#placing her in the perfect position for her to warm to Johnny except then she meets Goro Takemura lol

[merge-conflict]

The appeal of starting from the ending and working back is that you put a cap on every Might Have Been, every wandering tangent, etc. that your drafting mind might otherwise wind down. And there's nothing more irritating then having a good idea when wrapping something up only to realize you didn't have time to foreshadow it like you did the other 2 or 3 recurring consequences (TV writer woes).

Everything in the final conversation Abernathy has with Valentine has to be doing the work of two or three callbacks. Right now I've only hit the initial callbacks, and as I sketch out the ideas mentioned her in passing, which evoke certain strong emotions, then I know I need to do something with V's work involvement with Biotechnica, with some sort of clash with Jenkins, with what Valentine is like when she loses her temper. And I know that because it's what Abernathy is fixated on trying to control this breakup conversation, and also reveals what Abernathy herself is concerned about, and perhaps has been concerned about for a long time and never shown. (Or has she?)

Anyhow I love talking process, so this is the kind of skeleton script I'm going to be working backwards from. It will most certainly not survive exactly like this, but it's a good anchoring point:

<>

“If you tell anyone about anything, I’ll have you removed and handled as a double agent. You have been awful involved with Biotechnica lately.” - “I’m not going to warn you again. Do you understand?”

(dully) “You do that and they’ll know I was telling the truth.”

“It doesn’t matter what they know, it matters what they can prove.” (you know this. we've talked about this. don't be stupid.)

“I suppose next you’ll be asking me to use my new position to spy on Jenkins for you.” (petulant. bitter. a tool, you were always a tool, do you understand?)

“No. I know how you get when you’re angry.” (thinking. malicious. flippant.) “Besides, I thought you’d enjoy a chance to get your claws into him.”

(silently angry. is the implication that she’d do for him what she’d done for her? that she’s just a dangerous beast? that she knows her and her anger so well?)

“Well?”

“What do you want me to do? Beg for leniency? Make some emotional plea? You want me to ask if you ever even gave a shit about me? You want me to put on a show?” - “You wouldn’t believe a word I said anyway. Give me a cigarette.”

(hands one over, lights it. finally makes eye contact. this is real.) “Don’t look so glum. You wouldn’t have gotten half as far as you have without my help. You can cry into your bank account if you want, but it’s not like I’m kicking you out on the street.”

“Alright.” (inhale. peace. emptiness. drains her drink. drops the cigarette into abernathy’s.) “It’s done.”

<>

Re-reading this I already know I need to work in some reference to Valentine's mother and some warning/advice/celebration they have near the end of this reverse story. Something that ties back to her own failed marriage and divorce and dashed expectations. Something about finding a reason to keep going on until you can't bear to any more. Something that echoes the familial stubbornness which means Valentine in the damn things overlap will endure anything so long as she knows the expiration date.

The most fascinating part of writing these two to me is that Abernathy has this very strict rule about never admitting guilt or regret directly, but she'll say something like "I'd apologize but it's already done, isn't it?" and it's like YOU COULD STILL SAY IT! But she sees that as weakness. And Valentine picks up that same attitude here "What do you want me to do? Beg for leniency? Make some emotional plea?" They're mocking each other for the very normal human desire for acknowledgement. They're intelligence agents who think they're just making sure they're not fooling themselves (they're fooling themselves). Sincerity is only useful for pre-empting someone else trying to expose your vulnerability.

Anyway, they're operating on a certain set of fucked up toxic social rules that are in some respects even harsher than the normal corpo set. They're self-policing, because Abernathy is obsessed with gaining favor with someone who is a misogynistic homophobe, and she's playing for keeps against people who aren't reviled by this person. The idea might also come up that she doesn't NEED to be doing it to this degree, but she's warped her own idea of what she needs to do, and what kind of person she needs to be, and applied that to Valentine as well. The tragedy is that they love each other. They work well together. It's never going to work out. It didn't work out. But look at what they had, and how fucked up and funny and exciting it all was before it went to shit.

[topaz-eyes]

Ten Random Lines Meme

Nicked from @shes-a-voodoo-child

rules: pick any ten of your fics, scroll to the midpoint, pick a line (or three) and share it. then tag ten people.

tagging: not tagging anyone--meme, don't meme, it's all up to you!

Midnight At The Lost And Found (Emergency!, Johnny Gage/Roy DeSoto)

“Yeah, I do.” Johnny paused for another lathering up, then continued in a carefully controlled, matter-of-fact voice. “The second is… man, I don’t know why it’s so hard to say this, but--” Johnny’s voice faltered, but recovered, and he plunged forward. “The second thing is that I love you, Roy, like, really love you, with everything I have. My heart, my soul… and yeah okay, that includes the physical way too. I’ve always liked the men as much as I like the ladies, and I figure we’re compatible in every other way, so it was easy to, uh, extrapolate…” Johnny cleared his throat; Roy could almost see the blush rising in his cheeks, as surely as he felt his own redden.

2. Watching You, Watching Me (House MD, Gregory House/Lisa Cuddy)

"Now remember the last time."

She concentrated, and suddenly she was back to eighteen years ago: back to the days when they were Greg and Lisa instead of House and Cuddy. Back to that sultry June afternoon in House's studio apartment; the day before House was to set off for Baltimore and his fellowship at Johns Hopkins. In the small, cramped room that had no air conditioning, stacks of books piled on the desk, music scores scattered on the floor by his guitar leaning against the wall; back to what turned out to be the last time.

3. Let Be (Torchwood/House MD, Jack Harkness, James Wilson)

"Now that's a nice greatcoat! God, it's gorgeous! Where'd you get it?"

Jack looked down and brushed its wool fondly. "It's an heirloom."

"It's perfect on you. You look like you stepped out of Twelve O'Clock High."

Jack grinned. "Yeah? I know a bit about that era."

James peered at him. "Are you sure you're not Gregory Peck? 'Cause you sorta look like him."

He stared at James' well-manicured hand, sobering slightly as he thought of the Captain reaching for his own. "I'm positive."

4. Home For Christmas (House MD, Gregory House, James Wilson, Blythe House)

"Don't cause a scene, House. Open it," Wilson hissed in House's ear.

"No."

Wilson glanced at Blythe, whose gaze darted everywhere across the room except where her son sat.

"If you won't do it for yourself, at least do it for your mother." He plucked the envelope off House's lap and pushed it against his hand.

5. Downpour (Lie To Me, Cal Lightman/Gillian Foster)

Soon enough the air temperature decides to drop and the breeze picks up. "Finally," Gillian sighs a few minutes later, when the first drops of water patter onto the gravel of the rooftop. She raises her face skyward in relief.

The rain steps up quickly, from sprinkle to steady. The next thing she knows, Cal's stepped up close too, his hand splayed on her waist; his breath is hot in her ear.

"Ever shagged in the rain, Foster?"

6. Stranger Cures (Strike Back, Thomas "Mac" McAllister/Samuel Wyatt)

Wyatt heard a soft, almost resigned exhale from Mac’s bed. Maybe he should just bunk down in the main room the rest of the night. But after a moment, he heard the cot springs squeak as Mac rose, followed by two creaks of wood as he crossed the floor. His mattress dipped on the edge as Mac sat beside him.

Mac laid a warm, broad hand on Wyatt’s shoulder. “Will you trust me?” Mac said.

Wyatt drew in a quick, deep breath against an oncoming spasm and held it in, but it didn’t succeed, and he expelled it in frustration. “I just want this to stop, man,” he said, not bothering to hide his exhaustion now. “I don’t care how anymore.”

7. One Safe Place (X Company, Tom Cummings/Neil Mackay)

“Shove off,” Neil murmurs, not unkindly. Tom mumbles something incoherent and hooks his leg across him too.

“Fantastic,” Neil says, and rolls his eyes, but he doesn't have the heart to push Tom away. That's decided then, he's obviously not moving anytime soon. (And again, being honest, he really doesn't mind.) He settles back down, adjusting just a bit to rest his cheek on Tom's forehead to help keep the heat in (or so he tells himself). Lulled by the warmth in the shared sleeping bag, the rhythm of the rain, and the easy weight of Tom resting against him, Neil's eyelids droop, and he begins to drift.

8. Reunion (24, Jack Bauer/Tony Almeida)

Jack lived on his senses. He trusted his instincts. He knew Tony Almeida more than anyone alive, knew him down to his touch and taste and smell. But the stench of Tony's current anger and bitterness in the FBI office had overwhelmed any hint of him that Jack had filed away. He'd seen Tony frustrated and despondent, but this--

It was obvious that Bill Buchanan trusted this man implicitly, to the point of Deep Sky. But Bill too had been misled before, had placed his trust in the wrong person; hell, they all had. Double, even triple agents weren't unheard of: appearances could be surgically altered, voices re-trained, operatives conditioned. Jack had made enough mistakes today already; he couldn't afford to make another.

He had to know.

9. On The Shoulder Of Orion (Elementary, Joan Watson and Sherlock Holmes)

She looked up from the eyepiece to find Sherlock rocking back and forth on his heels, a pleased expression on his normally dour face. Joan smiled softly at him. “You’ve picked up a lot of incredibly detailed information in a very short time,” she noted.

“I promised Arthur I would assist him with his astronomy project on the evolution of stars,” Sherlock admitted, rather abashed; and he cleared his throat, looking away towards the horizon. “I believe the history of Betelgeuse makes a most excellent illustration of the concept.”

10. A Kinder Fate (Doctor Who 2005, Eleventh Doctor, Amy Pond, Sister-of-Mine)

"Lucy."

Once a year, every year, that had been the arrangement; but after the first year he'd forgotten and hadn't visited her since. He rushed to the mirror that hung across from the entrance to the library. He straightened his bow tie though it didn't need it, and waited.

And soon enough there she was, peeking from a crack in the door, the alien who usurped Lucy Cartwright and wore her face. "Hello, Sister-of-Mine," he greeted.

Lucy hung back by the door, her brow furrowed; gripping her balloon string tight, she shook her head.

"Yes, it's me," the Doctor said. "I've changed my appearance from the last time you saw me, but I'm still the Doctor." Still your jailer, he thought, wincing again.

[swtki]

Nothing - C. D

Pairing: Cedric Diggory x fem! Reader

Summary: Fears arise when Y/N wants to tell Cedric how many people she’s been with.

Warnings: mentions of sex, angst, swearing, not virgin reader.

A/N: yes this is based off of my feelings and Y/N is me but also this ones for my high body count bitches <3 ur sexy luv u xx.

He was perfect, absolutely flawless. The Golden Boy of Hogwarts stood tall and lean in his quiditch uniform, talking to some mates. I watched from the stone archway as I didn’t want to interrupt the conversation, not that he would have minded much. Cedric was always happy to see me, he loved dropping everything if it meant I was beside him.

His conversation ended once he spotted me and his face lit up in a smile. He did a small jog over to my place on the stone pillar, he immediately pulled me into a warm hug; which despite it being September and warm outside, I accepted with open arms. The scent of his cologne filled my head, replacing the world around me.

“Hey,” he lifted his head and kissed the top of mine, “I feel like I haven’t seen you in months.”. I smiled, he was in love with me and we both knew it.

“You just saw me like two hours ago.” I laugh and pull away. Six months of seeing each other and our relationship was exciting and we longed to see each other constantly. As we walked, our hands linked together, it was natural for us.

“You know,” Cedric said as we tossed our books onto the plush grass, “Christmas break is coming up.”

“Yeah, I guess it is.” I reply, shrugging my shoulders. “You’ll go home, I stay here as per usual?”

“Actually, I’ve convinced my Dad to go visit some relatives in America, so I’ll be here.” He noticed my confused expression. “I just want to spend this year with you, since you never go home and your owl isn’t the best at flying to a location.” I laughed, he wqs right; my owl was a poor bastard.

“I see...are you sure you won’t miss home? Theres not going to be anyone here - I mean except the handfull of other Hufflepuffs that stay. Its awfully boring.” I watched his face soften, leaning in closer to me.

“Thats exactly why I wan’t to stay.” The air outside was cold, but his warm body made it bearable. “You’ve never spent the night with me - sleeping in my bed, I mean. I dunno, just kind of thought you might like a sleep over in the prefects dorm.”.

“Oh.” I looked back down at my feet, avoiding his eyes. He was right, we’d never been in the others room, never mind going to sleep in it. I knew he would never expect me to have sex with him, he genuinely just wanted to see me - to hold me for just one night.

“I know we haven’t ever...y’know, so I of course don’t think this is my lucky chance or anything. Although, if it were I would love it - because you know it would be my first time-“ he quickly shut up when he realized I had gone stiff. There it was, the truth that he could tell me and I couldn’t tell him; He was a virgin, I was far from it.

“I need to um...I need to think about it. Okay, Ced? Don’t think you’ve said anything wrong, I’m just afraid that I might.” Kissing him on the cheek, I stood and walked towards the library. “Fuck.” slithered out of my mouth as I made my harsh steps.

The library was dim, candlelight and sounds of quills filling it. I spotted my closest friend, Mae, and thumped myself down into the wooden chair next to her.

“If you’ve come to arrange Hogsmeade plans I’m afraid Professor-“

“Cedric’s a virgin.” I said quietly, she relaxed and looked sympathetically at me.

“Haven’t we known that?”

“Well...yes, but he confirmed it. He wants me to spend the night with him.”

“And you don’t want to?” there was a hint of amusement in her voice.

“No!” I whispered, “Of course I do. Everytime I see him in that quidditch jersey I wanna give him a proper shag.”

“He is absolutley fit, who wouldn’t?” I glared at her. “So, whats the problem then?”

I huffed and rolled my eyes to the back of my head. “I haven’t told him how many I’ve had. He thinks I’m as pure as can be.” Maes face fell along side my own.

“Honestly, Y/N? Cedric loves you so I don’t think it will be too much of an issue, if it is then he’s not worth it. Besides its not like over three, yeah?” I quickly lost eye contact with her. “Oh.”

“Over five, to be honest.” I shamefully admit.

“Listen, whatever number it is won’t matter to him. He cares about you, not how many lads you’ve shagged.” Mae stood and collected her belongings, “I’ve gotta run, I’ll see you at dinner in a few.” We waved goodbye to each other.

The next Saturday soon approached, and most of the young witches and wizards departed in its place. Mae had gone home for the holidays, offering me her long distanced support for the talk I needed to have with Cedric. I desperately wanted to avoid it, telling him could ruin everything I’d come to love.

I softly knocked on the smooth wooden door, listening to the shuffle behind it. Cedric opened it and ushered me in, taking my jacket off as soon as I was. His room was warm, rather small yet clean as could be. It could only fit his twin bed, a dresser, and a desk, all the necessities.

“Would you like to borrow one of my sweaters? I don’t want you to be cold or anything?” He said nervously.

“Oh, I’m alright, this is one of your sweaters actually” I pulled at the hem of my top, we both gave a soft laugh. “Its sort of strange,” I looked around the space, “being in your room, I mean. Nice, welcome of course, yet its still a strange feeling.”

“Theres not much option for seating, so I’ll let you have your choice.” I smiled and studied the chair, it was old and wooden.

“I’ll take the bed, I suppose.” I sat down on top of the yellowish orange quilt and he made himself comfortable on the chair. “Cedric, I need to talk to you about something.” His smile turned to a worried expression. “Do you want to be physical with me? I of course want you more than anything, but I know you’re a virgin so I want to wait for you to be ready. I want you to trust me, and I don’t know. If you don’t want to be intimate yet then we can leave this discussion til then, its not pressing.” I looked down at the floor, feeling the bed dip next to me as he sat. He took my hand into his, tilting his head down so he could look me in the eye.

“Y/N, of course I do. Nothing you tell me is going to change how much I love you, nothing. Please, don’t feel like you must hide yourself from me.” His eyes were gentle, his voice smooth as honey.

“I’m not exactly first in line for the chastity competition, well - actually, I’m probably not even tenth. Its not in the hundreds or anything like that, but there are a number of lads who have seen me in compromising positions. I don’t have anything, but if you want to hold off on being intimate I completely understand.” He brought his hand to my cheek, bringing my face to look at his. He kissed me gently and squeezed my left hand.

“Like I said, nothing is going to change how much I love you. I don’t care if its three or three million, you know it will never be the same with them as it will be with me, because I love you, and you’re the woman I’ve been waiting to give my virginity to.” he wrapped his warm arms around me, pulling me into his chest. “I love you, Y/N”

“I love you. Would it be a bad time to ask if you have a johnny tonight, just for future reference of course.” we both smiled, the room being filled with a mixture of love and warmth.

taglist:

@annasdani @rosemallow10 @dystals @mellifluous-cosmos @wizardwheezes @endlessymphony @mullthingsoverinthehotwater

[junicai]

shivers.

| order no. | 2/21

| summary | Aria suffers the consequences of her own actions when she takes it upon herself to continue filming when sick.

| word count | 1.4k

| warnings | none

| era | circa. February 2020

Music videos are an extension of the song they portray. They are designed to emphasize and carry out any underlying messages that the songwriters have embedded in the lyrics - to give them more meaning, and to make them easier to spot and understand.

Rain rooms were a common enough feature in shooting a music video; especially with the rising popularity of heartbroken ballads in the western media. These songs were typically sung by crooning women, clad scantily in sheer white fabric that clung to their figures wetly, drenched by the water that rained from the ceiling above.

Aria was no such exception.

The thin, flimsy material of the cotton dress she’d been given to wear for this shot was going to provide her little to no barrier against the frigid water that was going to be pouring down her back in a little over three minutes.

With a final pat of a large blush brush dusting over the apples of her cheeks, she was set free from the make-up chair and ushered towards the set. A singular table was set against a grey backdrop, the ceiling dry for the time being.

With her hair roots suitably shook up for volume by a stylist's nimble fingers, Aria made her way to sprawl herself as daintily as she could over the fake wood while still trying to retain a modicum of her own decency.

With her head flung back, and her eyes closed, a shutter sounded, and the skies opened.

In reality, it couldn't have been more than a couple of seconds, nothing more than to just get her used to the feeling, but Aria resurfaced gasping, sitting back up with eyes squinted closed as she had to refrain herself from wiping the water away - less she rub the mascara into her skin.

"God that felt like I was being waterboarded."

Her comment sent a wave of laughter around the room, giggles coming from the corner where the cameras were set up.

A small tremor ran down her spine, but Aria hid it quickly with a cough and a shift in her sitting position. Her now wet dress stuck uncomfortably to her legs, and she grimaced at the cool feel on her skin.

"Ok! Let's run it again." The director's call came from the opposite side of the room, where she was stood behind a monitor, watching carefully.

Aria nodded dutifully, and moved back to her sprawled position again; this time taking more care to not lie in such a way that left her face overly exposed to the downpour.

They took the clip, six, maybe seven times.

The first few were stopped midway due to positioning changes, and the next one because she coughed lightly after choking on the water when it ran into her mouth by accident.

By the time filming came to a close, Aria was cold, and wet, and miserable. She had started shaking profusely the second she'd slid herself off the table, bare feet meeting the tiled flooring and toes curling at the biting feeling.

Her lips had taken on a blue tinge beneath the red rouge that had rubbed off over the duration of the last hour, and her fingertips mirrored that colour as they moved frantically up and down her biceps to try and put some heat back into her frigid skin.

Aria was still quivering lightly in the oversized jacket when she stepped out of the van and back into the dorms, toeing off her shoes at the entrance before immediately making her way into the kitchen.

A warm cup of tea to cradle between her icy fingertips sounded perfect, exactly what she needed. But unfortunately, her plans were thwarted by a rather tall man leaning against the counter top.

Johnny took one look at Aria's now almost purple lips, and raised an eyebrow.

"So do we need to go find someone who's been wearing blue lipstick? Or is that just the latest trend that I've missed?" He teased, pushing himself to wrap Aria in a hug.

She sank willingly into his embrace, curling up against his chest in an attempt to chase the warmth that he offered. "N-no, I'm just. C-cold. That's all."

Johnny tilted his head down to look at Aria without pushing her away. "You feel like a little icicle."

"M'cold." She whined, increasing in pitch when Johnny stepped away from her. "No! Come b-back you're warm."

He chuckled at her when she pulled the collar of her jacket up to her nose to retain the whisper of body heat that he'd given her. "Two seconds, Ari. I'm just going to get Tae."

Aria's head snapped up. "Why?"

"Because we've had conversations about not speaking up when you're uncomfortable during filming before, but apparently we're going to need to have another one. And, he can make better tea than I can."

Aria winced. "C-can it not, not wait? Til, t-tomorrow maybe?"

Johnny's eyes softened when he looked at her small form. She'd pulled the hood over her ears to hide her still damp hair prior to entering the dorm, but the small beads of moisture on her forehead were telling of a growing fever that came inevitably from being doused in freezing water for an hour.

"I'll see what I can do, kiddo. No promises though."

With that, he disappeared into the hallway, and Aria wandered her way into the living room where she plopped herself onto the couch and tugged a cushion into her lap to cuddle.

Stupid body getting cold and getting her in trouble. Stupid. Should have just warmed her up again. Stupid homoeostasis, or whatever it was. It was stupid.

A hand landed on her shoulder, stroking softly. "Hey, ice baby."

Aria tilted her head back towards Yuta's gently smiling face. "M'cold." She repeated, scooching over on the couch to make room for the man to sit down.

Yuta opened his arms in invitation, and Aria went willingly, burrowing herself in his chest. She sighed lightly at the warm comfort that his hoodie material offered, and pressed her cheek against his arm.

A clink of a mug alerted to Aria that there was someone - no, two people - in the kitchen, and soon after, Taeyong emerged with a steaming mug of tea in his hands with Jaehyun trailing after him, arms laden with blankets.

"T-thank y-you," Aria's teeth were chattering at this point, and Taeyong looked on in worry. A back of a hand was placed to her forehead, and he winced.

"Hyuck, would you mind grabbing the red pill bottle from the cabinet under the sink? The one that's full, Doyoung restocked it a couple days ago."

Donghyuck moved back into the hallway with an affirmative, and Aria looked up to Taeyong. "I don't, m'not sick. Just c-cold. I'll be f-fine."

Mark slid into the open space on the other side of Aria, placing a hand on her leg. "Love you, and everything. But shut up."

He received a thin glare from Yuta for his words. "She's sick, don't be rude."

"I said I loved her!"

"And then you told her to shut up!"

"M'not sick."

Taeil emerged from the doorway waving his hands with Donghyuck following quickly behind him. "I have medication for the invalid?"

"M'not sick!"

Yuta hushed her, tucking her head back into his chest. "We know, baby. You're not sick. But you're going to drink your tea and take a fever reducer and then go to bed okay?"

"But-"

"You can sleep in my room!" Jungwoo chirped up from the oppisite couch. Honestly, Aria didn't know when he had arrived, didn't know when half of the people in the room had arrived, but all of a sudden, she was surrounded by all the members of 127.

Aria shrunk back slightly with all of their eyes on her.

"M'not sick." Her voice was weak; a final hurrah.

"Here." Doyoung handed her the mug of tea that had cooled slightly. "Drink your tea."

[cherryfi]

Cat and Mouse (M)

Plot: Meeting Johnny had been an accident but the night you’d spent with him wasn’t. Now that he’s had a taste of you there was no way he was going to let you go.

A/N: @lovejohnnvsuh​ gave me this idea. It’s not very good but please be kind :D.

Warnings!: Unprotected sex, a little angst I guess, that bisexual agenda (if you squint). Mafia Au so mentions of violence.

Requests are open!!

This is my fav gif of him , my god!

Word count: 3463

The mission had been pretty simple you were just to take out one target and walk away like nothing had happened it should have ended well but, you hadn’t counted on Eunwoo being as smart as he was psychotic.

Neo zone was an upmarket bar owned by NCT, in the centre of the city. Anybody who was anybody hung out there and that was meant to be where you’d end your target’s short, crime-filled life.

It had been a summer night, the air still warmed by the setting sun but not as heavily as it had been during the day. The cool air carrying the promise of an eventful night.

The feeling of smooth satin rubbed against your body as you walked through the club confidently. The thrum of heavy noise music mixing perfectly with the swaying bodies on the dance floor, you fell into step with them perfectly aware of the eyes watching you; smirking when you caught your target’s eye.  Not noticing the other eyes that watched you dance with beautiful stranger on the dance floor. She smiled at you in invitation and if you hadn’t been on a mission maybe you would have let yourself be swept up by those full, pretty lips and even prettier eyes but you were working.

“I’m sorry honey but, I just came to dance.” You locked eyes with Eunwoo again, running your hands up your thighs and when he invited you over with a swipe of his hand, you were happy to oblige.

Sitting next to Eunwoo, you spent the night pretending that you were completely enthralled with his conversation, hanging off the edge of his every word. Laughing as convincingly as you could at his dry jokes while you rubbed his arm and eventually the more time that you spent with him, the more comfortable he got. His hand wandered to your thigh as you leaned into him.

“We should go somewhere more private, don’t you think.” You tried for sultry, hoping that you convinced him you were falling for him.

But really, he was falling into your trap. All you needed to do was just to convince him that it was a good time for the two of you to be alone, you’d take him somewhere away from the club and it would be a done deal.

You’d make it look like heart failure and no one would look into.

Given that you weren’t able to kill him in the club. Especially because Neo Zone was of course owned by NCT and everyone was subject to a search as soon as they entered, you had to pack something small. So a dermally absorbed poison disguised as a lipstick, would have to do.

All you need to do was rub it on the side of his neck and he would be dead within 5 minutes. He’d slip away peacefully not really knowing that he was dying and when they found him any autopsy would say that he had had a heart attack. Which of course would be a little suspicious given the fact that he was 23 years old and in prime health but because of his position within the organised crime community there was no way that anyone would really take any special look into his death because that would place them down a rabbit hole, exposing a lot of people along the way.

That was how the plan should have gone, but it didn’t.

As you leaned forward suggesting to him that maybe it was time for you to find somewhere private to go, you felt the cold and recognisable, fear inducing touch of the barrel of a gun against the back of your neck and in the same whispered tone that you’d spoken to him in…

“I know exactly who you are, and I know what you do. It’s over, Y/N.” On the outside you’d kept your cool but, inside the feeling of dread gripped you, sending adrenaline surging through your veins, while keeping you frozen. He laughed mirthlessly as he leaned back into the plush leather of the VIP couch.

Fate really was a cruel mistress; or maybe it was karma for all the people you’d killed.

You were one of the corporation’s top assassins and had been sent in on difficult operations.

Your best tactic was seduction.

You should have been able to complete your mission. But unbeknownst to you, you’d garnered a name for yourself in the mafia community and some of its top members had been waiting for you – you’d been compromised.

Just as you were being ushered to get up, you were surrounded by new men, some you recognised, others you didn’t but, you knew that they must have all belonged to NCT.

“We’ll be having none of that in my club Eunwoo, Neo zone is neutral territory, even for her, put the gun down before I have to make you. Miss Y/N, you and I need to talk.” Johnny stood at the helm, his height and dominant presence just begging anyone to oppose him.

He’d effectively saved your life but, you’d broken the rules and now it seemed that you were in trouble.

Neo Zone was neutral territory. Everyone knew that, including the Corp.

Regardless of what was happening, no blood could be spilled in an establishment owned by NCT.

They were the kings of the city and nobody wanted to invoke the wrath of their head ‘Lee Taeyong’, not even a group as powerful as the Corporation.

The Corp had largely stayed away from NCT as they hadn’t done anything to upset the heads at the top and NCT had stayed away too (providing the Corp an illusion of power that everyone knew they didn’t really have).

The rumours had been that Taeyong had dirt on everyone in the Corporation and with all the support of the top gangs in the city, could cause a mess if the corporation chose to ‘step out of line’.

But this wasn’t about the precarious relationship between the Corp and NCT, this was about Johnny Seo, the man who currently had you by the arm and was taking you to an awaiting car.

Seo Yongho or Johnny, as he was better known, was the second in command to Lee Taeyong and they matched perfectly. Where Taeyong tended to be introverted and cold, Johnny was open and warm making him the perfect host for a neutral and welcoming club like this.

“Get in, Y/N.” The whisper of his deep voice next to your ear, drove a chill down your spine. You hadn’t expected him to be so close and his imposing aura had become dominant and seductive.

You looked at your reflections in the car’s tinted window and it was clear from the way that he was looking at you what his intentions were.

You weren’t about to become some King pin’s maitresse  en titre.

“Look, thanks for back there but, I wasn’t about to do anything on NCT property. I know the rules and I know that the Corp isn’t immune. I’ve got work to do so; I’ll just be heading back.” But Johnny just chuckled as a man that you didn’t recognise opened the car’s back door, his copper skin seeming to shine even in the dimly lit night.

“Don’t you think you should thank me for saving your life? Get in the car Y/N.”

And thank him you did with the silent acknowledgement that this would be a one-time thing.

You were allowed to enjoy yourself from time to time, right?

You’d found yourself in his bed wrapped up in his soft cotton sheets where you’d thanked him again and again for his… kindness.

The way he’d held you, the way he’d said your name, hell, just the way he’d looked at you had bought on a feeling that you’d not felt for anyone and you knew you had to get away.

It was dangerous, how intoxicating he was and it was clear from the moment that you’d stepped into his car, that you’d never have enough of Johnny Seo and there was no way that he was going to let you. That was made even more clear at the end of the night when he’d whispered, “You’re mine.” Against your skin, his arms wrapped tightly around you.

But by daylight you were gone.

Thus, entering you into the game of cat and mouse.

Your company had put you on leave, understanding that you had been compromised and could no longer be in the field undisguised (and eventuality that you’d all planned for) but, you hadn’t planned on being chased by a very powerful man.

NCT (and therefore Johnny) were so powerful and so well connected that the Corporation refused to get involved, the thinly kept truce between the 2 groups on the line.  They did even give you a safe house to hide in but had instead given you the funds to keep running.    

You’d been running for 6 months and it was beginning to get tiring. Constantly teetering on the edge of paranoia, always looking over your shoulder, you were mentally drained.

With Johnny always one step behind you, you’d been unable to stay in one place for more than 2 nights without catching sight of him and you were running out of places to hide.

You would soon be trapped.

In a rare moment of good fortune, you’d been able to send him in the wrong direction, buying yourself some time to recoup before you’d be on the run again and you’d used that time to book yourself into a beautiful hotel.

The Lotus was a 5- star top of the market hotel, prized for its extravagant rooms and exceptional customer service. They had some of the best spa facilities in the world.

So, you’d booked yourself suite 448, a room with a beautiful view of the city and a full spa day with all the trimmings.

Taking off your hotel robe, you hung it behind the changing screen and made your way to the massage table. The smell of Jasmine wafted in the air, calming you as you rolled your shoulders and lay down on your stomach, covering your lower half with a towel.

As instructed, you pressed a button on the massage table, letting your masseuse know that you were ready and soon enough you heard the light padding of someone entering the room.

They said nothing as they began to pour warm massage oil onto your back and it should have sent alarm bells ringing but, you were too tired to care; sighing in bliss as you felt strong, warm hands working the knots out of your muscles.

The strong grip, however soon became painful as the (obviously) male hands started to push down onto your shoulders and when you felt them wrap around your neck, you jerked up; ready to throw yourself at whoever this psycho was.

You froze when your eyes met Johnny’s stern gaze.

“Caught you.” You scurried up the table, looking between him and the door but, you knew you didn’t stand a chance.

And as if reading your mind, Johnny grabbed your ankles pulling you down the table and into him.

He stood between your naked thighs, his hands underneath them, keeping you trapped.

“I’ll make sure that you can’t run from me again. Let’s use up all that energy, yeah?” The softness of his voice did little to mask the dominance of his words and you shuddered.

There was no way that he’d ever let you go.

“Do you want me Y/N? I know you do but, I need to hear you say it. I need you to hear yourself tell me how much you want me.” You felt brush of his eyelashes as he kissed along your jaw and down your neck. Lifting you off the table, he placed you to stand in front of him.

He hungrily drank in the sight of you, your nakedness on full display and you drew in a shaky breath, the heady smell of jasmine becoming intoxicating as it mixed and danced with the smell of his cologne.  You desperately wanted to hide.

The tension in the air grew thick as he watched you expectantly.

“Let’s cut this game short. We both know what we want so just say it. I’ll give you everything you’ve ever wanted; just say the word.” Even before you could muster up the courage to give into what you wanted, needed even, he’d already known that you would.

Johnny held your gaze, his eyes full of lust as he took off his clothes. His gaze becoming playful and smug when your eyes traced his movements.

“I want you.” And if it wasn’t clear enough, you grabbed his hands, stopping him as he made to undo his belt, instead undoing it for him.

Now on your knees, you were face to face (dick) with his member, gasping in surprise because of his lack of underwear. He only smirked down at you.

You gripped him gently, biting your lip as you began to stroke him; humming as he hissed in pleasure.

“How did you find me?” You kissed his tip, literally pumping him for answers, and took a tentative lick, making him buck his hips slightly.

“Does it matter?” You supposed it didn’t but, you wanted to know so that you’d make sure that he’d never find you again. You shrugged it off for the time being.

Johnny didn’t know it, but this would be the last time he saw you; you’d be in the wind again before he knew it.

“No.” You took him in whole, bobbing your head slowly, letting his deep groans egg you on.

You wanted to give into him, a man you barely knew, and that was dangerous. Assassins like you weren’t supposed to be taken with flights of fancy.

You let your thoughts go, fully enjoying the sensation of his hands your hair while you worked him to a frenzy. You moaned around him, increasing your speed when his grip got tighter, losing yourself in the burn of having your hair pulled.

You snapped back to reality when he pulled your head back and guided you to stand up and pulling you against his body, his lips stealing your breath away.

When he broke away from the kiss, his lips were swollen, his breathing heavy.

“As pretty as you look on your knees baby, that’s not how I want you.” He smiled sweetly and kissed your knuckles, helping you back onto the table.

“You’re so beautiful baby, I missed this view.” Johnny placed opened mouth kisses down your body and along your waist, your breath catching as he avoided the very place that you needed him.

He chuckled lightly at your exasperated huff as he kissed your inner thighs; gasping when he bit down, causing you to loosen your grip on the table, falling back onto the table.

“Y/N look at me.” You raised your head. Your vision hazy with need, you met the steely and determined gaze that you’d seen over 6 months before when you’d first met him.

“I’m going to devour you.” You wanted to curl up and hide from that gaze, but he wouldn’t let you. His grip on your thigh tightened as he opened your legs.

Your eyes rolled back into your head and you fell back again as he kissed your clit. His tongue worked you open, causing you to cry out and grip the sheets in your hands.

You were losing your mind, slipping closer and closer to the edge as he worked his tongue inside of you.

You cried out your hand flying to his hair and gripping him hard as he moaned against your clit, your thighs squeezing around his face.

Johnny’s left hand gripped your thigh as he sent to you to a fever pitch with the middle finger of his right hand; increasing in speed when you started announcing your orgasm.

He worked to your edge and then pushed you over it, your body going stiff and then lax as your orgasm washed over you, crying out with abandon.

He kept going even as you began to push his head away, the oversensitivity make you curl up.

“Johnny, stop. S’toomuch…” Your voice coming out garbled, you couldn’t find it in yourself to feel shame at how loud been, especially when Johnny stood up – his big body looming over you.

“It’s too much? It can’t be. I’m not done with you yet.” When he had that look in your eye, who were you to tell him no? You gasped into his fervent kiss as he entered you, wrapping your legs around his hips when he’d fully entered you.

Johnny was not a small man and you were reminded of that with ever inch inside of you but, you loved it.

Especially when he started rocking his hips.

He set a brutal pace, slamming against you in ways that made you sure you would bruise. His head resting in the crook of your neck, you felt more than heard every groan as he pounded into you.

He sunk his teeth into the juncture between your neck and shoulder, increasing in speed and causing you hiss, the pain quickly leaving you as he licked the sensitive spot, your head falling back.

You stiffened up, your hands gripping onto his shoulders as he rubbed your clit, his fingers matching the pace of his thrusts, his eyes never leaving your face.

“You gonna cum for me again, sweetheart? Let me know how good I make you feel.” Forehead pressed against your own, he held your gaze, his dark eyes daring you to tell him that you didn’t feel good.

The only responses you good muster up were garbled version of his name mixed with curse words eyes squeezing shut as you came again. Your vision turned white as you cried out, letting go and falling back onto the massage table – thoroughly exhausted.

Johnny came inside of you soon after, chanting your name like a mantra.

The joint comedown from your high was sobering as the gravity of what had gone on hit you.

Johnny held you gently, kissing along your jaw and eventually kissing your lips deeply. He helped you off the table and to a couch in the room; bringing you to sit on his lap.

“Won’t you be with me Y/N?” You laid your head on his shoulder trying to catch your breath and struggling to find reasons why it would be a bad idea to fall in love with him.

“You’d be happy with me; we both know it.” You wanted to believe him; you really did. But people like you, assassins, didn’t have happy endings.

“Would I?” You needed to get out of here.

“Yeah, I’d make you so happy. I know we don’t know each other deeply but, don’t tell me you don’t feel something.” He was pleading with you but, this was your chance. You climbed of his lap, wobbly on your feet, feigning exasperation and putting space between you.

You grabbed your robe, slipping it over your shoulders and tying it around your body. “It’s not that easy and you know it. There’s no happy ending here when I know that you’re just going to use me for sex.” Was that hurt you saw flash through his eyes?

It didn’t matter.

You needed this over and down with and just like you’d expected, Johnny bolted up from his seat, wrapping his arms around your waist to stop you from running. You wrapped your arms neck, hugging him tightly before you slipped the syringe out of your sleeve and injecting hm in the neck.

Johnny gasped, pushing you away and falling back into the couch, a wounded look on his face.

“What did you hit me with?” His words already slurring, he put his hand to his neck.

“It’s a sedative, you’ll be out for an hour or so. This can’t work Johnny. You know that, you have to know that. I’m so sorry but, I need you to let this go.”

“Why?” Honestly though why? You could genuinely see yourself being happy with him, there was no real reason to stop you other than fear. You wished you could give him a legitimate answer but, there was none.

Johnny soon passed out, the cross look on his face smoothing as he lost consciousness and you called it in, asking for the clean-up crew to tie up the loose ends; making sure to tell them not to hurt him.

They’d placed him in your hotel room to sleep the sedative off, while you disappeared, just as you’d planned.

Johnny woke up in suite 448, alone.

[cg29]

Fanfic Author asks:

For Avalanche: 4 & 11

Thank you so much for the questions 😊

4: Favourite Dialogue?

Definitely the conversation between Alan & Grandma during chapter 12. I feel that I captured a very young Alan’s thoughts and feelings well, plus the conversation between them had me blubbering when I was writing it. *Sharing the full chapter below*

11: What do I like about this fic?

I’m really glad you asked this question for this particular fic because the newest chapter has been annoying me (Meant to be focused on Virgil but he was being uncooperative. I’ve stepped away from it for the last couple of weeks to give myself a break and see if it helps) focussing on the positives instead helps me to realise why I do enjoy writing this one. So, reasons: I’ve really enjoyed the prompt challenge of repeating the first and final sentence but with different feelings attached - I feel it’s helped my writing get a lot better. Also adore writing little Tracy’s (even in sad situations) Also a big positive for this fic is it’s one of the rare ones that I actually know how it will finish - just need to get to that point first!

... ...

Chapter 12 - Alan. (Full fic available on AO3 & FFNet - CreativeGirl29)

“Night, night mamma.”

“Goodnight my darling.”

“Love you.”

“And I love you too pumpkin,” she replied giving him an extra big cuddle before placing a soft kiss on his head, “I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Mamma wait…” Alan pulled himself up and looked to where his mom had just been, but she had disappeared… Maybe he had been dreaming. After all, he wasn’t in his usual cosy bed with racing car covers, instead he was in a large chair with Gordon fast asleep next to him. Although, even if it had been a dream, usually when he called for her, she would be there as soon as possible to help comfort him… “Mamma?” He waited, but she did not come… Why wasn’t she coming?

Then he remembered, his mamma hadn’t been with them for a while now, ever since that scary day when the snow had tumbled down the hillside. Thankfully, both he and Gordon had been with their dad and he had protected them, then a little bit later they were in a big tent with Scott and John who had both given him a hug. Yet, what he had really wanted was his mamma to cuddle him better, and then for an extra squeeze from Virgie because he would always give the biggest, strongest hugs. Except neither of them had been there. Johnny had explained that they had got trapped under the snow and that some people were helping his dad to find them. Later they had gone outside when they heard cheering and he had cheered with his big brothers when he saw Virgil lying in his daddy’s arms, but there was still no sign of his mom.

Where was she? Why did she not come out to help comfort Virgil who looked really cold? Or to make him and Gordon feel better? And why were his two biggest brothers crying?

Later they had gone to a warm room, Virgil had been placed in a bed with lots of wires attached to him that made beeping noises, and still there was no sign of his mamma. He had asked his dad, but he had grown quiet and hadn’t answered. He had then asked John and Scott because they knew everything, and they explained that their mom had to go away because she was busy working as an Angel. Which made sense because his mommy was definitely magical. Although even if she were an Angel, then she could still come and comfort him? He didn’t want to ask his biggest brothers again because they had been upset by the question, his daddy was too quiet and had barely spoken to them, and he couldn’t ask Virgil because he was still asleep after getting very cold and sick. So, he decided to wait for his grandma to arrive, because she was really old… Probably one of the oldest grandmas in the world… Surely, she would know the answer to all of his questions? Unfortunately, he still hadn’t had a chance because his dad and grandma had been talking. Yet now his dad wasn’t in the room and… He allowed his eyes to adjust to the lack of lighting… Scott and John were asleep in their chairs, Gordon was still asleep in the one he was sharing with him, and his grandma was sitting, with her eyes closed, in a chair next to Virgil’s bed. Now was the perfect time.

So, carefully and quietly he climbed down from his chair, toddled over to his grandmas’ side, then tapped her on her knee before holding his little arms out towards her.

She yawned, opened her eyes, and smiled when they met his. “Hello sweetie, do you want a cuddle?”

He nodded his head.

“Better?” She questioned, after picking him up placing him on her lap and giving him a tight squeeze.

He nodded, then looked up into her blue eyes thoughtfully.

“What is it?”

“Where’s mamma?”

Sally’s eyes widened, even though she had been expecting this question. His other brothers had said they had tried to explain but knew he hadn’t understood and unfortunately Jeff was currently in no fit state to explain anything right now. “You understand that she was trapped with Virgil?”

Alan nodded.

“Well, your brother was found but he was cold and now he’s here to make him feel better.”

“So, mamma is in another room getting better from the cold?”

“No darling, your mother, she… She got to cold and because of that she’s had to go away.”

“To do her Angel work?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“When is she coming back?”

“She can’t come back darling?”

Alan grew tearful. “But I want her back.”

“I know darling, but she can’t because she’s doing important work… She’s helping others.”

“But I want to see her.”

She thought for a moment, then stood, carrying Alan with her over to the window before placing him on a hard chair that helped him to look out onto the dark sky… “Can you see the stars?”

“Yes, they’re pretty. Me and Johnny look at them all the time.”

“Well, that’s where she is.”

“In the sky?”

“Yes, if you look to the stars… Your mamma is one of them, and she is shining brightly and will always be watching over you.”

With eyes wide, Alan gazed up at the stars. It made sense that was where his mamma had gone. When he had been really tiny he had looked up at the bright, magical stars and wondered how they managed not to fall. Gordon had said that one day they would fall on him, but his mamma had told his brother off for scaring him. She had then explained they wouldn’t fall because they were helping to watch over him. “She is watching me?”

“Yes, sweetheart she is.”

“Which one is she?”

“That one,” John said, now wide awake and joining them both with Scott and Gordon, “definitely that one, what do you reckon Alan?”

“Yes,” Alan replied with a nod, leaning forwards so his hands were placed on the glass, his eyes not leaving the twinkling star, “night, night mamma.”

[thebluelemontree]

On this note: “ Another way of saying Littlefinger didn’t bet on Sandor is that he didn’t account for him.” I know people say that Varys was behind the bread riot, but there’s some speculation around that it was actually LF and Mandon Moore was one of his men. Moore abandons Sansa in the riots and I think that was staged. LF didn’t account for Sandor saving her. What he planned on doing to her - maybe an escape? IDK.

People say a lot of things in this fandom, let’s put it that way.  We see in no POV’s account that there is any evidence of attempted kidnapping on Sansa during the riot, let alone a whole conspiracy to commit kidnapping that was thwarted.  Let’s remember, Tyrek Lannister was the one that got snatched here (allegedly, technically he’s only known to be missing).  If anyone was specifically targetted, it was him.

The bread riot was always a powder keg waiting to explode.  No one person orchestrated it.  The Tyrells had cut off food supplies from the Reach when they stood with Renly against Stannis and Joffrey.  Prices are ridiculously high, and basic foodstuffs are scarce.  There’s rampant lawlessness in the streets as well as a bloody flux.  There’s open talk of rebellion among the guilds and merchants. Tyrion is burning down all homes and shops between the water and the city walls in preparation for Stannis’s attack.  This is going to displace hundreds, maybe thousands of poor people.  Joffrey is executing antler men and personally shooting bolts into unarmed, starving citizens.  Begging brothers are preaching damnation of the corrupt nobility, including charging them with incest, birthing monsters, and reveling under demonic influence.  The Lannister-Baratheons could not be more hated than they are at that moment.  We have to remember that at the time of the riot, Littlefinger was well away at Bitterbridge and then went on to High Garden to negotiate with Mace Tyrell for the then widowed Margaery’s hand.  He already has his man Dontos plotting with Sansa in the godswood, gaining her trust, so she leaves willingly when the time is right.  A second kidnapping/escape plot overcomplicates everything is totally unnecessary.  If Moore was supposed to be LF’s man, why wouldn’t he just lead Sansa away to a rendezvous point under the pretense of eluding the mob?  That would have been simple and plausible as her shield.  Just abandoning her in the swarm doesn’t speak to a plan that has to go off without any mishaps.  

On the other hand, Varys is the one official still in the city who was noted by Jaime to be conspicuously absent from seeing Myrcella off to Dorne.  Varys, who claimed to have informants all over the city, yet he never forewarned Cersei of any possible riot.  Again, it’s Tyrek that disappears without a trace.     

Sorry for the long wait.  I actually had to take some time to re-read and reflect on Mandon Moore.  I think it’s a really bad place to start the speculation with the assumption that he must be working for someone at all.  My conclusion is that he’s not working for anyone, and he doesn’t have to be to do what he does.  He is a guy motivated by naked self-interest and personal advancement, and that does not necessarily equate with greed or being in anyone’s pocket.  IMO, I think he has traits similar to a corporate psychopath (though he’s obviously down for murder too) than anything else.  Let’s just focus on how his characterization is described first.

Jaime had once told him that Moore was the most dangerous of the Kingsguard—excepting himself, always—because his face gave no hint as what he might do next. – Tyrion I, ACOK.

He’s described as appearing corpse-like with eyes that are “oddly flat and lifeless.”  He’s cold and emotionless.  Most notably, Ser Mandon has ties to no one.      

Lord Arryn brought him to King’s Landing and Robert gave him his white cloak, but neither loved him much, I fear. Nor was he the sort the smallfolk cheer in tourneys, despite his undoubted prowess. Why, even his brothers of the Kingsguard never warmed to him. Ser Barristan was once heard to say that the man had no friend but his sword and no life but duty … but you know, I do not think Selmy meant it altogether as praise. Which is queer when you consider it, is it not? Those are the very qualities we seek in our Kingsguard, it could be said—men who live not for themselves, but for their king. By those lights, our brave Ser Mandon was the perfect white knight. – Tyrion II, ASOS.

Of all the things said about him, nowhere does anyone suggest it is in Mandon Moore’s character to want anything outside of his career within the kingsguard.  He has a single-minded focus on duty and serving the king in an almost robotic level of obedience.  No one can tell what goes on behind that blank expression.  If a man’s motivations are unknowable, you can’t predict future behavior.  Mandon Moore does not strike me as someone who would fall prey to bribery or blackmail.  He’s not ideologically motivated, nor is he someone a conspirator can confidently rely on to carry out a task without risk of being double-crossed.  If we look at men Littlefinger has taken into his service like Ser Dontos, the Kettleblacks, Janos Slynt, Nestor Royce, Lothor Brune, Lyn Corbray, there’s always a glaring weakness to be exploited, be it greed, excessive/wounded pride, addiction, closeted homosexuality, desperation, debt, estrangement from family, desire to rise from the underclass, lack of better options, etc.  Mandon doesn’t have any of these vulnerabilities.  

So what did I mean by having traits in common with a corporate psychopath, though?  Varys talks about Mandon being “the perfect white knight” and possessing the ideal qualities of a kingsguard.  Certain types of corporate psychopaths can wear a facade of traits that the business world desires and values.  They can seem like the perfect employee that the company leadership can rely on.  They appear to be fearless and unwavering in their drive for success, sometimes even earning praise and recognition for outright ruthlessness.  Their sometimes apparent lack of emotions could be read as having the grit to do what is necessary in times of turmoil.  Most use manipulative tactics to discredit, undermine, or sabotage coworkers and superiors alike just to get ahead, which I will show is relevant in Moore’s case.  Everyone is either a potential pawn, patron, or enemy to be eliminated.  Not all psychopaths have superficial and grandiose charm, and no one would accuse Mandon of being charming, but he does put himself out there to be seen as indispensably valuable to the king.

Let’s go back to the bread riot and why Mandon Moore abandoned Sansa’s side as her shield.

Tyrion pressed blunt fingers into his throbbing temples. If Sansa Stark had come to harm, Jaime was as good as dead. “Ser Mandon, you were her shield.”

Ser Mandon Moore remained untroubled. “When they mobbed the Hound, I thought first of the king.”

“And rightly so,” Cersei put in. “Boros, Meryn, go back and find the girl.“  – Tyrion IX, ACOK.

I see no sign that there’s any duplicity going on here when he’s questioned.  Mandon Moore acted in a way he believed the king and the queen regent (his patrons) would approve of.  The traitor’s daughter’s life doesn’t mean anything to Joffrey, and she is only a secondary thought of the queen’s after they are safe within the castle; therefore, she is not a useful pawn to him.  If Mandon Moore shows any desire for anything at all, it’s this:  Sandor Clegane’s privileged position with the Lannisters.  Joffrey ordered Sandor to go after the peasant that threw the dung.  As Sandor is mobbed (and it would be reasonable to wager he’ll be imminently killed), Ser Mandon seized the opportunity to swoop in as Sandor’s replacement, dropping Sansa like a hot potato.  There is a reason he keeps being ironically regarded as the white knight in shining armor.  He’s a real Johnny on the spot that one.  Even if Sandor somehow isn’t killed, Moore still comes out looking like the kingsguard that did not falter in his duty to protect the king even in all the confusion and chaos.  It’s an opportunistic upstaging of a colleague to discredit his effectiveness at his job.  It proves shortsighted on his part because Sandor not only survives but has Sansa, still a valuable Lannister hostage, alive and in tow.      

This will come up again at the Battle of the Blackwater when Sandor finally breaks from the wildfire.  Tyrion orders Sandor to continue leading sorties outside the city walls, but he refuses.  Guess who chimes in?

Ser Mandon Moore moved to Tyrion’s side, immaculate in his enameled white plate. "The King’s Hand commands you.”  

“Bugger the King’s Hand.” Where the Hound’s face was not sticky with blood, it was pale as milk. “Someone bring me a drink.” A gold cloak officer handed him a cup. Clegane took a swallow, spit it out, flung the cup away. “Water? Fuck your water. Bring me wine.”

He is dead on his feet. Tyrion could see it now. The wound, the fire … he’s done, I need to find someone else, but who? Ser Mandon? He looked at the men and knew it would not do. Clegane’s fear had shaken them. Without a leader, they would refuse as well, and Ser Mandon … a dangerous man, Jaime said, yes, but not a man other men would follow. – Tyrion XIII, ACOK.

Since when has Moore ever shown any deference to Tyrion’s authority before?  Never.  This is a performance for his situational patron, part of Moore’s facade.  What is suggested by vocally taking Tyrion’s side is that Moore wants Tyrion to name him commander.  He would see the opportunity to take Sandor’s place by not only highlighting the latter’s disobedience, but his posturing implies that he wouldn’t hesitate to carry out the Hand’s orders.  It’s also a boon that Sandor’s behavior is quickly tanking any remaining confidence in his courage and leadership ability.  Moore must have thought himself the natural choice to assume command as he is a kingsguard and a capable fighter, but he could not have foreseen Tyrion absorbing Jaime’s counsel.  Instead, Tyrion decides to lead the sorties himself, shaming anyone that doesn’t follow as being less than a dwarf.  Being named the king’s standard-bearer, as Ser Mandon was, is usually considered a high honor.  A corporate psychopath wouldn’t see it that way.  It’s a piss poor consolation to being led around by someone he would consider a lesser man.  Battle is where a knight earns his commendations and honors, which we see in Sansa’s eighth chapter in Clash.  As commander of the sorties and his rival disgraced as a craven, Moore would have been the hero of the day should they emerge victorious.  Tyrion prevented that.  Moore would then be left with only one other option to assume leadership.  Tyrion has to fall on the battlefield.

“MY LORD! TAKE MY HAND! MY LORD TYRION!”

There on the deck of the next ship, across a widening gulf of black water, stood Ser Mandon Moore, a hand extended. Yellow and green fire shone against the white of his armor, and his lobstered gauntlet was sticky with blood, but Tyrion reached for it all the same, wishing his arms were longer. It was only at the very last, as their fingers brushed across the gap, that something niggled at him … Ser Mandon was holding out his left hand, why …  – Tyrion XIV, ACOK.

Ser Mandon’s sword comes down in his right hand and nearly kills Tyrion.  What Moore could not have anticipated was getting iced by Podrick Payne before he could finish Tyrion off.  There’s a simple elegance to Moore’s motivations being strictly his own.  There’s no complicated conspiracy needed to explain any of his actions.  He’s just a shark in a suit of armor.  But what about Varys implying there was a conspiracy to kill Tyrion with Moore as the catspaw?  It seems to validate Tyrion’s suspicions that it was Cersei, or at least someone.                  

Bronn had turned up all he could on Ser Mandon, but no doubt Varys knew a deal more … should he choose to share it. “The man seems to have been quite friendless,” Tyrion said carefully.

“Sadly,” said Varys, “oh, sadly. You might find some kin if you turned over enough stones back in the Vale, but here … Lord Arryn brought him to King’s Landing and Robert gave him his white cloak, but neither loved him much, I fear. Nor was he the sort the smallfolk cheer in tourneys, despite his undoubted prowess. Why, even his brothers of the Kingsguard never warmed to him.

… [the Barristan part already quoted above]

And he died as a knight of the Kingsguard ought, with sword in hand, defending one of the king’s own blood.” The eunuch gave him a slimy smile and watched him sharply.

Trying to murder one of the king’s own blood, you mean. Tyrion wondered if Varys knew rather more than he was saying. Nothing he’d just heard was new to him; Bronn had brought back much the same reports. He needed a link to Cersei, some sign that Ser Mandon had been his sister’s catspaw. 

Let’s not forget Varys benefits by furthering the rifts within the Lannister regime.  He can easily play to Tyrion’s paranoia by suggesting there’s more behind Mandon Moore’s murder attempt than there was.  He smiles and mentions Moore’s origins in the Vale, a gesture at Littlefinger most likely; however, there are no substantial breadcrumbs left behind to connect Moore to anyone.  We’re even reminded twice that Bronn’s investigation turned up nothing except what was already well-known.  There’s just no there there.  Tyrion is doing the same thing as the conspiracy theories by assuming that Moore has to be in someone’s pay, but his reasoning is faulty.

Jaime had always said that Ser Mandon was the most dangerous of the Kingsguard, because his dead empty eyes gave no hint to his intentions. I should never have trusted any of them. He’d known that Ser Meryn and Ser Boros were his sister’s, and Ser Osmund later, but he had let himself believe that the others were not wholly lost to honor. Cersei must have paid him to see that I never came back from the battle. Why else? I never did Ser Mandon any harm that I know of. – Tyrion XV, ACOK.  

He mistook Moore’s commitment to duty and obedience for having honor.  And yes, he did unintentionally cross Ser Mandon. He just didn’t know it because he couldn’t read the guy.  He couldn’t see beneath the surface, and that is why Jaime is correct in calling him the most dangerous.  One can never know for sure if this type of corporate psychopath sees you as their pawn, their patron, or their enemy at any given moment.  There’s no way to mount a defense against that unless you can understand who you are really dealing with.  Tyrion was just very, very lucky that he brought Podrick Payne with him into battle.                            

[spacehologramcollection]

Kombat Krew; Random HCS, Habits and quirks.

No idea what to call this. Just an assortment of some random headcanons, featuring various habits, quirks and random occurrences of the Kombat Krew.  Some of them are slightly NSFW so just to be safe, 18+ NSFW under the cut!  Ermac is NOT paired with anyone. More just a random Headcanon about him, solo, no pairing. Because I don’t do pairings with him.  Kano is mentioned, but it is a shit post.  Mainly trash! Hope you enjoy!

·         Kabal; Doesn’t matter if he’s pre or post burn. He has a bad habit of eating your food. The left-over pizza in the fridge? He ate it. That piece of cake you were saving, he ate it. Those sweets you hid in the cupboard, he ate them. He is so sorry about it though. He will buy you more to make up for it. He gets really hungry (I headcanon is metabolism is higher than normal) he says he’s sorry. He’ll never eat your special stash, the sweets reserved for when you’re ill/ on. And he always buys you non-edible gifts, he just gets hungry and needs to eat. He always shares his food though. So, he’ll never complain if you steal his chips (Fries) even though you said you didn’t want any.  

·         Scoprion (Hanzo Hasashi); Sometimes, when watching a film, if a scene gets a little too intense, he can accidentally, like light a pillow on fire. He really doesn’t mean to do it. It just happens. Some guys have the strength to pop pillows, he lights them on fire. You were once watching a horror film, and he accidentally set fire to the pillow he was holding. All because you jumped and squeaked a little. Which made him jump and squeak a little. Queue the both of you trying to extinguish it. He’s so sorry. It’s endearing because you both laugh about it. Seeing him smile is worth all the burnt pillows and set off fire alarms in the world.  

·         Sub Zero (Kuai Liang); He loves to hold you. He wants to feel close to you, the man has been touch starved for a while. It also brings him great relief knowing you are safe. But there is a slight snag in this. He’s freezing. His hands are extremely cold. And he has a bad habit of placing his hands-on exposed skin whilst asleep. Which wakes you up. It’s not bad in summer, but when are you actually anywhere but the cold? So yeah, Cold hands warm heart. He’s really sorry about it, apologises and blushes red. Why is it endearing? Because he just wants to be close to you. Subconsciously it’s like he’s trying to reach out and touch you. Even in sleep he’s trying to keep you safe. And ain’t that cute?  

·         Kano; Pisses to make his territory. Pissed all over your new sofa. Absolutely foul man.

·         Baraka; Isn’t really a bad habit, more of a regular occurrence, which has turned into a habit. Okay. So, I agree with the consensuses that he is a bit spiky and would rip clothes, blankets etc. But making out with him comes with a risk. To cut a long story short, he once got embedded into the couch. Innocent little cheek kisses, turned into you kissing his neck, straddling him. And he punctured your best pillow and his spikes got stuck in the couch. Well. Fuck. It’s quirky, because, he is literally like an up-turned hedgehog in these moments. Just don’t laugh… or let him catch you laughing.

·         Johnny Cage; He live tweets EVERYTHING. You’re shopping, he’s already tweeted fifteen times before you enter the centre. Only to be mobbed by a group of fans. You’re having a mini-jokey argument about the answer to a game show question. He’s asking his fans if they know, ‘Hey its classes as phone a friend Y/N. Except, it’s tweet your followers’ Can’t decide what to have on the pizza, live-poll for his fans to answer for you! As annoying as it can get, it is pretty sweet. Because well, he’s letting everyone know he’s happily spoken for. He is so proud to be with you, and he’s just boasting about it! it’s better than him not saying anything at all. So, you can deal with the crowds, just as long as he’s by your side.

·         Erron Black; He has this habit of just being a tad bit messy. Guns, bullet casings and powder everywhere. Also, he sometimes forgets that his boots are covered in mud, so that gets trailed in. Has a terrible habit of placing his feet on the table too. He likes to lounge, if he was an animal, he’d probably be a cat. So yeah. A bit on the messy side of things. He does help you clean up, but there is nothing worse than him, trailing mud into your house. You just kind of stare in disbelief, he’s wondering what’s wrong, then the colour drains from his face when he relaises what he’s done. ‘I’ll go get a mop’

·         Shang Tsung; He trapped Ermac in a bottle. Not happy with him at the moment. So yeah, he’s going to try and eat your fucking soul. Sorry guys. The bastard trapped the Spooky man in a bottle. Not happening.

·         Ermac (Not paired with anyone); They have a bad habit of just floating around. They have scared Erron before. Erron thought he was alone, all happy and content, one minute there was nobody. Next minute BOOM. Ermac is just floating and staring at him. Where the fuck did they come from?  Kotal was once taking a dip in a hot spring, didn’t notice Ermac hovering and reading. Next minute ‘We think the steam will help your wound’ Ermac is now telling him the healing properties of different salts. Thank god they cannot just drift through walls. They have boundary problems, they just want a friend to be fair. Someone be their friend!?

·         Cassie Cage; She sings in the shower. It sounds great to her, but to everyone else not so good. But it doesn’t have to be great! Why? Because it makes everyone smile and laugh. If she knows you’re down, expect her to start singing some absolute nostalgia hits in the shower, before booting down the door when she’s done. Making her solo into a duet. You have never been serenaded, until you’ve heard an out of tune version of ‘Dancing Queen’ By Abba, sung by Cassie whilst she’s drying her hair. Has totally done that vine, where someone is singing and grabs the curling tongs. She swears she takes more of after Johnny, he’s clumsy, a goofball and can’t sing for shit either!

·         Hotaru; Habitual by nature. Life with him is very organised and he has a lot of habits. One of his quirkier ones, would be that he automatically will coaster people’s cups/glasses. Like before they even put it down on the coffee table, he will fucking coaster that shit, all whilst making stern eye contact. He will also organise your library of books, games, DVDS, bottles of alcohol. Doesn’t matter what you have, if he cannot sleep he will alphabetically organise it. He’s another guy who can tune toasters to their perfect setting. Perfect toast for you when you wake up!

·         Fujin; Gods are quirky by nature, well they are to humans. Fujin is quirky even to Raiden… ever so slightly. Fujin has a fair few quirks, such as meditating in the strangest of positions, doing near naked Yoga is another. Because to him, his form is not seen as something to be prudish over. That, and it allows him to be zen. So yeah, prepare for half naked tai-chi in the living room. He can make the perfect cup of tea as well. Like you don’t even have to say how you like it. He. Just. Knows. Gotta love Fujin. He better be DLC or we riot.

·         Raiden; A quirk of his is that he loves cats and they love him. He’s not sure where this has come from, but there is something about them that makes them perfect in his eyes. If you have a cat, it will love him instantly. Random cats will follow him in the streets. He’s the god form of catnip. Your cat may ignore you, but it will not ignore him. You’ve caught him fawning over cute cat videos before. The internet is amazing.

[realllllfangirllllll]

Beyond Lovers || Chp.4

{More Than Friends Sequel}

Masterlist

Chairman!Jaehyun AU x CEO!Reader AU

Summary: You find yourself falling deeper and deeper in love with the former CEO after overcoming your fear of love. Although there were rough patches, both of you are now stronger than ever. However, you realize that maintaining a relationship and a company at the same time can be very difficult, especially if someone is out to destroy the both of you.

{ Previous / Next }

You were in awe as you walked through the building that was now lit up with purple, pink, and blue neon lights. It seemed it was only yesterday that Jaehyun proposed to have you as NCT’s CEO. You blindly accepted his offer not knowing how stressful it would be to weigh both online college and a company on your shoulders. Your eyes have almost gone blind from staring at a computer all day. From doing online courses to mapping out designs and promotions for NCT. You wouldn’t have been able to get through even half of it if your friends weren’t there to support you.

For the past few weeks, Soyeon and Mark have stayed up at the crack of dawn studying with you in hopes of finishing the courses required for the three of you to graduate on time. It’d be an understatement to say that the workload is difficult. At times, you even considered going back to college to learn face to face with a professor. However, Soyeon and Mark have always toughed it out and helped to make sure the three of you had the time for NCT.

When you have finished the crazy college workload for the day, you were faced with another workload from NCT. Photoshoots, coordinating, and managing the company left you absolutely no time to relax. You were just thankful your friends were suffering along with you. Soyeon, Soojin, Lucas, Winwin, and Ten were the models of the company. Since they were already professionals, half of the stress was taken away from you, not to mention that Ten’s ability to design saved the company so much time and money. Photoshoots also go smoothly with their professional opinions for improvements. On the other hand, Mark and Johnny were of great help behind the scenes. Mark was in charge of contacting future partners and other human resource duties while Johnny and you took charge of photography and video contents. The whole company was surprised, except for you and Jaehyun, that Johnny decided to retire from modeling. You and Jaehyun have always known Johnny’s passion and skill for photography. Plus, Jaehyun has always told you how guilty he felt to have made Johnny model with a “playboy” image back in SM. Taking both their thoughts into consideration, you used NCT as the perfect opportunity to settle both their concerns and wishes.

You walked through the crowded building remembering the countless nights the nine of you spent decorating and making the building look like what you all have envisioned for it to be: a place of creative freedom and a place that held no boundaries nor anyone to force a fake image upon others. With a big smile on your face, you greeted the people who congratulated you and had small talks with the guests of tonight’s grand opening event. You saw your friends enjoying their time eating, taking pictures, and just happily talking to other people. An ooze of happiness burst from inside of you. Although it was beyond difficult to start the company you and Jaehyun dreamed about, the endless efforts the nine of you put in resulted in a great outcome. 

You scanned around the room and stopped when you saw a particularly well-dressed man staring back at you with a bright smile on his face. Returning the smile, you subtly motioned for him to come.

“Hey there beautiful stranger,” the husky voice said.

You rolled your eyes at him as he wrapped his long arms around your waist. He stared at you lovingly and dove forward for a long kiss. 

Pulling apart, he said in a breathless whisper, “Congratulations Ms. CEO, this all happened because of you.”

Giving him a quick peck, you smiled and whispered next to his ears, “Well aren’t you lucky to be dating her.”

Smiling with his dimples exposed, Jaehyun tucked your hair behind your ears and gazed at you with loving eyes. “I sure am.”

Suddenly, you heard a buzzing sound in his pocket as he walked away to answer the call. You weren’t sure if it was because of the strobe lights or if you were just imagining things, but you saw a slight change in Jaehyun’s eyes. He seemed angry at first, maybe even furious, but when he made eye contact with you, his bright smile returned. You quickly brushed aside the doubtful feeling and walked toward him. 

Gently, placing a hand on his shoulder, you asked him softly, “Everything alright?”

With a light chuckle, he grabbed your hand and placed them beside him. As to assure you, he rubbed soft circles into the back of your hand and said, “I just got a call from our collaboration’s department chief. There were some problems with the contract.”

Pouting, you asked him, “So you have to go? I didn’t even do my welcoming speech yet.”

Jaehyun chuckled, pinching your cheek lightly, “I’ll see my famous girlfriend on youtube later. I know you’ll do great, but don’t forget to mention the handsome man who funded this whole project.”

You scoffed as he gave you a wink and started heading towards the exit. You saw him grab a glass of champagne before waving goodbye to you, disappearing into the elevator.

Sighing, you, too, took a glass of champagne from a passing waiter and gulped it down. You tried to calm your nerves as you gave yourself a mental pep talk. Truth be told, you were a nervous wreck on the inside even though you seemed poised and calm on the exterior. Memorizing your speech wasn’t the difficult part, after all, you planned to speak your immediate thoughts instead of drafting out a speech. This way, the people will understand your genuine appreciation toward them and the company. However, what made you break down with anxiety was the gossip and drama that surrounded you in the past. Although your dating scandal with Jaehyun became less of an interest to the public, there were still many people who doubted you and the position you carry. It took you a lot to fight down your insecurities to even get dressed for the event and show up. You didn’t want to disappoint your friends who all counted on you, so you shallowed down your fears and dragged yourself to the event with forged confidence, hoping nobody will notice your nervous breakdown.

You felt someone lightly wrap their arm around your neck and you turned around to see Soojin. Your best friend gave you an assuring smile and told you, “It’s going to be ok y/n. If anything happens, which it won’t, you have the eight of us to back you up.”

You returned a forced smile and replied, “It’s seven now.”

Looking at you with confusion, she asked, “Seven? Who left?”

“Jaehyun did. He had to deal with one of the department chiefs.”

“Tsk tsk Leaving his girlfriend on one of her most nerve-wracking nights. What a shame,” she shook her head and looked at you with a straight face, “I disapprove.”

You chuckled and lightly shoved her, “Shut up Soojin. He wouldn’t leave me if he saw how nervous I am. Plus, he has important business to attend to. It’ll determine all nine of our futures.”

Raising her arms up in defeat, she said, “Fine, fine. I’m just salty he took my beautiful girlfriend from me.”

You saw her pout as she leaned closer to you, and you pressed your hand on top of her mouth, shoving her away. “Please, you had countless boyfriends and now you try to claim I’m yours?” You looked at her with fake shock, “How dare you! You cheater!”

You both laugh, feeling better already that Soojin was there to shake off your nerves. Soon after, you saw the rest of your friends come over, encouraging you that you’ll do fine. You must say, it was nice to always have the seven of them by your side. Everything felt like it was in place as long as you and your friends were together, indifferent to the media, dramas, and gossips that could easily separate you all.

“Please give a round of applause for NCT’s very own CEO, y/n y/l/n!”

A roar of applause was heard through the neon-lit floor and you felt your nerves rising. Giving a small smile, you walked to the front of the podium as gracefully as you could. 

Taking a deep inhale, you let out your words loud and confidently, “Thank you for the warm welcome! I am so pleased to finally introduce to you, NCT.” Another round of applause stroke and a few cheers were heard. “Our company has been working endlessly to introduce to you all our wonderful models and designs. I would like to first, thank all of our NCT models for bringing this collection to life: Soyeon, Lucas, Soojin, Ten and Winwin,” through your anxious eyes, you saw your five friends waving to the crowd. You gave them a warm smile and continued, “These models are the center of NCT and my most precious friends. Please give them your utmost love and support.”

You continued through your speech with no mistakes and applauses were heard throughout the room. You started to feel at ease as you finished your speech with the words you wanted to say the most, “Last but not least, I would like to thank this one very special person. He has been the light of my life and the most supportive and helpful person to both me and NCT. Unfortunately, he had some matters to attend to so he won’t be here to introduce himself and talk to you all. Nonetheless, I would like to thank Jaehyun with the bottom of my heart. I love you and will continue to lo-”

A cold liquid flowing down your head caused you to freeze before you can finish your sentence. You tried continuing to speak but your eyes started to see red paint drip down from your hair to your face. You felt the crowd’s eyes stare at you as more paint fell down your body. Suddenly, you heard a few people push their way to the front of the crowd and curse at you.

“‘Love’ my ass!”

“Nice way to kiss your way up to the top!!”

“You’re nothing but a slut!”

Once again, fear and anxiety took over you. You didn’t know what else to do but stand there dumbfounded. No matter how hard you tried to muster up your courage to speak, nothing came out. The people just continued to shout threats and throw all sorts of foods at you. The room started spinning and your vision started to get blurry. You saw a swarm of security running towards the shouting people and Mark coming up beside you to call an end to the event. Just as you were about to lose yourself and fall to the ground, Johnny caught you by the waist.

You heard him whisper by your ears, “Hold it in, stay composed. Don’t let these idiots see you fall.”

Johnny’s words made you get a hold onto reality a little better as you stand up straight, acting as if nothing was wrong. You clutch onto his arms as the both of you walk towards the exit behind the backdrop.

———

• Sorry I’ve been MIA & S U F F E R I N G •

• I have too much work and I’m just a tiny girl so pls have mercy on me 🤕 •

• I’m also hella frustrated bc my card charged me for SuperM albums but I couldn’t place my order on the website like wtf does that even make sense to u •

• ANYWAYS HOW WAS JOPPING YALL LEMME HEAR UR REACTIONS •

• STREAM JOPPING 💎 •

[goldenswan]

Chapter 2 ( Lizzy P.O.V.)

5500 words - After getting out of the torture chamber, her fate must be decided.

Disclaimer: Violence signs depicted and swearing.

And now, here you are, trapped, unprotected and at the mercy of all those menacing eyes found in the room you just stepped in. They were all targeting you, how could anyone not feel vulnerable found in such a situation? Since you’ve entered you could feel the reek of danger and all your senses would shout alarmed to get yourself out. While your fight or flight instinct started building in you began to observe more your surroundings analyzing all the risks. The room was spacious and quite flamboyant, they were rich for sure, only by seeing this you know such a mansion you can only dream of, they can have a ballroom inside, but that’s not what you needed now. You soon found yourself drawn by the huge round wood table and all the people that were waiting at it. The two boys that escorted you went forward and took their places, letting a free chair in the middle of them.

My place I assume?

All of them were expectant at the last persons that were supposed to take their seats, you, and Jaehyun positioned at the opposite part of the table. From the sharp look, Jaehyun trowed towards and the sit down read from his lips you understood he was waiting for you, and he was becoming impatient of you being oblivious. You took his words and followed his demand. Only after that, he did the same.

Wanting to be that last. Does he consider himself that special?

You found yourself looking side to side at each man that was present, from left to right, strangely at the same time you became tinnier that you already were seeing how intimidating they were from a brief close up.

There are still many empty chairs, are they even more people like them in here? 

You started counting and learn each of it as if your life depended on it, who might help you out and who will push you down the pit.

Jaehyun seated right opposite to you, with an aura that would make you believe that even at this round table, he is the center, he was listening to the man next to him, you couldn’t hear what he was saying but from their faces and the attention Jaehyun was having while listening you knew it was serious and private.

The man that was talking seemed a bit more wiser, maybe with one year older, but softer in eyes, he was wearing a full suit, looked like a true businessman but you already know what’s their business, they were mobsters. You could tell he was serious but still calm, he felt in control over the situation, only his eyes were becoming softer whenever he was facing the woman near him.

I am surprised to see a woman between all these men, but again, she looks quite scary too.

Still, the man was smiling so warmly to her, taking her hand carefully in his, feeling reassurance through her touch and the welcoming smile with loving eyes she would return to him. Soon the man realized his expressions and he went back at looking serious, well he was trying but the woman stopped from keeping a straight face. Seeing her smile like that, made you awestruck, she was so beautiful, and even more, she seemed exotic, maybe she was a foreigner. She was wearing a uniform, she seemed to be dressed similar to a nurse, but it felt way more stylish, her attention was only on the two men near her and what they were speaking. You had a small heart attack when she turned her eyes towards you.

Did she catch me staring at her?

You got a bit worried before realizing she was looking at the boy from your left side, he didn’t seem to feel her stare but when he shifted his head to you she also moved fast to not be caught, smiling unfazed at the men near her. You stared back at the boy you just met look.

How was he called? Jaehyun mentioned it. Was it Haechan?

The boy glared at you, clearly not liking for you to keep your eyes on him for too long so you moved your stare next to him, meeting again another man in a suit.

Even though he was sitting down, you could know, he was quite massive and intimidating. He didn’t seem to care that much of being here. He was the only one who was keeping his legs on the table, his arms intertwined and his eyes lost and staring at the window.

No one was bugging him, and sincerely you would be scared to do it too. He was like a lion sleeping and who is that crazy of actually disturbing a lion? He did resemble one, with his hair color, full of warm tones or maybe that it was a bit longer, not too long, perfect to emphasize his face structure. He did throw some sneak peeks at you, trying to not seem too interested, but who he can lie, those were the only moments his dull eyes would show a bit of energy. But the last look he gave to you was different. This time you were the one to feel a bit electrified, or maybe scarred, even he only kept his eyes fixated on you for a second, they were too feral to feel nothing from it. You gulped the knot he was able to make in your throat.

Why do I feel I would end up eaten alive in here?

Next to him was another man, and surprisingly, if the previous was a ferocious lion, this was the prettiest deer you would see. He might be older, but his soft features might make you call him boy at first even thought that was a man standing near you. His hair seemed fluffy and his eyes were so big, like those of a Bambi deer. He seemed gentle and angelic. Maybe he will be the one to save you, after all, out of all of this he was the only one who didn’t feel threatening, but again, you ended up in here because you believed those types of eyes.

But he also looked worried, he was shifting in his chair, shaking, never keeping his eyes in one place, he was anxious. The man from before observing it too started to try amd calm him down, with a pat on his back, encouraging him to “man up” or that everything will be ok. Now at a second look, you realize all of them are dressed formally. All of them except the two next to you. Well, one of them was formal, before giving you his coat, you touch the fabric of it while blushing at the bold statement the boy said it before you entered.

Who am I lying, since when boys can say things like this so easily? Am I that old fashioned?

You found yourself looking again at him.

His name… was it

Y/N: Jaemin You whispered the name softly, more for yourself, but he still picked it up, turning at you, with a bit of shocked face to hear it from you. It didn’t take long to welcome you with a reassuring smile and praising eyes for learning it so fast.

Jaemin: Uhm, you got it right. I’m proud of you. He nodded happily while you started blushing again at him and all this scene.

What’s this? Did I end up in a romantic comedy?

***  Jaemin: I like to keep this image only to myself.  ***

Your ears started to burn while his voice and the fact he saw your bra right before to enter start playing again in your head.

Why his voice was like that? It won’t leave my head. That whisper was too close to me.

You moved your hand to cover your ears while still feeling them tingle from his voice. While you would go through this Jaemin would simply smile, enjoying that conflicted look on your face. On the other side, Haechan seemed to be unfazed at the beginning growing a bit annoying by seeing you and Jaemin. He rolled his eyes and sighed, turning himself on the other side, not wanting to assist more after seeing the scene. Turning his back to you made you see his leather jacket more clearly. He was the only one wearing one out of all of them.

Is he part of a gang?

Taking a closer look you could see what was written on the back of it.

“Nightmare?” I think I saw it before, but where?

Wait a minute, the boy that was with him when I got kidnapped had one similar.

The thought made you come to boil from the anger. You found yourself glaring again at the last man from the room. The one who also clearly tried way too hard to act like you are not in the room.

Goddammit, Lucas!

You are surprised to see him this time in a suit, and not the biker clothes you’ve been used to. While you worked at the coffee shop he was a simple customer. In the beginning, you thought he only liked the coffee from your shop, by visiting it quite often. You always tried to ignore the fact that you would catch him staring at you or your workmate’s teases that he might have a crush on you. He was handsome, but you didn’t want to allow yourself to get infatuated with such thoughts and dreams. Until the dream did happen and he confessed you. You only gave him his number, being suspicious of everything. For a few weeks, you only maintained texts and chitchat while you were working. He did walk you home a few times but none of you seemed to have courage to even kiss each other, you barely held hands, to begin with. You would lie if you would deny those moments, he made you smile only with a thought of him and you had butterflies whenever you would get closer to him. Soon you had your first date, you were so excited about it, and then here you are, you completely fell for his trap. He kidnapped you together with that boy, and you foolishly allowed them to do it.

 Jerk

You muttered it together with other curse words towards him, but he didn’t dare to face you, pretending not to hear you.

what a man, rising the trust issues I had until now reach a whole new level. If I get out alive … you … are … so dead. 

You were ready to rise from your chair towards him, before you hear Jaehyun cleaning his throat, bringing your attention back to him. He seemed mad serious about you to stay put, you wanted to fight back, but again, you were in no position to do it. He commanded to sit down, and again, you found yourself following him.

Johnny: Now what? Jaehyun: Now? Shall we start?   Taeil: We aren’t all, but I think we can, Mei will reach soon, and Renjun was instructed to give her all the details before she comes here, Jeno is with them too. Great, more people to show up. Jaehyun: Jisung and Chenle? Jia: We decided they shouldn’t be here knowing the topic we will talk about. Jaehyun: Stop babying them Jia, being part of it means they have to face everything that is happening here, good and bad. They can’t stay weak-hearted forever. Taeil: You are right, but we advise it might be better to postpone it for the next time when our boss will be here to decide if they should or not. They didn’t take their coming of age exams yet. They barely bloomed into being adults, we need carefully to Jaehyun: How you just said, they did become adults. Next time they should be here. Taeil: I understand. This shall be done. The man slightly bowed his head to Jaehyun in agreement.

Even that he lowered his head to him, you could still feel a bit of tension between the two of them, a small break installing before they went to the next name.

Jaehyun: Where is Feli? Is she still sick? Jia: She is recovering at a slow pace, but soon… Haechan: You two did become quite close, covering her. The boy spoked loudly, interrupting the woman with a sarcastic tone, being heard by everyone, without changing a bit his position, laid back on the chair. Jia: Being so jealous, if you want me to take care of you find other solutions Haechan.

The boy blushed for a second, but that faded away soon, even so, this time when he opened his mouth to speak you observed his voice being more mellow.

Haechan: But we all know the real thing. If Taeyong is not the one initiating a meeting she won’t attend it, even though it’s her brother calling her to be here. Why does she get special treatment? Johnny: Hm, true, but knowing her chaotic nature, it might be better with her out, for now, I would have refused too to come her but then I would have missed the chance to meet such pretty sight.

You were taken aback by his comment, a small blush arising in your cheeks. As your eyes lockdown one more time he flashed you a cocky smile, before moving back his attention to the man speaking, who was not in the mood to see flirting at this time.

Jaehyun: True, I will talk with her after, she listens but she never had enough focus span to stay in a meeting.

Haechan tried to hide a laugh from his comment. As he caught you staring at him, Haechan trowed you an annoyed look.

Haechan: What, now are you starting to catch feelings for me too. I thought after ending up in this situation you would have learned already. Lucas or Jaemin, I would be more careful when it comes to boys noona.

Tch… another Jerk

You got annoyed, but more because he was right of what he just told you. Jaemin too, just like Lucas, or worse, he might throw in a bigger problem.

Johnny: What about Mark? Jungwoo: Mark decided to take care of himself of the body found dead today. Haechan: ugh

He sighed deeply Haechan: that idiotic hyung of mine. Again, taking a fault that is not his.You heard Haechan mumbling under his breath. That was the first time when you saw his eyes got a tiny softer.

Jaehyun: The body from the morning, right. What info we have, how did she died? Jungwoo: She was found dead at her home with an overdose injected into her veins. Johnny: Such a coincidence to happen to know that people were trailing her. Jaehyun: Suicide? Taeil: Actually, a faked suicide. Jia: I got a chance to check up on the body before reaching here, it showed light signs of restraints on her ankles and wrists, at the first look, they might have used a polypropylene rope for this, letting soft marks, it can be seen as only that besides drugs she also indulged into more strong sexual hobbies Easily mistaken for someone who might have a rope fetish, but such statement is true only if you don’t check her mouth, by looking closely, I observed some of her teeth have been forcefully and quite painfully extracted, they went for the molars, nothing to be seen upfront, hiding the actual pain they inflicted on her, there have been also signs of…..

Jia: cigarette burns …..

Jia: her body …..

Jia: mutilated …

Jia: they used a knife for ……  

From there you lost your focus, you couldn’t hear anymore, your heart beating so hard was covering almost anything that she was saying, only small fragments would reach your ears letting your vivid imagination picture the whole gory acts, you started trembling from all the thoughts that were hitting you. With each new word, she would mention you would start to shiver harder and harder, forgetting any rhythm in your breathing, fear, and panic installing in by the gruesome acts she was describing. You could feel the stomach-turning upside down, a need to trow up combined with the feeling of your lungs failing of getting any air, you almost started choking.

Jaemin saw your face changing and acted quick reaching your hand behind the table. He allowed you to hold it as hard as you could, putting all the pressure you had into him. At the same time, he calmly stared into your eyes, reminding you patiently to breath, by accentuating his breathing, you soon start to mimic his moves, stabilizing back at a normal pace. A sigh of relief came from him he saw your pale face getting back to normal. The woman who was talking saw the whole scene, stopping from giving any other detail, slight remorse could be seen in her eyes.

Jia: The bruising may be minimal or invisible on the skin surface but they took their time in torturing her. We should be thankful to Doyoung for his connections within the police, we might have missed the chance of finding her identity and the case would just have been closed as a dead drug addict found in a bathtub.

Taeil: Also, on the identity topic, checking her info on the police data, we found that she changed her name and address quite many times, a runaway with light criminal records, a no-name perfect to use as a pawn in local actions, also more easily to have it confused when searching for a trail, the man stopped for a second fixing his gaze on you, his eyes shown worry and resentment. She is innocent.

Mei: So it was a mistake!

A loud voice was heard from the backside while the door opened. You turned around to be faced by possibly the most gorgeous woman you have met until now in your life. From head to toe, she was sparkling, from her black silk dress, the brown fur coat worn only on the half, letting a shoulder to be seen, the glamorous shapes of her body to the extravagant ruby earrings she was wearing, together with make-up so on point that you could never guess if she prepared for a date or a murder. You were blown away by the fierce and elegant aura she was radiating that took you quite a several seconds and blinks to realize she wasn’t alone. Two boys were standing by her side, left and right.

Again, wearing those leather jackets, one with bleached ashy blond hair and black eyes and another with brown hair and sharp eyes, both of them were quite intimidating, scary.

That didn’t take long, one of them changed completely as he sneezed, his face softening from the straight one he tried to keep, still, he looked a bit lost in thoughts, or maybe a bit under the weather you could say. His eyes seemed feverish. Jaemin laughed at the sneeze, followed by a small “someone had fun” that only you got to hear. On the other side, Haechan was seething from actually realizing one of those two was sick. Jaehyun: You are late. Mei: Next time I should be announced a little bit earlier when you fail of doing the smallest thing while the boss is out, even though I didn’t mind rushing in here, a ride with the motorcycle was something I did miss. And again, late? It seems I am not last, after all, you have some people missing. Especially that devil of a sister you have. Jaehyun face was starting to get a bit darker as the woman was going on with her talk, but soon he regains his composure. Mei: Can’t keep simple tasks in control, can’t keep his sister in listening to him, even this meeting and information I received came from the advisor order, so, our dear and precious underboss, Jaehyunie, enlighten me, whose fault is that right after Taeyong and Doyoung left to take care of the external affairs the first thing happening in this house is a mistake!? The woman shouted while finishing her sentence, she looked mad. Taeil: As an advisor, I feel you should listen when I ask to control both your voice and temper.

Jaehyun seemed unperturbed by the woman’s attack. He was analyzing her, keeping his eyes steady and his words followed in the same manner while each of it left his mouth. At that moment, with his low tone, and slow rhythm of speaking, you could truly see how much he was in control.

He didn’t need to shout, his words were already heavy enough, not only the woman who was supposed to receive the message, but everyone in the room found themselves listening carefully to him, even you found yourself drawn by him, he had the charisma of a leader, he was enjoying al those eyes on him, bathing himself in attention, and becoming a true ringleader in this scene.

Jaehyun: We are here to discuss Mei, and if you lose your cool so easily you are no use for any second advice, if it’s like that, then you can as well go back to your work, …  I will pay you for the hours while you were away or shall we make it double, bartender?

A smirk showed up on his face while rolling out of his tongue the last words, meeting her eyes, full of cockiness. Jaehyun: I will handle it myself.

If eyes could trow real daggers, it would have been a real carnage in here. The woman got so dark after that comment, but surprisingly she did calm down. The silence that fell in the room together with the pair of eyes you could swear they could’ve been owned by a true murderer made you feel full terror in your bones. You found yourself holding again Jaemin’s hand a little bit harder this time. The atmosphere was becoming so heavy you could have used a knife to cut through it.

You flinched when she started to move, walking slowly, hearing her heel clicks at such a tensed rhythm like a ticking bomb, that soon will explode, and it did, when the sound stopped, when her steps reached their destination, the woman faced Jaehyun with a killing smile, Taeil truly looked intimidated near her, but not him, Jaehyun faced her eyes with a faultless expression, and expectant eyes, waiting for hell to be unleashed.

Mei: I am amused but not surprised by such comments. since we were little you always wanted to be on top, didn’t matter the games or the rules, hungry for power, our Jaehyun would always become the one in charge when the chance arises, and today is no different than those past years, your father truly took its time to nurture such a desire into you, I will acknowledge that, but sadly he didn’t put the same amount of effort into teaching his children about ethics or value. Our dear underboss, I would be careful in your place, letting yourself be blinded by power will just make things easier for getting your crown snatched. Let the pride aside, after all, you didn’t always win, and I know the best out of all, of your fair share of losses.

She took a small break, to asses her upper hand before continuing her speech.

Mei: Taeyong trusted you for everything to work even without him here, and you failed, how can I not be mad. And more than mad, I am disappointed. The first time you’re given real power and you can’t even keep it in your hands. In your place I would start changing some things, seeing you fail is becoming predictable and … quite boring nowadays.

Jaehyun rose from his chair, reaching the same eye level with her, no actually he was way higher, even if she was wearing heels he was still towering over her, lowering his head, looking down on her.

Jaehyun: In your place, I would be more careful with my words, let’s not forget how dreadful it might be if we would know about all the mistakes in here, after all both me and you know the best who stepped on the wrong path the most often, right, cousin?

The woman shrugged, moving with so much lightness, just like a feather, no guilt could be felt from her stance.

Mei: I am not his mother, if it needs to be punished he will be punished, doesn’t matter of love when for me, blood is and will always be thicker. I came into this family to support Taeyong, this was and is my job since I was welcomed here, nothing more, nothing less. Taeil: Good, then this should be easier, the informants who mislead us, where previously workers under Doyoung.

She paused for a second, you could feel her aura getting again a bit darker, she turned around gracefully this time to face the pretty boy that was close to them, he flinched when he locked eyes with her, he was afraid.

Mei: …Jungwoo The boy flinched again while being called. Mei: I hope you have a good excuse, you kept close attention on this situation for quite a while, and even if they were previously workers under Doyoung, they are still currently in your command, you were the one in charge with the past mission.

Lucas: You know already what Taeil told us too if it’s a mistake like that we have to assume it together … as a family.

That was the first moment Lucas opened his mouth since you were there, also the first time he did face you, finally. He kept his eyes fixed, he didn’t show fear nor anxiety but also he didn’t provoke such feelings in you either.

Was that directed to me?

You got caught by the thoughts before coming back to the conversation.

Jungwoo: No… she is right, even if it’s a mistake, there are still my people who committed, I did know it from the start. I .. I will take responsibility. I am not denying or searching for a scaping goat, I will assume it, but my punishment will be chosen by Taeyong himself, when he comes back until then we need to solve the problem. That’s why I asked for Taeil to bring you all here, to inform you of her presence and also think of solutions. Thank you, Lucas.

The boy thanked with a cheerful smile.

Mei: Good. First, Jungwoo, I am proud to hear this from you but we will talk about this subject later, privately. Secondly, the police might help us the most, after all, currently, she is a missing person, right? Taeil: Not really, no one declared her missing, and we can keep it like that. But we still need to figure out where to place her. Mei: I see, well… one thing is for sure..

for the first time the woman looked at you and for the first time you felt such coldness from her eyes that a shiver ran into you, it felt like you were staring into death itself

Mei: … she won’t be allowed to stay here. Jaehyun: This is not mainly your decision. Mei: True, but after all of you seeing her appearance is not like my choice has no foundation. Jaehyun: Mei… Mei: When I entered this room, I didn't raise my voice because I am angry about the mistake, but more on its effect. I am seeing a ghost of a person that should never put a foot back into this place. Taeil: She Is not Alice… and she has zero connection with her. Mei: I don’t care. I don’t even want to know what would have happened if Taeyong would have been here today. I don’t want her here for when he comes back, find her a place to be sent or I will choose the place myself. I am not allowing demons to come back into his mind again.

A whisper you could hear from your left side.

Haechan: Good luck, knowing her, you might as well end up in a brothel for the better.

Jaemin: Stop scarring her with lies.

And you couldn’t think of your heart to sink deeper, but here we go again, the thought made tears start to show in your eyes, it was just too much, you don’t even know what to believe anymore.

Lucas: We will find her a place away from this house, she previously worked at a café, we have some chain restaurants under our networks, we can send her there. Johnny: Well if she makes good coffee she can work as my assistant, I do need one for all the travels and papers, and she will only stay in my office. Haechan: Or even better, we can use her for our cover. Think about it, a cursed café, one worker kills himself while the other one runs away, coincidence or a true criminal mastermind. I feel it’s a good news headline. Mei: Not bad... Haechan: Right, we get two birds with one stone... Y/N: OH Fuck off! The curse was loud and you could feel all the frustration that was built into that outburst. But you couldn’t take it anymore. You spat on him while you shout out, followed by your heavy breathing. The boy was perplexed by your reaction, he finished his sentence while wiping some of your spits that ended up on his face with a disgusted look, but this time with way less confidence in his statement.

Haechan: one stone. Now now, we understand that you are innocent, but you should understand also that we can just let you out after what you’ve experienced everything, plus seeing our faces. Y/N: I have nothing to deal with this and no reason to deal with this hell. I want out. Everyone was shocked by your boldness, well everyone except one person. That one started laughing like he never had a good laugh for way too much of time, and that one was Jaehyun. You ended up being shocked by his reaction, together with everyone from the room.

Jaehyun: Now, Mei, your turn to enlighten me, is she the ghost you thought you would see?

The man was smiling so cheerfully, it looked so happy, his face got lighted so much, he was enjoying this moment like a kid enjoying his favorite show, but this wasn’t a kid’s show, this was you being tormented.

Mei: She… well, she is different.

Jaehyun: Right. She is more amusing though. Now if you don’t have any suggestions you can all leave, we will need to discuss more private where we can hide her, for now, you know the situation, you are free, but keep an eye on her, she can’t be allowed to escape. And Y/N, trust me, you will leave this building tonight.

A smile was so brilliant and confident that it can shatter any defense. You couldn’t understand anymore, the feelings that came and left while staying in this room for all this time, how only this small moment would take all away, why is he like that, and why your heart feels like it can beat faster, only because of a man you barely meet, a man who took the blindfold from your eyes and welcomed you into this torture. How can you be such a fool and feel any sweetness from this? You felt conflicted by everything.

Pffff

Another laugh woke you up from all the reminiscences. This time not from the man from your story, but a new face.

Feli: I can’t believe it. I truly did miss quite a face. His laughing is a once in a blue moon event. Also making a promise for you leaving. How mighty of you Jaehyun, as expected of my brother. Jungwoo: Calm down, if you laugh like this with your nose clogged you will end up out of air.

The girl sounded so upbeat, that you wouldn’t believe she is sick if you wouldn’t have seen the number of tissues around her. Still, the coffee table was clean and welcoming with many sweets and tea. She coughed a bit while calming down her laugh. She soon took another spoon from her chocolate cake like nothing even happened.

Feli: Now now, having such a piece of information we can open so many new doors. I wonder, how we should put that into play.

After eating that last piece of cake she pointed her spoon towards you and welcomed you with a bright warm smile.

Feli: I should thank you. Today you turned my boring day into something way much better, and this can go on quite easily. So, Y/N, wouldn’t you like some of my help?

Boring, today was anything less than boring. This became a memorable day, you truly believed you’ve died at that time and ended up in hell, and all the devils you’ve met made your belief stronger. But letting your memories play again in the back of your head, and seeing again all those small things that you saw but never understand at the right time, you start thinking that maybe you were the actual devil that they’ve welcomed, hidden behind a lost child, but all if that is in the past, that’s why you are hearing it now. This is a story of the times I might have wished to change them, but they are all stuck, in Yestoday.

[397bartonstreet]

Hey @johnny-and-dora this is for you for the fall fic exchange!! This prompt I wrote for was “autumnal walk in the park” I’m really sorry a pre-series, pre-relationship undercover case is probably not what you asked for but it’s what came to me. Hope you like it!

Also thank you @b99fandomevents for organizing this. These types of things always strike excitement and activity in the fandom during the hiatuses. You guys are awesome!!

About a month ago, Detectives Peralta and Santiago made a huge bust of one of Brooklyn’s most prolific drug rings they’d been investigating since the early summer months. And it was awesome. They smashed into the doors of an abandoned warehouse straight out of an 80’s cop movie. All the men and women inside scattered and refused to go down without a fight, but they were no match for the Nine Nine. There were gunshots, screaming, kicking, punches, all the shebang that make these kinds of events extra epic. They got every single one of those sick, surprisingly attractive bastards. And Jake walked out of that place holding two handcuffed men in slow motion, with an ambient orchestra, an explosion behind him, and wearing sunglasses at night. He looked so cool.

Except they missed one dude. The leader of the drug ring. A fearsome man having hundreds of thousands of dollars to his name, elusive in records, and several deaths on his hands. His name… is Frank Smith.

Jake is still bitter about that.

The day before, Jake got a tip that this Anatole Kuragin (he refuses to call him Frank Smith) would be exchanging information with another dealer in plain sight at Prospect Park in the middle of the day. Jake guesses he understands the logic, no one would expect such a wanted criminal prancing around in daylight. But if he were truly smart, he wouldn’t risk it. And you can never tell if strangers walking through the park are also hiding in plain sight, waiting to catch you in the act and arrest you.

Captain Holt gave the orders for Jake and Amy to disguise as a married couple simply taking their child on a stroll through the park. Which is where they were now. Casually walking through Prospect Park pushing a clunky stroller they found in the precinct and wearing probably the dorkiest outfits Jake has ever worn on a case. He’s dressed like a father in suburbia, not a dope ass detective about to make a dope ass arrest.

“This is the worst. How am I supposed to look cool when I’m wearing a sweater vest and khaki pants?” he grunts toward his partner.

“Jake, this is not about looking cool, it’s about making the arrest and making the community a better place,” Amy says haughtily.

“This is like, the 20th case I’ve done with you and every single time you say something lamer and lamer,” he responds.

“I’m not the one keeping count.” Jake ignores her and instead makes his first survey of the park. They were told that the perp would be wearing a golden chain around his wrist to be easily recognized, but so far he sees no intimidating assholes wearing the friendship bracelet. Everyone here seems to be teenagers totally not smoking pot and families that look just like they do right now. They blend right in.

“The tip said that the exchange would be near the bridge. Let’s casually walk over there and take a ‘break’ on the bench and we’ll wait there,” Jake whispers to her.

“Ooh, it’ll give us time to enjoy the view. New York parks in Fall are the best. Everything is all colorful and beautiful, it’s like one of the only good things about this state,” Amy says. Jake switches his view from the people to the trees. It is beautiful, if he took casual strolls - which, who would want to be alone with their thoughts for that long- this would be the perfect time to do it. It’s picture perfect, with the way the leaves steadily drizzle down like rain, and the cloudy sky seems to bring out their vibrant colors. And the slight chill causing a want for warm drinks and comfy sweaters. It’s romantic, and he almost wants to pretend he’s not here for a case, and instead just take in the view. With his earphones in of course, he meant what he said about being alone with his thoughts.

“It’s a shame we’re working, I’d totally challenge on you who can make a bigger leaf pile,” she says with a smirk and he’s pulled out of his thoughts to cast her something impish.

“Oh, you’re on. We’ll come back tomorrow, I’ll even bring a pumpkin pie because I’m going to cream you,” he smirks. They reach the agreed bench to wait out the perp, and Amy struggles a bit to align the stupid stroller when she sits.

“What? That made literally no sense,” she says as he sits down beside her.

“Of course it does. What do you top pie with? Whipped cream and I’m going to whip you into cream, title of my sex tape.” Amy cringes and he can tell she’s resisting the urge to punch him in the arm.

“That’s disgusting, and if you have to explain the comeback then it wasn’t a good one.”

“Whatever,” he says. “Alright, back to business. You watch this way and I’ll watch that way,” he says and points in the opposite directions. All playfulness immediately leaves Amy’s demeanor and she’s back to being completely professional. It’s one thing Jake can admire about her, she’s incredibly dedicated at her job. She can flip the switch from casual to focused in a second, he can’t even do that.

Jake blinks away his thoughts, turning his attention back to his side. A comfortable silence falls between them, the only noise being Amy rocking the stroller back and forth and her shushing at the doll inside.

He’s trying not to show that he’s definitely staring intently at the man sitting alone on a bench, when he feels a sudden weight on his thigh. He looks down to see Amy’s hand opened expectantly. When he turns to her, she’s still just scouring the scene.

“What?” Jake asks. Amy turns back to him and flexes her hand in gesture.

“Hold my hand,” she says impatiently, as if this is just another everyday bit of police work.

“Hold your hand? For what?” he’s incredulous when he asks this, but he still places his hand on top of hers and Amy grips back.

“Because we’re supposed to be married,” she says.

“Isn’t the giant stroller in front of us indication enough that we’re straight smashing it?” Amy flashes him a glare.

“A stroller only goes so far, we won’t be very convincing if we’re stiff as boards.” She has a point, but of course he’s not going to say that out loud. Instead, he tightens her hand around his and pulls it closer to his lap. Out of instinct, of course, because that’s what couples do.

He can’t help but note that it feels kind of nice, her hand a cold contrast to his warm one. He tends to overheat, even in the Fall weather, and her hand provides some nice relief. He doesn’t dwell on that though, he has a case to solve, and it’s the last time he’ll ever hold Amy Santiago’s hand anyway.

Jake tries squinting as discreetly as possible at the wrists of those in his line of sight, trying to spot the golden chain. There aren’t many men lurking around the park, and none of them seem to be wearing any bracelets. Except for one guy, who has his hands behind his back. Jake keeps an eye on him.

“Are you cold, Patricia? You need mommy to give you another blanket?” Amy says loudly so anyone around them can hear.

“Patricia?” Jake asks.

“What about it, Jake” she groans, bracing herself for a round of teasing.

“That’s what you would name your daughter? Patricia?”

“It’s just the first one that popped into my head okay,” she hisses. “What would you name her?”

“Me? I’d probably name her something badass. Like Rogue, or Rebel,” he says, nodding his head.

“Rogue sounds like the antagonist of an awful racing movie,” she laughs. “If I had a daughter, I would probably want to name her something that’s kind of meaningful and touching. I’ve always thought about naming my daughter Carmen, after my grandmother,” she says.

“Aw, that’s actually really nice. Then I’d call her Caramel. Caramel Carmen. Giving your daughter nicknames is Peak dad.”

“Your daughter? Are we having this baby together,” Amy snorts, a mischievous glint in her eye. She absolutely knows that pointing this out will make him squirm, and Jake hates that she’s right.

“What? No! It’s just… the undercover situation that’s all… stop looking at me like that” he says and doesn’t wait for her reply, just puts his attention back to the mission. Thankfully she doesn’t press, just lets him continue the surveillance. What he sees is lots of people that look like them, but then again not really. There’s at least one parent with a kid around them or pushing a stroller as awkward as theirs. And in the park, with the autumn leaves falling around them, and the kids making piles and kicking at them. They’re real, natural, unlike they are.

He remembers having that with his own mom. Whenever his mom found time and wasn’t working, she would take him to the park. And in the autumn months, he’d do exactly what that little kid with the chocolate curls and Ninja Turtles beanie over there is doing. Shoving pine cones into his pocket and then chucking them into the arm to see how far he can throw them. Looking back to his mother for praise.

If he was a dad, he’d be throwing pine cones with him.

And for a moment, he doesn’t know why, he lets himself imagine what it would be like if this was real. If he was sitting in a New York park during its peak season, with a stroller in front of him holding a baby, a real baby that would be his, that would grow up to be like that little boy over there. The hand he’s holding in his lap would be his wife’s, a woman he actually loved. If it were his wife, he thinks, he wouldn’t just hold her hand, he’d lace their fingers together. He does just that, changing positions to demonstrate how he’d do it. He would also stroke her thumb softly, and he gives the hand he’s holding an experimental caress. He looks up at Amy, who is still rocking the stroller and her eyes still focused on what’s in front of her. If Amy were his wife, he’d playfully tug on that strand of hair that’s gotten loose from her ponytail- he stops. If Amy were his wife?

He blinks several times, pulling himself back to earth and away from whatever just happened. He even shakes his head a little for good measure, to rid of whatever the hell kind of intrusive thought that was. Amy would be the last person in the entire world he’d marry. He’s known her for a year now and the only non work related thing he’s ever heard her talk about was a seminar for perfecting the art of nonverbal communication. Which is like the nerdiest thing he’s heard anyone ever say. If anyone were to be his wife, it would be the hot, flirty, movie ticket seller that’s always giving him eyes.

He looks down at their hands to see that they’re still joined. Not only joined, but laced together. Not only laced together, but his thumb is still slightly caressing hers, and he quickly lets go like he’s burned himself. Amy doesn’t even seem to notice his internal struggle, or acknowledge the way he let go suddenly. She just puts the hand on the handlebar to aid the other.

Well… he guesses Amy is pretty in that pre-makeover nerdy type before the transformation that makes her popular kind of way. Not that he watches those movies.

But not for him, no way. Not Amy. He doesn’t even know why he’s still thinking about this.

“You want to yell at me for being stiff? You look like an animatronic,” he teases, hiding his awkward cough through a laugh.

“Shut up Peralta. I’m just trying to do my job here,” she says. A shiver suddenly wracks her body. “God, I need this guy to hurry up, I’m freezing.”

“Seriously? You’re wearing a scarf and gloves.”

“I get cold easily, leave me alone,” she says, and another shiver chatters her teeth a bit. It makes him feel kind of bad, the only reason they’re out here anyway is because he didn’t go for the ring leader first like he normally would before getting away. The boss is always the biggest collar, and in the excitement he didn’t think. So, before he can think about it too much, he’s shrugging off his leather jacket.

“Here, take this,” he holds it out for her.

“Oh, no, I’m fine man, I’ll just-“

“It’s fine, you wearing my jacket will add to our undercover look and make us less suspicious,” he says with a lowered voice. Amy purses her lips in contemplation for a moment more before taking the jacket and sliding into it, shuffling a little to make sure her badge, gun, and handcuffs are still easily accessible.

“Thanks,” she says, her voice betraying some shyness and embarrassment, she’s about to say something more when something catches her attention, her brows furrowing and lips pursing. “I found the guy. Gold chain on his wrist in plain sight.”

And just like that they’re back in the zone. Two detectives lurking about twenty feet away from the bastard they’ve got their eye on.

“Alright you get left, I’ll get right. Rosa is waiting for us in a black van over there so we have to grab him and take him to the car. Remember, be as quiet about this as possible, we don’t want to scare anyone.” Amy says. Of course with cases like these they can never be too quiet, but the quieter it is, the less panic there will be.

They both stand and walk the stroller towards the perp, Amy going left and him going right like instructed. Away from the bench they were sitting on, and away from the happy children and parents enjoying the daylight. Away from the little boy with the Ninja Turtles beanie that reminds him a little too much of himself. Away from the fathers he’ll probably never be.

And sure, maybe he won’t ever be a father, or have a wife to have autumnal strolls with. But right now he’s got what he does best. And he gets to do it right now, take down a badass crime boss in… maybe not the most badass outfit. You win some you lose some.

Being a detective is all he’s ever wanted, and he’s totally good with that.

He really is.

He swears.

[blade-revolutions]

Kai x Lyla first kiss scene (short version)

Due to studying of uni entrance exams, I haven’t written in a long while so I finally had time to sit down and write a bit - even if the piece is truly short.

The events take place in my Beyblade AU which is supernatural / magic powers themed. Both characters are 15.

//

Darkness.

Lyla Hart can’t seem to be able to see anything past it. Truthfully, she isn’t sure if there could be anything else except for it. 

Voices scream, desperate for help, for any sign of humanity. Flames are scattered everywhere.

How could they?

Firstly they sacrificed their own teammates for more glory, more power. Then they burned them, turning their bodies into ash. 

The cries of pain and agony echo in Lyla’s ears and she stills. She can’t see the river anymore, or hear the soothing flow of the water as it carries on. The night sky dotted with stars is replaced by the terrifying sight of James and Marcus, a fire is surrounding their whole being. She’s rendered speechless, her body frozen in spot as her mind replays yesterday’s events. She sees the boys breathing harshly, coughing, their skin glistening with sweat due to the unbearable heat. She hears their shouts vividly, their pleas when James says they won’t loose again.

A new gang arrived in town two weeks ago. Rumours began spreading they were the strongest team of the capital and had returned from worldwide competitions abroad. She recalls Hilary’s expression, half-doubtful, half-mocking. 

“Just what kind of competitions?” she put her glasses down and arched her brow in disbelief. “As far as I know, no one’s heard of them.”

“Well, we had been out of town for quite a while.” Lyla admits and stares at Hilary expectantly for her response. Both of them were agitated by the appearance of a new group out of nowhere - which proclaimed to be the best in the entire capital.

“Please.” Hilary dismisses her and takes a ship of her tea. “Claiming they’re the best when we’ve never encountered them -  not only we, but anyone is suspicious alone. It’d be foolish to believe such claims. We’re not eight.”

Lyla sits on her bed, folding her legs underneath her. She held the urge of sighing pleasantly because her bed is so warm and nothing can be as good as coming back to the comfort of your own bed. “Although that’s true, we’ve lost track of everything. We’ll have to gather more information as soon as possible. Don’t want them running to Kai and Johnny.” 

“Tala, Julia and Ian are already on it. Apparently, this supposed gang loves the survival kind of team contests. They are already advertising themselves by placing posters in the city to grab the citizens’ attention for the upcoming tournament. And for the Kai and Johnny part, I definitely agree. They won’t want to know how the boys react to those to who pull the superior act when in reality they’re not. 

Lyla is amused by Hilary’s words and the way she views the situation. To think the girl actually encouraged the idea of the boys putting some people in their rightful places entertained her to no end, considering Hilary would scold them for being hot-headed and a bunch of idiots with super powers.

“Wait till Tyson is added to the mix.”

Hilary catches her best friend’s glance and a laugh escaped her throat. “ For once, I’d be looking forward to it.”

She’s been a fire fairy for the past two years and she always perceived magic as the purest form of art and self-expression so when she had a taste of how destructive it could be, something inside her shattered.

Is magic truly evil?

She wants to stay alone and think, to find her sanity and her lost positivity. However that plan is proved to be a major failure when footsteps approach her from behind.

Lyla doesn’t have to turn around. She knows it’s him.

“How long are you gonna stay here like this?”

She merely rolls her eyes. Kai is as critical as usual, he just picked the wrong time for it. Lyla’s grip around her knees tightens and she buries her nose on the top of her knees to prevent the cold air from seeping in and to the rest of her face, despite the fact her attempts are futile.

“Ignoring me won’t make me leave.”

Oh he couldn’t hold himself back from being an ass! Not all hours are the same and Lyla is reluctant to put up with him.

“We’ll do everything to win next time.”

Next time. Heck they knew there wouldn’t be a next time and they still tried. They were willing to do everything, they could do everything. Out of the five, Marcus and James were the only ones with a heart and real potential to become better. Yet, death decided it was time to take away whatever good that gang had. Them.

A tear cascades her cheek. It was unfair, it still is unfair. They didn’t deserve any of this.

“You’ll have to leave sometime, Lyla.” Kai huffs.

Can’t. He. Just. Shut. Up?!

“I don’t remember having a babysitter surrounding me.” She tries to retort with a steady voice but it wavers slightly as she reached the end. Hiwatari is starting to get on her nerves and she can’t even stand on a verbal fight with him. So great.

“You know I’m not but what I said before was right. We have to go.”

She despises his ability to go from hot to cold the next moment. She often wonders why he doesn’t want to pursue being actor. Kai has perfected the technique of raising the brow - Lyla’s sure he has spent hours in front of a mirror practicing it, otherwise, he’s not normal - and since honey drips from his lips whenever he speaks, he’d be beyond perfect for any role of bad guy.

“You’re not always right.” 

Kai’s mouth stays agape briefly, staring at Lyla’s back stunned. Where did that come from?

“I didn’t say I’m always right.”

“But you definitely act like it.”

He presses his lips firmly shut. She is definitely bothered by something and that’s enough to push Kai’s ego back slightly. He remains silent before making another try and convince her it’s time to get home.

“It’s getting cold out here.”

 Lyla doesn’t respond immediately. The thought of ignoring him till he gets bored and leaves is too appealing. But Kai won’t let her get away easily.

“I like the cold.” She replies stubbornly.

“No you don’t. You like spring.”

“And you don’t like summer.”

“I don’t like a lot of things.”

“But you definitely enjoy getting on people’s nerves at the wrong at time.” 

Kai chuckles. He wishes he could see her face since Lyla’s cheeks tend to get covered with a soft red whenever they get into an argument - something that doesn’t happen often to his surprise.

Upon hearing him hold back his laughter, Lyla turns her head abruptly. Kai sees the tears on her cheeks and whatever comeback he has come up with dies on his throat. What can possibly has shaken her this much?

Then a thought crosses his mind. 

It’s swift and he could have missed it...but he’s positive that this could be exactly it.

He pushes his hands deep into the pockets of his hoodie, his eyes looking anywhere but her as one thought brings the other. Lyla takes a moment to trace his features; a part of his neck is exposed since Hiwatari isn’t fond of scarves along with hoodies and her toes curl unwillingly. She can’t deny she doesn’t like his neck. She really does and often wonders how it’d be to taste it. Then again she’s fifteen and shouldn’t accuse Kai of having a dirty mind. Hers isn’t any better.

Her eyes travel higher, to his rosy lips and soft breaths against the cold, to his mesmerizing purple eyes and red-tinted nose and to his slate blue hair which is pushed back into his black beanie. There’s a softness about him at seeing his face this vulnerable, free from the bangs that hide it from the rest of the world.

Her heart clenches.

“Kai?” She asks hesitantly.

“Yeah?”

“Do you think magic is evil?”

Kai ponders the thought for a minute. Afterwards, “No. I don’t think it’s evil at all. It depends on how you choose to use it, the purpose you have.”

More tears roll down her cheeks and realization dawns upon her; she can’t stop them from flowing. She can’t bury the pain anymore.

“That’s what I believe too but whenever I do, there’s the haunting image of Marcus and James, their unfair fate, how they deserved better and how they were always the best ones at heart from their group. They could be developed so much more, they could be everything the rest of their teammates would never be. They were kind and no one recognised that in them. People viewed them as the weakest members of the gang and all of that because of one loss at a match One fucking loss.” her sobs have made her voice lower. She doesn’t mind the tears because Kai knows. He knows her well enough. “I’m tired. I feel like breaking. I-I don’t think I’ll be able to use magic for a while after this. I don’t think - 

Her eyes fly wide open when Kai’s face comes too close for her comfort to hers and the next thing she knows is his lips on hers. For a heartbeat her brain is preoccupied by the fact this is not a dream, that she’s not in her bed fantasizing how kissing Kai Hiwatari would feel like since her crush on him only got stronger the longer she got the chance to know him better and spend time with him.

She lets her eyes close and sinks in. Lyla moves her hands from her sides to Kai’s neck and intertwines her fingers there, bringing them closer. She’s surprised when she notices his hands have come around to secure her waste, making her forget everything and her heart almost explodes at the feeling of his thumb, smooth on her cold skin as he wipes away slowly her tear. 

How someone so distant can be so soft?

She doesn’t have time to process the thought. He pulls away and heat rushes on her face.

Holy shit, it did happen.

Then another thought occurs. Why did he kiss her? To offer comfort? To stop her from babbling while crying her heart out? 

“Why did you - “ her breath hitches on her throat and she swallows to calm her nerves. “Why did you do that?”

A small smile flickers on Kai’s lips and Lyla wishes to see that more often “Because I wanted to.” Her head shoots up from the ground to stare at him astonished. 

“And because you seemed to lose your self.” he mumbles softly.

A grin lights up her face. She’s supposed to not lose her spirit, even if the world around her collapses. 

“Come on. Let’s go home. The guys will be worried.”

She nods and paces quicker to reach him, thanking God for making Kai a part of her life that reminds her she’s much stronger than she thinks.

[meenasmoon]

Coffeeshop au for meena and Johnny

My Sunshine

So I know that this one took me forever but I just really want to do a slow burn coffee au multi-chapter fic. But I have so many in line right now that it’s just gotta wait until I finish what i’m doing right now. Curse you brilliant anon!!!

When Johnny rode his jet black chopper into work that afternoon he was so absorbed in his thoughts that he could barely feel the bite of the cold winter wind through his fur. He parked in his usual spot and hurried inside of the Over the Moon Cafe. The cozy old building embraced him with a comforting warmth that banished the lingering cold that had settled in his bones and alleviated his worries enough for a small smile to grace his face. He weaved his way through the crowds of customers to the back of the shop where he ran into Ash just as she was heading out to start her shift.

The sassy porcupine rolled her eyes when he stumbled over her and almost crashed into a stack of mismatched mugs. “Watch out there Pretty Boy.” She scolded him half-heartedly and then strolled over to the register to relieve the harried looking buffalo that was trying to manage the line of customers. Like a pro she fielded the customers, decimating most of the line in a matter of minutes. Johnny watched her in amazement for a minute or so before turning around and heading back to get changed.

In the back room he stowed his helmet and his worn out leather jacket in his locker and grabbed his personalized apron. Everyone that worked at Over the Moon Cafe had an apron with their name embroidered on it, handmade by the General Manager, Rosita. His was his favorite shade of green and as he slid it on over his tight white t-shirt that hugged his muscles in all of the right places. Before he headed out to man the coffeemakers he swung by Rosita’s office.

The plump pig was sitting in her chair happily working on the mountains of paperwork that she had confiscated from the owner, Buster Moon. The hapless koala probably would have bankrupted the cafe by now if it hadn’t been for Rosita. The former housewife was the best, most intuitive manager that Johnny had ever had the pleasure of working for. Her office was decorated with various pictures of her 25 children and her husband Norman.

“Afternoon Rosita.” he greeted her from the doorway and she spun around to grace him with her huge, friendly smile.

“Good Afternoon Johnny.” She said cheerily and waved him into her office. Johnny gratefully stepped inside and perched himself on the other tiny chair in the office. He folded his long limbs up awkwardly to fit into the chair.

“What did you need?” She asked and Johnny nervously rubbed the back of his neck.

“Well ya kna I been workin’ ‘ere a long time and me dad told me last night that ‘e needs me ‘elp in the shop in the afternoons. I was wonderin’ if ya got a position available for me in the mornin’.” He finally blurted out in a rush, his cheeks bright red.

Rosita seemed to consider it for a few seconds, as if searching through her head for any open positions in the morning shift. Suddenly her face lit up and she grabbed his hands excitedly, practically bouncing in her seat.

“Oh Johnny this is perfect! We just hired a new baker so we can start selling some fresh-baked goods, and I need a shift leader to help her in the morning. Would you be interested?”

Johnny barely even took the time to think over the offer. It was a small jump in pay and it gave him the ability to help his father in the shop whenever he needed to, what more could he ask for?

“Y-yeah! Thanks Rosita!” He exclaimed happily and swept the startled woman up into a big hug. She laughed and patted his shoulder, giving him a motherly kiss on the cheek before he finally set her down.

“Now get to work!” She shooed him out of the office and he hurried off to his station, his face bright with happiness. All of the fears that had plagued his mind since his conversation with his father. Now he had returned to his element. He relieved the gazelle after she made her last coffee and stood back to appraise his duties.

The counter was lined with cups waiting to be filled with various forms of coffees and teas. He took a deep breath as he reached for the first cup, letting the warm smell of coffee wash over him. He had always felt at home in the little shop, with its mismatched furniture, lively decor and staff that acted more like family than coworkers. He smiled to himself and began working diligently.

When Johnny’s new job started the next week, he realized exactly why the position was still free when he asked about it. His shift began at 4 in the morning, before the sun was even up, he was dragging himself out of bed and sluggishly getting dressed. The act of driving his bike, and the cold wind in his face woke him up a little bit but he was still sluggish and desperate for coffee when he arrived at the little cafe. He unlocked the door and turned on a few lights behind the counter so that he could see well enough to make himself a strong cup of coffee.

He quickly made himself an espresso and gulped it down, relishing the feeling of caffeine rushing through his veins like wildfire. He shook himself and looked around the cafe with new eyes, quickly moving around to set up the shop for opening. He was in the middle of taking chairs off of the tables when the door jingled to signal that someone had entered. He was holding a bright yellow chair when he looked up to greet the baker, but as soon as he saw her all thought processes ceased.

She stumbled in rather unceremoniously into the cafe, nearly knocking over a table in front of her. Immediately she righted the table, mumbling apologies as she tried to straighten the table back into its original position. Johnny stared at her in awe, just taking her in for a second before she saw him. She was already wearing her special apron, and the delicate lilac color seemed to match her perfectly, even though he didn’t even know her name. She was wearing a loose flower print shirt underneath, paired with well worn jeans and pink converse. Johnny leaned against the chair that he had just set down on the floor and tried to think of something suave and sexy to say to her.

“Careful there love.” He said softly, smirking slightly when she jumped again and knocked over a couple chairs. All confidence, however, fled him as soon as he saw baby blue gems that were staring at him in shock and embarrassment. His poor brain wasn’t prepared for a shock and as a result his lost his balance and found himself laying flat on his back, staring at the ceiling and cursing himself for ruining his chances already.

Suddenly she was staring down at him, a shy smile brightening her face and sending his heart into a tizzy inside his chest. She offered her hand to him and gratefully took it as leverage to pull himself up off of the unforgiving hardwood floor. He dusted himself off and gave a nervous laugh, suddenly tense now that the had touched her skin, seen her beautiful eyes, fallen in love with that smile.

But what was her name???

He quickly glanced at her apron and read the embroidered name on the top corner: Meena. He smiled dopily at her and she pulled her ears in close to her face as she smiled and looked down at the spot where he had just been laying.

“Ya must be the new baker. Name’s Johnny and I’m ‘ere ter ‘elp ya if ya need it.” He nervously fiddled with his own apron, straightening out imaginary wrinkles and brushing away invisible dust.

“Th-thank you. I-I’m Meena.” She said shyly and Johnny felt his heart thump in his chest when he heard her sweet voice echo in the silent cafe. He stared at her for a moment, his mouth gaping slightly in awe, before he realized exactly what he was doing. Johnny felt himself blush as he cleared his throat and gestured to the back where the kitchen was.

Meena hurried back and as soon as she entered the kitchen she froze in surprise and stood gaping at the humble kitchen. The space had been built with enough room for larger animals to move around, but it was still kind of tight so Johnny just watched from the doorway as she reverently ran her hands over the counters, her big blue eyes so wide with awe. He couldn’t help but grin crookedly at her as she examined her tools and all of the ingredients that had been left out for her by Rosita. She picked up the sticky note stuck on one of the baking trays and a sweet smile once more graced her face as she read it.

Johnny pushed off from the doorway and wandered over to the other side of the counter, “Yer actin’ loike ya ain’t ever seen a kitchen loike this.” He said as he leaned closer, making her clutch the sticky note to her chest nervously. Her cheeks flushed an adorable bright pink at his question but this time her ears weren’t concealing her face from him, much to his relief.

“Oh um.. yes well… this is my first job.” She blurted out and Johnny’s eyebrows flew up in surprise. Meena’s blush deepened when she saw his surprise and her ears started to pull in towards her face. Johnny quickly backpedaled, trying to reassure her.

“Look Sunshine, I’m sure you’ll be fine. Ya can ‘andle this, and if ya need ‘elp, I’ll be ‘ere everyday.” He winked at her and Meena looked at him with a mixture of surprise and gratitude. He didn’t know where the nickname suddenly came from but it stuck, and she didn’t protest.

Johnny left her to her work and went to the front of house to finish his opening duties. Once they were finished he wandered back to the kitchen to watch Meena in action. As he got closer he heard the echo of a familiar song mixed with a sweet voice that he had never heard before. He peeked around the corner into the kitchen, where he was hit with a myriad of sensations.

The heat of the ovens was the first thing to hit him, but it was quickly followed by the sweet sound of Meena singing along to the music

Never gonna be in moviesExcept in a front row seatNever gonna be the raving beautyMy momma thought I’d beNever gonna write that novelNever be a homecoming queenNever gonna be a supermodelOn the cover of a magazine

She was cradling a mixing bowl in her arms as she danced around the kitchen like no one was watching. Johnny was so mesmerized by her voice and her movements that he didn’t even care if she caught him. He looked around the rest of the kitchen and found that nearly every tray was covered in warm, fresh-smelling baked goods. He could practically taste them already.

His attention shifted back to the beautiful elephant singing as she began to fill muffin containers with the batter that she had been mixing. Her lavender apron was covered in smatterings of flour and dried batter covered her hands and cheeks. It was obvious that she had been hard at work since he had left her. She was adorable and he cursed himself for falling for her so quickly, but he couldn’t help himself. He wondered how anyone could resist her as he watched her slide the tray into the oven and do a cute little hip shake as she set the timer.

He made up his mind int hat moment, he was going to woo this beautiful baker, his lovely sunshine, if it was the last thing that he did. With his heart pounding in his throat, he walked quietly into the kitchen and waited for her to turn around, singing into a whisk like it was a microphone. He stepped in and suddenly she was looking at him in shock as he sang along to the girly pop song and swayed with her in a random, joyful dance.

Meena stared at him in confusion and embarrassment but he barely gave her time to be ashamed as he distracted her with his warm voice and his words. She felt her apprehension melt away and she let out a joyful laugh as she joined him in singing once again.But all these things don’t matter in the light of things to come‘Cause, baby, you are my moon and I am your sun, ohJohnny, glad that she finally joined in, let out a laugh of his own and despite bumping into the counters and sending dishes clattering they continued to dance, absorbed in their happiness as they were. When the song finally ended, they held each other for a second, consumed with infectious giggles that didn’t seem to want to quit. Johnny winked at her, making that adorable blush appear once more in her cheeks.

Finally, they seemed to fall out of their reverie and Johnny released her from his arms. She nervously wiped at her dirty cheeks and tried to straighten her apron, but she was too disheveled and it was no use. Johnny just gave her another wink and meandered over to one of the trays laden with baked goods. He picked up a scone in the shape of a flower and took a big bite.

Meena watched nervously as he chewed and seemed to consider the flavor of the scone. When he didn’t say anything she felt dread begin to form in the pit of her stomach like a heavy stone. What if she had put in too much sugar? Too much salt? Where they too dry? Not cooked enough? Infinite examples of what she could have done wrong flew through her brain at a million miles a minute, but came to halt as soon as he swallowed and began to rain compliments down upon her.

You make me feel like a star, oh babyYou say, stay, baby, stayJust the way you areAnd tell me, girl, you’re fineAnd you will shineForever in my heartThat’s why you, yeah, youYou make me feel like a star

“Meena! Bloody ‘ell! These are amazin’! I can’t believe that scones could taste this good. Holy shit!” His praises were muffled as he took another large bite of the scone, moaning as the taste hit his taste buds once more. He looked at her like she was a goddess for bestowing those baked goods upon him. She smiled down at him and watched as he gobbled up the last of the scone greedily, licking his fingers to gather up every morsel. She giggled when he reached for another one, but quickly stopped him with her trunk, giving him a disapproving look.

“Okay no more freebies.” She scolded and he just shrugged sheepishly, shoving his yearning hands into the pockets of his jeans, “Th-Thank you.” She suddenly murmured, surprising Johnny.

“Wot for?” He asked, moving to place a hand on her arm in a demonstration of comfort.

“For complimenting my food, for making me believe that I can do this. I needed that.” Johnny pulled Meena into a tight hug, shocking her for a second before she embraced him back. After a few minutes of silence he pulled back and regarded her with a crooked smile that had struck her dumb from the moment it had hit her.“Sure thing Sunshine.” He winked at her and then jumped up so that he was perched up on the counter, watching her bustle around the kitchen, making magical baked goods. The music continued in the background and they spent the rest of their shift singing along together.

Maybe I’m not the girl next doorWho waves at you and smilesMaybe I’m not a centerfoldBut don’t I drive you wild?Baby, the way you see meIs the way that it should beFeelin’ like I’m something specialSeven days a week

The next morning when Johnny stumbled into the bakery, barely awake and in desperate need of coffee Meena was already there waiting, shining just as brightly as every morning.

“’Ow is it tha’ yer always so awake and ‘appy this early in the mornin’. It’s not bloody possible.” He muttered as he unlocked the door and let her in. Instead of being offended by his grumpiness she just giggled and guided him over to the espresso machine so that he could make his espresso. While he made his coffee she turned on the lights and went into the back to warm up the ovens and get out the ingredients for baking.

Once he had finished his first cup he made another and headed back to the kitchens to properly greet his new friend. While she got out ingredients he went over to the small speaker and plugged his phone into the aux cord. He scrolled through his music until he found a playlist he had made during his downtime at the garage yesterday. It was filled with songs that reminded him of Meena and maybe a couple that he wanted to show if her if she hadn’t heard them already.

Meena jumped a little bit when the music suddenly started flowing out of the speakers but smiled when she saw Johnny swallowing the last of his second espresso over by the sink. He rinsed out his cup and when he saw her watching him he began to playfully sway his hips to the beat, pulling out his most embarrassing dance moves for her. He was in the middle of the sprinkler when he finally broke down and joined her in laughing as hard as he could. She gently ushered him out of the kitchen and out into the front of the cafe.

“Finish your work out here.” She said with a giggle and a gentle shove, “And then you can come help me in the kitchen.”

Johnny rolled his eyes and pretended to pout as he took chairs off of the tables and began setting things up for the rest of the day. Meena just shook her head at his antics and went back into the kitchen to start baking.

And the only thing that matters when the day is doneIs that you are my moon and I am your sun, ohYou make me feel like a star, oh babyYou say, stay, baby, stayJust the way you areAnd tell me, girl, you’re fineAnd you will shineForever in my heartThat’s why you, yeah, youYou make me feel likeEveryday’s my birthdayEvery night’s a dreamOh, and when you kiss meI melt just like ice cream

Johnny hurried to complete his opening tasks and as soon as the front of house was set up he dashed to the back where Meena had set out a little station and ingredients for him. He eagerly washed his hands and bounced impatiently at his makeshift station as he waited for her to finish putting her tray into the oven.

When she finally finished she turned around and found him practically vibrating in excitement as he brandished a hand mixer like a chainsaw. He revved it, trying desperately to keep a straight face. Meena dissolved into giggles and he revved it again in response, his cool facade cracking slightly to reveal a smirk.

“Let’s get this party started eh Sunshine?” She laughed even harder and he couldn’t help but smile when that beautiful laugh echoed through the room. When they finally regained control of themselves she set up her own station and he followed her step by step through the recipe.

Of course this time it took twice as long on account of the fact that they kept taking breaks to eat the batter and have flour fights. By the time they were placing the scones on their respective trays, it had taken twice the time it usually did to make the scones. Her tray was filled with perfect scones in perfect flower shapes while Johnny’s was smattered with shapeless blobs that he had tried desperately to shape into flowers.

Meena assured him that it was a lot harder than it looked, but he still pouted while she put the trays in the oven and started on the next batch, this time moving faster and with more precision. As their first batch of scones baked he moped around the kitchen, fiddling with the music and dramatically sang along, making her laugh and distracting her from her work.

He didn’t stop until suddenly his dramatics were interrupted by the ding of the oven signaling that the scones were done baking. Johnny practically fell all over himself in excitement as she pulled the scones out of the oven and set the trays on the counter. Johnny looked back in forth between their respective trays and pouted comically as he picked up one of his scones and glared at it.

“They look a bloody mess.” He moaned sadly and Meena let out little giggle as she rescued the scone from his disdain and took a big bite. He watched her nervously, waiting for her reaction and to his relief she neither winced nor spat it out. Instead, she swallowed her bite and grinned at him, her eyes sparkling proudly.

“They’re very tasty though. Nice job Johnny.” She took another bite, munching on her treat as she put her muffins in the oven and moved the scones onto display plates. The whole while Johnny just leaned on the counter and watched her eat his attempt at a scone. He knew for sure that they were ugly and he was sure that they didn’t taste nearly as good as hers, but she praised them like they had come down from heaven.

Was it truly possible for someone to be that perfect? He grabbed another espresso and sipped it as he sat there and watched her dance around the kitchen like it was a stage and she was a performer. And how could he not enjoy it? She was making magic in the kitchen as that sweet voice of hers echoed off of every wall and mesmerized him beyond belief.

Never gonna be a Charlie’s AngelNever gonna be a saintBut you love me for all I amAnd everything I ain’t

By the time that Friday rolled around Johnny had helped bake practically every recipe that Meena prepared for the cafe and his presentation was definitely improving. He and Meena had bonded quickly over music and his horrendous baking skills and with each day he grew increasingly enamored with the sweet pastry chef. He had been fretting over what to do about it since they had baked together for the first time early in the week.

He didn’t have the courage until Friday morning when he pulled up in front of the cafe that day and found Meena waiting for him, a huge smile on her face. That one expression was enough to dispel his morning moodiness like the Sun did the darkness. Every morning she was waiting for him, making his heart pound as his stomach filled with butterflies.

He had never felt this way about another girl before. Sure he had his fair share of crushes but she outshone them all, literally. He could barely remember the name of the girl that he had been obsessed with in high school, now that Meena had come into his life.

Their day played out like every other one that week: Johnny would set up the front of house, Meena would bake everything except for a pastry of her choice, and Johnny would join her in the kitchen to bake.

Today they were baking Apple Cinnamon Coffee Cake, a recipe that Meena had brought from her personal collection and was hoping Rosita would add to the menu. The ever-indulgent woman was letting her make a big one for trial today and if it sold, she would add it to the menu. Meena was extremely nervous and Johnny was sure that she would bake it on her own for perfection but when he walked back into the kitchen the recipe was waiting for them.

“Are ya sure that ya want me ‘elp with this one?” he asked, staring at the deceptively simple recipe with trepidation. Meena gave him an equally nervous smile as she dusted off her apron and grabbed her favorite mixing bowl.

“Of course I do. How can I do something so important without my favorite baking partner?” Her cheeks turned pink at her own boldness but the ecstatic grin that lit up Johnny’s face as she spoke was enough to assuage her fears that she was being too forward.

“Well let’s get to work yeah?” He beamed and followed her careful instruction as he added ingredients and stirred the thick batter. Meena looked up from the recipe card just enough so that she could peek at his arms. The way his muscles flexed while he was stirring made her heart pound, but the main thing she wanted to see was the adorable look of concentration that he got when he was baking. It made her feel like he was trying hard to impress her, not that he needed to.

From the moment that he had swept her up into his arms and danced around the kitchen with her she was hopelessly enamored with him. The fact that he helped her bake and actually enjoyed it was just a cherry on top. 

Meena had never really had any serious crushes in high school, she was so focused on working to help her mom with money. But now that she was in culinary school and moving forward with her life she found herself yearning for the kind of love and affection that she had missed out on in high school. As if on cue, she had walked into her first day and the handsomest, sweetest gorilla she had ever met was there to greet her.

As she directed him on how to perfectly pour the batter into the baking pan she felt her suffocating nerves rising back up in her throat until she felt like she couldn’t breathe. There was no way that she would ever be able to ask him out, she was doomed to pine over him. Determined not to let her insecurities ruin the coffee cake or her time with Johnny she pushed them into the back of her mind and turned up the music.

You make me feel like a star, oh babyYou say, stay, baby, stayJust the way you areAnd tell me, girl, you’re fineAnd you will shineForever in my heartThat’s why you, yeah, youYou make me feel like a star

The coffee cake took the rest of their shift to bake and because Meena had already finished the normal pastries all that was left was to sit in the kitchen and munch on the extras. They sat across the counter from each other, eating misshapen cookies while they chatted about anything and everything. They were so deeply immersed in sharing facts about their lives that they almost missed the timer for the oven.

When the beeping interrupted them Meena put on oven mitts and carefully removed the perfectly cooked coffee cake from the oven. The heavenly smell of fresh baked goods and apple cinnamon made Johnny’s mouth water eagerly. He desperately wanted to get his hands on that coffee cake and he knew that so would every other customer.

Meena set the cake out to cool but before she could say anything they heard the other opening employees started to come in for the first shift of the day. They waited until the cake was cool enough to plate, their bubble of quality time sufficiently broken now that the other workers were there. While Meena cut the cake and set it out front Johnny collected their things from the bag and met her at the counter.

He said his goodbyes to the other employees and then walked out with Meena. As soon as they left the cafe they were hit with a blast of cold air and Johnny was suddenly grateful for the farewell latte that the barista had made for him. He awkwardly hung around the front of the store, trying to build up the courage to ask Meena out before she headed home for the day. He was mentally wrestling with his will when Meena shouldered her bag and gave him a reluctant smile.

“Thanks for the help with the coffee cake.” She murmured and looked over to the bus stop where she needed to catch her ride.

“Anytime Sunshine, daan’t worry about it.” He chuckled nervously and inwardly panicked as she started to back away to the bus stop. It was now or never. He swallowed down his nerves and cleared his throat, causing her to stop in her tracks and look back at him curiously.

“Would ya… I mean if ya want… ya daan’t ‘ave to… we could get sum food… and a movie… together…” He stumbled over his words helplessly and Meena walked back over so that she was standing close to him, her expression confused as she tried to decipher his ramblings. Suddenly her expression lit up in realization as she finally understood what he was trying to say.

“Are you…are you asking m-me out on a date?” She looked genuinely shocked but her baby blue eyes shone with so much hope that Johnny was able to find his voice.

“Yeah… yeah I am. A date wif me. What do ya think?” He asked, flashing that adorably crooked grin at her. Meena stared up at him speechlessly, her mind imploding as she processed the fact that the gorilla that she had been mooning over was asking her out on a date. She had never been asked out on a date before. What was the proper protocol? Was there a protocol? What if she was bad at it? What if she messed it up?

Her thoughts were rushing around in a panicked frenzy until she finally got a grip on them. It wasn’t like she had to decide her entire relationship with the boy right now. He wanted to take her out on a date, and she wanted to go out with him. It wasn’t complicated and she shouldn’t be afraid of him. This was the same boy that danced her around a kitchen, that baked disfigured scones with her, and sang along to every song that came on, even if he didn’t know it.

You make me feel like a starShinin’ bright in your eyesAnd I’ll always be your lifeShinin’ bright in your eyesAnd I’ll always be your light

“Y-yes.” She finally blurted out and Johnny’s heart started to beat once more. Her cheeks were a bright pink from the cold and from shyness. Neither of them noticed that Meena’s bus had come and gone, they were so caught up in each other.

“Brilliant!” Johnny exclaimed and practically beamed at her. He glanced at his bike and then back to her, an idea forming in his head.

“Let’s go right now. Ya got time?” He asked boldly and Meena’s smile grew exponentially.

“Y-yeah I do.” She fiddled with her bag but her smile never fell from her face. She was too ecstatic to let it fade.

“Awesome.” He mounted his bike and gestured for her to take her place behind him. Meena looked at the motorcycle nervously for a half a second before she forced herself to bury her fears and get on the bike.

“ ‘Old on tight.” Johnny called back and she immediately wrapped her arms around his waist tightly, making him laugh a little breathlessly as he started the bike and pushed out into the street. And just like that they were off, roaring through the streets with nothing but the cold winter air and each other to keep them company.

Johnny constantly thanked whatever deity would listen for coffee, but for the first time in his life he thanked the universe for early mornings.

You make me feel like a star

[aliceinthewritingrepublic]

There Is Always a Fall

Title: There Is Always a Fall

Fandom: Saints Row

Pairing: Johnny Gat/Female Boss

Rating: MA

Word Count: 3665

-

Johnny and Solveig get down and dirty in the kitchen.

Matt sees more than he bargained for and realizes a few things.

Looking inside the kitchen cabinet, all she could see was nutrient paste. Packages over packages of nutrient paste. Solveig scoffed and threw the plastic door shut before opening the next cabinet to the right. More nutrient paste. She was not sure what else she had been expecting.

“What’re you looking for?” rumbled a voice from behind her, and she did not have to turn around to know it was Johnny who had joined her in the kitchen of the spaceship.

“Not sure, to be honest. Kinda wanted a midnight snack, kinda knew I’d be shit out of luck.” She turned around and crossed her arms, leaning back against the counter and smirking at him. “What brings you here this time of night?”

“The bed was cold. It couldn’t keep me.” Solveig could have sworn she saw a twinkle behind those shades of his. She appreciated the implication that he had been missing her lying next to him.

She had spent the better part of the day inside the simulation of Steelport, gathering intelligence for Kinzie and Matt to do with whatever their big brains intended to. By the time she had had enough of shooting at realistic-passing clusters of voxels, night had fallen upon the crew. Not that ‘night’ was much of a concept anymore with them drifting through space aimlessly, but they were human after all and had a day-night-cycle ingrained in them. CID was an exception of course, but the rest of them were very definitely real people with the need to sleep.

Instead of heading to bed right away like she could and maybe should have done, she had headed down here instead to look for something to eat that she was bound not to find. It was weird walking through the ship when no one else was awake, the sounds of machinery and liquids running through pipes somehow amplified by the lack of any other sound. She had oftentimes thought that aloneness no longer existed in their world now, with all of them confined to such a small shared space for the foreseeable future. Tonight, she had realized that it was still possible. A younger Solveig had thrived on solitude, had never quite felt safe unless alone, had hardened herself until being alone felt right. Today, she did not need to be alone anymore. She felt safe among people. A sensation she had once believed was not possible.

But the person she very definitely felt the safest around was Johnny. They had been sharing a room and a bed ever since he had returned and their friendship had become something more. And it appeared he had become just as used to it as Solveig had if he minded her not being there for even one night.

“Sorry about not being there to warm you up.” She chuckled, taking a few steps towards him and putting a hand on his chest. “Missed me a lot?”

“Always.” He smirked and grasped her waist with both hands, leaning down and pressing a deep kiss to her mouth. It lasted only a few seconds but was enough to leave her breathless for a moment.

“I’m honored,” she answered, leaving only a few inches of space between their lips. “You know what I miss?”

He shook his head, not letting go of her.

“Actual food,” she deadpanned, dropping her head in mock exasperation.

Johnny’s laughter made her heart beat faster as she looked back up, joining in with a wide smile.

“Don’t you miss food, Johnny?”

“Obviously. There’s just other shit I miss more.”

“I miss other things too. Like, daylight. Clothes other than these bullshit space suits. Having an apartment.”

“Back in Stilwater, you had an apartment and still slept at the Saints’ headquarters almost every night,” he reminded her, taking a hold of her hips this time and slowly walking her backwards. It seemed her joking had not changed anything about what he was in the mood for. She did not mind in the least.

“That’s true. But just imagine, Johnny. If we were still in Steelport, we could have a whole house to ourselves.” Her suggestive tone was not lost on him. “You could be fucking me on any surface in the whole goddamn place, and no one could say anything against it.”

He took another step forward, pushing her along with him until her ass met the front of a counter. He pinned her there with his body.

“And you think I can’t do the same thing right here?”

Solveig smiled and threw her head back. He had backed her against one of the few places that did not have a cabinet above them. Good thinking on his part. He got right to work on the front of her throat, biting and sucking the underside of her jaw. She moaned, holding his head in place with one hand and reaching for the zipper of his suit with the other.

“You would do that? Right where anybody might walk in any moment?” She reached inside and rested her hand on his lower stomach for a moment. The well-defined muscles underneath the skin seemed to be tight in anticipation for her to make another move. She turned her head and enjoyed the feeling of his teeth enclosing a tendon in her neck. “Walk in and see you defiling your boss in the middle of the kitchen?”

“Defile,” he grunted against her skin, reaching down and taking her ass into two hands, squeezing tightly before pulling her up so she was sitting on the counter. Not missing a beat his hands grasped her breasts roughly, thumbs finding her hard nipples without a problem despite the fabric still covering her. “Doesn’t quite describe it when you’re this fucking eager to get me inside you.”

Well, she could not argue with that. She grinned and arched her back, pushing her tits into his large hands. Her own hand was still resting on his stomach. She dragged her fingernails along his skin, knowing full well that the sensation spread right into his cock. She turned her hand around and drew the same lines again on the way back. When was the last time she had been sleeping with someone continuously enough to have learned exactly how their body worked? Potentially never. A thought she did not want to linger on.

Johnny grunted against her neck and pulled down her zipper, pushing the fabric down her arms with a few quick moves, and already he had her half-naked. The heating here was not on at night. The cold air had goosebumps breaking out on Solveig’s lower arms, her nipples tightening a little more yet.

He was still wearing his shades, but the expression on his face showed appreciation for her body. She took the hand her held out for her and hopped off the counter, letting him help her out of her suit and underwear. She kicked the fabric to the side and looked back up at Johnny in all her naked glory. Her gaze caught for a moment on the very prominent tent in front of his crotch.

Reaching down, he opened his suit the rest of the way and pushed down the front of his underwear enough to be able to pull out his cock. It stood proudly, and there was not an ounce of shame in him. Not that she felt much of it either.

“It’s unfair you get to stay basically dressed and then there’s me. If someone comes in, they’re getting the full view, no-holds-barred.”

Johnny simply grinned at her and kissed her before bending down a little further so he could grab the back of her legs. She wrapped her arms around his neck and held on tight while he picked her up like she weighed nothing and sat her back onto the counter at the very front. It was not the most comfortable of positions, but the end justified the means, Solveig decided. Johnny kept his hands on her thighs, pushing and keeping them apart, opening her up to him.

“And what a view indeed.” His voice was deep and demanding. Simply knowing how much he wanted her, feeling the hunger of his eyes on her, made her wet beyond measure, not to mention how well he knew to play her body. “Anyone who gets to see you like this never needs another fantasy to get off to again.”

“Well, you’re the only one who gets to fuck me.” And that was all she wanted and needed him to do right now, to be perfectly honest. She tried to spread her legs a little further still, but it was nearly impossible in this position. The cold air against her wetness made her insides twitch, begging to be filled. She knew he could see the desperation on her face.

“Is that what you want me to do right now, Sol? Fuck you?” He was taunting her, pressing all of her buttons.

“Fuck me, Johnny.” She was breathless and not above begging. “Just fucking fuck me already.”

A hand moved from her thigh, thumb flicking her clit on the way up and her grasped her breast once more, tweaking her nipple just on the borderline between pleasure and pain. She drew air in through her teeth, wrapping one leg around Johnny’s waist and pulling him closer to where she desired him. Another tweak, this time of her other nipple. Then he squeezed her breast, massaging the flesh between his huge, strong fingers.

“Johnny, please.” The tip of his cock was pushing between her nether lips. All she needed was one singular movement from him. “Stop torturing me.”

He pushed himself inside slowly and with precision. Solveig could feel every single fraction of an inch pulling her apart without mercy and her eyes fell shut in bliss. Her fingernails dug into his biceps unintentionally. Taking him bordered on a challenge at times, but combined with her arousal, it made for a perfect fit. Her insides were stretched to a point where her muscles were not properly able to contract around him, and not for a lack of trying.

“Johnny,” she whispered, equal parts relieved and eager for more. She kept her eyes closed and let her head drop forward onto his shoulder, holding onto him tightly, willing to keep him inside her forever.

After allowing her a few more seconds to calm down, he began to move inside her. In and back out, over and over, relentlessly.

“God, Sol,” he soon grunted into her neck. “Hard to believe your cunt’s still this fucking tight after letting me fuck you this often.”

She whimpered in response, eyes still closed, and pulled her second leg up and around his waist too. She used both of her legs to beckon him into her in time with his thrusts.

“Fuck, Johnny.” She could feel her mind slipping a little from being fucked so thoroughly and knew she was beginning to ramble. “Oh God, fuck me, fuck me harder, don’t you dare stop fucking me, I fucking love the way your cock feels inside me, oh God…”

A particularly hard thrust had Solveig opening her eyes, and she turned her head slightly to suck on Johnny’s neck, her unfocused gaze wandering past the door frame, and there –

There was Matt Miller, blue eyes as wide as saucers staring back into her own. He seemed about ready to turn around and run off. Several threads of questions formed in Solveig’s head at once. How long had he been here? Had he heard her begging? Had he heard Johnny saying her name? Would he –?

But Johnny, none the wiser, kept fucking her hard, holding her hips in place now to keep her from sliding backwards on the countertop. And just like that, the moment for her to say anything had passed and her head was clouding again, the pleasure consuming her. Let him watch, if he wanted to. He was basically still a boy. He had probably never got to see a show like this in his life.

So she locked eyes with Matt again. He no longer seemed as intent on leaving as he had moments earlier. Here she was, bare as the day she had been born, getting fucked by Johnny Fucking Gat and letting Matt Miller watch. And not really all that bothered by it.

“Fuck,” Johnny moaned, and Solveig sensed that he was slowly inching towards his orgasm.

So was she. Suddenly, there was a hand on her face, caressing her cheek softly for just a second before two large fingers were bumping against her lips.

“Open up,” he requested, and she obeyed almost mechanically, not a trace of hesitation in her actions. She was unable to hold Matt’s gaze while she caressed the calloused pads of Johnny’s fingers with the tip of her tongue. Instead, she attempted to look into Johnny’s eyes, still partially hidden behind those damned sunglasses. In a short fit of annoyance, she reached up and swiftly removed them. Now finally able to properly look at him, she smiled about as well as she could with his fingers still in her mouth and ran her tongue along the space between them.

Deciding that this was enough, Johnny pulled his hand away, reaching around her and keeping her back upright with the other one. His thrusts inside her had become slower and more emphatic and now, he paused. He pulled her upwards and against him until she was barely even sitting on the counter anymore and almost immediately, she felt a finger pushing against her asshole. She concentrated on relaxing her muscles. Still, her insides contracted for a moment at the intrusion. There was a slight pull that she enjoyed immensely.

“Fuck, Johnny,” she swore, kissing him sloppily and moaning into his mouth. He pulled his finger almost all the way out and pushed it back in, repeating the motion again and again until she whined into his mouth, begging for more without saying it out loud. And this time, he did not leave her high and dry for long. A second finger joined the first, his wrist twisting as he drove them into her. Now spread in two places, Solveig felt deliciously full of him.

All the while, she did not for a second forget the blue eyes resting on her, able to see everything they were doing. She ought to have been humiliated, but instead, the realization made her insides twitch, reminding her of Johnny’s cock and fingers forcing her apart.

Johnny began to fuck her in earnest once more, placing her properly on the counter again. She was sitting on his hand now, fingers scissoring inside her and not allowing the ring of muscles any form of respite.

“Johnny, I…” Her eyes momentarily jerked to Matt’s still expressionless face one last time while she was still able to make sense of what was going on, a wave building up inside her a lapping closer to shore by the second. Then she looked at Johnny again, saw the muscles in his jaw twitching, saw him panting, knew that it was because of her. She pressed an open-mouthed kiss to his lips before throwing her head back, eyes screwing closed. She let one of her hands wander down her own body, its goal that last bit of attention she needed to let loose, but there was another, much larger hand in its way and got there first, two fingers rolling her clit between them, and then she was there, on the precipice of her pleasure.

For what must have been anything from second to minutes, she remained there, unable to make any sound, unable to open her eyes and see, forgetting who she was, no longer knowing her own name.

When she came back to herself, she was holding onto Johnny tightly, pressing him into her, digging her face into his chest. He was holding her in return, waiting for her to come back from wherever her mind had traveled off to. When she did, she had to look down and see his softening cock slipping out of her to know for sure that he too had come.

“Fuck,” she gasped eventually, once she had regained her voice.

“Yeah,” he agreed, laughing a little as he let go of her. “That was fucking amazing.”

She hummed in agreement while he took a few steps away from her and began to open cabinets, apparently searching for something.

Her eyes were drawn to the door frame. No one was there. Now, she was not even all that sure anybody had been there at all. Maybe her imagination had simply provided her with a particularly vivid fantasy tonight. The more she lingered on that thought, the more she believed it.

Johnny returned to her with a few pieces of tissue and helped her off the counter. She was a little unsure on her legs, but able to stand. Gravity had already come forward and together, they cleaned the reminder of their union from the insides of her thighs.

“Thanks,” Solveig mumbled when Johnny helped her back into her clothes. If she had not been tired before, she certainly was now. For just a moment she considered asking Johnny to carry her back to their bed. She bet it would have been lovely to be in his arms like that, feeling very small and appreciated.

But then she thought better of it and said nothing, instead walking next to him quietly on the way to their room where she would be able to fall asleep feeling very small in his embrace either way.

---

About thirty feet air-line distance away Matt Miller lay on his back in his bed, not daring to move at all. His hands were pressed into the mattress on either side of his hips. He was painfully hard inside his pants.

They had improved the performance of the simulation computers to a degree that they did not need non-stop supervision anymore, even when there was someone actively inside virtual Steelport. But tonight – of all times – he had not been able to fall asleep and had gone to check up on everything so he would at least be doing something useful. And then, on the way back, he had seen light spilling from the kitchen into the hall. Thinking someone had forgotten to turn in off, he had not hesitated to enter.

And there they had been, shamelessly fucking in the middle of the kitchen. He had wanted to yell that he was sorry, to run away, to do anything but take a closer look, but her eyes had met his and he had been transfixed.

The boss was a stunning woman, in her very own, wicked way. Matt had thought so ever since he had become part of her team and seen that there was a certain amount of goodness inside her that she tried very hard to hide from the outside observer. But now, he would probably never able to get this new image of her out of his head. Entirely nude, littered in tattoos and scars, her face contorted in pleasure as she was getting fucked by Johnny Gat. A goddess. And she had said nothing. Had let him watch. Had let him see her bliss.

It had never been officially disclosed whether Johnny and the boss were a thing or not, but the members of the crew that had known both of them back in the day had shared their suspicions ever since the boss had returned with Johnny by her side.

Now he knew for sure. He felt the side of his face burning at the memory of her jumping him and punching him in the face when he had voiced his disapproval of her plan to bring Johnny back. And there were more things he remembered. Things from back in Steelport, when he had still been the leader of the Deckers, working against the Saints and using any means necessary in doing so.

And although he was trying desperately not to think about it, a vivid memory weaseled its way past his defenses.

Matt had felt very clever about the cyberspace warfare he had led against her, had thought he would be able to prove himself a worthy leader who would eventually surpass Killbane in power. As such, he had pulled out all the stops to defeat the famed Boss of the Saints, not limited to but including... blaming her for Johnny Gat’s death and then taunting her with it, only weeks after his alleged death.

Even then, when she had still been his enemy and he had not known about any of her romantic inclinations towards Gat, he had known it was cruel.

Now, tonight, in his uncomfortable bed on a tiny spaceship that contained the entirety of what was left of humanity, knowing that the two of them were lovers, he felt so much worse. She was tough, and rarely, if ever, let any emotions show – but he must have hurt her immensely. His boss. Solveig Lundström. Sol, as Johnny had called her.

Matt had known her name ever since he had first looked into her person way back when. She had taken all kinds of measures to obscure her identity, but he had always been very diligent when it came to his job. He supposed Kinzie knew as much as he did, but – just like him – she too respected the Boss too much to let her know what she knew. What Matt knew. What Johnny knew.

He dug the heels of his hands into his closed eyes, trying to drive out the image that returned every time he blinked. The Boss’s face as she let go and fell over the edge. Wicked and divine.

Turning onto his side and squeezing his eyes closed, he willed himself to fall asleep.

He had no right to that image, his guilty conscience told him.

If anybody did, it certainly was not him.

[andrea-odown]

Lessons in Love - Chapter 25

A Sing (2016)-fanfic. Sequel to my story “Keep on Singing”.

Read it on FF.Net and AO3.

Description: After their kiss on stage there’s still so much to figure out for Johnny and Cia. None of them has been in a relationship before, after all.

Chapter 25: Johnny

Johnny isn’t surprised when he receives a text from Ash. What surprises him is that it seems to be a mass text sent out to more people, and - that’s the unusual part - it’s an invitation to meet at her and Lance's place on Friday night.

With a frown he looks at Cia, sitting next to him at the table, eating her breakfast.

Her phone beeped at the same time his did which only strengthens his idea of the message being sent out to other people, too.

“Hey, did you just receive an invitation from Ash, too?” he asks.

Cia nods. “Yeah, I did. Pretty … uhm …”

“Unusual?” he suggests.

“Yeah,” Cia agrees.

“I wonder what’s going on,” Johnny goes on. With Ash’s recent condition - the passing-out, the puking - he can’t help, but be a bit worried. What if Ash is going to tell them that she has some really bad disease, something life-threatening? He’d better not think about that.

So close after his father’s heart attack, he doesn’t even want to think about it.

“Me too,” Cia says.

“Do you think…” He breaks off to take a deep breath. Not wanting to think about it is one thing. Actually managing not to think about it a totally different thing. And he fails.

“Do you think it’s serious? I mean with Ash passing out so much recently and … well, you know.” He sighs again.

Cia looks at him for a moment. “If it were that serious, I think she’d tell us sooner and not wait for the weekend. It’s still four days to go,” she tells him.

Johnny isn’t sure if she actually believes that, but it somehow makes sense. So he decides to go with it.

Although he’s still worrying a bit, and of course, Cia realizes. She always does.

She places a hand on his cheek, her eyes locking with his.

“Don’t worry so much,” she says with a smile, and her smile is so warm and gentle, he simply has to return it.

And then she kisses him. It’s a warm and gentle kiss, just like her smile, but the moment, he wants to deepen it, his phone beeps, and he pulls away.

Usually, a text message wouldn’t keep him from kissing her, but with his father in hospital and Ash’s condition, things have changed a bit.

He can’t wait for life to turn back to normal, though.

“Sorry,” he says to Cia, giving her an apologetic smile.

“It’s fine,” she replies before she continues her breakfast.

Johnny reaches for his phone.

And what he reads makes Ash’s text message drop to the second most surprising text message he received recently.

Because this new text is from Lance.

He wants to meet up with Johnny today.

Johnny can feel the panic rise in his chest again.

He and Lance have never met alone before. What if he wants to tell Johnny that Ash is just playing it cool again while in reality she’s really, really sick and he wants to tell Johnny beforehand because…

Well, why would Lance do that?

Because he needs someone to talk to?

Johnny can only presume, but he’s sure Lance has better friends than Johnny to talk about such a serious matter. If he and Lance can be called friends at all.

Because Johnny is Ash’s best friend and thus deserves to know the truth?

Could be, but no. It sounds a bit far-fetched. If anything, Ash would tell him the truth, not Lance.

Which leaves Johnny with no explanation at all.

Lance’s text is still weird, and Johnny decides that he isn’t good at handling weird right now.

But he doesn’t want to let Lance down either.

So he types his reply and sends it.

Sure, when?

Lance’s reply comes a second later.

2 at the mall okay for you?

Johnny can’t say it is okay because that’s usually the time he visits his dad. But there’s something about the way Lance texted him - or that Lance texted him at all - that tells him he’d better say yes.

Perfect! See you!

When he’s waiting for Lance to show up, Johnny tries to fight that uneasy feeling down, but fails. And so the uneasy feeling increases and contributes to his wish that he’d prefer to visit his dad.

But before he can think more about it, Lance shows up.

“Hi Johnny!” he greets with a little wave of his hand.

“Hello!” Johnny replies, searching Lance’s face for a sign of what is going on.

The porcupine makes no move to start talking and looks a bit nervous which only adds to Johnny’s uneasy feeling.

“So, what’s up?” Johnny finally asks when Lance still doesn’t say anything.

“It’s Ash,” Lance says with a sigh, lowering his eyes to the ground. “She’s …”

Dying?

Deathly ill?

Undergoing some serious surgery?

Johnny hates that Lance breaks off right there!

“She’s …,” Lance starts again, only to break off again.

Johnny is this close to grab Lance and shake him!

Lance takes a deep breath and looks up, searching Johnny’s eyes.

“You gotta promise not to tell anyone that I told you that,” Lance says. “It’s supposed to be a secret until Friday.”

“I promise!” Johnny says quickly, still fighting down the urge to shake Lance.

He wants to know what’s going on. He needs to know!

“Okay,” Lance says, lowering his eyes again. “Ash is -” Johnny holds his breath in anticipation - “pregnant.”

Johnny blinks a few times before the full impact of what Lance just said hit him.

“Really?” he says as all the tension melts away from him.

Ash isn’t going to die, Ash isn’t seriously ill.

No, Ash is pregnant!

This information brings a big grin to Johnny’s face.

“That’s amazing!” he calls out. “Congrats, Lance!”

He puts a hand on Lance’s shoulder, giving it a pat.

“Thanks,” Lance replies, looking at Johnny with a little smile. “But you have to tone down that grin. You aren’t supposed to know anything.”

Johnny’s eyes widen for a moment before he speaks up, “Yeah, yeah, sure!”

He tries his best and manages to get the corner of his mouth down. At least a bit.

“There you go!” Lance says with a little laugh, and Johnny laughs a bit, too.

“Now, let’s get to business,” Lance goes on, and suddenly, he seems nervous again.

It’s the moment Johnny realizes that of course there must be more to this. Lance didn’t want to meet just to tell him that Ash is pregnant. That could have waited till Friday.

“Okay,” Johnny says.

Lance takes another deep breath.

“The thing is …,” he starts before he breaks off again.

Johnny doesn’t feel the urge to shake Lance that much now that he knows that Ash is alright, but it’s still there. He really wants to know what it is that makes Lance so nervous.

Lance clears his throat. “I want to ask Ash to marry me.”

“That’s great!” Johnny calls out, and the grin is back on his face.

Again, Lance replies with a little smile. “Thanks,” he says. “And that’s where you come in. Do you think you could help me choose an engagement bracelet for her? You’re her best friend, and I really could need some help because, well, I’m not sure if I can do it alone.”

“Of course!” Johnny replies happily.

“Thanks, man,” Lance says. “And Johnny?”

“Yes?”

“Remember, you gotta tone that grin down.”

“Oh yeah, sure! Sorry!”

Johnny thinks he’s doing a good job on toning that grin down. Whenever Cia catches him humming and smiling and asks why he’s so happy he replies that it’s because his dad is doing better.

Which isn’t a lie.

It’s one of the reasons he’s in such a good mood. Although this means that his dad is going to be moved back to jail soon. Which he doesn’t like that much, but Johnny decided he’d rather have a healthy father in jail than having a sick dad at the hospital.

When Cia and he are on their way to Ash and Lance’s, it is really hard for Johnny to act like he’s still worried. Or at least act like he’s not happy and excited.

He’s doing a reasonable job, he thinks. Cia doesn’t get suspicious.

He only hopes that Ash is going to break the news soon because he isn’t sure how long he can keep this up.

He patiently waits in the living room as the others arrive. He only shares a look with Lance every once in a while. Of course when no one else is looking.

They are all there - Rosita, Gunter, Meena, Mike and Nancy, Mr. Moon, Eddie, and even Ms. Crawly who is finally able to walk again although she still needs crutches. Since she doesn’t have a mobile phone Johnny can only guess that Ash personally invited her - or had Mr. Moon do that.

Anyways, Johnny is fine that Ms. Crawly is doing better, too. Ever since his dad ended up in hospital he hasn’t been able to visit her.

So he walks up to her and starts a little conversation, and Ms. Crawly is as nice and caring as always.

But when Ash clears her throat, Johnny’s attention is with her immediately.

Finally! Now he can stop acting soon!

“Okay, guys,” she says, “you all may be wondering why I called you here. As some of you know, I haven’t been so well recently, and there’s a reason for that.”

Johnny is biting down on the inside of his cheeks. Everyone else looks concerned, so he really can’t start smiling now!

Ash lets her eyes glide over her guests, and Johnny bites down on the inside of his cheeks a bit more.

No smiling, Johnny!

And suddenly, there’s a smile on Ash’s face as she says, “I’m pregnant!”

There’s a moment of silence, and then suddenly there’s laughter and congratulations.

Johnny is glad that he can finally allow his mouth to turn into a big grin. He’s been fighting it down for way too long!

“Are you going to get married?” Rosita asks, and Johnny immediately looks at Lance whose eyes widen a bit.

His hand disappears in his pocket, Johnny knows that he’s fumbling for the bracelet. Johnny even watches how Lance is moving, about to get down on his knee, but then, Ash blows a raspberry.

"Are you kidding me!?" she calls out. "Marriage is for the establishment, not for free spirits like Lance and me!"

Johnny feels a pang in his heart as he watches how Lance simply shoots back into a standing position.

Luckily, no one seems to have realized.

Except for Johnny himself, of course.

And he feels for Lance, actually, he’s really sorry for him.

Johnny can only hope that it shows in the look he’s giving Lance before he turns his attention back to Ash.

And with that, the smile is back on his face.

It doesn’t feel so appropriate anymore, though.

But he keeps it up.

He’s good at this after all.

[3one3]

The Sequel - 789

Chelsea, England

André Schürrle, Juan Mata, other Chelsea players, and random awesome OC’s

(okay they’re less random now but they’re still pretty awesome)

original epic tale

all chapters of The Sequel

“You know what’s funny? Schü and I went on our first date at the restaurant here, if you don’t count the lunches and dinners we had in Florida when I was 100% positive he was 100% not interested in having sex with me.”

“What, you thought he was interested in having riding lessons with you?”

“No. I don’t know. I just thought he was bored or something.”

“Remarkable.”

“Shut up.”

“I’m getting another drink.”

“Ohmetoo! Same again, please, thank you.”

Juan deliberately bumped into Christina’s arm so her elbow would fall off the table when he got up to go to the bar. Their watering hole of choice for a rainy Monday night was the basement for a trendy Shoreditch boutique hotel. She wanted to see Juan because two weeks of horse showing and visiting André meant two weeks without any friend-dates, and he wanted to go out. Christina rode the horses that weren’t in Zurich with her over the weekend and then took Lukas shopping in the city. Mostly they were out for food. She wanted to visit her favorite market to get some really good meat and produce to cook with while she was home for a few days. Prolonged exposure to hotel food often did that to her. The little boy “helped” her make blueberry and oats muffins. He thought chia seeds were magic. Stirring them in water and watching it turn to gel was so much fun for him. Using magical ingredients in place of others to make her baked goods more healthy was so much fun for his mom. So was experimenting with cocktails in a rather plainly decorated but colorfully lit bar and music venue. Her drink of choice was made from Aperol, Bombay Sapphire, Campari, grapefruit juice, and ginger ale. Juan placed her second one down beside her cheese plate. She forgot to schedule dinner between baking and getting dressed to go out.

“What are you having?” she asked him curiously when the next glass to touch down on the table was not the same as the stemware his first drink was served in.

“Johnnie Walker.”

“Ew.”

“Do you want to stay for whatever the musical act is or do you have a curfew?” the footballer inquired from the relaxed posture immediately resumed upon returning to his seat. Juan was in a pretty good mood. A slight blip at White Hart Lane was wiped away with a win at home against Hull after almost every team in the large chasing pack managed to stumble and distance themselves even further from Chelsea’s heels. They also recovered from some Diego Costa drama. Everything was great. The Spaniard also just took on another marketing project- his father’s restaurant. Perhaps most obviously in terms of reasons for him to be relaxed, was his happiness at Christina being back in town and available to hang out.

“I don’t really care,” she told him with grilled sourdough in one hand and her cocktail in the other. “Espen is staying over to do Lukas in the morning because I have a shoot, so it doesn’t matter when I get home.” The bar under the Ace Hotel was known for its 7-days-a-week live entertainment and late nights. Some nights it was more like a packed club. On Monday at a little after 9 it was just a bar with some people really pushing the limits of “after work drinks”, and a few little conclaves whose lives evidently afforded them the freedom to go out for boozing and lounging on weeknights. If there was a crowd coming specifically to see whomever the scheduled artists were, they weren’t there yet.

“Who or what are you shooting for?”

“A German horse magazine. I did the interview in Leipzig so they’re just coming to do the pictures, which evidently necessitates having some people from adidas come dress me.” Three-to-one he’s saying something like “In that case, you should sleep over and let me UNdress you” in his head, the brunette in leather leggings surmised. She rubbed a square paper napkin between her fingers to get rid of crumbs, and then flipped her hair over its part, removing it from her face.

“What was the last legitimately interesting interview question you were asked? I get the same ones over and over for years.”

“I don’t know.” Her nose wrinkled a little on its own volition, and she paused with her drink on its way to her mouth. “I kind of don’t pay attention anymore. I don’t even think about the answers, let alone the questions. I haven’t given a consciously honest interview in...more than a year, probably. I used to care. I used to always try to be brutally honest. I’m tired of the same questions over and over, as you say, and I think I was tired of having to share so much of myself. I used to like being really transparent. It was important to me. It was also emotionally exhausting. People used to find it novel and fun and refreshing and then after a while they just tried to use it against me all the time, so F that. If you’re going to twist everything I say and make drama, I’m not going to give real answers anymore.”

“I have a very serious and important question for you, cariña.” Juan’s lips stayed flat and un-emotive, but his eyes sparkled with his typical kind of guile. Christina raised a brow to invite him to make his inquiry. “When are you making me fried chicken?”

“Wednesday!” She sat back in her boxy wood chair and smiled like the cat who got the canary, even as she licked spicy cranberry jam off her thumb. “I got a bunch of fresh chicken today. I’ll make the buttermilk up for it tomorrow so it can soak overnight. You can make yourself free for Wednesday dinner, yes?” It was novel to have the ability and opportunity to surprise the player.

“For the fried chicken, yes, absolutely.”

“Good. I’m going to invite Nat and the kids too, and Eden I guess. Otherwise I have too much leftover chicken and not enough days to eat it.”

“Why are you so giggly?” The Chelsea man was skeptical about his ex-girlfriend’s persistent, gaping smile. The giggles were in her eyes too, and even in her skin. She was a little red from her off-the-shoulder sweater all the way up to her cheeks. “You look like you’re keeping a secret. Are you going to use some weird, healthy, disgusting ingredient to bread the chicken and be like “Surprise! It tastes as good but it’s really...seaweed flour”?” She used her newly re-cleaned fingers to shake her hair back where it belonged, and pinched some of the length between her index and pointer fingers to gesture with it at her friend.

“You are as paranoid about food as Schü. I made chunky mashed potatoes while I was in Dortmund and trying to save Stef and Mario’s relationship with an intimate dinner for four, and he was like smell testing the bowl because he was sure I snuck cauliflower in with the potatoes.” Christina used her little cheese knife to get some soft Brie for her next piece of bread, but she hardly broke eye contact to do it, and her smirk remained.

“Seriously. You’ve been borderline giddy all evening, with the exception of talking about interview questions.” The player’s head tilted to his right, like a dog might do when he’s asked a question or wishes to ask one of his human. “Do you have some secret you’re keeping?” She thought absently that he might have assumed she was concealing some seduction plot for later on. That wasn’t the case. She did make her underwear choices with the possibility of that sort of thing in mind, but it wasn’t made up yet as to whether or not she wanted to get into that.

A curious thing happened on her visit to Dortmund. It became apparent that sleeping with someone else a couple of times made sleeping with her husband again way better than usual. There was no telling why, or what was even different about it. It just felt good, physically and emotionally. The parts that were supposed to be special felt special, and the parts that were supposed to make her melt into a warm soup of satisfaction did that too, on a level higher than the equivalent experiences just a week or so earlier. André enjoyed it too. He had that inevitable sense of relief that his girl didn’t seem in any way tainted, or spoiled. Her visit was much too short for his liking but much better than he expected, in part because they stayed in bed for a lot of it. Still, Christina was wary of the concept of rushing to Juan’s bed the minute she had the free time and opportunity. And that definitely wasn’t what had her smiling out of her pores.

“What did you do yesterday again?” she asked back of her friend, with a concerted effort to squeeze her brows discerningly and questioningly- an act to try to suppress the smirking. “Remind me.” The Spaniard was confused.

“I went to Paris with Taylor, to look for a book she wants. And to eat. I told you this.” His burlier brows were pinched too, because he didn’t understand her line of questioning or what it had to do with her cocktail-infused perma-smiles.

“And what didn’t you do, that you otherwise normally would on a Sunday when your BFF is competing?”

“Watch the stream?”

“Nah, more normally than that. I know you don’t always watch,” she laughed.

“I didn’t wish you luck. I was trying to give T my attention all day, and you made it pretty clear last week that you didn’t want to talk about-“

“Relax!” There was persistent, tame laughter in the face of the player’s self defense. “I’m not complaining. I’m not asking what you didn’t do like I’m mad about it. Use your head, Juanin,” Christina challenged. He grew desperate without a clue what she was trying to get him to deduce or conclude. The violent shaking around of the ice in his glass matched the almost perturbed look in his eyes. I’ll put him out of his misery, I suppose. “You didn’t ask me how the qualifier went!”

“Like I said, you made it seem like you didn’t want-“

“I’m not complaining! I’m just trying to tell you that I won! That I’m happy because Dirk was excellent and absolutely perfect and we won the qualifier. Derp.” The rider folded her left leg up to put her platform sneaker flat on her seat, and continued to look devious above the rim of her drink, which she then sipped carefully in hopes that her friend’s face wouldn’t contort in any more comical ways that might make her laugh and thus choke.

“Oh, fantastic. Well why didn’t you just say that from the beginning!” He remained perturbed and appeared even frazzled. This delighted his ex. He looks like someone has done him some injustice, she thought. He’s incredulous but I think it’s actually because he’s upset with himself for not asking me about the horse show. I’m sure he did remember that I said last week not to talk about horse showing because last week was a hellacious nightmare of calamity and it wasn’t even my fault, but I bet he still meant to at least ask how the show went, she worked out in her head while reaching over to shove him in the arm- a teasing gesture. Either way, he is so cute when he’s off his game, or when anything unexpected happens, really.

“I’m trying not to make a big deal out of wins,” she demurred, her own composure regained and her cocktail half gone. “They never used to be a big deal. It was just normal to win. So I’m treating it like a normal thing, in hopes that it actually becomes normal again. Kind of like the US media and Donald Trump. But yes, I am in a good mood, and- Actually, hold up for just a second.” Christina raised one finger and took a deep breath. “I want to amend my previous statement. The winning part isn’t so important, or the normal thing. The performance is. D-Money was uhhmazing. He had wings and turbo boosters and FRIC suspension. But that use-“

“What suspension?”

“FRIC. Front and Rear InterConnected, for F1. Mercedes developed it at the end of the V8 era and Ferrari complained and complained until Charlie decided it was illegal. You know how roll bars link the front right to the front left and the rear right to the rear left? FRIC was a hydraulic system designed to connect front and rear, to work like a roll bar but for pitch, to try to keep ride height stable. I trust I don’t need to explain why that would be advantageous.”

“You’re an insufferable know-it-all at times, cariña. Stop knowing things you have no right to know,” Juan insisted. He also tried somewhat halfheartedly to get the attention of a waitress who was less than halfheartedly committed to doing her job.

“This isn’t even like uber nerd level F1 knowledge. It was discussed on TV. Ted Kravitz probably explained it on his iPad in a phone booth or something.”

“What?”

“Never mind. We should go to a race together this year though.” Christina briefly considered righting her most relaxed posture in the broad chair when the waitress walked up to the table. She felt like she was relaxing on a couch at home, and ordinarily that wasn’t an acceptable state of being for her in a bar, but it was awfully comfortable. She just looked up at the young woman instead, and then over at Juan, since she didn’t know what he summoned her for.

“She needs a piece of cake, or a tart, or something like that.”

“No I don’t.”

“Yes you do. She does,” he nodded at the server.

“I have a pecan tart with vanilla mascarpone and blackcurrants, toffee pudding with ginger ice cream, ice cream by itself, roasted pineapple with fresh passion fruit and coconut sorbet, and chocolate and brioche butter pudding with rum raisin ice cream.”

“You want the thing with the chocolate?” The player looked at Christina with large and innocent, almost childlike eyes. He clearly believed some celebration was necessary despite her explicit wish to downplay her World Cup qualifier result, or the performance that earned it, as it were. She had no interest in dessert of any kind but his expression was too cute and genuine to deny. The idea of seeing his face fall- of disappointment moving in- was too terrible. Instead the rider nodded to the waitress and held up two fingers to request two spoons. If he was making her have bread pudding and ice cream, he was going to have to eat some too, and she was sure he’d have no objections. “You’re already having a fizzy drink so I didn’t think champagne was an adequate celebration,” he explained once the girl left with the empty glasses from their first round. Christina stared at the part of the table freed up. There was a minimalist depiction of a constellation there. All the tables had them- white drawings on the dark gray tabletops, giving a hint of the celestial about the place. Each table had a very melty white candle in the middle too.

“No celebration is necessary, but okay.”

“Good.”

“I’m gonna need to go home after dessert though because food coma. I’m already full of cheese.” Christina reached for another block of semi-hard British cheese in defiance of her own decree.

“My home.”

“Oh you think so?” she chuckled.

“I know so.” The Chelsea midfielder nodded just one time and a clever smirk spread across his jaw, doing away with all the confusion, bafflement, and innocence of before. She looked all around their table to assess who might be looking, and hurled a piece of cheese in the direction of his face. It bounced off his cheek and chin and ended up in his lap.

“You’re so cheesy!”

“You’re so happy you’re drunk even though you’re not drunk,” he told her while he ate her harmless artillery. “It’s a little weird. I forgot what it’s like. I only see you this happy when you’re naked and sweating. And that’s a different kind of happy.”

“Shhhhhhhhh!”

Juan assured her no one was or could be listening, and that was probably true. The tables immediately surrounding them were empty. They were populated slowly over the course of their dessert eating and a third and final round of drinks. The volume of people showing up late for the band was a surprise to both of them, and kind of unwelcome. Juan had picked that spot for its relative emptiness and super relaxed atmosphere. Nobody bothered him there. It was almost like the bar had a regular crowd and they didn’t care what new people popped in as long as they didn’t change that chilled out atmosphere. That changed with the hour. Christina also couldn’t bear to sit still for a minute longer, or wear all her clothes, for that matter. She was a little drunk and a lot full and very tired, and for her that necessitated comfortable and/or minimal clothing and lying down.

The duo of intoxicated friends took a cab back to Juan’s. Christina was committed to hanging there for a while regardless of anything he might have had in mind about her being naked and sweating, purely because she drank too much to drive and needed that recovery period for the food too. There was couch spooning, and she found a triple play of episodes of The Tudors, and spent much of the first one explaining her Henry VIII era fetish- her self-proclaimed strange obsession with kings and other royal folk sleeping with anyone they wanted, by charm, coercion, or brute force, the “boobs in the face” costumes no doubt scandalized by Hollywood, and the idea of having sex in Victorian-draped beds. The player told her she just had a rape fetish, which she vehemently denied. Her rebuttal also included a thesis about women actually having all the power over the king of many wives. The fact that half of them ended up dead didn’t sway her. To her, Henry VIII was just a hopeless romantic, not in that he behaved like a particularly romantic gent, but in that he fell in love or lust with pretty much everybody and couldn’t keep it in his pants. The male heir problem didn’t figure into her theory. She liked The Tudors because it included all the soap opera drama with just enough of the authentic violence to elevate it above actual soap operas. Also, she thought Jonathan Rhys Meyers was really sexy as a brooding, womanizing king.

“Hoooooow can you enjoy this show?” Juan whined to her halfway through the second episode. She’d been quiet for a while and thus afforded him the opportunity to actually pay attention to the program, and to playing with her hair. “All that happens is two or three people have a quiet conversation about another person betraying someone, then clergy members threaten people or get threatened, and a young man in poofy sleeves flirts offensively with a blushing girl with her breasts in his face. It just goes on repeat. Same thing over and over.” He spoke quietly and tiredly, and he was losing motivation to remain upright on his elbow behind the rider, his head beginning to tip backward into the rear cushion.

“I don’t see how that can be a bad thing. Those are all dramatic and interesting things. There’s a trial coming! This is the kind of shit that goes down when you marry your brother’s wife and then want to bang somebody younger and hotter and need permission from the Pope. The Queen has such pretty jewels. I think Dolce ripped off the costume designers for this show.” Christina insisted on silence for the tense trial before some representatives of the Pope, and Juan nearly fell asleep. He did abandon holding his head up, and laid it down on double stacked pillows behind her. The episode finished when the trial didn’t really go as planned for Henry and his treasonous confidant.

“What else happened this weekend that I didn’t remember to ask about?” the Spaniard questioned with a sleepy yawn. He was more interested in playing with her fingers in his hand in front of her chest than he was in whatever would happen in the third and final episode. It was past both of their bedtimes.

“Tim got an offer for a book deal. A publisher wants me to do a book about...me, I guess. He said they have some writers in mind to help with it and I could use the time between now and the Olympics to meet with them and pick one, and then we’d do it after the games. I’m not interested.”

“Your career is too young to be in a book.”

“I agree.”

“Why do you think it went better this time, baby girl? Can I ask that?”

“I have no idea. I was by myself but I doubt that matters. Hey, I have a question for you.” Christina shifted from her side to her back to ask her question, because she wanted to see his face when he answered. It wasn’t going to be an easy question, however. It was one she felt slightly uncomfortable asking, but deeply curious about the response. Juan didn’t seem wont to let go of her hand, which he held loosely by a couple of fingers, so she just moved it to her stomach, over his sweatshirt that she borrowed for coziness’ sake. He sat up on his elbow again. “You’ve slept with Taylor since we were last together, right?” He nodded and his right eyebrow kind of twitched, which she read as confusion about why she was asking that specific question, and maybe what her feelings about the answer were. But that wasn’t the answer she was most curious about. It was just part of the set up. “Was it better than usual, or not as good? Or the same?”

“Why?”

“I don’t know,” she fibbed, averting her eyes from the sleepy blue ones studying her at close range. The ceiling was a fine safe harbor for hers.

“Yes you do.” The Chelsea creator released her fingers to move some hair from her face, in case she was trying to hide under that too. He uncovered her right eye, previously protected by a curtain of pure cacao. She’d parted her root-boosted and very soft, shiny hair far to the left, which meant there was always some hanging in front of her face. Juan’s pointer finger must have liked the way it felt. He continued combing the relocated strands by her temple.

“I’m just wondering.”

“Why are you wondering? “I don’t know”.” A baby smile accompanied his mocking impression.

“Why does it matter? Whatever I say, you’re going to assume I just want reassurance that you like being with me better.”

“Why do you say that? I don’t assume that. I do assume you already know I’d rather be with you. I’ve made that clear to you, cariña, haven’t I?” The faint but authentic little smile morphed into faint consternation. I have bitten off more than I wanted to chew, Christina reflected. It wasn’t that she couldn’t chew her piece. She just didn’t want to have to. She wished she’d gone for something less substantial.

“Can you just answer my question, and maybe I’ll tell you why depending on the answer.”

“It’s not any different.”

“Okay.”

“Now tell me why.”

“No.”

“Is it not good with him anymore?”

He can hardly contain himself, the rider thought when she gave in and peeked to her left- when she made eye contact. There was eagerness looking back at her, and someone on the verge of validation. I didn’t even think of that. He thinks I’m asking because I don’t like sleeping with Schü anymore, and that that means something. Something good for him. Now I have to crush him and tell him it’s the opposite? How do I always get myself into these stupid emotional quandaries? Ever since I got a fox tattooed on my person my cleverness and cunning have steadily waned. Perhaps my baby fox is growing up and he’s stealing my foxy qualities so that he can be a complete, adult fox. Christina reached for the inky fox cub in the top hat on her wrist and inadvertently chewed her lip. The Spaniard gently nudged her toward giving an answer.

“If you spend three minutes before you answer, I know you don’t say the truth, baby girl.”

“It’s better. It’s amazing. I was hoping you’d say the same so that we could talk about it, but now I realize how stupid that is,” she sighed, eyes back on the ceiling and thus with no idea whether her friend’s face registered disappointment or not. “You wanted me to say it’s bad now.”

“It’s not stupid. You can talk to me about anything.”

“I know I can, but that doesn’t mean I should.”  

“Beautiful girl,” Juan mumbled, his gaze still very much trained on her, and her impending dismissive reaction. “Don’t roll your eyes at me.”

“Don’t try to get me out of my own stupidity with an empty compliment,” Christina mumbled back.

“I wasn’t, and it’s not empty. You are objectively a beautiful girl, and to me, more than that.” He used his thumb to gently push on her temple and encourage her to turn her head towards him a bit. “Stay tonight,” he implored when she finally looked his way.

“Do I look like I’m going anywhere?” The rider let her bent knees tip over against him, and pushed her pout out for a kiss. She got the innocent sort she was after- the kind that punctuates a decision, or seals an agreement. Hollow as her head said his compliments were, her heart disagreed. His face being that close to her and his hand touching her and his voice near enough to vibrate off her instead of just resonate in her ears could give her heart veto power over her head- could let irrationality and romanticism overrule skepticism and reluctance. Christina lived her life through a filter of skepticism and reluctance. They were like guiding principles. They came naturally to her, by instinct. She was dubious about everything and the reluctance came as a consequence of her never wanting to be wrong, and never wanting to disappoint anyone. Everyone in her life that she loved dearly, be it as a partner, a lover, or friend, and including the horses she was closest to, was able to lure her out of skepticism and reluctance and allow her to indulge the irrational and revel in the romantic. To have a close and endeared relationship with Christina required being able to give her a holiday from her own personality. That was why her relationship with herself was often so rocky. Juan made her want to believe in his compliments.

“Ready for bed?”

“Only if you’re gonna carry me there. I’m too tired to move. My body is already sleeping,” she smiled. It would take more than telling her she was beautiful and giving her a smooch to turn off the sarcasm-dependent part of her personality, which relied on humor to save her from overly intense moments.

“You want me to wake it up?” The footballer withdrew his delicate touch from near her temple and placed his palm on her stomach instead, where the borrowed gray, white, and black sweatshirt was all bunched up from her various wiggles and twists. She warned him not to tickle, and he promised that he meant alternative methods of rousing her body from its figurative slumber. That garnered more eye rolling, so then she did get tickled, and when she was about to tip over that well known line between laughing hysterically and suffering a literal fit of giggles, and not being able to breathe, stomach pain, and panic, her scruffy-faced tormenter actually did pick her up to carry her to bed- only Christina was uncooperative. She ended up being carried predominantly by her butt, with her arms around the back of his neck and one bare leg trying desperately to hold around his waist so she wouldn’t fall, is if she were ever in jeopardy. He set her safely down on her feet near his bathroom door so she could make use of her new toothbrush, or wash her face, but the reigning World Cup champion just got into bed and asked for a t-shirt, since there was no chance she was sleeping in the sweatshirt in his already too hot room, engulfed in the too hot featherbed, covered with the too hot comforter, next to his too hot body.

Juan supplied one of his teeny tiny black tees but tried to stop her from actually putting it on. She intended to take the sweatshirt off, put the shirt on, and then unhook her bra and fish it out. He unhooked the two clasps on the strapless lace garment in one go before she even got the shirt over her head, and just rubbed her back when she turned to scold him in the other half of the bed. There was no act or game afoot. She didn’t really feel like cashing in on André’s understanding again that night. She still went pretty willingly when he used that hand on her back to try to pull her close, and she still let him kiss her with more invention than the prior liplock on the couch.

“Beautiful girl,” the player repeated from close enough that his nose was still touching hers.

“Not tonight, okay?” Christina didn’t move to stop him, or even to put some distance between them. She was still but for tilting her head a bit to kiss one side of his mouth apologetically. He closed his left arm around her waist to stop her from moving away anyway.

“Why?” he asked without disappointment. His nose glanced across her smaller one on his way to giving her another kiss, with his whole mouth.

“I’m tired, and I don’t like the optics,” she explained once given autonomy over her lips again.

“What optics?”

“The I don’t see you for a couple of weeks and the first thing I do is go out with you, spoon on your couch, and have sex optics. It’s like I was gone and busy for two weeks and then hurried to have a date or something.”

“Why do you care what it looks like? That’s like telling yourself what you want isn’t right. We’re the only ones who see. Shouldn’t you be more concerned with wanting it than how it looks?”

“But I don’t want it- that’s what I’m saying.” Oof now I feel bad, and awkward, Christina cringed to herself, imagining that her best friend felt as if he put in all the legwork throughout the night- taking her out, getting her drinks and dessert, suffering through her TV shows so they could cuddle and chit-chat, laying on the tender compliments, getting her to agree to spend the night- and wasn’t getting anything for it. “I’m sorry. I can still go home if you want.”

“Why would I want that?”

“Because you asked me to stay so we can fuck, and-“

“When did I say that?” The player reached for the top of her thigh with the hand that wasn’t on her waist. She was sort of half sitting Indian-style and half leaned over on her hands by his lap from his pulling her closer. He kneaded halfway between her knee and hip, and kissed persuasively at her mouth, which still opened a little for him despite her stated disinterest. The hair around his lips scratched and tickled against her skin. I feel almost a little like catnip, like when the cat gets the little bag of it and rubs his face all over it, but Juanin is slightly less intoxicated by it than a kitty gets. “Hmm?”

“What?” the expat managed to get out before his lips were trying to engage hers again. His tongue staying in its confines made communication, with words anyway, easier than it otherwise could have been.

“When did I ask you to stay so I can fuck you?”

“Why are you-“ Her opportunities to speak were still pretty limited by his slow and soft kissing, however. “Kissing me...and squeeze...my butt...if that’s not what you meant?”

“Why are you kissing me back if you meant not tonight?” the Spaniard questioned before poking his head out more to make sure his face stayed pressed to hers one way or another if she was going to sit up or pull back. Because she didn’t do either of those things, his lips hit hers with a bit more force and she read that as willful intent rather than a physical consequence. I should be more careful with what I say to him about liking when he’s in control, and that whole rape fetish thing. She finally checked out mentally on the smooching and Juan noticed. “We don’t have to have sex,” he assured, nonchalant and casual but still face to face- quite literally, really, with his forehead pushed into hers. “I want you to stay. I missed your body, baby girl- touching, holding, watching it. So beautiful. My angel. Come here,” he whispered while pulling her all the way over with him so they both ended up laying down- him on pillows and her on him. Soon she felt his warm and careful palm moving aimlessly around the small of her back, and the bottom of her butt lifted up. The constant kissing actually stopped. The scruffy face was pressed to her left cheek, and she could feel breath on the top of her shoulder in the form of a contented exhale. And she had no idea what she wanted, or if Juan literally meant he just wanted to touch her or if he was alluding to more than that and thought he could turn her on and change her mind by talking about it that way. Her soft and susceptible core could only withstand so many whispered “baby girls” and “my angels” before shifting.

“Why am I so beautiful tonight, hm?” she inquired, just to buy some time to figure out what she wanted. A little part of her conscience was afraid her best friend found her extra attractive that night because she was so obviously happy. When André told her she looked better happy it annoyed her and she counted it as a strike against him. And yet...I have 100% always found Juanin irresistibly hot when he’s really, really happy and smiley.

“You’re always beautiful.”

“Uhhuh.”

“I said already. I missed you, cariña. We sleep together like 4 times and then you don’t let me see you for 17 days.”

“Aww you counted,” Christina chuckled in his loving hold. She lifted her chin off the front of his shoulder to turn and smooch his cheek. “I can’t allow too much access, or demand will diminish.”

“I assure you it will not.”

“Seriously, and I don’t ask out of vanity, but curiosity- what to you is beautiful? Why is my body so beautiful to you? And don’t give me any bullshit about my abs making you think about my orgasms,” she warned while trying to figure out where to put her arms and hands.

“Your hair is beautiful. I love your hair when you do things with it. Every time you touch it. Your eyes are beautiful and you know it. Your nose, and your lips, and your chin- all beautiful together. Your thighs to me are amazing- the shape, the tone, the skin- all about them. The way you do everything is beautiful to me. You exist and I watch and you’re beautiful, cariña.” Juan explained, his delicate touch still roaming around some of her beautiful parts. He was a little bit flippant about his assessment, like he was amused that she wanted specifics. But most of all he sounded appreciative, and casual. He wasn’t trying to make a romantic declaration, or oversell his answer to make her want more.

“Thank you? Is that what a girl is supposed to say when you tell her her existence is beautiful?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You’re pretty too.”

“Thanks,” Juan laughed. He also moved both hands to her waist, spread them wide, and let them massage their way up her torso. She felt his legs circle around her knees too. It was not an unpleasant way to be immobilized. “Do you want your cashmere blanket to sleep with?”

“In lieu of the comforter or in addition?”

“Either.”

“Are you going to sleep in it with me if I choose in lieu?”

“Yes.”

“Is there jizz on it?”

“No,” the player scoffed. He turned to frown and shake his head at her, and took her poking finger prisoner. It had been poking at the dent in the base of his neck. Taking it was just an excuse to engage with her hand, and his digits were laced between hers a couple of seconds later. The whole concept of lying together and just touching and feeling made her curious again, but the second time it was about something that also gave her trepidation. She couldn’t help but wonder if her friend regularly shared the same activity with his girlfriend in that bed, and if he was so enamored with her body too.

“Do you stop Taylor from putting clothes on and hold her hostage atop your body just to...enjoy hers?”

“Why do you always ask me questions you don’t really want answers to, cariña?” Juan used his hold on her hand to bring it to his cheek, to press the back of it into his scruff and keep it there.

“Insatiable curiosity.”

“While I believe with all of my heart that you have insatiable curiosity, you and I both know that has nothing to do with it,” he scolded.

“If I say yes to the sex can I get out of the lecture you’re about to deliver?”

“No lecture. Take your beautiful body over to that chair and get your blanket.” In yet another surprising and impressive demonstration of the Spaniard’s ability to multitask, he simultaneously removed her hand from his cheek so that he could give it a little kiss, and let go of her side to pat her butt encouragingly. She got up to follow instructions and he got up to fold the comforter out of the way. He left it close enough that they could still tuck their feet under it. Christina wrapped herself up in the expansive navy James Perse blanket and then climbed clumsily over his body back to her spot. I kind of want to be held hostage aga- The thought was hardly complete before Juan invaded her blanket and made sure his also beautiful body was as close to hers as it could be. He rubbed his right hand up and down the outside of her left thigh- possessively almost- and then pulled her leg over his hip and let his palm rest further up, on her butt. The rider did her best to get some of her blanket over him.

“I need to set my alarm still,” she reminded while moving her head around to try to figure out where she was in relation to the nearest pillow.

“You need to talk with me more still.”

“Yeah? Why’s that?” Now I’m a hostage of him AND this blanket and its over my head and I can’t see and I don’t know where my pillow is and he’s making my thong go too far up my ass. Oh, there. Pillow.

“I like talking with you. I like when your voice is the last thing on my mind before I sleep.”

“Have I not been talking to you for the last 5 hours?”  

“Yes.” The Chelsea player who moved one of his large square pillows for her so that they could share it settled in, seemingly for the long haul. He was very close inside the cashmere, and the enshrouding made it possible for Christina to pick up the faintest whiff of Scotch on his breath. It was sweet and woody, in contrast to the citrus and spice of the stuff André liked. It was hard not to think of the German in that situation. She loved that lingering whisky flavor when she kissed him.

“What else do you want to talk about?” Besides sex, my body, and kissing.

“Whatever,” her friend shrugged.

“Let’s talk about how Trump is going to start a war with Iran and we’re all gonna die.”

“Perhaps there is a more...light subject you could come up with for bedtime.”

“Talk to me about football.” Because the only thing mein Schü will tell me about football is how angry he is about it all the time, and I love hearing about football, and I’m annoyed that we’re right back where we were in footballing terms a year ago, only now we’re living in different countries and upending our lives for football. “And I’ll talk about it back. About Chelsea. England.”