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shurisneakers · 3 years

Text

harmless (ix)

Summary: Bucky volunteers to go stop a small time villain, but nothing can prepare him for what exactly he has to deal with. (Bucky x villain!reader, drabble series)

Warnings: cursing, sex jokes, frustrated bucky, dramatic reader, anxiety

Word count: 3.9k

A/N: a lot of requests came in last week, so cool and thank you for sending them in!! i’ll try my best to write them if they weren’t originally what i had planned for this series bc they’re so cute kfjdghdf. also hey shoutout to @i-reblog-fics-i-like for suggesting the backstory thing!

here’s my ko-fi if you’d like to support my writing <333

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Somehow it bypasses Bucky’s spam folder and is in his primary email. SHIELD tech is too advanced to let fake mails like this reach him and this doesn’t make sense. Unless it was one of the stupid dating websites he signed up for.

Leaving aside the obvious typo in the subject, he clicks on it, hoping it doesn’t unleash a virus onto his computer.

He’s instead greeted with a poorly Photoshopped picture of you at a bar with a martini in your hand. He doesn’t have to look too hard to see that the martini is, in fact, an emoji. Off to a terrible start already.

Right beside it is an even worse image, an imitation of an early Internet chat box.

Harbinger of Doom just sent you a message!

Come to the empty lot near lair. Bring goggles. 😩💦

Decline/Accept

He wants to strangle you.

______

“Why did you curse my eyes so early in the morning?” He spots you at the top of the lair, speaking loudly so that it hopefully reached you.

“What?” you yell back down instead. “If you’re saying something, I can’t hear you.”

He rolls his eyes. He pulls his phone from his pocket and presses on your contact.

He watches the look of confusion morph into one of slight surprise when you reach into your pocket and pull out your call.

“Don’t ever send an image like that to me again,” he says directly.

“If that one image is too much for you, how will we ever make our sex tape?”

His mouth opens and shuts like goddamn fish.

He can hear your laughter even without the phone.

“First of all- stop laughing- first of all, a sex tape is never going to happen. Second of all, I have a debriefing to go to, we need to make this quick.”

He holds up a finger when he sees you begin to say something. By the look of trouble painted all over your face, he knows it’s going to be a dumb innuendo.

“Thirdly, why are you standing there?”

“I watched The Last Airbender,” you say once your cackling dies down.

“I like that show.” He did. Peter sometimes watched it when he came over and Bucky more often than not joined in.

“I know, you told me.”

Oh.

“Okay, what now?”

“Put your goggles on.” You take one step towards the ledge.

“What are you doing?” The goggles don’t do anything to shield him from the sun, considering that they’re not tinted. Maybe he could invest in those.

You send him a smile, taking a step further. His walk towards the building turns into a jog, then a sprint when you’re basically standing on the edge.

You spread your arms out like Jesus Christ himself before flinging yourself off the building. His stomach drops.

His phone falls to the ground, discarded to the side as he sprints to break your landing.

It never comes.

Instead, a gust of wind smacks him in the face, forcing him a few steps backwards.

“I am now an air bender.” your eyes shone. “Kind of.”

Just like that, the show was ruined.

He wipes the dust on from his glasses that he now understands why you made him wear. Considerate, for a person who nearly just gave him a heart attack.

“Why.” It’s not even a question, just a statement.

“You know how the Tower has a giant ‘A’ on the side?”

He stares at you.

“I‘m gonna spray paint ‘asshole’ on the side of it.”

Pepper would not like that.

“That’s not even evil.”

“Yeah, but it’d annoy your super friends,” You do a flip midair, testing out the repulsors that were tied around your palms, “and I’m the voice of the people.”

You’re too high for him to reach. He doesn’t have his tools, or anything useful on him considering that he never had to use them before. He couldn’t even launch himself at you from the side of the building because you’d just move out of the way. He could jump really high but it would just have the same consequence.

He could talk and keep you distracted but that worked once, it wouldn’t again. At least not for long.

Fuck, he really had only one option.

He leaves you to do your somersaults and turns, walking over to where he dropped his phone. It’s an upgrade from the brick he was using a while ago, but not a high end Stark model. A smartphone, but barely.

He sighs, punching in the number and holding it up to his ear.

“Who are you calling?” you yell from above him.

“Go back to your shitty aerobics,” he yells back.

You pause for a second. “Was that a fucking pun, James Bar-”

The dial tone ends when someone picks up. He diverts his attention back to the call.

“Hey man, I-

“No.”

“You didn’t even let me finish.”

“It’s probably something stupid,” Sam doesn’t even sound annoyed, just uninterested.

“I need your wings.”

“I was right. Bye.”

It was a long shot anyway.

“Fuckin’ hold on a second.” He sees you disintegrate a concrete block by having it drop from the air. “You come here and fix this, then. She’s air bending now.”

“...like Avatar?” Sam unsurprisingly got the reference.

Peter’s interests were usually shared by everyone in the Tower, just because they had to compensate for the teasing he had to endure. It led to a lot of geeky documentaries and occasional musicals. Bucky wouldn’t be caught dead humming songs from Thoroughly Modern Millie under his breath.

“Yeah.”

“You want me to come and fight your girlfriend,” he says slowly.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Bucky urges, “and yes, I need help. Can’t exactly reach her when she’s twenty feet above me.”

“We have a briefing in 30 minutes. Why did you even go there today?”

He doesn’t know how to answer that. Just looks up at you smacking one of the repulsors against your thigh when it sputters for a second. It’s tradition.

“Well?” Bucky ignores his question.

“Fine,” Sam’s voice is distant for a second as he agrees. “Clint’s asking if he can come too.”

“Fuck no.” One of them was more than enough and Sam was way better at negotiation.

He hears a faint profanity from who he assumed was Clint before the call cuts.

He takes a seat on the ground and waits.

“You’re not going to make any effort to stop me?” You have your arms pressed to your side, palms pointed downwards to keep you afloat.

“I could just throw things at you again.” He makes a mention towards the small pebbles.

“I will fuck you up if you even try,” you warn. He lifts his arms in surrender. “So that’s it. You’re just going to sit there.”

“To be honest, I couldn’t care less if you painted the building,” he says with the least amount of interest he could muster, not that that was very hard.

“Do you not like your team?”

“I do.” He isn’t lying. “But they’re little shits.”

“I can draw a couple of dicks on their window, no problem,” you say offhandedly.

He looks up at you through his fingers. “That won’t be required.”

Although it was appreciated.

“Cool, so then I’m gonna go.” You make a mention of the utility belt on your waist. He looks at the many spray cans that decorate it.

“What colour are you going with?” he interrupts quickly. Fuckin’ Sam. What was the point of wings if he couldn’t get here in 2 minutes?

“Red, probably.” You look down. “I got purple and white just in case.”

“Building’s dark, red is good.”

“You really don’t care, do you?” You lower yourself down to the ground, a few feet ahead of him. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing.” For fucks’ sake, Sam. “You really don’t like superheroes, do you?”

“I don’t have anything against them.”

“Then why do you do this every week?”

This was wading into personal territory and he did not like it.

“Well.” Your eyebrows knit together. “Because I want to. It’s fun.”

“No other reason?”

“Do I need to have another reason?” You push your palm downwards, sending you back up into the air. “Can’t I just be evil because I want to?”

“Sure,” he says. He’s heard worse reasons. “Why not?”

“Besides, if you think I don’t like superheroes then you should meet Jake.”

“Who’s Jake?” He hadn’t ever heard you mention him before because he’d remember if you had.

“My roommate.”

“I didn’t see him when I came over.”

“That’s because we’re not conjoined at the hip.” It takes you a second to stabilise. “Besides, he grabbed the water while I got the bracelet but he refused to come say hi.”

Bucky looked down at his wrist. It was still there. He found himself fidgeting with it more often than not.

“He hates superheroes?”

“He has a valid reason.” Your eyes widen in worry when your head suddenly dips.

“What is it?” He knows the height at which you’re at isn’t very dangerous but if need be, he’s close by.

“Come find out.” Your eyes shone mischievously. “But yeah, no reason for me to be evil.”

“Not even a tragic backstory?”

“None. But if you want it, I can give you one, Barnes.” You test the waters, seeing how long you can lie horizontally. “Can’t promise you’ll like it though.”

“Try me.” He has time to kill. He’s a good listener.

“Well, it all started with my family- a troop of gorillas.” You flip over to lie on your back. “They practically raised me, they did. Until my gorilla mother died and I was all but consumed by grief and-”

“Your mother was a gorilla?” He entertains the notion.

“Or was it my father?” you ask thoughtfully. “I don’t know, I don’t remember. Anyway, I met a-”

“Just to clarify, none of this is real, right?” he interjects.

You stare at him. He stares at you.

“Bucky, that’s the plot of Tarzan,” you say slowly, “or at least whatever I remember of it... which I’m beginning to realise isn’t much.”

“Just clarifying.” He leans back again.

“Anyway so then when my mother, the deer-”

“Gorilla.”

“Whatever. Was killed, I escaped to some place-”

“Where?”

“Somewhere. And I stayed with these seven men-”

“Why seven?” He actually remembers watching this movie with his sister when it came out. An early memory, a bit faded. He remembers how long he saved up for the ticket.

“Because character development. And then I realised the reason my life was so weird was because there was a rat controlling me by pulling on my hair-”

“What the fuc-”

“If you ask any more questions, I’m going to stop.”

Bucky blinks at you. “So that’s your backstory.”

“Raw and uncut, baby.”

“Just to get this straight, your mother, the gorilla deer-”

“Witch.”

“Huh?”

“She was a witch who stole my hair.”

“Wha-”

He’s interrupted by the giant shadow cast by something that flies overhead.

Fucking finally.

He doesn’t even have to look up. Sam does a small glide to the ground, landing gracefully beside him.

Bucky finds you speechless but straightened up from your earlier posture.

“Buck,” Sam greets him.

“Sam,” he says in return, getting up from his place.

A grin spreads across your face. “Mr. Sam Wilson. No way.”

“You’re Y/N, I’m assuming?” Sam offers, posture relaxed. He clearly wasn’t here to fight.

“The one and only.” You tear your eyes away from Sam to glare at Bucky. “Barnes, if you had told me we were expecting guests, I would have dressed better.”

Bucky furrows his eyebrows in suspicion at you. You’d dress up for Sam.

You dressed up like a suburban tourist dad for him. He was feeling the offence incoming.

“Can’t count on him to be useful in any situation.” Alright, he did not call Sam just to have the both of you team up against him.

“Normally I’d agree with you but he did just invite you here, so...” you trail off, looking at Sam expectantly.

What the shit.

Sam smirks. Bucky switches rapidly back and forth between the both of you.

“I see why Buck keeps coming back every week.” It doesn’t take long for him to catch on, enlisting a feeling of triumph from you.

“I can’t see why he doesn’t just stay at home everyday if this is the view.” You gesture to him.

This is not what Bucky wanted.

“Okay,” Bucky interrupts, “what is going on here?”

“Pure chemistry, I’d say.” You’re half tempted to bite your lip to seal the deal.

“I agree.” Sam just nods, completely and utterly serious.

You think that you’ll give him a gift basket just for playing along despite meeting you for the first time at that moment.

“Get a room.” Bucky rolls his eyes.

“Maybe we will.” You tap your finger against your lip in thought. “How do you feel about Indian food, Sam?”

“Very positively.”

Bucky grits his teeth. “If you’re not planning to spray paint the Tower, can you just hand over the repulsers so we can go home for the day?”

You let out a small tsk in disapproval. “See what I have to deal with?”

“Can’t imagine how you do it every weekend,” Sam says dryly, not wasting a second in replying.

“Hello?” Bucky waves his arm around. “She’s the villain here.”

“Your face is the villain here.” You tear your eyes away from Sam only to glare at him. “He won’t even wear a cape. Why am I the only one who brings their A-Game every week?”

“Sam just get the damn-”

“You should wear a cape, man.” Bucky’s absolutely sure that even Sam knows it’s a ridiculous idea.

“I’m not wearing a fuckin’ cape,” he grumbles.

“What are your thoughts on swords, then?” Your finger finds a place under your chin in deep contemplation. “You’d look great with a sword.”

Bucky buries his face in his palms. “Sam, for the love of God.”

“Okay, alright.” Sam finally gives in with a small chuckle. He runs a few steps to get a small head start before launching himself into the air, whizzing past your levitating figure. He does a neat little flip midair before matching your height.

Showoff.

“How difficult are you gonna make this, Wilson?” you ask, a smirk on your face.

“Jesus Christ.” Bucky exhales, looking at the both of you through his goggles.

“What’s your play here?” Sam calls out loudly.

“Was gonna spray paint ‘asshole’ on the side of the Tower.”

“After the ‘A’?”

“After the ‘A’,” you confirm.

“Now that’s too small,” Sam tutted. “You gotta think bigger. Paint the whole Tower.”

“Sam!” Bucky looks horrified.

“Hmm.” You look like you’re considering it. “Don’t have enough paint for that though.”

“You’re an evil genius, right?” Sam casts a small glance at Bucky. “At least that’s what he tells me.”

“You talk about me?” You grin at the disgruntled man on the ground.

“I don’t,” he mutters, shaking his head. A lie.

“Yeah, so build something,” Sam points out. “Get some more paint. I’ll even tell you the best vantage points to spill it.”

“No, he won’t,” Bucky shouts from below.

“He’s just cranky because he didn’t get his prune juice this morning, ignore him,” Sam dismisses him.

Prune juice? He was a young 100, not ancient.

“What’s your favourite colour, Falcon?”

“I like red.”

As annoyed as Bucky is right now, he stores that away in his memory for later. He also knows Sam loves seafood and a good pair of shoes.

“A couple of gallons of red paint it is, then.” You lower yourself to the ground, Sam slowly follows suit until he lands beside Bucky.

“You know we can’t let you go without taking those, right?” Bucky tilts his head towards your invention.

You narrow your eyes at him. He doesn’t budge.

“I’ll tell ya what,” Sam pipes in instead. “I’ll keep them until you finish getting the paint and once you’re done, we’ll make an evening out of vandalising the Tower.”

Bucky may not enjoy his company all that much but he admires Sam’s diplomacy. Of course, you would never make it this easy while reasoning with him.

“That a promise, Mr. Wilson?” You raise your eyebrow at him questioningly but are already in the process of removing the things from your hand.

“Wouldn’t ever lie to you, doll.” He holds up his hand in a mock swear.

You walk towards Bucky and him, rotating your wrists to get rid of the soreness. “Bold claim for a man who met me ten minutes ago.”

“Feels like it’s been longer.” He sends you a wink and you can’t stop the laugh the escapes from you finally.

Bucky holds his hand out for the gadgets. You shrink away from him with a click of your tongue.

“Technically, he takes this round.” You send a nod towards Sam, dropping off the repulsors into his hand. “So he gets it.”

Bucky rolls his eyes.

“You gonna keep ‘em safe?” you ask Sam, this time a little more earnestly.

“Guard it with my life,” he says seriously, pressing his lips together in a line to avoid smiling.

“You’re both ridiculous,” Bucky cuts in.

“You’re going to be late.” Sam tucks the devices into his pocket safely. “You know how Steve gets when people walk in on his speeches. Do you even have a ride?”

“Got the motorcycle.”

“See you there.” Sam nods.

“Save me a place,” Bucky says to him.

“No.” He doesn’t even hesitate. “Y/N. It was a pleasure.”

“Still holding you to that evening, Sam.” You send him a smile.

“I’m countin’ on it.” He gives you a small three finger salute before taking off, leaving you staring after his retracting figure.

When the dust settles, Bucky awkwardly clears his throat. “Right. So that was that.”

“Dude,” you let out an exhale. “he’s so hot.”

He murmurs something unintelligible. It vaguely sounds like a series of threats but mostly a list of complaints.

“Don’t you have a meeting to get to?” You turn your attention back to him.

“Yeah.”

“Aren’t you going to be late?” You glance at the clock on your phone.

“I’ll just tell them I was on a mission.” Well, sort of. “Besides, what are they gonna do? Kick me out?”

“Fair enough.” You shrug. “Have a safe ride back.”

From what he knows of you and Sam, the both of you were kidding around. But he could never be too sure. He can’t even ask if you were serious about the entire thing because it’s none of his business.

Were the implications of having his mortal nemesis and other mortal nemesis date important enough to overrule that?

“Are you planning to skip your meeting, or?” you ask when he remains freezes in his spot, eyes glazed over like he’s thinking about something. “Because if you are, I know this great Thai place-”

“Don’t do that again,” he says instead, shaking his head to jolt him out of his thoughts.

“What?”

“Flinging yourself off roofs like that.”

“Why?” Because it scared the hell out of him, for one.

“Just don’t.”

“Oh please, like you’ve never done dangerous shit like that before.” You narrow your eyes at him, reading his face. “Are you telling me you care about me?”

“No.” His nose twitches. “Just don’t throw yourself off buildings when I’m around.”

“What about when you’re not?”

“As long as I’m not there to witness it.” He shrugs, spinning on his heel to leave. Technically he preferred if you didn’t do things like that at all.

“Fine. I’ll just have my clone try out all the dangerous stuff for me.”

He stops in his tracks. “You have a clone?”

“Well,” You squint, “no. But I’m working on it.”

He scoffs, shaking his head. “Bye Y/N.”

“You know, it sounds an awful lot like you’re saying we’re friends.” Your whole demeanour changes and he already knows what’s coming.

“I never said that,” he argues vehemently. “All I said was that I can’t have your murder on my hands.”

“Thus implying that we’re friends. In a fucked up, enemies kind of way.” You positively beam at him. “Aw, Barnes, that’s adorable.”

Adorable? Adorable?

“I hate you.”

“I love you, too, bestie,” you gush, dumb grin on your face. “I’ll make us friendship rings next time. What are your thoughts on matching tattoos?”

He wants to cry.

______

By the time Sam walks into the meeting room, the session’s already begun. He shoots an apologetic look to a monologuing Steve before taking his place at the nearest chair available.

Something sharp pokes his thigh. His wings are off and in the backpack beside him, but then he remembers your little inventions that were still in his pocket.

He tries not to make much of a noise while he pulls them out, giving them a look over to make sure they’re not broken.

“Watcha got there, Big Bird?” Tony asks lowly from beside him.

“Something that Barnes’ enemy made.” Sam holds it up slightly.

“The one he’s been rendezvousing around town with every weekend?”

“That’s her.” He’s about to put it in his backpack when Tony stops him.

“Pass that here for a second.” He recognises it immediately for what it is, interest piqued.

Sam hands one of them over while he puts the other back in the bag. It’s a metallic circle, not bigger than Tony’s palm, with a thick leather strap to tie it around your palm.

“She made this?”

“Why don’t you ask him?” Sam mentions towards Bucky who silently slips into the conference room, standing in the corner near the potted plant since there were no more chairs left.

“The balance has gotta be off on this thing,” he mutters to himself, wholly ignoring the brooding man standing in the corner like a Christmas tree.

“She seemed to be manoeuvring it fine,” Sam catches the eye of a lower ranking agent who makes the mistake of glaring at him for talking while the meeting was going on. A few seconds later the agent hastily looks away and doesn’t turn around for the rest of the hour.

“Could be better.” He uses a much more intricate model for his suits, although this isn’t even half-bad for a homemade version. “Do you know how long she took to make this?”

“Buck says she comes up with a new one every week, so I’m guessing that long.”

It had a few glitches but it was incredibly refined for a week’s worth of work.

“Interesting.” He gives it a quick overlook before handing it back to Sam who drops it into the bag.

He casts a swift glance at Bucky, noting how he wasn’t even paying attention to the meeting but rather to whatever he had tied around his metal wrist, fidgeting with it with his thumb.

Tony has an idea.

And that was generally bad news.

Next part

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #mcu fic #bucky fic #bucky barnes fic #bucky fluff #bucky barnes fluff #bucky angst #bucky barnes angst #harmless fic #winter soldier x reader #Winter Soldier #bucky barnes #bucky

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palbabor-writes · 4 years

Text

Practicum

Pairing: Shigaraki Tomura x Fem!Reader

Warnings: SMUT/18+ only, unbalanced/unhealthy relationships, student/teacher sex, tw.dubcon, tw.sub/dom dynamics, brat taming, fingering, masturbation, a table is pretty roughed up in this, so pls hold a brief moment of silence for it

Words: 12,857

“So, you just want me to read from the book?”

“Yes.”

“And...answer questions?”

“That’s what I said,” Shigaraki smirks, already reaching toward his bookshelf, tugging the heavy Intro to Biology text out and shifting it into his large hands.

You bite at your lip again and pass your gaze from his amused expression to the bland cover of the textbook, debating your next move, trying to walk yourself through all the ups and downs. It’s too simple; too easy. It’s not like him. He’s got something else in mind, why else would he fucking look like that? It’s not a bad look. No, it’s a look that makes your stomach flip and head spin.

“Stop being so suspicious,” Shigaraki scolds, drawing your wandering attention back to him. “I don’t bite, that is, unless you want me to.”

Notes: the title was selected because it’s got the word cum in it. ahhh, the things that crack me up. anyhow.

this is part of the BNHA Degeneracy server’s 9 to 5 collaboration! i had a ton of fun participating in this and thank you guys for making this so freaking awesome! special shoutout & thanks to @albinoburrito & @kugutsuu for their beta edits! this was a departure from what i usually write about and i appreciate all of your notes and help!

Practicum prac·ti·cum /ˈpraktəkəm/ noun a practical section of a course of study

It’s your senior year, they said. Live a little, they advised. Stop and take a breather, you’re practically home free! Take some easier classes. Focus on what’s in front of you, it’ll be over before you know it! On and on and on.

Spring semester is almost here. You’ve applied for graduation, the cap and gown ordered, and you have a shiny class ring sitting on your pinky. It’s in the bag. Just breeze through four more classes and you’re out. Well, it would be an easy shot, if you hadn’t put off this one class.

It always popped up, so it’s not like you could plead ignorance. Your advisor warned you, each quarterly meeting, that you needed to get it out of the way. Take it seriously, he cautioned, clacking out his notes, typing down that you’d failed to heed his sage advice, again. If you wait too long, you’re not going to get the professor that you want.

That was the other problem. You’re a procrastination superstar. If there was some kinda award for putting off assignments, you’d have won it ten times over. You liked the heart pounding race to the deadline, the sleepy boasts that you’d tackled the project within hours of its due date.

It’s a stupid habit. Every semester you promise yourself that you’ll do better. You won’t wait, you’ll tackle things one assignment at a time and turn them before the hard cut off at 11:59 pm. Who the fuck did you think you were kidding? Certainly not your friends, or your advisor. He could read you like a book. Hell, he’d even sent warnings.

‘Don’t forget about the deadline for senior registration!’

‘You don’t want to be on a waitlist. You especially don’t want to take one of the harder professors. These are freshman level classes, they’re designed to flunk undergrads. Don’t forget (Y/N), chew them up and spit them out tactics are employed.’

But you had. You’d set an alarm on your phone, then neglected to give it a title, so you’d only chuckled and smacked the chirping into silence that morning, snoozing the all important deadline away.

Fuck.

Most of the classes for biology are wait-listed. No, scratch that, all the classes for Intro to Genetic Biology are wait-listed. You opt into the waitlist for all of them, just in case, and a week later your phone alerts you that one has an open seat. Actually, it has several open seats, too many open seats to be natural. However, you’re not going to look a gift horse in the mouth, so for now, you’re enrolled in BIO 1208: Principles of Cell and Organismal Physiology - For Non-Science majors.

Perfect.

Yeah, no. You’d looked up the professor, since the whole open seat thing was still giving you the heebie-jeebies, and your heart dropped. You’ve heard of him, most of the student body has. His classes are notoriously small. Not because the university limited them, or planned for smaller class sizes. No, his classes are tiny because he is infamous for failing students.

Most, when they realize they’re scheduled for his bio classes, frantically drop, taking the withdrawal and praying for better luck next semester. Others, brave souls who think they can come out unscathed, attempt to grit their teeth and push through. But, by midterms, they’re war torn and haggard, shaking their heads and praying for a ‘C’, at best. Fewer still, pass.

This pedagogy isn’t a sign of good teaching; quite the opposite, in fact. You don’t want your student body failing. Yet, year after year, Professor Tomura Shigaraki keeps teaching the same Intro to Bio class. It boggles the mind, but you’ve never had to worry about it. Well, until now.

When you’d received the notification that you’re enrolled in the B section and spied the name Shigaraki under the professor listing, you’d scarfed down your suddenly flavorless lunch and dashed up the steps to the student advising hall, praying there was some way you could wiggle your way out of this growing disaster.

“I’m pretty sure I told you to take it earlier and to take it in the fall when there are more freshman level classes available. I swear I said that to you. And, AND, I even sent you emails, several times if my sent inbox is to be believed, to NOT forget when senior registration ends.”

Your advisor is peeved. You don’t blame him. He’s right, this is your fault, but there’s gotta be some kinda loophole. Something, fuck, anything, that can pull you from this mess.

“I know, I know! I’m so sorry. You’re right. But, I mean, can’t I just hold off for another week? See if the waitlist clears?”

The man that you’ve known for four years, that’s seen you progress from freshman to senior, steeples his long fingers and purses his lips, likely debating on a tactful scolding, or a firm rebuttal. He takes a deep breath and you can’t help but sink into the soft cushioning of the chair, your nose wrinkled and brow furrowed, mentally preparing yourself for the worst.

“Do you know how many students we require to take BIO 1208?”

“No,” you gulp, nibbling on your lower lip nervously.

“Over 7,000. Do you want to hear the statistics that would need to shake out in your favor for you to miraculously avoid taking this specific class? Nothing is going to open for you, it is this class, or no class.”

You sigh, and your advisor nods, pushing his horn-rimmed glasses up his nose. “Well then, I suggest you brush up on your study skills. Find a classmate that you can compare notes with, join a study group, go to the student union and ask for a tutor. I would hate to see you back here for the summer semester. You’re scheduled to walk the stage this spring and you’ve worked hard for this, so don’t fuck it up, okay?”

You’ve attended this university for four years, but the first day of term always gives you the jitters. It doesn’t matter that you know your way around, or that you know ten professors by name, and bump into several friends on the way to your next building, you’re always buried in your phone, checking and double checking the next class’ room number.

Despite all that caution, you’re lost.

In your defense, it’s your first time stepping foot in the Graduate & Research building and the whole concrete block is a fucking maze. There must be a basement because the numbers don’t match up with the floors and they seem to jumble further every time you round a corner. Like what the hell? How can this next room be GR 3.03.05 when this is clearly only the second floor and GR 2.03.11 was right down that other hallway?

Exasperated, you lean against the nearest wall and tug your phone out again. Shit. Class started ten minutes ago.

Part of you wants to call it a day, end the search here and try again on Wednesday. Maybe take a few extra minutes to scout out the building next time and have some idea of where you’re going before the start of class.

Ugh, why is this so stressful?

It’s the first day of classes. Surely Professor Shigaraki won’t mind if you’re a few minutes late; besides, if you’re lost, others must be too.

You tuck your phone back into your pocket and resume the hunt. Two hallway turns later, you find your mark.

Your hand pauses beside the heavy wood, and you take a steadying breath. Again, why are you so nervous? Just go in and take a seat, it’s easy, stop freaking out over nothing.

The door groans open, hinges protesting the sharp push, and you stumble into a darkened room. The low glow of the projector doesn’t help your blurry vision. Ah, shit, it’s one of those older rooms, so it’s built like a bad movie theater. Oh well, better get to a seat before he spots you.

Swiftly, you make your way toward the raised steps of the aisle and the second row of chairs, plopping into the first one you reach that’s empty. You’re too busy fiddling with the zipper of your backpack to notice that the speaker has stopped his rasping preamble, but as you pull your laptop out the ominous weight of that heavy silence hits you and you toss a hooded stare toward the front of the lecture hall.

Immediately, your eyes land on the professor’s and you feel a low shiver shake up your spine.

He’s watching you.

The gleam of the overhead projector makes his red eyes flash, and he openly scowls at your gaping expression, his lips curling into a dark sneer.

“Well, thank you for joining us, Miss…?”

He’s waiting for your response and you squeak out your last name, mindlessly rubbing your moistening palms against your thin skirt.

“Ah, Ms. (L/N). Now that you’ve graced the class with your belated presence, may I continue?”

“Uh,” you gasp out, your mouth dry, tongue sticking to your teeth, “I’m sorry. I got–”

“I didn’t ask for an explanation, or in your case, an excuse. Or are you now attempting to disrupt this class purposefully?”

“Wha– I-I’m–” your words stumble to a halt, voice failing under the intense glare that he’s giving you. “No,” you finish lamely, ducking your head, nails digging into your sweaty palms.

“Thank you. Do me a favor, stay after class.” His voice is gravel, threatening and low. You don’t like the edge in his tone. It makes your skin prickle and your knees knock. He sounds like the kind of guy that you don’t want to run into in a dark alleyway, or a classroom, for that matter. Even so, it’s not your fault, and despite your feelings of unease, you can’t tamp down your need to protest his unreasonableness.

“But, professor, I didn’t mean to–”

“If I need to repeat my insistence for silence, I’ll make things easier on both of us and fail you now.”

Stunned and fuming, you bite your tongue and lean back into your chair, crossing your arms and blinking back mounting tears of frustration. Great, just great. It’s the first fucking day of class and it looks like you’re already on his shit list. And for what? For being late on fucking syllabus day! What an ass.

You look over at him as you defiantly finish setting up your computer, hoping each pull of a zipper or screen reboot will grate under his stuck up skin. He’s not inordinately tall, or old. In fact, he looks like he might only be in early 30s. He has long white hair that’s pulled back into a low ponytail and, from what you can make out in the dim lighting, some kinda skin condition on his forehead. That, or he’s prematurely wrinkled, and let’s be honest, if he’s gone through life with that big of a stick up his ass, he deserves each and every pull on that mottled skin of his.

You linger in your seat when class is over, lips pulled into a thin line and legs crossed. Finally, when the last student has left the room, professor Shigaraki flips a switch beside his elevated podium, filling the lecture hall with a sharp, fluorescent light. He pauses by his raised computer system and clicks off the overhead projector, blanketing the massive room in an uncomfortable silence.

“Since you missed the part of class where I go over the syllabus, I’ll give you a brief rundown. Under no circumstances will I tolerate tardiness. If you do it once more I’ll mark you absent and three absences knock you down a full letter grade.”

Glumly, you cross your arms and peer up at him, finally able to get a good look at his face. Your first observation was correct. His skin is sharper around his forehead, but his wavy white hair does a pretty decent job of covering up the imperfections. He has two scars: one nicks across his right eye and the other splits down his rough lips, parting the skin and granting him an even more foreboding appearance than his already gruff demeanor does. He’s dressed in a dark pair of jeans and he’s wearing a low slung v neck shirt. It’s a brilliant red and it brings out that otherworldly glint of his red eyes. Shit, you think bitterly, while he’s not conventionally handsome, he’s not exactly hard on the eyes either.

You shake your head against these unproductive musings and curtly snap out a clipped, ok.

“What was that?” Shigaraki scoffs, tilting his head at your sullen figure. “Speak up.”

“I said,” you bristle, eyes narrowing and chin lifting, “Okay, I apologize for interrupting your lecture, it won’t happen again. But, in my defense, if I’m allowed to do that in this class, I’ve never been in this building before, and it’s not like–”

“You’re a senior, right?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Then you’ve had four years to figure out the layout of this university. The excuse of ‘being lost,’ isn’t an option for you. You know the buildings and you’re fully capable of turning up early to sort out the rooms.”

You let out a long sigh and look away, mumbling vague protests. This guy is ridiculous. You’re not a science major and it’s not your job to know the ins and outs of each building. How fucking stupid. Who does he think he–

“Speak up. I won’t ask you again.”

You bite your lip and look back at him but he’s moved in that distracted moment, silently stepping down from his raised platform and is now leaning over the first row of chairs, looming over you. You can’t help your sudden flinch as you sink further into your chair, away from him.

“If you’re gonna complain, Ms. (L/N), I’d much rather hear it. Don’t you think It’s rude for you to mutter under your breath about me? You don’t see me doing that to you.”

“Fine,” you blurt out, turning away from his insistent, and all too close, gaze. “I was saying that I’m not a science major. I get that I’m a senior, but you can’t seriously expect me to know every nook and cranny of this campus.”

“No, but I can ask for you to be a little more thoughtful. I put time and effort into my lessons and I won’t have you undermining them by bouncing in here with those legs and that flouncy little skirt.”

You’re about to counter his little haughty speech on politeness when you finally process that final comment he’d breathed out. Flabbergasted, you raise your head back to his, but he’s already moving away, snatching up his shoulder bag and waving you a curt goodbye as he presses open the squeaky door. “Next class is at 10 am sharp, so be on time Ms. (L/N).”

You’re still slumped in your seat when the door glides shut again, your eyes wide and jaw no doubt comically unhinged.

Wait. Did…did he really just say that?

Obviously, for the next class, you’re early. You’re so early that you’re the first one in the lecture hall. You select a seat toward the back and fiddle with your computer, checking your messages, adjusting your brightness, replying to old emails, anything to keep your head down and attention occupied.

The door opens and, despite your best efforts, your head flies up, expectant and tense, ready to meet those red eyes of his head on, to show him you’re here and he better… oh. It’s not him. It’s two chattering freshmen. One of them gives you a quick smile, but they both quickly take their seats, a few rows over, and continue their soft conversation, leaving you to fall back onto your earlier distraction tactics. You twiddle with your phone and shoot off a few texts, change your wallpaper, accidentally close an app you meant to leave open, and then the lecture hall door reopens.

He steps in slowly, completely ignoring you and the other scattered students, opting to sort out a few papers and set up his login on the school computer. The minutes tick by and you can’t seem to jerk your eyes away from him, suddenly fascinated by his languid movements. He looks more relaxed than he did on Monday, looser and fluid, completely in his element. True to his word, at ten am on the dot he begins class.

Professor Shigaraki has an interesting voice. It’s low, calculated, bordering on a rasp. It’s one of those tones that makes you want to lean forward and listen up, even though he’s only discussing cellular biology. Which isn’t exactly the sexiest topic for that shockingly dulcet timbre of his.

Wait. Sexy?

Your pen falters against your notebook, and your eyes drift up to his frame. He’s switched the lights off again and the shine of the overhead projector is the only illumination in the hall. His white hair gleams in the dim lighting and his long hands animatedly illustrate his points, elegant fingers opening and closing, gesticulating about the intricate nature of the human genome. You’re so focused on watching his movements that your elbow partner has to push the slip of paper onto your collapsible desktop. You blink at the sheet, your pen nearly clattering from your hand, and you twist to peer at the unfamiliar student beside you.

“It’s the attendance sheet and, um, I think you’re the last one,” they whisper, careful to lean away after they finish their explanation, not wanting to draw professor Shigaraki’s ire. You maneuver the paper under your pen and scribble down your name, biting your lip and silently berating yourself for your poor selection in seating. Great, now you’ll have to take the paper down to him after class. What if he talks with you again? Shit.

At 11:25, class ends. You collect your things and plod down the steps, the attendance sheet clutched between your fingers. He’s just snapping the projector light off when you reach his podium.

“I, uhh, have the attendance. You want me to just leave it here, or…”

“I’ll take it,” his hand is extended toward you and those red eyes are fixed on you now. It’s not the same disgruntled stare he’d given you on Monday. No, this look is a little more curious. Again, you’re taken aback by your reaction to him. He’s not even saying anything, just patiently waiting for you to deposit the sheet into his open palm, but there’s something about him that’s making your heart race.

Maybe it’s those eyes of his.

They are an unusual color and they have a strange intensity to them. Right as they narrow, the vermillion shining under the sharp lights; you press the paper to him and he pulls it from you, studying the names that are listed.

You want to say something. Maybe toss him a quick, friendly, goodbye. Or apologize for the other day? Ugh. What can you even say? ‘Gosh, so glad I was on time today! All that fascinating information about the genetic code! So glad to be here!’ No, that sounds stupid and a little patronizing. Besides, why do you want to talk with him at all? He’s an ass, remember?

“Did you need something?”

His question snaps you out of your stupor and you numbly shake your head at him, already lowering your gaze, but his exhaled chuckle makes you pause, your fingers curling around your backpack straps.

“I know I upset you the other day, but I appreciate you taking the effort to correct your mistake.”

“Oh,” you breathe, your eyes finding their way back to his. “Yeah, well, like you said, I’m a senior. Gotta take responsibility for myself someday.”

“Ah,” he smirks, that long scar on his lip quirking upward. “Seems like you’ve got some determination after all. You might be more interesting than I gave you credit for.”

“God,” you scoff, popping out a hip and crossing your arms at the bemused leer on his face. “Just come right out and say you think I’m a bad student, why don’t you?”

“Don’t worry,” he amends, tucking the attendance sheet into his shoulder bag and snapping the clasps closed. “There’s plenty of time for you to end up right back at square one with me.”

He’s already halfway out the door by the time you right yourself from the shock of his last comment and you follow him, a string of low curses falling from your lips.

The spring semester always flies by, and before you realize it, a full month has bled away. You’ve kept that same seat in Shigaraki’s class and at the end of each session you head down to his little platform, attendance sheet outstretched. Each day of class has a different ebb and flow. Sometimes he chats with you and it’s gotten easier to talk with him, both of your eyes holding and lingering, lips raised into calculating smiles. Sometimes it almost feels like he’s flirting with you. Other days he only spares you a curt nod, his white hair curtaining his expression from your curious gaze. You’re not bothered by these silences, not when you’ve got your secret weapon.

The days that you like best, the ones that you plan, sorting through your closet until you’ve found the perfect choice, are the days when you wear one of your skirts. You’d even gone on some skirt shopping sprees as of late. On those days he doesn’t just make some sort of fleeting eye contact with you, no, on those days he stares.

At first, you’d tested out your theory, staggering your outfits, careful to not screw up your suspicions with a hasty miscalculation, but as they say, the third time’s the charm. How did he expect you not to notice? He never bothers to hide those sharp ogles and recently you’ve made a point of dramatically gathering your things when you wear these cute little ensembles, bopping down the steps so his eyes have to work to follow the line of your hips and the long paths of your bare legs. One rainy afternoon you’d worn over the knee stockings, that came to an abrupt halt over the plush skin of your upper thigh, under your mini skirt and he’d practically leapt over the podium to grab the sheet from you, his eyes hooded and dark, almost wild.

“Test, on Friday,” he warns, eyes finally rising to meet your bemused expression. “Don’t stay out too late tonight.”

“What makes you say that?” you ask, brushing at a rogue fold in your skirt, luring him back to your legs.

He scoffs at you, that jagged scar arching into a smirk. “Humph. You’re dressed up. Most of the students just wear the sweats, or pjs, and call it a day.”

“I like to put a little effort in all that I do,” you retort, grinning up at his vermillion stare.

“Yes, so I’ve noticed. You certainly look the part…and you’re keeping up with the workload of this course.”

“Ahhh,” you crow, clapping your hands excitedly. “Are you saying I might get an ‘A’ in this class? Be the first time someone’s done that in a while, from what I’ve heard around campus.”

Shigaraki sneers and tuts out an inaudible reply, leaning a little closer to you, making you inadvertently fall back a step. “Don’t push your luck.”

“Awe,” you pout, crossing your arms over your chest. “I’m doing ok on all the quizzes and the classwork.”

“So far,” he taunts, his pearlescent hair falling over his broad shoulder.

“Tch. Don’t be like that. I’ve been studying.”

“Sometimes it takes more than that.”

“Oh?” you smile, raising your chin. “What else should I be doing, professor?”

“We’ll know that after Friday, won’t we?”

God.

You’d felt so confident when you’d turned in your test and that stupid, horrible, sexy little quirk of his lip scar that he sends you, when you’d handed him your papers, carries you on some strange, half aroused cloud all weekend. Maybe, just maybe, this class won’t be so bad after all.

The tests are handed back the following Friday, passed from row to row so everyone can fish out their papers and marked Scantrons. Yours, since you still occupy that final seat on the back row, is the last. Biting back a grin, you flip it over, so ready to see that A, that grade that you worked so fucking hard for, that… wait.

The gross flash of red across the top of your paper leaves you reeling, your breath catching against the back of your throat. It’s not a terrible grade, well, it wouldn’t be, but there are only three tests in this class, so it’s going to plummet you down to a B. One more fuck up will leave you with a C, or worse, an automatic failing grade.

No. No, no, no, no.

You can’t afford a bad grade, you honestly can’t even let yourself slip to a B. Your fucking cap and gown have just come in and with them that cord that you can wear around your neck at graduation. The one that marks you as honors cum laude. Fuck. You’re already pulling one B, in one of your other classes, because you’ve been focusing so much time and effort on this one. Another B will strip that cord from you, leaving you barren, with a less than ideal GPA.

God fucking damn it.

You glare up at Shigaraki, who’s busy taking the rest of the class through a review of genetic mutations, but you can’t hear him anymore, too incensed, too overwhelmed to even care about what he’s saying. The test crumples under your fingertips, the paper shaking in your hands, and you seethe, your teeth biting your lower lip to pieces.

It’s not fair. You’d paid attention. You’ve taken all the notes. Read all the chapters. Drilled and studied till your eyes had drooped, heavy with exhaustion. You’ve done it all right. Plus, he’d been so fucking flirty, so open with you. You’ve never chatted with a professor this way, never gone out of your way to wear clothes they like, that make them watch you, their eyes hungry pinpricks as you walk to them, mindful of the luscious sway of your hips.

No. Fuck him. Fuck this class.

Before your elbow classmate can leave, you ask for them to hand in the attendance sheet. You barely hear their response, too busy slamming your laptop into your backpack. As you storm past the podium, you can feel his eyes on you. The distant sensation of his gaze makes your flesh prickle, but you ignore your involuntary reaction and shove your way out the door.

“(Y/N), you can’t switch classes this late. It’s almost midterms. Besides, I don’t think anything has opened up and if you’re going to drop it, you’ve gotta get the signature of the professor,” your advisor tells you, blinking at your stony expression over his thick glasses. “I don’t get it. Why do you want to drop it? Your grades are alright and it’s just one test. You can always try–”

“Gimme the paperwork.”

Shigaraki’s office is on the top floor of the research building, tucked away down another winding and weaving hallway that once again requires your careful inspection to navigate. When you finally hit the right set of doors, you slowly make your way forward, counting the numbers up as you pass. His door is wide open, a yawning cavern that’s filled with the distant light of a lamp. You brush a hand down your skirt, smoothing away any wrinkles and steadying your nerves.

You’d tossed on the skirt this morning, before you’d gotten the grade, and you hadn’t thought to go home and change, too consumed by that simmering rage bubbling within you. And now, like this fucking class, this skirt felt like a mistake, something stupid and vapid that you wished you had time to change out of. He’d told you he liked your attire, liked that you put effort into your outfits. At the time, you’d been so thrilled and excited that he’d complimented you, but now you wish you were confronting him in baggy jeans or lazy sweats, anything that would turn that avid gaze of his away from you.

Lost in thought, you waver beside his open door, nibbling on your lips and tugging at your clothes. It’s now or never. No point in putting it off. What’s the worst that can happen? What can he do now? Or, a darker side of you whispers, what do you want him to do to you? What? That’s a stupid thought, you scold yourself, lifting a hand to the wall and rapping against the beige paint, announcing your presence.

When the sound fades away, swallowed up by the empty and darkened hallway, you poke your head around the corner, searching for him. His head is tilted quizzically, and he blinks twice when he spots you, that all too familiar smirk lifting his lips.

“Ah, Ms. (L/N), what can I do for you?”

His voice is softer than usual and your name sounds like honey, his tone resting on the syllables and consonants for a beat, almost as if he’s savoring their lift, their sound. You can’t help but swallow heavily at his appraisal. Suddenly this may be a terrible idea.

Ugh. Get a grip (Y/N).

“I-I need you to sign this withdrawal paperwork,” you finally reply, digging in your bag and tugging out the thin leaflet, holding it out to him. He’s silent after your demand, meditatively threading his fingers and peering up at you, his red eyes bright.

“Step inside and shut the door behind you,” he instructs, his gaze never falling from yours. Despite the simplicity of his request, you can’t help but bristle at his imperious tone. Why does he always have to sound like that? Like he’s seconds away from taking control of the situation, or of you? He’s always one stupid step ahead, and no doubt he’s going to try and talk you down. Or, he’ll sign it and say that he always knew you were a screw up, someone who only did things halfway, who could never match up to his lofty expectations. Humph, the sooner you’re outta here and out of his class, the better. So, you obey, closing the door and petulantly flopping into the unsteady chair that sits in front of his low desk.

He maintains that uneasy quiet, his red eyes whisking over your disgruntled face, waiting, watching. Unable to take this strange standoff, you push the university paperwork toward him, sliding it as close as you dare to his bent elbows. “I would like to withdraw from your class,” you repeat, lips setting into a thin line.

“Why?” he asks, cocking his head so his loose white hair falls a little further down his rough brow.

“Something came up.”

“Hmm, I can try to work with a new schedule, if it’s your job, or home life,” he counters, eyes narrowing as he sharpens his observations of your brittle expression.

“It’s not that,” you smart, crossing your arms. Great, he’s going to make this difficult.

“Then I suggest you tell me what’s on your mind,” Shigaraki replies, mirroring your movements and leaning back in his chair.

“I don’t think this class is working out for me.”

He exhales a soft laugh at your lie, and you watch that tiny mole at the edge of his chin lift in his quiet mirth. “This is a freshman level course and you’re a senior. You’re in my class because it’s likely the last pre-rec that you need to take before you graduate.”

“Um, yeah. But–”

“And now, you’re wanting to drop it because of one poor grade.”

You grind your teeth and fix him with a stark glower. “I–”

“There will be two other tests. If you read your syllabus, you’d know this.”

“I read the syllabus. Your tests are worth a stupid amount of points and it only takes one of them to tank my grade.”

“Frankly, you did better than most of the class. You only need to work on practical application. I said that the written portion would be a major component of the exam. I also provided you with a review and a rubric. So I’m not sure–”

“Your grade drops me to a ‘B’, and that ‘B’ pulls me from the honors list. And… well… I thought that…”

“Oh? What did you think?” he presses, his voice suddenly dropping to that lower octave it had drifted into when he said your last name.

“I thought I’d get a better grade,” you spit out, turning your head and biting at your lip again.

“Why?” he counters simply. His obtuseness is making your blood boil.

“What do you mean, why?” It takes all of your will to not slip a ‘jackass’ into that question.

“It’s not a hard thing to answer. I graded you fairly and according to my rubric. Why exactly do you feel you merit a different grade than the one you earned?”

You fall into a frustrated silence. You can hear your heart pounding against your ribs and you want to scream at him, to leap over his desk and shake him until his teeth fucking rattle. Your shoulders are rising and lowering disjointedly and his vermillion eyes are honed in on your face, shifting over your pinched expression with a distant interest. You can feel tears pricking at your eyes and you hastily rub a fist over them, brushing away any rogue drops of moisture.

“How can you ask me that? You think I didn’t notice you staring at my legs? Or that you always had something to say to me when I was wearing a skirt? What was I supposed to think, huh? I fucking thought shit like that was gonna help, ok? God, I’m so stupid. I can’t… fuck.”

Shigaraki arches forward when you finish, a deep sigh leaching through his parted lips. His teeth snap together when you look up at him, your eyes gaining back some of that earlier defiance, and he gives you a quick grin, clearly pleased by your shift in attitude and pushes your paper aside, fixing you with a dark look. “Here’s a thought, since you feel you’re so different, I’ll make you a deal. I’ll give you a chance to make up the score.”

“I don’t care about the score anymore. I wanna drop your class,” you snap, but it’s a halfhearted barb. Something has changed in his demeanor. He’s dropped the concerned professor act and is leaning so close you can hear his steady intakes of air. He’s only a few inches away; if you want, you could touch him.

“I doubt you want to attend a class in the summer. Besides, they won’t let you walk if you haven’t finished your freshman level courses. And you can’t tell me you don’t want to graduate, to earn that cord that lets you into the honor cum laude. So stop pouting and hear me out. I think you’ll like what I have in mind.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever like anything about you,” your voice is sharper than you mean it to be, but the challenge makes Shigaraki smile. As it crosses his cracked lips, it pulls that scar up and it makes those eyes of his glow. He looks like the cat that’s got the cream and you’re not sure how to respond, so you cross your legs and wait for him to make the next move.

“You sure about that? Well, I’ll have to change your tune then, won’t I? But that can wait, lemme tell you what my requirements are. I’ve got a copy of the textbook in here. I’ll have you review some of the major concepts, you’ll read the passages aloud so I’m sure you’re on the right track, you’ll hand the book back to me, and then I’ll verbally quiz you over the material. If you answer them correctly, I’ll bump you to an ‘A’ on your test.”

You have to actively work to keep your mouth closed. “So, you just want me to read from the book?”

“Yes.”

“And… answer questions?”

“That’s what I said,” Shigaraki smirks, already reaching toward his bookshelf, tugging the heavy Intro to Biology text out and shifting it into his large hands.

“Stop being so suspicious,” Shigaraki scolds, drawing your wandering attention back to him. “I don’t bite, that is, unless you want me to.”

Your eyes boggle and you have to clench your thighs tighter, your stomach churning, you feel light-headed and you can feel your core fluttering with your sudden arousal. “Wh-what did you just say?”

“Stop gaping at me like that, you’ll make me blush. Now come on.”

Your jaw snaps closed and you shake your head, trying to clear your mind from your whirling emotions. He takes this reaction as a surrender and stands, stepping toward a marred table that rests a little ways away from his desk. He licks his thumb pad and flips through a few pages before finally settling on an appealing section. Once he places it on the table, he twists back to you and crooks a finger your way. “Come here,” he orders, his voice deep and languid. Obediently, you rise on unsteady feet, hands tugging at the length of your skirt, careful to keep it pressed down as you walk toward him.

He makes space for you to stand in front of the book and shifts back, one hand resting on the table, propping him close to your bent figure. You look up at him, but he only nods his head toward the table, a wicked smile curling the corners of his lips. Blink a few times but finally, the words clear and you can see the block of text that’s in front of you. It’s passages on DNA encodes and RNA proteins, hefty stuff, things that you had to make flash cards for. This isn’t going to be easy. If anything, he’s picked some of the harder concepts, the ones that take steady knowledge in the foundations. Flustered, you look back to him, but he’s moved. He’s leaning against the wide window beside the table, a dark mark against the glass.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, a laugh bubbling in his tone.

“There’s no way…” you stammer, shaking your head at him.

“Want me to throw a curve in?”

“I should ask what kinda curve, but knowing you, it’s likely gonna be something terrible.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” he rumbles, stepping away from the window and leaning close to your stiff form. “It just takes an open mind and some enthusiasm on your part.”

“Enthusiasm?” you question, trying your best to withstand his closeness. You can feel the heat radiating off of his broad shoulder and if you tilt a little nearer, you could graze against him, or feel his breath on your skin.

“You’re right,” he amends, his forearm contacting your side. You startle at the touch, a gasp falling from your lips, but you don’t pull away and you can’t stop staring up at him, your eyes wide. “Obedience is a better word. From here on out, whatever I tell you to do, I expect you to obey it, although it’s not exactly, ah, school approved.”

“You want me to suck you off or something?” you sneer, hoping to stumble him off his guard, even if it’s only for an instant. Too bad he’s always one step ahead.

“Don’t be vulgar. Think outside of the box, (Y/N). Do you think I’m going to go for something so short sighted when I could have you bending to my will? Obeying every little demand that I make? I’d much rather see if that skin of yours tastes as good as it looks, then simply have you on your knees. No, I want you to fucking scream for me while I stuff you full of my cock. But first, you need to put in some work. You should know that by now.”

Oxygen is suddenly very hard to come by and you can feel your mind hazing over as you stammer up at him, your mind flitting from word to word disjointedly. Shigaraki grants you a wolfish grin, and he dips his lips beside your ear, whispering over those tiny hairs that rest against your tender skin. “I’ll make this part easy. Nod and I’ll give you the first set of instructions.”

What did he say? Nod? What happens when you nod? Fuck, why are you letting him do this? Is your grade really worth it? Are you that desperate that… that…

Shigaraki is whispering other promises over you as you war with yourself, speaking his words gently, slowly, his breath hot as it fans over your neck. It’s like you’ve fallen under some kinda spell and before you realize it, your traitorous head is bobbing up and down, letting him know you want him to keep going.

“Perfect,” he sighs, his lips grazing over the shell of your ear, jerking a shiver from you. “Now, lean forward and put your hands against the table.”

You do as he says, but he’s not satisfied with your positioning, his fingers wrapping around your wrists and yanking you forward, jutting your ass out and pressing your chest down, maneuvering you until your nose is right above the pages of the textbook. “There we go,” he rasps, pulling away so he can admire your splayed form. “Hmm, your legs are too close together. Spread them.” Knees trembling, you obey, gasping when he runs a palm against the curve of your thighs.

“You’ve got such nice legs (Y/N), so let’s put them on display, shall we?” His fingers search against the top of your skirt and they still when he reaches his prize: the zipper. When he pulls it down, you let out a sharp squeak of protestation but he silences you with a swift pinch to your side.

“Now, now, don’t be like that. You nodded, remember? Besides, you could have left when I told you I’d give you a curve but you couldn’t help yourself could you? You want me to keep going and to do that, I need you to take this skirt off. No, don’t move. I’ll get rid of it for you. Why don’t you focus on the task at hand, hmm? Aren’t you supposed to be reading for me?”

You arch away from his fingers and he chuckles at your impudence, one large hand hooking under your chin and pulling you toward his face. His red eyes blaze as they find yours, the dark pupils threatening to swallow up that deep vermillion. “Let’s start with the second paragraph. If you do well, I might grant you a reprieve.”

Jerking your face from his grip, you twist back to the text, trying, and failing, to ignore his inquisitive fingers, unable to resist sighing as he works one up your inner thigh. He pauses when no words fall from your lips and you grumble out a few low curses before acquiescing to his silent demand.

“The flow of genetic information in cells from DNA to mRNA to protein is described by the Central Dogma, which states that genes specify the sequence of mRNAs, which specify the sequence of proteins. The decoding of one molecule… the… the… molecule… by spec-specific…”

He’s slipped your skirt down over the swell of your ass, but he’s taking his time, flexing out the front of the material and dipping his fingers over the bump of your lower stomach, kneading into the delicate flesh that’s stretched out for him. You can’t help the twitch of your spine and you involuntarily wiggle, palms slipping forward, dragging you further along the tabletop. Shigaraki chuckles above you, running his rough lips over the back of your neck.

“You’re so sensitive. I’ve barely touched you.”

He circles his hands back to your skirt and edges it along, lowering it sharply on one side and then giving the same treatment to the other. You’re doing your best to keep up with your stammering readings, but it’s difficult when he keeps sighing and running his long nails across your newly bared skin. Finally, he works the skirt down and it thumps against your bare ankles; the fabric tickling your skin.

Meanwhile, his other fingers skitter against the elastic band of your rapidly dampening panties. Once he hooks the lace under his hand, he yanks them along your legs, trailing them sinfully slowly, ensuring that they glide down the billow of your thighs. His teeth nip at your ear when you stumble to a halt in your recitation and your hands tense over the grains of wood beneath them, your nails pinching into your palms. “If you stop, I stop,” he warns, his head bumping against yours, his sharp nose pressing against your pulse.

“You’re not exactly making this easy,” you grumble, doing your best to ignore his renewed pets and strokes.

“Stop complaining,” he smirks, leaning away from your head to peer at your newly exposed flesh. “You better pay attention to what you’re reading or you’re not going to pass the questions I’ll be asking you.”

“Yeah, yeah, ow!” you squawk, whipping your head around to glare up at him. He fucking pinched you again! This time, he’d slipped his hand between your spread legs and tweaked your inner thigh, painfully.

“Read,” he repeats, running those guilty fingers upward, lingering beside the heat of your cunt, careful to not get too close. When you start on the next sentence, one of his hands tugs up the fabric of your shirt, snaking upward until he’s thumbing against the wire of your bra. Once again, you falter to a halt and exhale a wavering breath.

Goddamn it. This review is no review. You’ll be lucky if you can even recall what a cell is if he keeps this up. You hear his ominous intake of air and quickly resume your recitation, mumbling something about RNA and mRNA differences.

Wait. Didn’t you just…

“Looks like you’re having trouble listening to me. I told you to read aloud, not to repeat the same passages over and over.”

“Hey, at least I’ll have a firm grasp on those. You should ask me something about that s-section… ah–”

The hand that was resting under the cup of your bra has made its way underneath the lightly padded material, and his thumb and index fingers have trapped your peaked nipple between them. As soon as your snarky comment left your mouth, he’d twisted the bud, squeezing it until it throbbed.

“Pay attention,” he commands, shoving your bra upward, freeing the globes of your breasts and cupping both of his broad hands under them. Your abused nipple stings and the mixture of sharp pain and jarring arousal goes right through you, stoking that coil that pulsed within your core, and sending a tacky flush of your essence down your spread thighs.

The next few words are a struggle. The text keeps blurring and your breaths are coming in fast and heavy. Shigaraki is still feeling you up, keeping his lips close to your ears, rasping sharp commands to you and dealing out lightning fast rounds of pinches and squeezes each time you falter.

“I–I can’t… I don’t even know what I’m reading anymore,” you bemoan, your hips pressing against the edge of the table, legs trembling as you attempt to keep them apart. He’s deliberately ignoring your throbbing clit and a desperate edge is creeping into your voice.

“Are you always this whiny? Fine. I’ll give you a moment to read without any distractions.”

Thank God.

True to his word, he slips away from your back and you’re left shivering against his sudden absence. Despite your quaking, you’re determined to make the most of this chance and you quickly read out the paragraphs that are on the second page. As you ramble down to the last bit of text, you realize you can’t hear him anymore and when you finish the last sentence; you start to really wonder where he’s drifted off to. A tense silence follows your completion of the material and you arch up on the tips of your toes, jutting your ass out and stretching the stiffened muscles of your lower back.

“Didn’t say you could stop reading, and judging from all of your complaints, I don’t think you got some of those earlier concepts, so I’d suggest doing a quick review,” he taunts, the sudden rasp of his voice startling a low gasp from your lips.

He’s close; somewhere behind you and to the left from the sound of it. You try to twist around, your chest lifting from the table, and when he notices, his hands return, creating a rough pressure against your neck as he forces your body back down. His weight plasters you to the surface, scraping your partially exposed stomach and tender breasts over the nicked wood. Shigaraki is merciless in his swift correction, his breath puffing out angrily behind you. “Didn’t say you could move, either.”

Stunned, you freeze. Your arms are arched awkwardly, but he keeps his weight against you, flattening your breasts and forcing your back to arch into an awkward bend. Fuck, you think, how are you supposed to stay like this? Your legs are already aching and if he shifts away again, he’s likely going to expect you to maintain this absurd pose.

“Yes,” he groans, his voice catching against the word, “Good girl. Now, stay just like that.”

Damn it.

“Go on, read the first part again,” he instructs.

“The entire genetic content of a cell is known as its genome and the study of genomes is gen-genomics. In eukaryotic cells, but… but not in p-prokaryotes, DNA forms a complex with histone proteins… with histone proteins… sub-substance… of…”

His teeth have latched onto your neck, and he’s sucking bruises into your tender skin. He’s still pinning you to the table, but his hands are widening their explorations. He’s started dragging a fingernail across the puffy folds of your cunt, teasing against the dripping and swollen flesh, chuckling when you buck against his hold.

“You always seem to lose it when you get to cellular modulations.”

“I–I–It’s not… I can’t help that you keep…” you whimper, your fingers curling under your palms, head shaking back and forth. You can’t think. He’s not being fucking fair, and you can’t even string your goddamn words together. Shit. “Y-you’re not being fair,” you accuse, falling on the only thing that keeps running through your mind, your splayed feet shifting uncomfortably under you.

“Not fair? Not once did I say fairness would come into this arrangement,” he lifts himself off of your back and leans beside you, one arm planted beside your crooked elbow. His fingers trace over the curve of your ass, cupping at the thickest part of you and squeezing.

“But don’t worry, I’ll make sure you get a little satisfaction out of this arrangement. I bet you look good when you cum. And you’ve been working so hard to get my attention these last few months. So careful to do what I tell you. Looking at me with those big eyes of yours, all wide eyed every time I catch you looking at me. And don’t even get me started on your lips. You’re lucky I didn’t fucking bend you over after class, especially when you started wearing all of those cute little skirts for me. Ahhh, don’t moan like that, I won’t be able to help myself if you do. Let’s see how you’re doing, shall we?”

Without warning, he slips his longest digit into your cunt, groaning loudly when he’s sucked into your welcoming heat. Your pussy, hungry for any kind of scrap, ripples around his intrusion, clamping and pulling, desperate for more.

“Fuck,” he groans, his weight falling against your shoulder. “You’re soaking.” His elegant digit pushes deeper and you roll your hips under him, urging him closer, sighing when he sinks to the last knuckle. As he pulls his finger back, he adds another, swiftly v-ing the two before curving them together as they slip back out, dragging a steady line of pleasure from your quivering cunt. Shigaraki whispers another round of awed praise against your ear, his voice dark and breathless.

A third digit is added on another trip out, and it creates a ragged sensation within you. It’s close to what you like, but he’s stretching you too far and it’s starting to hurt. He either needs to speed up, or give you a little more pressure. If you can hump your clit against the edge of the table, maybe it’ll give you the friction that you need. When you mindlessly buck your hips, your thighs threatening to lose that spread, he stops, holding his fingers inside you, laughing as you agitatedly try to shift him back into his earlier rhythm.

“So eager. I’d say you’re ready for my questions.”

“W-what?” you gasp, wholly focused on making him restart the push and pull of his fingers inside you.

“I’ll start you off with something easy. What’s the cell membrane?”

“W-what? The cell… ah–”

“Answer me. Now,” he grunts, leaning forward, re-steadying you as his fingers pull outward, dragging against your sensitive folds and schlicking through your arousal lewdly, loudly. You moan and your eyes roll back, completely ignoring his demand as you fall into the haze of pleasure that comes after his movements.

His free hand travels up your neck and he tangles his fingers into the tendrils of your hair, yanking and jerking at the strands, demanding your attention.

“I said, answer me.”

“Shigaraki–I–fuck. I can’t even… ugh… think right now!”

“Do you want the grade, or not?” he questions, his voice tense. “Answer correctly and I’ll give you what you want.”

“I–I don’t think I can,” you whine, pressing your hips back as he thrusts his fingers forward again, curving them upward, searching for the spongy pad of nerves that rest against the front of your pelvis.

“Oh? What happened to wanting that A? What about your graduation? You gonna let me fuck up your entire college career? I can do it, you know. I’ve done it to so many simpering freshmen. I fail kids left and right and you’re no different, (Y/N).

The university lets me ahh–there it is! God, you’re so fucking wet.

Where was I? The university can’t say no to me; they let me do what I want. I bring in too much money, too many tempting grants, and that’s all they really care about. So what’s it gonna be? Let me see that you can answer this basic crap and I’ll pass you. Or would you like for me to tie you down and force it outta you another way?”

He’s picked up the pace of his fingers as he rambles over you and a swift press against that newly discovered spot inside you has you falling to pieces in his hands, popping up onto your tiptoes and rutting yourself against the surface of the table. “O-ok, God, ok! Just–fucking repeat the goddamn question,” you pant, head slumping forward, forcing his fingers to tighten against your hair to hold you upright.

“What is the cell membrane?”

You wince your eyes closed, trying to rack your brain to focus on something other than the heavy pressure of the three fingers that are teasing their way across your dribbling pussy. He’s moving his presses with a lackadaisical, inconsistent rhythm now and it’s hard to fucking think. You can’t tell if his next thrust will be hard, or soft, or so rough that it’s bordering on that bittersweet line of pain.

You shake your head, doing your best to ignore the mounting pressure that he’s building inside you and the ache of your neck and legs. Finally, after another sharp tap against that secret bunch of nerves at the front of your cunt, you latch onto a vague remembrance.

“It… it’s a double layer of–of phospholipids that make a boundary between the cell and t-the surrounding… ugh… it controls the passage of materials.”

“Very good. Elaborate on the cellular wall.”

He’s unrelenting in his domineering treatment, twisting and frigging his fingers each time your breath hitches, and your arousal is leaking down your legs, making your skin stick and pull. It’s too much, you can’t! How can he even ask this? Words are falling from your lips incoherently, and all too soon you’re gasping out his name rather than reciting the answer.

“Cellular–oh, fuck, Shi–Shigaraki–Please, keep–don’t stop! S-Shigaraki, God that… feels… ah–keep going!”

He ignores your request and pulls his fingers away, robbing you of that sweet pressure that he’s so carefully mounted within you.

“I’ll count that one as incorrect. Your ‘A’ is swiftly becoming an ‘A’ minus, (Y/N)” he snarls, his teeth gritted, hands falling to the swell of your hips, wet fingers digging into your soft skin.

“What? No! You didn’t give me enough… e-enough time! How can–can you expect me to answer that qui-quickly!”

“Let’s try another.”

It hurts. That ache that he’s drawn out of you is starting to sting and throb and he’s being such a dick about it! You twist and grind under him, and he traps your disobedient hips against the rough siding of the table.

“I don’t–” you protest weakly, your legs trembling and chest heaving under his weight.

“Do you want this? Wouldn’t you like to pass this class? To graduate with honors?” he growls, leaning closer, his hands braced against you, his fingers no doubt leaving bruises on the supple crest of your hips.

“You’re such an ass! Yes! Fuck, please! I–I want it so fucking bad!” you cry out, your voice drifting into a sob as you croak out the last plea.

“Then answer another question. What’s diffusion?”

“D-diffu-diffusion is the process by which molecules move from an a-area of… of… fuck- of high concentration, to low concentration. Shigaraki!”

“I should count that as another miss, but you got the major concept correct.” He removes his fingers from your waist and yanks your ass toward him, keeping your overeager hips away from the fleeting relief of the sturdy table. “Pop your legs together,” he commands, one hand wrapping around your arched throat, squeezing until you obey. His other hand drops to that thatch of curls that rest between your quivering thighs and he gathers up your gossamer strands, rubbing against your clit for one hazy instant, sending a flash of spots across your vision.

“Mmm, now that’s a pretty sight. Good girl, don’t move,” he reminds you and you want to scream at him. Right before you can spit some frustrated vitriol out, he’s releasing your neck, his hands dropping from your skin and letting you fall back to the uneven surface below. Just before your chin contacts the wood, his hand is back in your hair, tugging you upward, holding you a few inches above the table. The sharp pain makes your scalp tingle and you unconsciously rut against the tempting heat that’s now plastered to your ass. He’s hard. You can feel the stiff bulge of his cock straining against the front of his dark jeans, pressing into the cleft of your posterior.

“T-that’ can’t be comfortable,” you pant, twisting your head so you can look up at him from the curve of your shoulder.

“Oh? You worried about my cock?” he asks, his red eyes flashing down at you challengingly. You don’t bother giving him a verbal response, opting instead to grind your ass up, catching against the jut of his length, earning yourself a low groan. His lips curl when you repeat the motion and you realize you love watching that smug face of his drift into a look of tense pleasure. It makes his scar on his lip flush and those red eyes of his fall to a lazy half mast. He spies your arched brow and pleased grin and pushes himself off of you, leaving you alone and open on the table.

“Keep pushing your luck. I’m more than happy to drop you back to a B.”

“What?” you scoff, teeth clinking together as you clench your jaw. “I didn’t move!”

“No, but you’re trying to take control of this and we can’t have that can we?” Shigaraki sneers. “Now, how shall I punish you?”

“P-punish me?” you stammer, a chill racing down your spine.

“Ah, I know. This’ll really piss you off,” he twists from your strained gaze and walks back toward his desk. What? What the fuck does he mean? You can’t see him from this angle, not with the way your legs are stretched and back is lowered, but it doesn’t stop you from trying, your chin lifting upwards as you do your best to keep him in focus.

Ugh. It’s no use. He’s slipped past your field of vision.

Hearing is likely your best bet, so you shift your forehead back to the table and listen, straining your ears to pick up any morsel. Something opens and closes and you catch the sound of the wheels of his chair as they shift, squeaking across the floor, and the groaning of the springs when his weight is applied to the cheap leather.

Okay, so he’s in his chair. Is he just gonna look at you? That’s not… wait…

There’s a faint clicking sound.

It’s both familiar and unfamiliar to your ears, but once the teeth slide over the last pull, you realize. It’s a zipper.

Oh fuck. Is he going to jerk himself off? With a gasp, your head whips back around. He’s still positioned himself away from you, and you can only just make out the sounds that are accompanying the undoubted rise and fall of his fist. All you can see is a tiny sliver of his body, but you catch sight of the coiling muscles on his neck and you notice that his head is dipped forward, pearl white hair settling across the cut of his collarbone. The one red eye that meets yours is blazing and hungry, it makes every hair on the back of your neck stand up.

God, he’s staring at you, watching you, getting himself off as you’re half naked and bent over a desk in his office, fully subjugating yourself to his whims and fancies for the sake of your grade.

Damn it, (Y/N). This should not be a fucking turn on. You should be disgusted, but the flush of slick that drips down your thigh says otherwise.

He lets out a choked moan, picking up the pace of his hand, letting you hear the click and slip of his palm as it strokes up and down his cock. A shiver echoes up your spine and your hips seem to have a mind of their own, grinding your clenched thighs over the dip of the table, easing the clenching pulsations that your cunt is shuddering through you.

“Look at you, so desperate for my touch that you’re humping the fucking table. Such a dirty girl, and so disobedient. You’ve only answered a few of my questions correctly and yet your slutty little mouth and body keep pushing at me. Making me put you in your place. Let me ask you something, why should I go out of my way to fix your grade when you can’t even prove to me you understand the simplest concepts?

Ah, here’s a thought. What if I told you I’ll wave the other requirements; no more readings, no more quizzes, but I won’t let you cum? What if I just get myself off? You’re putting on a such a good show for me! Why should I bother with seeing that you’re satisfied when that table seems to do the job for you? Sound good? Or would you like for me to come back over there and make you cum?”

“I–I don’t… I don’t want…” You can’t get the words out, your tongue feels leaden between your lips and you can’t think of anything but the steady itch that’s spreading from your clit.

“Speak up,” Shigaraki demands, slowing his jerking fingers. The chair he’s sitting in groans as he leans forward, and his eyes wide as they take in the delicious sight that’s propped before him. “You don’t want to cum? Is that it? You’d like for me to get myself off and leave you there?”

“No!” you cry out, your fingers digging into the scuffed wood of the table. “I-I want you to make me cum.”

There’s a sharp clatter and you jump at the abrupt noise. It must be the chair you think, your heart pounding against your chest, waiting for Shigaraki’s next move. He only lets a few seconds drift by before he presses himself back to you. He leans his broad chest over your back, the front of his legs pushing against the back of yours. His exposed length is wedged firmly against the cleft of your ass and its tempting hardness makes you squirm under him, but he’s propelling you forward, pinning you against the rough wood, and you can only flail uselessly under his control. His lips skim over your neck and he bites into your skin, sucking and licking bruises as he inches closer to your pulse.

You say his name pitifully, wantonly, and he lets out a shaky gasp. Something about your tone has shifted something within him and you can feel his cock swelling, dripping a rope of wet pre-cum down your shaking leg.

He leans away, removing his sticky hardness from your ass. “Seems your priorities have shifted. You’re a little preoccupied right now, aren’t you?” he asks, his voice gravel scraping against your overwhelmed senses. You let out a weak moan and he snaps into action, his fingers pushing under your flattened stomach and tugging against the fabric that he finds. He yanks you upward, pulling your shirt up as he goes. His palms dip under your half lifted bra, and he cups at your breasts, massaging the rounded bulbs and plucking at your peaked nipples. Your head lolls back, and he sucks at your earlobe again, his breath warm and rasping as it passes by.

“Hold still,” he commands.

It’s not an easy position, this stretched upward arch that he’s forced you into, but it’s worth it when you feel his cock pushing between your tensed legs. He doesn’t thrust into you, opting to run his weeping tip against your slippery folds, pressing until his bulbous head is twitching against your pulsing clit.

Goddamn it, you think as he stills, his lips smacking open-mouthed kisses over your shoulder, it’s not enough. You wiggle your hips back and forth and he abruptly exerts a firm pressure against your windpipe, leaving you sputtering and gasping. “What’s wrong? Not happy with this? Do you think you deserve something more? Do you think you’ve earned that?” He shoves you back against the surface of the table, his broad chest following the plane of your back, trapping you under his heavy form.

You’d replied, you know you must have, but you can’t hear yourself anymore, your attention attuned to the warm length that’s pressed against your shuddering folds. You’d likely thrown in a please for good measure because Shigaraki rewards you with a quick peck to your shivering neck and his thumb, swirling it around your clit, creating a cresting ache that leaves you mumbling incoherently, a thin line of drool slipping from your parted lips. As he keeps that faint osculation up, your fingernails scrape over the wood of the table, your feet lifting you onto your toes, curving your back, and shoving your leaking pussy into his open palm.

“Greedy little thing, aren’t you?” Shigaraki says, a breathy desperation lingering around the edges of his rasping voice. “But it’s just not enough, right?”

You nod, licking up some of the excess saliva that’s built under your heavy tongue and crane your head back at him. His eyes are the first thing you see. They’re wild, ravenous and glinting with a roughness that makes you whisper out a soft whine. Fuck. It’s not supposed to be like this. You’re not supposed to want him this badly. Goddamn it. Now that he’s caught your gaze, he won’t let you look away, and he presses himself closer, his cock twitching and warm, the tip rubbing back and forth, keeping time with his circling thumb.

“You gonna fuck me, or not?” you finally ask, unsticking your lips and smirking up at his hardened face.

“Tch. Don’t rush me,” he grumbles, removing his hand and teasing cock from your cunt, watching as your body convulses under him, your pussy quivering against the excess stimulation that he’s wrought over you. Your thighs burn, aching to break free from his control, to rub against that throb, that tingling that keeps shuddering outward.

“One more question,” he tells you, lifting his dripping thumb to his lips and sucking off the traces of your arousal. The sight of him licking his pink tongue over his gleaming knuckles almost makes you lose your balance, your arms shaking precariously under you.

“A-another? Come on,” you pout, your eyes following the curve of his wicked lips, watching as his scar quirks upward, amused by your useless defiance.

“Make you a deal, answer it correctly and I’ll give you my cock. Sound fair?”

“Ugh, whatever, just hurry up,” you snap, so impatient and turned on that you can hardly think.

The tip of his cock presses against your sopping entrance, pushing forward just enough to part your dripping folds but stopping before he clears that first, tight ring of flesh. The promise of his dribbling tip makes you lose any semblance of self-control. You thrash under him, but he traps your disobedient hips against the rough siding of the table.

“No! Don’t stop! Come on Sh-Shigaraki–Don’t be such a fucking–ah–”

“Do you want this? Do you want my cock?” he growls, leaning over you, his fingers squeezing down, no doubt leaving bruises in the supple crest of your hips.

“Yes! Fuck, please! I–I want it so fucking bad!” you cry out, your voice drifting into a sob as you croak out the last plea.

“Then you better answer. What are cytosines?”

“They… they’re n-nitrogenous base… fuck… base that pair… that pair with guanine during D-DNA replication… I–please, please, Shigaraki! Fuck me! I want your cock! Fuck me, fuck me!”

Thankfully, he either takes pity on you, or can’t control himself anymore, his hips surging forward, gliding his thick length into your cunt and snarling at the mind numbing heat that waits for him. He keeps driving upward until he bottoms out, sharp hipbones grinding against the plushness of your ass.

He’s not gentle with you, no he’s animalistic and raw, his thrusts papping into you with a terrifying strength. You would have liked something slower, something that lets you enjoy each imperfection and dip that raced along his cock, but this, oh, this is an exception because this is perfect. It’s not what you want, but it is what you need.

The heavy fullness that he’s stuffing you with leaves you breathless, but you somehow manage to gasp out a string of nonsensical praises each time he drives back into you, overwrought by his roughness.

This coupling isn’t kind, isn’t right, and is not healthy, for either of you. No, not with the way he’s using your shivering body, distracted with slacking that euphoric thrum that’s making his cock pulse and swell inside you.

But fuck it feels good and you can’t help but tremble with delight. These intoxicating thrusts of his ram him up against something that’s buried deep inside you, and each time he hits it another star of bright pleasure races through you. The familiar coiling of release is steadily mounting with each rapid fire rut he gives you and if he could just, ah, there’s something that’s… no, fuck, it’s, it’s not going to work. It feels good, but it’s missing one vital ingredient, one thing that he’s neglected to pay attention to, to notice.

Your clit needs to be tweaked and rolled, and right now it’s pulsing away against the table, beating a sad tattoo into the grainy wood. Oh well, you think, head fuzzy, lost in the euphoria of his powerful cants, grinding your ass into his hips as he digs into another teeth chattering thrust. He’ll likely finish soon, and you’ll probably need to get yourself off later. It’s not something new, and it’s not like he’s going to care enough to focus on that, on you. This whole thing has been about control, so there’s likely no room for your own pleasure.

“What’s wrong,” he gasps out, his fingers lifting from your hips to curl beside your turned head.

“What? N-nothing–I–” you pant, eyes rolling back as he hits that spongy patch of nerves again.

“Tch. Hold on,” he interrupts, his voice rasping and breathy. He pulls himself out of you with a grunt and yanks you upward, hauling you onto the tabletop and flipping you on your back, bending your stiffened legs and bracing your knees against his lean forearms.

He holds you apart, spreading you open with his powerful hands. You can see him properly now, and the sight makes your breath catch against the back of your throat. Fuck, he looks good.

His long white hair is draped across his bare shoulders and his eyes are blazing pits of hunger, devouring the sight of you with those red irises. His jaw is clenched, and he glares down at you from his imperious height, his nostrils flaring as he drags in a quick intake of air. To your shock, he gives you a little time to acclimate to this new position, opting to languidly step forward, letting his slippery cock head press and tease at the dip of your opening. But right when you think he’ll move again, he stops, his eyes roving over the lines of your face.

His sudden stillness makes you peer quizzically up at him and you scoot closer, your feet lifting from the table. The movement snaps him out of his stupor and he grabs your ankles, roughly pinning you back down.

“Keep still,” he snarls through clenched teeth, that scar of his lifting.

You nod mutely and he rewards your unquestioning obedience with another powerful thrust, sinking his swollen cock back into your waiting cunt. He lets out a sharp groan and grabs at your hips, jerking you forward, already drifting back into that all-consuming rhythm he’d started earlier. His ruts are a little slower from this angle but, in no time at all, that familiar ache pools in your core, stoking and building at an alarming rate. The driving force of his hips soon has you blinking back spots and distant stars, and this time he adds the all important pressure of his thumb, circling the finger pad over your clit and dragging a broken moan from your quivering lips.

“So that’s what you needed. You close?” he grits out, his lips set in a curled scowl. He’s lost some of that early control, his hips stuttering as they connect with yours, his power lessening, cooling, as he looks for your release.

“I–I think–oh fuck, do that again. Yes! Just–ah!”

He angles your hips upward and gives your clit another quick oscillation, pressing down until you’re gasping. “There you go. That felt good. You’re getting tighter,” he laughs, looming over you, shoving your heaving chest downward as he jerks your hips into him, forcing your body to do most of the motion, making your shoulder blades scrape across the uneven wood. “Cum for me. Fucking cum on my cock, (Y/N). Cum and I’ll give you your A, I’ll give you whatever the fuck you want.”

Your spine arches as you break around him, your cunt greedily pulling him deeper, slipping him past the barrier of your tender cervix and earning you a weak shout of praise from Shigaraki. Seconds later, he’s pulsing and twitching against your walls, the warm pooling of his cum filling you up and spilling down your spread thighs.

His head drops to your shoulder and the rough skin of his forehead sticks to your sweat dampened flesh. For a long moment you’re both still, each of you struggling to catch your breath, luxuriating in the tingling sensation of release.

“I fucking hate you, you know,” you gasp out, your arms circling his back, fingertips etching vague patterns over his neck and shoulders.

“Ha,” he snorts, “I’ll have to remember that. Don’t worry (Y/N), I’ll pay you back for that little remark next time.”

“Oh? Next time?” you chuckle, moaning as he twists out of your hold and pulls his softening length out of you.

“I’ll fail you on every assignment if you try to keep away,” he threatens, his eyes falling to the gaping mess that he’s left behind. You cross your legs, denying him the satisfaction of leering at your dripping pussy.

“Fine. But next time, fuck me on something softer than a damn table.”

tags: @spicy-skull, @xwildskullx, @yixxes, @ghstmthr, @rekoii, @diaouranask, @bat-eclecticwolfbouquet-love, @libiraki <--- i’m coming for you. you’re gonna have to read for this, lady. so, uh, i’m officially noneconing you here.

notes: you made it! this thing is a monster & i’m so sorry i can never stfu

#shigaraki tomura #tomura shigaraki #reader insert #shigaraki x y/n #shigaraki x you #shigaraki x reader #bnha smut #9 to 5 collab #bnha degeneracy server #collaboration #tw: unhealthy relationship #tw: teacher/student #tw: dubcon #tw: bribery

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undermattsun-archive · 4 years

Text

taste

(skate rat) kawanishi taichi x fem!reader | w.c 3.5k

a/n: SURPRISE it’s a sequel to mouth <3 my original skate rat sin i suppose, and also like my first real fic/drab for the fandom. god bless. as always thank u to @bakatenshii + @sugardaddykenma for putting up with me ranting about this fic (and also putting up with me since mouth)

big big thanku to #1 wife @pomsuki for reading this for me and yelling at me to finish this damn thing <3

18+ university age | pls read ALL warnings

warnings: drugs, public sex, dub/noncon exhibitionism, degredation, humiliation, dubcon, blood, slight injury (it’s a bloody nose), toxic behavior, misogynistic energy? vibes? you’ll know when u see it honestly

reading mouth isn’t necessary but it is appreciated! and pls check out melt + nightingale syndrome for they exist in the same skate rat universe (+ they’re delicious fics) also the people who wrote em r BIG SEXY

There were more than enough reasons to quit Kunimi Akira. He never texts back, he doesn’t go to class, he’s fucked a few of your friends and he couldn’t commit if you paid him. He was simply a waste of time, it was like every second spent with him was another mark ticked off a test, a percentile lowering on your next paper.

But chucking Kunimi would be like trying to sort grains of rice, difficult and damn near impossible. He always knew how to draw you back in and he enjoyed the mind games a lot more than his bored expression would let on.

Despite the impossibility of quitting him you had to at least try, so you swore up and down that hooking up with him at Oikawa’s party some odd months ago was truly the last of it, that you were done with him and all of his irritating skate rat friends.

Which begs the question of how you ended up at the little concrete amphitheater on campus, sandwiched between Hanamaki and Matsukawa on one of the steps, a blunt being passed between the two of them without so much as a second glance towards you.

“Say, when’s the last time you and Kunimi had fun?” Makki’s grin is nothing short of lascivious, a slimy feeling weighs on your tongue as you shrug off a shudder.

“Say, was that ever any of your business?” You retort, snatching the blunt from his lips bringing it to your own and inhaling deeply, revelling at the warmth creeping down your throat and filling your chest.

“Quit it Makki, she’s not gonna fuck you. Kunimi got her ‘round his little finger,” Mattsun coos, taking back the blunt, “besides, heard she’s a fuckin ice queen in the sack. Boooring.”

A sharp inhale keeps you grounded, the sound of Iwaizumi’s board slamming back down onto the pavement reminding you where you are, who you’re with. You’re not going to fall for Mattsun’s little games too.

“Tch.” Daggers prick at your lips, but you bite your tongue knowing that fueling the fire will earn you nothing but a headache. It’s not like you’re waiting for anything, or anyone, stealing a few more hits and leaving would be the best option.

“Oh? Nothing to say? But I heard your mouth was your only redeeming quality.” You focus your gaze on Iwaizumi telling Oikawa to stay out of his way, trying not to let your growing discomfort scare you away. The stubborn refusal of letting Mattsun’s words win only letting a dull ache grow at the base of your skull, prickling further when he and Makki let out low mocking laughs.

“Hey fucknuts!” Your head whips over to see a blur of crimson race by, followed gradually by a few other familiar faces you’ve seen around at parties and on campus.

“God, not these assholes.” Makki laughs as Oikawa makes faces at one of the newcomers. Your eyes drag across the unfolding scene as the number of rowdy idiots grows. You swallow hard, knowing that staying any longer would only cause your headache to further bloom.

“That’s my cue to leave.” You sigh, it’s not like you were waiting for Kunimi in the first place. You weren’t. You were just...killing time.

“Leaving?” Your head tips back to look up at the source of the question, Kawanishi Taichi, of course.

“Yeah, dunno why I’m here in the first place.” You brush off his quirked brow and shove Mattsun hard with your shoulder as you stand up. With a curt nod, you smooth a hand over your jeans, turning on your heel to brush past Kawanishi, ignoring the low whistle that falls from his lips. You make it a good distance down the walkway before the sound of crunching footsteps behind you prickles at your ears as you ready yourself to tell whoever it is to get lost.

“Want a ride?” You let out a huff as you look over your shoulder to see Kawanishi standing so nonchalantly, hands tucked into his pockets as he chews on a toothpick.

“Shouldn’t you be skating around with your little boyfriends?” The comment slips out, followed by your tongue sliding over your bottom lip as if it’ll soften the sharpness of your tone.

“Nah, just droppin 'em off,” his eyes rake up and down your figure as you turn to face him, “where’s yours?”

“My what?”

“Your little boyfriend. You were waiting there like a lost puppy for him.” A protest rises in your chest, curbing it when you see a flash of something akin to flirtatious teasing in his normally passive eyes.

“I... I don’t have one.” The words are slathered in honey, punctuated with a flutter of your lashes as Kawanishi takes another step forward.

If Kunimi likes playing all those stupid games, why not play a few of your own?

“Is that so?” His head tilts slightly, you feign shyness, fiddling with the hem of your shirt as you smile sweetly at him, confirming your statement with a nod of your head. “My car’s just over in the parking lot.” He tips his head in the direction of the closest lot, before turning to start walking. Without hesitation you easily fall into step beside him, trying to dampen your rising nerves.

Despite the dumb little hookups peppering your dating history, you had only gone so far with most of them, Kunimi being one of the few —and the only one you crawled back to— that you had made the unfortunate pleasure of going all the way with. You keep pushing away at the thoughts of inexperience as Kawanishi approaches an old, beat up, black Corolla, the paint flaking off with dings and dents littering across the body, the impeccably shiny rims on the wheels making you snort.

It was a rather famous car across campus, seeing it around with stupid skate rats crammed in there with the windows fogged with smoke was an almost daily occurrence, especially highlighted by how it’s tied to one too many stories of girls having varying encounters with Kawanishi –and sometimes one of his friends– in said car.

“Wanna smoke or skip to the real fun?” He never minced any words, always up front or just completely skipping out on the conversation. It always made him the best project partner in the odd classes you’ve shared over your uni years.

“I don’t like waiting.” The fuzziness nipping at your spine from the few hits you took earlier were just enough, not wanting to dull your senses completely during this encounter. The bluntness of your answer causes a smirk to play at Kawanishi’s lips as he opens the door to the back.

“Well then, ladies first.” He gestures to the gray cloth seats, you make a point to ignore the questionable stains littered across it as you slide in, trying to focus instead on figuring out the heady scent permeating through the car. Cheap cologne, cigarettes, weed and maybe stale beer, and something that was distinctly him.

Your eyes are drawn to a stain on the roof that looks oddly similar to an eagle, the thought unfinished as Kawanishi practically dives in after you. The sound of the door slamming preempting hands roaming over your body and lips moving against your neck.

“Kawa-”

“Just Taichi.” He clips as he works the buttons of your jeans, a coarse hand working against your spine as he unhooks your bra.

“Eager much?” You laugh as he pushes at your shirt and bra exposing pert nipples to cool air, simultaneously managing to work your jeans past your hips and down your thighs.

“You said no waiting.” With a chaste kiss to your lips he’s maneuvering you onto your stomach, raising your hips in the air, face shoved halfway between the seat and door. You let out a huff as your hand braces itself against the door, while the other on the seat below you, trying to find some semblance of comfort in the cramped setting.

“Mhm.” It’s the best reply you can manage as he grinds his clothed cock against the cleft of your ass, already hard. You can only imagine how many women he’s had in this situation to award all six feet and three inches of himself the ability to move so successfully around in the cramped backseat.

Nimble and worn fingers circle around your hip, dipping down to tease at dampening lace, eliciting a soft moan from you. You push back against him, delighting in the soft grunt he lets out as he curls himself over you to scrape his teeth over your nape. His fingers continue to run up and down against your clothed cunt, pressing at the growing slick spot marking your wanting hole.

“Excited huh?” He mumbles as he skims his tongue against the shell of your ear, you manage a low hum in reply as he slides his hands back up, tugging down the flimsy piece of clothing, exposing your needy cunt to hungry eyes. He wastes no time pressing his fingers against your twitching hole, causing you to wiggle your hips just enough to earn a low chuckle and send the message of just how much you want him, need him.

Without any further hesitation he slips in a finger, your back arching with the realization his fingers are longer than Kunimi’s, chest burning at the fact you could even think of another man in this situation. As if he can sense your wandering thoughts Taichi works in another finger, another following quickly after. There’s no urgency in his movements, each twist and thrust of his fingers methodical, curling in just the right way, making sure to brush his thumb over your throbbing clit to send a stinging pleasure up your spine.

You can’t deny the way he’s taking you apart so sweetly, the tightening deep in your belly achingly sweet, as he starts to thrust his fingers even deeper, tiny gasps and whines starting to grow louder and louder as you careen towards bliss. With a particularly rough curl of his fingers you feel yourself come undone completely, punctuated by a shameless moan.

The sound of knuckles tapping against the fogged glass pulls you out of your blissful haze, still acutely aware of the way Taichi has his fingers lazily twisting inside of you.

“It’s open.” He tugs you back by the hips slightly as he retracts his fingers painfully slow, listening as he unzips his jeans. Your heart races as the passenger door opens, shifting uncomfortably to try to catch a glimpse of who’s slid into the car.

“Oh, so that’s where you went, Mattsun said you were hanging around.” Your blood runs cold, your state of undress tightening your chest as you become painfully aware of the situation you’re in. The passive tone of Kunimi’s voice nips at your skin, tears away at the search of mindless fun that you had tried to pursue with Taichi, filling your chest with raw embarrassment.

“What do you want?” The tear of a wrapper following the question, whatever protest you had silenced by a hand coming down to grip harshly at your ass.

“You have my grinder.” Kunimi slips into the passenger seat, the sound of the glove box popping open making your eyes squeeze shut.

“Yeah well close the door at least.” Your eyes widen at Taichi’s statement, you didn’t want Kunimi to just close the door, you wanted him to leave.

“Whatever. Can I smoke in here?” It doesn’t sound like much of a question, more of a declaration with the ‘can’ and the question mark tacked on for decoration.

“I don’t care, do you?” You crane your head just enough to catch the blasé expression on Taichi’s face, a quirked brow directed more at your ass than you.

“Yeah sweetheart, care if I’m in here while you’re whoring yourself out?” Kunimi scoffs, the irritated tinge to his bored tone making you furrow your brows.

“Oh fuck you.” You start to rise on your elbows, only for Taichi’s hand to land between your shoulder blades, keeping you from moving any further. You let out a huff as Kunimi clicks his tongue in feigned disappointment.

“Sorry babe, it’s me who’s fucking you this time around, maybe Kunimi can get the next round.” Before you can even bother with a retort, Taichi drags the head of his cock against slick folds, teasing at your entrance. You let your head hang down, the click of a lighter grating on your nerves more than you would like to admit.

“Please, fuck me, I want it so bad.” The whininess of your voice annoys even you, but if Kunimi wants to stick around and get on your nerves, then two could play that game.

“Since you asked so nicely.” Just like before he slides in slowly, carefully, as if to make you memorize what each inch of him feels like splitting you apart so sweetly.

“Shit.” You exhale shakily as you try to adjust to him, it had been months since you last fucked anyone, since you last fucked the asshole sitting passenger.

He sets a leisurely pace, steady and infuriating. There’s a hand clamped down on your hip, fingers digging in painfully to keep you in place, to establish that he’s the one calling all the shots. You huff, still trying to buck your hips to meet his thrusts. There’s something in his actions that makes you feel greedy, desperate for so much more than he’s offering.

There’s no way around it, you’re completely at his mercy, left taking the shallow, slow thrusts that only makes the desperate ache deep in your cunt grow.

“Hook a finger or two in her mouth.” There’s a pause in Taichi’s motions, letting you finally take a deep breath of the thick weed laced air. “Don’t look at me funny, do it and see what happens.”

You hear a non-committal hum as those devilishly nimble fingers skim past your jaw, a whimper preceding his index pushing past your lips with a harsh tug at the corner of your mouth, the painful stretch of your cheek causing you to clench down on his length.

“Oh? You were right.”

“She’s already broken in,” Kunimi takes a long drag of the joint hanging in his fingers, “no point in holding back.”

It’s as if a flip is switched in Taichi, the statement becoming an immediate challenge as he hooks in another finger beside the other, yanking harshly as the snap of his hips becomes almost painful. The sound of skin slapping against skin fills the car, swirling with the heady smoke defiling the air.

“W-Wait Taichi.” The words are garbled around his fingers, and you’re quickly dismissed as he snakes around his other hand to hook his middle and index on the other corner of your mouth, the stretch in your lips burning as he shifts from the quick paced thrusts to deep, hard strokes.

His only reply is to tug harshly on your mouth as pathetic whines and distored words spill from you.

You can feel yourself start to shake almost violently, still reeling from your earlier orgasm and suffering at the hands of Taichi’s now vicious pace. Each thrust pushing you into madness, each tug of his fingers bringing you back.

“Fuck, fuck.” He curls over you again, sloppily running his tongue up your nape. “You wanna cum?”

“Mhmm,” you yelp at a particularly rough slam of his hips, “please.”

He grunts, moving a hand to grip at the back of your head while keeping his other hand planted on your hip, fingers biting into your hip. There’s no warning as he grinds into you, the hold on your hip finally relenting as he slides his digits back down to pinch at your throbbing clit, the bit of pressure sending you careening over the edge.

“T-Taichi.” Pleasure wracks through your body, your legs tremble violently as you try to move your hand on the door, shoulder aching from holding yourself in place. The second your hand moves, you give into the force of Taichi’s hand on the back of your head, forcing you to slam face first into the door, the impact making your nose sting, blood immediately starting to gush, running down your face and chin.

You’re not sure if he doesn’t notice or doesn’t care as he continues his assault, the once careful, methodical thrusts turning desperate and depraved as he moves with reckless abandon. His teeth drag across your shoulder, before pulling out completely.

“Don’t need this.” You grip at your nose, trying to ignore the disgusting feeling of blood seeping onto your fingers, looking over your shoulder again to see Taichi pull off the condom. You can’t even protest with the way you’re bleeding profusely, pinching at your bridge at a poor attempt of stopping the bleeding.

“Stay still.” In one swift movement he’s plunging back into you, bottoming out immediately, a muffled yell falls from your lips, arching your back as he drives into you with just a few more hard thrusts you feel his seed spill inside you.

For a moment you two stay suspended, the head of his cock nudging against your cervix, making you groan in a twisted sense of pleasure of pain. He pulls out painfully slow, delivering another harsh slap your ass as he sits back.

“Oh, sorry ‘bout your nose.” He helps you flip onto your back, swiping his thumb over the blood trickling onto your lip before shucking off his t-shirt and handing it to you. “Don’t have any tissues.”

“So who’d you like playing fuck toy for better?” For a split second, somewhere between the back breaking orgasm and your nose being slammed into the door, you had blissfully forgotten that Kunimi was still in the car, but now that perfect illusion just had to be shattered.

“Must you be such a dick all the time?” You manage to pull your jeans back up, hissing at the stinging pain in your hips and lower back, ignoring the lewd feeling of Taichi’s cum starting to leak from your abused cunt.

Beside you Taichi manages to tuck himself back into his pants, reaching under the driver's seat to yank out a hoodie reeking of weed and cigarettes.

“Maybe you two should just get together already.” Taichi lets out a low chuckle as he pulls on the hoodie, getting out of the backseat, slamming the door hard before throwing the driver’s door open. You don’t even bother trying to hook your bra back on as you pull your shirt down, letting yourself slump back down and lay across the backseat as you reach up to check if your nose is still bleeding.

“Like hell.” Kunimi twists around in the passenger seat, looking down at you with an amused smirk, offering the freshly rolled joint to you. “You look like shit. I said she was broken in, not to break her more.” He only gets a wry laugh from Taichi as he starts the car.

“Thanks, right back at you.” You sit up just enough, looking at Kunimi expectantly. He shakes his head before twisting the joint in his fingers and placing it between your lips, producing the lighter. Just as he’s about to hand it to you he brings his hand back a bit, grabbing your jaw with his other as he lights the joint. He picks up Taichi’s bloodied shirt, pouring water from a twisted plastic bottle onto it before passing it back to you.

“Cute, blew her back out and you’re doting on her.” You watch as Kunimi moves to sit back in his seat, not even bothering to spare you a second glance as he shrugs. You dab away at the drying blood on your face, ignoring a few of the splotches that landed on the joint.

“Guess I play favorites, drop us off at my place.”

“Us?” You exhale after a long drag, narrowing your eyes at the back of Kunimi’s head as Taichi pulls out of the parking spot.

“What do I even get out of doing that?” You can’t help but nod in agreement of Taichi’s statement, feeling yourself growing annoyed at the way they seem to ignore your entire presence.

“You can fuck her again.” Kunimi offers and you almost drop the joint as your jaw falls open at the absolute nerve of the man.

“Excuse me? I’m right here?” The way that neither of them even flinch at your statement, let alone acknowledge it makes you slump back into the seat, begrudgingly accepting the fact whatever you say isn’t worth shit to either of them.

“Hm.” It doesn’t sound like he’s actually considering the offer, but the quick look over his shoulder as he turns out of the parking lot sends a chill down your spine and your stomach to twist.

“Believe it or not, her mouth’s her one redeeming quality.” The two of them snicker, like two old pals sharing an inside joke.

“Shut the fuck up.” You’re brushed off once again as they toss back a few more comments before Taichi stops at a red light, looking over at Kunimi, then back at you and finally back towards the road.

“Yeah alright.”

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hello-yue-here · 3 years

Text

as a person who spends way to much time grooming their eyebrows to perfection here is every gaang member and their philosophy surrounding eyebrow grooming because im so fucking bored and cant think of anything else

aang: he does not give a shit but he let’s katara do his eyebrows because she thinks its fun and wants to practice on him because apparantly he has a really good natural shape? he doesnt rlly know what shes talking about but it makes her smile and he gets to put his head in her lap while she plucks the hairs so its a win win for him (hes a big baby tho. she will pluck one (1) hair and he will start tearing up. yes this is based on my best friend who lets me do his brows for him.)

katara: absolutely refuses to let anyone touch her eyebrows but herself. she once got them done at a salon and they completely removed the tail and she cried for three days over it. it was awful. (olivia stop talking about yourself. im sorry i cant. olivia. no katara and i would have the same exact eyebrow journey.) anyways katara is now ridiculously good at doing her eyebrows and ppl compliment her brows all the time.

sokka: manz was born w the perfect brows. he doesnt even have to do anything to them its crazy. katara is super jealous because sokka doesnt even care. he doesnt even realize the power he posesses. fully doesnt understand the hype about brows but hey he can annoy his little sister with it so he pretends he does.

toph: doesnt give a flying fuck about her eyebrows but she does get them waxed sometimes because 1) shes just so used to it because her mother and 2) she likes the way it makes her face tingle

zuko: i mean… i hate to say it but… he only has the one eyebrow… so he takes a lot of care of it. asks katara for tips to make it look nice. started off as a menace to all eyebrows. he was the king of overplucking and over drawing. has come to know better tho. hes now pretty good at eyebrow maintenence.

suki: an eyebrow legend. almost as good as katara. the difference between katara and suki is that suki likes to experiment with different eyebrow trends and use eyeliner and eyeshadow to paint fun patterns and makeup designs w her brows. katara likes to keep it natural and suki is like “lets make it extra”

azula: instagram brows or nothing. even after the trend died she continued doing it. its what works and it always looks perfect on her. she is secretly terrified of trying anything new w her brows.

mai: thinks that the paper thin look from the 90’s is still good (trust me its not) but for some reason she makes it work so like, go you mai. it takes a lot of skill to pull of the over plucked look so ill give u that.

ty lee: QUEEN OF THE BUSHY BROW AGENDA. unruly af brows and its adorable. plucks when she feels like it which is like every four months.

yue: occassionally she’ll run a spoolie through her brows so they look tamed but other than that its not all the important to her. she does however have concrete opinions on lip care and oral hygiene.

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yandere-daydreams · 4 years

Text

Title: Trapped

Word Count: 3.2k

Written for an anonymous commissioner.

Pairing: Yandere!Oikawa/Reader.

Synopsis: Oikawa isn’t the first stalker you’ve caught the interest of, and you really, really didn’t think he’d be the last. Now that you’re in trapped in his arms permanently, you’re forced to make the best of his smothering obsession.

TW: Non-Con, F. Reader, Non-Consensual Touching, Overstimulation, Bondage, Knife-Play, Blood, Mentions of Death, Mentions of Stalking, Imprisonment, Gaslighting, Mindbreak, Flashbacks and Implied PSTD.

Part One.

It'd always been the adrenaline, for you.

You liked the danger, too, and the satisfaction of knowing you’d beat a stalker at their own game. You liked being able to smile as you crushed a hidden camera under your heel, to laugh as you lost the poorly-disguised ‘stranger’ in a festering crowd, to feel utterly, entirely contented as you pictured Oikawa’s expression while he watched you rip another one of his hand-written, stumbling, rambling letters into shreds after reading the first nonsensical line. The rush was the best part, though. The frayed nerves, the blurry vision, the way your heart threatened to give out every time you woke up somewhere you didn’t remember falling asleep, a rope wrapped sloppily around your wrists and your own panties shoved in your mouth because someone hadn’t thought to buy a gag before you started screaming. It was fun. There wasn’t a better way to say it. It was fun.

It’d been fun back then, too. But, that’d been different. You’d gotten out in time. You’d assume Oikawa would be as easy to read as he was, and that was your mistake. You thought you had more time. If you were being honest, you were starting to think Oikawa’d gotten predictable. You were starting to think he’d gotten boring.

Huh.

It makes you sound like the creep, when you put it like that.

There was nothing exciting about laying on a bare mattress, stripped of your clothes and weapons and dignity, blindfolded and restrained as your captor, your actual captor, did something on the other side of the basement, assessing the small amount of damage you’d caused before you were caught and captured in earnest. You hadn’t fought back, not really, not after you realized you wouldn’t be able to escape without breaking down the door.

You’d been in a stupor, but now that your pulse was beginning to slow and the panic was slowly turning into solidified, gnawing terror, you were starting to regret reacting so calmly. You thought he’d go easier on you, if you went along peacefully. You were used to the lead-up. You weren’t sure what to do, now that you were working out the aftermath.

You were in Oikawa’s territory, now, his fantasy.

All you could do was bite your tongue and hope he wasn’t the type to hold a grudge.

But, that didn’t mean you could stop yourself from flinching when you heard him take a step towards you, the noise jarring compared to the quiet tension you’d adjusted to. There was a light chuckle, breathy and non-committal, punctuated by a gentle, sympathetic hum as he crouched by your side, the sound of skin scraping against concrete and a subtle dip in the mattress underneath you serving as your only hint at his position. He didn’t touch you, not at first, but it might’ve been better if he had. At least then, you wouldn’t have to wait for it. If he lashed out, you wouldn’t have to spend so long wondering where he was going to strike first. “I’ve been dreaming about this, cutie,” He stated, the words almost a sigh. Contented, fulfilled. As if he might let you go again, just to see how good it’d feel to snatch you back up. “You kept me waiting for forever, you know that. Wanna guess how long?”

You thought it was rhetorical. This was his long-winded, villainous monologue, and you were the damsel in distress, forced to listen. Your assumption was corrected with a flick to your forehead, the gesture playful, but still startling enough to make you recoil. “Answer when I ask a question, brat.”

You remembered the day, but not the date. He’d tried to get your number in a bar, then when you politely declined, he’d tried to slip something into your drink and you’d splashed it over his chest, staining the nicest shirt you’d ever seen. You’d been so proud of yourself, you’d let yourself buy coffee from the most expensive shop in town every morning for the next week. “Seven months?” You guessed, your voice coming out meeker than you meant for it to be. “I... I’m not really sure.”

Another laugh, this one punctuated by a tap to your cheek. “You really don’t think much of me, huh? Can’t say I’m not offended, (Y/n).” There was a slight lull, and when he went on, his tone dropped, lowering just enough for the change to be noticeable. Just enough to make his touch seem dangerous, as he took you by the jaw. “Two years. We’ve been playing this game for two fucking years, and apparently, you didn’t even notice. It would’ve been one thing if you rejected me, but I don’t like being ignored. I spent so much time watching, so much time nudging you in the right direction, but you’ve always been the oblivious type, haven’t you?” There was another sigh, this one labored, heavy. Tired, but not as regretful as it should’ve been. “Oblivious and energetic. But, we’ll plenty of time to take care of that together, won’t we?”

It was a numb sort of shock. A realization you should’ve seen coming, an injury that phased through your skin and struck your chest without a buffer to cushion the blow. “Bastard,” You spat, before you could think better of it. It was more frustration than anything - hot, overwhelming frustration. Suddenly, you wish he’d been kind enough to gag you, too. You wouldn’t be able to make things worse for yourself, that way. “You were following me for years, and your first move was to drug me? You must be even crazier than I thought--”

He was gracious enough not to let you dig your own grave any deeper. Without warning, two fingers forced themselves into your mouth, hitting the back of your throat and making you lurch forward, only for Oikawa to catch your shoulder. “We’ll have to work on that too, but don’t worry.”

He paused, leaning forward, pressing a kiss into your forehead, one so light and so sweet, you could almost ignore the bared teeth, lingering underneath it.

“Your boyfriend’s gonna take care of everything, from now on.”

It was a small mercy that he’d gotten rid of the mattress.

He must’ve gotten tired of it, of giving you the luxury of being able to squirm and lean away from his touch and pull at the tether he’d repurposed when you got too brave, for his taste. Its replacement had been simple - a wooden chair, metal fetters keeping your wrists bond to its arms and your ankles to its legs. You’d say you didn’t see the point in the latter pair, but it would’ve been impossible to ignore Oikawa’s intentions, this far into your captivity.

You’d tried biting at him. You’d tried worming your way out of your restraints and finding weak-points in your shackles and, the few times you’d been able to, attacking him out-right, but Oikawa was an Olympic athlete and you were sore and stiff and drained, and there was nothing you could do to stop him as he draped himself over your shoulders, a knife in one hand and the other preoccupied, playing with your pussy and getting a little more impatient every time you growled or shrunk into yourself or gave him an exuse to do something reckless and heartless. It was humiliating. It was risky, moreso than it had to be. It was…

It wasn’t your last admirer would’ve done. Not while you knew him. Not before you left. Not before he became one of two hellish options.

“Still awake, angel?” It was more of a purr than a question, finished off by a tilt of his blade, the sharpened edge pressing into the flesh of your throat. A rational, logical part of you knew he’d never do it. If he wanted to kill you, he’d already had plenty of time to, and while Oikawa was a pervert and a kidnapper and a psychopath, he didn’t seem like the type to get his hands that dirty. Part of you knew that, a part of you was so sure of that, but that sensible minority seemed to grow fainter every time his thumb prodded at your clit, pushing messy circles around the sensitive nub, every time lithe fingers traced over your slit, collecting slick and playing with the idea of fucking genuinely fucking into you. Playing with it, just playing with it. Touching you enough to make your mind fog over and tears form in the corner of your eyes, but not enough to let you forget where you were or, more troublingly, who was touching you. “I don’t know how far I can push you, after this morning,” He went on, casually. “I mean, when you passed out, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I never thought you’d have anything against blood.”

Blood. That reminded you of something, something older than the open wounds still littered over your hips and spotted across your back. A broken nose, an ex-boyfriend complaining about your ‘over-protective friend’. Dirty alleys and pieces of glass. Bloody knuckles, scraped and raw, but not Oikawa’s.

The blindfold was gone, but you clenched your eyes shut regardless. You didn’t want to think about that. Oikawa’s sadism was easier to lean into, in comparison, more welcoming, although not nearly as hospitable as the dark, repressed recesses of your mind. It wasn’t like he would’ve let you drift off, anyway. The moment he noticed your attention start to shift, two digits were forced through your tight entrance, making you jerk forward just enough for his blade to draw a thin, red line in your throat, warm blood just beginning to drip from the corners by the time he pulled away. It didn’t hurt. Hell, it barely stung, but suddenly, your heart was racing, your pulse beating in your ears, and Oikawa’s laugh ringing out like chapel bells on the morning of an execution.

It wasn’t adrenaline. It wasn’t panic suppressed by practicality. The only thing you felt in that moment was white, hot fear. For your safety, your well-being, your life. For all the things Oikawa could so easily take away, if he wanted to.

He was just as merciless in this facet as he was in any other, chasing after his own entertainment rather than your satisfaction. He didn’t try to hide it, either. You could feel his smirk bite into your scalp as he pushed a fleeting, affectionate kiss into the top of your head, as he curled his fingers and spread them apart, giving your aching cunt everything it’d been dying for. It was cruel, really, how you could barely buck your hips, every little movement only putting you closer to his knife, to the thing that could end you with a slip of his wrist or a switch in his mood, but there wasn’t anything you could do. You were beginning to think that was what Oikawa wanted. To push you into a defeatist mindset. To prove that trying to resist was useless, now that he’d gained the upper hand. To make you see that he’d already won, and he wasn’t going to indulge you with a second round.

There wasn’t anything you could do. Not anymore.

You’d already lost.

The first time he fucked you, it’d been in his own bed.

Or, you think it was his bed, at least. He’d taken you out of the basement the same afternoon, and when you didn’t try to run the first time he turned his back, he’d nodded approvingly and cuffed your wrists to his headboard as a well-earned precaution. There was a jersey mounted on the wall with colors you didn’t recognize, but it wasn’t like you’d ever been his biggest fan. Gold and silver trophies were arranged half-hazardly along a shelf on the far wall, but he might’ve just liked to show off. He liked to show off. Above all things, you knew he loved to show off.

That was why he’d waited so long, until you could barely think and your whole body ached and you’d been willing to do anything to sleep in a real bed, rather than on a cement floor with little more than ropes and chains for company. You really couldn’t think, could you? You’d been focused on the ceiling since he first forced himself into you, your cunt already wet from too much foreplay and too little pay off, but even that was blurry, now, a blend of beige and white with nothing to interrupt it. Oikawa was talking again, but you didn’t want to listen. You couldn’t be sure of how long you’d been here, but it was long enough to know things were easier, when you didn’t listen to him.

A few words made it through the haze, though, once your gaze drifted to his face and you saw his lips moving. “So pretty,” He muttered, his voice low, just quiet enough not to be affected by the way he thrust into you, measured and erratic, at the same time. There was a spark of pain in your hips, strain in your thighs, and you realized he was holding your legs, one thrown over his shoulder and a thigh pressed into his side, his nails biting into your skin. It hurt, but in a distant sort of way. The pain was cold, like a knife cutting dead meat. Something that elicited a feeling similar enough to be recognized, but missed the mark and landed somewhere alien, instead. “My pretty little girl, my stubborn sweetheart, mine,” He went on, almost incoherently. He didn’t think you were listening, and to his credit, you really wished you weren’t. “Mine, mine, mine. Perfect and beautiful and mine.”

His hips slotted against yours, his cock hitting something soft and spongy inside of you, and you couldn’t seem to smother the shudder that worked its way through your body, that dull electricity that had your nerves standing on-edge, your back arching, a pitch whine snaking out of your throat that would’ve been painful to swallow down. It was less of a reaction and more of an impulse, something you were too worn-down to fight off, but Oikawa’s lazy grin still widened as he leaned down, nipping at your jugular. “Like that?” He asked, the words nearly muffled by your skin. “Does she wanna be mine?”

You didn’t deny it. You didn’t have time to try. His lips were on yours before your could, the collision sudden and messy and harsh. You pulled at your restraints, but Oikawa’s only response was to groan against your mouth, one of his hands coming up to cup your cheek, to clamp down around your jaw and hold you in place as he raked his tongue over yours. It was the first time he’d kissed you, beyond chaste pecks and bites that spoke more to his bloodlust than his fondness.

It was the first time he’d kissed you, and yet, you couldn’t bring yourself to hate him, you could hardly bring yourself to think about Oikawa. All you could do was remember the last time someone had kissed you like this.

All you could do was remember him.

It was a flood of information, too much to process at once. The house you grew up in, back in Japan, and a boy sitting on your bed with pretty eyes and a stern scowl and the lightest blush painted across his pale skin. How he’d tasted, the way he’d way he kissed you - shyly but fiercely, like you were the only thing that mattered to him, the only thing he was willing to dig his nails into and keep. The phone calls at midnight, the afternoons you spent on the bleacher’s of your high school’s gym, the friends that avoided you and the arm that was constantly wrapped around your waist, holding you just tightly enough to make breathing a little harder than it should’ve been.

The ring he’d tried to give you, after graduation, the one you’d never gotten a chance to wear. How he pushed his bangs away from his face as he tried to shove his way into your apartment, yours, not the one you’d shared with him and fled from, the first time he'd lost his temper. The restraining order that never stopped him, and the feeling of his hands around your neck, everything. Everything you’d tried to think of as an accomplishment. Everything you wanted so badly to think you were in control of, even as you bought a plane ticket and packed your bags and ran, just to get away from it. Everything you’d been stupid enough to think you could avoid, with Oikawa.

You couldn’t be sure when you started crying, but you must’ve. There was a cracked sob before you started talking, and then something you could only barely recognize as your own voice. “Tobio,” You gasped, flinching into yourself. There weren’t tears, but your eyes were wide, burning. You didn’t want Kageyama to touch you. Someone was touching you, and you didn’t want Kageyama to touch you. “Please, Tobio, it hurts, it-- I can’t-- I can’t breath--”

Finally, Oikawa stilled, pulling back just enough for his confused expression to be visible. He didn’t try to hide it, bewilderment mixing with offense before he put the pieces together, before uncertainty turned to realization and realization turned to anger. He didn’t hit you, but for a moment, you thought he was going to. It looked like he wanted to, but he didn’t.

Just as quickly, his features softened, and he broke out into a wide, forgiving smile. As if you’d only ever imagined his frown.

His next kiss was gentle, barely a shadow of his first. Soothing, in a way. It might’ve been comforting, if you weren’t so distraught. “Why didn’t you say something, angel?” It was a question, but he didn’t bother waiting for an answer. You were almost relieved. You probably wouldn’t have known what to say. “If I’d known you were scared of big, bad Tobio all this time, I would’ve done something. He’s so mean, isn’t he? Did he put his hands on you?” There was a hint of resentment in his tone, but it was easily lost under the faux empathy, the sweetness. So layered on, you might’ve believed it was genuine. You could’ve, if you tried to. “You don’t have to worry about him anymore, not while I’m here.”

“I don’t…” You tried to respond, it was a weak attempt. Now, the tears came, but Oikawa didn’t seem to have a problem brushing them away, cooing as he swiped his thumb over your cheek. “You won’t--”

“I want to keep you safe,” He corrected, before you could convince yourself he didn’t. “From Tobio, from everyone. And you’re gonna let me, aren’t you, princess?”

You wanted to feel safe. You wanted so desperately to feel safe. Running away from Kageyama hadn’t worked, not when it just led you to Oikawa, and it’d been so pointless to act like you were ever in control. You wanted to be protected. You wanted to be safe, and Oikawa seemed so sure of himself, as he started to fuck into you again, his pace considerstate and his touch loving. So loving, it was easy to think he might actually love you. More than Kageyama did, anyway, towards the end.

Maybe you would let him.

Maybe you’d try, just to see what it was like.

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ironhusband · 4 years

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do u have any domestic TonyRhodey headcanons?

I sure do! Thanks for asking, Vix!

Rhodey is the one who cooks. Tony can’t cook at all. Seriously, Rhodey tried to teach him, videos online tried to teach him, professional chefs tried to teach him, Mama Rhodes tried to teach him. It’s no use. He just can’t do it. So Rhodey cooks. And Tony absolutely loves every single thing Rhodey makes for him. Rhodey says that he’s an amateur compared to his mother, but in true sappiness, Tony says Rhodey’s cooking is better because “you can just taste the love you have for me, honeybear.” Rhodey always rolls his eyes with a tiny smile because he loves how sappy his husband is. Rhodey is usually too busy with work to cook though, so usually Tony orders them takeout for dinner. Rhodey swears that the way Tony orders them takeout comes with psychic; Tony always orders by Rhodey’s mood even if he doesn’t know what Rhodey’s mood is. When he had a bad day at work, Tony orders him his comfort food. When he missed Tony that day, Tony orders the hamburgers from the chain Tony always invited on at MIT. When Rhodey had a good day at work and wanted to celebrate, Tony would order him something from some fancy new restaurant in Malibu. When Rhodey’s day was fine but tiring, Tony orders pizza and they eat quickly before going to bed. Even though their cooking skills are different, food is a love language for the both of them.

They’re the kind of couple that can sit together in comfortable silence. They do like to do things together, watching TV or doing a puzzle or working together on a project, but sometimes it’s nice when they do different things in the same space, content and happy. Usually Rhodey would draw something while Tony would answer Emails or Rhodey would go over some of his trainees resumes while Tony was mindlessly playing the guitar. Occasionally, they would look at the concretion on each other's face and smile fondly. Sometimes they do it while sitting side by side or with their legs tangled together. They always feel completely at ease and relaxed, just by being close to one another.

People (The Avengers) are sometimes surprised at how much Tony and Rhodey love PDA when they’re with people they trust. Usually in public, they like to keep their hands off each other. Oh sure, they flirt like crazy, and Tony loves to announce that they’re very much together and that he’s crazy about Rhodey, but they don’t really touch. It’s a left over instinct from DADT. At home though? Tony and Rhodey always kiss before they go to work. They hold hands a lot, even if it interferes with them doing something (that’s how they broke the sink once). They constantly call each other’s nicknames and tell each other how much they’re loved. Tony always kisses Rhodey’s forehead whenever it’s in reach and Rhodey kisses Tony neck in a way that makes him giggle because the spot is ticklish. They always cuddle up to one another at movie nights and play footsie under the table at dinnertime. DADT might have meant they can’t show their love in public, so they like to remind each other of how much they love each other and want nothing more than to touch in private.

Tony and Rhodey have the exact same taste in everything. In movies, in books and in music and in humor and in hobbies. It’s not like they agree about everything, and even about their taste in popular culture, they like to pretend they’re different. But they have the exact same taste in everything. Which means they have monthly book clubs with just one another (because everyone else are clearly idiots) and they always listen to the same music in the workshop and for movie nights, they both laugh at each other’s jabs at the movie. They don’t ever have to tell each other before ordering tickets, because they’d either love it together or hate it together, but they’d always do it together. They do crosswords together and puzzles together and work on workshop projects together. As I said, they love doing things together, and with their shared interests, they get to do it a lot.

They love dancing! Absolutely adore it. They love dancing individually, Rhodey absentmindedly moving to the songs he used to like as a kid while Tony smiles fondly at his dork of a husband and Tony “distractingly” dancing in a seductive way, absolutely knowing what he’s doing to Rhodey. They love dancing together too. They love going to the clubs and complaining about the music the young people now but still dancing like they used to in MIT ( “let’s show them how it’s done!” they say. Everyone backs away twenty feet from them because these old people are so embarrassing). They love dancing in the workshop to the music they like, sometimes just nodding their heads to the beat and sometimes full on dancing, even if the music isn’t remotely dancing music. They love slow dancing, sometimes doing it randomly, without music in the background until JARVIS puts some Sinatra on, and by that time they’re too wrapped up in each other to notice the music came on.

Instead of date nights, Tony and Rhodey have “staying in bed” days. Sometimes their lives are so hectic and Tony’s sleep schedule is usually a mess anyway, that they need a break. They need a whole day to sleep in until late, have breakfast in bed brought to them (by Pepper, the hotel they’re staying at, or one of the Avengers), cuddle between the sheets, watch horrible new movies that they didn’t get a chance to see yet and make love where they want to. It happens once a month, usually at the last day of the month. It’s a nice way to start a new month, they think. It makes them both so happy to have a whole day for one another. They chose this instead of date nights, because this feels so much more intimate and romantic for them.

They don’t really say “I love you.” They both know they each other, but it’s very rare they say the words. They like to show it instead. Tony loves making big gestures and sending flowers to Rhodey’s work and he throws his arm over Rhodey’s shoulder while they lace their fingers together and kissing Rhodey passionately whenever he can. Rhodey for his part compliments Tony whenever the opportunity arises, never misses a chance to make him laugh and he leaves Tony Rhodey’s favorite hoodie for Tony to steal and he loves running his hands in Tony’s hair and kissing his cheeks. The word ‘love’ never needs to be said. They both know it and they both show it, and that’s enough for them.

They’re silly and childish with one another. They absolutely build blanket forts together and talk until they both fall asleep, like they’re still teenagers. They still but lightsabers and pretend they’re fighting each other to the death. They both still say ‘jinx’ whenever they finish each other’s sentences. They both still fight over the bubble wrap whenever they get a new package, and eventually all the fighting means all the bubble are already popped. They both still declare the floor is lava sometimes, and take the game completely seriously. Tony and Rhodey are both serious professionals that can adult properly. But with each other they feel comfortable enough to have some childish fun together, feeling like no one would judge them.

They take care of each other differently when they get sick. Rhodey is more low-key about it. He makes Tony soup, reminds him to make his meds and cuddles Tony when he’s feeling too miserable. Tony likes it for the most part. Not working sucks and Rhodey is evil for forcing him to stay in bed. Rhodey just rolls his eyes and tells him projects are better without sick germs being all over them. Tony however, freaks out whenever Rhodey is sick. He forces him to go to the doctor, and when the doctor sends them home, because Jesus Christ, Tony, it’s just a cold, he constantly asks Rhodey how he’s feeling, buys him the best meds, piles blankets over pillows over blankets on his bed to make sure Rhodey is comfortable, he flies all the way to Philly to bring Rhodey soup from his mom and he gets him what he wants whenever he wants (unless the request is “oh my god, leave me alone!”). Rhodey thinks it’s sweet, even if Tony is a little bit overreacting. He would much rather have a nice, relaxing day to be miserable in his sickness, though.

They’re always bickering. About absolutely stupid things. It’s never serious, of course. They almost never fight, unless it’s about really important often moral issues. But they always bicker. It’s their way of flirting. Tony is just a person who generally bickers with people, and Rhodey is one of the few people who cam keep up with him (comes with practice) so of course he returns his quips jab for jab. Most times they bicker over breakfast or over their work together and sometimes they bicker while they’re with their friends or when they’re talking to the bots. But they always bicker with a fond expression and their fingers linked together and with a kiss at the end.

#this is so embarrassing #I wrote 10 disginstyly sweet headcanons and it came out as 1.5k words. I - dfghujhgfdsdfghjhgfd #Ironhusbands #rhodeytony #tonyrhodey #rhfe #iron husbands #tony stark #james rhodes #rhodey #james rhodey rhodes #asks #rhodeytony headcanons #ironhusbands headcanons #vix tag

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c-is-for-circinate · 3 years

Text

So as close as I am to fully escaping Hades for the first time, I figure I might take this opportunity to write down a couple of things I'm scared of from this ending. The story is so good so far! But I have seen good stories before! And there are patterns, right, patterns it's so easy for even good stories to fall into, so yeah, I have fears, and they mostly come down to Hades himself.

(Yep, this one got long again! People seem to be enjoying my game-reaction rambles, so, for your enjoyment under the cut: themes of separation and reunion, predictions for what Zagreus is the god of, and a whole lot of discussion of familial abuse dynamics, how they're depicted in fiction, and the work it takes to change them in real life. Stay warned! Stay safe!)

(ALSO, I still haven't made it past the first couple of chambers in the Temple of Styx, so no spoilers in the reblogs/comments please! Yes, even though the whole post is me going on about predictions and hopes and concerns about the path the story might take. I WILL GET THERE SOON.)

It has been really interesting watching some of the stuff the game is doing with themes of parting and reunion, and how that corresponds to life and death. So many of our social links are about reuniting estranged loved ones: Chaos and Nyx, Eurydice and Orpheus, Patroclus and Achilles. Hades is estranged from Olympus, Persephone left. And every time we leave, or try to leave, it is both an attempt at a parting (and Meg and Than are so hurt by that goodbye, or lack thereof) and an attempt at a reunion with our mother. Every time we die it's a reunion, every time we die it's fun, it's great, we get to go back home and check in with all of our friends and be impressed by whoever made Employee Of The [Timeperiod] and sell fish to the cook and put down yet more rugs. (My Zagreus has something of a rug addiction. What can you do.)

It's at the point where I feel pretty secure in stating that Zagreus is going to discover eventually that he is both life/death/rebirth god, and god of partings and reunions. Both halves of both of those things. People leave each other when they die and re-find their loved ones in death; you go away from one group of people to come back to another; you have to depart to return, and I really think that's where we're going to end up with Zagreus. He's going to reunite his various friends with their loved ones, he's probably going to restore communications between Hades and Olympus and even Persephone, he's going to reunite with his mom, and he's going to come back to the Underworld before he leaves to see everyone up top all over again. And of course the vehicle for all of this coming and going is death, because death is the ultimate departure and reuniter. (This is absolutely a religious concept containing a whole bunch of "oh hey our culture has a lot of Christian influence, doesn't it", Greek trappings aside, but that's fine, it's a game made in 2018 not 300 BC, these things happen. They keep calling the Underworld 'hell' and 'infernal'. It's all good.) Of course he's a cthonic god. Of course he bleeds, because you have to bleed in order to die, and Zagreus has to die again and again and again. That's his whole thing.

Thing is, though, looking at those themes, I am also continually aware of the fact that some partings are for a really good reason. Some partings should not end in reunion.

Yes, of course this is about Hades the abusive dad. I have been talking about Hades the abusive dad basically non-stop since I started playing this game, where did you think this post was going.

There are a few things I'm nervous about, separate but related, and at the core it all comes down to, I'm not okay with it if we learn why Hades got to be this way, and Zagreus forgives him as we-the-audience are meant to do, and Hades promises to do better, and nothing concrete about the situation is forced to change. Actual, meaningful, practical, logistical, non-hypothetical non-metaphorical change, not just for Zagreus but for Hades himself.

Because I know how this story tends to go, in fiction. Fictional abusive parents (especially in fantasy/sci-fi stories) tend to come in two types: 'coerced their offspring into actual murder with a side of physical abuse and optional unethical lab experimentation', or 'this was here to create character conflict, we didn't mean for it to read as actually abusive, this parent just has flaws to make them a good character, we swear!' Hades isn't the first type--we have never once seen Hades strike his son, or anybody, or even come out from behind his desk--which means that the fear is, always, always, in every piece of fiction, that he's the second. That the writers are going to decide that the right response to his abuses is remorse, forgiveness, and one really good conversation. That they don't realize it's abuse in the first place.

And, like. They have to know, right? They have to. They can't have done this by accident. (Sometimes, writers get so close by accident.) They can't have done so well at drawing out this situation simply by going, 'well, people are meant to fear this god, so they'd probably react like this, and I guess based on what I've seen in other stories or vague acquaintances they'd then do this,' and never put the name on the situation. Every single time we leave to the tune of a Hades word-flash, he's being dismissive, insulting, and sometimes downright cruel. He is cruel. They have to know!!!

But oh boy have I been consuming media for a lot of years, and oh boy have I run into a lot of writers who don't know.

Reconciliation is such a loaded word, but stories about dysfunctional families really do love it. Stories based around themes of reunion are primed for it. And of course, it's nice, it ties a happy ending off with a sweet little bow, everyone gets to be with the people they love and the family is safe and nobody gets hurt, but so rarely have I seen stories that show the actual work required to rebuild those relationships in a realistic or meaningful way. So rarely do stories trying to build that happy ending actually let the victim of abuse set and maintain boundaries. The character never gets to actually just cut the damn ties to the thing that hurt them. The character so rarely even gets to be safe.

And it's so hard in this game specifically, because "THERE IS NO ESCAPE", because every single thing about this game says that the story's not over when Zagreus gets to the surface, that no matter what he's going to have to come back. It's so hard, because this is a game about reunions. I am not going to get an ending where the abused kid trying to flee his toxic home and abusive dad actually gets to leave and stay gone, not in this one. And that hurts (I have watched and supported and done my best to help multiple real-life friends get the fuck out of homes like that, and stay gone, I have seen how hard it is, how complicated, how awful, and there are never stories for that), but I can live with it, if I get an ending where Zagreus is at least safe. Where things change. Where they really change.

Which is why I need actual, concrete, material changes in the logistics and power structure of the Underworld for this ending to be okay. Understanding why Hades is Like That doesn't cut it. Remorse doesn't cut it! Because look, even if Hades wants to do better, even if he admits he's at fault and tries to be better, he is still set up in a position as an all-powerful tyrant, and trying to become a better person is hard. There is nobody around who can keep him in check when he starts backsliding, which he will. Even if he doesn't want to, he will.

Because people are people, and it's really difficult to break patterns! Especially if everything around them stays the same. Hades is going to slip at some point, be cruel, be callous, be tyrannical, no matter how much of an effort he's making. Not to mention, it is STRESSFUL to face your own crimes and improve, it sucks, it feels bad. And what do habitual abusers do when they feel bad? What's the only coping mechanism Hades appears to have established for dealing with his own shit? That's right, it's inflicting suffering on everyone else around him. (This is why it doesn't really matter what circumstances drove Hades to act this way, why it can't matter--I believe that he is suffering, but he copes with that suffering by inflicting additional suffering on everyone around him, everyone who relies on him, and that's still true no matter what made him feel bad to begin with.) So then we just get a great old guilt-->lashing out-->more guilt-->more lashing out merry-go-round of abuse even as Hades is trying to change. That's how these things work. And yes, change is possible, improvement is absolutely possible, but the environment needs to change first. The system that enables and rewards Hades for acting this way can't stay in place. Things need to actually change, with people who are around to support Hades in his growth and also check his power, people who have power of their own to stop him. And however it happens, for this story with this protagonist with these goals to feel like a happy ending, Zagreus needs to be safe.

It would be okay, though a little disappointing, if those changes were mostly based in magic and fate and, idk, divine mind-control. (This story has been so grounded in actual human dynamics that a fantastical solution to a realistic problem would feel like a letdown, but if it actually solved the problem I'd be okay with it, more or less.) It would be okay, though a little disappointing, if the responsibility for bringing Hades to heel fell upon Zagreus and Persephone, if the two family members who he hurt badly enough that they felt the need to run away from him entirely now had to shoulder the burden of helping him fix himself. (There are definitely ways to write that dynamic better and ways to write it worse, and I think I trust these writers to land on the 'better' side of the scale, but I still don't love the implications.) I think I'd be pretty into it if Hades took a vacation off to Olympus to Work Out His Shit with his own family, while a coalition of Meg, Nyx, Thanatos, Zagreus, and Queen Persephone took over running the Underworld in his absence. I think we might end up getting some combination of those things. I'm hopeful. I think these writers might know what they've written. I think they might have a sense for what it'll take to fix.

But yeah, I'm nervous. (Nervous enough that I might switch to God Mode just to get through, combat has started getting really tedious instead of fun, I want to know what happens next, and this is a game and there is no shame in making it more fun for myself by making the boring parts a little quicker and easier.) I've seen so many stories go wrong. This one has done so much to earn my trust. We'll see if it breaks.

#Hades game #Hades spoilers #driveby meta attack #C plays stuff #I have so much hope!!!!~!#I have so much fear!!!!!#DO NOT TELL ME WHAT THE ANSWER IS GOING TO BE!!!!!

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mimiplaysgames · 3 years

Text

Terraqua Week Day 5 (Mischief)

Summary: Aqua doesn’t have a crush on Terra. She doesn’t. Okay, she does. Or, Terra accidentally walks in on her in the shower. || Word Count: 3,476

Read on AO3

A/N: @terraquaweek I should mention a tiny little warning that there is a reference to nudity in this fic! It’s not described, so it’s totally T-rated but in case that is something you wanted to know. :) This is the shortest fic in the bunch, something cute and fun. The shower scene was a deleted scene in my Terraquanort fic, but I found that it just didn’t fit with the mood at all haha

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

nah.

Accidents don’t often happen to Aqua.

Ha.

Aqua swings her Keyblade upward. The force juggles golden rings assigned for training, usually tied to a pole for a bounce back. The Master mentioned some interesting techniques the other day in class: style changes, or the ability to enhance your power after a string of emotional attacks deep in the heat of battle, when you’re forced to rely on your heart to pull you out of a tough situation. Terra is sure to be developing new tricks, too.

There’s two months left until the Mark of Mastery. Letting the rings loose is a handicap Aqua places on herself: they’re heavy, resisting her magic to bounce in the air. This way, they should mimic what it’d feel like to fight a powerful enemy. She practices her pirouettes, and her waves of magic attempt to buoy them in the air in a violent tornado, but her spell flounders, a small push by a child in a playground. She adds a waltz step, a flip to give it a good kick, but it’s not enough. The rings crash back onto the grass.

Aqua grunts and goes for the kill—but she twists her ankle at the crevice of a rock, landing on her knee.

“Stars,” she curses, wincing. Her knee is scraped, a hole ripped through her stocking, and her ankle aches. Stars. She casts Heal on her knee to soothe the sting and the gentlest summon of Ice to counter the swelling in her ankle. She tries to stand on it but can’t, so she casts more rounds of Heal and Ice spells until her leg can at least bear her weight.

Aqua limps to the castle through the back entrance, where the communal showers are. Showerheads, each with its own white curtain, are built on one side and sinks on the other in a wide open space. It’s part of a long hallway that connects to one of the gyms and a storage room down a corner. The floor is lilac concrete tile and drains, where it gives way to marble when you enter the castle proper.

There was a time when the castle housed enough students to justify the size of this room, but Aqua is grateful she has direct access instead of having to drag this stupid ankle up a tower to her bedroom.

She shrugs off her sweaty, dirt-ridden clothes and shoes, and throws them in one corner, picking a shower that already houses soap, careful to put all her weight on one foot. The curtain draws around her in a u-shape and she turns the hot water knob, the pipes whistling as the water gushes through.

It gently scalds her at first but Aqua sighs when she gets used to it, rolling her shoulders and lifting her elbow over her head to stretch. The heat is good for the muscles. She presses her fingers near her neck, where it’s tight, and massages, then bends down to cast more Heal and Ice spells onto her ankle. Grime and sand flow down her skin, losing saturation as it curls down the drain under her feet. The soap stings when it runs over her scrape.

She can’t keep making mistakes.

Maybe the waltz step was too much and over-complicated things.

Aqua turns the knob off after rinsing her body and listens to the water drip onto the floor. The repetitive sound is hypnotic. She’ll journal her progress when she gets to her room and make comparisons with entries from the last few weeks.

Hopefully, she’s improving at an acceptable speed despite the injury.

Aqua tests her ankle. She can’t flex it. Stars.

What is she missing when it comes to her technique? Does she need better endurance with her pirouettes? Does she have the time to do it right before the Mark of Mastery?

When she realizes that she needs a towel to dry off—and there’s no towel in sight—she realizes that she’s been standing there wasting the time away. The shower is the greatest and the worst place to think.

Aqua figures she could grab a towel from the storage room nearby without anyone noticing.

She opens the curtain.

Terra is standing right there, eyes as round as oranges with a heavy bag of fertilizer in his arms. He drops it. Aqua shuts the curtain with a screech.

“I’m sorry!” she hears him yell. Through the bottom of the curtain, she sees him scalping for excess that spilled over. Whatever hits the floor is mixing into the water, making mud. He’s barefoot.

“Terra, what the stars—?” she hisses, covering herself despite the curtain (a single piece of thin fabric).

“I’m sorry! I didn’t know you were in here!”

“How is that possible?”

“Why are you standing here doing nothing?”

“Just—Terra—” She groans loudly.

There is a pause as he walks backwards. “I-I didn’t see anything.”

“Get out of here.”

His footsteps slap across the floor, a subtle splash and the smack against the tile. Aqua peeks through the curtain when it’s quiet. She’s alone with a sequence of mud heading into the castle. Aqua grabs her clothes, slipping the bare minimum on despite its filth, and treks down the hall, purposefully taking opposite directions from his trail.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Their designated table in the library is always littered with books, damaged ones exchanged for the unread when the assignment deems it. There’s an extra stack for Ven since he’s a couple of years behind.

Aqua (carefully) enters the library (ignoring the throbbing—it will heal quickly, she tells herself). She’s cleanly dressed and re-bathed, and takes a seat at the desk while Terra and Ven babble about the nonsense of a textbook they both hate.

Terra gives her a quick, panicked glance before turning away from her and staring hard at the book in front of him.

Ven notices. “Aqua, are you hurt?”

“I’m fine, just a sprain,” she says, suddenly clenched in the throat. What happened in the shower was nothing. No big deal. Sometimes best friends see things. So why is she, too, bordering on panic? Heat builds in her cheeks, so much that it hurts. Aqua tilts her head at an angle so her hair covers her face.

“What’s with you two?” Ven asks and Aqua flinches.

“Nothing, Ven,” Terra says too sternly. He bites his lip and stands too quickly. “A Heal spell isn’t enough for a sprain, what were you thinking?” he asks her without looking at her. He clears his throat loud enough to make Ven recoil, trying his best to hide how shaky his voice has become. “Excuse me,” Terra says before shuffling his feet like he’s holding his pee and disappearing.

When it’s quiet, Ven leans forward to get into Aqua’s personal space. “Okay, I know something’s up. What’s going on?” He squints. “Why is your face all red?”

“N-no reason.” Aqua opens a book. If she digs her entire face into it, it will look like she’s hiding on purpose. She lowers her chin (casually) to pretend she’s reading.

“You’re a liar.”

Aqua slams the book back down. “I do not lie, Ven.”

“Sure, you’re the definition of perfect. But you’re lying to me now.”

Aqua doesn’t know what to do. Her record is spotless. She’s a good student and a good person. She’s only ever told small, harmless white lies, about being tired when she doesn’t feel like it, or saying she isn’t hungry when she is so they don’t catch her sneaking in a brownie. But not this.

“I’m not,” she says in the most unconvincing way.

“Fine, I’ll bug Terra about it—”

“There was,” Aqua says, her voice uneven (damn the stars), “an accident.”

Ven raises a skeptical brow. “And? How bad could that be?”

Aqua huffs and crosses her arms. It’s just Ven. Her other best friend, no judgment here. “Terra surprised me.”

Ven rolls his eyes.

“In the communal shower.”

He points and laughs at her, dropping his head in a fit and slamming a fist onto the surface of the table. “That’s the best thing I’ve ever heard,” he says in between gasps. “Oh, he must be suffering right now.”

Terra returns, more relaxed, carrying a wooden bowl and bandages. Still, he avoids looking Aqua in the eye.

“So…” Ven says with an obnoxious knowing to his voice and Aqua regrets everything. “Did you enjoy the view?”

Terra stares at her first, his brown skin pale. He glares at Ven with the ferocity of homicide.

Ven bursts into another shake of laughter. “Stars, don’t tell me. You’re blushing so hard.”

At that, Aqua looks away. The thought is embarrassing and a… relief? At the same time?

Terra doesn’t honor Ven with a reply. He trembles, forming a claw with his hand. When he waves it, the bookshelves shake. Several books zoom out and flap, hovering over Ven and hitting him on the head like crows on the attack.

“Wait, stop, how are you doing this?” Ven shields his head with his arms, but Terra is bent on murder. Ven summons his Keyblade and cuts straight through the spine of a book. “Okay, okay, I get it!” The books glide close, ready to torpedo if necessary. Terra refuses to say anything. Ven steps away from the table, on guard. Then he smirks. He sticks his tongue out and bolts out the door. “Maybe that means you guys will finally kiss!” he yells down the hall.

Kiss.

A word as loud as a volcano erupting.

Terra lets go of his magic and all the books drop to the floor, yet the crash is still quieter than Kiss, quieter than how hard her heart is drumming in her chest.

Without a word, Terra picks up the bowl with both of his hands and mumbles a short-lived Fire spell. It’s obvious that she’s to remove her sock and give her ankle to him. That’s the point, a turmeric and olive oil mix, gently heated to reduce inflammation. He doesn’t need to ask.

Aqua lifts her leg to remove her stocking.

Terra flinches and dramatically averts his eyes.

“It’s just a sock, Terra.”

Terra motions to look at her as a response, but stops himself. “You shouldn’t be walking on it,” he bites.

“Call me stubborn.”

“You’re stubborn.”

She fights the impulse to slap him on the back of the head. “Here.” She offers her naked leg to him.

Terra still won’t look at her, but digs two of his fingers into the mix and holds her calf with his other hand. He almost draws back from her skin. Stars, he is blushing. She is too, she can feel it, a boil in both of her cheeks, a flame building in her stomach. His fingers are warm and strong, a caress on her skin. She likes this. She has all the capability to do this herself but she doesn’t want to.

Shit.

Aqua crosses one arm over and brings her hand to her chest—her way of looking dignified as Terra rubs the solution over her ankle. She has been appreciating how broad his shoulders have gotten, how sharp his jawline is, how tall he’s grown. All things that most people would notice, surely. He’s beautiful, he’s always been.

He opens his mouth to say something.

Aqua panics. “If you dare make a comment—”

“You’ll kick me?” Terra lifts her leg higher out of spite and nearly pulls her off the chair. He takes the bandage and starts to wrap.

Aqua stammers. How are they going to get through this?

“It was an accident, Terra.”

He freezes as though he can’t decide if he should finish the job or drop her leg. After a pause, he pitches his voice into a high octave to mimic her (badly). “Oh please, Terra, they’re just breasts. Nothing major.”

“You said—” she squeaks and covers her mouth. She shouldn’t be so naive. The heat in her cheeks bake.

That’s fine. Best friends know lots of intimate things, especially with how long Terra and Aqua have been together. Some of her guts, though, are about to choke her esophagus. She hopes that doesn’t mean she wanted him to see anything. That she’d want him to enjoy it.

Shit.

Terra trembles in nervous laughter, soft and quiet, staring holes into her ankle as he knots the bandage. He’s blinking too much. “You’ll need to compress cold rice on it every now and then,” he says, suddenly serious. “And rest,” he stresses like it’s a curse word.

“Terra?”

He hesitates. “Yeah?”

Footsteps approach them from behind, too graceful to be Ven’s. Terra scrambles to pick up the books, choosing the sliced one first to slip into the bookshelf so the Master doesn’t notice. Aqua straightens herself out and slips on her shoe.

“Would someone mind explaining to me the mess in the communal showers?” the Master asks as he enters, before eyeing the mess in the library. He braces his hips with his fists. “What on earth are two concoting here?”

Her cheeks burn harder.

“Not much, sir,” Terra says, gathering a tall stack of books under his chin. “Pranking Ven. The usual.”

The tone of his voice is too suspicious and the Master knows them too well.

“Aqua,” the Master says, “you sustained an injury.”

All she can come up with is, “Not in the prank, sir.”

“So the mud—?”

“In the shower,” Terra says quickly, without thinking. Overcompensating for the awkwardness. He bites his lip. “I mean, she slipped when she was showering.”

“He only knows because I told him,” Aqua says and she wants to slap herself. Of course that’s how Terra would find out in any normal story. Spelling it out makes it seem like he witnessed it himself. Terra glares her a new one.

Eraqus reads her with skepticism. He folds his hands behind his back and clears his throat. “Terra, you remember the discussion we’ve had some years ago regarding certain curiosities—”

“Yes, Master.” Terra inhales sharply and coughs.

The Master smiles. He looks pleased with himself. “You may continue to clear this up. And if you would please, keep the mischief at a minimum. It would be a great distraction from your work.”

Terra grits his teeth and Aqua lowers her eyes. “Yes, Master,” they both say slowly, like they’re about to step on hot coal.

When the Master leaves, Terra drops books onto the table. He’s finally looking at her, his eyes such a striking depth. It suddenly melts her away. Why so sudden though? He’s always had dark eyes.

Oh. She’s taken him for granted. Now she sees.

“What was that?” he whispers.

Aqua scoffs. “I was about to ask you the same thing.”

He shakes his head. “I never want to have that kind of conversation with the Master ever again.”

“At least let me help you,” Aqua says, nodding over to the last gathering of books on the floor.

“I’m not letting you stand on that foot.” He bends over to do the work himself.

“Then I’ll help you clean out the mud.”

Terra puts away the last handful of books, and chuckles to himself. “How do you want to get there? Crutches?”

“No, thank you.”

“Well, I either carry you in my arms or I fling you over my shoulder.”

Aqua needs to find a spell to hide the blushing. It aches. “What an obnoxious suggestion.”

“Then I’ll leave you here in the library.”

“No.”

Terra snorts. “Okay.” He hooks an arm under her knees and lifts the rest of her body like she’s a hollow ragdoll. So close to him, Aqua can feel the grooves of his muscle, his chest durable and broad. She wonders if he enjoys holding her this close, too.

“I am really sorry,” he says as he takes her back towards the showers, passing by the open entrance to that gym, padded for wrestling. It’s not one they use often, since most of their training happens towards the front entrance. “I was on my way to take care of the squash. It was a dumb accident.”

“It’s okay,” Aqua says. She’s resting her head on his shoulder, staring at the way his neck moves when he speaks. Here, they don’t have to look at each other. “It wasn’t a big deal.”

“Yeah.” He sounds almost disappointed, if not relieved. “Glad we sorted that out, right?”

“Definitely.” She wraps her arms around his neck tighter.

“What were you doing?”

“Pushing myself too hard.” Aqua scoffs.

“Typical Aqua.”

At the way he says that—mock-cocky, snivelish, playful—she blushes. He hasn’t changed since they were little, but it’s a side to him that only she and Ven sees.

There’s a lot to him that he only shows her.

They reach the storage room where the mop and towels would be stored, but he doesn’t enter. “We really need to install a door here,” he says. They reach the communal showers, and he bypasses them too. Terra finally settles her down on the terrace outside.

“Stay here, I’ll be back.”

“No, wait, I’m helping you—”

“Not with that foot, you’re nuts.”

“You can’t stop me from crawling back inside.”

“Then I’ll drag you back out.” He smirks, almost like he’s his old self but not quite. His old self isn’t this adamant. It makes her think that there’s something he isn’t saying, that maybe she’s misreading him, stuck between doing his duty to help her and needing time away from her. That he’s hiding it all behind a joke, and she has to let him go.

“Okay.” She crosses her arms.

“Rest isn’t terrible for you,” he says as he walks away.

Aqua stares at dry dirt. Down this path are the flower and vegetable gardens, contained by a fence. Beyond is the trail that leads right to the spot where she started this ridiculous ordeal. If only she didn’t trip. She’s been training for years. She’s too skilled to be having accidents, too far in her studies to think this hard about her feelings for Terra.

Too far in her studies and too mature to keep denying that she wants him to look at her. She does.

She gets tapped on the head.

“Wait here,” Terra says, heading towards the gardens, barely giving her a glance.

Aqua anchors her elbows onto her thighs and drops her chin into her hands. A sudden thought invades her mind: he’ll come back from whatever chore he has to finish here, take her to her room, and now that everything is said and done, they’ll pretend like none of this has happened.

And that is that. A weird day finished, a blip in history.

Terra comes back into view faster than she anticipated, holding a bouquet of orange and blue flowers in his hand.

Aqua uses the wall to pull herself up, keeping most of her weight on the good foot. “What’s this?”

Terra opens his mouth to speak, and leaves it there. He licks his lips and offers the flowers. “Um…” He scoffs. “I’m bad at this.”

They smell nice. Roses and bluestars. They must be his way to apologize. “They’re beautiful.”

“Um…” He clears his throat, rubbing something raw at the back of his neck. “Would you like to, uh…” He glances at the ground beneath him, summoning the courage to look at her and speak clearly, overusing his hands to demonstrate. “There’s actually a really pretty cave nearby, full of crystals and minerals. It’s spectacular, and I’ve always wanted to take you to see it.” He blushes, swallowing. “Um, when you feel better, would you like to come see it with me? Spend the night, I mean?” He blushes harder, scoffing. “It’s a nice hike and it’s a great camping spot.”

Aqua squeezes the stems of the flowers and her heart hammers too hard to find her voice. “That sounds…” She exhales. “Nice.” She almost asks for permission—from who, she doesn’t know. Terra is asking her. She’s asking herself. “Yes, I’d love to.” She hopes to the stars she’s blushing less than him.

Terra has no answer except for a nervous giggle, his eyes gleaming. He leans forward and kisses her on the cheek, whipping himself back with a hand to his face like he’s committed the worst sin in the world.

It’s warm where he left his lips. Aqua touches it with her fingers.

Embarrassed laughter sputters out of Terra’s mouth with many unnecessary apologies.

Aqua smiles, and it comforts him. “Can you take me back inside?” she asks, that smile twisting her cheeks. It hurts so good.

“Sure,” he breathes. “Anywhere you want.”

They exchange rogue giggles and excited glances as he carries her. They talk as if nothing indeed has happened, where they avoid any mention of mischief to be had in the near future, at least for now. Maybe the stars threw her off balance this morning on purpose. Best friends. They’ve always been.

#terraqua #aqua #terra #ventus #kingdom hearts fanfiction #lmao omg #this cute little one is finally out #i hope you like it!#my fic

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tacochippy · 3 years

Note

please infodump about jackie. i love themb

I DO TOO FJJSJSJA

Before I say anything- I think this is infodumping- I am neurodivergent but I don't have adhd or autism specifically so if that's offensive please let me know:) also nothings concrete or set in stone. And sorry for the typos I'm tired and stupid(/j I am very smart and worthy of love),,

Okay SO. Gonna talk about all of it! :D

The year is 2022. Covid doesn't exist and the world is somewhat better than today, though still has the fundamental issues (capitalism and stuff, yk)

So. Onan distant planet, millions of light-years away in space, is a planet named Hectiine. This planet is safe, for the most part. There are multiple cities within, some more 'bad' than others but still considerably better than Earth in this story. Everybody from Hectiine is made of White Star Form- they look like swirls of bright white light and the tendrils of this white light stuff that makes up their being can move and shift. They can turn into more human looking bodies, as well as other simplistic lifeforms shapes. The art of shifting has been lost to the ages for the most part. The few that can shift however, are sent straight to the Capital City, basically a big city with important people.

(It's important to note that while this city is better, no city on Hectiine is bad by any means. Everybody's needs are met, and people have free time even when they run the society and work and whatnot.)

So, one of the main protagonists of this story, Miyakoi (me-a-koi)(Koi like the fish lol) Arderius Exdosii, discovers she can shift. She is about... 14 in earth years, and she discovers the shifting ability and has a lot of fun. I'll draw her regular pure White Star Form soon but for now have a picrew of her partly shifted and fully shifted form. (I can link the picrew if you want!:))

As soon as she discovers it she excitedly tells her family, and is told to pack. She's heading to the Capital! So cool. At the capital she learns of a prophecy-fortold by their Gods, proven to exist but not mean, and copied into multiple books.) Miyakoi is to meet one of the God's Priests, of the goddess of Vision and Sight, (their main one as she granted the people of Hectiine their vision without eyes and kickstarted the world.) and receive a Prophecy book. The priest sends her to earth, just as a scout she's not THAT special. So Miyakoi is caught up on what this means exactly- she is to head to earth, scout out a hero, and come back with the hero through any means necessary. She's not practiced enough to save the world but she still needs to help. One of the older, more trained, men will save the world.

The Prophecy is going to be written properly soon, I'm literally making this up as I go dknsskjdaa,,, but it essentially is about a hero being retrieved from Earth and brought to Hectiine to prepare for battle. The hero and a citizen of Hectiine- no specified characteristics- is to go with the hero to a different planet, Jinahul, to stop an [《?¿?》] from making the planets of the world disappear. The hero must be: Smart, Brave, Loyal, and Human.

The [《?¿?》] Is an 'untranslatable' word the preists decided ot mark as such. The reason this Prophecy is unknown is to stop panic- especially since the God's haven't spoken in decades about anything. The prophecy was told and wirtten in an ancient, barely comrphesnible language. Left to their own devices the priests and Council (I can talk about this world more later too if you want!:D) decided it best to pretend the gods were still active and the Prophecy doesn't exist.

The Prophecy is very vague, but has a lot of words and different translations as every city has a different unique way of writing and the ancient language issue.

So! Miyakoi heads to earth. There she gets some forged documents and struggles to learnt he ways of human life before this """school""" thing starts. She doesn't know what that is and spends an entire weekend catching herself up to be ready for-what she now knows as- grade 8. In her first class, Art, her new favourite she decides, she meets another student. She's the cliche "nice pretty girl with good grades" from what she can tell. She seems like a good enough candidate, so Miyako I tries befriending her. She sees instances of the girl, Sophie Basil Richards she learns is her name, stand up for her friends. She isn't yet confided of Sophie- and consults her copy of the prophecy a lot.

She also meets Jackie. Jackie is a more mischievous student, and definitely a slacker, but still has the qualities of a hero. Miyakoi doesn't have a time limit, so she chooses to observe both Sophie and Jackie. Jackie has a good heart, and they're a nice person after a bit. (Pretend I gave Jackie pupils here for when she's on earth fkjdjsjs)

Miyakoi decides on Jackie. She's seen Jackie defend her friends, never falling to throw a punch when they deem it's needed. Jackie is headstrong and from her observations and excessive note-taking is the perfect candidate. Theyre smart and brave and loyal and they're so lovely it almost hurts. Mind set, Miyakoi sends a note Jackie's way. "south bathroom in 10". There miyakoi will wait and be in her part form. She waits and waits and the door opens, miyakoi turning to see the hero, the one who she'll send home with her-

Clearly distracted, "uh... I was told to meet you here in 10? Uh-"

Sophie.

It was Sophie.

She had walked in. To see this. Floating mass of white glowing tendrils??? Miyakoi shifting looks like her face melting off. So then Sophie sees her friends face reverse-melt off. Sophie freezes, seeing the second half of the shift, and she's frozen in place.

Thus, the adventure starts.

Most of this was world building and stuff- I'M LITERALLY THINKING IT UP AS I WRITE THIS KFNDKENEKDHDIEHEIHE- and it's a LOT bestie. This lives in my mind rent free istg.

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agent-cupcake · 3 years

Text

fluff is good, it’s even fun sometimes. but, you know, i think i’ll always enjoy dark content the most. like, no matter how much i insist i have moved past it, my entire career began because i learned the term yandere and realized i’d found my place in the online sphere. but, really, lust and fear have a complimentary relationship. the emotions and sensations they invoke, both physically and mentally, are equally potent and stem from the same place for me. the fluttery sensation in my stomach dances indiscriminately to the tune of disquiet and arousal, excitement stirs itself up within my chest at the mention of being wanted, uncaring if the intent is sadistic or lustful. its a shared theatrical fantasy of fear, catching thrills from simulated danger as we imagine what it is to be in a situation so dire, so intense and frightening, that we cannot help but to hyperfocus on our discomfort. we practice these emotions and engage in these disastrously unhealthy relationships through emulation and the sanitized vessel of the written word, but without any of the emotional price that would be asked of us if it were real.

it’s not real.

there is nobody lurking behind your window in the gaps between the streetlamps, even if you were to turn off the lights in an attempt to get a better view, but maybe you shouldn’t anyway. there is no face to breathe fog and leave smudged fingerprints on the glass pane while they peer into the internal life you hold sacred, but you should probably keep your blinds shut. there is nobody hiding behind your shower curtain as you stumble half-blind and asleep into the bathroom at two in the morning, but it wouldn’t hurt to check. if you hear a sound, surely you cannot logically attribute it to a malevolent person moving unseen through the secure sanctuary of your home when they assumed you would be in bed, but you should probably take a look at your locks. if you notice that your things are not where you left them, it’s silly to assume that someone has been into your room, rifling through your things and leaving them almost as you left them. to believe that somebody genuinely and truly meant you harm in such a personal way would be to risk the foundational safety that you rely on to live with any measure of peace. and besides, memories are fallible. our senses are imperfect. our overexcited and imaginative minds can betray us. you can be infected by a nightmare you can’t quite remember, only that you woke up shaky and gasping and frightened, squinting in the darkness to make out the figure standing at the foot of your bed that you could have sworn was just there only to be reassured that it was just a bad dream. you can hurry home because you felt certain you were being watched only for the sensation to be ultimately attributed to your own paranoia. yes, the world is dangerous. but maybe not your world. these things, these dramatic scenes cut straight from an episode of the hundreds of crime dramas, don’t happen to people like you.

but

we fantasize about yanderes and dark personalities and the brutal psychological and bodily torture any character of our choice could subject us to, we imagine the most grim of situations in a light that appeals to our own desires, twisting horror to suit us in a controlled manner.

still, it is frightening, isn’t it?

it’s past midnight, maybe one or two in the morning, and you’re sitting within the four walls of your room that you no longer believe to be protection enough from the stalker that has been creeping closer and closer. you’re staring at the familiar surroundings that suddenly feel very alien and contend with the bone crushing frenzy of utter stillness in the face of animal panic, the intense crackling and wavering that you can almost see hovering above your skin and holding up little strands of hair as chills crawl in bug-like hoards across the feverish flush of your flesh. all at once you are overwhelmed and helpless against him as he invades, defiles, and dismantles each aspect of your life. there is nothing you can do, no protection from this stylized predator who who has been perfected by fantasy made real so that he no longer resembles any common stalker. in the dark, you are vulnerable. in this situation, you are isolated. shame fills your chest, sloshing around to the frantic rhythm of your heartbeat, embarrassment at the ridiculousness of your reaction. really, what are a few messages? maybe you’re misinterpreting the signs, there’s not enough evidence to prove anything. you have to use the bathroom, yet you don’t feel safe to enter the dark hallway because there might be a figure standing at the other end, and what would you do then? you want to contact somebody for comfort, but everyone you know is asleep and you don’t want to disturb them over something so trivial. you want to move and run and scream and deal with the problem, but you can’t do anything. just sit. just watch. just wait. minutes tick by, somehow. and somehow, dawn breaks over the horizon. you didn’t sleep, but maybe the sun will provide safety. maybe.

maybe not. there’s a unique kind of horror in the mundane. you don’t think about the sounds of the world around you until you begin to feel uneasy in the sunny open air, until the paranoia kicks in and suddenly it’s all you can hear because you’re hyper-focusing on trying to identify why you no longer feel safe. birds warble and call to one another. the leaves relentlessly rustle as the playful breeze shakes them about. from far away, a dog is barking. the big kind, the one that goes “boof boof,” you’ve just gotten out of your car after being out all day and you’re standing uncertainly in your driveway, looking around to try and pinpoint why you’re so anxious. you realize, with a zipping sort of shock down your spine, that there’s nobody else around. not even any evidence that they existed in the first place and it’s so stupid but you begin to think that maybe you’re the only person who has ever existed because the world around you feels so empty and barren. energy tingles in the air, but it is hollow. a void of something you can’t quite perceive. the dog stops barking. the wind dies down. do you dare go inside? your home, the place that should be your refuge, is not safe. you go inside and look at a kitchen you scarcely recognize as your own, at a bed that might as well belong to somebody else, at decor you once were so proud to put up that now seems arranged by a strangers hand. the one who is preying on you is probably human, but the threat feels supernatural in effect. omnipresent. we fear that which we don’t understand, and how can you possibly understand the motive of someone who has focused on you? dread sinks down deep as you shift from foot to foot and second guess every move you make. it smells like sun-warmed concrete and the wind-blown scent of spring greenery. just like your home itself, the smell is familiar as it is foreign. eventually, you go inside.

it’s so obscene, the way that sweat pools between your shoulder blades and slicks your skin, making you shiver with a distinctly antithetical chill to your blazing temperature. sweat is gross and uncomfortable, it makes your clothes cling to your skin and hair mat to your forehead. it’s so crude, this gouging, pinching discomfort like you need to pee making your thighs tremble as they clench together. your entire body is wound up tight as you crouch in the dark, barely allowing yourself to breathe for fear of being discovered while he looks for you. maybe he takes his time just to mess with you, maybe he doesn’t. maybe he tauntingly calls out to you in a feigned attempt to draw you out of hiding. maybe he means it when he tells you that he loves you. no matter what, there’s no escape, not anymore. it’s a foregone conclusion that you will be found. but you can’t move. fight or flight is out the window, you are frozen. you know the eventuality, yet you cling to hope out of the sheer, stubborn, and half-mad belief that this cannot possibly be real.

its so repulsive, this sickness that gathers in your gut, that invites the swollen weight of nausea to press down heavy and inescapable in your throat, that sits on your paper dry tongue. it tastes like old, rusted metal, the scent that clung to your blistered hands when you were young and tried your luck on the ancient playground monkey bars. the bloody flavor that choked you when you lost the last of your baby teeth, leaving your childhood behind and exchanging imaginary monsters for the real ones. just when the anticipation is on the precipice of killing you, you’re found. you expected it, yet you still scream. it still hurts, it’s still terrifying, you’re still clouded by the vague fog of disbelief that this could be real. you keep thinking that. it can’t be real, this can’t be real. things like this don’t happen to you.

but it is. you can’t stop it. you have no control over your life in that moment and thereafter.

and you think about everything you’ve ever read online about torture. human beings are so capable of hurting each other, it’s a dedicated art form. and you know about stalkers, the real kind, not the fun fictional yandere kind. you know the torture that human bodies are capable of withstanding before dying, the grotesque limits they can endure. limbs removed or hobbled. fingers peeled of nail and skin. teeth pulled, tongue cut out, eyes gouged, skin lashed to tatters, feet spun around so the skin stretched like rubber. not to mention sexual torture. when a human being is granted absolute dominion over another, even the best of them go rotten. do you ever think about that? in these situations, the fear of pain would get to me above all else, i think.

if you don’t immediately disassociate from the fiction, if you force yourself into the scenario as its presented with a degree of reality, the horror is really limitless. and, you may ask, why was this important? because it is six am and i cannot sleep and i’ve had this entire conceptual outline of good horror yandere fiction sitting in my docs for ages that i’ll never actually use to write character x reader so i am giving it to you raw and uncut.

#personal #yandere #uh tw for being a pretentious and sleepy idiot cooming over ye ole classic yandere tropes #sometimes i like to imagine this stuff in clear enough detail that it actually makes me uncomfortable enough to turn on the light #and rethink my life choices #because this aint it #but at the same time #at this point its sunk cost fallacy i've spent too long typing this out to discard it #sorry dear followers #stalking tw

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flooffybits · 4 years

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Idol: Blackpink

Anon: Hi, can I request a BP scenario where the 5th member who is the youngest one is struggling with getting a lot of hate and starts to feel like she’s not good enough to be in BP and starts distancing herself please?

☕buy me a coffee☕

You did your best with keeping your eyes straight ahead despite the feeling of your manager looking at you while sitting at the driver’s seat.

Even though he was driving, you could tell that he was watching you from the corner of his eye and the way he fidgeted next to you was a clear indication that he wanted to say something.

“Oppa, I’m fine.” You decide to end his squirming, but your words only made his frown deepen and a sigh passed his lips. “Are you really? You aren’t usually this quiet.” He states in a knowing tone, but you ignore it the best you can and shrug the comment off. “I’m just tired. You know that we were busy.”

You understood his worries, however, because aside from burning yourself out from all the schedules and practices, you’ve been receiving some not so pleasant words from people all over the world.

Being part of one of South Korea’s biggest girl groups, of course everyone would be watching you and of course they had something to say about you simply because of how you looked or how you acted.

Recently though, due to a hangout with other idol friends, people were quick to make up theories about how you rarely spend time with your members and that you’re often with other people instead. While actual fans did defend you, it hurt when a lot of Blinks were the source of the hate comments you were receiving.

“You know that what they say isn’t true. Just because you’re in a group doesn’t mean you have to confine yourself with only the girls. You’re allowed to have friends.” Your manager reminded you when he dropped you off at the dorm and you offered him a small smile. “Thank you, oppa.”

Exiting the vehicle, you slowly walked into the dorm, your feet dragging against the concrete floor while you kept your head down, hands stuffed in your jacket’s pockets due to the cold weather.

Upon reaching the door, you could already hear the sound of Lisa and Jennie screaming from the other side, probably the latter messing around again. You couldn’t help the small smile that tugged on your lips, but that didn’t last long as you let out a breath and finally unlocked the door to enter, putting your shoes away before quietly walking to your room.

“Y/n! How was the shoot?” Jisoo called out when she heard the door open, pausing her game just so she could look at you. You ended up stopping by your bedroom door to look at her and flashed a quick smile. “It was fun.” You said simply. “I saw Yeri and-”

Before you could say more about your day, Chaeyoung had popped up from her room, squealing as she held her phone out. “Unnie! You have to see this!” She announced and, just like that, Jisoo’s attention was whisked away, making the corner of your lips turn downwards before you decided to just freshen up and stay in bed.

“I wanna see, too!” You heard Lisa yell right when you closed the door gently behind you. Even when you wanted to distract yourself from your members, the ruckus outside and the volume of their voices was just too loud that you felt as though they were mocking you for not being a part of their fun.

Of course, you had nothing against your members. You loved and cherished them deeply. But there were instances where you felt as though you weren’t really part of the circle.

You may work in the same group, but it felt as though you were working with strangers now, compared to when you first debuted. They were often all together while you had to be a few steps behind.

It wasn’t their intention. You know that for a fact because there are still times that Jennie comes to cuddle with you when she wakes up in the morning. Chaeyoung still goes to you when she receives a gift that she finds really adorable. Jisoo is always cooking for you and making sure that you’re healthy, and Lisa still looks at you with the same fond smile on her face whenever you’re together.

But why on earth did it feel like you were never really part of the group anymore? Why did it seem like it that even strangers point out that there’s a gap between you and the four of them?

While staring at yourself in the mirror, you wipe away the lone tear that managed to force itself down your face before you proceeded to clean up and take off your makeup.

After you got changed in more comfortable clothing, you let yourself fall on the bed, letting out a grunt in the process. With your arms extended to your sides, you stared up at the ceiling, thinking back on your relationship with the other four girls and the comments people had about you.

It was unhealthy, which was why you were often reminded not to read them. But there were times that they would slip and like any other person, they still hurt you despite pretending that you’ve never noticed them. And when more of them started to come up, the more difficult it was for you to ignore.

After getting fed up with all the rumors and comments, you’ve just shut everything about the subject out, thus removing yourself from your members just so you could numb out the pain of what everyone was telling you.

The sound of your phone buzzing again made your heart drop because you were already anticipating what it was due to what you received today. But it didn’t change the fact that it left a bitter taste in your mouth when you saw the few more texts people have sent your way on Instagram.

“Give me a break.” You muttered before carelessly tossing your phone aside and grabbing a pillow to place on your head. Shutting your eyes tight, you do your best to keep any sound from escaping your lips while you wept against your pillow.

“Where’s Y/n?” Jennie asked after she finished setting the table and finally took a seat. “In her room, I think. She hasn’t left since she came home.” Jisoo replied while frowning and setting her phone down on the table.

“Can someone call her? She’s probably hungry by now.” The rapper requested and Lisa was already on her feet and skipping over to your room, humming as she did.

And while waiting, the other three just stayed at the table and Chaeyoung played with her spoon. “Y/n has been really busy recently.” She suddenly commented, making the other two look over at her. “We’re celebrities. I think it’s understandable that she’s busy.” Jennie replied confusedly, but the silver haired woman shook her head. “No, I mean, she spends a lot of time outside. We rarely get to spend time together unless we all have a schedule together. But even then, she still feels... I don’t know.”

Jisoo glances back to the direction of your room, spotting Lisa walking back. “Where's maknae?” She notices that the smile the Thai woman previously wore was no longer present, so naturally, her worry set in when there was no sight of you on top of that.

“She’s sleeping.” Lisa mumbled while taking a seat and Chaeyoung glanced at the two with the same look she had earlier. “Did something happen?” She couldn’t help but ask and Lisa nibbles on her lower lip before running her fingers through her short hair. “Well, when I went to check on her, I thought she was just pretending to ignore me.” She explained, her lips pursed together. “When I took her pillow, she really was sleeping but... she looked like she was crying.” She finally says and Jennie sat upright.

“Crying?” She demanded, her protective instincts coming to light when Lisa confirmed that you were, in fact, crying. “She looked so tired, so I didn’t wake her up to ask.” She added and the four of them looked to each other, silently wondering what could be the source of your sadness.

As they started to eat, none of them could think of any possible reasons for you to be crying. You’ve always displayed yourself as a bright and happy go lucky person. It was one of the traits fans loved about you that they considered you to be Blackpink’s happy pill.

Even during the times they cried on stage, you were seen smiling at your unnies and comforting them. The time Jennie cried on tour, you were quick to cheer her up, wrapping your arms around her and playfully dancing with her that she eventually started to smile again even though she cried enough to stain your shirt with a bit of her makeup. Even when Chaeyoung cried at the concert in Australia, you were already waiting for her backstage with open arms.

While you were the youngest among all of you, they had to admit that they’ve never really seen you cry. Maybe they’ve caught you teary eyed in one of your birthday surprises, but that was it.

Suddenly, Jennie’s phone vibrated, drawing everyone’s attention as she answered the call. “Yeri, what’s up?” She asked but hearing more of the girl’s words had ended up making her brows pinch together and her expression seemed to drop even more. “No, she’s just sleeping. Lisa checked on her a while ago.” She replied, quickly checking on the others, spotting them all waiting for her to finish.

“What? No, I haven’t checked anything yet.” She bit her lip before sighing. “Yeah. Yeah, I’ll try to talk to her when she’s up.” She nodded even though she knows the other couldn’t see her. “Thank you. I’ll talk to you later. Bye.”

“What did Yeri say?” Lisa asked and Jennie quickly opened up the app to check on the post the Red Velvet member told her about. Since she hasn’t really logged in for a while, she didn’t know what was happening.

And it looked like the others did, too.

When the comments section finally showed up, they could clearly see that Jennie wasn’t happy by what was on there. But since they didn’t know what she was looking at, they grew a bit impatient.

“Yah! What is is?” Jisoo asked and Jennie let out a huff as she exited the app and locked her phone. “People are such assholes, I swear.” She muttered and while leaning back against the chair. “They’ve been talking about Y/n not being a part of Blackpink, again.”

Chaeyoung and Lisa’s face scrunch up in displeasure while Jisoo scowls. “They’re doing this again?” She scoffed before checking on the comments for herself, wondering just how bad they were this time around.

“But Y/n wasn’t like this before?” It sounded much more like a question instead of a statement and Lisa leaned her head back when she let out a breath. “Or she was already bothered by it but didn’t want to tell us about it.”

“Why would she do that?” Chaeyoung countered, clearly confused.

“Because she doesn’t want us to worry, obviously.” Jennie responded before she stood up. “Where are you going?” Jisoo asked worriedly when she saw the look that was present on the brunette’s face.

Though she was also worried, she didn’t want Jennie to be disrupting your sleep over this issue, knowing full well that you needed to rest after a long day.

“I’m just going to my room, think stuff through.” She replied without turning to look at them. “Can you clean up for me?” The girls understood why Jennie was asking the way she did. She looked after you like an actual older sister even when you were only younger than Lisa by a couple months.

Looking back at the comments on the group’s official page, she had to grit her teeth when she saw all the horrible and nasty comments “fans” have left on the most recent post.

How could they call you all of that when you were nothing but an absolute sweetheart that made her and the girls smile? And thinking back on what Lisa’s said, she couldn’t help but feel a bit guilty that she made you think that you couldn’t let your own guard down just because you were the one holding all of them together.

When she saw people saying Blackpink would be better off without you, she felt tears prick at her eyes just at the thought of not having you around. God, were you thinking of leaving?

She knows that there are idols who end up leaving their groups because of hate.

At that thought, Jennie shot up from her bed and she was quickly making her way across the hall and into your room, bumping into Jisoo on the way there and catching her off guard.

“You said to leave her alone.” Jisoo shrugged her shoulders in response. “I just went to check. I didn’t wake her up.” She answers before pointing over her shoulder where the rest of the maknae line was placing some blankets on the airbeds you all kept somewhere in case you had some friends over.

“You can take the bed. The three of us are staying on the floor, so don’t worry.” Releasing the breath she didn’t know she was holding, the younger one nodded and smiled gratefully before she’s fully entering the room and then making her way over to your bed.

Chaeyoung and Lisa had their heads rested at the edge of your bed, just quietly watching you with sad eyes, almost resembling lost puppies who were looking for their owner. Jennie would have laughed at the sight, but when she noticed your tired face, it reminded her on why she came here in the first place.

“You think we can convince management in taking a break?” Chaeyoung asks softly when she was gently tracing the side of your face with the tips of her fingers, being careful as to not wake you and Lisa rests her chin against her arm. “At the rate we’re at now, I don’t think it’s too far off.” She mumbled quietly when Jennie laid beside you.

Her arm automatically wrapped around your waist and even when with the fact that you were asleep, your body was quick in reacting to her touch as you turned to your side and nuzzled into her when Chaeyoung withdrew her hand.

Seeing you look so drained had pained their hearts because they had hoped to look after you since you were the youngest, but it turned out being the complete opposite where they were even unaware of the things you were going through.

Looking at your slightly smaller frame curled up to her, Jennie let out a sigh as she pressed a kiss to the top of your head. “You’ll be alright, little angel. We’re going to take care of you.” She whispered softly before pulling you further into her.

The next morning, you were surprised to wake up to someone next to you. At first, it made you panic, but the moment your eyes opened, you had calmed significantly to see Jennie’s sleeping face.

But that didn’t make the situation any less confusing.

Moving from under her arm, you lifted your upper body to look around for your phone, only to be, once again, startled when you saw the other three of your group fast asleep on the floor.

Lisa’s legs were draped over both Jisoo and Chaeyoung despite not being in the middle and you wonder how Chaeyoung was comfortable with having both that and then Jisoo’s arm around her neck.

“Don’t go.” Jennie’s muffled groan causes you to look back at her. With her face scrunched up and the way her arm tightened around you, you worry that she may be having a bad dream. But her eyes open right before you decided to wake her and she pulls you back into her.

“Don’t go, Y/n. I need you here.” She whispered and you’re extremely bewildered by her sudden clingy nature. Though she is typically clingy in the morning, she’s never been this clingy where she would actually force you to stay in bed.

“But don’t we have to work?” You asked her. Her response is a huff before her other hand was already guiding your head to her chest, allowing you to hear the steady beat of her heart. “Later. Right now, I need you here.”

It was going to be a bit of struggle getting you to open up about everything, but at the moment, Jennie wants you to know that you’re wanted and needed. If not the company, then by her and the girls.

She was going to let you know that she wasn’t going to let you go so easily. Because even when you haven’t said anything, after she realized the steps you were taking in pulling away from them, there was already a forming doubt inside of you.

And she and the girls would do whatever it takes to get rid of it.

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babyspiderling · 4 years

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Up To Interpretation Michael Jackson x reader

(Victory Tour)

I stand on the corner of the stage, the arena dead silent around me. I hear a radio playing softly from somewhere backstage and I sign along, closing my eyes and letting my hands dance and tell the story the singer weaves. I hear the click of hard souls on the concrete, their clacks drawing closer to me. The squeak of sneakers, or some kind of rubber soled shoe follows behind the first set. I don't stop signing through the interruption, focused on keeping up with the speed and the intent behind it. I hear both feet whispering to each other, but I don't pay them any mind. I have to be perfect for the first performance of the tour. The rubber soles squeak away as the click clack of the other pair grows closer. A hand is placed on my shoulder and I turn to the hard soled feet. I am met with one of the singers I am interpreting tonight. I concentrate on his eyes, signalling him to go on. Behind him, I see one of his brothers run up behind him, his rubber sneakers squeaking across the stage, a notebook and pen in hand. He shouts "I got what you asked for Mike!" Mr. Hard Shoes glances over his shoulder and accepts the items. Opening the book, he scribbled down on the paper. He quickly shoves the book into my hands and gestures to me to read what he had written. "Hello, my name is Michael Jackson. Who are you and what are you doing here?" His handwriting is a bit difficult to read, random capitalization's here and there, and the words scribbled quickly and carelessly. I guess I was taking too long to read the note, sneakers huffing out a "Great, not only is she deaf, but illiterate." I swallow and hand the book back to Michael, turning to sneakers. I stare him in the face as I sign. "Me not deaf. Me hearing. Me don't speak. Me sign. Me sign for you."

A/N: This is ASL Gloss, The sentence structure for ASL is a bit different than regular English. ASL is quick and to the point, since there are no signs for words like "and" "the" "or" etc. Deaf People are not cavemen, they can express the same thoughts, feelings, and ideas we can, they just do it a little differently.

His mouth drops open a little bit in confusion, his eyes locked on mine as he says to Michael, "What is she saying and why is she staring at me?" I roll my eyes and turn back to Michael. I sign "Your book, you give me? Please?" Michael gets the picture, the sign for book clueing him in. "Oh! You want my notebook? Here." He hands me the notebook and pen and I write carefully and legibly. "I'm not deaf. I'm actually hearing. I'm mute, so I sign. I'm your interpreter for the U.S leg of the tour." I hand the book back and patiently wait for him to read it. He playfully smacks sneakers upside the head, laughing out a "You idiot, she's not a crazy fan. She's our interpreter for the show! And she heard everything you said." I smile, seeing the relationship the two have.

Sneaker's eyes widen comically as he realizes how far he stuck his foot in his mouth. He walks up to me, holding out his hand for me to shake. "Sorry 'bout that. I'm Jackie. We just saw some girl standing on stage waving her hands around like a crazy person, and didn't know what to think." I shake his hand, signing book again so I can properly introduce myself. Under my previous message I write "I'm Y/N, I understand the confusion. I'm mute, meaning I can't talk, but I can hear everything just as well as you can. For some reason, the fact that I can't talk made them hire me on the spot. I was actually about to ask for the set list so I can rehearse, or at least be a little prepared for tonight." I hand the notebook to Jackie and keep the pen to myself, writing on my wrist to purchase a few notebooks myself. He nods and leads me to the backstage area, Michael following close behind. "I'll introduce you to the guys and get you the set list, alright?" I nod my head, memorizing the path since I probably won't be able to ask for directions if I got lost.

Jackie leads me to a dressing room filled with four other guys and two girls. Michael introduces me to the group, "Guys, this is Y/N, she's our interpreter for the U.S leg of the tour. Y/N, this is Jermaine, Marlon, Randy and Tito. These are our sisters La Toya and Janet." I wave to them, staying silent. Marlon says "Cool, signing even when off the clock, nice gimmick." I look back to Michael and sign "They read book." He stutters out "Oh right. Here guys, this should explain some." He takes the notebook from his pocket and tosses it to Jermaine, who then passes it around. La Toya walked up to me with this glint in her eye. "Oh! You're so pretty! If we were going anywhere else, I wouldn't do a thing, but those stage lights will completely wash you out, even the guys have to wear makeup. Can I get you ready?" I think about it, and nod. I hold up a finger, and write down. "It has to be simple. Nothing flashy. Rules of the game. No jewelry, no distracting clothes, no sparkle eye makeup. Not up to me, just comes with being an interpreter." She reads it quickly and sags her shoulders a bit. "Fine, I get it. Nothing too flashy. But I promise, we're going to have some fun." She drags me to a second dressing room, one with lit up mirrors and vanities. She sits me down and pulls out a giant makeup case. I relax my face and let her do her thing, trusting her to not go overboard. She plugs in a curling iron as she finishes up my makeup. Without any paper around, I try my best to communicate. I pull my hair back, off my face, another rule of interpreting. Luckily, La Toya got the message. "Oh! Hair back, got it." She curls my hair, completely covering it in hairspray, and gives me a beautiful bun on the top of my head, leaving the second half of my hair down. I inspect myself in the mirror, never feeling this beautiful in my life. I turn to La Toya and sign "Thank you", hoping that if she doesn't understand my hands, she can understand the look in my eyes.

I walk out into the hallways, now hustling and bustling as it gets closer to show time. I was given the set list and lyric sheet for the night while I was made over. I run the entire show at least 5 times before being called to take my place, the instructional prologue getting ready to play.

By the end of the show, my wrists and fingers ached from the fast movements to stay on pace with the band. Walking backstage, I just want to take my makeup off and stretch out my aching joints. Michael stops me in the hall and asks me, "Hey, you want to fly with us? I'd love to get to know you more, plus give you the set list for the next show to let you practice." I nod, wanting to answer his questions. He lights up. "Maybe, you can teach me some sign language? Don't get me wrong, I love writing back and forth, but it'd be cool to sign to each other" He leads me to the limo that is taking him to the hotel and then the airport in the morning. "I'm not sure where your room is, but I can have your stuff sent to mine and we can talk some. If you'd like." I shrug my shoulders, I didn't know either. He makes a quick phone call and I watch the lights move past. "Hey, Y/N, you were really cool there. It was like you were singing and dancing with your hands at the same time. Why don't you talk? If you don't mind me asking. You don't have to answer." I hold out my hand for the notebook and try my best to write on the bumpy road. "Long story. I'll tell you at the hotel, roads too rough to write it out on the way." He reads my writing and nods in understanding. "I get it." We fall into a comfortable silence as we drive to his hotel.

I follow Michael through the lobby, up the elevators and to his suite. My bags are placed in the main room, and Michael stretches his arms above his head. "Hey, Y/N, I'm going to go take a shower. If your story really is as long as you're saying, go ahead and start writing it down. I can read it while you shower." I nod and he hands me a legal pad, much better than the little hand notebook Michael carried around at all times. I sit down and start writing.

"I've been mute since I was 6 years old. My dad and I were going to the record store to listen to some and take others home to add to our collection. The light turned green, and we went, but someone else swerved into our lane, causing a head on collision. My dad died on impact, but they said he didn't feel any pain. Pieces of glass got caught in and cut my throat. I woke up in the hospital with no vocal chords, no voice. The damage done was too much for them to take and they had to be removed. I don't want your pity, I've gotten nothing but pity since I was 6. I'm not fragile and you do not need to treat me as such." I put the pen down just as Michael finished up in the bathroom. I gestured to the pad, and grabbed clothes for the shower. When I came out Michael was just staring at the paper, some areas warped with his spilled tears. He looked up at me with glossy eyes and enveloped me in his arms. "Oh, Y/N, I am so sorry. We don't have to talk about it or anything. We can just go to bed right now if you want." I shake my head. I break away reluctantly and go back to the paper. "No, it's ok. If you have any questions I will do my best to answer them." He thinks for a moment and asks, "Can you make any sounds? If you don't have vocal chords, how can you be vocal?" I hum a little tune, and make a couple of noises. We sit down, and he asks me to teach him to sign. We start with finger spelling.

"What's your favorite candy?" "(F-A-V-O-R-I-T-E C-A-N-D-Y)" "Wow! I love those! I like S-K-I-T-T-L-E-S. Oh! And P-E-A-N-U-T M-N-M-S!" I smile at him. He's a really fast learner. I yawn and glance at the clock. I sign "time" and point at the clock. He follows my finger and reads the time. "Oh wow, 1:30. We should probably get to bed. I'll take the couch and see you in the morning." I reach for the pen to protest but he snatches it before I can lay a finger on it. "No Ifs ands or buts. I'm taking the couch." I roll my eyes, signing "Silly boy" and making my way to the bed. I fall into a blissful sleep easily.

The next morning Michael and I are on our way to the plane, the next stop being Irving. We sit across from each other, Michael signing what he can, and writing what he can't. I teach him little words and phrases as we go, and specific ones at his request. Sooner than expected we touch down and make our way to the venue. The entire tour goes by in a flash, performing every night with the boys, only watching from the wings our eight shows in Canada. On our last night in LA and my last night on the job, Michael drops a bomb on everyone around the world. That this was the last show for the tour. I translated what he said for the audience, a look of complete confusion on my face. I struggled to focus on the task at hand, translating for those Deaf at the show, unable to comprehend what had just happened. The show had ended finally and it was chaos backstage. People yelling at Mike for his cancellation, calling it selfish, immature. I couldn't help but feel a little hurt. I knew that this was my last show, and that I would no longer be working with the band, but I thought he would at least tell me since I thought we were close. I pushed through the throngs of angry managers and crew members back to my little corner.

I gathered my things, coming across one of the notebooks that Michael and I had practically filled. The others full of writing were in my suitcase back at the hotel. In my heartache, I accidentally dropped the notebook, its pages falling open on impact. A page filled with shading and lines caught my attention, its place in the back making it invisible to me. Examining it closely, I realize it's an incredibly done sketch of me, done by Michael. I was asleep when he did this. I think it was on the plane to Denver. I gently closed the pages, and placed it into my bag.

I turned my gaze to the sound of the door opening, revealing none other than the artist himself. With creased eyebrows, I simply sign "Why?", not understanding why he did it a bit. He sagged, as if all the air had been let out of him. "Because, Y/N, I couldn't stand being under their thumb anymore. I couldn't work with Joseph anymore, I need to be the one in control. I want to make my own music, send my own message, without anyone telling me otherwise." I nod, understanding where he was coming from, but sad to see him go. I wiped at my tears and signed "I'll miss you Applehead." This made him chuckle and pull me in for a long, large hug. "I'll miss you too." He kissed the top of my head and took a step back. He signed "You always in my heart." something I had taught him, but fragmented. He picked up the notebook laying in the top of my bag and tore out an empty page, as well as a pen. He handed both to me. "Write down your address and I promise I will write to you practically everyday. And if I ever go on tour, I know just who I'll hire to be my interpreter." With one final tearful hug goodbye, it was time for us to go our separate ways. I would miss him, but I knew I would always be in his heart, and he in mine.

Taglist: @accio-boys

#michael jackson #michael jackson imagine #michael jackson x reader #80s imagines #80's imagine #80's fanfiction #80's x reader

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heli0s-writes · 4 years

Text

III. Paralysis*

Summary: “I’m sorry,” you sob, locked around Bucky’s bicep, his forearm, fingers digging into the smooth obsidian plates, fisting the fabric of his sleeve. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” As if he were Natasha—as if you could stop both her death and his mangling, or at least hold her the way you are holding him now.

A/N: 9.8k words. OOF.

Warnings: Language, robots v. monsters violence, Big Time angst and comfort, smutty bits (dry-humping, thigh riding).

Trinity Epoch Masterpost

He leaves around sunset. Hair combed neatly to the side and freshly shaven, Steve’s dashing in a fitted suit and tie.

In the middle of passing around a basketball, Erik Killmonger, in all his subtlety, whistles, “Looking fresh, white boy!”

Steve smirks, smoothing the front of his jacket, “This monkey suit? I’d rather be in circuitry.”

He’s been laying low since Siegehook, since Bucky’s arm, and since you. But now the story’s changed and he’s gotta get his narrative straight— he’s introducing a new character, changing the players, and guiding the spotlight exactly where it needs to go.

Jimmy Fallon— Kimmel? One of the Jimmies personally flew into Hong Kong for a special taping of his late-night show. Orion racked up eleven kills; it’s another record and the people want what they want.

Fury called the three you of into his office after the network reached out for the umpteenth time. He strategized shrewdly to have Steve on this particular broadcast because it’s not as serious as a news report and not as wordy as an interview. Too many things can go wrong in both: cross-examinations, misquoting, scrutiny after the fact.

Steve works best in front of a live audience. He’ll sit down tonight—broad and tall—smile at the camera and the host, make a few charming quips, and then he’ll let the world know.

James has been hurt. The next breach will overlap his recovery time—don’t worry, everybody, fortunately, there’s a pilot available to step in and fill his place until he’s fully healed. And yes, he’ll be back soon, both in the Jaeger and on the show— I know you miss him, he’s even more popular than me, huh? Broody and quiet, right, ladies? He’s a hit!

Then he’ll laugh and field some questions about his new partner—but keep it vague for both yours and Bucky’s sake.

It didn’t need to be said. You didn’t want to be named, Steve didn’t want to make any assumptions for the future, and Bucky didn’t want to know if anyone thought he couldn’t pilot anymore.

Erik passes and you catch, sidestepping Thor and shooting over his figure which is no easy feat considering his massive height and the way Steve is staring you down. You don’t have to be hooked up to his brain to know what he’s wondering.

Since the trial run, you’ve been feeling the after-effects of the drift in oscillating waves. Sometimes you catch yourself standing ramrod straight, physically feeling heavier, knowing it’s him.

You okay? We talked about this. Yes, you are. No, you aren’t. It’s complicated. He’s fixes his tie the same time you spot a wrinkle. After-effects.

Erik jumps for a rebound when you miss the next basket, getting it knocked away by Thor’s enormous hand. Steve’s already gone when you look back, but Erik is passing again, and your next shot sinks through the net.

“That’s fuckin’ right!” He knocks his elbow into yours proudly, pushing sleeves over elbows until you can see the patterns of scarification up his arms. Feet back and forth on the scuffed concrete with distracted rhythm, you dribble, thoughts still on Steve.

“Hey,” a voice calls over the sound of the slamming ball. Barnes toes the edge of the makeshift court. A jacket is tucked under his arm, baseball cap atop his dark head. “Come on, it’s Friday night and you’re thinking too much. I wanna show you a place.”

He leads with confidence, directing the taxi in practiced Cantonese picked up over the last two years. Then, once disembarked, he peeks back every few minutes on the street to check if you’re still following. Your gait is awkward—steps firm, but lopsided. All off kilter and wound up like a spring.

It’s okay. In Bucky’s experience, food always helps. He’s taking you to his favorite restaurant—hole-in-the-wall Sichuan. He hollers over his shoulder, "You better be prepared for spice!”

Red lacquered doors open with a tinkering sound, a tiny overhead bell signaling new arrivals. A hostess steers through a path of similarly varnished tables and decorated chairs when Bucky asks for a quiet corner. Fish tanks of koi gleam green and blue. Chandelier scatters gold and white diamond shapes on a ceiling painted like a cloudy sky.

Hot tea first, and he sips carefully, gaze moving up to the T.V. behind your back when you’re busy flipping through the menu. A few more minutes pass of your furrowed brow sinking deeper and Bucky’s hand slides quickly across the tablecloth, nudging the booklet from your clutch.

“I got this.” And relief washes over your entire body like rain.

The appearance of entrees breaks your trance. Mai Gai, Char Siu Bao, Dan Dan noodles, and eggplant in garlic sauce—you’re trying to tell him it’s too much, wondering when he even ordered, but he ignores you. Not his fault you spaced out, he says, catch, and a napkin flies directly into your chest.

It makes you laugh, and Bucky secretly wants to tell you that it wouldn’t kill you to do it more often. Why the hell not, anyway? He’s tired of being upset about something that was largely inevitable. He knew the risk of death when they signed up to be Rangers so on the bright side, at least it’s his arm and not his head. At least it’s his arm and not his co-pilot’s. You’ve proven to be more than capable and proven to be someone he can trust with Steve’s life.

If Bucky had any doubts about whether or not that damned Rogers determination would see them through—they’ve been dispelled now.

The drift was sound. When Steve stepped out from the loading dock, he was lighter like half his weight had been sloughed off. When you followed, helmet pulled from your face, Bucky could see where it landed. Your hips, your shoulders, your jaw, all defiant—even if temporarily—coming down from the high of the handshake. Squared and strong, you looked at Bucky and certainty gleamed from your eyes.

You are Orion’s new pilot. He’s gotta give it up. It could be worse.

Bucky’s fingers shift as he unsnaps chopsticks and grabs spoons, the plates on his left clicking quietly, flexing his pointer when it sticks. Sometimes the prosthetic is a little glitchy because nothing’s perfect, but Stark and Shuri are constantly making updates. They use technology from the spinal clamp to connect his synapses, running tests on its reaction time, sensitivity, and functionality. He can feel pressure, but not pain, and wouldn’t it be nice if it applied elsewhere, too?

He passes your utensils over, wrapped loosely in a napkin. It could be worse.

“Hey Barnes,” you call earnestly, running your fingers over an embossed floral pattern on the paper, “Thanks.”

He’s not looking at you yet, firmly on a mission for soy sauce and chili oil. He makes a well of it in a ceramic dish and stirs with a chopstick, moving it to the center of the table, finding distraction in small tasks.

“...Barnes?”

“It’s Bucky,” he says finally, flicking his eyes to your hopeful face, “You can call me Bucky, alright? Usually that’s just for Steve, but you’ve been in his head—know me now, I guess. So you might as well. Hold your horses—I’ll serve you.”

Speechless, you put your hands in your lap and observe him scoop food, the syllables of his offered nickname tapping like a metronome over your curious tongue.

Bucky, you consider, watching the way he moves. Bucky, with his long hair pulled back and out of his cap. Bucky, his soft and worn hoodie, boots drumming gently against the table leg, eyes discreetly glazed over because he doesn’t think you notice the change in his mood.

Bucky, who made you laugh in the Jaeger hangar—even if he did threaten your life upon the first meeting. Who could have let you rot from boredom and worry, but instead took you into Hong Kong to his favorite restaurant without being asked to. Who could hate you—truly, truly hate you—for taking half his life from him, but instead is piling a mound of fragrant jasmine rice on your plate.

“What?”

“Bucky. I like it. It sounds nice.”

A clipped noise of displeasure, “Okay. Don’t fuckin’ wear it out.”

“Bucky...?” You murmur, sly. “Bu-cky. Buck-y.” The tips of his ears swell pink as you continue, emphatically pressing your lips together, letting your jaw hang open, pronouncing with precision. A bite of a steamed bun and you lick the edge of your mouth, “Bucky…hm…”

He sputters.

“Would you stop? Jesus, you’re annoying just like him— no fucking wonder— the two of you. Just fuckin’ darling.” His words are all run together with how fast his frustrated tongue moves, a healthy flush over his cheeks, spoon clinking on his plate.

It’s cute. Stoic, serious, James—Bucky Barnes– just a boy who can’t take a bit of flirting without lighting up like a candle. It’s fun. You like him, Bucky Barnes.

An unexpected ache overtakes you and suddenly Bucky looks more familiar than he ever has. Something excruciating about the soft crinkles of his brow, the way his generous lips draw back to reveal a sliver of his teeth.

He’s Bucky wiping the sweat from his collar in a dirty alleyway, jeans torn at the knees, bruises budding along his knuckles as he yanks up a troublesome blonde friend. Bucky, young and determined, helping Steve into bed every time he got sick.

Bucky, hovering pallid and broken in the drift, hurt and afraid but you felt his resolute strength in Steve’s head even as he howled in agony. Far off and shuffling in transparent layers until he was little more than a specter, but he was there.

His eyes lift again, raising to point you toward the T.V.

“There’s our boy.”

Our boy. And it keeps hurting.

You twist your torso as Steve steps out from backstage, waving and smiling, impeccably poised. He shakes Jimmy’s hand— silently mouthing thank you and hey because the cheering and yelling is too loud to hear him anyway. You try to stop thinking about Bucky anywhere but corporeal and whole across the tablecloth.

“Hey, Jimmy, how are ya?”

“Good—good, Steve. It’s so great to have you on the show again! Wow, you look great! Specimen.”

Steve chuckles modestly, tucking his chin to his chest, “Thanks, you do too.”

“Alright, no need to flatter me, we’re already in love with you, okay?”

You grin the same time Steve does, but whereas he continues to joke and enthrall two hundred people, you grow restless. Bucky refills your tea and drops a crumble of yellow rock sugar in.

“Relax,” he mutters, “It’s fine. He’s good at this. Eat your food.”

And you know this; you know him. Steve’s good when the questions get too personal and when there’s gaps in the conversation—when the cheering interrupts him or when his jaw ticks before he morphs it into a smile.

He’s good when he breaks the news to a hushed audience, gone eerily quiet like they’ve stepped on consecrated ground. Steve gives them those big blue eyes and the room immediately bursts into applause. Some people are crying. The host is shocked into wordlessness.

You feel relieved, getting what you pleaded for. No cameras. No questions. No pressure. The truth is aired, and Bucky seems pleased, too. You’re about to turn around, offer your full attention, thankful for his company, but then something else happens.

Jimmy blinks his stupor away from the blow of Steve’s confession. He takes a sip from his mug and after a short exchange of, thank you for your transparency, it must have been hard— wow I didn’t think you’d drop a bomb like that on us tonight! I thought I was the one with the ace up my sleeve— ha!

He points off-stage and says, “After that, I think you deserve a nice surprise, Steve. Ready?”

Tall, gorgeous, lightly curled hair cascading down her back—the surprise is a woman. She steps easily in heels, an off-the-shoulder red dress hugging tight to her body. Stunning. She waves to the audience and they go wild.

Steve shoots up to meet her for a kiss in front of the host desk, shaking his head in disbelief, tangling his fingers in her silky hair. There’s cheering again and the crying keeps on.

“Oh my god— Jimmy! You sly devil!” He’s overjoyed. “Baby— how’d you—I thought you were working.”

“I can always make an exception for my favorite guy.” She showcases perfectly white teeth and the high apples of her rosy cheeks.

It’s Ophelia Reyez, Steve’s model-turned-actress girlfriend of approximately six months. Her recent appearance on the Victoria Secret fashion show blew up the internet and her last Sports Illustrated swimsuit cover sold out in every gas station you went into.

Their first meeting was at a charity event—raising awareness about pollution in the Pacific, discouraging scavengers from harvesting Kaiju parts after battles. A picture of them standing two feet away made its way through social media the next morning her PR team made contact before noon.

So of course, it was decided; it’s a beneficially mutual relationship, after all. Doesn’t matter if he hates it or not—people don’t want to know that pilots live in a metal box and play basketball on Friday nights. They want to see Rangers in a role— monogamous relationships with beautiful people, white picket fence (or gated community) future in the making, and eventually plump-faced babies in strollers.

Steve’s now back in his seat, shifted so Ophelia is sitting in his lap, turned to the side. His hands are locked around her slender waist—an incredibly believable display of public affection. She kisses his cheek, leans her head on his shoulder, beaming brightly. If you were anybody else, you’d believe it; you have before.

“Fuck me gently with a chainsaw,” you whisper in both awe and annoyance.

“Feeling it, huh?” Bucky speaks plainly around a bite of eggplant when he notices your jaw. That habitual and microscopic signal he’s grown to spot a mile away means Steve’s irritated and pissed off, and now it means that you are, too.

“Yeah,” you admit, shaking your head. You turn back to him, thoroughly bothered, having had enough of the performance.

“Uh-huh. Everyone’s a Fly—even her.”

You sigh at the label. Jaeger Flies, is what he’s saying. Ranger groupies. Derisive titles— and maybe deserved— for men and women who are attracted to pilots solely because they’re pilots. They want the opportunity to be famous or the privilege of being elite.

Even her, Ophelia Reyes. She’ll forever look at Steve Rogers as the Ranger.

Natasha always lamented—usually as she took her earrings off after a date, heels slipping off her pale feet—about another civilian man who worshipped her, and how that would be a dream for most people, to be so adored, so revered, but you always felt her sorrow in the drift mourning a love she couldn’t have.

She wanted the white picket fence. The normal life, normal husband, normal family. Her clean break from the past where monsters could no longer chase her in Decima and nightmares could no longer chase her at night. Behind closed doors, she was all torn open at the seams. And you’d wordlessly tell her shut up because she had a family with you. You loved her too, wasn’t that worth something?

She’d spiral and spiral and nothing was ever enough.

Your stomach twists and it keeps hurting.

Bucky pays for dinner. He asks as he pops a mint into his mouth, “Up for dessert?”

“God, Buck.” You groan, and Bucky takes a second to run that through his head again. God, Buck. Another thing like Steve.

“C’mon, I wanna show you another place,” he says thoughtfully, “Hold on to your hat, punk.”

A lighthearted swat to your back and then he’s shoving the ballcap hanging from his chair on your head.

The streets are lit with all sorts of colors as you follow him through the market, peering at vendors showcasing an abundance of food and miscellaneous items. You keep telling him you’re too full and can’t eat another fucking bite, but he only commands you to walk it off. The crispiest egg waffles are somewhere down this way, and even though he can’t remember the intersection, it should be close.

Between steps and dodging passerby’s, he relates his own experiences of brief PR relationships. A Russian woman one time, and a Greek woman another time. Cross-cultural because it made the PPDC look good—and it was all about looking good. He loathed it, of course, but he’d bite down a couple of months before their representatives would release those asinine joint statements about “conscious uncoupling” – schedules too busy, still have love for each other in their hearts, though.

“Couldn’t tell you those girls’ middle names. We’d get together just long enough for some media circulation—dates where we’d pretend to be offended when pictures leaked on TMZ.”

“Well,” you muse over a vision of Bucky leaned back on Steve’s mattress, returned late and bored of another paparazzi encounter swarming him in the lobby of some hotel. You know it like a dream—his ankles crossed, shoes shucked off, cracking his neck. Fuckin’ wild, Stevie. This girl. My knees ain’t what they used to be.

“Least you got your dick plenty wet, didn’t ya?”

He makes a noise like an engine backfiring—offended like you’ve pawned off his prized possessions or something.

“Jesus—you’re an ass.” He slams the bill of the cap down until it hits you in the nose. Another huff, more cursing, and then he’s saying fuck you before speeding off alone.

You chase cheerily, finding his chestnut head peeking over the crowd with ease because he’s tall and hard to lose in Hong Kong. A few more blocks down with him looking back surreptitiously to make sure you’re not lost, and Bucky ends up being the one who is actually lost.

“Shit. Can’t find the stand,” he grumbles, “Don’t give me that face. These are way better than the ones we passed earlier—fucking all soft in the middle—fresh pandan leaf, alright? You don’t get it.”

“I don’t even know what that is,” you laugh, feeling your cheeks grow tired from the way they’ve been lifted all night.

A stifled, hot breeze of urban downtown mixes with a chilly gust of wind, carrying Bucky’s petulance away though the throng. Blinking, you look around, craning your neck and shuffle to the curb. Stalls with hanging lanterns. Carts lined with pickled mango. Vendors grilling skewers of pork and cleaving roast duck into chunks.

You suddenly dart from him across the busy road and barely avoid a rickshaw balancing two enormous baskets of finger bananas. When you return, you hold up matching green popsicles. One gets shoved into his mouth, other one into yours. Pandan, like he wanted.

“Hey, it’s not bad,” you give it another taste. Lingering coconut, a little bit leafy, but not unpleasant. “Oh shit—cold!”

Bucky licks his lips, stinging red from the ice. You shudder loudly as brainfreeze hits, another chatter of your teeth following when a gust of wind whips through. He shrugs his jacket from his shoulders.

He calls you a dumbass after an embarrassing story about the time you skinny-dipped in a pond near The Icebox in the middle of winter. A handsome man, your eager libido, and a handle of whiskey had been involved. You giggle about being bed-ridden for half a week afterwards, but you got his number and a few good nights in his bed.

“Guess you’re not as boring as I thought.”

You whistle, “Sweetheart, I got stories that’ll put some hair on your chest.”

Bucky smacks you on the shoulder. “Ass.”

The Shatterdome comes into view much later.

What would have normally been a three-hour excursion, at most, has unintentionally into six and you’re nowhere close to tired—not quite ready for it to end. Bucky is bright with energy, too.

The past hours have been dedicated to recalling old tales. One led to another, threads pulled from the most insignificant of mentions—your old Boston Terrier’s underbite; Bucky accidentally knocking Steve’s bottom lip into his own braces in sixth grade and it swelled up so big he could hardly talk; Natasha, unable to pronounce fucking aluminum out of all the damn words in the world; you, unable to pronounce facetious; and then Bucky, trying his own hand at it and realizing he can’t either.

“Fa—fa-shish-shush? Fascist—tus? Factitious… Ah, shit.”

“Buck,” you gasp through another fit, “Bucky—you have to shut up. Oh—Oh my god—my face hurts.”

“Christ, who fucking made this word up?” He turns the corner toward the living quarters, shaking his head. Just you and him between the rooms and his steps slow at the advent of an inbound goodnight.

Bravely, now that you’re in more secluded space, you offer, “I can tell you more... if you want. Anything. It’s only fair.”

“Yeah,” he says, going quiet and careful. “If you want to.”

So, you take a deep breath, bookended by a nervous grin because other than Steve, the only person who knows anything about you outside a confidential manila folder is dead.

“Well, it might surprise you, since I’m just so goddamn talented—"

“Oh, here we fuckin’ go.”

“Kidding. I wasn’t good at anything,” you elbow him before fishing out your key. “Other than getting into trouble.” Clicks of the cylinder and your vault door squeaks open. “Lots of fighting—I was a small kid. Had nothing but the clothes on my back and just the biggest chip on my shoulder.”

“Sounds like someone I know.”

Yeah. It’s funny. Steve’s alleyway fisticuffs might as well have been your own. You tell him as soon as the PPDC started recruiting again, you were in line. Their standards were confusingly specific and the tests they ran didn’t make any sense, but you passed and landed in Kodiak Island under the austere care of Stacker Pentecost.

Flipping the light on, you invite him inside. “I’d been in and out of foster homes. Barely had a high school degree. Got into… bad work. You know— what do homeless young adults with questionable moral codes do when their 9-5 isn’t paying the bills?” It’s desperate joke to break up the tension but he doesn’t take the bait.

“I’m not judging.”

You plop down on the edge of your table— a spotty metal thing pilfered from a vacated room. He takes the single seat in front of you, moving a dusty glass of water toward the wall, expression only showing attentiveness.

“Well, anyway…” you pause, “I was in the Bay Area after Trespasser— you know, scavenging. But, well, it changes your perspective a little when you’re sneaking through government tape at 3 in morning, stepping over flowers and memorabilia for all the deaths to crouch over a monster’s fucking toenail.”

“Hell,” a sardonic and self-deprecating grin, “I might have been a degenerate street urchin, but someone’s family got taken from them and here I was—monetizing their tragedy.”

Arching your back for more comfort, you splay your left leg over the surface, “Pentecost always said if I was lucky enough, I’d suffer brain damage or radiation poisoning, but might as well die in a Jaeger than in a ditch like I figured I always would. Son of a bitch had my number.”

Bucky’s lips are pursed lightly, eyes are tracing the path of your laces through bent hooks when you wriggle your boot back and forth. He spreads his hand over your ankle, keeping you still.

You swallow when he squeezes.

“Uh— I met Nat at Kodiak.” Bucky is warm. You oscillate between ignoring him and focusing on him, clinging to his hold instead of chasing the thought of Natasha too much. “We were… very similar. Childhood, um, troubles and all that.” You give him a pointed look and he makes a small noise of understanding with no intention to press for details, “She became my best friend. She was the first person I had. My only family.”

A nod of mock irritation and he says, “Yeah. Steve was always a part of mine. Sometimes they say they like him more than me. Can’t blame ‘em.”

“It’s the charm. They make it seem effortless, huh?”

“Fucker can’t take a bad picture to save his life.”

You laugh. “A smile like the goddamn sun!”

“One look into those stupid blue eyes and you’re a goner.”

“Criminally pretty.”

“Hah!” Bucky snorts, “Pretty enough for all of us.”

The floodlight on the wall casts darkness in the shape of your head over his shoulder. Lines of wayward hair caress his neck, tapered strands resting on his collarbones, chestnut glowing orange. His irises stipple forest green when it touches the light, smile nostalgic and lovely.

“Don’t be stupid,” you look at him for another minute longer, “You’re pretty, too, Buck.”

A raise of his brow. Bucky’s mouth opens and closes a few times vacantly. “Thanks,” he mutters finally. Then, bashfully, “So are you.”

Then, a cautious murmur of your name that you almost miss, and he’s peering up at you, deliberately soft. Bucky’s thumb knead small circles over the stitching of your jeans.

“You loved her, didn’t you?”

You loved her, didn’t you?

The years sweep through, passing over your face in a range of rapid-fire emotions. Bucky watches them change like shadows of a bonfire. Delight, amusement, longing. Anger, despair, grief. Deep and unforgiving because she was your whole world—all you had— and she left too soon.

You inhale and it sounds like a sniffle— exhale, and it sounds like a sob. No going back now; you did promise him anything.

You loved her, didn’t you?

Of course you loved her. Natasha-fucking-goddamn-Romanoff. Yeah, of course you did.

You loved her like a sister. You loved her like a lover. You loved her in reflexive ways, like mother’s intuition, finding your motivation in the need to protect her even though she hardly ever needed protection. You loved her like precious gems. You loved her like she was made from your own rib. You loved her enough to love unreciprocated.

“Well, you spend years living with someone, in their brain, learning everything about them— every decision in and out of their control that led them up to who they ended up being. Their—all their impulses and all the things they think about themselves. How—how they hate themselves sometimes.”

You’d always said you were the stupid one. Too stupid to reflect on the past and too stupid to let it burden your conscience the way she’d let hers. A running gag whenever her hand jammed putting on a lipstick she’d worn a million times and you’d finally have to do it for her.

Cheer up, Nat. You’re too pretty to cry. You’d line her lips, pat in rouge delicately, encouragingly. And then you’d shut up because there was nothing you could tell her. A million reassurances rolled off her back because they only made her feel worse. She clung onto your care like another weapon in her chest because she couldn’t return it even though you told her you wanted nothing from her but happiness. Jesus Christ, Nat, I thought I was the stupid one.

“When you know someone like that, it’s easy, isn’t it? You see them exactly for who they are and suddenly there’s no longer the concept of good or bad. What else could I do but love her? Especially when she thought so little of her damn self—tried everything to be someone else but—Jesus, if you only knew how radiant she was—”

You shut your eyes. “A smile… like the goddamn sun. Ah, fuck—"

And now you’re crying. You haven’t cried about Natasha in almost half a year because it’s something you track like the entrance bay’s war clock. Five months. Ten days. Zero again.

You’re choking back too many words and you don’t even know why you said all of that. You start apologizing, rattling out more, too much again, desperately like a prayer, pitch escalating higher and higher. “She deserved everything. A life that was completely—solely—hers. A life that made her happy— and why— why her?”

Why not me?

Bucky hears it in the silence. Watches it descend like a funeral shroud, weighing you down until you look as heavy as Steve on his worst days—when he stares at Bucky’s arm, like Bucky can’t see, can’t feel him there. And he knows Steve is thinking, why not me?

Bucky rises to his feet, stepping next to your uselessly dangling leg, resting his left hand on your shoulder and you grasp him, clutching achingly tight, torn to bits. And it’s too much all at once.

“I’m sorry,” you sob, locked around his bicep, then his forearm, fingers digging into the smooth obsidian plates, fisting the fabric of his sleeve. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” As if he were Natasha—as if you could stop both her death and his mangling, or at least hold her the way you are holding him now.

You’re smashed into little pieces, barely keeping your head above water, holding it all in, and no one recognized how you were drowning the entire time.

Solemnly, curiously, he feels like he’s seeing you for the first time but not quite, remnants of familiarity sparks in him—the filmy plastic layer of an old photograph pressing down to reveal something he once knew and finally knows again.

You make helpless noises, staring numbly ahead, tears rolling out like marbles to drop into your lap.

Bucky shakes his head, “I’m fine,” he whispers gently—frustrated—brow furrowed, his fingers rubbing the salt from your chin, “Quit your blubberin’.” He tilts your face up to the light, watching you take a shuddering breath, exhausted from unearthing buried skeletons.

It's wet when he kisses you, supple flesh chapped around the edges from anxious gnawing, swollen hot from weeping. It’s soft and quick, and then he pulls away.

“St—sorry,” he says, mouth pressing into a thin line, lips drawn in and tentatively licked. “Sorry, I don’t know… I don’t know why I did that. I shouldn’t have.”

Your eyes are sad—big and vulnerable, inflamed red, confused, worried, something else weaving through the damp gaze. Your strong, small fingers are still tight on him, and even though Bucky pulled away and apologized, he rushes forward again.

His free hand curls around your neck, supporting your head. Lips part and close, pressing firmly, expertly, naturally. It feels like he’s kissed you before and missed it— like a kiss he’s been waiting on for a long time.

Banging on your door jerks him away. You careen off the tabletop, smooth the back of your hair, wipe your face and the vault creaks open.

“Marshal,” Bucky greets.

“Rangers…” Fury’s steps are suspicious, phone in his hand aglow. “I thought we had a plan.”

Your heart is beating too fast, the press of Bucky’s plush lips still warm, the scent of his skin still near. You sense it like an imprint, feel it like a brand. The room spins with an onslaught of possible scenarios—all horrendously unclear.

“Care to explain this to me?” The marshal turns his phone toward you, the lit screen displaying a photo of a dark street, illuminated by red and yellow lanterns. A thick crowd is spread around stalls of fruit and knick-knacks.

The headline reads James Barnes Spotted in Hong Kong with Mystery Woman, and the two of you are circled inside a red ring. You’re teetering off the curb of the sidewalk next to a sewer grate. It’s grainy and distorted, but Bucky’s striking features are clear.

“And this one?”

Bucky’s cap on your head, popsicle sticks between your teeth and his.

Steve Rogers on Jimmy! Jimmy Barnes on a Date!

James Barnes Officially Over Penelope Mercouri.

James Barnes’ Injury?

Fury tucks his device back into his coat. “Not that I care what you get up to on your spare time, but we had a tale to tell. It’s hard pushing an agenda when you’re pushing the wrong way.”

“We just got dinner,” you stutter, an upsurge of guilt rising. The speculation, the kiss, the gut-wrenching reflex that feels like a crime. Fury’s calculating now, looking from you to Bucky, assessing the situation with some pity because you truly look pitiful.

“What you got is PR on cleanup. Potts has been trawling Twitter for the last 20 minutes. For someone who doesn’t want to be in the public eye, you’re making a lot of noise.” He points to Bucky’s jacket still over your shoulders.

You tear it off. “It’s not—”

“Oh no—I won’t be losing sleep any over it.” The marshal’s single eye blinks calmly, “She can spin the story, but you become responsible for this.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means, Ranger, that the spotlight is on you now. And there is nowhere to run.”

And if you didn’t think it could get any worse, footfalls down the hallway reach your ears in a pattern that you recognize immediately. Here he is, stepping into your room like it’s his own, suit jacket over his forearm, shirt halfway untucked and tie pulled loose. His lips drawn together and unreadable.

But you read it: Steve’s seen the pictures, too.

And goddamn, if you didn’t think it could get any worse— the earsplitting alarm announcing sudden movement in the breach startles you all.

“Orion Bravo, report to Bay 08, Level B. Codename Polidori. Category 2 Kaiju.” Shuri’s reedy voice is collected but critical. The thin screen next to your bed blinks on primary colors, wavy lines of activity rising and falling, counting down until emergence. Three hours.

Banner streams down the hall. The ruckus drowns him out.

Fury’s dark skin is ochre beneath the lights, “Category II,” he says, “Should be achievable. Odinsons will be on standby, guarding the Miracle Mile. Maximoffs on the coastline. They’ll come to you if necessary. Shelve your personal troubles, Rangers, we’ll continue this conversation later.”

Circuitry. Battle armor. Helmet beneath your arm. Muscle memory cuts down the time to seven minutes until you’re set to board, but you need more. Just a few—you have to tell him—better now than later—better from your mouth than from the drift. So, you blurt, “Bucky kissed me.”

Steve turns.

“We kissed. It—it’s nothing. I just needed to tell you before we get in. Didn’t want to seem like I’m hiding anything—I’m not.” It sounds so stupid, like a child admitting fault for breaking a window with a too-hard throw. It sounds like betrayal.

His helmet is gripped tightly in the crook of his elbow. Steve’s chin juts out incrementally, chewing on the inside of his lip, the air around him gone stagnant until he makes a noise both like a scoff and a hum.

“Sure. Fine. I get it—you’re lonely.” It’s worse than any response you expected to receive. “You know what I mean.”

It must be a testament to the depth of your connection now— you knowing him, him knowing you in all the ways that can make an argument escalate into atomic warfare. Precision strikes and then the two of you walking Ground Zero in its aftermath.

“Wait—you think I’m lonely?” You block his way out, furious. “What the fuck does that— have you met yourself? Girlfriends who will never see you for who you are. Ophelia Reyez? Katherine Lau?”

Orion Bravo. Report to the loading platform.

“I know exactly what I’m doing—do you? I spent all evening on T.V. for you--”

“Oh, boo-fucking-hoo, Mister Martyr in front of a drooling audience telling white lies and screwing a Victoria’s Secret Angel in some penthouse suite— such sacrifices you’ve made in my honor.”

Orion Bravo. Report to the loading platform.

“What the fuck have you done lately?” Steve snaps, “Other than try to fuck my co-pilot?”

His words hit like a kick in the goddamn teeth. You slam your helmet into his chest and the polycarbonate shells knock together violently.

“I’m your fucking co-pilot,” you snarl, “You wanted me.”

Steve steadies himself, twisting until he’s snarling at you down the bridge of his nose, “Enough. We’re being hailed, I’m not breaking this record because of you, and not for a Category II. Get your shit together.”

You grind your molars when he pushes you aside, stumbling on shaking legs. Your brain feels gnarled—misshapen and bent up in sharp, jagged points—and as much as you want to stomp his goddamn face in, he’s right: you can’t feel this way. You can’t. It’s your first drop in two years with the best pilot by your side—and you’re responsible for his life. The last one proved disastrous, and you cannot risk that again.

Your suit feels heavier with each step. When you climb in after Steve, the rig feels more obstinate. Your head, chest, heart are all swollen with turmoil and hot rage.

He’s next to you, breathing deeply. You mimic, shelving personal troubles like the marshal commanded.

Out of alignment, the automated voice of the system calls, and you push it back further, grabbing the entire shelf and hurling it into the depths. Steve sends you an incisive look. A blame. You take a breath, another, and another. Fuck!

“Orion.” The heads-up display spotlights Bucky’s face in the control room, emotionless. “Focus.”

You inhale one more time, seeking reassurance in his unwavering gaze—necessary peace in the silhouette of his phantom left arm. Bucky. Steve. Natasha. You. There can be no more loss. You cannot let it happen again.

Levels stabilizing.

To your right, Steve makes a noise like he’s shaking something off.

Neural Handshake complete.

Bucky stands behind the glass, watching aircrafts lower their hooks. A nod of his dark head is the last thing you see before Orion is lifted from the hangar.

There would be a fucking storm.

You’ve always hated fighting in the rain because Kaiju are enormous, slippery, alien amphibians, and Orion’s left fist slides off more times than you’d like. This one’s much smaller than Orion, which allows it the slight advantage of speed, slicing through the water like a shark, corkscrewing for an extra boost of velocity before emerging with a splash from behind.

A miss when you and Steve weave away, hazarding a minor scratch to the right shoulder before Orion’s shield knocks it back.

Despite the vexing evening and the simmering hurt in the pit of your chest, the drift is steady. So, you take it for what it is, cast the rust off your bones, and the two of you do some fucking damage on this thing.

Banner named it Polidori, after the writer credited with inventing the vampire genre. K-Science sonars detected protruding fangs and petal flaps folded on its back like vestigial wings. So, Polidori, he shrugged, it’s cute.

You discover with swift horror that the flaps are neither vestigial nor cute when Polidori pulls one sliver of leathery skin free with a splat. An atrocious shriek rings over the storm as it struggles with its own body, then another shriek and the left pillar continues to stretch, knobby blunt end of its shoulder blade shooting high, ripping itself full of gaping holes in its endeavor.

Banner was more accurate than he realized.

“Orion!” Shuri’s voice is sharp, “Bring it down! Do not let it into the air! Use your cannon!”

You’re frozen stuck, eyes squeezed shut at the sight of stretched membrane. A terrified whimper and a puncture of nauseating memory nicks at Steve’s concentration.

No! Levels spike on the HUD screen. Fuck! Steve is caught in the undertow and the rig jams beneath both your feet.

“Orion! You’re out of alignment! Orion!”

She’s here.

Natasha’s bright hair is unfurling all around you. There’s deafening splintering when the incisors of her killer punctures through Decima’s chest and both her legs. Metal grinds against metal, the sound searing itself into your eardrums—your brain—your heart. Wings are beating—wild flaps of rubbery sails against the downpour—muffling screams from Decima’s cockpit.

It’s as real and cruel as the last time you saw it.

Bi Fang, like the bird from Chinese mythology, beaked and blessed with flight to make up for its one leg. Bi Fang the Kaiju was legless, and Natasha was convinced Decima could take it. You had no reason to think otherwise; five previous kills cultivated your confidence. You had her by your side, after all. Two orphans with something to prove, proving it again and again.

Wings and fangs? No legs? Six is an auspicious number. The smirk on her lips blooms fiercely. You’re laughing when Decima hovers above the water. Alright, Tasha. Six drops.

A tremendous splash and you touch ground.

She grins. Six kills.

Polidori has one limb fully flexed, fragmenting pixels bending into the shape of Bi Fang. Natasha is bending, too, lowering her center of gravity. Her elbows are against her ribs, fists set. This is gonna hurt. Come to–

Come to me! To me!

He’s stepping in ink. In water. And then metal is beneath Steve’s feet. There are flashes of rain, lightning, and he recognizes her dead center of the storm.

Natasha Romanoff, vibrant and joyful through the glass of her helmet. You, next to her, reciprocal smile on your face stuck in hysteria, tears streaming down your cheeks in wide stripes. Steve’s hand is reaching but going nowhere. Echoes overlap of crying and shouting. Yours. Hers. His.

Come to me!

He yells again, but you’ve chased the rabbit too far.

Come to me!

He’s trying his hardest, stretching himself like ropes to bridge the fissure. He feels your fear, your hurt, and for a flash, it eats him whole, spits him out a twisted-up way and his brain screams for Bucky.

Bucky is doing the same through the control room, reaching his will out to Steve, praying their connection still holds despite their distance. He’s yelling for you, too.

“Steve! Get the hell out of it! Steve, you need to get her!”

The ripping of his red left arm loops three times in quick succession before Steve can temper it down. Bucky is howling, crying, sobbing. Steve is breathless, stuck, rattled, steeling his entire body to witness the amputation for another inescapable replay until your frozen body smears across his blurry field of vision.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!

Bright whites burst behind his eyelids. Flares of panicked emotion. Bucky. Natasha. Him. You. An endless rippling chain of trauma lashing Orion open.

“Come on— Steve! It’s moving! Steve!”

“Buck! I’m— I’m okay! Just— need a second.” Steve scrambles for his sanity, latching on, knowing Bucky’s well— alive and not hurt. Shuri begins urging him to get up faster. Polidori’s moving slow, but it is moving, and it needs to be put down now. She’s calling for the Odinsons—Colossus, be prepared to walk-

The metal under Steve’s feet slides away. Water returns, ink flowering behind it—molasses and murky. His steps are unsteady, chest heaving as he advances through a field of speckled glimmers like fireflies at dusk. Each flicker reflects an agonized shard of your distorted face.

A flit of your voice rushes behind his head. Steve whips around and tries to catch it but no such luck.

Again, to the right, then gone each time he spins. It builds and builds until he feels half-deaf, frantically invoking your name into the ether where it becomes lost in dissonance. Butterfly-winged iridescence scatter and plummet, shrieking, shrieking, shrieking.

Then, nothing.

He finds you crumpled over on Anchorage’s shore.

Decima reaches sand as a crackling mess of Jaeger parts, chest piece ripped clean off the right side. You clamber out of the rig, hugging Natasha’s mutilated corpse. Your drivesuit is split open down to the hip, the glass of your helmet fractured and splattered with blood from your nose– still dripping.

He shakes his head, attempting to free himself of your scarred clutch. You had been hooked into the rawest fear—linked up when she died— gored and broken with half your brain believing it is also dead. Chills race up his spine and breaks him out in a cold sweat. He feels strangled to his very soul.

Then, seizures take you—the casualties of solo piloting—the neural damage come to collect. Nobody know how many miles you steered Decima alone and truthfully, it should have killed you.

Your eyes roll up to the sky, body convulsing before slamming into the ground like a rag doll, shaky fingers still reaching for your co-pilot. Steve shudders quietly, flinching with each impact. A final wail and everything slackens to a dull vibration. You quiver on the sand, howling and crying for Nat.

Polidori’s right wing casts itself loose, jaw opening wide. Steve’s on a time limit; there are only a few grains left in the hourglass. He croaks your name.

A second of recognition triggers from behind the curtain and it’s miraculously enough for you to see him. It’s enough.

He begs. He begs on his goddamn knees, crawling to you.

Look at me, only at me. Come back to me, please. Please. Please.

Steve gathers you in his arms, both of you trembling and afraid. Your suit heals itself, pieces stitching back together, blood little by little disappearing from your nose. Natasha shimmers away.

He presses the glass of your helmets together. He needs to get closer.

Steve? S-Ste-Steve—Steve?

You’re still crying. You’re breaking his heart.

Yes. I’m here.

St-Steve, what d-d-do I do?

You’ve got me now. I’m here with you. You understand?

He can see you struggling to escape, consciousness clawing with nails and teeth to return to the present.

Yeah. Y-Yes.

We have to move.

Steve—Steve—everything hurts.

Just for now. Just for a little bit—but I’ll make it better, I promise. Nothing’s gonna hurt you again. Will you hold on to me? Do you trust me?

Y-yes… Yes, yes. I trust you.

The rig lurches back to life beneath his feet. Jittery and creaking with strain, Orion rocks forward with a rumble. The drift stirs once more, noise giving way to silence.

Steve’s vision clears. You’re back in the present, precariously grounding your strength inside his guidance. You raise an unsteady left arm. He powers it up. Energy surges through the cockpit, tremors running up your side as it charges. Your hand splays. Steve’s palm takes aim.

Activating plasma cannon.

The beam pierces Polidori’s shoulder and its roar chases a simultaneous thunderclap.

A crack of lightning flushes the sky purple. Orion’s right arm lifts high above its head and slams back down, the glowing hot edge of its shield cleaving through Polidori’s skull.

Bucky’s grip on the control room’s railing feels like it could warp metal. Wilson is on his right, other pilots in a row next to him. All is silent.

Through the relay of Orion’s camera, Polidori’s writhes one final time. A death throe—pathetic trilling drowned by rising water, falling into deep darkness. Overhead, Kaiju clean-up advances, jet engines rumbling behind an ashy horizon. Orion’s shield retreats to its side with a wet, sloppy sound. The handshake pulled through. Steve got to you.

Abruptly, the room vibrates with the shouting of about fifty voices. Sam is banging on the railing, strong fists rocking the entire length of it, roaring with glee. The others are even wilder— shoving each other in triumph.

Bucky tunes it out, waiting for quieter confirmation. He can hear the both of you despite the racket. Steve’s steady pants, cut with throaty relief—this one, Bucky’s familiar with. Your small, weak sobs strangled with tears—this one, he’s quickly learned, but knows now in his bones.

“Twelve drops,” you announce hoarsely. Raw. “B-Buck?”

He grins, dazed comfort rushing over, your voice chasing the torture away.

“Twelve kills, sweetheart,” Bucky says, “You did it.”

The raucous celebration in the Shatterdome simmers down around four, sunrise just a couple hours behind the horizon. Unruliness had broken out, triggering a party that lasted from the time Orion got picked up ‘til now, and still there’s chatter in the common room.

It’s normal; Anchorage celebrated too after most kills—as long as no one died.

You’re freshly showered and changed, barefoot as you patter it back to your room. Voices from other beds are lowered as you pass—friends taking banter back to private spaces, couples pressed up against each other. All standard-issue revelry to commemorate the endurance of life.

It’s how these things go. Violence on a massive scale, humanity threatened with extinction—the people closest to death feel it the most. When routine becomes monotony, it’s good once in a while to be stimulated again.

Damn near two thousand people in close quarters—Rangers in perfect form, friendships assembled on the foundation of sharing an exceptionally singular purpose. Even Pentecost in all his grave formalities couldn’t ward off human nature. Plenty of pilots hooked up with each other and other staff in Anchorage and no one cared as long as it didn’t muck anything up on the job. At least the marshal could control that; mishandle your personal relationships and you’d be off the docket for your next drop.

Sex is biology. Desire is human.

It’s hard for you to feel human this morning. Exhausted by the fight and the prior evening—awake now for over 24 hours, you broke away from the commons as soon as you arrived, spending an hour simply breathing in the steam, the habit achingly comforting. Your chest still feels tight, heart bloated with invasive flashbacks.

You used to decompress with Natasha. A few drinks, tales from the cockpit, shadowboxing and putting on a show, glad to be in the company of friends— to be back safely with each other. Then you’d scatter with the crowd, meet her in the showers, and help her wash her hair in silence. Nothing but the trickle of shampoo down the drain.

She’d cry, sometimes. Catharsis, mostly. Curled up in your arms, the both of you cozy in pajamas on the floor. Then off to bed where she’d climb under your sheets, falling sleep with her head on your shoulder, your fingers in her hair.

A love unspoken. A home in the shape of a twin-sized bottom bunk. Cramped and narrow. Too brief.

You sigh. Everything hurts.

A few rooms away from yours, Steve’s door is open just enough for a line of orange to escape. You know he’s there, waiting patiently as he has been. You went near catatonic on the way back, lying down in the cockpit, no longer needing to be hooked up. You shed the armor, holed yourself into the corner of Orion’s hull, and said nothing when he sat by your side.

Walking in front of the light, he places himself in the entrance way until he’s looking at you. His face is a gentle blue shadow, resplendent halo glorious behind his head. He’s dressed in soft pants and a t-shirt damp at the collar. A droplet of water runs down his neck.

It emerges like an orchestral arrangement. Leisurely notes creep into your ears—a tune you’ve always known. Plucks of strings, escalating windchimes. It echoes, the trails on his skin, his measured breath, his percussive voice layering and pleating until there are dozens of him.

Look at me. Come to me. I need you.

You feel it all at once. A knotted, chaotic tempest. Hesitation. Confusion. Ache. Bucky. Him. You. Your eyes lock with his. A mistake and a revelation.

Steve holds out a steady hand. You take a step, terrified, pulled into his overwhelming atmosphere like magnets, your bodies humming a secret frequency, purring for each other.

The drift opened everything up, but the battle tore it all out. The both of you are laid bare, everything else fallen away.

Nothing’s gonna hurt you again. You’ve got me now, you understand?

You reach the shadow he casts, eclipsed entirely by his bulk. Steve threads his fingers between yours and with a tug, you surrender your worries to him.

He’s kissing you before the door is entirely shut and latched. He fumbles for the locks, wraps his arms around your waist. A click and a clatter. He moans into your mouth.

You exhale from deep inside your chest. He inhales like it’s all the oxygen he needs.

Your hands move to one place, his hands to another. Before your bodies can savor it, the both of you have roamed on, reading each other’s minds, knowing what’s next.

More. More. More.

It’s impatient and fast and Steve picks you up with ease. You forget yourself, forget the world outside the room, outside the three-by-three tile area of where he’s got you lifted, legs wrapped tight around his hips. Fingers dive into the back of your pants, squeezing, up your shirt, pawing at your breasts.

His groans blow heat onto your neck. You arch away, giving him more skin to brand kisses onto. He nips at your throat, light, then again, rough. His voice is raw and thick, husky little clouds making their home on your body.

Gentle sucking on your bottom lip follow each kiss. He takes you to bed, dropping himself onto the mattress, you on top of him. He’s been in your head; he knows what you like. Knows where you want him. Your voice is getting higher, sounds quick and shallow.

Steve guides you with one hand on your hip and the other beneath your thigh, soft pajama bottoms pressing against his. He groans each time you rock forward, needy for more contact against his groin.

You’ve been in his head, too. He likes feeling hands in his hair, so you grip his flaxen strands. He likes hearing, so you make a little more noise. He likes seeing his partner helpless because of him, losing all control, falling apart for him.

So you do.

Pleasure rushes from the top of your head to the tip of your toes, his name burning in your throat. It’s an incredible shock and you’re spellbound, enraptured by him drinking in the parting of your swollen lips. Quickly, he places you on his thigh, enormous and strong, needing a better position to see— to feel you on him. Hungry attention, eager eyes, pleading like a mother tongue.

“Keep coming for me. Just like this— don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

The shamelessness of it—your underwear soaked to your pants. The fever of it—his body like a fire, low, husky begging just from watching lighting up your spine. It’s extraordinary adrenaline— the heightened and profound connection of knowing one another in every way—as if you were made for each other.

Animal instinct liberated from human sentience. Desire pursuing release. Two bodies colliding and igniting.

You can’t stop the next cresting wave, crying out again.

Steve pushes you on his leg repeatedly, back and forth, solid and firm between your thighs even as you shudder and whimper, telling him it’s too much— you’re too sensitive. He kisses your neck, jaw, chin, cheek. He doesn’t stop moving.

“Hold on to me.”

A bead of sweat collects on the dip of your cupid’s bow. He looks at how sweetly your skin shimmers as you shiver, how your pupils are blown wide, how you look so perfect to him. He presses his forehead to yours, looks into your eyes like the way he did in the drift.

You reach for him and rub in quick strokes, fumbling when he rocks you back, gripping when he rocks you forward. Parted lips hover, “One more time for me—ah, please,” he begs, “Before I do.”

But he’s too late and too heated. Steve makes a mess of his sleeping pants, taken over the edge by how you feel without hardly feeling you at all. He buries a groan into your shoulder, riding it out with indelicate thrusts into your palm.

“Oh,” he murmurs, “Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck.”

He’s blush pink and beautiful when he remembers himself again, rubbing his cheek against yours. He knows what you’re thinking— the realization in the comedown, the leaching fear of what could have been a mistake. But it isn’t, and Steve remains faithful to your body.

“Stay. I’m sorry—for hurting you. I’ll make it better.” Velvet kisses to your lips and you shake your head, apologies no longer necessary.

A whisper of his name like it’s the most radiant word. You cling to him, kissing him, answering only to him.

In the afternoon when Steve is still sleeping, you retreat to your room. You pause at the sight of Bucky already on your bed, caught in the bleary focus of his gaze. With lashes soaked wet, his throat constricts around a forceful swallow.

“Hey,” he says, voice breaking on the syllable. He pats the space next to him and you come sit, turning your knees until they knock into his.

“Bucky…”

He laughs like you’ve told a joke, like the sound of his own name is a funny thing escaping your mouth. “Hoped I could catch you last night, before—” he laughs again. “—Before bed. Just wanted to—I guess I don’t know what I wanted to do.”

The hurt resurfaces. You find him through the rose-dappled lenses of Steve’s eyes. Those warm summers with two boys running wild, effortlessly devoted to each other. Your heart swells like you’re there, gazing at russet locks flying in the wind. Years and years between them—Bucky’s smile, lopsided and carefree. Steve’s gaze, illuminating Bucky in every memory.

“Bucky,” you say again, so wonderfully soft, he thinks, even as his chest feels stretched to bursting. “You love him.”

He places his temple on your shoulder, face hidden by the long strands of his hair.

“You’ve been in his head. He’s easy to love.”

“Yes,” you agree, touching his bangs, pushing them over his ear, streaking four affectionate lines through, “He is.”

“So are you.”

Bucky turns into your palm, smiling openly, like the truth is the simplest thing in the world.

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