her eyes more than her mouth.

“Smells like citrus,” she said, lifting it to her face.

“Laundry sheet. Sorry if it’s too floral for your whole field-biology aesthetic.”

 Ellie chuckled and stepped further inside, this time with purpose. “Please, I’ve smelled worse.”

You laughed and turned back to your laundry, only half paying attention as you folded a clean shirt, but you were acutely aware of the sound of boots thudding to the floor, of fabric rustling behind you. When you finally looked again, Ellie had stripped off her overshirt, now dressed in just a black tank that clung to the water she was unable to dry off. You noticed a patch of silvery scar tissue near her shoulder blade, like something long and narrow had raked across her.

You caught yourself looking too long and turned quickly back to your duffel bag.

 Ellie noticed. Of course she did.

“They’re not from the raptors,” she said casually. “One’s from a thorn bush. The other one’s from a juvenile ankylosaur who didn’t like being sedated.”

You turned back, smiling faintly. “Is that better or worse?”

“Depends on your insurance.”

Her right forearm bore a black fern, curling in a slow spiral up her skin. A small moth nestled in the roots, wings outstretched like it had just landed to rest there. The lines were fresh, almost glossy in the dorm light.

Her other tattoo sat high on her left arm, above the curve of her bicep. It was older, slightly faded, but still striking: a raptor skull, drawn in precise anatomical detail, the kind you’d see in a museum display. Ferns and bones looped around it in a circular crown, delicate and wild at once.

“The moth one’s new.”

You cleared your throat. “Yeah?”

 “Got it after I transferred out here. It’s a death’s-head. Some cultures say it’s bad luck.”

“Do you believe that?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I like it. That’s enough, right?”

You nodded, then gestured toward her shoulder. “What about that one?”

Ellie looked down at the raptor skull, smiling like it was an inside joke. “I got it when I was sixteen. Had to lie about my age.”

You laughed, but the sound caught in your throat. She was still close—too close, maybe—and the way she stood, so casual and self-assured, made something twist in your chest.

You smiled faintly, folding another shirt. “Hey,” you said after a moment, trying to keep your voice even. “I, uh—found out where I’m placed today.”

Ellie paused, mid-pat of her face with the towel. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.” You swallowed. “Marketing’s doing some new campaign—Humans of Jurassic World or whatever. They’re assigning interns to departments for storytelling and engagement.”

Ellie raised a brow, sceptical. “Sounds fake.”

“It does,” you agreed. “But apparently I’m shadowing someone from the Raptor Program.”

Ellie blinked, then narrowed her eyes a little. “Wait. Me?”

“Yeah. Aubrey said you’re temperamental,” you added, smirking.

Ellie grinned, a little wild. “Temperamental’s just code for doesn’t suffer fools.”

You laughed. “Guess I’m in trouble.”

She studied you for a moment. “Nah. You look like you might surprise me.”

Your fingers brushed a fold in the laundry you weren’t folding anymore. “You could’ve just said you wanted to hang out.”

She tilted her head, voice low. “Would that’ve worked?”

“Maybe,” you said.  “Next time, try it and see.”

Ellie stepped back toward the door but didn’t open it right away. She lingered, fingers brushing the frame.

“I like your room,” she said. “It suits you.”

“Is that your way of asking if you can come by again?”

“Not asking,” she said, grinning as she slipped out. “Just warning you.”

And with that, she was gone.

But your room still smelled faintly of sun and citrus and Ellie.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

You woke to the sound of your alarm playing the Jurassic World theme in low-fi synth—a joke you’d set up on your first night, which now felt vaguely threatening at 5:45 a.m.

Through the open window, the jungle was still waking up. The air was thick with dew, soft birdsong trilled between branches, and far off in the distance, something massive made a low groaning sound— Good Morning.

Your hands moved through routine before your brain caught up: quick shower, camera bag over your shoulder, badge clipped, shoes already damp from the dew on the steps as you headed out into the humidity of early morning.

Ellie had said to meet her at the raptor supply shed by 6:30. You arrived at 6:25 and she was already there, sitting cross-legged on top of a crate, sipping coffee from a dented thermos and picking grass off of her cargo pants. Her hair was tied back in a loose knot, her boots unlaced. Her face lit up when she saw you, and your stomach betrayed you with a little flip.

“You’re late,” she teased, hopping down.

You raised a brow. “I’m early.”

“I know,” she said, grinning as she handed you a cup. “But I wanted to say it. I was here at 5:45.”

“Why?”

She shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep. Also, the system flagged a motion trip around four. False alarm. Bird or something.”

You took a sip—strong, a little burnt. “God bless you.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” Ellie said, hopping off the crate. “You’re on raptor duty today.”

You blinked. “I thought I was just filming?”

“You are,” she said, already walking toward the gate. “You’re filming me and I’m working, so raptor duty.”

The raptor enclosure was larger than it looked on the map. Part jungle, part reinforced paddock, part bunker. The outer gate opened into a winding path lined with reinforced steel and topped with electric fencing.

Ellie moved through it like she was part of it—radio clipped to her belt, keys jangling from a carabiner, hands already gloved as she scanned a tablet for sensor data.

"You’re not gonna see this on the tours,” she said. “These girls don’t perform.”

Three of them, each moving with uncanny precision as they darted between the trees. One lifted her head, her gold eyes scanning the tree line. The other two circled near a feeding station. You felt a pulse of adrenaline as one of them lifted its snout and made direct eye contact.

“They’re watching us,” you whispered.

“They always are,” Ellie said.

The outer gate hissed open with a groan. Another handler pushed a steel cart in—two heavy haunches of meat, marked and logged. The scent hit immediately, the girls went still.

“That’s Jinx,” Ellie said. “Leader.”

“She doesn’t look aggressive.”

“She’s not. She’s calculating.”

You watched Jinx tilt her head, just slightly, then the others followed. Ellie nodded once, like she understood something no one else could hear.

“She knows you,” you said quietly.

Ellie’s mouth curved.

You blinked. “Imprint?”

“She was too old to imprint properly. But yeah. Something like that.”

“Is that… safe?”

Ellie shrugged. “Nothing here’s really safe.”

Then she glanced sideways. “But she’s never come for me. Not once.”

The cart was wheeled back out. The gates hissed closed behind the handler. The girls returned to the trees slowly.

“They’re amazing,” you breathed.

“They’re misunderstood,” Ellie said. “Everyone thinks they’re monsters.”

You turned to her. “Why do you think that is?”

She paused. “Because they’re smart. People don’t like being outsmarted, especially if who they’re being outsmarted by isn’t human.”

There was a long moment of silence between you, broken only by the whir of a distant drone circling above the canopy. Ellie leaned her weight on one hip, glancing down at her arm where her raptor skull tattoo peeked out from under her tank top.

Unfortunately, Ellie’s morning raptor routine was not fit for public consumption.

She barked into radios, swore when a feeding gate jammed, wiped sweat from her brow with the back of her glove. She talked to the raptors and they responded in a way with soft huffs and curious clicks.

You’d filmed interviews before. Sat through seminars, cut and edited dozens of high-gloss campaign reels for campus groups and charity drives. But this wasn’t that. Ellie Williams didn’t have a camera version of herself. There was just Ellie.

That meant she also had no interest in being directed.

“I don’t want to do the influencer crap,” she had said. “No offense.”

“Some offense taken.” You said, crouched beside a control panel, adjusting your camera. “Let’s try something for TikTok. Just, like, say your name and job? Maybe give a fun fact about the raptors?”

Ellie squinted at the lens like it had personally offended her. “Why would I do that?”

You blinked. “Because it’s part of the job?”

She turned toward the paddock instead, shielding her eyes to scan the treeline. “Fun fact: their eye sockets are larger than yours. Next question.”

You huffed. “Ellie.”

She glanced back over her shoulder. “What?”

“You’re making this hard.”

Her mouth quirked. “I thought you PR types liked a challenge.”

You pointed the lens at her anyway, just to spite her. “Fine. I’ll work with what I’ve got.”

“If I catch you filming my ass without permission, I will feed you to them.”

Later, when she took a break in the shade of the fence wall, you passed her the water bottle from your bag.

“Don’t say I never give you anything,” you said.

She took it, eyeing you with mock suspicion. “You poison it?”

“Tempting.”

She drank anyway.

You sat beside her, back against the warm concrete. The raptor sounds faded behind you.

“Hey,” you said. “You’re really good with them.”

Ellie looked away, squinting at the sun breaking through the canopy.

“They’re predictable,” she said.

“Yeah?”

“They don’t lie. They don’t fake anything. If they like you, they show you. If they don’t… well. You find out fast.”

You nodded slowly. “Sounds refreshing.”

“People,” Ellie said, almost absently, “aren’t like that.”

You studied her profile—sharp jaw, sunburnt nose.

“No,” you said softly. “They’re not.”

For a moment, she looked at you like she wanted to say something else. Instead, she stood.

“Come on,” she said. “We’re not done.”

The juveniles—the babies, as she called them—were only slightly less terrifying than the adults. Half-sized, sleek, wicked fast. Ellie led you into a smaller enclosure for behavioural training.

“You can film,” she said. “Just don’t run.”

“Why not?”

“They chase.”

You laughed nervously. “Oh.”

One of them, a smoky blue female with a slitted golden eye, approached Ellie and bumped her thigh with its snout like a puppy.

She crouched, whispering something you couldn’t catch. The raptor tilted its head, then chirped. A moment later, it lay down and rolled onto its back, exposing its belly.

You caught the whole thing. Ellie laughing, hand buried in feathers, dirt smeared on her cheek, her whole face lit up.

That night, back in your dorm, you sat at your desk with the lights off, your laptop glowing.

You edited late into the night—cutting through shaky footage, filtering the sun just right, lining the audio to a soft indie track. You saved the file, but you didn’t upload it. Tomorrow, you’d show her first, just in case she wanted to see herself the way you saw her.

Before the rest of the world did.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

The fluorescent light flickered above your desk like it, too, was tired of this job. Half your shift had been spent hunched over your laptop, headphones in, sorting through footage from the Raptor Paddock. You didn’t really mind.

The head of PR wanted more behind-the-scenes enrichment content for the park’s YouTube channel—playful but grounded, edgy but safe, and most of all, viral. Their emails used a lot of adjectives.

Your headset buzzed.

Minor incident, that’s how they phrased it.

“Minor,” in Jurassic World terms, meant no deaths, no lawyers yet.

You sat up straight.

A group of influencers had been taken too close to the Raptor Paddock. Someone thought it would be great content and someone else ignored the guest photography guidelines.

The raptor who lunged wasn’t Jinx. Thank god. It was Roo, the most skittish of the three. The flash went off and she reacted on instinct—leapt toward the fence, jaws wide, a blur of feathers and teeth. Now it was online.

Your screen lit up with hashtags you didn’t want to see. #DinoDanger, #SheAlmostDied. You stopped the autoplay, but the thumbnail was enough— Roo mid-snarl, one girl halfway into a dramatic faint. Her friend laughing, shakily.

You forwarded the footage to the Comms lead. A response came ten seconds later.

Get a statement from a trusted handler. Soften this. Now.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

You found Ellie behind the garage near the paddock gate, sitting on an overturned crate with a can of iced coffee sweating in her hand. She was coated in dust and grease, like she’d crawled straight out of a ventilation shaft. Which, knowing her, wasn’t impossible.

She looked up, one eyebrow raised. “Don’t you have press releases to copy and paste?”

You gestured toward her with your tablet. “Don’t you have raptors to whisper to?”

Ellie grinned, tired and amused. “Touché.”

You sat across from her on a cooler. She didn’t offer the coffee, you didn’t ask.

“I need a quote,” you said.

Her smile vanished. “About what?”

“The influencer thing,” you admitted.

She exhaled through her nose and rubbed the back of her neck. Grease smeared higher across her cheek.

“I told them,” she muttered. “Told them not to bring cameras near Roo. She doesn’t like flashing lights. Makes her nervous.”

You stayed quiet. Not the time to turn on a camera.

“They had a whole goddamn ring light,” Ellie said, voice low. “Pointed straight at her. The guests got scared, so did she. Then security panics and sets off the siren. Good job, everyone.”

Eventually, she stood.

“You want a soundbite?” she asked, brushing her hands off on her cargo pants.

You waited.

She looked down at you.

“Tell them this isn’t a petting zoo,” she said. “These animals aren’t props. They’re thinking, breathing creatures. If you poked a bear in the woods with a selfie stick, whose fault would that be?”

You swallowed. “That’s not exactly... soft.”

Ellie tilted her head. “You want me to lie?”

“No,” you said, softer. “I want you to keep your job.”

That got her. A flicker of something passed through her eyes—surprise maybe. She stepped closer and dropped her voice.

“Okay. Try this: ‘The handlers at Jurassic World prioritise the mental health of every creature in our care. Safety and respect come first—on both sides of the fence.’”

You typed as fast as you could.

Ellie leaned over, tapped your screen with a single finger.

“Then add: ‘Some animals, like Delta, are sensitive to sudden light. We ask all guests to follow our guidelines to protect both themselves and the dinosaurs they came to see.’”

You looked up at her. “That was... actually perfect.”

She smirked. “I can do optics. Doesn’t mean I like it.”

Later, you sat alone on the roof of Dorm C, tablet balanced on your knees, watching the video you shot yesterday before uploading.

In the final cut, you watched a shot of Ellie walking alongside the paddock fence with the sun burning gold behind her.

You clicked publish.

The video went live at 6:49 pm, by 7:03 it was trending and the comments poured in.

Hear me out, She’s so serious I love her, and Mother.

You didn’t tell Ellie, but you saved the top comment anyway.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

Every now and then, the schedule lined up just right. Two staff members off-duty. No emergency drills. No PR fires to put out. A window. A breath.

And Ellie took it.

You didn’t take one of the trams. Ellie drove you out herself—an old off-roader that smelled like engine oil, tires kicking up trails of red dust as she pulled away from the paved park roads and into the island’s interior. The farther you went, the more the sounds of the resort faded—until there was only jungle. It wasn’t on any map they gave guests, no visitor trails or attractions.

“You’re not gonna murder me out here, are you?” you joked, peering through the trees.

Ellie grinned. “Not unless you start talking about CGI inaccuracies again.”

She parked at the edge of a ridge overlooking a narrow river. The canopy opened above you into streaks of blue and gold. A breeze moved through the high branches, the air wet and fresh, bird calls echoed through the valley.

Ellie plopped down in the dirt like she’d been here a hundred times before. “This was all here before the board meetings, before the fences, before the holograms. And it’ll all still be here when the last attraction breaks down.”

You sat beside her. The earth was warm under your palms.

“You ever think about what you’d be doing if you hadn’t come here?”

You nodded. “All the time.”

“And?”

You shrugged. “Maybe still in PR. Just… for a less cursed brand.”

Ellie smirked. “Like cereal.”

You laughed. “Exactly. Something safe. Something where the biggest crisis is oat milk backlash.”

She picked up a stick and started absentmindedly dragging it through the dirt—first a spiral, then something more detailed: the suggestion of a raptor skull, curved and sharp and familiar. She was quiet for a while, drawing.

Then she said, “You know what I wanted to be when I was a kid?”

You shook your head.

“Astronaut.”

You blinked. “Seriously?”

Ellie smirked. “Yeah. Had the poster on my wall. Memorised the Apollo missions. Wrote a letter to NASA when I was nine asking if they’d let me bring my best friend.”

You laughed softly. “What’d they say?”

“They didn’t write back.” She gave a one-shouldered shrug, casual on the surface but threaded with something more tender. “I kept dreaming about it anyway. Floating above Earth. Being the first person to touch something that hadn’t been touched.” She paused. “Guess I still got that last part.”

You looked over at her. “What changed?”

Ellie pressed the stick into the soil. “I hit high school, and science was harder. Math was never fun. Biology clicked, and space didn’t.”

There was something in her voice that made your chest ache. Not regret, exactly. Just the trace of a fork in the road, a fig that hadn’t been taken from the tree. The version of her who might have gone up instead of underground.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

The dorms weren’t glamorous.

Faux-wood floors, standard-issue twin bed, metal desk with drawers that stuck, a narrow kitchenette with two mugs that were never clean at the same time, one window that opened exactly three inches. Jurassic World spared no expense for the dinosaurs, but the interns? You learned quickly how to make do.

Somehow, though, the place felt luxurious when Ellie was in it.

She kept leaving things behind: a thermos, a hoodie, the Jurassic World issue of National Geographic with her notes scribbled in the margins. She always ended up back here, always found her way to your side of the compound when shifts ended and the park dimmed for the night.

Lunch wasn’t a planned thing.

It started after a meeting, both of you too tired to go back to work, the cafeteria mostly empty. Ellie dragged her tray to your table without asking, dropped into the seat across from you like she’d been doing it forever. She had her sleeves rolled up and a smudge of something dark under her cheekbone, like she’d leaned against the wall of the paddock and forgot about it.

She looked exhausted.

You slid your extra protein bar across the table without a word. She didn’t say thank you, just peeled it open and ate half in two bites.

“A trainer tried to feed Scylla a banana.”

You blinked. “Why?”

“She said she read somewhere that primates liked them and thought maybe—” Ellie cut herself off, pinching the bridge of her nose. “I can’t keep having these conversations.”

You bit your lip to hide your laugh. “Did Scylla eat it?”

“She spat it out!”

You pushed your tray closer to hers. Shared space, shared air. When she picked at the lettuce on your plate without asking, you didn’t stop her.

That afternoon, back in your dorm, Ellie dozed on your bed with one foot still on the ground. You sat at your desk, typing half-heartedly, sneaking glances every few lines.

Her breathing slowed. Softened.

You turned down the brightness on your screen and let yourself stare. There was something vulnerable about her when she was asleep. Less fire, less focus.

Her arm shifted, and her fingers brushed your pillow like she was reaching in her sleep.

Your heart jumped.

You turned away, flustered. Pretended to read a park protocol memo. Didn’t take in a word of it.

That evening, she cooked.

Not well or efficiently, but she refused any help. You offered, but she waved you off and handed you a drink instead. “This is a one-woman show. Sit and be amazed.”

She stood barefoot, chopping onions with the dullest knife in the drawer and humming something under her breath, maybe Fleetwood Mac or something from her endless playlist of 70s deep cuts, you weren’t sure. She burned the first round of garlic toast. She swore loudly. You laughed so hard your stomach hurt.

Dinner turned out… edible. You both sat cross-legged on the floor, plates in laps, knees bumping.

“This is terrible,” you said around a mouthful.

“Shut up,” she said, grinning. “You’re eating it.”

“Only out of fear.”

She nudged your knee. “Coward.”

You leaned back on your palms, looked at her.

“I like this,” you said.

Her smile faltered slightly, became something smaller. “What?”

“This. You. Here.”

Ellie looked at you for a long moment, unreadable.

Then she reached for your plate and took the last piece of toast.

“Me too,” she said.

Later, when the lights were off and the window cracked open to let in island air, she curled up behind you without asking, one arm slung loosely around your waist. Her breath warmed the back of your neck.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

The week hit like a monsoon, you barely had time to breathe. You fielded incident reports, coordinated guest services, drafted press responses in thirty-second bursts. You worked through lunch. You took dinner at your desk. You fell asleep in a chair two nights in a row.

And through it all, there was Ellie.

Sort of.

You saw her once—midweek. Briefly.

She caught you outside the main building, a clipboard tucked under one arm, sunglasses perched on her head. She looked flushed and windblown, like she’d just come from the raptor paddock. Her shirt stuck to her back. Her hands were dusty.

“Hey,” she said, jogging to catch up. “I was hoping I’d run into you.”

You were already walking.

“Sorry,” you said quickly. “I’m heading to the office—there was a perimeter breach yesterday, and apparently that means communications has to rewrite the entire emergency script again because no one in legal can do their fucking jobs.”

She fell into step beside you, smile dipping a little. “Right. Yeah. No worries.”

You didn’t notice the shift in her tone. Or if you did, you ignored it.

Ellie gave a short nod, one hand hovering awkwardly like she’d meant to reach for your arm.

Then she said, “Don’t work yourself to death, okay?”

But the door had already closed behind you.

She didn’t come by that night, or the next.

You told yourself it didn’t matter, that she was busy too. If she needed you, she’d say so.

But every time you opened your dorm door and saw that she hadn’t left anything behind—no hoodie, no coffee cup, no scrawled note—something in you pinched.

The silence wasn’t cruel. It was worse than that.

It was polite.

By Friday, you were frayed at the edges. The comms team cleared out early. Some kind of mixer for the PR interns, catered with branded cupcakes and a weirdly peppy playlist of noughties throwbacks. You told them you had emails to finish, but you lingered in the empty office, lights half-dimmed, hands idle.

And finally, when you couldn’t stand it anymore, you grabbed your badge and left.

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

The raptor paddock was quiet at this hour.

The jungle edge glowed gold. You leaned against the low fence, heartbeat a little louder than it needed to be.

You weren’t even sure why you’d come.

But then—you heard her voice.

“Good. Good, Jinx, yeah, that’s it—move slow.”

You turned just in time to see Ellie moving through the inner track. She had one hand raised towards Jinx, her movements fluid, confident. She was in her element, every line of her body relaxed but alert. The trainers nearby deferred to her, stepping back when she approached.

She was magnetic.

You suddenly felt like a ghost.

You waited until Jinx was redirected, until Ellie handed off her radio to another staff member, until she peeled off her gloves and stepped toward the break area alone.

You followed.

“Hey,” you said.

She looked up.

The smile she gave you was faint. Careful. “Hey.”

“I—uh, I didn’t mean to blow you off the other day,” you started. “It’s just been… a lot.”

Ellie nodded. “I figured.”

You hated how neutral her voice sounded. Like she’d coached it into steadiness.

“I missed you,” you said, softer.

Ellie didn’t look at you right away. She stared out toward the trees, jaw tight.

“I didn’t want to make it weird,” she said finally.

You stepped closer. “It’s not weird.”

“It felt weird,” she replied, still not looking at you. “Like maybe I imagined more than what this is. Or was. I don’t even know if you even like— Forget it.”

The words hit harder than they should’ve.

“You didn’t imagine it.”

She looked at you then, maybe a little hurt.

“I’m bad at balance,” you said, a little broken. “I pour into the job until I forget there’s a me underneath it.”

Ellie’s shoulders eased slightly. “Yeah. I know that feeling.”

“I didn’t mean to make you doubt.”

She nodded. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

She gave a small smile. “But I’m not going to chase you through it. I care about you. Enough to give you space. Just… don’t wait too long to come back.”

₊˚⊹ 𐂯

You stood outside her door for what felt like a full minute.

It was too quiet. The usual hum of the compound felt distant here, muffled behind thick walls and late-night haze. You could hear your own heartbeat in your ears.

One knock, that’s all it took.

When the door opened, Ellie was standing there barefoot, hair damp and curling slightly at the ends. She wore an oversized grey shirt that hung off one shoulder and loose black shorts that looked like she’d had them since high school. Her eyes were tired, like she hadn’t been sleeping.

You stepped inside.

Her dorm was nothing like yours. The lighting was dim—one warm bulb over the bed, the rest off. The smell was a mix of sandalwood and cedar that clung to her clothes. A raptor plush sat on the windowsill next to a sun-bleached paperback copy of The Lost World and a tin of black guitar picks. Her desk was half-covered in field notes, fossil diagrams, and a mug full of broken pencils. There were stars painted on her ceiling—tiny, glow-in-the-dark ones, peeling at the corners. A few had drifted down to the floor.

And in the far corner, propped against the wall next to a stack of old music magazines, was a handmade guitar, a moth delicately carved to match her arm. The strings were a little loose. One of them looked like it had been replaced with fishing wire.

She noticed you looking. “My dad made it.”

“Seriously?” You approached it gently, like it might crumble if you touched it wrong. “It’s beautiful.”

“Sounds like shit if it’s not tuned,” she said with a smile. “But yeah. It’s mine.”

There was a long pause.

Then, from her spot by the door, Ellie asked, “Did you come here to say something?”

You hesitated. “No. I just wanted to be near you.”

Her expression didn’t change. But something behind her eyes softened. “Are you sure?”

You nodded. “I missed you.”

Ellie broke.

She reached for your face, and her touch was both careful and hungry. Her fingers brushed your jaw, your cheek, and then she kissed you.

And god, did she kiss you.

You melted into it, into her, into the way her lips moved slow and certain over yours, into the warmth of her hands sliding behind your neck. She tasted like mint, like she’d just brushed her teeth, ready for bed. The bed— you backed her towards it without even realising it, one hand tangled in the hem of her shirt, the other gripping her waist. She gasped when her knees hit the mattress, and then you were climbing into her lap, half-straddling her, mouths still locked together.

Ellie pulled back just long enough to breathe, her forehead pressed to yours. “I’ve wanted this,” she murmured.

You kissed her again, deeper this time, slower. Your hands roamed over her hips, the curve of her back. She made a sound in the back of her throat when your lips grazed the corner of her jaw, then her throat, then just below her ear.

“You smell like rain,” you whispered, lips brushing her skin.

“I have showered,” she said, voice shaky but smiling.

“Didn’t say it was a bad thing.”

She shifted, pressing up into you, hands now sliding under your shirt, palms splayed warm across your spine. Her touch was reverent, exploratory, like she couldn’t believe you were really here.

You pulled away just enough to look at her.

Her cheeks were flushed, lips swollen, eyes wide and glassy like you were something she was still trying to process.

“You okay?” you asked softly.

“More than,” she whispered.

[cloudyluun]

Silver Springs | (famous!harry x famous!reader)

Summary: Falling for Harry Styles was never part of Y/N’s plan. As the daughter of Stevie Nicks, she’s spent her whole life running from the spotlight, carving out her own identity in the indie rock scene. But when fate keeps pulling her back into his orbit, resisting becomes impossible.

A slow-burn friends-to-lovers romance filled with stolen glances, whispered lyrics, and a love too big to keep secret forever. Featuring: a dramatic rain-soaked love confession, a very public grand gesture, and enough Fleetwood Mac references to make Stevie proud.

Because some love stories are meant to be legendary.

A/N: Okay, but why was this request everything I’ve ever wanted in a fic?? The slow burn?? The secret relationship angst?? The messy, desperate, I-can’t-breathe-without-you love confession?? And let’s not even talk about that post-confession smut scene because I need a moment. To the lovely soul who requested this, thank you for feeding my drama-loving heart. This was so much fun to write, and I definitely got way too emotionally attached. (Also, I need a rockstar AU in real life ASAP.) ALSO I’m sorry, I definitely overdid the scene dividers oops.

Word Count: 8,5k

Warnings: 

Slow-burn tension that hurts (but in a good way)

Secret relationship chaos

One rain-soaked love confession

One hot, messy, emotional SMUT scene (18+)

Paparazzi stress & PR nightmares

A duet so romantic it might ruin your standards

Fleetwood Mac lyrics used as emotional warfare

☆ ★ ✮ ★ ☆

Y/N had been born with the weight of a legacy she never asked for.

From the moment she took her first breath, the world had already decided who she was. The daughter of Stevie Nicks. Rock royalty. A ghost of the past in a modern world. The media had never let her be anything else. They picked apart her features, searching for traces of her mother—the same high cheekbones, the same wild hair. They hunted for echoes of Fleetwood Mac in the songs she wrote, dissecting every lyric, every melody, desperate to find a connection. And when they couldn’t?

They made one up.

Her father’s identity had been a secret from the start, a mystery wrapped in whispered rumors and unanswered questions. Some tabloids swore he had been a rockstar, a fleeting love affair lost in the haze of the ‘70s. Others speculated he had been someone ordinary, someone her mother had chosen to protect from the chaos of her world. Y/N had stopped wondering a long time ago. Her mother had always said, "You don’t need to know where you come from to know where you’re going, baby." And maybe that was true. But sometimes, when she looked at herself in the mirror, she wished she knew which parts of her belonged to Stevie Nicks and which belonged to a stranger.

Still, despite the world’s obsession with her past, Y/N had built something of her own.

Her music was raw, poetic—a fusion of indie rock and dreamlike lyricism that belonged entirely to her. She wasn’t interested in stadiums or radio hits; she wanted songs that lingered in the bones, the kind that made people ache without knowing why.

And yet, no matter what she did, the headlines always found a way to reduce her to a footnote in her mother’s story.

"Stevie Nicks’ Daughter Haunts the Music Scene—Can She Ever Escape Her Mother’s Shadow?" "The Princess of Rock ‘n’ Roll: Y/N Nicks Inherits a Legacy of Magic and Tragedy."

She ignored them. Mostly.

But some nights, when the whiskey burned too much and the music wasn’t enough, she wondered if she’d ever just be herself.

The first time Y/N met Harry Styles, she was fifteen.

It was a warm summer night in Los Angeles, the kind where the air was thick with nostalgia, humming with the remnants of a golden era long gone.

Fleetwood Mac was playing at The Forum, and backstage was a haze of cigarette smoke, laughter, and the scent of aged leather. It was a world Y/N had always known, one that felt like home and yet never quite belonged to her.

She had been curled up on one of the velvet couches, her combat boots propped up on a glass table, flipping through an old notebook of half-written lyrics.

Her mother had walked in then, a force of nature even in her sixties, wrapped in flowing black fabric, rings glinting under the dim lights. And beside her—

Harry.

He had been twenty, freshly cut from the boyband machine but still unmistakably him. Messy curls, dimples carved deep into his cheeks, a floral button-up that hung loose over his chest. There was an ease to him, a confidence that most people his age hadn’t yet earned.

Stevie had smiled, her voice all warmth and amusement as she introduced them.

"Harry, this is my daughter, Y/N. Y/N, sweetheart, this is Harry Styles."

Y/N had barely spared him a glance, disinterested in the way only a fifteen-year-old girl could be.

She had looked him up and down, unimpressed, before muttering, "Oh. You’re the boy with the hair."

There had been a beat of silence. Then—

Harry had grinned, wide and unbothered. "And you’re the girl who hates the spotlight."

That had made her pause.

She had finally looked at him properly then, taking in the twinkle of mischief in his green eyes, the way he had spoken to her like he knew her, like he could already see the edges of her soul.

She had hated that.

So she had rolled her eyes, shutting her notebook with a snap. "Yeah? What gave it away?"

Harry had only chuckled. "Just a feeling."

They hadn’t known it then, but that moment—that first careless exchange in the glow of The Forum’s dressing rooms—had been the beginning of something that would follow them for years.

They had drifted in and out of each other’s lives after that, their paths crossing at industry events, in backstage corridors, in places where music and fame blurred the lines between strangers and something more.

But they had never been close.

Not yet.

That would come later.

And when it did, neither of them would be able to stop it.

It was a city built on illusions, a place where the past and present blurred under neon lights and whiskey-soaked conversations. People changed here, or they lost themselves trying.

Y/N had spent years learning how to exist in the industry without letting it consume her. She had built walls, wrapped herself in the armor of cigarette smoke and sharp words, refusing to let the world shape her into something she wasn’t.

But some nights—nights like this—she felt the weight of it all pressing against her ribs.

She had been in the music industry long enough to know that these parties weren’t really about music. They were about power. Influence. The quiet, calculated dance of networking, where every glance and every handshake meant something.

Y/N hated it.

And yet, here she was.

The party was in the Hollywood Hills, tucked away in a mansion that reeked of old money and new fame. The kind of place where people got too drunk on tequila and promises they wouldn’t remember in the morning.

She had come because she had to—because being seen mattered, even when she wished it didn’t.

She was twenty-five now, no longer the sharp-tongued teenager who had met Harry Styles in the glow of The Forum’s dressing rooms.

She had grown into herself.

And so had he.

She saw him before he saw her.

Harry was in the center of the room, as he always was, laughter spilling from his lips as he leaned against a marble bar, his rings catching in the dim light.

He looked different now—older, surer, carved out of something stronger.

The curls were shorter, but still wild. The tattoos more visible, inked stories along his skin. He wore a suit, something sleek and expensive, but the top buttons of his shirt were undone, revealing a silver cross against his collarbones.

Even here, surrounded by actors and musicians and people who pretended they belonged, he was the only one who looked like he truly did.

Y/N had spent years pretending she was immune to the charm of men like him.

But as she stood there, watching the way he moved, the way people gravitated toward him, she felt something stir in her chest.

Something she didn’t want to name.

She turned away, heading toward the bar, but it was already too late.

She heard his voice before she felt his presence.

“Well, if it isn’t rock royalty.”

Y/N exhaled, bracing herself, before turning to face him.

Harry was smiling, that slow, lazy grin that had made girls weak in the knees for over a decade.

“Pop star,” she greeted, raising an eyebrow.

His dimples deepened. “Didn’t think this was your scene.”

Y/N shrugged, lifting her whiskey glass. “It isn’t.”

Harry’s gaze flickered over her, assessing. “Then why are you here?”

“Same reason you are,” she said, taking a slow sip. “To remind people we still exist.”

Harry chuckled, shaking his head. “You don’t have to remind anyone, love. They never forget a Nicks.”

There was something in the way he said it—something almost… knowing.

She tilted her head, watching him. “And they never forget a Styles.”

His smirk deepened. “Touché.”

The conversation between them felt effortless, the kind of back-and-forth that came with years of shared history, even if most of it had been from a distance.

She had always liked that about him.

That he could meet her wit for wit. That he never backed down.

That night, they danced around the past without ever acknowledging it, teasing each other between sips of whiskey and stolen glances.

He called her "rock princess" like it was a private joke.

She called him "pop star" with just enough mockery to make him laugh.

The undercurrent of something more was there—tangible, electric, waiting to be acknowledged.

But neither of them touched it.

Not yet.

Later, when the party had thinned and the air inside had grown heavy with heat and smoke, Y/N slipped outside.

She kicked off her heels, stepping onto the cool stone of the balcony, and lit a cigarette with steady fingers.

The view of the city stretched before her, a glittering sea of headlights and broken dreams.

She inhaled deeply, letting the nicotine settle in her lungs, humming a familiar melody under her breath—one of her mother’s, an old Fleetwood Mac song that had been stitched into her bones long before she was born.

She didn’t hear him approach.

Didn’t realize he was there until he spoke.

“Still hate the spotlight?”

His voice was softer now, missing the teasing edge from before.

She exhaled, watching the smoke curl into the night. “I hate what it does to people.”

Harry leaned against the railing beside her, silent for a moment, as if turning over her words in his head.

Then, he huffed a quiet laugh. “Still the girl who hates everything?”

Y/N smirked, side-eyeing him. “Still the boy with the hair?”

Harry grinned, running a hand through his curls. “I like to think there’s more to me than that.”

Something unspoken passed between them then.

A shift. A breath.

A moment on the edge of something inevitable.

Neither of them moved.

Neither of them said a word.

But in the silence, they both felt it.

A crack in the walls they had spent years building.

A spark that had always been there, waiting for the right time to catch fire.

Harry called her three weeks after the party.

It was late—too late for anything that wasn’t trouble.

She had been sprawled across her bed, an open notebook balanced on her stomach, trying to piece together a song that didn’t want to be written, when her phone buzzed against the nightstand.

She didn’t need to check the name.

There was only one person who would call her at this hour, as if he knew she’d still be awake.

She let the phone ring twice before answering. “You lost, pop star?”

Harry chuckled, his voice low and lazy. “Not lost, no. Just… thought of you.”

Y/N rolled onto her side, tucking the phone between her shoulder and ear. “Oh? Should I be flattered?”

“Dunno.” He paused. “Wanna come to the studio tomorrow?”

That made her sit up.

She knew Harry was working on a new album. The industry had been buzzing about it for months, but he had been careful—secretive, even—about who he let in.

And now, he was inviting her.

Y/N hesitated for only a second before saying, “What time?”

She arrived at the studio the next evening, her guitar slung over her back, dressed in a well-worn Fleetwood Mac t-shirt just to mess with him.

Harry was already there, sitting on the edge of a couch with a notebook in his lap, his fingers tapping out a rhythm on the cover.

He looked up when she walked in, a slow smile spreading across his face. “Didn’t think you’d actually show.”

Y/N dropped onto the couch beside him, stretching out like she owned the place. “Didn’t think you actually had a studio. Thought you just wrote love songs in expensive hotel rooms.”

Harry chuckled, flipping the notebook shut. “Maybe I do both.”

The night unfolded in quiet moments and half-sung melodies.

She watched as he disappeared into the recording booth, slipping the headphones over his ears, eyes fluttering shut as the music took over.

And for the first time, she let herself really listen to him.

Harry had always been a good singer. That much was obvious. But there was something about watching him like this—seeing the way he poured himself into every lyric, the way his voice carried a rawness that no amount of polish could hide—that made her breath catch.

He was singing something new, something unfinished.

And as his voice curled around the notes, thick with longing and something unspoken, he looked up—straight at her.

Y/N’s grip tightened around her whiskey glass.

The booth’s glass separated them, but the way he stared at her—intense, knowing, like he could see straight through her—made her feel like there was nothing between them at all.

She swallowed hard, looking away first.

Harry smirked.

One studio session turned into two. Two turned into three.

And then, before she knew it, she was on a plane with him, tucked into first-class seats as his tour swept across the country.

She told herself she was just tagging along for inspiration, a creative escape.

She told herself it didn’t mean anything.

But the late nights in hotel rooms told a different story.

They fell into a rhythm—drinking whiskey on balconies, trading lyrics like secrets, letting conversations slip into the kind of honesty that only existed between two people who didn’t want to admit what they were to each other.

Some nights, they wrote.

Some nights, they just existed—stretched out on hotel carpets, hands brushing when they passed the bottle back and forth, staring at ceilings like they held the answers to questions neither of them wanted to ask.

She hadn’t expected this.

Hadn’t expected the way he looked at her when she wasn’t paying attention.

Hadn’t expected the way she wanted to memorize the shape of his laughter.

Hadn’t expected the way she craved him, in the quiet, in the spaces between words, in the way his voice curled around her name like it was something sacred.

One night, she fell asleep in his hotel room.

They had been listening to records, the vinyl crackling in the background, the bottle of whiskey between them half-empty.

She had kicked off her boots at some point, curling up on the couch, his hoodie draped over her shoulders like she belonged in it.

Harry had been mid-sentence when he noticed she wasn’t answering.

He turned, finding her tucked into the cushions, her breathing soft, her hair spilling across her face.

Something in his chest tightened.

He exhaled, rubbing a hand over his jaw, telling himself to let it go.

But he didn’t.

Instead, he leaned in, brushing her hair behind her ear, his fingers lingering a second too long.

She stirred slightly but didn’t wake.

And for the briefest moment, Harry let himself want it—let himself imagine what it would feel like to close the space between them, to taste the whiskey on her lips, to see if she’d kiss him back or push him away.

He hovered there, so close, so fucking close—

And then he pulled back.

Shoving a hand through his curls, he let out a quiet curse, grabbing the nearest blanket and draping it over her instead.

Not now, he told himself.

Not yet.

He sat back, forcing himself to look away.

But even in the dark, even in the silence, he knew.

He was already in too deep.

London was cold, the kind of damp chill that clung to bones and made her wish she was still waking up in different hotel rooms, still stealing sips of his morning coffee, still pretending she didn’t care when he hummed her songs under his breath.

The withdrawal was annoying.

But not unexpected.

She had just finished scribbling notes for a new song when her phone rang.

“You still in town?”

She smirked, setting her pen down. “Didn’t know you missed me so much, pop star.”

Harry chuckled, that deep, lazy sound that made something twist in her stomach. “Not even denying it, are you?”

She rolled her eyes. “What do you want, Styles?”

“Dinner.”

That made her pause.

Sure, they had spent weeks living in each other’s pockets—whiskey-soaked late nights, studio sessions stretched into dawn, long looks across dimly lit dressing rooms—but this felt… different.

Intentional.

Like he was asking for something neither of them were ready to name.

Still, she played it cool. “Where?”

“I’ll text you.” A pause. “Wear something nice.”

She showed up to the restaurant in a leather jacket, ripped jeans, and her mother’s old silver rings.

Let him try and tell her what to wear.

Harry was already there, tucked into a quiet corner, a half-full glass of red wine in front of him. His curls were messier than usual, his sweater hanging loose on his frame, and the moment he saw her, his dimples deepened.

“Very fancy,” he teased, flicking the collar of her jacket as she slid into the seat across from him.

Y/N smirked. “If you wanted a date, you should’ve said so.”

Harry’s lips twitched. “Didn’t say I didn’t.”

The air shifted.

She ignored the way her pulse quickened, instead reaching for the menu. “So. What’s good here?”

They fell into easy conversation, talking about the tour, the highs and lows, the stupid inside jokes they’d collected along the way.

But somewhere between the laughter and the second glass of wine, the mood softened.

“Do you ever get tired of it?” she asked, twirling the stem of her glass between her fingers.

Harry tilted his head. “Of what?”

“Being… this.” She gestured vaguely at him, at the world outside the restaurant doors, at the weight of fame that followed them both. “The cameras, the expectations, the pressure. Do you ever just wanna disappear?”

Harry studied her, running his thumb along the rim of his glass.

“Sometimes,” he admitted. “But then I remember why I started. And it’s not about all the noise. It’s about the music. About…” He exhaled, shaking his head with a small smile. “About moments like this.”

Y/N felt her heart lurch before she could stop it.

She cleared her throat, forcing a smirk. “Sappy.”

Harry grinned, leaning back in his chair. “You love it.”

She did.

That was the problem.

They should have known better.

A quiet dinner in London? No such thing.

The next morning, the headlines were everywhere.

Harry Styles and Rock Royalty: A New Power Couple?

The Fleetwood Mac Connection—Is Y/N Following Her Mother’s Footsteps in Love, Too?

Spotted: Harry & Y/N, Cozy London Date Night or Just Old Friends?

Y/N groaned, tossing her phone onto the kitchen counter. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Harry’s name lit up her screen.

She answered without greeting. “Tell me this will blow over.”

Harry chuckled. “It’ll blow over.”

“You’re lying.”

“I am.” Another laugh. “We could deny it.”

“Obviously.”

“Or…”

Y/N narrowed her eyes. “Or?”

Harry’s grin was practically audible. “Could always lean into it.”

She snorted. “You wish, Styles.”

He hummed. “Yeah, maybe I do.”

Her stomach flipped.

Before she could respond, there was a knock on her door.

“Gotta go.” She hung up quickly, shaking off the warmth curling in her chest.

Then she opened the door.

And found her mother standing there, arms crossed, eyebrows raised.

Y/N barely had a chance to step aside before Stevie breezed past her, silk scarves trailing, the scent of patchouli and incense filling the space.

She made a beeline for the kitchen, plucked Y/N’s phone off the counter, and squinted at the headlines.

Y/N sighed. “Good morning to you, too.”

Stevie hummed, tapping a red-lacquered fingernail against the screen. “So… you and Harry Styles.”

Y/N groaned. “For fuck’s sake, it’s nothing.”

Stevie arched a delicate brow, taking a slow sip of her tea. “Sure, baby. Keep telling yourself that.”

Y/N scowled. “It’s not love.”

Stevie’s lips curled into a knowing smile.

“Love is messy in this business, honey.”

Y/N rolled her eyes, snatching her phone back. “I wouldn’t know.”

Stevie just laughed, something soft and far too smug in her gaze.

Because she knew.

Long before Y/N was willing to admit it to herself.

She spotted him immediately.

Harry.

Leaning against the marble bar, whiskey in hand, dimples out in full force as he laughed at something Lizzo said. He looked too good, annoyingly good, all effortless charm and understated power in his black suit, his sheer shirt open just enough to tease golden skin and the sharp edge of his collarbone.

Y/N swallowed hard.

It had been weeks since the headlines. Since her mother’s knowing smile. Since she had convinced herself she wasn’t thinking about him like that.

But now, with the golden glow of the chandeliers casting shadows over his cheekbones, his green eyes flicking up to meet hers across the room—she felt it.

The pull. The inevitable, undeniable pull.

She found herself at his side before she could think better of it, sliding onto the barstool beside him.

Harry glanced at her, eyes flicking over her outfit—a silk slip dress in deep navy, barely-there straps, silver chains glinting against her collarbone. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, his fingers tightening around his whiskey glass.

Interesting.

Y/N smirked, plucking an olive from the garnish tray and popping it into her mouth. “Enjoying yourself, pop star?”

Harry exhaled a laugh, tilting his glass towards her. “Was just about to ask you the same thing, rock princess.”

She arched a brow. “You clean up well.”

He leaned in slightly, voice dropping. “So do you.”

Her breath hitched, but she masked it with a slow sip of her drink.

They fell into easy conversation, but the teasing was sharper tonight, laced with something dangerous. He was closer than usual, his knee brushing against hers, his fingers grazing the inside of her wrist when he reached for his drink.

And every time she laughed, his eyes flickered to her lips.

Sometime after midnight, when the party was loudest and the drinks were strongest, Y/N felt the walls closing in.

She had spent the last hour with his hand on the small of her back, his voice low in her ear, his eyes dark and unreadable whenever she so much as looked at someone else.

She couldn’t take it anymore.

So she grabbed his wrist.

“Come with me.”

Harry blinked, surprised, but let her lead him through the crowd, up a grand staircase, and through a side door that led to the rooftop.

The city stretched out below them, glittering in the darkness. The muffled bass of the party throbbed beneath their feet, but up here, the air was crisp, cool against flushed skin.

Harry ran a hand through his curls, exhaling. “Y’finally had enough of all that?”

Y/N scoffed. “I just needed to breathe.”

A beat of silence. Then—

“You think about it too, don’t you?”

Her stomach clenched.

She turned to him, arms crossed. “Think about what?”

Harry took a step closer. “This.”

Her heart hammered. “Harry—”

“I think about you too much,” he admitted, voice quiet but firm, like he had been holding it in for years.

The air crackled between them.

Y/N’s nails bit into her palms. Her voice was steady when she said, “Then do something about it.”

Harry moved before she could take it back.

His hand found her jaw, fingers tilting her face up to his. He hesitated for a fraction of a second, his breath fanning against her lips—giving her a chance to stop it, to pull away.

She didn’t.

So he kissed her.

Slow at first, teasing, like he wanted to savor the moment. His lips were soft but firm, tasting like whiskey and warmth, like something she hadn’t realized she had been starving for.

And when she kissed him back, something inside him snapped.

A groan rumbled in his throat as he deepened it, his other hand sliding around her waist, pulling her flush against him. The cold rooftop wall pressed against her back, his body against her front, caging her in.

She melted.

Her fingers tangled in his curls, tugging just enough to make him growl into her mouth. She felt his smirk against her lips before he kissed her harder, licking into her mouth like he wanted to learn every single inch of her.

The city blurred around them.

There was only this.

Only him.

Only the moment they had spent years pretending they didn’t want.

When they finally broke apart, Y/N was breathless, lips tingling, her hands still fisted in his hair.

Harry smirked, eyes dark and hazy.

“Was wondering when you’d let me do that.”

Y/N let out a breathless laugh, her fingers tracing his jaw.

“Shut up and do it again.”

And so he did.

They didn’t talk about it, not really.

They just acted.

And once that line had been crossed, there was no going back.

The secrecy of it all was intoxicating.

It turned the smallest moments into something electric—her fingers grazing his when she passed him a drink, the press of his palm against her lower back as he guided her through a crowd.

They stole kisses behind dressing room doors, in dimly lit hallways, in the backseat of a blacked-out SUV. It was a game neither of them acknowledged but both played with fervor.

It was thrilling.

It was dangerous.

It was them.

Harry had sent her nothing but a single text:

Room 1107. Door’s open.

So she went.

The moment she stepped inside, he was already reaching for her.

His hands were warm as they slid around her waist, pulling her in. His lips found hers before she could even make a remark about his audacity, and suddenly she was backed up against the wall, gasping softly into his mouth as his fingers gripped the hem of her hoodie—the one she had stolen from his suitcase weeks ago.

It smelled like him.

It felt like home.

“Missed you,” he muttered against her lips, his voice rough with exhaustion but laced with something softer, something sweeter.

She smirked, her fingers curling into his T-shirt. “You saw me three hours ago.”

Harry hummed, dragging his lips down the column of her throat. “Still too long.”

She rolled her eyes, but the shiver down her spine betrayed her.

But sleep had other plans.

Y/N woke up tangled in crisp white sheets, her limbs a lazy sprawl across the mattress. The scent of Harry—cologne, whiskey, and something distinctly him—wrapped around her like a second skin.

And then—

A knock at the door.

Her eyes flew open.

Harry groaned into the pillow beside her. “Fuck’s sake.”

“Harry? You up?”

His assistant.

Shit.

Y/N scrambled upright, heart racing. She barely had time to throw on his hoodie before Harry was tugging her off the bed, dragging her toward the closet.

“Oh, you have to be kidding me,” she hissed.

He just grinned, pushing the door open. “Get in.”

“Harry—”

“In, love.”

She barely had time to flip him off before he shut the door behind her, sealing her in darkness.

Y/N pressed a hand over her mouth to keep from laughing, crouched between his suitcases, her bare legs chilled by the cool air inside.

She could hear everything.

The door creaking open.

Harry’s voice, rough from sleep. “Morning.”

The assistant’s knowing tone. “You sound like shit.”

A pause.

Y/N could feel the smirk in Harry’s response. “Yeah, well. Long night.”

Her glare could have burned through the door.

From the other side, she heard rustling—probably his assistant rifling through a bag.

Then—

“Oh, and by the way? If you’re gonna sneak someone in, maybe don’t leave two pairs of shoes by the door next time.”

Silence.

Y/N’s stomach dropped.

Harry, to his credit, barely missed a beat.

“Right. Yeah. Noted.”

The door shut a moment later.

She barely had time to breathe before the closet door swung open, revealing Harry’s smug, dimpled grin.

“Next time,” he murmured, offering his hand to pull her up, “you’re hiding under the bed.”

Y/N smacked his chest.

And then kissed him.

It was meant to be quick—just a press of lips in playful retaliation—but Harry wasn’t one to let a moment slip away. His fingers curled around her waist, holding her there, deepening the kiss. It was languid, familiar, the kind of kiss that tasted like late nights and secrets, like comfort and hunger all at once.

She sighed against his mouth. “I should go.”

“I know.”

Neither of them moved.

It was only when the morning light began creeping through the curtains, spilling over their tangled limbs, that she forced herself to untangle from him. Harry stayed in bed, arm draped over his forehead, watching as she slipped into her jeans and pulled on his hoodie—her own top lost somewhere in the haze of the night before.

His voice was hoarse from sleep. “At least let me get you a car.”

“I’ll call one,” she assured him, raking her fingers through her messy hair.

Harry sat up then, brows knitting together. “Y/N—”

“I’ll be fine,” she interrupted, flashing him a small smile. She pressed a last kiss to his cheek, inhaled the warmth of his skin, and slipped out of the room.

And right into a camera flash.

The second she stepped onto the pavement, she knew.

The street wasn’t exactly swarming, but one paparazzo was enough. He was already snapping rapid shots, the sound of the shutter slicing through the dawn stillness like a guillotine. She didn’t run—that would make it worse. Instead, she pulled up the hood of Harry’s sweatshirt, kept her chin down, and slid into the waiting car.

Her phone buzzed before she even reached her apartment.

Maddie: Shit. Have you seen TMZ??

Y/N’s stomach twisted. She hadn’t even shut the door behind her before she was pulling up the link.

The headline screamed at her in bold print:

Y/N Nicks Spotted Leaving Harry Styles’ Home—Rock Royalty & Pop Prince?

Her pulse pounded as she scrolled. Dozens of pictures. Some from last night when they arrived separately at his house. Some from this morning, catching her in the same outfit.

And then the comments.

Not surprised. The tension in that interview was insane. She’s not even that famous wtf. Fleetwood Mac and One Direction crossover??? Didn’t she date that bassist last year? She’s literally wearing his hoodie. IT’S HAPPENING. Harry can do better tbh.

Her fingers tightened around the phone.

She should have known.

By noon, it was everywhere. Entertainment news, gossip sites, even actual journalists weighing in on the implications of her and Harry. She ignored the notifications, silenced her phone, but then came the email from her publicist.

And worse—Harry’s PR team.

We need to get ahead of this. No comment is best for now. We’re drafting a statement.

It was bullshit.

By mid-afternoon, she was at his house.

Harry was pacing the living room, phone in one hand, stress written all over his face. He looked up when she walked in, exhaling heavily. “They want me to deny it.”

Y/N’s breath caught. “What?”

“They think—” He dragged a hand through his curls. “They think we can ride it out, wait for something else to distract them. If we say nothing, it dies faster.”

Something bitter lodged itself in her throat. “Say nothing? Or lie?”

He hesitated. And that was enough.

“You said we were in this together,” she said, voice sharp.

“We are,” he insisted. “But you know how this works, Y/N. It’s different for me. The fans.”

Her laugh was hollow. “Oh, the fans.”

“That’s not—” He sighed, shaking his head. “You know what I mean.”

“No, Harry. I don’t.” She crossed her arms. “Because last I checked, I’m in this industry too. I’ve had my entire existence scrutinized since birth. Do you think I don’t know what it’s like to have people picking apart my every move?”

His jaw clenched.

She pressed on. “But I’m not ashamed of you. And I sure as hell don’t want to pretend this isn’t real just because some PR team is scared of a few bad headlines.”

“I’m not ashamed of you,” he said, voice low.

“Then why are you acting like you are?”

Silence.

Her heart hammered.

Finally, she exhaled shakily, voice barely above a whisper. “I want us to stop hiding. Please.”

He didn’t say anything.

And maybe that was her answer.

Y/N swallowed the lump in her throat, nodded once, and turned for the door.

The quiet thud of the door closing behind her felt heavier than it should have.

It wasn’t dramatic—no slamming, no storming out. Just the quiet finality of leaving.

And yet, it echoed.

She didn’t cry in the car. Didn’t cry when she got home. Didn’t even cry when she scrolled through Twitter and saw her name still trending, the discourse evolving by the hour.

What does Harry see in her anyway? She’s just another nepotism baby. She’s so private—does she think she’s better than his other exes? She’s clearly using him for clout. She’s lucky to have him, but he deserves someone who actually appreciates him.

Her fingers hovered over the screen before she locked her phone and tossed it onto the couch.

Let them talk. Let them spin their stories. It wasn’t like the truth mattered.

She went silent.

No Instagram stories, no late-night tweets, no cryptic lyrics. The press called it a calculated move, the fans called it suspicious, but in reality?

She just didn’t have the energy.

She slept too little and drank too much coffee. She ignored calls from her publicist. Ignored texts from mutual friends who wanted to check in but were probably just fishing for an inside scoop.

And Harry?

Harry didn’t reach out.

Not once.

Which, of all the things, hurt the most.

It had been three days.

She was at her mother’s house when it happened.

Stevie had always been able to tell when something was wrong, no matter how good Y/N thought she was at masking it. She hadn’t pried, though. Not yet. Instead, she let Y/N exist in the space, offering quiet company rather than questions.

But Y/N knew she wouldn’t escape forever.

That night, the house was quiet except for the hum of the wind outside. Stevie had gone to bed hours ago, leaving Y/N alone in the dimly lit living room, the grand piano standing in the corner like it was waiting for her.

She didn’t even realize she was walking toward it until her fingers brushed against the keys.

She sat down.

And she played.

It started as muscle memory, the chords slipping out in a familiar pattern, soft and haunting. The kind of song that lingered in the bones, that carried the weight of something unfinished.

"You could be my silver spring..."

The words came out quieter than she intended, but they were there.

"Blue-green colors flashing..."

Her voice wavered.

"I would be your only dream..."

Her fingers trembled over the keys, the melody filling the empty room.

"You will never be my lover..."

The tears slipped down her cheeks before she could stop them.

God.

She hadn’t cried. Not when the pictures leaked, not when the headlines turned ugly, not even when she walked away.

But here, under the weight of this song—her mother’s song—she broke.

She barely heard the footsteps approaching behind her.

But she felt the presence.

A hand, warm and familiar, rested gently on her shoulder.

She didn’t flinch. Didn’t stop playing.

Stevie sat down beside her on the bench, saying nothing.

She just listened.

And when Y/N’s hands finally fell away from the keys, when her head dropped forward and her shoulders shook with silent sobs, her mother reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Oh, baby," she murmured softly.

And that was all it took for Y/N to shatter completely.

She turned into her mother’s arms, hiding her face against her shoulder as the heartbreak spilled out in ways she hadn’t allowed before.

Stevie just held her.

She didn’t say I told you so, didn’t say you knew this would happen, didn’t say I warned you, love is messy in this business.

She just let her cry.

Because what was there to say?

Y/N had been willing to fight for this. She had been willing to face the noise, the scrutiny, the world dissecting her every move—for him.

And he hadn’t even reached for her when she walked away.

She had loved him. Had let herself believe, even just for a moment, that they could exist beyond the secrets, beyond the fear.

But maybe she had been wrong.

Maybe he was never hers to begin with.

Meanwhile...

Harry hadn’t slept.

He had spent the last three days running on autopilot, going through the motions of studio sessions and meetings, pretending like everything was fine when it wasn’t.

He had tried to tell himself that this was the right move. That letting the story die on its own was the best way to protect them both.

But nothing about this felt right.

He had checked his phone a hundred times, fingers hovering over her contact, but he never typed anything. What could he say? Sorry I didn’t fight for us? Sorry I let the fear win?

He wasn’t sure what finally pushed him over the edge. Maybe it was the lack of her name in his messages, the absence of her voice. Maybe it was the fact that he had spent years wanting her and only had days before she slipped away completely.

Or maybe it was the video.

It wasn’t even a full clip, just a fifteen-second snippet someone had posted online.

Y/N, at a piano. Playing Silver Springs.

It was grainy, the lighting dim, but he knew her silhouette anywhere.

And he knew what that song meant.

His stomach dropped.

Because suddenly, it wasn’t just the weight of the media or the PR teams or the fans that mattered.

It was her.

It had always been her.

And if he didn’t move now, if he didn’t do something, he was going to lose her for good.

The rain was relentless.

It hit the pavement in steady sheets, washing the city in silver streaks and the glow of streetlights. It soaked through Harry’s clothes, plastering his shirt to his skin, curling his hair against his forehead, dripping down his jaw like the storm itself was trying to pull him under.

But he didn’t care.

His heart was hammering, his chest tight with something wild and desperate as he stood in front of her door, fist poised to knock.

This was it.

No more hiding. No more silence. No more pretending like he could live without her.

His knuckles hit the wood. Once. Twice.

Nothing.

He swallowed hard, knocking again, harder this time, rainwater slipping down his wrist.

Still nothing.

His stomach clenched. What if she wasn’t here? What if she didn’t want to be here—what if she had already left, had already moved on—

The door swung open.

And there she was.

She stood barefoot in the doorway, an oversized sweatshirt hanging off one shoulder, her hair damp, like she’d just stepped out of the shower.

She hadn’t been expecting him. That much was obvious.

Her eyes widened, lips parting slightly as she took him in—the way his shirt clung to his chest, the way water dripped from his curls, the way his breath came ragged and uneven.

For a second, neither of them spoke.

Then—

“Fuck the PR,” he blurted, voice raw. “Fuck the headlines.”

She blinked.

“I love you.”

The words hit the air like a lightning strike, sharp and electric.

A breath. A pause. A crack in the silence.

The rain hadn’t let up.

It streaked down the windowpanes, tapping a steady rhythm against the glass, pooling in the crevices of the street outside. The air smelled like wet pavement and something electric, something on the verge of breaking.

He stood there in her doorway, dripping onto the hardwood floors, soaked to the bone. His shirt clung to him, darkened by the rain, molded to the sharp lines of his chest and the ridges of his stomach. Water curled at his jaw, trailing down the hollow of his throat. His breaths were heavy, ragged, like he’d run here in the downpour, like nothing in the world had mattered more than making it to this moment.

And she—

She just stared.

Chest rising and falling, lips slightly parted, fingers trembling at her sides.

Silence stretched between them, thick and weighted, every unspoken word, every unshed tear, every almost hanging in the space between their bodies.

Her fingers fisted in the damp collar of his shirt.

She yanked him inside.

The door slammed behind them, but neither of them noticed.

His back hit the wood, a sharp inhale punched from his lungs as she pressed against him. Their bodies were a tangle of heat and desperation, a collision of limbs and longing, the storm outside nothing compared to the one building between them.

Her hands slid up, skimming over his shoulders, gripping the nape of his neck, pulling.

Their mouths crashed together.

It was rough. Messy. Clumsy in the way only something utterly inevitable could be.

Her nails scraped against his scalp, and he groaned into her mouth, his fingers threading into her damp hair, tugging just enough to tip her head back. His lips slanted over hers, deepening the kiss, tasting her like he was starved for it.

She gasped when his mouth trailed lower, down the curve of her jaw, the column of her throat. He bit down, just enough to leave a mark, just enough to make her shudder against him.

Her hands fumbled at the buttons of his shirt, but the fabric was stuck to him, refusing to give. Frustration twisted her features.

“Off,” she demanded, voice breathless, thick with need.

He barely pulled back long enough to shove the wet fabric off his shoulders, letting it drop to the floor with a damp slap.

She pressed her palms against his bare chest, feeling the warmth of his skin, the erratic beat of his heart beneath her touch.

Then, she leaned in, running her tongue over the rain-slicked skin at his throat.

His whole body tensed.

“Jesus Christ,” he rasped.

Losing Control

They didn’t make it far.

They stumbled through the flat, hands desperate, mouths never parting, breathing each other in like oxygen.

Her sweatshirt was the next casualty, pulled up and over her head, landing somewhere behind them. His hands were on her skin instantly, fingers tracing the delicate lines of her spine, dragging down, down—gripping the back of her thighs and hoisting her up.

She gasped against his lips, legs wrapping around his waist.

He walked them backward, moving blindly, guided only by instinct and the sound of her breathing, the little whimpers she made when he kissed the hollow of her throat, the way her hips shifted against him.

They hit the couch.

She was weightless for a moment, air rushing from her lungs as he dropped her onto the cushions, hovering above her, chest heaving.

His hands spread over her bare thighs, sliding up, up, until his fingers hooked into the waistband of her shorts. He glanced up, meeting her gaze.

“I’ve wanted you since that first night,” he murmured, voice rough, wrecked.

Her breath caught.

A single heartbeat. A moment suspended in time.

Then she was tugging him down, capturing his mouth with hers.

Heat.

That was all she could feel.

The press of his body, the weight of him between her thighs, the scratch of his stubble against her skin as he kissed a path down her stomach.

Her nails raked down his back, catching at the waistband of his jeans, tugging. He groaned, the sound vibrating against her skin, his grip tightening on her hips as he pushed himself lower.

His lips ghosted over her navel, down further, until—

Her back arched, a sharp inhale punched from her lungs, a curse whispered into the air.

And then everything blurred.

A tangle of limbs, clothes stripped away piece by piece, moans swallowed in kisses, bodies moving together, frantic, unrestrained, the storm raging both outside and between them.

He pressed inside her with a shuddering breath, forehead dropping against hers, their hands gripping, clutching, desperate.

“Look at me,” he murmured, voice hoarse, raw with something deeper than lust.

She did.

And in that moment, it wasn’t just sex.

It was everything.

They collapsed against each other, breathless, bodies tangled.

Her cheek rested against his chest, his fingers tracing lazy circles over her bare spine.

The rain pattered softly against the window, but all she could hear was the steady rhythm of his heartbeat.

For a long moment, neither of them spoke.

Then, quietly—

“You didn’t stop me from walking away.”

He exhaled, his lips brushing over her temple. “I wanted to.”

She glanced up at him. “Then why didn’t you?”

His throat bobbed. “Because you deserved more than that.”

Her heart ached.

She shifted, fingers trailing over his jaw, over the curve of his mouth. “And now?”

His hand tightened on her waist.

“I’m done running.”

She stared at him for a beat.

Then, slowly, she smiled.

And when she kissed him, soft and lingering, he knew—

So was she.

The world could burn. The headlines could scream. The fans could theorize. The PR teams could scramble.

None of it mattered anymore.

Because they were done hiding.

They chose the timing.

They chose the words.

They chose each other.

The cameras were set up in a cozy, softly lit studio, with plush chairs and warm lighting that made everything feel a little less staged, a little more intimate. She sat beside him, their hands resting on the space between them—not quite touching, but close.

The interviewer, an older woman with kind eyes, smiled at them both.

“So,” she began, “I think it’s safe to say the world has been dying to know. What’s the truth?”

Harry exhaled a soft laugh, shaking his head. He glanced at Y/N, his dimples peeking out as he grinned, then looked back at the camera.

“The truth?” he repeated, voice playful, teasing.

She nudged him, a silent Behave.

He ignored it.

“Yeah,” he said, shrugging like it was the easiest thing in the world. “I’m in love with her. Always have been.”

The interviewer made a sound of delight. The world outside exploded.

She turned to Y/N, who was smiling so wide her cheeks ached.

“And you?” the interviewer asked gently.

Y/N looked at Harry.

He was already looking at her.

“I’m in love with him too,” she murmured. “Obviously.”

The arena was packed.

The energy in the air was electric, a chorus of cheers and music and flashing lights. The setlist was nearly done, the concert winding toward its final moments. But before the last song, Harry paused.

“Alright,” he murmured into the mic, stepping back from the center of the stage. “I’ve got something special for you all tonight.”

The crowd roared.

His eyes found her, standing just offstage, watching him with an amused smile.

And then—he extended his hand.

She hesitated.

Not because she didn’t want to. But because, for the first time, this wasn’t just between them. This was in front of thousands.

He must have seen it in her eyes, because he smiled—soft, reassuring, knowing. He wiggled his fingers, beckoning her.

“C’mon, love,” he said. “Duet?”

The audience screamed.

She laughed, shaking her head. “You’re ridiculous,” she mouthed.

But she took his hand.

The moment she stepped onto the stage, the noise doubled, an eruption of cheers and chants and camera flashes.

But none of it mattered.

Not when he was looking at her like that.

The first chords of the song played, slow and sweet, the melody wrapping around them like something sacred.

And then—

He lifted her hand, pressing a kiss to her knuckles.

Soft.

Lingering.

Devoted.

The crowd melted.

But in that moment, as the lights bathed them in gold, as their voices wove together, as their fingers stayed entwined—

It wasn’t about the world watching.

It was about them.

Because for once, it didn’t matter who was looking.

They had each other.

☆ ★ ✮ ★ ☆

Thank you so much for reading, you’re a total angel! Don’t forget to like, comment, and reblog if you enjoyed! It means everything to me! 💖

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[novelistwriter]

Patron of the Night

DP x DC Prompt

Those of Gotham have heard the tales of the Night Dweller, a mystical figure that was said to be seen roaming the streets of Gotham during the night, but when people try to get closer, the figure vanished. The tales described the figure as a woman who looks like she is in the Middle Ages. The Night Dweller was spotted again, but they aren't a woman, as they now resemble a young man with modernized Middle Ages clothing.

Danny, being the Ghost King, Ancient of Space, and now the City Spirit of Gotham, is resting in the caves beneath Wayne Manor, which is where Lady Gotham made her lair before she faded. The curses were too much to bear for her. Lady Gotham was a good friend to Danny during his early years as Ghost King. She was his Ghostly Mother when his own mom couldn't accept that he was a Halfa.

Danny had inherited the mantle of City Spirit from Lady Gotham when she handed him an item right before she faded before his eyes. He cried, cried for months as the loss of his Ghostly Mother, which put Gotham in a constant weather fluctuation where it was either rainstorms or thunderstorms happening for those months Danny had mourned.

Danny, an Immortal Halfa thanks to the Crown of Flames and the Ring of Rage, explores Gotham, getting a feel for the City his Mother loved dearly, and because he is in the City, his form had morphed into his City Spirit form, which resembles his Mother's look with some differences between his amd hers.

Danny has four forms now, his human form, his Phantom form, his Ghost King form, and now his City Spirit form. He knows about the Night Dweller tales, his mother told them to him herself.

"Those that have found my Lair, I would grant them my protection and a portion of my power. For I was the Patron of the Night to those who lived within my Haunt, and the Night would be the ally to those who I have blessed with my powers"

Danny remembers those words from his mother when he asked questions about the Night Dweller tales.

And now, years after the deaths of Martha and Thomas Wayne, a young adult Bruce Wayne stands before Danny in the Lair he inherited from his mother, asking Danny to train him (Danny doesn't know that Bruce found out about Danny through the young man's searching for teachers to train, as Danny bested Ra's and the rest of the League of Assassins, keeping them as a portion of his army for the Living side of the world, just in case that this world has its own form of the GIW).

[lionneee]

The Enemy

Masterlist

Taglist

English is not my first language, please be kind

Modern!MafiaBoss!Aemond x Ex!Fem!Reader

•Warnings: smut, taking of sexual themes, murder, non-con, knife play, mention of killing someone.•

“Yeah, baby —“ He breathed out as he moaned, looking down as you circled your hips against his cock. He slapped your ass and gripped your hips tightly, stopping your movements to start pointing into you from behind again, fast and hard, like he loves it.

“Baby — Yes, fuck me —“ You moaned as you arched your back, burying your face in the mattress.

“Fuck, baby —“ He growled as he squeezed your hips, his fingers digging in your skin as he thrusted faster, close to the end. You moaned louder as you started rubbing your clit, wanting to finish with him.

“Let me —“ He panted as he leaned down and slipped a hand between your legs, his fingers taking the place of yours, rubbing your clit furiously, making you aware of how close he really was.

“Fill me up —“ You moaned as you panted, trying to jerk your hips, moving them back to meet his thrusts.

“I’m going to, baby —“ He moaned as he moaned in your ear. “You’ll be fucking leaking -“ He moaned again, the image his words created in both your mind making you come on the spot.

You let yourself fall down on the mattress of his door room bed. 

Aemond sat back on his haunches, slipping carefully out of you, looking at his cum slowly leaking out of you.

You smile, satisfied as Aemond laid behind you, wrapping his arm around your middle, pulling you back against his chest as he smiled, kissing your shoulder sweetly.

“I love you so much.” He mumbled against your skin. You smiled even more as you caressed his arm with your hand.

“I love you too.” You hummed as you looked back at him, your lips joining immediately in a soft, slow kiss.

The room’s silence was broken by a harsh knock at the door, followed by Aemond’s sigh, a mix of amusement and annoyance.

“Yeah, yeah. We’ll be quiet next time.” Aemond exclaimed, raising his head towards the door.

You chuckled as you heard a string of curses from outside.

Aemond’s room-neighbor had complained already about the volume you kept during sex, just like this time.

All of you knew this wasn't the last time he would be coming.

Your last years at college was almost to an an end, but you and Aemond planned to fuck in these dorms a few more times.

It was memories like that that kept Aemond going in the prison.

He missed his girl.

He had been completely inebriated by her since the first time she saw her. She was sweet, soft, caring and gentle, something he had barely known in his life.

She was also funny, a bit sassy and beautiful.

She was also the sister to his number one rival family.

After his father’s death, the business went all in his hand, his father knew he was the best for the inheritance.

But he didn’t care. She didn’t care. She didn’t want to have anything to do with the mafia world, she wanted to stay out of it, and her brother was more than happy to let her.

It was just the two of them, her, and her brother Cregan, whose parents died in an accident during work.

Their relationship had to be a secret.

She knew her brother would have never allowed her to date him, and he had to keep his reputation solid and fearful.

She didn’t ask about his job, he didn’t tell her about it, they went on dates, they had sex, Gods, a lot of sex, and they just… lived their life.

That, until Cregan found out.

“You stay out of this!” Cregan shouted at her, as she sobbed, her back pressed against the wall of her house.

Cregan had a broken lip, his cheek was red, and probably there would have been a nasty bruise the day after. 

Both him and Aemond were painting as they stood in front of each other, looking at each other like lions ready to fight.

“Don’t talk to her like that!” Aemond quickly scolded Cregan, taking a step towards her. Cregan pulled out a gun and pointed it to him.

“Don’t you dare. Don’t take another step.” He growled.

“Cregan no!” She sobbed desperately, her face red, her cheeks completely wet, her eyes full of pain. “Please I love him!” She was begging him.

“No! I let you live your life, I gave you everything, I protected you, took care of you! And this is how you repay me?!” His voice was louder than thunder, and his face was scary.

She had never seen her brother like that, so furious.

“I didn’t choose to love him!” She sobbed back, her voice strained and weak.

“I don’t care! I don’t fucking care, you’re coming with me.” Cregan said as he grabbed her wrist, tugging her towards himself, his gun still pointing at Aemond, but he didn’t care.

Aemond took another step forward, but then Cregan raised his gun from his chest to his head, his eyes on him, his expression pure coldness.

She screamed and squirmed in the arms of her brother, trying desperately to reach for the gun, or Aemond.

“You won’t see her again. I swear to God if you try I’ll make your head blow with one of my bullets.” 

Aemond couldn’t fight more that day.

But he was going to get his revenge.

And his girl back.

“Dinner!” The guards shouted as they hit the metal doors of all the rooms with their sticks. Aemond grunted and pinched the bridge of his nose, the sound giving him an annoying headache, just like every morning.

He sighed and stood up, he washed his face in the sink and tied his hair back into a ponytail as his roommates got up too.

As the leader of the Targaryen family, he had a lot of friends here.

He was protected, not even the guards dare to touch him.

He guessed it was thanks to the nasty scar on his face.

And his name.

He took a deep breath as he leaned his head back, closing his eye.

“You’re so pretty.” Her naked body was laying beside him, her soft fingers were caressing his scarred cheek, her eyes fixed on the stone in his eye socket.

“You’re saying that out of pity.” He grunted as he turned his gaze from the ceiling to her.

“I’m not. I love your face. I could stare at you for hours.” She smiled as she bit her lip, her hand moving to caress his hair.

“Such a creep.” He huffed a laugh as he turned his body to the side to look at her better. He moved his hand to her breasts, looking at how her nipples perked at the mere touch of his fingers, how her breath would always hitch.

“Do you really think so?” He looked back up at her face. She smiled softly and nodded, caressing his face again.

“Gevie.” That words, his native language coming from her mouth was a massive turn on for him. He immediately crashed his lips against her and pulled her body close to him.

“Issa rūs.” He growled.

-My baby.-

Aemond shook his head to get himself back together, then he walked out of his cell to walk with all the other prisoners to the eating room.

He was always among his people every step he took, in his room, at his table, at his chores.

He rarely was alone.

The few times he was, he fucked his hand like a wild animal until it would be covered in cum.

All for her.

He always did everything for her.

“Cregan?” He could hear her voice through his phone, they spy hidden in her brother’s office offering a live audio of her voice.

Her sobs.

“Cregan?!” She shouted as she kept crying. 

He closed his eyes as he listened to her sobs. He could almost see her, kneeled beside the body of his brother.

At the moment, Cregan’s body counted three bullets.

He did it for her.

So they could get back together, live together.

God he had missed her so much.

He was tired of jerking off on her nudes, he needed the real thing.

“Cregan!” She shouted as she kept crying desperately. He heard some ruffling, something falling on the floor.

“My brother is dead!” She shouted. “M-my… Aemond Targaryen did it.”

He did it for her.

And she put him in handcuffs.

Days were long without her, and even more without anything about her body.

At least he managed to get one of her thongs in there.

But the scent almost faded.

“The plan is set, boss.” Jason, his left arm in the prison, said.

Aemond gave one nod as he looked down at his food.

Escape prison was easy.

He didn't do it earlier because he knew she needed time to recover from his brother’s death before she could focus back on him.

Placing a few pieces of evidence that would lead away from him and make up an alibi was like stealing candy from a baby.

His trial process was easy to finish, after all, they didn’t have true evidence that he killed Cregan, and his alibi was firm.

Turned out to be easier than ever.

With a smirk on his face he walked out of the front door of the prison, his jumpsuit replaced with a pair of black jeans and a black sweater.

He looked at his driver and got in the car.

“Let’s go get her.” He said as he made himself comfortable.

It was night when he broke into her house.

Actually, broke in was an euphemism, he owned the place.

She was living with his money, and she didn’t even know it.

He saw her on her bed. Her hair messy on the pillow, her mouth half open.

Her body was covered by the blanket.

She was beautiful.

He walked closer to her, caressing her face softly as he looked down at her sleeping form. 

She had always been a deep sleeper, it was hard to wake her up.

He was happy to learn it when he had a little something to take care of, one of the nights she slept at his house.

He slowly handcuffed one of her wrists, then he pulled her arm up, slowly, carefully, then he raised her other arm, and quickly handcuffed it to the headrest.

He walked slowly on the end of the bed, dragging her blanket with him, smiling as she saw her wearing both but a thin pajama.

He slowly moved her pants off, along with her panties.

He needed to taste her again.

His hands slowly moved her legs open, his head digging between her thighs.

He took a deep breath in, taking in her scent before licking her slightly, enough to have the taste on his tongue.

He had to bite back a moan as he pulled back slightly.

It had been so long since the last time he ate her out.

He’ll make sure he’ll have all the time in the world in the future.

What took him off guard, was her foot hitting his face at full force.

But still too weak.

He chuckled as he stumbled back. He stood up and looked down at her.

“I remember your brother teaching you to fight. He obviously failed, you wouldn’t scratch a man, baby.”

“Don’t call me like that, you bastard!” She shouted.

So feisty, just woken up.

“At least my brother taught me how to fight. And don’t you dare speak of him again!” She said as she tried to say up, but she quickly became aware of the handcuffs.

“You like those, baby?” He asked as he stood at the edge of the bed, nodding towards the handcuffs. “You know which one are those?” He smiled down at her. “The same one they used to handcuff me when you turned me in.” He sighed as he yanked the sheets completely off the bed.

“And for the record. I didn’t teach you how to fight, because you didn’t need to with me. I would have never let anything happen to you. I’m not letting anything happen to you.” He specified as he looked at her trying to get free of the handcuffs.

“I did this all for you. For us.” He said as he grabbed her ankles, her eyes snapping back at him. “We can be together now.”

“You killed my brother!” She screamed, trying to kick him again, but he simply chuckled, pinning her ankles down on the mattress.

“He spreaded us apart. He pointed a gun at my head.” He hissed.

“He never shooted!” She growled back. “He never would have!”

“And see what that brought you.” He moved her ankles apart. “You’re alone. Your business is shattered, I took it.” He said as he started tying one ankle to the foot of the bed.

“No, no!” She tried to get away, but it was useless.

“Why do you think you still have your money, baby?” He asked as he moved to tie the other ankle.

“Why do you think you’ve been spared by the destruction of your family business?”

“Fuck you. You psycho-“ She gritted her teeth as she found herself unable to move.

“Now now, no need for insults.” He crawled on top of her. “After all… I’m here to collect.” He grinned down at her. “You’re my war prize.”

“I’m not your anything.” She growled, but he didn’t even listen.

“We’re going to move away.” He said as he lifted her shirt, despite her trying to stop him by squirming harder.

He grabbed a handful of her soft boob, and leaned down to suck her nipple, his leg sliding between hers, his thigh pressing against her clit.

“Keep squirming.” He smiled against her, her movements making her grind against his thigh. She tugged at the handcuffs as she tried to lower her hands.

“You-“ She tugged again. “Killed-“ Again. “My brother!” She yelled as she started to cry. “You had no right! No right! He loved me!”

“Not as much as I do.” He said as he moved his hand between her legs, strolling her clit. “I might hate you for calling the police on me-“ He looked down at her cunt, then back up at her face, the tears running down the sides of her face. “But you are my woman. No one loves you more than I do.” He pulled his fingers back from her and pulled off a knife from the back of his pants and twisted easily in his hand.

He straddled her and pointed the knife to her throat.

“I would let this world burn for you. If you’d told me you don’t want to be on this earth anymore, I’d use all my power to find another planet to live on.” He leaned down, his face inches from hers. “And we’d repopulate it.”

“You’re crazy.” She said, her eyes filled with tears as she pressed her head against the pillow to get as far from the knife as possible. He licked the handle.

“About you, baby.” He turned the knife in his hand, the handle pressing against her skin, the blade against the skin of his hand. “You can ask me anything. Anything. I will give that to you.” He moved the handle down her body. “You just…” He moved the handle inside her, looking at her eyes widening at the intrusion. “… stay with me baby.” 

She looked away, turning her head to the side as Aemond started to move the knife slowly, caressing her inside walls with the rough material.

“Stop -“ She sobbed as she closed her eyes. She hated how her body was betraying her, feeling pleasure out of something so sick and wrong. “Stop, just stop.”

“You feel that too, uh?” He kept looking at her. “You feel this is right. That we belong together.”

She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood, fighting back sobs and the confusing mix of pain and pleasure coursing through her. "No, no, Aemond!" She whispered hoarsely, her voice shaking. "This is torture.” She said, desperate, hoping to at least gain his pity.

Aemond chuckled darkly, the sound sending shivers down her spine. "Torture? Is that what you call this?" He rocked the knife handle inside her gently, the crude motion stimulating her sensitive flesh. "Or perhaps...enlightenment?"

Her eyes flew open, wide with horror and revulsion. "Shut up!" She spat, struggling futilely against the restraints. "You're insane, Aemond. Fucking insane!"

Aemond smirked, enjoying the sight of her distress.

"Maybe I am." He admitted, his tone casual. "But doesn't that make what I'm doing even more brilliant? I'm rewriting reality for us both."

He began to thrust the handle deeper, faster, each stroke hitting that spot within her that made her toes curl as the blade started to cut his hand, but he didn’t seem to care. "You can deny it all you want, but your body knows the truth. It craves mine as much as I crave yours."

Her breath hitched, her hips bucking involuntarily against the handle. Tears streamed down her face, mingling with the blood from her bitten lip. "Please..." She whimpered, her voice barely audible over the pounding of her heart. "Stop, don’t do this to me..."

Despite her protests, she couldn't ignore the traitorous sensations building within her. The knife handle's coarse texture rubbing against her inner walls, the pressure and friction igniting a fire that spread through her core. 

She hated it, she hated the feeling of nostalgia, of happiness of having back at least part of her past, even in a maddening and sickening way.

Her thighs clenched, a moan escaping her lips before she could bite it back.

"See?" Aemond purred, his voice a seductive whisper. "Your body tells the truth, even if your mouth lies. You want this, baby. You need me."

Her gaze snapped to him, her eyes blazing with a mixture of fury and shame.

"You killed my brother!" She yelled again, hoping to get control of her body back with her

Aemond raised an eyebrow at her accusation, his expression unreadable. "Your brother was weak." He stated flatly. "He got in the way of my plans, and he paid the price."

The knife handle continued its relentless rhythm, each stroke pushing her closer to the edge. Aemond's free hand reached up to grip her chin, forcing her to meet his piercing gaze.

"You can hate me all you want, baby."

He punctuated his words with a particularly deep thrust, the blade scraping against her cervix.

Her vision blurred, her world narrowing to the searing pain and the overwhelming urge to surrender.

"Stop fighting it." Aemond commanded, his voice low and commanding. "Let go and accept that we are not separating again."

"I hate you." She groaned as her body arched from the bed. "I will never love you again."

Aemond smiled, a cold, calculated smile devoid of warmth or humanity. "You’re so pretty when you’re in denial, baby."

He increased the pace of the handle, driving it into her with brutal force. She screamed, her nails digging into the sheets as she struggled against the restraints. But Aemond held fast, his grip unyielding as he rode her through the agony and ecstasy.

"We are two sides of the same coin." He growled, his breath hot against her skin. "You cannot escape me, just as I cannot escape you. We are destined to be together."

With a final, vicious thrust, Aemond buried the handle to the hilt inside her.

Her scream cut off abruptly as the handle plunged deep, the sudden impact triggering a violent contraction within her. Waves of intense pleasure crashed over her, obliterating the pain and leaving her gasping for air.

For a moment, she hung suspended, lost in the overwhelming sensation. Then, with a strangled cry, she came undone, her body convulsing in a frenzy of release. The orgasm ripped through her like a tornado, making everything fade except pleasure.

As the aftershocks subsided, she lay limp and spent, her mind fogged by the intensity of what had just occurred. Through the haze, she felt Aemond withdraw the knife,  licked the knife handle and then discarded it carelessly on the floor with a satisfied smirk playing on his lips as he watched her body twitch and spasm through the aftermath of her climax.

Rising from the bed, he towered over her prone form, his imposing figure casting a shadow over her. "That's the power I hold over you." He murmured, his voice low and menacing. "The ability to reduce you to this - a broken, quivering mess, completely at my mercy." He smirked. "But you know I have much more power over you than just that. Even if you did manage to leave me, baby, please tell me.” He looked down at her. “Do you think you'll be able to live a normal life? Find someone new to love, have a life with him, a future, fuck him?” He laughed as he shook his head. “No, baby. I love you. And I’m not letting you go. Ever."

Her chest heaved with ragged breaths as she stared up at Aemond, her eyes glazed and unfocused. The echoes of her intense orgasm still resonated through her body, leaving her feeling raw and exposed.

She wanted to lash out, to spit venom at him for his cruel words and actions. But the strength had been drained from her, leaving only a hollow shell. All she could manage was a pitiful whine as he loomed over her.

"I-I won't..." She whispered. "I won't ever be yours, Aemond. Never." She hissed evilly, but he simply chuckled as he started to pull down his pants.

Aemond chuckled darkly, amused by her futile defiance. He reached down and grasped a fistful of her hair, yanking her head back to expose the vulnerable column of her throat.

“We’ll see about that.” He whispered in her ear as he settled comfortably between her legs.

He lined up his throbbing cock with her entrance and thrusted to the hilt, stretching her tight core around his thick length.

“Take it, you feisty little bitch.” He smiled. “I still remember everything you like, you know that right?” He looked down at her, watching her discomfort as she struggled to adjust. “I know you. And I’ll make you feel so fucking good, baby.” He set a punishing pace, pounding into her relentlessly, moaning and closing his eye for a moment as he savoured the feeling of having her walls being stretched out from him again.

“Scream all you want. No one's coming to save you from my cock.” He reached around to fondle her clit, rubbing the sensitive nub in time with his brutal strokes.

She yelled, her tits kept bouncing against his chest with every thrust, but he reveled in her cries, the sound music to his ears as he rutted into her like an animal.

He picked up speed, his heavy balls slapping against her ass with each powerful thrust.

“You love this, don't you? Love being fucked raw by me.” He moaned as he felt her pussy clench. “You’ve always loved it, when I treated you like you could never break, unlike everyone else did.” He leaned down to bite and suck at her nipples, adding to her torment and pleasure. “And you still do. Just like you love me.”

She clenched her hands into fists, squeezing her eyes closed as the nostalgia of their past ate her alive.

"Fuck you – I don’t love you!" She gritted her teeth.

He pulled back slightly, just enough to look into her eyes as he drove into her again.

“Oh, keep telling yourself that, baby.” He grinned, a hint of pride in his voice. “Your tight little cunt is gripping me so fucking tight – it knows exactly what it's missing without a real man's cock.” He reached down to rub her clit harder, determined to make her come on his cock.

“Admit it, baby. You're loving every second of this.”

His hips snapped forward, hitting that sweet spot inside her that made her gasp and clench around him.

"I'll never come for you." She growled.

He chuckled, a dark and sinister sound that echoed through the room. “Oh, you will. You're so close, I can feel it.” He pinched her clit roughly, trying to force her to orgasm and pounded into her harder, faster, reveling in the feeling of her tight walls squeezing him.

“There’s no more escaping this. No more sending me away -” His voice was strained by pleasure, he wasn’t even trying to control his sounds, moaning shamelessly.

“I-I hate you –” She said as she felt herself treading on the edge of her orgasm. “I’ll never love you again, you’re trash  to me.”

He smirked at her defiant words, finding them only more arousing.

“Keep telling yourself that, sweetheart. But it’s not your body that betrays you.” He could feel her getting closer to the edge, her pussy fluttering around his shaft. “It’s your mind.” He thrusted especially hard, grinding against her cervix.

“Cum for me, baby. Now”. He demanded, his voice low and authoritative.

She shook her head defiantly, even as her body betrayed her, trembling on the brink of climax.

“Never... I won't…” Her words dissolved into a moan as he hit a particularly sensitive spot inside her. “F-fuck!”

Despite her best efforts, she could feel herself hurtling towards orgasm, her pussy clenching rhythmically around his pistoning cock. The stimulation to her clit combined with his commanding presence proved too much to resist.

“No – ” She cried out as she came undone, her vision whiting out from the intensity of her release.

Her inner walls spasmed almost violently around him, milking his shaft for all it was worth.

“Aem -” His name slipped past her lips unbidden as wave after wave of pleasure crashed over her.

He groaned in satisfaction as he felt her pussy clamp down on him like a vice, her juices flooding his cock and dripping down his balls. “That's it, cum for me – ” His voice suddenly soft as he continued to pound into her through her orgasm, prolonging her pleasure and using her spasming walls to bring himself closer to the edge.

“Fuck, you feel amazing.” With a final, deep thrust, he buried himself to the hilt and let out a guttural moan as he started to cum. He grunted, shooting thick ropes of hot seed deep into her womb as he filled her to the brim with his potent release.

They didn’t move for a while, catching their breaths after the intense encounter, but as soon as she bursted into tears Aemond immediately hugged her, freeing her wrists.

“Shhh, I’m here, baby -” He whispered in her ear as he caressed her hair, keeping her close, but she kept crying harder.

She couldn't help herself, even if he killed his brother, a part of her will always welcome Aemond, desperate for the old sense of stability that she had been seeking since it all went down.

Since her brother tore her away from Aemond.

Because that was the moment she felt like dying the most, and she felt the worst sister in the world for that.

So she cried, hoping those feelings would just flow out with her tears.

She hated Aemond, but not because he killed her brother, she hated him because he was still the love of her life, despite everything.

Because she tried to move on, desperately, she wanted to run away from her feelings for him, but every time she managed to find someone interesting she would feel guilty, she would feel like she was in the wrong place, like she was doing everything wrong, and she couldn’t fix it.

“I hate you.” She sobbed as she wrapped her arms around him tightly.

“I know.” He pressed his forehead against her temple. “I’ll fix it.”

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[togglesbloggle]

For the Reverse Unpopular Opinion meme, Lamarckism!

(This is an excellent ask.)

Lamarck got done a bit dirty by the textbooks, as one so often is. He's billed as the guy who articulated an evolutionary theory of inherited characteristics, inevitably set up as an opponent made of straw for Darwin to knock down. The example I recall my own teachers using in grade school was the idea that a giraffe would strain to reach the highest branches of a tree, and as a result, its offspring would be born with slightly longer necks. Ha-ha-ha, isn't-that-silly, isn't natural selection so much more sensible?

But the thing is, this wasn't his idea, not even close. People have been running with ideas like that since antiquity at least. What Lamarck did was to systematize that claim, in the context of a wider and much more interesting theory.

Lamarck was born in to an era where natural philosophy was slowly giving way to Baconian science in the modern sense- that strange, eighteenth century, the one caught in an uneasy tension between Newton the alchemist and Darwin the naturalist. This is the century of Ben Franklin and his key and his kite, and the awed discovery that this "electricity" business was somehow involved in living organisms- the discovery that paved the way for Shelley's Frankenstein. This was the era when alchemy was fighting its last desperate battles with chemistry, when the division between 'organic' and 'inorganic' chemistry was fundamental- the first synthesis of organic molecules in the laboratory wouldn't occur until 1828, the year before Lamarck's death. We do not have atoms, not yet. Mendel and genetics are still more than a century away; we won't even have cells for another half-century or more.

Lamarck stepped in to that strange moment. I don't think he was a bold revolutionary, really, or had much interest in being one. He was profoundly interested in the structure and relationships between species, and when we're not using him as a punching bag in grade schools, some people manage to remember that he was a banging good taxonomist, and made real progress in the classification of invertebrates. He started life believing in the total immutability of species, but later was convinced that evolution really was occurring- not because somebody taught him in the classroom, or because it was the accepted wisdom of the time, but through deep, continued exposure to nature itself. He was convinced by the evidence of his senses.

(Mostly snails.)

His problem was complexity. When he'd been working as a botanist, he had this neat little idea to order organisms by complexity, starting with the grubbiest, saddest little seaweed or fern, up through lovely flowering plants. This was not an evolutionary theory, just an organizing structure; essentially, just a sort of museum display. But when he was asked to do the same thing with invertebrates, he realized rather quickly that this task had problems. A linear sorting from simple to complex seemed embarrassingly artificial, because it elided too many different kinds of complexity, and ignored obvious similarities and shared characteristics.

When he went back to the drawing board, he found better organizing schema; you'd recognize them today. There were hierarchies, nested identities. Simple forms with only basic, shared anatomical patterns, each functioning as a sort of superset implying more complex groups within it, defined additively by the addition of new organs or structures in the body. He'd made a taxonomic tree.

Even more shockingly, he realized something deep and true in what he was looking at: this wasn't just an abstract mapping of invertebrates to a conceptual diagram of their structures. This was a map in time. Complexities in invertebrates- in all organisms!- must have been accumulating in simpler forms, such that the most complicated organisms were also the youngest.

This is the essential revolution of Lamarckian evolution, not the inherited characteristics thing. His theory, in its full accounting, is actually quite elaborate. Summarized slightly less badly than it is in your grade school classroom (though still pretty badly, I'm by no means an expert on this stuff), it looks something like this:

As we all know, animals and plants are sometimes generated ex nihilo in different places, like maggots spontaneously appearing in middens. However, the spontaneous generation of life is much weaker than we have supposed; it can only result in the most basic, simple organisms (e.g. polyps). All the dizzying complexity we see in the world around us must have happened iteratively, in a sequence over time that operated on inheritance between one organism and its descendants.

As we all know, living things are dynamic in relation to inorganic matter, and this vital power includes an occasional tendency to gain in complexity. However, this tendency is not a spiritual or supernatural effect; it's a function of natural, material processes working over time. Probably this has something to do with fluids such as 'heat' and 'electricity' which are known to concentrate in living tissues. When features appear spontaneously in an organism, that should be understood as an intrinsic propensity of the organism itself, rather than being caused by the environment or by a divine entity. There is a specific, definite, and historically contingent pattern in which new features can appear in existing organisms.

As we all know, using different tissue groups more causes them to be expressed more in your descendants, and disuse weakens them in the same way. However, this is not a major feature in the development of new organic complexity, since it could only move 'laterally' on the complexity ladder and will never create new organs or tissue groups. At most, you might see lineages move from ape-like to human-like or vice versa, or between different types of birds or something; it's an adaptive tendency that helps organisms thrive in different environments. In species will less sophisticated neural systems, this will be even less flexible, because they can't supplement it with willpower the way that complex vertebrates can.

Lamarck isn't messing around here; this is a real, genuinely interesting model of the world. And what I think I'm prepared to argue here is that Lamarck's biggest errors aren't his. He has his own blind spots and mistakes, certainly. The focus on complexity is... fraught, at a minimum. But again and again, what really bites him in the ass is just his failure to break with his inherited assumptions enough. The parts of this that are actually Lamarckian, that is, are the ideas of Lamarck, are very clearly groping towards a recognizable kind of proto-evolutionary theory.

What makes Lamarck a punching bag in grade-school classes today is the same thing that made it interesting; it's that it was the best and most scientific explanation of biological complexity available at the time. It was the theory to beat, the one that had edged out all the other competitors and emerged as the most useful framework of the era. And precisely none of that complexity makes it in to our textbooks; they use "Lamarckianism" to refer to arguments made by freaking Aristotle, and which Lamarck himself accepted but de-emphasized as subordinate processes. What's even worse, Darwin didn't reject this mechanism either. Darwin was totally on board with the idea as a possible adaptive tendency; he just didn't particularly need it for his theory.

Lamarck had nothing. Not genetics, not chromosomes, not cells, not atomic theory. Geology was a hot new thing! Heat was a liquid! What Lamarck had was snails. And on the basis of snails, Lamarck deduced a profound theory of complexity emerging over time, of the biosphere as a(n al)chemical process rather than a divine pageant, of gradual adaptation punctuated by rapid innovation. That's incredible.

There's a lot of falsehood in the Lamarckian theory of evolution, and it never managed to entirely throw off the sloppy magical thinking of what came before. But his achievement was to approach biology and taxonomy with a profound scientific curiosity, and to improve and clarify our thinking about those subjects so dramatically that a theory of biology could finally, triumphantly, be proven wrong. Lamarck is falsifiable. That is a victory of the highest order.