#so he had to. well. how do we say here 'bypass the block'

[shmaptainwrites]

𝐓𝐎 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐒 [𝐀 𝐕𝐈𝐎𝐋𝐄𝐓 𝐁𝐑𝐈𝐃𝐆𝐄𝐑𝐓𝐎𝐍 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘]

PAIRINGS — Violet Bridgerton x fem!Reader [Modern!AU]

SUMMARY — Violet and Reader spend some quality time with Daphne, August, and Caroline at an outdoor charity event.

WORD COUNT — 3.1K

WARNINGS — none

NOTE — Extra big thank you to my flock this week for helping edit and tweak the ending so that it fit the chapter better! Can't wait for you all to see Grandma Violet in action :)

𝐒𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒 𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 | 𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 | 𝐀𝐎𝟑

𝑪𝑯𝑨𝑷𝑻𝑬𝑹 𝑰𝑿: 𝑳𝑬𝑻𝑻𝑰𝑬

“I really hope the weather holds up,” you looked up at the sky, noticing some grey clouds that threatened to block the sun. “What am I saying this is England, it’s going to rain.”

“The key is to always come prepared,” Violet informed you. “I’ve got a coat in the back.”

“The years of mothering eight children have done you well,” you chuckled as you continued your walk together to the venue. 

When you were standing in line to enter the outdoor tent Violet felt a tug against her pant leg and she looked down, and beamed. 

“Auggie!” she grinned and immediately bent down to pick up her eldest grandchild. 

As soon as he was in her arms, the small boy tucked his face in her shoulder and she cooed affectionately.

“Oh, is someone feeling a little shy today?” she asked and he nodded his head, just as his mother caught up with him. 

“Goodness, there you are,” she let out a breath of relief, a small baby that could be no more than a few months old in her arms. “Auggie, you need to tell me before running off like that.”

The boy mumbled something into Violet’s shoulder and she placed a hand on her daughter’s arm, assuring her everything was fine. 

The young woman turned to you, a smile on her face. 

“I don’t think we’ve formally met yet.”

“No, we haven’t,” you shook your head, holding your tablet in one hand so you could shake hers and introduce yourself. 

“I’m Daphne and this is Caroline,” she motioned to the baby in her arms. “And that’s August,” she pointed to her son who was with Violet. 

“It’s nice to finally meet you all,” you said. “I imagine life is busy with a new baby.”

“Very, my middle child, Belinda, has been feeling the lack of attention, so she and her father are doing a little outing today,” Daphne chuckled. “Do you mind if I ask why an event like this would require a financial manager?”

“Good question,” you looked over at Violet. “Your mother’s assistant is on leave right now so I’ve been helping to fill the position here and there and…well, let's just say I owed her a favour.”

Violet pressed her lips together and tried not to laugh thinking of the violent hangover she had woken up with the morning after celebrating with you. In the moment it was anything but funny, but in hindsight she wondered where she ever got the notion that all of a sudden she was a heavyweight. 

She heard a few clicks and looked around, noticing a photographer, probably paid for the event, taking pictures of them. 

“Daphne, are you sure it was a good idea to bring the children?” Violet asked quietly and Daphne saw the source of her mother’s concern. 

“Mum, this hardly ever happens to them,” she explained. “It’s not like how it was when we were kids, for the most part they’ve left us alone. And it’s not tabloids, it’s an event photographer. I think we’ll be okay.” 

Violet wanted to accept Daphne’s assurances, but she couldn’t completely bypass her own discomfort. Daphne did have a point of the photographs being taken by someone hired, but Violet’s preference would have been for her grandchildren to have complete privacy.

“Lettie,” August finally lifted his head and looked up at Violet. 

“Yes, my darling,” she said while moving up the line, drawing her thoughts away from the photos.

“Are you gonna be here the whole time?”

“The whole time,” Violet nodded. 

“Can I stay with you?”

Violet smiled and looked over at Daphne for an okay, who nodded her head, which allowed Violet to say yes to him. 

“Auggie,” Daphne spoke up. “Can you say hi to Nana’s friend?”

August waved at you and you smiled and gave him a small wave in return. 

“Nice to meet you Auggie.”

He immediately became shy once you spoke and wrapped his small arms around Violet’s neck again. She kissed his curly hair and savoured the feeling of having him still small enough to be in her arms. 

“So, Hyacinth has told me a lot about you,” Daphne turned her attention back to you. “You both seem to have hit it off.”

You laughed a little, “Yes, Hyacinth and I were fast friends.”

“It’s quite sweet, you seem to really understand not only what you do for work but how our family operates,” she mentioned. “I’m sure my mum appreciates that.”

“I think it’s actually been quite nice for me too,” you admitted. “Before, I was working for a holding company and everything felt so…cold. Everything was transactional, but working for your family has really reminded me that money can be used to do good things, especially in the right hands.” 

“My father used to say something along those lines,” Daphne smiled. “It’s part of the reason why I try to bring the children out to these events, it’s good for them to see what our family’s values are. Even if their last name is Basset, they’re also very much Bridgertons.” 

“Oh, absolutely,” you nodded your head and looked over at little Caroline, who began to fuss as they finally were admitted into the large tented area. 

“I’m not sure why she’s so restless,” Daphne commented. “I just fed and changed her.” 

Violet was quite focused on August, explaining why they were there and what they were doing while the small boy had the side of his head pressed against her cheek, simply listening to his Nana’s words. 

You turned your attention back to Daphne, taking in her comment before tilting your head and looking at the young girl. 

“Do you want me to try and settle her?” you offered. “Sometimes babies like to cooperate with me, it’s hit or miss, but might be worth a shot, if you’d like.” 

Daphne considered it before deciding that it couldn’t hurt and you swapped your tablet for Caroline. 

“I’ll just follow you around in case she ends up wanting you,” you said. “And so she doesn’t end up out of your sight. It might be nice to have your hands free for a bit.” 

“Yes, most definitely,” she chuckled. “Thank you, I know you probably have other things you need to be doing.” 

You shook your head. 

“I can be the assistant to Lady Bridgerton and the Duchess of Hastings for one day. Your mum is also quite busy with August, I’m sure she won’t mind.” 

Daphne smiled and placed a hand on your arm, giving it a squeeze while watching you bounce Caroline carefully in your arms,seeing how her small whines faded and instead, she just squirmed a little to get comfortable. 

As promised, you followed Daphne while she socialized and made some meaningful conversations with other donors and organizers and Caroline seemed perfectly content in your arms. In the moments between conversations, you and Daphne continued to chat and make jokes, bonding over that love you both shared for your respective families. 

Violet watched from afar, still holding August up on her hip, who was perfectly happy admiring the elaborate fountain display in front of him. She focused on how your arms carefully cradled Caroline, your touch affectionate and gentle; how Caroline would reach out to you at any given moment and you would give her the attention she seeked, whether it was a smile, a finger to hold, or a small adjustment of her blanket under her chin. 

“Lettie?” August tried to gather Violet’s attention, but her mind was still elsewhere. “Nana Lettie?” he tapped her shoulder and she turned her head to face him, a smile on her lips. 

“Yes, my darling?” 

“Is that your friend with Caroline?” he asked and she nodded her head. “Why is she holding her?” 

“Well,” Violet began. “I think your sister was being a little fussy for your mummy, so she offered to help.” 

“I think Caroline likes her,” August determined. 

“I think so too,” Violet agreed. “Would you like to go talk to her now that you know Caroline likes her? Or are you still feeling shy?”

August seemed to contemplate his Nana’s words before nodding his head, making Violet smile. 

“But Lettie,” he tapped her again. 

“Yes, Auggie?” 

“Can she come after to play with us too?” 

Violet’s heart warmed at the question from her grandson and she pressed a smacking kiss to his cheek. 

“You know what, why don’t we ask her?” she suggested in return. “I think she’s having fun with your mummy, maybe they want to spend more time together too.” 

August seemed happy with that suggestion and Violet continued to walk towards you and Daphne, a fluttering sensation coming over her when you looked up and smiled. 

“Violet, Auggie, you came back to join us,” you said. “How was your walk around?”

“Good,” August said, gaining a little more confidence to speak directly to you. 

“What was your favourite part?” you asked, a bright smile still on your face.

“I like the water fountain,” he pointed back to the display. “And Lettie.” 

“Of course, we can’t forget Lettie,” you nodded your head. “I think she’s the best part too,” you whispered to him, not so discreetly, and he giggled at your childish behaviour. 

Caroline made some babbling noises and you acknowledged her attempted contribution to the conversation, which made August laugh. 

“August, didn’t you have something you wanted to ask?” Violet reminded him. 

He turned and looked over at you, a shy smile on his face. 

“Do you want to come over and play later?” 

Daphne beamed at the suggestion and quickly agreed. 

“It would be so nice to have you for dinner. The house will be quieter without Simon and Belinda, we’d love to have both of you,” Daphne looked at you and then Violet. 

“Well, I don’t have anything planned,” you said. 

“And I already cleared my schedule after this,” Violet agreed. 

August was happy that his suggestion was accepted and was eager for the event to finish so you could all be on your way. 

When it did, Caroline was fast asleep in your arms and you helped Daphne buckle her in her seat in the car before going back to join Violet in hers, running so that the rain wouldn’t catch up to you too much. 

“I should have brought a coat,” you chastised yourself as soon as you got comfortable in the car. 

Violet saw your partially soaked clothes and found herself staring at the fabric of your white blouse now that it had become more…transparent. 

“I think you’ll survive,” she said, quickly pulling her eyes away and focusing on what was in front of her.

“Yes, but now I’m…wet,” you looked down at yourself and Violet bit her cheek hard to keep her mind from wandering too far. 

There were a few moments of silence when you realized Violet’s mind was clearly elsewhere and so you decided to ask her a question. 

“So, why does August call you Lettie?” 

She chuckled a little bit and moved a hand to rub the back of her neck, the other still on the steering wheel, her gaze on the road ahead. 

“August was born when I was still in my forties, so you can imagine I didn’t particularly want to be called Grandma or Grandmother,” she explained. “Daphne was quite set on Nana which I don’t mind too much, but I preferred something more along the lines of a nickname the children could call me. An ill attempt at keeping some of my youth.” 

You chuckled at that, surely it wasn’t an ill attempt. Even if Violet was a young grandmother, you knew she just had one of those faces where, if someone saw her on the street, they would never be able to pinpoint her exact age. 

“So you went with Lettie? I think it’s very cute,” you said. 

“So did I, but between me using Lettie and the kids teasing me and calling me Grandmama and Nana, I get a mix of names from Auggie and Eddie,” she sighed. 

“Eddie is Anthony and Kate’s son, yes?” you asked and Violet nodded. 

“They all have nicknames. They named him after Edmund.” 

You placed a hand on your heart, “That must have meant a lot to you.” 

“It did,” she smiled. “And I think it meant a lot to Anthony that Kate agreed.” 

It didn’t take too long to get to Daphne and Simon’s home from the venue and August was quick to drag both you and Violet out of the car and into the house. 

August showed you his toys and got you to sit down with him and begin a game with building blocks. 

Violet took Caroline from Daphne so she could figure out what the plan was for dinner. Before long, Daphne called everyone into the dining room to eat. August scarfed down his food and asked to be excused so that he could go play again and Violet and Daphne took shifts eating and holding Caroline. 

“Let me put her to bed,” Violet suggested after dinner was over. “You should both go and make sure Auggie isn’t making too much of a mess.” 

Daphne chuckled and nodded, knowing her mother wanted to spend more time with Caroline, so she indulged her, and after a brief argument with you about the dishes, where she ended up conceding and letting you help, you both made your way to where August was and took a seat to begin relaxing and visiting. 

“Do you have a big family as well?” Daphne asked and you shook your head. 

“Large extended family, but my immediate family is quite small,” you said. “But family has always been so important to me. I wouldn’t be where I am without them.” 

“I feel the same way,” Daphne said with a smile while August came up on the couch and sat himself comfortably in your lap, playing quietly with a few action figures. “I think, even after my father’s passing, seeing how my family was able to move past that and help each other through it, it made me want something like that for myself.” 

“Which you seem to have now,” you looked down at August in your lap and she smiled, reaching out to gently brush her fingers against her son’s cheek. 

“Yes, but not without a few obstacles,” Daphne tilted her head thoughtfully. “My husband lost his mother when he was quite young and his father was…distant, and that’s simply the polite way of putting it.” 

You nodded your head, your fingers fixing the tag on the back of August’s shirt. 

“We had a lot of conversations before getting married,” she said softly. “I wanted children and he didn’t, but we also loved each other too much to just give up on having a longer lasting relationship.” 

“This might be a bit of an invasive question, so you don’t have to answer it,” you said. “But do you ever worry that Simon regrets changing his mind about having children?” 

August was now cuddled into you, his eyes slowly closing while a hand of yours played with his curls, lulling him into a peaceful sleep while you and Daphne spoke. 

“I did at first,” she nodded, “but when Auggie was born, you could see it in his eyes. It wasn’t necessarily what he had wanted for himself, but something he was working through.” 

“I’m happy you guys decided to work through that together. Clearly, it’s what was meant to happen for you.” 

“I think so too,” Daphne smiled. “I didn’t realize how much work my parents put in to making their marriage work until I was also in the thick of it. I talked to my mum and went in thinking she wouldn’t understand because her marriage to my dad was so perfect, but there’s really a lot you don’t notice about your parents as a kid.” 

“I can definitely empathize with that. I’m still finding things out about my parents that are helping me understand them better,” you chuckled. 

“Yes, my mum never fails to surprise me,” Daphne agreed. 

“It’s always good to keep a little mystery,” Violet’s voice rang through the room and you both turned to see her leaning in the doorway. “Looks like you managed to get Auggie to sleep too.”

You looked down at the boy resting in your lap and smiled. 

“I guess so. Should we move him to his bed?” you asked. 

“Might be a good idea before he starts to drool,” Daphne warned you and you chuckled, adjusting August so you could hold him properly and stand up, while Violet said she would show you the way to his room. 

After you had put August down on his bed and Violet had tucked him in, you left the room together and she turned around to you to speak. 

“I never thanked you for coming today.” 

“Oh, no thanks needed,” you shook your head. “I owed you one.” 

“I won’t argue with that,” she nodded. “Had a lovely time explaining why I was feeling unwell to Hyacinth and Gregory.” 

You chuckled at the thought of the two discovering their mother had overindulged the night before. 

“You seemed to have hit it off with Daphne as well,” she noted. “Not that we are particularly hard to be around, although Eloise would say otherwise, you always seem to find something to talk about, something to…connect over.” 

“There’s an easy explanation for that, I think,” you said. “They’re your kids.” 

“That’s it?” she chuckled. 

“Well, we get along just fine and each of them have a little piece of you in them, when you find that, it’s easy to connect,” you shrugged. 

Violet’s lips curled into a tight-lipped smile and her eyes drifted down to her feet while you continued to walk down the hallway. 

She wasn’t sure how to respond, but Daphne saved her the trouble, passing by the end of the hallway with three wine glasses and a bottle. 

“You two coming?” she asked. 

“Too soon?” you asked, and Violet shook her head. 

“I’m fine,” she said. 

“Okay, well, how about just one?” 

“Shut up,” she said, but you could hear the amusement in her voice. 

Daphne looked at both of you, confusion etched on her face. “What’s going on?”

“Oh, boy, do we have a story to tell you,” you said as the three of you reached the dining room.

“I cannot wait to hear it.” Daphne uncorked the bottle and started pouring as you and Violet took your seats. 

When you looked to Violet, she nodded her permission for you to begin the story, and as you launched into it, she found her mind preoccupied with an incessant curiosity. You had said you could see parts of her in each of her children and she didn’t know why she cared, but now she desperately wanted to know exactly which parts you were seeing.

TAGLIST —

@paola-carter @madde11 @thesamesweetie @cherrysxuya @philocalistwrites @mako-mermaids2021 @oh-mydarling @courtneyteal @amethyst-bitch @etherynn @lilisdarling @fictionalized-lesbian

[mrs-heelshire]

Please, pretend to be my date.

• Gender neutral reader • sfw • reviews and reblogs appreciated • should I write a part 2 and with who ??? •

● TW : Street harassment. ●

° Arataki Itto ° Kamisato Ayato °

Ayato :

It was your first time in Inazuma and you were so excited to visit the region. You were here for a mission that was already fulfilled, so you now have all the time you wanted to explore. In fact, you hadn't bought your return ticket yet. Walking around Narukami island all day, you start by the ports and the city of Inazuma before heading to the Grand Narukami Shrine in the afternoon. Now walking in the Chinju forest, you were quietly humming to yourself as you looked all around you, taking a few pictures here and there.

You didn't notice them until they noticed you. There were two men, coming in front of you, and they already seemed pretty messed up despite the premature hour of the day, not walking straight. It was only 2 p.m, how could they already stink of alcohol? Truth be told, that was a question you don't want the answer to. You would have much preferred to go on your way as if nothing had happened, but they had decided otherwise.

Deviating from their path to block yours, the two men looked at you from head to toe as if you were just a piece of meat. You hated that, but you didn't want to take any risks. Here, you were all alone, there was no one around you for miles around, and you knew it very well, unfortunately. You had no other choice than to just try to walk away with politeness.

“Well, hello there, pretty thing!” One said as he stepped closer.

“Never saw you around…” The other started to add with a disgusting smirk painted on his face.

“Hello, I’m sorry, but I have to meet up with my boyfriend, he’s waiting for me, and I’m already running late.” Forcing yourself to smile politely, you took a step back before bypassing them to resume your journey.

As you might expect, neither of them believed your little lie. Turning around, the both of them followed you, calling you by names. You were scared, and it didn't take you more to speed up the pace. You had to run away, but you were too afraid that by starting to run it would annoy them and that they would do more than insult you.

Hands shaking, you were looking everywhere to find a way out. But there was nothing here, only trees, bushes, and… someone! There was a person, a tall man, standing on the edge of a cliff staring at the horizon in front of him. It was so unexpected that, at first, you thought you were dreaming. Yet, you instinctively headed in his direction. You could feel it, he wasn’t like them.

“Babe!” Calling for him, you waved at him like a little kid.

The tall blue haired man slowly turned around, not expecting anyone to call him that. Looking at you, he raised a bow, unsure of what to do or say. But you were the first to speak, in a low voice, just loud enough that only he can hear you.

“Please… Can you pretend to be my boyfriend? Just for a minute…”

It only took a quick glance over your shoulder to understand the situation you were in. A broad smile appearing on his face, he opened his arms as if to welcome a loved one. He had agreed to come into your game, to help you, and that relieved you so much.

“My love, here you are! I missed you!” The man didn't touch you on his own, he only put his arms around you after you threw yourself into his arms.

His hands remained at the right height, not getting too low on your body, which only confirmed your first impression, he was a nice guy. Your embrace only lasted a few seconds, but it was enough to calm you down. Detaching himself from you, it was on the two men who were still standing there that his attention fell.

“Gentlemen, may we help you?”

You could swear you saw water moving behind him before you turned around to focus on your stalkers. Both of them were agape, looking at you with surprise and worry. They didn't seem to be worried about you, but rather worried about themselves, as if just seeing this man terrified them. You had no idea what was going on, but they quickly bowed to apologize, almost shouting as they spoke so quickly, shaking their head. Then running away, they left you stunned, not knowing what to do or say.

“Wha…”

“My lord! Archons, you did it again! Don’t go out by yourself!” A blond-haired man shouts while running in your direction.

“Thoma, everything’s fine, don’t worry.” Your savior replied with a polite smile.

“Everything’s fine.” He added in a softer voice as he now spoke to you. “Are you alright?”

Nodding, you bowed to him to thank him, but he instantly grabbed you by the shoulders to get you up.

“Nothing more natural. Let me introduce myself, I’m Kamisato Ayato, but please call me Ayato.” He asked you, holding out a hand to you.

“I’m Y/N, it’s a pleasure to meet you.” You answered him, holding out your hand.

“The pleasure is mine.” As he gently shook your hand, offering you a warm smile, his attention was caught for a moment by the so-called Thoma who was tapping his foot behind you. “It’s time for me to head back home, may I offer you a cup of tea if you have some time?”

“That would again be a pleasure, Ayato.”

Itto :

It was your day off, the very first in a long time. Far too long. You were more than determined to enjoy it, and after spending the morning in your bed resting, you decided to go out for some fresh air in the afternoon. Going out for a walk in a forest nearby.

Walking alone in Chinju Forest, you were far from worried about your own safety. It wasn't the first time you wandered there after all and the place still appealed to you as much as ever. Humming along the way, taking a few pictures of the landscape here and there, it wasn’t pretty flowers or beautiful birds that caught your attention the most. It was a group of young men. Not really comfortable, you had preferred to be discreet by trying to leave before they saw you, but unfortunately for you, this hope was quickly taken away from you when one of them called for you. Obviously not knowing your name, it was by what seemed to him to be a compliment that he called you, making you then noticed by the whole group.

“Hey sweet thing! Don’t run away like that, you could hurt that attractive body of yours if you fall down and Archons, it would be a real shame!” He said with a grin painted on your face, heading in your direction, followed by his friends.

You instantly knew that you had to lie your way out of here, it was the safest option you had. They were five, you were all alone, fighting or running weren’t even options.

“Hello gentlemen, I'm sorry, but I'm in a hurry. My boyfriend is waiting for me. Have a nice day!” Forcing a smile, you sped up the pace without waiting for the slightest response from them.

“Seriously? You could have found a better lie!” One of them loudly groaned as another snickered, making you shiver.

“Are you scared of us, honey ? Don’t worry, we don’t bite. Unless you want us to.” A fourth man told you by grabbing your arm firmly, preventing you from fleeing.

You were so scared, they held you. There was no way out. ‘Just my luck’ you thought. But luckily for you, your luck quickly turned in your favor as a new man appeared in your field of vision. The man was walking down the path the group had just led you off, pulling you towards them, and he was holding some kind of box he seemed to be talking to in his hands. He wasn't with them, it was enough for you to trust him.

“Babe!” You shouted, waving at him.

The man that was holding you instantly let go of your arm in surprise, giving you the opportunity to run to whoever was approaching. This man was really tall, and he seemed to have some kind of horns on his head. Was it an Oni? You couldn’t care less. He seemed nice and that was all that mattered.

“Who…” Caught by surprise, the horned man looked at you with big round eyes.

“Please, pretend to be my boyfriend… please…” Giving him no time to say anything, you begged him to help you.

Looking down at you, he seemed to be thinking. Was he hesitant to help you? You quickly got your answer as a wide smile lit up his face. Despite your fear, you couldn’t help but notice his beauty. Oni or not, he was attractive, but it wasn’t the time to think about it. And he didn't really give you time to think as he slipped you the box he was holding in your hands.

“Sorry, I’m late, my love! Can you please hold this for me while I chat with these gentlemen for a minute?” He asked you in a voice as warm as his smile was. It was strange, and you couldn't explain it, but he managed to reassure you completely just by his mere presence.

Quietly nodding, you were left alone with this box in your hands as he headed toward the group. Turning to look at him, you could have sworn you felt his whole aura darken as he approached them. And even though you could only see his back from where you were standing, you could clearly see the terrified facial expressions on each of the men's faces. Those who had terrified you a few moments earlier, were now the terrified ones.

It didn't take long for the men to literally run away, leaving you completely speechless as your savior returned to your side. It felt unreal and yet, in less than five minutes, everything was calm again. Calm enough for you to notice that something was moving inside the box you were holding. Hoping it wasn’t a bug, you saved all your questions for later. First, you had to thank him, and you felt like words wouldn’t be enough.

“You saved me, I could never thank you enough. Thank you so much for what…ever? You did to them. I owe you one.” You thanked him, bowing, still carefully holding the box in your hands.

“Nah, it’s nothing! I'm Itto, first and greatest head of the Arataki gang, nice to meet you.” The so-called Itto reassured you with a broad smile.

“Oh… I’m Y/N, no title to present, I’m sorry.” Again surprised by his warm aura, you could have sworn his smile just made you blush. Just a little.

Giving him back the box, he answered your silent question about what was inside.

“Oh! I was out looking for beetles and I found an enormous one! Thanks for taking care of his box for me! Oh! Have you ever seen a beetle fight?” His excitement was contagious, you felt yourself smile as you shook your head.

“No, I have not, but I'd love to see my first with you if you want to.” Bugs weren’t really your thing but, with him, you felt like you might end up enjoying everything he could show you.

“It would be my pleasure! I was about to join my friends, if you will follow me.” As he beckoned you to follow him, you both kept on chatting all the way to meet his friends with big smiles on your faces.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

more thoughts on book 7

The more I think about it, the less sense it makes 😭 so I’m going to get my thoughts out here before they drive me up the wall…

Disclaimer: it’s entirely possible that future updates for book 7 will address or remedy the issues/questions I pose in this post; I’m just laying down what my thoughts are now just to get them out there.

***BOOK 7 SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT!!**

Alright, so it has been well-established by this point that Malleus is super OP, one of the top 5 strongest mages in all of Twisted Wonderland, may draw his power from nature so his magic is never-ending, blah, blah, blah. But like… doesn’t that, in of itself, create a bunch of narrative problems around powerscaling???

The first thing I think of is, “Malleus is one of the top 5 strongest mages”. That’s a VERY specific thing to explicitly state. I’m assuming that Malleus is not #1/THE strongest mage, since otherwise the characters would just say, “the” strongest mage in the world. (In fact, his grandmother is said to have power that far exceeds Malleus's own.) So… like… what’s stopping the other top 4 strongest mages from banding together to take him down (once they theoretically get alerted/contacted about this potentially WORLD ENDING event)? If they’re all located on Sage’s Island then maybe they’ve all fallen asleep and can’t help, but isn’t it statistically improbable that all of the world’s strongest people live on the same island???

Continuing off that point, a common theory is that Maleficia (Malleus’s grandmother) may also be one of the top 5 strongest mages since the entire Draconia line is powerful. B-But then why hasn’t she come in to bonk her grandson on the head? 😭 We can’t really say “oh, she’s busy with royal duties” because HER grandson is posing a danger to everyone in Twisted Wonderland; I think she can spare a few moments to attend to this crisis??? And it’s not like they can’t get in contact with Briar Valley (in spite of their lack of technological advances); Idia’s parents literally contacted them for help with breaking through Malleus’s barrier on Sage’s Island, and Briar Valley actually responded—but they even with their help, they could not bypass the magical field. The story did not say that Maleficia herself was involved in this process but COME ON, she’s the darn queen and it is her own family member that is causing this issue (Mr. Shroud said “the royal family” tried to help, and since Malleus said Maleficia is his only living relative… yeah, process of elimination). If she’s as strong as we think she is (ADDENDUM: Malleus and Sebek say in a chat that Maleficia is WAY more powerful than Malleus is, even in her old age), couldn’t she just waltz right in without feeling a thing (like how Malleus casually walked into the performance venue in book 5, completely bypassing OB Vil’s poisonous mist barrier). It’s just all so confusing…

Another weird thing is??? How can Malleus manipulate space-time in such a wide-reaching area… and expand forth from that… Is that the blot doing it for him??? In addition to his own insane magical powers + pulling more energy from the earth to fuel it???? I don’t know, it seems kind of bullshit how big of a gap there is between him and all the other plebs who can’t bend time and space to their will 😂 Even back in Endless Halloween Night (ie the last time he was shown manipulating time and space) it was just for the (relatively) small area that is NRC campus. I believe it was also stated that he had help from ghosts to achieve this…? (Or was that just help with the party? I don’t know, at this point I try to block out memories of Endless Halloween Night as much as possible.) It feels like it really breaks power-scaling and makes Malleus almost God-like with his powers (which, personally, isn’t for me).

I guess it makes him a formidable “end game” boss, but there’s a LOT of suspension of disbelief that comes with that. The circumstances seem very much stacked against the NRC students and the rest of the world; I wonder how they’ll exactly defeat Malleus if the high tech, magical, and physical forces cannot so much as breech his barrier. Not even confront Malleus and attempt to fight him, just even reaching him is a challenge. So how are they going to pull this big save off and get someone who is so indignant about getting his way (even before OBing) to reverse his curse? (I swear if it’s the power of friendship I’ll be 😬 because if ANY OB boy should face the consequences of his actions to the fullest degree, it should be the one who endangered the lives of not only students but of everyone in Twisted Wonderland 😭) Book 7 has been building up the hype for the ending so well so far, but as the conflict keeps escalating and Malleus falls deeper into despair I cannot help but get jittery about a potentially lukewarm punishment for all the shit he caused…

[ussgallifrey]

(She Moves With) Shameless Wonder | 21

✦ Summary: Your badge clearly said SHIELD consultant, so you weren’t entirely sure where Fury was getting this whole make you an Avenger idea from. But you had a feeling it might have something to do with the recent discovery of an artifact at the bottom of the Arctic Sea.

✦ Pairing: Steve Rogers x Female Reader

✦ Warnings: Canon divergence, dialogue taken directly from Avengers: Age of Ultron, language, mentions of Hydra experimentation, moderate violence, Steve Rogers definitely not being jealous.

✦ Word Count: 9.4k

✦ Playlist: Here

✦ Author’s Note: Uh...hey. How's it going? I'm just visiting as it was. For anyone who might be totally unaware, I've been away for almost a year now. At the beginning of 2023, my partner experienced a near fatal injury and well, life has kind of revolved around that for some time. He's physically healing, I'm emotionally and mentally healing and life is finally moving along once again.

Consider this me dipping my toes into writing once again. Maybe not regular updates, but a start. The majority of this chapter has been sitting in my drafts since, god, November of last year? As a spur of the moment kind of thing, I decided to reread the entire story earlier today and felt determined enough to maybe add to it once again. And... here we are. Anyway, back to the story <3

[Master List]

Steve finds himself in one of the several glassed-in conference rooms in the tower with Tony and Hill - only a few hours after Natasha was cleared by Dr. Cho. The billionaire looks like he’d rather be doing anything other than this. Most likely wishing he could be back in his precious lab, studying the scepter for all its worth before it was returned to its rightful home.

He closes the door behind him, eyeing the laptop on which Maria is typing, “Said you got a lead?”

She hums in soft acknowledgment, eyes scanning something on the screen before she finally gives him her attention. Tony rocks back in his chair, feet crossed at the ankle on the adjacent seat. Steve remains standing at the end of the table.

Images appear on the whiteboard behind her as she begins her report, “It took us two hours to bypass the corrupted files and the top-of-the-line encryption - ”

“No thanks to JARVIS,” Tony adds quickly, with a knowing smirk.

She nods, but otherwise ignores the comment, “We’re looking at roughly thirty years of backlog.”

Steve watches the images on the projection switch between the scepter, schematics, and patient files. Jesus.

“You were on the right track, Captain. Strucker wasn’t just using that thing for weapons - though we have at least a good amount of information on the weaponry he successfully made. But I believe your interest was focused on the containment cells?”

It’s at that moment that you and Clint walk in, offering an apologetic nod as you take a seat beside Tony. You lean forward almost immediately when you see what’s on the screen - an image taken just earlier today of the mangled cell block.

The screen changes to two prisoner files marked PATIENTIENT 4.1and PATIENT 4.2. Admittedly, his German isn’t as good as it used to be during the war, so he fumbles through the article with little to no comprehension.

“Anyone get that?” Clint gestures at the screen, an incredulous expression on his face.

Before Hill can even bring up the translation, you’re muttering out, “They… they weren’t experimented on. The scepter, it wasn’t - ”

“What do you mean?” Steve asks, eyes narrowing at the files as if he could somehow understand the foreign words now.

“Is there any language you don’t speak?” Tony whirls around in his seat to stare at you instead; totally missing the point.

“Jedek, Sentinelese, and Mudbara to name a few,” you answer levelly, before craning your head back to look at Steve and then over to Clint. “It says Patients 4.1 and 4.2 were entered into their program in 2005 - ”

Hill nods, the projection changing over to a set of images - body parts being measured and cataloged. They looked surprisingly small - skin stretched tight over the bones of a forearm, a calf, and a shockingly skeletal spine.

Children. He was looking at the images of two children that HYDRA had taken in.

Gritting his teeth, he manages to get out a sharp, “What else?”

Maria takes over then, back to more pages of files, “They were part of a series of off-the-record adoptions, during the country’s last civil war. People went missing by the hundreds back then. The official death count is still incomplete from the time. But it appears that individuals like Strucker were using the war to their benefit.”

The screen is flooded with images then, hundreds of people - primarily children, he notes with a sour turning of his stomach and the clenching of his fist at his side.

“And he was what, using the scepter like he was playing at God?” Barton scoffs with a bitter tone.

Steve is reminded then of the fact that if anyone understood the gravity of the scepter and the capability of its power in the wrong hands, it would in fact be Clint Barton.

Hill’s lips form a thin line, “For some, yes.”

“But not these two?” Tony fills in, twirling a pen between his fingers.

“Why?” Steve questions, unable to pull his gaze away from the new blurred image of a dark-haired girl, no older than eight - her eyes wide as she’s seemingly forced into a position for the camera.

It’s then that you lean forward in your chair, squinting at the file next to the girl’s picture before you rock back in your seat - “They were showing abilities on their own accord?”

And then the bombshell drops.

“This is their DNA structure against the typical human’s - ” In the center of the table, a blue holographic projection is displayed. Two double helixes slowly rotate alongside one another.

For all his aptitude, Steve can’t spot the immediate difference between the two. But you and Tony surely latch onto it quick enough. Leaning over the table, the billionaire swipes his hand at the helix on the left and instantly increases its size.

“What the hell is that?” Tony wonders out loud, turning the helix with his fingers.

It’s only then that Steve notices the strange strand near the center of the structure. It’s forked, compared to the other relatively straight branches. Almost spiked in its appearance.

“They called it the X gene, in the official reports,” Hill supplements.

“Which did what, exactly?” Tony asks, eyes still focused on the hologram.

She clears her throat for a moment, before saying, “From what we understand from their reports, these two individuals had naturally occurring inhuman powers on a previously unheard-of level.”

Everyone’s attention falls on her, and the silence lingers.

“Superpowered humans whose abilities can be traced back only to their own mutated DNA.”

Tony looks between the screen, the hologram, and then Steve.

“Shit. You’re saying these things can just pop up now, yeah? Any random person could get some kind of unnatural ability?”

“We have to look into it further, obviously - and if we were able to run the appropriate tests - ”

“What happened to them?” you ask, standing slowly. Clarifying only a moment later when you’re met with blank stares. “The file says they were still there when we breached the fortress. And yet we didn’t find anyone there that wasn’t already in a body bag in the morgue.”

She gives a tight nod, flicking off the presentation, “We have eyes on the city.”

“Do we even know what they look like? Let alone their intentions,” Tony questions, leaning away from the table and tapping the pen for a moment against his leg.

Hill shakes her head, “No. But we have a limited age range and a general profile to work with. And two people who were held captive for most of their lives will display a unique range of responses and choices. One slip, and we’ll find them. But if they were able to escape Strucker’s fortress on their own accord - ”

Tony seems unimpressed as he nods, walking backward for a moment as he says, “Keep me looped.”

You step forward to speak to Maria as the billionaire leaves - probably back to his lab. Clint stands up with a tired stretch.

“How’s she holding up?” Steve asks gently as the archer moves around the table.

The blonde smiles fondly, shaking his head, “You know, Nat, man. She doesn’t do bed rest for shit. I’m bribing her with coffee and I got Thor keeping her company right now.”

“Keeping her from escaping, you mean?” you turn back towards them with a knowing smile.

Clint chuckles, “Something like that.”

Steve nods, watching as he takes his leave then, waiting around for you to finish up with Maria. He recalled how rattled you had been that day upon discovering the cells. To finally have an answer to that giant unknown - well, Steve just wanted to see how you were holding up after it all.

Your brows raise marginally as you see him still standing there, but the two of you walk out into the quiet hallway together as Maria packs up her things, stepping in sync as you head for the elevator to the private quarters.

“So…” he starts, still processing the whole meeting in his head.

“So, naturally occurring superpowers,” you agree with a disbelieving shake of your head.

He shares your shock, glancing over at the curiously downturned expression on your lips. And here he thought the weirdest thing science had ever turned out was him. But in a world of literal Gods and billionaires with time and money to spend, Steve probably shouldn’t have been as surprised as he was.

“It makes me wonder,” you say as you stop at the metal doors of the elevator, “If this is the first instance of the mutation - if something in their specific genetics can be traced back to this. Or… or if this could be a totally random human mutation.”

The bell dings gently as the doors slide open and the two of you enter.

Steve just shakes his head, “I have no idea.”

You hum in quiet contemplation. The doors swish shut after a moment and Steve presses the button for the appropriate floor before stepping back, eyeing you out of his peripheral. Your curiosity was like a burning ember, he could see it growing by the second and it made him smile - seeing that thirst for answers, for knowledge, so clear on your face.

“They were seemingly random too - not necessarily connected powers or even all that similar really,” you turn to face him, eyes narrowed as you seem to work through everything out loud, “The male prisoner had an increased metabolism and improved thermal homeostasis. And the girl had neuroelectrical interfacing, telekinesis, and mental manipulation.”

Slowly he turns to face you, peering down into your energized eyes with a look of confusion clearly plastered upon his own.

With one glance up at him, you specify, “He moves incredibly fast and she can move things with her mind. The grooves on the floor, the deformed cell bars. It’s kind of unbelievable, right?”

Steve offers a look of consideration as he nods toward the now-opening doors. The two of you exit onto the pristine floor of the personal living quarters for the team.

“Have you ever seen something like this before?” he asks, glancing over at you as the two of you pass the closed door to Dr. Banner's room.

“Not like this. Gods and other immortals, sure. Gamma radiation accidents and one notable serum-enhanced super soldier,” your eyes turn playful as you look over at him - he returns the expression with a smile of his own. “But never naturally occurring human mutation, no.”

“Tony's gonna have a field day,” he sighs, at last, coming to a stop just beside the door to the room the billionaire had forced upon you.

As if he wasn't already deep in the research pool with the scepter. Once Thor returned it to its rightful home, Stark would eagerly be jumping on the opportunity to explore the mutated genome for all its worth.

You make a thoughtful humming sound as you seem to register just where you are now, peering back at the door.

“Hey, uhm,” Steve clears his throat as he looks over at you, a slight blush on his cheeks. “You're going to the party tomorrow night, right?”

That pulls your attention as you look back at him with a gentle smile, “Yeah, he roped me into it. Told me to call up some friends to come along. He wouldn't take no for an answer.”

Steve laughs, “Yeah, that sounds about right for Stark.”

“Doesn't even matter that I have no one to invite along. Honestly, what does he think I do in my spare time to warrant friendships like that?”

The words themself seem disheartening but you're chuckling despite it.

He offers a grin of his own, “Seems to be a mutually shared problem.”

Your eyes flicker up to his, a sparkle of warmth within the depths of your irises.

“Yeah,” you breathe out gently. And then your hand grabs hold of the door handle and you push back with your weight to open it a crack. “Well, maybe I can scour my contacts for someone. And if all else fails, you could always call up Sharon?”

There's a hopeful lilt to your voice, one that Steve, unfortunately, has to dampen.

“She's on assignment right now. Probably won't be stateside for another month.”

Your lips form a gentle ahh, “I'm sure you'll think of someone by then.”

Seeing a chance appearing in front of him, Steve gulps down his anxious nerves. Natasha had said to be blunt after all.

“Or… I could just take… you.”

With a surprised blink, your lips curve up into a breathtaking smile that nearly sends him reeling.

“Sure, Rogers. Though Sam might be a little jealous of me taking his wingman away.”

Relief swims through his belly as he rocks back on his heels, unable to contain his smile, “I'm sure he'll get over it.”

The lab is thrumming with energy when you come to check in on the two scientists who, by the looks of it, haven’t left the room since at least the day before - if not longer. Settling in on one of the spare stools alongside an abandoned workbench, you watch them work - flicking between screens and running computations that are basically incomprehensible to you.

“How may I assist you?”

“Cronus!” you startle as the bot seems to materialize next to you.

Unlike the rest of the Iron Legion, this particular bot has a drawn-on smile on its mouthpiece, crudely done in a lopsided Sharpie scrawl. Along with two wonky curved eyebrows above the visual optics.

“Oh, hey, Your Highness,” Tony calls out, not even looking away from the new set of schematics in front of him.

Bruce gives a little wave of his own.

“No need for assistance,” you inform the drone, watching the digitized glowing eyes seemingly blink before it walks back to the corner of the lab from which it came.

From across the room, you hear the billionaire give a slightly defeated damn it before he looks up and seems to decide that you’re far more interesting - striding across the room until he’s leaning against the workbench next to you.

“Have I mentioned how unnerving those things are?”

He glances back at the bot, “My Legion, you mean?”

You hum in agreement, “I mean, I understand that you gave up the suit and this was the next logical step. But you couldn’t have made them a bit more… friendly?”

His lips form a challenging grin, “I’ll have you know that the Ultron line of toys are currently at the top of everyone's Christmas wishlist. And there’s an anime currently in the works inspired by my Legion. So, maybe it's just you and your slightly outdated ways.”

You blink in confusion, “Anime?”

“Seriously? How long have you been around here?”

With a strangled laugh, you look away, “A few thousand years, give or take. And I’ll have you know that my interests far outreach your capitalist hold on the franchise market.”

Tony stumbles back, a hand held to his heart, “Okay, ouch. I let you into my tower, offer you a room, and you call me a money-hungry capitalist?”

A shrug is all you offer him in return.

He gestures at Bruce with a pleading look in his eyes, looking for backup apparently. But the other scientist merely holds up his hands in a clear sign of not wanting to step into the fray.

“Okay, I’ll play,” he resigns, leaning his elbows on the workbench - watching you with a playful intensity. You can make out each ring under his eyes, the speckles of red veins in his tired expression.

“While I’ve been coming up with more and more exuberantly creative ways to fund this entire group operation, you’ve been doing what exactly?”

Turning on the seat to better address him, you state quite plainly, “Cleaning up SHIELD’s mess.”

“Which we’ve also been doing,” he shakes his head. “My question is: why haven’t you joined us on any of these little adventures?”

Admittedly, you kind of blank for a moment.

It was a legitimate question, considering you were doing nearly the exact same thing for the past year, just on your own. While you knew Steve had been silently tracking his long-lost friend during this time, you also were aware of the many raids he had partaken in with the team.

“I mean, even with this whole scepter business just about wrapped up, there’s still bases and terrorist cells out there. And since you’re already here - ”

“Anonymity,” you answer, suddenly.

Tony blinks, jerking his head back as you slowly and calmly press forward.

“I spent centuries being nothing more than a legend amongst your kind. I could come and go as I pleased. I worked for SHIELD while remaining almost entirely off their records. Yet one instance in New York and suddenly my identity was dragged into the open and now - ”

You gesture vaguely around the lab, “Now, I’m here and a part of a household name. I preferred it when it was just me doing the quiet work behind the scenes and not having my name and image on the news.”

“And lunchboxes and costumes and a few knock-off toys, to name a few other things, right?” Tony’s eyes flash with what you think is meant to be humor.

Your anger simmers and you offer him a tired, half-hearted smile, “It was an easier life when my name was only associated with museum pieces and ancient tales, yes.”

He nods thoughtfully, biting at his lip as he looks between you and Bruce.

“So… it’s a maybe?”

You shove his arm away, good-naturedly, “I’ll see you at your party tonight, Stark. You too, hopefully - ” you call over to Bruce.

The other man quirks his lips into a shy smile, “I’m not sure I have much of a choice in the matter.”

“You don’t!” Tony responds cheerily, eyes flickering over to you as you exit the lab. “Okay, let’s run it again, JARVIS, and see if we can keep the system from overloading this time.”

The party is in full swing now. The drinks have been flowing freely from the bar as comfortable music streams from the speakers. It’s a surprisingly casual affair for Tony’s standards - though the man is dressed in a three-piece suit. There’s a mix of colognes and perfumes and the sharp bitterness of alcohol in the air.

He hasn’t partaken in any of it, in all honesty. He’s on the precipice, waiting for your arrival.

Steve had done his best to hide his disappointment earlier in the day when you informed him that you would have to catch up with him at the party later.

“I’ve got to pick up some friends from the airport,” you had said, almost sheepish when you knocked on the door to his room.

And he had responded with a nonchalant of course, yeah, it’s no problem sort of answer. But now that the party had officially been going on for almost an hour, he couldn’t help but feel an anxious twinge in his side as he kept sweeping the room with his eyes - trying to find you in the crowd.

It’s not that he can’t socialize with the team, the veterans, or the other partygoers. It’s a completely different reason entirely that he keeps seeking you out amongst the celebration.

“So,” Sam knocks his elbow against Steve’s arm. “You find a place in Brooklyn yet?”

He gazes out over the atrium, knowing the well-recycled conversation was just Sam’s attempt at distracting him for another few minutes. While he had never explicitly spoken about his feelings towards you, it seemed it was apparently evident to just about everyone in his inner circle of friends - Sam and Natasha included.

“I’m not sure I can afford a place in Brooklyn.”

It was true. But like he had told you the other night, he didn’t all that mind staying at the Tower. It at least kept him busy when he wasn’t working on the missing person’s case with Sam. Everything had changed after the collapse of SHIELD and Steve hadn’t been particularly interested in going back to square one and attempting his shot at normalcy.

No, joining them on the HYDRA raids had been exactly what he needed.

The other man takes another swig of his drink, “Well, home is home, you know?”

Steve looks at him for a moment before he returns his gaze to the room - eyes not quite seeing the actual location itself. But lost in the beginning of an idea that his mind sometimes liked to dangle in front of him. Images of a possible future that didn’t seem all that unwelcoming - just a little improbable.

It’s only with the loud boisterous sound of Thor’s booming voice that he’s able to focus back on the party itself and, more importantly, on the three women who have just come up the stairs.

It’s like an immediate sucker punch to the gut as he takes you in. He’s not sure if he’s ever actually seen you in a dress before. But what a debut this is.

It’s very… Grecian, he’ll admit. Bathed in soft white fabric and glistening golden embellishments, you’re every bit a goddess as you make your way over to Thor - introducing your guests.

Steve finds himself literally muttering a silent wow to himself, feeling the uptick in his heartbeat and the sudden rush of warmth to his cheeks.

And then he’s clamping his hand on Sam’s shoulder, “Think I need a drink.”

The other man just chuckles into his glass, already knowing exactly where his attention has fallen for the rest of the night.

You can’t help but smile as Thor tugs the taller woman into a tight hug. The shorter of the two immediately backs up before he can grab hold of her.

“You’ve gotten bigger,” she states with an air of disinterest.

He chuckles, patting the other on the shoulder fondly, “Still using the same mystical illusions then?”

Sprite shrugs.

Her disguise is about five inches taller than her actual form and abnormally similar to the airport's gift shop cashier they had passed on the way out to meet you. With dark chestnut-colored hair and a pair of striking green eyes, she looked nothing like her usual self - but that was the entire point, of course.

“We’re trying to keep a low profile,” Sersi says gently, leveling Thor with a look that was filled with the expectation of continued secrecy.

It wasn’t every day two Eternals were invited to a Stark Tower party. But then again, only the two of you knew of their existence in the first place. A well-kept secret indeed.

He makes an understanding ahh sound, nodding your way, “Friends from work, then?”

“Yes, actually,” you tug Sersi’s hand into your own. “We worked together at the Louvre for two years.”

“And at the Acropolis Museum - ” she fills in.

“And the Natural History Museum in D.C. and - ”

“London and New York, yeah. We get it,” Sprite interrupts briskly, her attention drifting over to a young waiter with a tray full of champagne.

Sersi’s expression softens as she looks over at her companion, “And that’s our cue to get a drink. We’ll catch up later.”

She makes a valiant effort to pull Sprite away gracefully to a nice quiet corner while you look upon Thor in his crimson jacket and casually messy smoothed-back hair.

“I half expected to see you surrounded by your kind,” you admit.

He chuckles, eyes raking over the fit of your dress, “While it is no Asgardian revel, I must admit, I quite enjoy the company I have made here on Midgard.”

“Hmmm, I see.”

Your shoulder brushes against his upper arm as the two of you move through the crowd.

A glance across the room has you spotting Steve at the bar, conversing with Natasha and Clint. You want to make your way over to them, but you know how out of place Thor is in the room - much like yourself, honestly. You had never been one for parties, even back on Olympus - and they were frequent there. Not wanting to interrupt your companions' conversation at the bar, you remain with your fellow god.

“And when you speak of good company, I assume you are referring to your good lady? Dr. Foster?”

The way his brow creases as his lips form a thin line makes everything that much more abundantly clear, especially when the God of Thunder attempts to duck out of view to grab hors d'oeuvres from one of the caterers. He pops the caviar cracker in his mouth and immediately blanches, forcing himself to swallow it down and smile.

“Yes, of course. Very good, very… happy,” he nods, hands on his hips.

Taking pity on the poor man, you rest your hand upon his arm, “Odinson. I know you have been here far more often than you’d like to admit - ”

“Well,” he smirks, “Midgard is quite low on daring quests for someone such as myself to partake in. I seek leisure where I can.”

With an unsurprised huff, you say, gently, “If you were here for leisure, as you say, you would not be here with us, I believe.”

His shockingly blue eyes meet yours. An air of long-held familiarity passes between the two of you as the party around you continues on. It’s with a knowing look in your eyes that he has to force his own gaze away, coughing roughly into his fist.

“Ah, advice from the virginal goddess herself. Have you become an expert in the field of relationships, my Lady Athena?”

You release your hold on his arm, shyly rubbing at your own elbow as your eyes flit across the crowd.

“Hardly. But I’ve been around long enough to know these things, Thor. How long will you be away after you return the scepter?”

He sniffs indignantly, “I have been away from my home for a long time indeed. I feel it warrants an extended visit.”

Something in those eyes makes your heart clench, your features softening in intensity as it dawns on you. He was not spending time with Jane Foster because there was no longer a reason to do so. He wanted to be here. He desired to get away from that place and therefore that relationship.

The realization is heartbreaking, so you find yourself asking, “Are you okay?”

The god nearly balks at that, plastering on a very tight smile, “Wh-why would I not be? Come! We should have a drink to celebrate such an accomplishment!”

His arm wraps around your waist in an instant, his large hand covering the middle of your bare back - fingers splayed across your heated skin. If he did not want to ruin the evening with talk of his past love, then you certainly weren’t going to push the topic tonight.

“I swear if it’s anything like the terrible drink your kind used to have back in the day - ”

He beams, looking down at you as the two of you walk over to the railing overlooking the lower levels of the Tower.

“I come bearing only the best for such revelries - ” he grins, pulling an ornate flask from his open jacket, “And only for the closest of allies.”

Flicking the topper off, he holds it out for you. Taking a wary sniff, your eyes nearly bulge as you giggle a nervous sound.

“Cronus, help us all.”

Grabbing hold of the flask, you take a single swig of the fast-burning liquid, sputtering pensively as it runs down your throat. Voice turned hoarse as you wave it back his way, “See? Truly terrible. Your people have no concept of a good drink.”

Thor chuckles, taking a shot of the Asgardian liquor for himself before pocketing the flask once again, “For tonight only - and because I am in the presence of a friend - I shall try not to take personal offense to that.”

You give him a nod in return, eyes blazing with a playful challenge, “Do try that.”

Natasha, for all appearances, is fully healed up. She’s perched on the barstool, sipping on her red-tinted drink, eyes scanning the room when Steve approaches. Clint has a grounding hand on her waist as he talks to a man on the other side of her, though she doesn’t seem to mind the lack of attention. Settling her drink down on the counter, she smiles up at him sweetly.

“Well, well, well. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Steve scoffs a quiet laugh, tucking his hands into his pockets as he glances over at you - your two friends seem to be familiar with Thor, or at least extrovertedly confident enough to greet him with a hug.

“You got cleared to drink?”

Nat waves a dismissive hand, “I’m Russian, this barely counts as alcohol. Though I see you’re not participating.”

He shrugs, eyes flickering back over to the four of you as the conversation with your friends seems to wrap up fairly quickly, leaving you alone with Thor.

“Doesn’t do any good with the serum, you know.”

She makes a soft hum of understanding, taking another sip of her drink as she watches him watching the two of you from across the room.

You were the point of his focus.

The soft draping of your dress seemed perfectly tailored to you, with its flutter sleeves and high neckline. The hem fell just above your knees, and as you turned to walk towards the balcony overlook, Steve felt the sudden tightening of his throat as his eyes fell to your back. It was fully exposed, save for the clinching collar at your neck and the guiding hand of the Asgardian whose fingers were resting far too low for Steve's liking.

Clint’s laughter pulls his attention back over to the bar, as he leans down to whisper something in Nat’s ear before dipping back into the crowd of people. Steve’s focus falls on the arrow-shaped necklace the assassin begins to fiddle with.

“If you were looking for a moment, Captain, now would be a good one.”

Sometimes, he found it unnerving how quickly Natasha could read a person down to their very core. Even after all of his time training and working for SHIELD and the STRIKE team, he had never managed to school his features away like they did. He was probably an open book for her abilities, whether he liked it or not.

With a sigh, he finally looks back over just in time to see Thor’s hand on your bare back, his head lowered down as you clutch something small and silver-colored in your hand. You’re laughing and even across the noise of the room, he can make it out with near clarity.

Natasha slides her finger along the rim of her glass, with a teasing, “Tick, tock.”

Pulling back his shoulders and forcing a purposeful breath from his lungs, Steve begins to weave his way through the crowd. He’s stopped one too many times for his patience, but he gives each person a polite and respectful greeting before apologizing and attempting to continue forward once again.

At last, he spots the bright white of your dress. He can even hear the tail end of your conversation above the low hum of the music playing on the speakers.

“ - probably best if you just... yeah. We’ll speak later.”

And only once he’s made his way through the last few party-goers, does Thor press past him with a tightly-lipped Captain in lieu of a greeting. Steve watches him go for just a moment before he focuses his attention back onto the person he had crossed the floor to see.

Your brow is furrowed and your voice cuttingly vicious as you eye two new strangers beside you.

“What in Cronus’ name are you doing here?”

A man with dark curls and a warm complexion merely rolls his eyes at you, “This is how we’re greeted.”

“Well, what did you expect?” You snip, eyes flashing something dangerous as you round on the taller man. “A hug and a kiss? I mean... you can’t just come here and expect – ”

“A warm welcome?”

Steve’s gaze falls to the shorter of the two – still a hair taller than you of course. His grin is worryingly bright, forced, but not sinister. Steve takes a step forward.

The movement alone drags your attention away from the men and the tension on your face seems to dissipate with relief when your eyes lock in on him.

“Steve,” you plead gently, extending your hand out for him.

Unsure of what exactly he has stepped into, he grips his belt and stares straight ahead at the two visitors – only after giving you a quick glance.

“Captain Rogers,” you say with a hint of salt. “May I introduce my brothers.”

He knows his brows have risen in surprise as he refocuses on the men.

The dark-haired one, with the thin beard, sneers down at them both. While the shorter of the pair, decked out in a plum-colored velvet jacket, offers a more comforting smile. But Steve’s reassurance wains when he reaches out and grabs hold of your shoulder – trying to steer you away from him.

“Pleasure, of course. But we need to speak with our dear sister.”

You grip the man’s hand and yank his wrist back in a clear warning.

“And if you decided to seek me out in such a public place, clearly you give little care to who may be around to hear what you intend to say.”

A very clear I’m staying where I am. Steve almost wants to smile with pride as he crosses his arms over his chest and gazes down at you. Not a sign of fear or trepidation lies on your face when you shoot him a quick look.

The taller of the two sighs. Dropping his arms, he reaches into his wheat-colored pant pocket and pulls out something that glints in the ambient lighting. While he takes hold of the silver chain, a small locket slips to the bottom – dangling in the air beneath his fingers.

“A gift.”

Steve’s eyes instinctively trail to your face – curious what your reaction will be. But your expression remains resolutely blank.

Flipping the locket into the palm of his hand, your brother carefully flicks open the silver cover to reveal a gentle flickering orange flame.

If he were able to look away from it, Steve would have seen the near-gasp of surprise on your lips.

“You’ve been away, ‘Thena,” your other brother says gently. “For far too long.”

With a twist of his wrist, the locket snaps shut and Steve’s gaze rises to the dark eyes of the other man.

“A message, I give to you, dear sister. Goddess of Wisdom.”

Extending his hand out, the locket dangling precariously between the two of you, Steve watches as your fingers carefully wrap around the item – slipping the chain from your brother’s fingers until the piece of jewelry is safely secured in your own hand.

Leaning in close, ducking his head down to almost your ear, the taller of the two harshly whispers, “Uti prudenter.”

When he pulls back, your eyes harden and Steve swears a flicker of gold shines there for just a moment. Staring up at the man in question, you ask, “What have you seen?”

“Nothing but what is to come.”

You snort indignantly, tossing the locket in your hand for a moment of thought.

“How ever helpful, Hermes.”

He crosses his arms, sparing you a calculated look.

“I’m not the god of visions, am I?”

“Only a carrier of precious flames, is that right?”

Holding out his palm, as if to say well, give it back then. You hold the locket closer to your chest, turning your shoulder toward Steve, making the man smirk.

“As I thought.”

With a hmph, you watch as he disappears through the small crowd before descending the stairs. Your other brother watches on for a moment before giving you a small, albeit sheepish, smile.

“Be careful.”

At that, your features soften a hair. Raising a brow at him, you ask, “Aren’t I always?”

A sharp laugh escapes from his lips as he steps forward to wrap you into a quick, tight, hug. One that you quickly accept.

“Never.”

Without a parting word, he too follows the steps of your other sibling and heads down the stairs. You stare on for a moment longer, glancing down at the locket in your hand before at last you turn those brilliant eyes toward him.

“Family reunions, am I right?”

He can’t help but chuckle at that.

With a soft sigh, you lean against the banister behind you, encouraging him to do the same as he falls into place on your left. His eyes have a hard time trailing away from that silver-chained locket though, still sitting in your palm.

“They never travel this way,” you explain. “Must be important. Probably on word from the Fates.”

His curiosity piques ever more, but one question seems to fall into place at the forefront of his mind.

“And that flame... was that...?”

Your eyes lift from the necklace to meet his pointed gaze.

“The Promethean Flame, yes. Or an extension of it, at least.”

Giving another sigh, your fingers pull open the latch before you tilt your head to the side. Your hair cascades over your right shoulder as you pull the chain around your neck – clasping the lock together – before you gaze down at the heavy locket now resting against your bosom.

“You know that when I’m away from Olympus for too long, my powers weaken. My body grows more prone to suffering as a typical human would. This, I imagine - ” you take hold of the plain-faced locket, staring at it as though it’s a puzzle to answer, “May keep me from experiencing too great an injury.”

Releasing a breath he didn’t realize he had been holding, Steve says, “For your sake, let’s hope so.”

Your warm eyes trail upward to meet his gaze and a curved smile befalls your sweet lips.

There’s a faint feeling of warm inebriation now running through his veins – having partaken in one or two sips from Thor’s special flask. He uses that reason, and that alone, for the lazy arm he has resting on the couch behind you. His whole body flushes as you turn your head toward him – laughing at something Clint had said just a moment ago. Your left shoulder brushes against his bare forearm and he grins in return – not having heard a single sound above the ringing of your laughter.

“Absolutely not,” Clint’s saying – twirling a pair of drumsticks on the floor beside Maria.

Tony raises a brow in return, “Why would I lie about that? No, I had a rep from Ben & Jerry’s literally here before this whole scepter business blew up. They want to make a whole line of flavors around us.”

Your head lolls to the side, a tired smile tugging at your lips. He can feel the gentle bobbing of your pointed heel against his calf, though you don’t seem to notice as you glance back at the man to your right – saying something soft and apparently funny in nature to Thor who barks a laugh in return.

“What’d ya say, Cap?” Tony grabs his attention. “Up for a little rendezvous with apple pie and other such iconic flavors.”

Steve just shakes his head in return.

“ - yes, a solid rum flavor would do you well,” he hears you say to the other God.

“And for you?” Thor muses playfully. “What shall it be?”

Before you can even conjure up a reply, Steve finds himself saying, “Honey.”

Your sharp gaze turns to him and immediately a smile blossoms across your features.

“Honey, strawberries, and a touch of cream. You know me well, Rogers.”

Steve shrugs in return, secretly pleased with himself for anticipating such an answer and for turning your attention away from the other man for just a moment more.

Somehow talk of ice cream flavors and brand deals gives way to a more interesting topic of conversation amongst the group in only a matter of minutes.

“But it’s a trick,” Clint bemoans.

Thor smiles in a pleased fashion as he passes along the silver flask from you and then onto Steve who quickly knocks back another shot of the fiery liquid.

“No, no, it’s much more than that.”

He can feel the curl of your fingers around his hand when he hands back the container and his eyes fall to the small patch of uncovered skin above your knee – your white dress having risen slightly higher as you lean back against the warm cushions.

“Ah, whoever he be worthy shall have the power!” Clint exclaims, holding his hands out toward the hammer resting on the coffee table. “Whatever, man. It’s a trick!”

“Please, be my guest.”

Thor gestures at Mjolnir and silence seems to befall the group for just a moment as everyone’s attention pinpoints on the infamous hammer. There’s a second of silence as Clint seems to take in the words.

“Come on. Really?”

“Yeah.”

To his right, he can hear Rhodey sigh, “Oh, this is gonna be beautiful.”

Even you turn your attention to the archer now as he approaches the legendary weapon.

“You know I’ve seen this before, right?”

At Thor’s nod, he grips the handle and attempts to pull. But it doesn’t even budge a millimeter as he grunts with the effort. With an incredulous laugh, he draws his hand away, shaking his head.

“I still don’t know how you do it!”

“Smell the silent judgment?”

Glancing across the room, Clint offers his hand out to the billionaire.

“Please, Stark. By all means.”

With his typical air of arrogance, Tony lifts from the couch beside Rhodey and plucks open the button on his suit jacket. Steve leans back beside you and watches with glistening amusement as he rounds the table.

“Never one to shrink from an honest challenge. It’s physics.”

He takes a moment to wrap the leather strap around his wrist, preparing his hold as he looks toward the God in question.

“Right, so, if I lift it, I then rule Asgard?”

Thor, unsurprisingly calm, responds, “Yes. Of course.”

Steve covers his mouth with his fist, already anticipating the likely outcome.

With two solid tugs and a few bitten grunts, Tony releases the strap – a sudden look of determination overcoming his features, as he says, “I’ll be right back.”

As he wanders off, much to the hooted badgering from Clint and Rhodey, Steve catches the familiar look you share with Thor. You lean into the other’s side, nudging his arm with your elbow as you whisper something too soft for even the super soldier’s ears.

Arriving back with a piece of a suit, Tony attempts the feat again. And, when that ultimately fails, he has Rhodes following after him to grab a part of War Machine’s armor. That attempt also fails – rather spectacularly as your sweet laughter fills his ears.

There’s also an attempt made by Bruce and Sam. The latter grunts with the effort before ducking his head down with a laugh.

“Man, I don’t know how you do this.”

And then he feels the gentle pressure of your arm against his elbow. When his gaze trails away from Sam, he meets your heated expression.

“Steve?” you softly goad.

What more can he do than roll back his sleeves and rise to the challenge?

“Go ahead, Steve. No pressure,” Tony drawls, still in defeat over his own failed attempt.

Sam gives him a warm slap to the shoulder as he passes.

“Come on, Cap,” Barton encourages.

Staring down at the hammer, he fixes his gaze upon the engraved runic wording. Physics had failed Tony, sheer force of will failed Clint. Maybe if he just...

Wrapping his hands around the handle, he offers you a quick glance – catching your watchful stare – before he pulls back with all of his might. He swears, for just a second, that he can feel it budge, but when he looks down... nothing.

Holding his hands up in defeat, a smile on his face, he catches the biting laugh from Thor as the other man shakes his head.

“Nothing!”

Steve presses past the two of you before taking his seat once more. You give him a solidary pat on the shoulder and a gently murmured tough luck, Cap. Someone clears their throat and Banner gestures his hands towards Natasha.

“And... Widow?”

Realization crosses her features as she leans back with a too-obvious smile.

“Oh, no, no. That’s not a question I need answered.”

Drawing their attention to the last remaining member of the team, Steve’s eyes fall upon you. Too busy watching the moment unfold with Romanoff, you’re suddenly staring at the group of them before also laughing – holding your hands up in pure dismissal.

“Absolutely not.”

“Come on,” Tony goads in an instant. “If there was anyone who could manage a feat of godly power...”

“Out of the question.”

This time, it’s Thor’s daunting timber that speaks.

Steve knows he’s not the only one curious by the sudden change in format as all eyes seem to fall on the God himself. Thor stiffens, fingers clutching his glass as he peers over at you for just a second.

“That’s not something that can be done,” you say in slow calculated words. “We will never wield one another’s weapons.”

“Can’t or won’t?” Tony immediately inquires.

Your nervous expression pauses on Steve for just a moment, as if needing strength for whatever conversation was suddenly unraveling. Your knee presses against his outer thigh and he immediately pushes back in return.

“Can’t, obviously,” Thor sniffs, gazing at the contents of his amber drink before taking a healthy drink of it. And then his dark eyes fall upon you, “Show them.”

Sparing the other God a heated glance, you stand up at once – your dress falls back in place with a careful draping of soft white fabric as you brush past Thor’s spread knees – taking your spot before the hammer.

Shooting a look at the accompanying group, you reach your hand out towards the weapon in question – just for a sharp bluish-white zap of lightning to arch out and singe the end of your fingertips. Pulling away with a sharp hiss of discomfort, you bring your digits up to your lips and gently suck at the burned flesh.

“See?” Thor drawls.

And then a light seems to glow in your eyes, a new wave of confidence, as you say with a teasing tone, “Fair is fair.”

Tossing your hand up into the air – a ray of golden light stretches down from the ceiling as your shield materializes in your hand. You hold the Aegis close to your side – looking ever so much like the fictional Goddess of legend that you were.

Steve’s fully, hopelessly, entranced.

Thor actually shrinks away from the object in question – digging himself further into the corner of the couch cushions as though he could vanish into them.

“No mortal man can wield such an item and I do not wish to try.”

Clint barks a laugh, “Come on! Like the lady said, fair is fair. Own up!”

The shield seems surprisingly light in your hand – though even Steve knows that appearances are entirely deceiving, having been in a position to use it on more than one occasion.

But with keen interest, everyone watches as the God of Thunder slowly rises to his feet. His hand reaches out, then pulls away, before he grits his teeth and finally goes for the strap of the inner handle.

You slip your hand away until you’re just barely holding it up at all. Thor’s fingers curl alongside yours for just a moment before you pull away entirely and –

BANG

“Fuck!” Barton hollers.

Thor screeches as the shield connects with the floor – splintering the wood – as the Aegis just barely grazes the toe of his shoe. He leaps back as if burned, though clearly he suffers from nothing more than burnt pride.

But Steve’s attention falls on the beaming smile on your face.

“Anyone for a go?” you ask cheerfully.

“Absolutely not.”

“Enough bruised ego for one day.”

And then your eyes cross over the group to meet the super soldier’s, a knowing glint in your warm expression as you ask, “Steve?”

Returning the grin, and feeling a bit prideful in the fact that he presses past a somber-looking Thor, Steve leans down and pulls the Aegis free from it’s temporary holding place in Tony’s floor – offering the shield back to you with little more than an uncomfortable twinge of discomfort from the sheer weight of the item.

“Thank you,” you smooze, taking hold of the shield once again and allowing it to lift up into the air and back to its home of origin.

There’s a moment that passes, between the two of you then, where a silent understanding almost occurs, but it’s immediately lost to the sharp ringing of a mechanical sound across the room. Steve’s hands fly to his ears as he cringes away from the noise.

Just as fast as the ringing occurred, it’s gone in an instant. But the sound of something metal upon the floor grabs everyone’s attention. Steve feels himself stepping closer to your side as you all look on at the metal bot that staggers out of the lab.

“Worthy? How could you be worthy? You’re all killers.”

He takes a breath, unsure of what exactly he’s seeing, but trusting it no more than he did SHIELD or any other faction he had found himself up against in the past three years.

“Stark.”

“Jarvis.”

“I’m sorry, I was asleep,” The mangled bot continues, glancing around – almost unseeing – at the room. “Or I was a dream.”

Tony’s pulled out a device and is speaking into it, but Steve can hardly look away from the sight before him – before them all. As the bot twists and turns, unsteady on its feet. Wires hang from its body like dangling tendons and veins, it holds a hand to its head as if in pain.

“- there was this terrible noise. And I was tangled in... in... strings. Had to kill the other guy,” the bot waves its hand in fleeting reference. “He was a good guy. But down in the real world, we’re faced with ugly choices.”

“Who sent you?” Thor demands.

The electronic voice of Tony Stark then plays out for them all to hear.

“I see a suit of armor around the world.”

Beside him, Athena barely breathes out, “Ultron.”

The bot fixes her with a glowing blue-eyed look and Steve stiffens.

“In the flesh. Or... no, not yet. Not this chrysalis. But I’m ready. I’m on a mission.”

Hill clocks the hammer on her gun, staring down the bot, “What mission?”

“Peace in our time.”

And then, as if fixing its look on one person in particular, the bot’s thrusters come to life and it surges forward – hand open – as it grabs hold of Tony and careens out the window.

Steve lurches forward, rushing to the shattered glass as the malfunctioning robot grips the billionaire by the neck over the bustling city street many stories below them all. Tony digs into the arms of the creature, his feet dangling, kicking uselessly for purchase.

Turning his attention toward the group now circling the open space, the bot seems to sneer.

“Look at you. The very ideal of peace-keeping. But what are you really?”

The bot soars closer, not enough to be within full reach. And Steve knows that any attempt at disarming it will bring Tony’s safety into immediate question. He can do nothing more than stare on in disturbed wonder as the robot begins lecturing them.

“Your very existence is a threat to peace. Agent Romanoff and Barton, the two gallivanting criminals.”

Its mechanical eyes rove across the group, landing on the person standing to his left. Your chin juts out in defiance. The robot chortles.

“And the Gods from another realm. How much destruction can you cause with just a flick of your mighty finger? Of course, your faith in humanity’s greatest threat is of grave concern to any being with a twinge of intelligence.”

A pointed metal finger singles out Doctor Banner, who shrinks away from them all – nervous glances shared – as he ducks his head down.

“Captain America, himself.”

Steve’s hardened gaze refuses to be moved by the bot as it focuses all of its attention on him.

“So locked in your ideals, Captain. But at what cost? Unwilling to compromise for something you believe in. Endangering the entire planet at the cost of a ghost.”

A surge of discomfort lashes up inside of him and Steve can’t help but look away – if only to catch your equally concerned eye.

“And you - ” At last, the bot jerks Tony away – giving the man no secure hold beside the arm extending him out to his doom. “Anthony Stark. A man so obsessed with making amends for his past, that you end up causing more harm than good.”

Tony struggles, his face turning red as he puffs out desperate breaths.

The bot turns toward them with the most menacing look a robot could ever give.

“This group – this team. You put the world at large at risk. Every argument, every guilt trip, and jab will lead to your failure. Where I was created to see the world as it is. How it should be. The ultimate global peacekeeper.

In an instant, the wall behind the bar explodes as three similar robots shoot out towards the group.

Tony is all but tossed toward them, landing in a curled heap beside Rhodey and Clint – panting out a worrying series of breaths before he manages to stand and call out to the Legion’s operating system.

Gunshots ring out, the heavy metallic clunk of Thor’s hammer making contact with something equally dense, shattered glass, and the shrill cry of Helen Cho meets his ears as he pushes forward. Leaping over the glass banister, Steve lands atop a silver bot, yanking back on its head with all his might as it tries to slam him into the wall.

It succeeds, with the second blow, as he tumbles down onto the floor – broken glass shards dig into his palm as he tries to steady himself.

“Cap!”

Sam’s voice rings out across the room as a shield is tossed his way.

Using a chair for a weapon, you manage to knock away another bot from Dr. Cho’s reach – sending it back into Thor’s hammer. Steve swivels in time to catch the shoulder joint of another robot, bringing the shield down on its back with some relief as the bot splutters out electrical shocks before ultimately disengaging.

Looking up from the remnants of the mayhem, his chest heaving and his hands gripped into tight fists, Steve watches as Tony takes a heavy step back from the initial mangled-looking bot as it presses further into the room.

“That was dramatic.”

Steve spares you a glance as he tightens his grip on the shield.

“I’m sorry, I know you mean well. But this... this team will never work. You will be humanity’s downfall. You want to protect the world, but you don’t want it to change. How is humanity saved if it’s not allowed to... evolve?”

Glancing down at one of its fallen comrades, the bot kicks the side of its head – the steel faceplate gives way, revealing the wires and mechanisms that lie underneath.

“With these? These puppets?”

It looks back upon them all.

“There’s only one path to peace,” it stares at Tony then. “The Avengers’ extinction.”

And then the bot shatters with the might of Thor’s hammer.

“I had strings, but now I’m free...” The bot drowns for just a moment longer before its lights dim and the entire thing grows silent.

Stepping forward, Steve stares down at the last remaining pieces of the mangled robot before his full fury turns toward the billionaire resting on the glass steps with another torn-apart robot beside him.

Previous Chapter || Next Chapter

[justimajin]

The Profit & Love Statement » Pt. 5

↠ Pairing: Seokjin x Reader

↠ Genre: Fluff, Comedy, Angst

↳ (3.9k), Office AU (lowkey E2L vibes) 

↠ Summary: The workplace isn’t for everyone. It can be mundane and repetitive, with some describing it like a nuisance and others as a blessing. You’re the kind that leans more towards the latter and while it does make you an ideal candidate for many things, nothing could have prepared you for the whirlwind that is the new employee.

GIF credit.

↠ Next Update: Tuesday, August 15 (series masterpost here)

You narrow your eyes at the instant ramen.

The first and last time you attempted cooking the simple packaged noodles, you had accidentally added in oil instead of water and the entire pot erupted into flames, resulting in the bulk of the noodles to come out fried to a crisp instead of boiled. 

What could go wrong a second time?

As you stand there in the aisle contemplating the life and death situation, a cart hits you.

You spin around, the young man profusely apologizing.

“Don’t worry about it.” You say with a smile, and he meekly pushes the cart across from yours, attempting to quickly bypass you in the lane.

You drop the packet of noodles into your cart and push it forward with a sigh. You had come home during the night only to discover that your fridge was nearly empty and as a result, you had ended up busing to the grocery store with Yuna in an attempt to salvage some food.

However, your current circumstance only has you wincing at products the further you dive deeper into the store.

“Y/N!”

Yuna rushes down the lane, pausing at your cart with a collection of snacks in her hands.

“Can we get these?”

“Let’s see…” You dart your eyes, grimacing at not only the abundance in his grasp, but the inflated price each one has. 

Your vision shifts, noticing a pile of chips on sale. “Why don’t we get those ones?”

Yuna scrunches her nose, “But they taste horrible.”

“They’re on sale.” You offer with a soft smile, pushing your cart closer to them. However, Yuna’s expression doesn’t change. 

You sigh, reaching out for one of her snacks, “Alright, how about we just get one of these?”

She beams, “Okay!”

You smile, but then Yuna realizes what’s in your cart.

“You’re going to buy ramen…?”

“Yeah, it’s cheap and I’ll try to make it again.” You suggest.

“Oh, okay….” Yuna says, “That sounds nice…”

You shake your head from her horrible attempt to be optimistic, “Don’t worry, that’s why I’m buying some snacks just in case.”

She laughs at that and you resume roaming around the store for the next hour. You don’t end up buying much, a particular impending notice tending to manifest in your brain every five minutes and the words ‘why is everything here so expensive?’ leaving you more than once.

It’s not long before you’re checking out at the cashier and Yuna helps you carry the groceries out the store. But that’s when her head reels around.

“Can we go there?”

“Hm?” You turn around and notice the posh restaurant on the other side of the street.

A grimace runs through you, “Maybe next time.” You promise right away and it’s hard to ignore the flash of disappointment that crosses Yuna.

As the bus moves through the various stops, the pending notice blocks your thoughts again. You assumed that grabbing extra shifts from your restaurant would be hard enough, but you wonder how it’ll pale in comparison to the mammoth task you’ve taken on. 

Taehyung deeply sighs.

It’s not difficult, nor is it excruciating, but he’s starting to realize both yours and Yoongi’s distress.

There really is only one way to describe it:

Kim Seokjin and the workplace do not mix well. 

“Mr. Soon-To-Be CEO, that is not the way we do that.” He cautiously states. He’s lost track of how many times he’s said that phrase or alterations of it to the intern.

“But this is so boring.” Seokjin scoffs, spinning around in his rolling chair. Taehyung can understand that it’s hard to properly grasp onto Marketing concepts and that the latter doesn’t have much experience with it, but he hasn’t managed to get anywhere as a result.

Seokjin suddenly stops, a bright twinkle residing within his irises, “Hey, hey, want to hear a joke?”

Taehyung inwardly groans.

“Not reall–“ 

“You know how you were telling me about how small businesses can take up loans but big corporations don’t need to?” 

He furrows his brows. That was something he told Seokjin in a casual conversation, and he actually remembered it.

Before he can answer, the Soon-To-Be CEO is already laughing. 

“Is it because they’ve lost interest?”

Immediately the man is doubled over and wheezing with squeaky laughs. Taehyung stands frozen before him like a statue, his confusion morphing into a deadpan expression.

It nearly mimics the one Yoongi usually has, but the lack of reaction is something the man before him isn’t keen on.

Seokjin stops laughing, crossing his arms with a pout, “Laugh.”

It almost sounds like a command and to rebuttal, Taehyung lets out the most hysterical and jovious laugh of his entire life. It lasts for a single minute before it is completely gone, similar to a switch being turned off.

Seokjin frowns at the reaction.

“Geez, Tae.” A new voice beckons him from the door, “You could have at least tried to properly laugh.”

Taehyung whirls around, a bright smile stretching across his features.

“Y/N?”

You return his smile and enter the room, “How’s the shadowing been going?”

Taehyung’s smile drops, and he lets out a deep exhale.

You chuckle, “Sounds about right.”

Seokjin frowns, “What are you doing here?”

“Good question.” You muse, “I’m here to help Taehyung and to oversee your training from now on.”

Seokjin’s eyes widen at that. You reminisce that even though this process is just an uphill battle for a promotion and you weren’t able to secure a Managerial position, your role is somewhat similar to what you were aiming towards.

You take the chair next to Taehyung, “What were you teaching Seokjin before I got here?” 

“Pretty much the basics.” Taehyung begins, “I was trying to explain the different types of media we use in the company for Marketing and how we work with other departments to ensure the right type of advertising.” 

“So you haven’t even progressed to the hand’s on components yet…” You murmur underneath your breath, turning to Seokjin. 

“And how much of that did you grasp?” 

He squints, “Probably like…. 2%.” 

You frown, placing a finger against your chin. If there was anything you knew about Seokjin, it was that the office was brand new for him, and there was no point getting extensive with his training if he wasn’t able to keep up. 

Which means you really need to go back to the basics. 

“Alright then,” You turn to Taehyung, “Do you mind if he works with me for some time? You can resume training him afterwards.” 

Taehyung glances at you in puzzlement, not quite understanding what was churning in your mind. But he solemnly nods, deciding to go with your judgement. 

***

The moment you leave the room, there’s no stone left unturned.

“You still don’t understand how to do basic computations, right?”

Seokjin turns at the sound of your voice, previously occupied with simply following behind you and peering around the place.

“Nope.”

“And you’re still confused around how things work here on a day-to-day basis?”

“Well, yeah.” He plainly states. Turning his attention over to you, he peers over your shoulder.

He raises an eyebrow at the notepad in your hand. “Wait – are you writing all of that down?”

“Yep.” You say, focused on writing the last point. You unclick your pen and drop it into your pocket. “It’s like I said before, I’m overseeing your training now.”

Seokjin follows you to your cubicle, absentmindedly staring around.

You gesture to your desk for him to take a seat. He compiles and a giant stack of papers lands right in front of him.

He furrow his brows, “What’s all this?” 

You gesture to them, “These are some of the training manuals we give to newer employees. It’s usually complemented by a training program, but since you’re an intern already, this will have to do.”

You slip out some papers from the bottom of the stack. “Since you mentioned having problems about making computations, you’re going to need to understand them first.” You slide the paper closer to him, “That means going through past company trends.” 

The paper is then added to the pile, “Additionally, it’s better for you to get more hands-on experience. That’s the best way to learn and many employees only tend to understand after they get the experience. And that’s why‒” 

You point over to the empty cubicle next to you, opposite to the side Yoongi works at, “That’s going to be yours.” 

You pause, focusing on him now, “Make sense?”

He slowly nods, lips pursed and a crease forming between his brows. You take it as an answer and hope that the change of routine would be helpful somehow, but when you move to head over to Hoseok’s office for any more training manuals he has to spare, you don’t notice the speck of fear that’s entered his eyes. 

Rising onto your feet, you swerve, and he’s left alone.

As he stares at all the papers and tasks before him, he can’t help but think there’s something completely different about you from the start of his training. Before you were merely annoyed with his antics and would take any opportunity to quip back something at him.

But now, now it’s like you’ve taken charge of everything and there’s no place he can run.

Raising your hand, a knock resonates against the door.

It comes swinging open in second, a tired yet still cheerful Hoseok emerging out.

At the sight of you, he warmly smiles, “Oh, hi Y/N. Did you need something?”

“Some training manuals.” You reminisce, “I managed to only grab a couple from HR this morning but I wanted to ask if there’s anymore I could just borrow for the time being.”

“Of course.”

Hoseok widens the door to his office and you slip in, watching him look around the room and pull out some drawers. It takes him a couple of minutes before he can locate them, and he hands them over with a smile.

“I’m assuming these are for Seokjin?” 

“Yeah…” You sigh, “I’m sure Taehyung’s already told you the news.”

He frowns, recalling seeing the man working at his cubicle alone, “You mean the good news for him?”

You chuckle at that, “It is what it is. I’m just here hoping I can do a good enough job with this role.”

You wonder if the tension if evident on your feature, because Hoseok replies with‒

“Hey, don’t stress out too much about it.” He says, the corner of his mouth tugging, “I mean, you were right in the way. Even if Seokjin’s supposed to become the new CEO, he’s just another employee like the rest of us.” 

You hum, “Besides, if there’s anyone I can see doing his training, it’s you. You should have seen the state Taehyung was in after a day.” 

A chuckle escapes you from that, and Hoseok warmly smiles. 

Retrieving the manuals, you exit his office and head back to your cubicle.

The first thing that catches your eyes is the way Seokjin is slumped against his desk, his head turned down and brows furrowed as he stares at the stack of papers before him.

“Any luck?”

His eyes snap up in an instant, “Oh, uh, yeah….” An angelic smile forecasts over him, “It’s starting to make more sense now.”

You smile with a knowing look, “You know, you have to work on it seriously.” 

His face pales, but you simply gesture towards the paperwork before turning to your monitor. 

At being caught, Seokjin lets out a deep sigh.

It’s difficult for him to explain. Even though he thankfully isn’t expected to do the same volume of work as before and the work you’ve given him isn’t necessarily the hardest (actually, it looks a lot simpler than before), his focus is fleeting and drifting elsewhere. 

He highly doubts he’s even at the standard compared to all the people in the cubicles surrounding him. 

Lifting his head, he peers up in your direction.

You were in the middle of a conversation with Yoongi now, saying something about statistics that he truthfully can’t understand. Yoongi hums, listening attentively to your words.

He narrows his eyes.

The change in you was something he wasn’t expecting either. He wasn’t worried at first, but you seem to be as strict as some of the Managers here and might possibly get even more so as time passes. 

And the more confined he is, the more it makes him want to get out.

“Is the forecast okay?” You’re leaning against his cubicle, eyes running through the report Yoongi had given you.

He hums, “The totals make sense and your report has the same inputs as mine.”

A lengthy sigh leaves you, “Good to know I managed to get some work done right.”

“The report is good, Y/N.” Yoongi chides and you faintly smile at him.

“Y/N.”

The commanding voice snaps you out of your thoughts, Soyou standing before you with an intent look in her eyes. “Do you have a moment?” 

“Yes, of course.” You quickly state, following her into her office. Glancing warily back, Yoongi sends you a thumbs up and you hold in your breath. 

You know why Soyou wants to speak with you, and you’ll have to give it your all to impress her. 

She gestures for you to sit down, crossing her legs as she sits across from you. 

Soyou cuts to the chase, “How has it been going with Mr. Kim?” 

“He’s been picking up on his training,” You explain, willing your shaky voice, “I’ve assessed that he needs to adapt to the workplace, as well as familiarize himself according to the departments.” 

Soyou hums and you continue, “I believe it would be best for him to understand the company’s inner workings first and foremost, such as getting information from the training manuals first before applying them.” 

“I’ve also ensured that he works alongside me so that I can assist him in any way I can.” 

“What is your opinion on his working capabilities?” She lifts a pen, tapping it against her notebook. 

“There’s potential for his future employment.” You truthfully state, “However, I can observe he will need more time than what is mandated for an intern.” 

“I see…” She leans forward, clasping her hands together, “Can I trust you to complete his entire training, Y/N?” 

“Of course.” You confidently say, “I will see to it that he is integrated into the workplace.” 

“Good.” Soyou stands up, as do you, “There’s a meeting happening in the conference room soon.” 

You nod, understanding she needed to promptly leave. 

Heading back to your cubicle, you notice Hoseok leaning against Yoongi’s cubicle. 

“Everything go smoothly?” Hoseok wonders, and even Yoongi turns away from his monitor, watching your reaction. 

You nod, “It would seem so, she was checking in on Seokjin’s training and by the looks of it, seems happy with what I’m doing.” 

“That sounds good.” You hum at Hoseok’s comment, ready to resume back to your work. 

Unfortunately, your mindset is cut short. 

“Hey….” A deep frown mars your features, the uncertainty drawing Yoongi and Hoseok’s attention, “Has anyone seen Seokjin?” 

“What do you mean?” Hoseok asks, “I thought he was taking a break.” 

“He was just getting started.” You respond, glancing around to see if you could possibly spot the man anywhere. 

It’s when you’re beginning to debate asking the front desk about his whereabouts that Yoongi places a hand against your shoulder. 

“He was wearing a gray suit with a black tie, right?”

Eyes widening, you nod right away.

“Uh, Y/N–” Hoseok’s peering out the window, squinting his eyes. “I think I’ve got some pretty bad news.” 

Before you have a chance to ask, he looks away from the window and then at you. 

“I think Seokjin ran away.”

You appear flabbergasted, tone pitching higher. “What do you mean he ‘ran away’?”

He gestures to the glass, “Take a look for yourself.”

You swiftly walk over, peering through the transparent material. You notice a handful of individuals outside of the building, but your eyes narrow in on how Seokjin is one of them, doing occasional and nervous-filled double takes as he waits for the light across the street to turn red.

You’re at a loss for words.

“Am I…” Your confusion morphs into horror, “Am I supposed to go after him?”

“That’s Seokjin, alright,” Yoongi mutters from behind you. “And I guess so.”

Your eyes flicker between Yoongi and Hoseok, who seems to be both suspended in shock and disbelief as you. 

Taking one quick glance at the promised work you were hoping to complete, you let out a long sigh and rush to grab your coat.

This definitely wasn’t part of your job description. 

***

Deep breaths escape your form.

It wasn’t too long ago that Hoseok and Yoongi had graciously discovered that your intern had run off the one moment you weren’t watching over him and it’s led you on a wild goose hunt just to locate him.

You’ve looked everywhere. Across the street from where you last saw him. Near the building you were and even accompanying shops you suspected he might have slipped into.

Which was perhaps the worst part of it all. Not only can you not comprehend why Seokjin would simply just run off like that, you have no clue where he could have tried to escape to.

Not until you land on a particular café.

Your eyes widen. 

Seokjin sits in one of the booths, engaged in conversation with one of the waiters.

You don’t take a second longer to enter, pushing against the door that jingles on your arrival. Seokjin turns around at the sound with a smile, but the colour completely drains from his features.

He lets out a blood-curdling scream. 

To be fair, you’ve been running around a lot and it’s caused your appearance to be just a bit disheveled. 

Aka you’re hunched over and wheezing, hair falling down like you’ve just walked out of some horror movie. 

“Who are you?!” He asks in defense. 

“Can you stop yelling for a minute?” You look up annoyed, brushing your hair away. 

Seokjin calms down immediately, sheepishly laughing. 

“Oh, hi Y/N….” 

“Hi.” You answer back sarcastically, walking towards him, “You know, I have nothing against physical activity, but no one ever told me that I’d have to hunt down the CEO’s son.” 

He immediately rises from his seat, but you raise your hand in an attempt to stop him. 

“Don’t.”

He knows, he knows you’re here to haul him back into that boring office, chide him for running away in the place and potentially, even tell one of higher ups of the situation he’s caused. However, all thoughts go completely out the window when you choose to sit opposite from him in the booth instead.

You ask him a question that has his eyes rounding.

“What did you order?”

It’s almost like he’s lost the will to speak in the moment until reality finally snaps him back in. “Uh, just their famous latte….”

You nod, gesturing the waitress over and requesting for another latte. Settling into your seat, you take your coat off and peer around the café.

At your silence, Seokjin curiously pipes up.

“So I’m taking that I can stay…?”

You cross your arms, “We’ll leave after the drinks get here.” 

“But it’s really nice here.” He persuades, “And besides, when do you get the chance to be at such a nice café with such a dashing young ma–“

You're glaring at him and he quickly clears his throat, “I mean, technically, this is a break…”

You scoff, “Are you really trying to justify running away?”

“Yes.” He answers right away.

You’re extremely reluctant at the moment. You’ve had to run around for a while and search for him like your life depended on it, oddly wondering why on earth you went from being promoted from a part-time mentor to a full-time one.

But it’s clear to you that Seokjin truly dislikes being in the office, so you’re wondering if maybe being outside from it might be useful.

“Five minutes.”

“What?”

“You get five minutes.” You state, “Then we have to go back.”

He sighs in relief and finally relaxes. It’s not long before your drinks arrive and you take the steaming mug right away.

“I’m curious.” You say after a moment of silence, sipping down on your cup.

He glances up intrigued, “Do you have a business degree?”

The cup in his hand nearly falls.

He loudly scoffs, as if offended, “Of course I have a business degree!”

“Hm. Impressive.”

For some reason, he finds that the sarcastic tone you use means quite the opposite.

“Seriously, what kind of opinion do you have of me?” 

“Well, you did make quite the impression when I met you at the office.” You point out. "And you just ran away from the office too." You want to mentally add, but hold back in case he tries again. 

Seokjin leans back, “That wasn’t even the first time you met me.”

“The first time I met you, you were a completely different person.”

“What do you mean?”

You shrug, “I don’t know, you seemed a lot shyer back then.” Your head shakes, “Definitely the complete opposite of now–“

“I think the words you’re looking for are irresistibly confident.”

“ –almost like the person I met in the past was like a twin or something–“

“Unfortunately, the world’s been blessed with only one of me.”

You pause, a deadpan expression crossing you as you move on, “Anyways, I would have never guessed you were the CEO’s son.”

You’re prepared for Seokjin to rebuttal with a lengthy exposition of some proud characteristic of his in response, but the conversation dips into an abrupt silence.

You frown and though he smiles, it doesn’t quite reach his eyes.

“Well, you’re not the first person to say that.”

For a moment, the silence takes over and you’re almost tempted to change the topic or bring light to something else, but then he continues.

“And you’re right, by the way. I’ve changed a lot.” There’s a giant mischievous grin on his features, “Improved on my already amazing qualities, if I do may say.”

You have the urge to eye roll at that, “But being the CEO’s son...that’s something I never got a choice in.”

You stare at him wide-eyed.

“I see….”

His voice increases in volume, “Besides, even if I wasn’t the CEO’s son, I still think you would be pretty lucky to be here sitting across from me.”

You don’t even hesitate to let the sarcasm leak in with a smile, “Sure…”

A loud alarm blares through the air and Seokjin jolts back from the sound. You take out your phone and swipe at the screen, instantly rising onto your feet.

“Alright, break time’s over.” You clap your hands, “Back to work.”

His jaw drops, “You set a timer?!”

“I said ten minutes, right?” You grin, “Now come on, I’m not in the mood to chase you down a second time.”

Seokjin playfully rolls his eyes, but nonetheless follows after you.

[mothguillotine]

IV.

CW: Carl gets shot

A few days after the disaster of the CDC, the group decided to abandon some of the cars. It's easier to keep you all together, and you don’t have to use as much gas. You ride in the RV with Adi and Gracie.

Jesse is upset at you again, so he elects not to ride in the RV. So there you sit watching Andrea fiddle with her gun while Shane instructs her. Everyone has been tense about the CDC situation. You could tell that some people in the group were upset with each other.

“How much longer do you think until we get there?” you ask Dale.

“I have no idea. The highway is blocked up pretty bad.” he tells you, “Oh jeez. Aw no. See, a way, though?”

Daryl nods at Dale and nods his head to follow him.

“Uh, maybe we should just go back; there's an interstate bypass.” Glenn suggests.

“We can’t spare the fuel.” Dale tells him.

“Jeez.” Glenn says, looking at all the abandoned cars.

Then the engine starts sputtering, and you realize that the radiator hose is shot yet again.

“God damn it. Not again.” you say.

“I said it. Didn’t I say it?” Dale starts complaining, “A thousand times. Dead in the water.”

You and everyone who was in the RV get out to examine the damage done by the trashed radiator hose.

“Problem, Dale?” Rick asks.

“Just a smal matter of being stuck in the middle of knowwhere with no hope of-” Dale then looks around, “Okay wait that was dumb.”

“If you can’t find a radiator hose here…” Shane says to Dale.

“There’s a whole bunch of stuff we can find.” Daryl says.

You walk over to where Jesse is. He is listening to the conversation from the car he was riding in with Rick's family and Carol and Sophia.

“Can you stay in the car with Gracie?” you ask him, “She is ready for a nap and I think it would be better if she was with someone.”

“Yeah, sure. Whatever.” he said to you.

You knew he was upset with you. That was no secret to anyone. Why he was upset with you nobody knew except for you and him. You passed Gracie over to him and he got back into the car with her to give her a nap.

“Adi, maybe you should stay with Jesse in the car until we get moving again” you tell her.

“No, I wanna help you find things. I can help.” she tells you, “I promise I will stay with you.”

“Okay, but you stay with me the entire time. Okay?”

“Okay.”

So you and Adi went to look for food, water, medicine, and supplies. You went through a few cars before you found a medicine bag. When you opened it you found general meds like Ibuprofen, Advil, Claritin, and Tylenol.

“Y/N look!” Adi says pointing at something in a suitcase she had opened.

When you walked over you found some clothes that would fit Adi and some toys.

“Good find Adi.” you tell her, smiling down.

“Thanks.” she says back with a smile.

You and her continue to go through cars together until you find something that you didn’t expect to ever see. You walk over to where Adi is looking though bags you click and hear a soft whirling. She turns around to see you pointing a camera at her. Not just a camera, but a polaroid.

“What was that?” she asks you.

“Look,” you tell her, as a picture comes out the top, “this is an old camera people used to use before digital or disposables.”

She grabs the picture and looks at it.

“But nothing is on it.” she tells you.

“Well it takes time to develop,” you tell her, “you see if you-”

You were cut off by Lori telling you and Adi to get down. That's when you see it. Dozens of walkers. You pull Adi down under a truck by where Sophia and Carl are hiding. You look over to where Carol is hiding with Lori and see her crying with Lori's hand covering her mouth.

You all stay like that for what feels like hours. Until you see that the herd of them is thinning out to where only one walker is going by at once, and after a while no more come around the vehicles. Then it is finally safe. You watch as Sophia goes to get out from under the truck. Then you see another walker grab at her. She successfully escapes that one but then runs into another when escaping from the other side.

She runs into the woods away from the walkers as they stumble to get her. Rick chases after her trying to protect her from the walkers.

“Lori. There’s two walkers after my baby.” Carol cries to Lori.

Lori shh’s her and comforts her. You don’t hesitate to run back to the car to check on Jesse and Gracie. You find that Jesse is alright and Gracie is still sleeping. Then you run back over to where the group is waiting for Rick to come back. After a while he does come back but not with Sophia.

“I found her. I thought that she may have come back on her own after I left her.” Rick tells you.

“You left my baby, alone?!” Carol yells at him.

“It was only for 10 or so minutes while I took down the walkers.” he tells her, “I will go back out to look for her.”

“I will come with you.” Daryl tells Rick, “I can track where she went if you show me where you left her.”

“Okay then we will go out right now and look,” he tells the group.

“I will go too.” Shane says.

“If he’s going, so am I.” Glenn tells Rick.

“So will I.” you tell them.

“I don’t think that's a good idea.” Rick tells you.

“Yeah I have to agree with Rick here.” Shane says, “It's safer for you to be here.”

You go over to Rick and whisper into his ear “Listen Carol is in no condition to be going out looking for Sophia. It would be better if I came instead of her and she will definitely want to go if I’m not.” Rick nods his head at your statement.

“Okay so me, Y/N, Shane, Glenn, and Daryl will all go out to look for Sophia.” he annonces to the group.

Just before you all leave to go back out Carol pulls you aside to give you a hug and tells you thank you. You and the group all walk back to where Rick says he left Sophia.

“Sure this is the spot?” Daryl asks.

“I left her right here.” he tells Daryl, “I drew the walkers way off in that direction up the creek.”

After Daryl found some of her tracks he concluded that she had in fact listened to what Rick said about keeping the sun on her left shoulder and had headed back to the highway.

“She was doing just fine until right here. All she had to do was keep going. She veered off that way.” Daryl tells you pointing at the foot prints Sophia had made.

“Why would she do that?” Glenn asks.

“Probably a walker or she heard what sounded like one.” you said to the group.

“I don’t see any footprints. Just hers.” Daryl said to you.

“So what do we do? All of us press on?” Shane asks.

“No,better if you and Glenn get back up to the highway.” Rick tells Shane, “People are gonna start panicking. Let them know we're on her trail doing everything we can. But most of all, keep everybody calm.”

“I'll keep 'em busy scavenging cars. Think up a few other chores. I'll keep 'em occupied. Come on.” Shane tells Rick, before ushering Glenn away from us.

Rick, Daryl, and you all continue on following Sophia's tracks until you find a walker. Rick distracts it while Daryl shoots an arrow at its head.

“Sophia!” Daryl shouts while Rick goes up to the walker. You follow Rick in investigating the walker.

“What are you looking for?” Daryl asks Rick.

“Skin under the fingernails. It fed recently. There’s flesh caught in it’s teeth.” Rick tells him.

“So what are we gonna do?” you ask.

“What kind of flesh is it?” Daryl asks you and Rick.

“Only one way to know for sure.” Rick says getting out a knife.

“Oh my god. You can’t be serious.” you say.

“Here, I'll do it.” Daryl tells Rick, “How many kills you skin and gut in your life? Anyway, mine is sharper.”

You and Rick look on while Daryl opens the body taking out the guts. What seems like more than normal Daryl says that he had a meal not too long ago. Daryl continues cutting and apparently finds what he is looking for.

“Here's the gut bag.” Daryl says as he plops down an organ.

“I got this.” Rick says.

You watch as he cuts open the so-called gut bag. Daryl pulls out chunks of fur and meat from it.

“This gross bastard had himself a woodchuck for lunch.” Daryl says after examining the remains.

“At least we know.”

“This woodchuck was not worth smelling this.” you tell them sniffing the air. You all stand up and walk away when you trip. You fall right into the cut open walker.

“Oh. What the fuck.” you exclamin trying to pick yourself up from the corpse.

“Shane found a bunch of water. You can wash up when we get back.” Rick tells you.

“Yeah, but my goddamn clothes are ruined.” you tell him looking at your now nasty and stained t-shirt.

“Find some clothes for you too.” Daryl says.

You all continue to follow Sophia's trail until it goes cold. Then Daryl tells you both that you should head back without him so he can continue to look.

“Daryl it's getting dark out we don’t have any lights it's pointless to be out past dark.” you tell him.

“We can’t just leave her out here all night.” he tells you.

“Daryl, as much as I don’t like leaving her out all night there is no point in continuing when it's dark.” Rick says agreeing with you.

“Fine,” he says angrily.

All three of you head back to the highway before it gets too dark. After a while of walking all of you are back at the highway. The group approaches the railing where you are walking up to the highway.

“You didn't find her?” Carol asks.

“Her trail went cold. We’ll pick it up at first light.” Rick tells her.

“Is that blood?” Carol asks, looking at you.

“We took down a walker.” Rick says.

“Walker? Oh my god.” Carol starts to hyperventilate.

“There was no sign it was anywhere near Sophia.” Rick says to her.

“How can you know that?” Andrea asks.

“Trust me. We found out the hard way.” you tell her.

“We can’t just leave her out there!” Carol yells.

That night you can hear Carol crying. You barely sleep as it is but hearing her all night makes you feel guilty. If you had stayed out in the woods for a few more minutes would you have been able to find her. If you had originally ran to find her with Rick you could have helped. It hurts.

“What about the guns?” Andrea asks the next morning while you are all preparing to go out again to find Sophia.

“We’ve been over this. Only Daryl, Rick, and I are carrying.” Shane tells her, “We can’t be firing off rounds every time a tree rustles.”

“It’s not the trees I'm worried about.” Andrea tells him.

“Y/N can I speak with you?” Jesse asks you quietly.

“Uh-” you see Rick telling people the plan, “Yeah make it quick.”

“I don’t want you to go.” He tells you bluntly.

“What? Why?” you ask him.

“You should stay here with Gracie and Adaline.” he tells you.

“Jesse I get the whole concern thing over me, okay?” you tell him, “but I’ve been out in harm's way more than you. I can handle myself.”

“It’s not that.” he says before trying to find the right words, “If you get hurt, or die, what am I supposed to do with the kids.”

“What do you mean? It's the exact same thing if you died.” you tell him, “You raise them and teach them.”

“Let me rephrase. What am I supposed to do with Adaline?” he asks.

“What do you mean? Why is she different from Gracie?” you ask.

“You know what, never mind.” he says after that.

“Wait, wait, wait, what do you mean?” you ask pissed off now.

“We can talk about it when you get back from running away from your problems.” he says to you before pushing past you.

You can see him walking back to where Gracie and Adi are still sleeping in the car. You focus your attention back on Rick. He is answering questions the others have about the search. One of the group is not paying attention and that would be Daryl. He is looking at you, you don’t doubt that he could probably hear the whole conversation. After you are handed a machete the group sets off. You try to focus on the search, but in the back of your head you keep thinking about what Jesse said.

All of you walk for a while until you find a tent. Daryl goes to check the tent and tells us that she isn’t in there until the group hears a church bell ringing.

“What direction?” Shane asks.

“I think that way. I’m pretty sure.” Rick tells him.

“Damn, it's hard to tell out here.” Shane says.

“If we heard them then maybe Sophia did too.” Carol says.

You all decided to run towards where Rick heard the bells coming from. There you find a church. It has no steeple which makes Shane think that this is the wrong church. All of you ran into the church to see if anyone was in there. All you find are some walkers. The group takes down all of them in a few minutes, which makes you think that you all are getting better at the whole fighting thing. Then you hear the bell again.

“It’s on a timer.” Daryl says.

“I’m gonna go back in for a bit.” Carol says to us.

“Okay.” you tell her.

You walk over to a bench that has a view of the whole cemetery. You look out amongst the graves. It's quiet, after moving so much these last few days it's weird but nice.

“Why were you and Jesse arguing?” Daryl asks from behind you.

“It’s… complicated.” you tell him.

“Trust me I know all about complicated relationships with brothers,” he says. You look over to him and he seems genuinely interested.

“Jesse and Grace were sent down here to stay with me. My parents were getting divorced and they didn’t want them to be in the middle of it. Jesse was not very happy about it.” you explain, “I moved down here for college because I saw the divorce from a mile away. While I was down here I got a job at a daycare. When this shit started I was there. Adi’s parents were late that day. I waited for a few hours with her until...” you pause, “I left right away with her and went back to my apartment. Then we left.”

“Why was Jesse upset about Adi though?” Daryl asks.

“In the beginning, he wanted to go back up North and try to find my parents but I couldn’t just take Adi. We were supposed to drop her off at the refugee center in Atlanta but the road got super jammed and nobody was moving. That's when I met Lori and Carol. After a week or so in camp Jesse wanted to leave again but I felt safer with the group than by ourselves.” you tell him.

“He wants to leave now?” He asks you.

“I don’t know. Probably. Teenage boys are hard to decipher.” you answer.

“Why don’t you now?” he asks. You look at him.

“I don’t want to be alone.”

The plan was simple enough. Rick and Shane went a little further for the night before heading back. The rest of you were supposed to go back to the highway. Then Carl said that he wanted to go. Then you told them that if they were all going that you wanted to go to. So you set off to find her for another hour or so.

“Dad, look.” Carl says pointing at a deer that was crossing in the sunlight. It was a gorgeous scene. Until it wasn’t. It happened so fast one second Carl was admiring the deer the next he was down on the forest floor.

You immediately go to help him. You take the flannel you were wearing and press it down on his wound. Rick falls down next to him.

“Rick, I need you to press down on this for me. Okay?” You ask him, he follows your instructions.

You put your head to his chest to hear his heartbeat. It doesn't sound good but he is still alive and breathing. Next thing that happens is you hear something big coming from the forest. He is apologizing profusely, but right now you are focused on keeping Carl alive.

“I can get help for him, there is someone who can help.” he tells you.

Rick picks him up and we all start running. Ultimately you and Rick run way faster than Shane and the other man can. Every so often Rick will get tired of carrying Carl and you help him get situated again before starting to run.

“How far? How far?” Rick shouts at him.

“Another half mile that way. Hershel. Talk to Hershel. He will help your boy.”

The closer and closer you get to the place the more you realize that you are on a farm. As you approach the house you see people coming out.

“Was he bit?” the older man asks.

“Shot. By your man.” Rick tells him.

“Otis?” A woman speaks up.

“We need help. Now.” you say urgently to the older man.

“Get him inside.” he tells you.

You help Rick get Carl inside the house. He lays him down on a bed and backs away. You take the rags from Hershel and press on Carl's abdomen.

“Keep applying pressure to the wound.” he tells you, “What's your names?”

Rick doesn’t say anything.

“Y/N and Rick.” you tell him.

“Okay well we are going to do everything we can. Okay?” He reassures you. “You can move now.”

“I was a nursing student.” you tell him, “I can help.”

“I think right now I would prefer to work with people I know.” he tells you.

“Yeah, right.” you say backing off of Carl slowly while one of the women replaces your hands with their own. You gently take Rick out of the room to see Shane.

“Is he alive?” the man asks who shot Carl.

“What the hell were you thinking? You ever hunt before today?” you ask him.

“Of course I’ve hunted before. I just-” you cut him off.

“Yes, he's alive. Lucky thing because the bullets are still inside.” you tell him. Before walking back inside.

Walking into the room where Carl was, you see both Hershel and the women looking at you with pity.

“Your son is extremely lucky he isn’t dead right now, but he is losing a lot of blood and is going to need more.” he tells you, “Can you or your husband donate to him?”

“Rick isn’t my husband and Carl isn’t mine. But I have type O blood so I am more than happy to donate.”

“Oh I am sorry. Come here.” he tells you, holding up the equipment you would assume for the transfusion. A few minutes later Carl wakes up screaming after Hershel tries to get one of the fragments of the bullet out.

“Stop! You're killing him!” Rick yells coming into the room.

“Rick, do you want him to live?” Hershel asks him.

Hershel tells Rick that he needs to put Carl under to get out the rest of the pieces. Shane and Otis leave to get the supplies while Maggie goes to get Lori.

About an hour later you see Lori coming up to the house. You are sitting on the porch drinking orange juice and eating a cookie. Rick is in Carl's room giving him another blood transfusion.

“How is he? Is he alive?” Lori asks you from a distance.

“He needs surgery, Lori. He’s been getting blood transfusions from me and Rick for the past hour.” you tell her.

“What are his chances?” she asks you.

“You need to ask Hershel that. Not me, I'm sorry.” you tell her.

“You have nothing to be sorry for sweety.” she tells you while walking into the house to see her son.

You sit back down on the porch and look up at the sky. It’s calm for a minute until you hear Lori crying. This brings you back to the reality of your world. It’s not calm anymore.

<Previous Part/Next Part>

Masterlist

[hellotherediesel]

Fun Fact: On Tumblr, there is a 4096 character per block limit. Polls bypass this. Long-ass proof under cut.

According to all known laws of aviation, there is no way a bee should be able to fly. Its wings are too small to get its fat little body off the ground. The bee, of course, flies anyway because bees don't care what humans think is impossible. Yellow, black. Yellow, black. Yellow, black. Yellow, black. Ooh, black and yellow! Let's shake it up a little. Barry! Breakfast is ready! Ooming! Hang on a second. Hello? - Barry? - Adam? - Oan you believe this is happening? - I can't. I'll pick you up. Looking sharp. Use the stairs. Your father paid good money for those. Sorry. I'm excited. Here's the graduate. We're very proud of you, son. A perfect report card, all B's. Very proud. Ma! I got a thing going here. - You got lint on your fuzz. - Ow! That's me! - Wave to us! We'll be in row 118,000. - Bye! Barry, I told you, stop flying in the house! - Hey, Adam. - Hey, Barry. - Is that fuzz gel? - A little. Special day, graduation. Never thought I'd make it. Three days grade school, three days high school. Those were awkward. Three days college. I'm glad I took a day and hitchhiked around the hive. You did come back different. - Hi, Barry. - Artie, growing a mustache? Looks good. - Hear about Frankie? - Yeah. - You going to the funeral? - No, I'm not going. Everybody knows, sting someone, you die. Don't waste it on a squirrel. Such a hothead. I guess he could have just gotten out of the way. I love this incorporating an amusement park into our day. That's why we don't need vacations. Boy, quite a bit of pomp... under the circumstances. - Well, Adam, today we are men. - We are! - Bee-men. - Amen! Hallelujah! Students, faculty, distinguished bees, please welcome Dean Buzzwell. Welcome, New Hive Oity graduating class of... ...9:15. That concludes our ceremonies. And begins your career at Honex Industries! Will we pick ourjob today? I heard it's just orientation. Heads up! Here we go. Keep your hands and antennas inside the tram at all times. - Wonder what it'll be like? - A little scary. Welcome to Honex, a division of Honesco and a part of the Hexagon Group. This is it! Wow. Wow. We know that you, as a bee, have worked your whole life to get to the point where you can work for your whole life. Honey begins when our valiant Pollen Jocks bring the nectar to the hive. Our top-secret formula is automatically color-corrected, scent-adjusted and bubble-contoured into this soothing sweet syrup with its distinctive golden glow you know as... Honey! - That girl was hot. - She's my cousin! - She is? - Yes, we're all cousins. - Right. You're right. - At Honex, we constantly strive to improve every aspect of bee existence. These bees are stress-testing a new helmet technology. - What do you think he makes? - Not enough. Here we have our latest advancement, the Krelman. - What does that do? - Oatches that little strand of honey that hangs after you pour it. Saves us millions. Oan anyone work on the Krelman? Of course. Most bee jobs are small ones. But bees know that every small job, if it's done well, means a lot. But choose carefully because you'll stay in the job you pick for the rest of your life. The same job the rest of your life? I didn't know that. What's the difference? You'll be happy to know that bees, as a species, haven't had one day off in 27 million years. So you'll just work us to death? We'll sure try. Wow! That blew my mind! "What's the difference?" How can you say that? One job forever? That's an insane choice to have to make. I'm relieved. Now we only have to make one decision in life. But, Adam

The above is probably slightly less than 4096 characters, but it’s close.

Now for the poll.

[shurisneakers]

harmless (ix)

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

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

Word count: 3.9k

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

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

Additional Scene   || Previous Part  || Series Masterlist

Hot single in your area! 😈  Find your solemate! 

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

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

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

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

Harbinger of Doom just sent you a message! 

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

Decline/Accept

He wants to strangle you. 

______

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

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

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

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

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

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

His mouth opens and shuts like goddamn fish.

He can hear your laughter even without the phone.

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

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

“Thirdly, why are you standing there?”

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

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

“I know, you told me.”

Oh. 

“Okay, what now?” 

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

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

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

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

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

It never comes. 

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

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

Just like that, the show was ruined.

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

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

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

He stares at you. 

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

Pepper would not like that. 

“That’s not even evil.”

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

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

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

Fuck, he really had only one option. 

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

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

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

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

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

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

“Hey man, I-

“No.”

“You didn’t even let me finish.”

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

“I need your wings.”

“I was right. Bye.”

It was a long shot anyway.

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

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

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

“Yeah.”

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

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

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

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

“Well?” Bucky ignores his question.

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

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

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

He takes a seat on the ground and waits.

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

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

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

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

“Do you not like your team?” 

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

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

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

Although it was appreciated. 

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

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

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

“Building’s dark, red is good.”

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

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

“I don’t have anything against them.”

“Then why do you do this every week?”

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

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

“No other reason?”

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

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

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

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

“My roommate.” 

“I didn’t see him when I came over.”

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

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

“He hates superheroes?”

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

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

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

“Not even a tragic backstory?” 

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

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

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

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

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

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

You stare at him. He stares at you.

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

“Just clarifying.” He leans back again.

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

“Gorilla.”

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

“Where?”

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

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

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

“What the fuc-”

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

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

“Raw and uncut, baby.”

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

“Witch.”

“Huh?”

“She was a witch who stole my hair.”

“Wha-”

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

Fucking finally. 

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

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

“Buck,” Sam greets him.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

What the shit.

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

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

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

This is not what Bucky wanted.

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

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

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

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

“Get a room.” Bucky rolls his eyes.

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

“Very positively.” 

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

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

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

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

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

“Sam just get the damn-”

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

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

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

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

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

Showoff.

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

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

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

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

“After the ‘A’?”

“After the ‘A’,” you confirm. 

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

“Sam!” Bucky looks horrified. 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“What’s your favourite colour, Falcon?”

“I like red.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Bucky rolls his eyes.

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

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

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

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

“Got the motorcycle.” 

“See you there.” Sam nods. 

“Save me a place,” Bucky says to him.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“Yeah.”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“What?”

“Flinging yourself off roofs like that.”

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

“Just don’t.”

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

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

“What about when you’re not?”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Adorable? Adorable?

“I hate you.”

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

He wants to cry. 

______

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

“She made this?” 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Tony has an idea. 

And that was generally bad news.

Next part

[samuel-de-champagne-problems]

I’ll Take X-pecting for 200, Alex

Summary: Dr. Spencer Reid plays a trivia game at the request of his wife, Y/N, but he’s in for more than some heaving hitting questions. 

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Wife Reader 

Word Count: 1.5k 

Author’s Note: I really don’t think that this summary does this justice

I’ll Take X-pecting for 200, Alex 

Shuffling the cards with a shake in her hand, Y/N tells herself to just breathe. This is something that Spencer and her have been looking forward to, dreamed about, and constantly discussed. Regardless of how much she knows Spencer loves her, there’s a lingering seed of doubt that only grows with the sound of Spencer walking into their house. 

“Y/N!, I’m home, darlin’,” Spencer calls from the hallway, dropping the “g” because he knows that Y/N finds it endearing. 

“Baby,” Y/N yells from the table. “I’m in the dining room. I made us a trivia game! Come play with me, I need your brains,” she finishes, smiling at her husband, who has been away for nearly two weeks.

“You know do I love trivia, Y/N,” Spencer says. He takes a seat next to his wife, but before he can kiss her, she pushes him out of his chair and motions for him to take the seat opposite of her.

“Before we start, how was the case? Everyone make it home in one piece?” Y/N asks concerned over the wellbeing of some of her closest friends. 

“Everyone’s fine, Y/N. The unsub ended up being a team. Two women hellbent on getting revenge for their children’s murders. One of them got away,” Spencer explains, solemnly. 

“Oof,” Y/N says, letting out a sigh. “It’s at times like these that I’m glad I don’t have your job. I’m kinda glad she got away, between you and me.” 

“It’s hard, sometimes we don’t really know who we’re bringing justice too. But, I’d do anything to protect my future children, and you. Anything I needed to do to keep you safe,” Spencer tells her, leaning across the table and kissing Y/N’s hand. She gives him a sheepish smile, but inside her mind is eager to get this trivia game started. 

“You’re a charmer, Dr. Reid,” Y/N flirts. 

“Just for you, Y/N. Now you mentioned something about trivia,” Spencer says, clapping his hands together excitedly. 

“I just thought you’d like to rest your brain after a case but shifting though all those facts you got stored up there. And I always said you should try out for Jeopardy,” Y/N says as she collects the cards with the clues. 

She spreads out the categories, Child Psychology, Children’s Books, Labor & Delivery, Nursery Rhymes, X-Epecting, on the table. They were all handwritten on different colorful pieces of cardstock and decorated with baby animals and block letters. Y/N read the categories aloud to her husband, allowing herself to steal a glance at his face while he concentrated on the categories, as if he already could answer the questions. 

“All right, Spencer, you pick first,” Y/N says, in her best Alex Trebek impression. 

“I’ll take Child Psychology for $200,” Spencer chooses, looking up to smile at Y/N. 

“This is the substitute mother that baby monkeys formed an attachment to in Harlow’s psychological experiment,” Y/N asks.

“Terry-Cloth,” Spencer interjects. 

“Not uh, Spence, you need to answer correctly,” Y/N teases. She looks up at him expectantly to choose the next clue. He rolls his eyes at her, but secretly he enjoys the playful banter they still share even after all these years. 

“Um, Children’s Books $200,” 

“This is the story of the clever spider that can weave words in her web,” 

“What is Charlotte’s Web?” 

“Correct, pick again please,” Y/N says, as she tries to maintain a stoic composure. 

“This is the average of days that newborns keep up their sleepless parents,” Y/N asks, sure that this question would stump her genius husband. But to no avail, Spencer answers the question correctly. 

“Okay! Next time try-outs are around, I’m forcing you to take the test,” Y/N says running over to kiss Spencer on the cheek. 

“You know judges are supposed to remain impartial, Y/N” Spencer tells her, putting his arm around her waist as if he’s signally her to sit in his lap. 

“I can’t help it, how about you win kisses every time you get a question right, Spence,” Y/N proposes. 

“I guess it’s worth more than fake money,” Spencer teases.

“You offend me, baby!” Y/N pretends to be hurt by Spencer’s words, but urges him to continue the game. 

“You only got a couple more left, Spence,” 

“Okay, how about X-Expecting for $200,” Spencer chooses. 

“This chromosome is linked to the baby’s mother,” Y/N quizzes, finding it difficult to keep her smiles and secrets at bay when Spencer’s arm tugs around her waist tightly and his fingers draw patterns under her shirt. 

“What is X-Chromosome,” Spencer answers before Y/N can even finish the clue. 

“You know that you’re supposed to wait until the clue is read, Spence. I should redact kisses,” Y/N fake threats. 

“No! Y/N I’ll die without your kisses, please!” Spencer cries out in pretend disain. Much to his amusement his goofy behavior leads Y/N to plant small pecks on his forehead. 

“There, that should hold you over,” 

“I doubt it, Y/N. I miss you already,” Spencer mutters into her shoulder, as if he’s trying to get closer to his wife more than he could already be with her sitting on his lap. 

“Two more clues till Final Jeopardy,” Y/N announces, ignoring the fact that she’s bypassing the rest of the clues and totally disregarding Double Jeopardy. 

“Hmm, let’s go to Nursery Rhymes for kissing for the rest of my life,” Spencer picks, peppering Y/N’s shoulder with kisses. 

“Huh! Look at that, Spencer, you got the Daily Double, so whatcha going to wager?” Y/N asks, knowing she’s pulling this Daily Double straight out of the air, but Spencer’s affection for only one lifetime is not nearly enough for her. 

“I’ll make a true Daily Double, darling. That means double the amount of kisses,” Spencer tells her, ticking the sides of Y/N waist. 

“Here’s your clue, Jack is urged to be nimble & quick, helping him do this,” Y/N reads from the card. 

“What is to jump over the candlestick?” Spencer guesses, closing his eyes to be assaulted by Y/N’s eager lips. 

“Yay! Double kisses!” Y/N yells happily as she pecks Spencer’s eyelids and nose, causing him to laugh at her light affection. 

“Next question, it’s the last one so you don’t get a choice, but I have so much confidence in you, my genius husband. These are the names of the 3 stages of labor?” Y/N questions, looking over her shoulder to get a glimpse of Spencer’s mind at work. 

“What are dilation, expulsion, and afterbirth,” Spencer answers, once again perfectly. 

“Okay, Dr. Reid you’ve accumulated a total of double kisses for the rest of our lives. Your Final Jeopardy category is, Ready For It…” Y/N announces. 

“Last one,” Spencer says, and Y/N wonders if Spencer’s figured it out by now. She hands Spencer the small cardboard box. He looks at it curiously and Y/N can feel her heart in her stomach. He must know by now, she thinks. He’s brilliant, but sometimes he can be a little clueless when it comes to things like that. Y/N thinks back to how they danced around each other for years before Derek practically had to force them out on a date. He must know. 

“You’re clue is inside the box, Spence,” Y/N tells him, her voice shaky and unsure. 

Spencer carefully opens the cardboard box and reaches in to pull out the small pregnancy test that lay hidden inside. He looks it over, reading the test twice, three times, maybe even four times. He honestly can’t remember taking longer to read something. Spencer looks up at a terrified Y/N. 

“You’re pregnant? We’re going to have a baby?” Spencer asks, desperately wanting to believe what he holds in his hand. 

“You’re gonna be a daddy, Spence,” Y/N tells him, her smile struggling to conceal itself in between the bouts of happiness and joy that courses through her veins. 

“A baby! Oh Y/N. A baby!” Spencer shouts rushing over to where his wife stands in between the entrance from their kitchen to their dining room. 

“You’re happy, right Spence. You want this with me-” Y/N starts, a sudden rush of fear lodging itself in her heart. 

“Of course I’m happy, Y/N. I’m so happy to be a dad. You’re going to be a mom! You’ll be the best mom, Y/N. I love you, Y/N,” Spencer says, crouching down to rub his hands on Y/N’s belly. 

“Hi sweet baby,” Y/N says softly, looking down at her belly and covering her hand over Spencer’s. “I want you to meet your daddy. He’s going to take care of you so well, he might talk a lot but you get used to it” 

“Hey, baby. It’s your dad,” Spencer murmurs quietly into Y/N’s belly. “I’m so glad that mommy told me about you. You gotta do some growing in there before you can meet us, but we love you so much, baby,”

“I really love you so much Y/N,” Spencer says as he sits up to kiss his wife. 

All his life Spencer’s loved science. He loves discovering the undiscovered. Memorizing all those theories and facts and methods could never prepare him for the awe that sat before him. He realizes that he’s looked at science all wrong. There's a beauty in science- a natural, unadulterated beauty that’s so rare to find. But he’s found it and he’s never letting go.

Thank You for Reading!

Taglist: @calm-and-doctor​ 

If anyone wants to be tagged in new posts, feel free to comment and I’ll be thrilled to tag you <3

[mochegato]

Hope on Board

Chapter 1 - Boy’s Night Out

“Okay,” Dick boomed, bringing the room’s attention to himself.  “Weapons on the counter.”  He raised an eyebrow at the disgruntled objections around the room.  “We are going out to have fun.  We are not going to take guns or knives or arrows to the bar. This is a night off.  This night is to relax and blow off steam.  Boy’s night out.”

“Having a gun does relax me!” Jason mumbled around the bite of apple in his mouth.

“Naw, it’s the shooting that relaxes you,” Roy pointed out shoving his head away as he walked past him.

“No guns!”  Dick grabbed the gun out of Jason’s thigh holster as he passed by and tossed it onto the counter.

“Hey!” Jason yelled, grabbing Dick’s shirt and violently pulling him back to face Jason.  “Don’t touch my guns.”

Dick held his hands up in surrender and waited quietly for Jason to let go.  Once Jason had backed off and taken another bite of his apple, Dick shook his head.  “See that there, is exactly why we need a night out and no weapons.  I expect all weapons on this counter before we walk out that door.”  He stared Jason and Roy down.

“Why are we going to a club if we just want to talk?” Tim pointed out with a defeated sigh.  “Loud music, people bumping into you, lights flashing… not the ideal atmosphere for talking.”

“We’re also blowing off steam and a distraction while we talk so Jason doesn’t get bored and start fighting is not a bad idea,” Dick pointed out.  “Which brings us back to no weapons.”

Jason huffed and walked over to the counter keeping eye contact with Dick as he started removing his knife and his backup knife and his small knife and his backup gun and laid them on the counter one at a time.  “Thank you, Jason.  Roy?”  

Roy sighed and removed his knife and a gun. Dick raised a skeptical eyebrow at him.  “What?  I’m not a paranoid asshole like him.” He motioned to Jason.

“Tim?” Dick questioned with a stern look.

“Like I carry weapons on me when I’m not in the suit,” he scoffed.

Dick stared him down waiting for him to admit having weapons.  When Tim didn’t fold under his stare, Dick nodded and looked back to the group.  “Fine.” He reached behind him to pull off his tee shirt, throwing it over the back of the couch and grabbing a button up shirt instead.  

Tim stared at the shirt he put on as he buttoned it.  “That’s what you’re wearing?”

“Yeah… what?  I like it.”

Jason opened his mouth to comment but instead glared at Roy when he smacked him upside the head to stop him from saying what they all were thinking.  "If Wally were here, you'd let him say it," he muttered.

"Well, Wally's sick isn't he?  So he's not here." Roy muttered back.

Dick looked between them and finally gave up waiting.  He shook his head and moved to the door.  “Let’s go. We’re going to hang out, drink, dance, and have fun.”

“And get laid,” Roy cheered.

“Not about getting laid,” Dick singsonged as he walked through the door.  

“But we’re totally going to,” Roy whispered to Jason.  “Well, we,” he motioned between himself and Jason, “are going to.  Tim’s boy is out of town and Dick’s on his own with that shirt.”

“Whatever, I just can’t believe he thought those were my only weapons,” Jason scoffed.

“Or that I didn’t have any,” Tim agreed.  “Either we’re getting better or he’s getting worse.”

<><><><><> 

The bar was more crowded than they expected, but they had still been able to find a table far away from the dancefloor where they could actually talk and watch the other patrons while they drank.  

“Dick, we need another round,” Roy pointed out, motioning toward the bar.

“And?” Dick scoffed not even looking at him, keeping his eyes on the dancefloor instead.  

“And we want the drinks now not in an hour,” Jason retorted quickly.

“We all know if any of us go it’s completely hit and miss when the bartender acknowledges us and with the bar as busy as it is, it could take a while.  But every time you go up, he makes a beeline straight for you.” Tim continued flatly.

“Heh, straight,” Roy chuckled.  

Dick rolled his eyes but got up anyway.  “Fine. I’ll just buy all night long.”

“Now that’s what I call a good night out,” Jason cheered, holding his beer up toasting Dick.  “Get me two.”

Dick pushed through the crowd and finally settled into a spot leaning against the bar.  As soon as he appeared, the bartender made his way over to him, bypassing patrons who had been waiting since before he got there.  Dick sighed at the proof the others were right. He ordered their drinks with a smile. No use upsetting the man pouring their drinks and controlling whether they got served or not.

He looked up and down the bar while he waited for their drinks.  His eyes caught on a woman a few people down from him.  She was waiting patiently and gorgeously for her drink.  Her dark hair was pulled up in a high bun, but tendrils had fallen around her face from vigorous dancing.  Her body was covered in a light sheen of sweat and her long-sleeved, bright blue crop top looked like it was meant to flutter lightly over her top but instead it clung to her sweat-covered body as she moved, occasionally giving a flash of the black bra underneath.  She was flushed from dancing giving her a luminescent look.  But the thing that truly drew his attention was her smile.  She had the most gorgeous, welcoming, exuberant smile on her face.  It lit up her whole face, causing her eyes to crinkle.

He started to push away from the bar to talk to her when he saw a man drape his arms over her shoulders. His head was positioned so the back of his head was blocking Dick’s view of her face so he couldn’t see if her expression was happy about the intrusion or upset, and his yellow and red shirt that hung loosely off him blocked Dick's view of her body language.  Dick leaned back against the bar, but kept an eye on her in case the embrace was not welcome.  How bad was it that he kind of hoped it wasn’t?  However, it quickly became apparent that it was not unwelcome.  “Come on Bugaboo, let’s get back out there.  I want to have fun tonight.  Maybe find someone to finally make out with me.”  

The woman rolled her eyes at him.  “Adrien, almost anyone here would make out with you.  Straight men would make out with you if you asked.”  She and the man nodded to the bartender in thanks when he dropped off their shots.

“It can’t just be anyone though.  I’m looking for a sign.  I’m waiting for the universe to show me my future.”  He stretched out his hand in front of him as if showing off his future.

“In a nightclub that is probably a front for one of the mob families,” she deadpanned.  He shrugged at her.  “I cannot stress enough how much that’s not how this whole thing works.  The universe isn’t going to give you a sign, especially not in a dive bar while you’re drunk.  You make your own destiny, my child, this isn’t Serendipity.  Now, drink,” she commanded.  

Dick watched as they clinked their glasses together and downed the shots before returning to the dancefloor.  His eyes followed her as she started dancing.  He hummed to himself, clearly together but not together.   Their boy’s night had been going on long enough, hadn’t it?  They had been talking long enough that it would be acceptable for him to get on the dancefloor himself soon, right?  He hummed to himself.  He might have to try to find her later.  He tore his eyes away when the bartender brought his drinks.  He winked at the bartender in thanks and returned to their table.

He brought the drinks back to the table, joking and reminiscing with the three of them.  The point was to get closer to each other, after all.  All throughout their conversation, he kept an eye on the bar for the woman he had seen earlier.  The next time she went up to get a drink, Dick excused himself to get one as well. They were close enough.  He wanted to get closer to someone else now.  The others at the table raised their eyebrows, giving each other knowing looks.

By the time he made his way through the crowd to get near the bar, the woman was facing off against a man who was easily twice her size and mostly muscle. “Hey, asshole!  Back off!”  

“Excuse me?  What the fuck business is it of yours?” he growled, crowding her personal space in an effort to intimidate her.

The woman clearly didn’t get the message, furrowing her brows in an angry glare.  “Grabbing someone’s ass and attempting to grab other areas as well without their permission is sexual assault, fucker!  She clearly does not know you and does not want you touching her.”

“You have no proof of anything,” he snarled at her.  “Now sit that pretty, tight, little ass down and maybe I’ll let you kneel in front of me a little later.”

The woman’s mouth dropped as she stared at the man.  “Yep, that’s the expression you’ll be making later.”  He reached to pat her on her ass.  Dick lunged to grab his hand before he could reach her, but he was just a beat too slow.  Instead, the woman grabbed the man’s hand and twisted along with his momentum, pushing him down as she twisted.  She moved her feet slightly to trip him, throwing him even further off balance.  She twisted his arm at an uncomfortable angle as he fell, forcing him to turn over on his stomach so she could pin him to the floor once he finally landed.  “Also, sexual assault?  Illegal, asshole.  Doing it to more people, surprisingly, doesn’t make it less illegal.”

“It isn’t sexual assault if you want it,” he jeered at her.

She scoffed at him, making sure to keep the pressure on her hold as she did.  “I doubt there has ever been anything living or otherwise that has wanted you looking at them let alone touching them.”  Dick chuckled at her response.

“Excuse me, what is going on here?”  A man Dick recognized as the bouncer asked.  He was eying the woman who was pinning the man down with heavy suspicion.

“That man sexually assaulted that woman and when this woman pointed it out he tried to sexually assault her as well,” Dick answered for her.

The bouncer looked between the first woman, the second woman, the man on the floor, and Dick.  He finally nodded and grabbed the man by his jacket collar.  “Come on mother fucker, we’re going to get your picture then you are never coming in here again, understood?”

“Do you know who I am? You’re making a monumental mistake,” the man screamed as he was getting dragged away.

The black haired woman didn’t bother watching the man as he was hauled away.  She shifted her focus entirely onto the blonde woman who had been assaulted.  “Hey, are you okay?  Can I get you a drink to steady your nerves?”

The blonde shook her head. “No, thanks.  I’m okay.  It happens. You go to a club, it’s going to happen.”

The black haired woman and Dick both gaped at her.  “It shouldn’t happen ever.  If anyone ever does anything like that to you again, kick their asses or call someone over to do it for you.  He had no right to touch you.  Going out to have fun doesn’t make you an open target,” Dick interceded.  “Assholes like that should feel unsafe in clubs not you.”

The blonde shrugged at him. “Thanks for your help anyway.  Can I buy you a drink?”

The black haired woman shook her head and gave her a gentle smile.  “No, thank you.  I just refreshed mine.  Have fun, yeah?”  The blonde nodded and waved before returning to the dancefloor.

The black haired woman collapsed onto a barstool with a sigh.  She chuckled and shook her head as she looked at her drink.  “Thank you by the way.  I don’t know if the bouncer would have trusted just my word.”

“Not a problem.” He took a seat next to her.  “I’m glad I could do something to help.  I tried to grab him before he could get to you but I wasn’t as fast as you.  You were really impressive.”

She shot him a glance from the corner of her eye but didn’t really stop to look at him.  The charming smile he shot her faltered when she didn’t look close enough to actually see it.  His liquor fueled mind frowned at the lack of attention.    “Thanks,” she mumbled.  She drank the rest of her drink in one gulp, which Dick thought was quite impressive considering it was full and not a shot.  

She laid the glass on the counter harder than it seemed like she meant to and continued to stare at it for a few moments.  “Hey,” he leaned a little closer to her while still giving her space.  “You okay?  You want another drink?” He motioned to the bartender for two more drinks for them.  

She rubbed her face and took a beat before turning to finally face him with a thankful smile.  “You really don’t have to.”  

Dick’s charming smile made it back to his lips, even wider than it had been before.  “No, but you deserve it for protecting the club.”

She shook her head.  “It wasn’t…”  She looked down at his shirt and balked, staring at it suspiciously. After a few moments, she looked up toward the sky with an annoyed scowl that still looked adorable, like an irritated kitten.  “Am I a joke to you?” she called out.  

His charming smile morphed into a look of confusion.  “I’m sorry?”

She waved her arms like she was waving away the concern.  “It’s nothing.  Interesting shirt.  Fan of ladybugs?”

He looked down at his shirt as though seeing it for the first time, “Oh… uh… I just liked the pattern. I don’t think I would have even recognized them as a ladybug if you hadn’t explicitly pointed it out.”  The woman looked back up toward the sky with a menacing look he didn’t quite understand.  He thanked the bartender when he served their drinks and turned back to her.  “Do you… uh… like ladybugs?”  

The woman gave a defeated sigh and looked down to her shoes.  When she looked back up, a resigned but amused smile was on her lips.  “No, it’s just… my friends used to call me their everyday ladybug.”

Dick cocked his head to the side studying her curiously.  There was something going on, but he couldn’t quite make it out yet.  But there was no way he was going to miss an opportunity to dance with a beautiful, strong, sweet woman.  “I’m Dick.” He stuck his hand out to shake hers.

She took his hand and gave him a bright smile, “Marinette.”

He looked over to the dancefloor and back to her.  “Do you want to dance?”  Her smile brightened, making his heartbeat pick up.  She pulled on the hand she was still holding and guided him onto the dancefloor, drinks still in hand.

Chapter 2

@dickinette-february

[mxtantrights]

past lives | 9

a/n: second to last part? idk. maybe I’ll write an epilogue to smooth everything over.

The sight of police cars swarming the outside of the office building sets you off. It couldn't be good, it could never be good in Gotham. You had called in late to finally get a new phone, which you were busy picking up. That was so abysmal at this point.

You basically jumped out of your ride share and the cold air hit you. You ran right up to the front entrance and saw the yellow tape. That sinking feeling began to set in. Something bad happened. Someone bad came here.

The officer keeping a crowd back is the first one you spot. You go up to her and show her your ID badge.

“I work here- can you tell me what happened?” you ask.

She shakes her head, “I can’t give out the details right now but you can come to the station later on.”

“Later on? Is anyone hurt? Can you at least give me that?” 

She looks around at the people behind you before beckoning you closer. You inch over to her.

“As of right now eleven are dead, about a dozen injured.” she says.

You thank her and move towards the back of the growing crowd. Your hand goes into your jacket pocket and you hit speed dial number 2. It rings and rings in your ear but no answer. You try Fallon again.

Some part of you is screaming inside. Eleven dead. Eleven chances that it could be Fallon. Or twelve chances they are injured.

As you hold the phone up to your ear and you hear the ringing in your ear you hear the crowd become more antsy. You turn around to see the reason why and there they are. Fallon walking out with an office, one of the standard gray blankets wrapped around them.

You end the call and ran over to where they are. The officer looks as if they want to block you but Fallon meets you halfway. They don’t extend their arms around you, but you do around them. You can feel them shivering and you know it’s not just the cold.

“Fallon, you’re alright. You’re okay. You’re gonna be okay.” you say.

They start crying in your arms and you hold them tighter. A few moments pass when you hear them mumble something into your shoulder. You have to pull them back from you.

“It was horrible, they just came in and started stabbing people with fancy blades. I had to use Daniel’s body as a shield- my brother told me to do that in case of emergencies. He did that during that bloody bank robbery a few summers ago and-”

You push their head back into your shoulder and they begin sobbing again. And if it we’re for the info they just relayed to you, you would have gotten emotional too. Fancy blades? A lot of people probably have katanas and such in Gotham. But how many of them would target your office?

This was him. This was punishment.

You reach back into your pocket and pull away from Fallon.

“Use my phone to call your brother. Tell him you’re safe.” you say. 

Fallon nods and takes your phone. You watch as they enter the information into your phone and start the call. On the other hand, your eyes are glazing over the crowd to make sure that none of the league’s lackies are hanging around.

It seemed like your past life was done being past tense. It’s not like you thought you could burry it. You knew things like this didn’t stay buried. But you had no idea that it was go about like this. 

If Ra's knows that you and Damian share a father, Bruce is in trouble. Severe trouble. 

Fallon hands you your phone back. 

“He’s a few blocks away, gonna come with me while I go to the station. Nice phone by the way.” they say.

“I can go with you.”

“No, you need to stay here and handle your boss duties or whatever.” 

“Yeah you’re right. Okay.”

“I added my number in there, so call me when you’re done. Be safe.” 

Fallon then walks away from you, back to the officer they left behind. They no doubt had to give up their clothes for evidence. It had blood all over the front. Probably Daniel’s. 

You spotted the clothing store across the street and it seemed to be open. You waited until it was safe to cross before jogging over to the shop. One of the workers met you at the door.

“Hi I need to buy a warm outfit for my friend, she’s gonna need a change of clothes.”

“Of course.” 

The man lets you in and you run over to the first warm thing you see. A knitted black sweater, in Fallon’s size. Then you grab onto what felt like very soft sweatpants in a large. The man was waiting for you at the register. 

The amount wasn’t your focus you simply swiped your card and it went through. Instead of taking the back out to Fallon, you kept it with the worker. You told him that Fallon’s brother would drop by and pick it up.

You left the store as you searched in your bag for the business card. It took a bit but you did find it. When you did you took out your phone as well and put in his number.

Your finger hit dial and it only took one ring for him to pick up.

“Are you okay? I’m watching the news right now.” he asks.

“I’m fine I wasn’t in the office yet. Are you available to meet?”

“Yeah I can come to you, or-”

You weren’t able to get another word in because someone had gotten the best of you. You heard tires screeching and suddenly two black SUVs were in front of you. Before you had a chance to run you felt an electricity shoot through your back. 

It became too much and you felt your body grow weak, and your eyes slowly started to close.

The last thing you saw was a face from your past.

Nyssa.

-

Bruce went into his other mode fairly quickly. He had heard you speaking, what seemed liked cars coming to a screeching halt. And then he heard your phone thud. The call disconnected after that.

He alerted the others to come to the cave. Bruce knew something was happening but he didn’t know exactly what. He knew he was missing some details.

One things certain, Damian’s undercover mission to Gotham academy ended with a fire. Now there’s been a murder spree at your job. It seems like his children are being targeted. Who was next?

He got down to the cave with speed. Already waiting for him was Damian and Tim. The two watched Bruce bypass them and move toward the computers.

“I need cctv of of Gotham Square, around the Wordsworth building.” he said.

Tim jumped into action and was able to pull it up within mere seconds. Damian watched from behind the two of them.

“What’s this about father?”

“It’s about what happened at Gotham academy and now at the Wordsworth building. Someone’s on the attack.” he answered.

Damian wanted to dig for more, “what do those things have to do with one another?”

“Damian I need you to get in contact with Dick and Jason with their ETAs.” Bruce dodged the question.

He didn’t really need confirmation at this point. If his father dodged the question then the answer he’s thinking must be true. Someone got to you. Not someone, his grandfather. So he moved quickly to get to the comms.

Jason called in with a 15 minute ETA. Richard about the same. Damian knew that Jason would get here first though he was reckless with his bike. 

-

Dick got out of his car and ran up the steps to meet the rest of the family.

“I’m here what’s the situation?” 

“A kidnapping.”

“Woah- who is it?” Dick asked.

Bruce gave him a look before answering. “My long lost child.” 

It was at that moment everyone looked, in some shape or form, at Damian. His face hadn’t changed one bit. 

“The writer who interviewed us right?” Jason asked.

Bruce nodded.

“Alright do we have any idea who was behind it?” Dick asked.

Tim raised his hand and led the group over to the monitors. They all gathered around to watch you on the screen. You were on the phone- Bruce had told them it was him- and then the cars came. Before you could even fight off your attacked, you were tasered with a stick. 

They watched you drop your phone and go down on the sidewalk.

“Look who shows up.” Tim said. Then on cue, Nyssa al Ghul comes onto the screen. She picks up your phone and ends the call. Her henchmen lift you up and carry you into one of the SVUs. It’s all effortless after that. The cars drive off onto the main road and take that all the way until there's a blindspot. Like they knew it would be there. 

The cars aren’t seen after that.

“What does the league want with your child Bruce?” Jason asked.

“Leverage? A trade-off? It’s not clear yet.”

“I’ve got cctv footage from the Gotham Academy fire.” Tim said.

Damian watched in real time as the video started playing. And down in the bottom left corner, there he was with you. You shielded him that day. Tim changes the angles and finds another feed and it gets a closer look at the both of you.

Bruce faces Damian, “Do you wanna explain this to us?”

[thedragonnerd]

Ficlet: Forgiveness (Namaari)

(tw: lil bit of violence. Finally managed to finish this!)

The Council of Kumandra has finally arrived at an agreement on article 7, clause 15 of a mutually beneficial trade agreement, when Benja raises his hand, and calls for a break in proceedings.

‘Now is a time for feasting,’ he says, ushering the Council members away from the chamber, and Raya could almost weep in relief. Her boredom had been so intense during the last thirty minutes of the meeting, it took all she had not to fall asleep right in the middle of negotiations.

She pulls herself out of her chair slowly, aiming to be the last to leave the room as she allows the visiting dignitaries to file out ahead of her - sometimes, playing the role of a good host can be exhausting. Her stomach is beginning to rumble loudly, but she’s torn between going to hunt for a plate of food first, or going to search for Namaari, who had been helping to represent Fang’s interests at this meeting, and hence had to sit with their party rather than next to Raya, where they can usually whisper back and forth on all sorts of ridiculous topics.

Although she hides it well, Raya has noticed Namaari struggles sometimes with attending meetings in other lands, especially in Heart where there are curious looks, or sometime downright hostile glares towards her and the rest of the Fang delegation.

It’s with this thought in mind that Raya stumbles out of the room and towards the distant hum of people already congregating for dinner. She bypasses the array of mouth-watering dishes however, nodding at her Ba as he catches her eye. He’s deep in conversation with Chief Virana, so she decides to avoid disturbing them, and focuses on scanning the room with a singular purpose in mind. She cannot see Namaari anywhere, but before she can venture forth to search other parts of the palace, Sisu bumps her shoulder gently.

‘Raya, my girl!’ she says, body curling around Raya slightly, and nose poking against Raya’s cheek. ‘What’s making you so distracted? Was it that long boring meeting? Cos I have to say, I totally dozed off for most of it, so I sure hope Pranee spoke up for us…’

Raya tunes her out slightly as she resumes her searching of the crowd, hoping to see Namaari’s broad shoulders somewhere in the room, until a soft ‘thwack’ of a paw lands on her arm, Sisu’s claws tapping gently on her skin.

‘Raya?’

‘Sisu, have you seen Namaari anywhere?’ Raya asks. ‘I haven’t been able to find her.’

‘Oh, she went outside a few minutes ago,’ Sisu proclaims, flicking her tail in the general direction of the door that leads to the gardens. ‘She said she wanted some fresh air or something.’

‘Thanks, Sisu!’ Raya calls absently over her shoulder, already heading for the exit. The negotiations had gone on for so long that dusk is beginning to fall, and a light breeze sweeps through her hair as the summer heat fades away. Lanterns flicker on as she hurries down the pathway that she assumes Namaari’s taken. Usually if everything gets too much, and Namaari feels overwhelmed, she tends to hide with her serlot for a while. There’s no reason she shouldn’t be there, perfectly fine and safe, but for some reason there is an anxious knot in Raya’s chest…a feeling that she needs to find Namaari now, just to be sure.

As she rounds a corner, she hears raised voices in the distance, and squinting her eyes, she spies a group up ahead. There are five young men – warriors, dressed in the clothes of Heart, Talon and Tail – and they are talking loudly and angrily at a sixth person, their hands already grasping their swords. Raya knows it is Namaari before she even sees the figure dressed in white, boxed in by the men with a large rock wall at her back.

‘’Maari!’ she calls, hastening her steps, but the people before her are too engrossed in their showdown to hear. From the direction of her approach, the men’s backs are turned to her anyway, and whilst she can see Namaari’s face, the other woman has all her focus trained on the threat.

She doesn’t want to spark a fuse by racing in unannounced if Namaari has it under control, but as she hurries along the path towards them, she sees one of the men take a step forwards, waving his sword around dangerously as he continues to shout. Five against one is not exactly fair odds, but Raya knows Namaari can handle herself well in a fight – indeed, has been on the receiving end of some of those punches both in battle and on the training grounds. If something is about to go down, she’s confident that Namaari will be able to hold them off long enough for her to arrive and join the fight.

She’s almost upon the group when it happens. Namaari grasps her two swords, pulling them out with casual ease, and then…she throws them down by her feet, her chin raised proudly. Raya’s blood runs cold as she watches the ringleader lash out, kicking Namaari down to the ground.

‘’Maari, get up!’ she cries out, sprinting the last few steps.

Everything seems to occur simultaneously. Namaari’s eyes widen as she sees Raya for the first time, her hand reaching out as if to stop her from coming closer, whilst several of the group begin to turn around at the sound of Raya’s voice. But Raya only has her sight set on the leader, as his arm raises and she sees a flash of metal swinging down towards Namaari. She desperately launches her own sword towards him, hoping Namaari won’t be caught in the crossfire, and its extended blade wraps around his, pulling his arm back abruptly.

Raya slides across the ground, foot kicking out at the two nearest opponents, and she can see them tumble down out the corner of her eye as she spins around, flinging her into the fight. She’s a skilled combatant herself, with years of being out on the road and having to watch her own back, and she manages to draw blood in the first few seconds of facing down a now rather surprised looking ringleader. But as soon as one goes down, there are two more circling around her. The men are all trained warriors themselves, and she realizes with a jolt that she recognizes several of them, especially those from Heart, making her reluctant to take a kill strike.

One moment of distraction by someone managing to slice her left arm means she is vulnerable, and in the next moment she lands heavily on her back, the breath knocked out of her. The Talon man peers down at her with an ugly twist to his smile, and there is a flash of a weapon coming towards her face before twin blades thrust into view, blocking his attack.

Namaari grasps her wrist, pulling her up with one hand, and then they are fighting back-to-back, a team of flashing swords and bloodied knuckles. Their opponents have no chance, and the five men lie on the ground with various wounds before Raya can even take a deep breath.

‘What were you binturis thinking?’ Raya feels the rage burning inside her as she looks at their prone forms. The ringleader – a warrior from Heart, she is shocked to see – spits blood onto the dirt, and then snarls up at her with red-stained teeth.

‘She’s the one that destroyed the world,’ he croaks, gesturing towards Namaari. ‘And yet now you welcome her here to our lands with open arms? After everything she’s done? We demand blood for blood.’

Six years of surviving alone during the reign of the Druun has made Raya observant and fast with her reflexes; as he pulls out his crossbow and begins to raise it towards Namaari, she has already lifted her foot, stamping down hard enough to feel the satisfying *crack* of his fingers under her heel.

‘No, you almost destroyed the world right now,’ she hisses, a white-hot rage sweeping through her mind. ‘You almost destroyed Kumandra and the peace we’ve sought for so long, with your inability to let go of the past and refusal to remember she also helped save this land.’

Her hand clenches in a fist, and she moves to lunge down for another punch to his face. A muscled arm curls around her waist instead, hauling her upright.

‘It’s alright, Raya,’ Namaari says softly, pulling Raya’s back against herself. ‘He’s not worth it.’

Raya is about to say exactly how worth it she thinks it would be, when they are suddenly surrounded by Ba, Virana, Sisu and other concerned guests, who have followed the sounds of the commotion.

--

Later, they are sat on Raya’s bed in silence.

‘Let me at least deal with that,’ Namaari breaks the stand-off, nodding her chin towards Raya’s arm, where the thin scratch still bleeds sluggishly.

‘I’m still angry at you,’ Raya says grumpily, but shuffles sideways slightly so that Namaari can have easier access to the wound. Namaari says nothing in response, leaving instead to collect up some bandages and a damp cloth, and when she returns, she focuses on cleaning the cut with precise focus.

‘It won’t need stitches,’ she murmurs as she wraps the clean bandage around Raya’s arms, her fingers gentle but firm in their actions. ‘I’m sorry you got hurt for me.’

‘Namaari, do you know why I’m angry?’ Raya interrupts the moment, ducking her head so that their eyes meet for the first time since dealing with the aftermath of the attack. Namaari holds her gaze for a moment, before her eyes slide away to fix on a point somewhere over Raya’s shoulder.

‘That man from Talon…Raya, his wife died in a Druun attack. Not turned to stone, but was actually killed in the chaos. Same for one of your own citizens – he told me his brother had drowned trying to swim away from the Druun in the initial attack. How do you expect me to hear that, and not…’

‘Not what, Namaari? Not hand yourself over for execution, or whatever they wanted to do?’ Raya is unimpressed. ‘Not everything is your fault, you stubborn binturi. And I refuse to let you become some sort of martyr due to some misguided quest for forgiveness.’

Her voice is raised slightly by the end, but one look at Namaari’s troubled face has her sighing deeply. She reaches out instead to wrap her arms around Namaari’s shoulders, pulling her into an embrace despite the stiff muscles she feels under her hands.

‘I wish sometimes that you’d simply forgive yourself,’ she confesses softly, the words coming easily. ‘But until then, I guess I’ll just keep reminding you instead.’

She feels arms tentatively rise up and wrap around her waist, and in response, she tucks her face in against the crook of Namaari’s neck. They sit embracing in silence for a long time.

[votederpycausemufins]

hermit!Tommy au keeps living rent free in my brain and i need to get it out to write my other stuff. writing sort of helps but it’s also letting other aus in!

like in this i’m also using triplet au and some avian race stuff plus one au thing i’m adding because i like it!

send help, i don’t know enough about dream smp to write it well but i’m writing anyway and maybe it’s good but i have Anxiety™.

uh, anyway, part one of this new idea, if you have any idea who would help dream get tommy back like this, tell me cause otherwise i’m only using tubbo techno and dream cause i’m not sure who would realistically join.

oh yeah and @petrichormeraki for making the hermit!tommy au and i think also the triplet au? and then also @strawberrylemonz because i didn’t realize they had more chapters of their one fic and i binge read all of memories in the stars so now Grian and Tommy are brothers in this fic.

Dream smiled wildly under his mask as he stared at the portal that stood in front of him. It was no nether portal, the only resemblance being the purple color between the blocks of the frame. Said blocks were eight pure diamond blocks making an almost five by three shape. It had taken months to learn of the design and get it to work properly, but here it was. Known only as the infinity portal, Dream knew this was just what he was after.

A few other players stood near him, having assisted in the creation of the portal at Dream’s demands and threats. It had started when Tommy disappeared. When everyone realized, there were a range of emotions, but almost everyone knew that there would be no way to find Tommy. They hadn’t noticed for who knows how long after he left, leaving no trail. Dream was the only one who thought there might be a way to find his lost ‘friend’. And that idea became real when at a MCC tournament with Tubbo, the compass the boy always wore stopped spinning once again. And even then, learning that had been chance when in the middle of a game the normally hidden item had come loose.

Dream never saw Tommy so he assumed that he was simply in the crowd and not participating, which made it harder to pin him down, but with the return portals going group by group, it was easy to see the compass stop tracking Tommy after the Hermitcraft group left.

The initial knowledge left Dream shocked and even doubting a return of Tommy. That place was known as a very well protected place. It was likely that Tommy’s arrival caused those that resided in Hermittown would have their admin making things harder to bypass. And at the same time, someone who could get through like Tommy did, even by chance, would likely be heavily monitored. It’s just how Dream would do it.

But not wanting to give up, Dream researched into these people and learned how the Hermits would open their gates briefly before moving on. Based on previous patterns, there was no way Dream would wait months and months before that happened again, but some knowledge has seeped over from the previous event.

Some of the Hermits had found a way to create something called the infinity portal, and immediately Dream knew that would be his way to Tommy. If anything were to get past the Hermit’s protection, it would be something of their own design.

And now here it was, his very own Infinity portal. He had even used his admin powers to give it a little upgrade. A duplicate of Tubbo’s compass was placed into one of the blocks making up the frame. It was slightly dented and scorched from previous attempts and was currently sparking dangerously, but it was all holding. 

Now, speaking of Tubbo, the boy was just to Dream’s right. He grabbed Tubbo a little harshly and pulled him forward. “See, it finally works!” Dream spoke, his voice edging complete madness. “And I’m sure it wouldn’t have without that little trinket of yours, so why don’t you have the honors Tubbo?”

Normally Dream wouldn’t want to give anyone else the chance to get to Tommy before him, but he was smart and knew how to survive. While the portal looked stable and working for the most part, the sparks from the compass told another story. He could go in first and potentially die, or he could use a test dummy. 

Tubbo was too eager to see Tommy once again and didn’t see any problem with going first. He stepped onto the portal and barely gave a second thought about Dream’s Request to come back once he was through to say where exactly they landed. He watched as the world around him warped and turned purple, just as with a nether portal, but the bright white flash that followed was different.

The first thing Tubbo saw was a large turquoise building, but to see it better, he took a step out of the portal and fell into the water a few blocks below. He looked back up at the portal and then at the ocean floor before using the blocks he had on him to build back up to the portal. As he did so, he could feel his communicator buzzing madly. Tubbo finally looked at the thing once he reached the portal again and made a small platform around it.

<MumboJumbo> Did someone make a new cam-drone?

<Tango> Not me

<Grian> Might be Tommy, he’s the only one afk right now

<joehillssays> name sounds familiar and he doesn’t normally use them, so might be an old one.

Tubbo stared at the communicator, there were more messages, but only the first few mattered to him, specifically the message with Tommy’s name in it. He couldn’t be completely sure that it was his friend though, but before he could look at the list of other users, two new messages came in.

<TommyInnit> Guys, please just let me have this one, it’s really important.

<TommyInnit> Tubbo how the fuck

Tubbo couldn’t help but tear up at the message. He started typing back, sure his message was coming out poorly due to the tears messing with his already impared vision, but there was a ping as his message was sent before he walked through the portal again.

~~~~~

Tommy had finished afking near Mumbo’s industrial district, having turned off his communicator so he could just sit and watch the machines go. As he turned everything off again, he unmuted the device just to have a flood of messages show up. He scrolled up until a yellow one caught his eye.

Tubbo_ joined the server

Tubbo. His Tubbo. How was he here? Tommy had to know, and even if the other Hermits would get upset at his language, it was all he could think of right now. He sent a message, hoping Tubbo would see it and that this wasn’t all some huge mistake. After the messages were sent, he stared at the communicator until another message was sent. Seeing Tubbo’s name in a message made his heart soar, but it immediately seemed to stop as he actually read the response.

<Tubbo_> Dream’s been trying to find a way to you for months and he finally did it! I’m going to be right back with him and the others!

Tubbo_ left the server.

Tubbo was one thing but Dream was another. Tommy could feel himself trembling. He had found a way in. Tommy’s worst fears were coming true. But then another message came in.

<Grian> Alright, guess I’m breaking out the axe again

<Stressmonster101> I’m already headed to my brewing area.

<xisumavoid> Looks like they used an infinity portal.

<Docm77> I have nothing to do with it

Tommy managed to smile just a little at how quick everyone was jumping into action at the mention of his own admin. As more Hermits chimed in, Tommy sent his own message.

<TommyInnit> Dream is the real threat. I don’t think Tubbo would be helping if he knew the full story or is being threatened or something. I’m not sure who else will come, but just maim and capture anyone besides those two unless I say otherwise.

~~~~~

After what seemed like an eternity, Tubbo stepped back through the portal. He was dripping wet but had a huge smile on his face and Dream knew Tommy had to be on the other side.

“He’s there! He’s really there!” Tubbo was practically bouncing around.

“You’re wet.” Came the deadpan tone of Techno’s voice as he stepped closer, now knowing the portal was working.

“Yeah, it sort of spawned over an ocean but I made a platform and everything.”

“Good job Tubbo.” Dream spoke before anyone else could. “Now we can go help free Tommy from wherever these people have trapped him and bring him home.”

“Well, when I showed up, Tommy was able to use a communicator which is how I know he’s really there, so maybe he isn’t trapped and need rescuing?” Tubbo asked meekly.

“If that were true, wouldn’t he have come back Tubbo? If not for all of us, if not for his home, why didn’t he come back for you?”

Tubbo didn’t respond and Dream pushed past him to be right in front of the portal. He turned around to face the others he had collected there and pulled out his axe. “We don’t know what all will be there to ‘greet’ us once we go looking, so better to arm yourselves now. And the sooner we go through, the better.” And with that, he stepped into the portal.

When he reached the other side, his communicator immediately started buzzing. With no one in sight, Dream pulled it out to read what these Hermits were getting up to. He couldn’t help but laugh at the messages coming in. It seemed that they were torturing Tommy or something. This would be easy. Behind him, more people from the SMP came through the portal. They had weapons at the ready and even looked a little disappointed at the lack of a battle on the other side.

Dream pointed out the two landmarks that were best visible, a large turquoise tower and an island littered with buildings. While the tower was closer, Techno pointed out the building was made of warped wood, so it would be tough to deal with. The island on the other hand, it was so full with buildings that obviously plenty of these Hermits had to be living there. It was surprising it didn’t look like more of a mess.

Tubbo was the only one to notice a small island with a single chest on it. After close inspection, the chest was in no way trapped and Dream laughed when he saw it was filled with boats. “It’s like they’re asking us to attack them!”

After placing down a number of boats, Dream and the rest of his group rowed towards the island. A few people stayed out of the boats and swam in the water. While they weren’t as fast, it was better than having everyone vulnerable as they rowed.

They had nearly reached the island when there was the distinct sound of a firework being fired. Techno was the first to jump out his boat, looking for the source, but as the seconds went on, there was no explosion. Instead, another firework went off and a shadow passed over the boats.

Looking up, the group saw a figure with giant wings, a trail of smoke behind them. Techno fired his crossbow at them, but the flier swerved out of the way before diving at the group. Boats moved to get out of the flight path, but Dream stood in place and readied his axe. As the figure grew closer, he smiled. Perfect height, red shirt, blonde hair. That was Tommy. “Tommy, glad to see you. It’s been ag-” Dream was cut off and stopped smiling as an axe blade hit him just as Tommy passed him. 

He was about to speak again when there was a laugh. One that sent shivers down his spine. Dream looked around, but the source could only be from the one flying around him. That wasn’t Tommy. “A-Attack the imposter!” He managed to get out, pushing down his fear. There was only one person with that laugh. The dreamslayer.

As Grian swooped down for another attack, a yell from the nearby shore stopped everyone in their tracks, even making Grian slow down as it was someone yelling at him. “Grian! Get back here and give us a chance to be diplomatic about this!” Looking towards the island ahead, Dream could see a figure standing at the shore which the avian now flew towards before landing. Someone aligned with Grian was potentially dangerous as well, but Dream has an army while this new person wanted a peaceful option.

Still, it was an opportunity to get closer safely, so Dream obliged, having Techno follow him. The warrior begrudgingly agreed, this was for his brother after all. He hopped out of his boat and climbed into the back of the one Dream was rowing. Within a few moments they had reached the shore and Techno growled slightly at the sight of this new person. They seemed to have an attempted copy of Tommy’s face as a mask. The one Dream mistook for Tommy wore an identical mask. 

“Hello there. I’m Scar, mayor of Hermitcraft. I’m sure you’re here for Tommy, but I’m afraid he does not want to return with you, and we don’t have that many slots available for new comers at the moment.”

Techno crossed his arms at this ‘mayor’ while Dream let out a curt laugh. “I’m sure that’s what you think, but Tommy is one of us. He has to come back. Especially since staying here leaves his family behind.” Dream gestured to Techno.

“Hey, if they fill out the right paperwork and what not,” Grian started, Scar attempting to interject that he would have to be filling out the paperwork too before being shushed. “The rest of the family can come live here. Isn’t that right Techno?”

Techno barely gave any reaction and Grian shrugged his shoulders. “Okay, I get it. Haven’t seen you in who knows how long. It’s fine.”

Dream glanced over towards Techno. “You know Grian?” Techno replied with a no at the same time Grian replied with a yes. “Either way, that doesn’t matter. Tommy is coming with us.” And Dream swung his axe. Grian quickly intercepted it, but that’s why he had brought backup. Techno used the gap Grian had left and used his own axe on Scar. It only took a single hit as the mayor had come without any armor. In fact, the only things that fell to the ground were two masks, one of Tommy and the other of Scar. 

As Scar was killed, everyone’s communicator buzzed. Dream smiled, now it was a two on one, something this dreamslayer couldn’t possibly win against. But his smile fell as Grian gave a smile of his own. “You know we were giving you a chance. But now everyone knows what’s going on.”

Dream gave a nod and Techno lifted Grian by his shirt. In his other hand he held his axe which was now being positioned over the parrot wings Grian sported. That made the avian flinch which Dream was glad of, but before the axe could fall, there was the sound of plenty of fireworks going off and then the sky was filled with other hermits, all equipped with elytra.

[kashimos-hajime]

slipping away | b.b.

summary: and now, he’s not your bucky anymore.

WARNINGS: ANGST, hospital talk, swearing, vomitting,  pairing: amnesiac modern!bucky x gender neutral!reader word count: 5.3k

a/n: a small study on a long-term relationship and the strains and disagreements that come into it. it’s been a hot sec since i’ve posted any marvel stuff. still tryna get back into writing for bucky, but this is written for @mushyjellybeans​​. prompt is bolded :)

“I don’t think this is something we should be arguing about,” you mutter, throwing your phone down into the car’s cupholder as Bucky’s grip on the wheel only intensifies. You slide hands over your thighs, stretching your legs against the red carpet of his newly refurbished Mustang. If there’s one thing you haven’t argued about yet, it’s the renovated ‘87 Mustang Bucky’s done over with his father, not completely done yet, but still, it looks hell of a lot better than it did before. “It shouldn’t have been made an issue tonight, of all nights.”

“You wanted to make it an issue.”

“Because all you ever want to do is fight!”

“I don’t want to fight!” he exclaims, his voice still barely containing itself and you cross your arms, slinking into your seat as you toss him a glare. “I just asked if you could see yourself even considering marrying me, and you said no.”

“Because you said I could take my time with this decision,” you snap, eyes darting from his face to the tense paleness in his knuckles. The car is thrumming beneath your thighs, purring down the highway and you shift your gaze to the window. He always drives fast when he gets pissed. “Put your fucking seatbelt on. You always get so reckless when things don’t go your way.”

The barb is meant to dig in deep, and it does because he doesn’t put the seatbelt on to spite you.

“Bucky, seriously. Put the fucking seatbelt on,” you growl, head snapping to him again. He ignores you, and you sigh incredulously, planting your chin in your palm and glowering out into the night. “Fucker.”

He’s shutting you out. He’s shutting you out, and not listening, and you’re about to throw yourself out of this car if you don’t roll down the window.

So you do and as they travel over a speedbump coming off the highway. It’s green lights ahead, and you hope the twenty minute drive to his parents’ house is enough to let things cool off a titch, but you know it’ll only crop up because his mom will ask when Bucky’ll propose and—

Fuck. They’ll have to talk about it at home later tonight.

Bucky switches on a playlist on his phone to fill the uncomfortable silence and you think this is the kind of choice you don’t make when you’re eighteen. You never thought you might break up with Bucky because of the thought of marriage. When you were eighteen, you thought it would be something like cheating, or university, or some other factor that would force you apart.

But no, it’s marriage. A union.

Ironic, that is.

You bypass the first green light easily and in the distance, you can see the next. Leaning your head against the side of the car, you rest your arm along the window sill and just let the wind whip at your face, numb it until when you breathe, your lungs seem to freeze. The wind softens when they approach the intersection and Bucky slows down just enough to scan the road before heading forward to the next one. There are side streets feeding into the main road but there aren’t many cars. Not a lot of people drive in the suburbs on a Sunday night, and it’s been an easy drive otherwise. As they head for the last intersection between them and Bucky’s parent’s house, you spot the green light and feel Bucky speed up.

He’s eager to get out of this suffocating car, too. An uneasiness curls up in the pit of your stomach as you hear another car’s engine growling into the quiet night. Straightening up, you look around and spot no car in their direction coming close to the speed Bucky’s going. He’s pushing the speed limit, his hand fidgeting with the seatbelt as it tries to slot into the buckle and you reach forward with your closest hand and help it slot into place.

You don’t miss the way his lip twitches in thanks and you merely turn your head back to the road, watching with an empty mind, letting his music wash through you as the growling of that speeding engine somewhere down the street grows louder. You’re about to ask Bucky if he hears that when a car speeds through a red light from a side road.

“Bucky, stop!” The words are torn out of your throat as you throw your hands out in front of you.

His foot slamming the brakes, the harsh whine of the tires burning against asphalt rings in your ears before a sickening crunch sends you forward. Glass cracks, something thuds, and the last thing you know is blood slowly dripping your face, something smoking in the distance and the screams of someone before everything goes black.

.

The lights are bright and blurry as you let out a muffled groan.

“Don’t worry, we’ve got you.”

Your face is splitting pain and you groan, trying to turn your head but you’re frozen in place. Something’s wrapped tight around your neck, keeping you in place as someone shines a light into your eyes. Lungs seizing, you let out a choked cough, back arching off the bed as you try to raise your arm to the plastic mask digging into your cheeks. Something is prodding your stomach, something runs along your legs—there’s too much all at once and you try to shift away from whatever keeps touching you, but hands take you, keep you still.

“Try to stay still. I know it hurts, but you’re safe now.”

“Bucky.” His name slips past your lips, throat burning, but there’s no response. There are voices buzzing at the edge of your hearing and you blink, trying to clear your vision. Your head is spinning and you try to raise your hand weakly. Fingers take you by the wrist, gently ushering your arm back down to the bed. “Bucky.” Eyes slipping shut, your mind plays the crash over and over again. You’re nothing but a bystander.

Where are you, Bucky?

“We’re losing ‘em. Give me the paddles.”

Are you still here?

“Clear!”

Please. Stay for me.

.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

“How’re you feeling, Y/N? C’mon, stay with us.”

Who? Steve, is that you?

“Bucky had to have brain surgery, Y/N. They said… they said it went well but they won’t know how well it really went until he wakes up.”

He’s alive? Oh, thank God. Thank you, thank you, thank you—

“But he’s getting stronger. He hasn’t woken up yet, but they think he’s getting stronger. Nat and Sam are sitting with him, now. We’re taking shifts to make sure the two of you aren’t alone.”

That’s nice of you, Steve. Thanks for being here.

“Oh, God, hey.”

Yeah?

“Hey, can you hear me?”

Loud and clear, Captain.

“Hey, nurse! I think they’re waking up!”

Eyes opening, you squint at the warm lamplight in the darkness of the room. Your throat is burning and your stomach is twisted, nausea swimming behind your eyeballs as your eyes flutter shut again. There’s something digging into your skull, your abdomen sore, and your whole body is wracked with an exhaustion that barely allows you to move. It’s a slow, dull ache all over you, pressing you deeper into the bed.

“How’re you feeling, Y/N?” one of the nurses asks quietly and you groan, voice cracking.

“I’m thirsty.” As they slowly raise you into a half-sitting position, your eyes barely open and you spot a shape in the corner. “Steve?” The shape moves closer and you spot golden hair gleaming in the lamplight and you laugh despite how much it aches in your chest. “Thought it was you.”

“Hey. How’re you feeling, huh?” Something nudges at your lips and you part your lips just enough for a straw to slip in. Sucking down water like you need air, you let out a silent groan. The water pushes down like a thick block of ice down a swollen throat as you manage to keep it down. “Feeling like turning away from the light?”

“Feel like I got run over by a truck,” you mutter, head sinking into the pillow and Steve’s relieved laugh soothes the ache between your temples. “Where is he?” Blinking, you see Steve’s face clear before you and his lips press together. His eyes are red-rimmed and his face looks a bit too splotchy, but you don’t point it out because it’s Steve and you love him. Your best friend’s trying to be strong as he tries to find a gentle way to put it.

“He’s asleep right now.” Asleep, you repeat dully in your head as Steve sits down by your bedside. “When you’re stronger, we’ll go see him, alright?”

“Okay.”

.

Bucky looks like he’s dead.

It’s the one thing you can’t help as you push yourself to his glass door. He’s inside, awake and talking to your friends inside and there’s a thickness to the air as he sits up straighter. Your whole body is still aching with a pounding in your stomach as you pause at the edge of the glass, frowning when Steve says something that makes Bucky shake his head.

It’s been only a day since the crash and you’ve just gotten strong enough to get up into a wheelchair, and although you’d insisted on wheeling yourself to his room, your nurse still stands a few feet away as you watch Natasha reach out a hand towards Bucky but he slaps it away, running his hands ragged over the bandages wrapped around his skull. Like he wants to pick himself apart because he’s missing something and you know.

Somehow you just know because there’s an emptiness in his gaze that spears right through you.

Tears already begin to bite at your eyes, and you open your mouth but not a sound comes out. He’s paler than a ghost and his expression is one of blank agony. He’s scrambling for something to hold onto and you think you can hear Steve beg, a quiet, trembling thing that frightens you because Steve doesn’t beg.

“So you remember nothing?”

“Nothing.”

The silence that follows hollows you. You turn to the nurse, you think her name is Linda, and silently ask her to take you away.

It takes a long time for someone to come find you. Blinds pulled closed, door shut, your room is drenched in darkness beside the lamp on your nightstand. You feel numb everywhere, but your heart is in pieces in your hands as you shove food down your ungrateful throat. Every bite feels like another bone broken and you stare blankly at the wall ahead of you.

“Bucky, stop!”

If you’d just been quicker—

“Y/N? Can I come in?” Blinking, you swallow the thick pudding, feel it stick to your throat as you let out a hoarse ‘yes’. Sam enters the room, eyes scanning the area and soaking in the bleak aura that is your recovery room. You set down the pudding on the tray beside your untouched lunch and blink again, turning your gaze away dismissively.

“What?”

“Bucky’s awake,” Sam says, closing the door behind him. You can see two other shapes outside your room as you cross your arms over your chest and lean back into your bed that’s frozen in it’s sitting position. You don’t want to look at him—have to look at him and watch his mouth form the words that’ll destroy you. “Doctors give him a clean bill of health. He’s going to have to come in for PT and checkups, but otherwise, he’s good beside a few deficits.”

“Yeah?” You feel sick, feverish. You feel like your stitches are splitting open with every second Sam doesn’t tell you the truth you know is bottled up inside him. “Anything else?”

“He doesn’t remember who you are.” But he knows you, you assume bitterly in your head and you finally look at Sam. He’s staring at you with something you might think it's pitiful and it disgusts you because you don’t want to be pitied. You don’t want anything except Bucky and you can’t have him.  “He doesn’t remember anything after graduating high school, so… that’s seven years he doesn’t remember.”

Seven years.

Seven years of his life gone like smoke.

“Anything else?” you grit out between clenched teeth. Sam’s eyebrows rise but you merely set your jaw and meet that incredulous gaze of his.

“They don’t know whether or not it’s going to go away, they don’t know why it’s that time span, but it just is. They say maybe the amnesia will go away but it's a chance, and he has to regain his strength. So he’s going to have to go through a lot of therapy. It’ll help if he has a support system, you know?”

“Okay.”

You don’t mean to sound cold, but you do, because if you’re anything but, you will shatter. You know Sam wants you to jump at the chance, jump out of your bed and run up to see Bucky. You think Sam might hope that the instant he sees you, all of it will come back like something out a fucking fairytale but this isn’t a fairytale.

You’re not enough to bring him back. You’re not a miracle worker.

Tears are clotting in your throat and it’s becoming hard to breathe when you add, “Is there anything else, Sam?” He’s clearly taken aback but you can’t bring yourself to care about Sam in this moment as you grab your banana pudding again and swirl your spoon within just to make yourself look busy. You look from the yellow goop to him, a smile pulling strangely into your cheeks.

His eyes flitter from your untouched meal to your face, and he shakes his head.

“Let us know if you wanna see him, I guess,” he murmurs and you keep that tight smile on your face until he leaves. When the door clicks shut, you toss the pudding back onto your tray, grab the plastic receptacle the nurse left on your nightstand, and throw up everything.

Water, pudding, breakfast, it burns its way up your throat as you try to keep yourself quiet. You can hear your friends talking outside. Struggling to keep yourself quiet, you choke, spitting saliva out of your mouth as you grab the water from your food tray, swishing it in your mouth and falling back into the bed.

Your whole body clenches as you spit out the water and rinse your mouth again. Every movement is an aching thing as you set the receptacle down on your nightstand and close your eyes.

Your wait until you’re sure your friends are gone before you break.

You fall apart slowly, like pieces of you peeling away until you’re nothing more than your broken heart. The sobs that wrack your body are relentless and you shove your forearm into your mouth to muffle your cries. You want to bite into your skin. You want to distract yourself from the agony tearing you to shreds. You want to feel anything but the pain.

Tears sweep into your hair, cloud your vision and your whole face floods with heat as you try to breathe through the pain. You’re cleaved into pieces on that bed, eyes squeezed shut as the tears keep flowing, and your throat burns.

Shoulders shaking, you suck in gasping breaths as your hand crawls over your face, smearing tears across your cheeks, fingers digging into your skin. You’re suffocating and behind closed eyes all you can see is your Bucky, launched through the windshield. Your Bucky, bleeding as you reach for him but you can’t. Your Bucky, left behind on the scene because they extracted you first and you’re screaming, screaming for him to be alive, and then it’s your Bucky, smiling and laughing and whispering confessions, and he’s crying and then he’s sick with the flu and he’s finished his bachelor’s, and he has flour on his cheek, and—

And then it’s your Bucky, shouting, begging, your Bucky with his back turned, your Bucky frowning and there are new lines in his face, and new questions that never would’ve cropped up, and it’s your fault, your fault, your fault; damaged, damaged, damaged.

Your Bucky slipping away between your fingers.

And now, he’s not your Bucky anymore.

Your fault, your fault, your fault, a voice you can’t shut up in your head chants quietly.

You’re inclined to agree.

.

You sit in the cafeteria, watching as lunch hour draws to its close. You’re nothing but cracked glass slapped together with duct tape and it’s beginning to peel.

It’s only been a day since your world has fallen apart around you and you haven’t spoken to anyone. There’s nothing to say.

Natasha pokes half-heartedly at what’s left of her salad beside you as you stare blankly at the napkin holder. Your own lunch tray is empty because you’ve forced it down your own throat, but every bite had been bland—nothing but a soft mush in your mouth.

“Y/N,” your best friend begins, and your eyes drag dismissively towards her. Her blue eyes are soft, eyebrows drawn together as she sighs. “Don’t you think you should at least see him?”

“Why? He doesn’t even know who I am,” you mutter, dragging your arms towards yourself and crossing your arms over your chest. A heaviness pulls at your shoulders. “Maybe it’s better that way.”

“Hey, don’t say that,” Natasha scolds. “Don’t ever say that.”

“Why? It’s not a secret we were basically on the brink of breaking up and it’s not like you’ve told him who I was. Told him that I even existed,” you spit coldly, sinking in your chair, Your gaze drifts off to the little fake plant decorating the cafeteria table and you think, How lucky you are to be forever. “You know, at least this way, he doesn’t get hurt.”

“Except he is hurting,” she says. “His life has been wiped clean and he has no idea what to do next.”

“Get better. Move on.” The words crawl out of your mouth, torturous, and Natasha shakes her head, frustrated, but you don’t care. You’re sick of feeling like this, but you can’t help it. You can’t help feeling half-dead and exhausted and the need to look over your shoulder constantly has become second nature because you don’t want to see the man you love as nothing more than a ghost. “What do you want me to say, Nat? He wasted seven years on me and I couldn’t even say yes to marrying him. I couldn’t give him the one thing he really wanted and he gave me everything.”

“That’s not what matters. What matters is that he loves you and just because he doesn’t remember, it doesn’t mean it’s not real. He knows you’re out there. He knows he loved someone because Bucky has so much love to give, you know that.”

“He was going to leave, Nat,” you tell her quietly. The words drag against your throat like a cigarette against skin and it burns so much you have to close your eyes against the pain. “I know it. He was done.”

“No, he wasn’t.”

“He was.” You never needed eyes to see it. You know him in a way no one else does. You know that every time he looked at you, he wanted the future, and it was something he couldn’t pry out of you. “He had one foot out the door last night, so it’s a fucking blessing he doesn’t remember.”

“But you miss him.”

The words ring you hollow.

“Of course I fucking miss him. What kind of question is that?” you ask with half a forced laugh and your chest aches so much you think it might burst. “What kind of question is that?” you repeat, softer, and the laughter is gone because you want to melt away. You’ve missed Bucky for ages.

“Then, maybe you should fight for him. Maybe, you should see this as your second chance,” Nat whispers just as the door opens to the cafeteria and your head jerks up to see Steve push someone in on a wheelchair and she stands immediately. Your eyes find his pale figure before you can help yourself and you chew on the inside of your cheek to keep yourself present.

He’s better, although a bit unsteady, and he’s regained some colour but he’s still pale. He looks sick to his stomach with every second he stays awake. Natasha heads over to take the tray from Steve’s hands and retreats back to your table, setting it down in the space on the other side of you. Once Bucky slides into the empty spot beside you, you barely manage a slight smile before picking up your fork and pretending to be interested in your own lunch.

“This is Y/N,” Natasha says and your lungs spasm when you meet his blue gaze. They’re bright, warm but tired, and you swallow, trying to formulate an appropriate response. How long has it been since Bucky—your Bucky—looked at you like that? “We, uh, we were just chatting while I was waiting for you guys.”

“Hey.”

“I’m James,” he says, textbook because that’s how he meets every new face, and if you think you remember eighteen-year-old James Buchanan Barnes, his next words will be: “But everyone calls me Bucky.”

Like you said, textbook.

You drop your fork and shake his outstretched hand, ignoring how warm he is, and it’s like history is repeating itself.

“Nice to meet you.” You want to smile and the corner of your mouth lifts as Natasha grabs her lunch tray and gets up.

“Sam’s probably waiting for us to get him some coffee. He has a shift starting soon,” she says with a pointed look at you. Steve shoves his hands into his pockets and smiles at Bucky when he sends him an unsure look.

“We’ll be back in a jiff, Buck,” Steve says. “Y/N’ll take fine care of you.”

“Uh, okay.” Bucky’s eyebrows quirk and as your two friends leave, you can’t help the anger licking at your insides. You hate the feeling of his gaze on you so you resort to staring after your traitorous companions. “Sorry about that. I can go, if you want.”

“No, it’s fine,” you dismiss it quietly, resigning yourself to your fate. It’s not like Bucky can go without someone else’s help and his nurse is chatting to yours in the corner of the cafeteria. You don’t want to bother her.  You’ll yell at your friends later. Right now, you just want to sleep it off. “Natasha’s nice.”

“Yeah, she’s like that once you get to know her,” Bucky returns, digging into his mashed potatoes. You pretend you don’t notice how he lowers his head as much as he can so not too much food is lost on its quivering journey to his mouth. His hand is so visibly unsteady, it aches to watch but you know he won’t want your help. “What are you here for? You look a bit banged up.” His eyes dart to the bruises along your arms and your smile grows at the concern laced behind a curious question.

“Got into a crash.” you say with half a shrug. You’ve grown used to the bruises by now. “Wasn’t too serious for me. Just a bit of a scratch on my liver.”

“Oh, me, too. I had a partial splenectomy” he says. “My brain got the worst of it, though.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, can’t remember a single thing after eighteen. So, that’s seven years ago?” he says it like he’s desperately trying to remember and your smile flickers. His face is wrought with distress now that their friends are gone, and his lips are pressed into a tight smile. “Glad I still kept with the same people, though.”

“Yeah.” He brings a scoop of mashed potatoes to his mouth and his smile sinks into your gut when he notices you’re not eating. “Are you hungry?” You blink at him, at his offer. He even looks younger without the burden of your time together.

“No, I’m okay.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” you insist before clearing your throat. Your gaze goes from your lap to Bucky just eating and you try to formulate the words you want to say into a coherent sentence. Do you remember even part of who I am? Can you even see me? “Uhm, do you… do you, like, remember a bit of what you’ve lost?” Your eyes widening, you put a hand over your mouth and duck your head. “Oh, that sounds stupid. I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s okay.” Bucky smiles again, easier, as if he’s happy to talk about it, and it’s so startlingly bright your heart flips in your chest. You duck your head and grab the glass of orange juice just so it doesn’t seem like you’re just watching him eat. It’s sweet in your parched mouth. “I get what you mean. Uh, no. It’s like an empty slate,” he says and you don’t know whether or not feeling so fucking relieved makes you a shitty person or not. “I think I know time has passed, but when I try to think of those years, nothing comes up.”

You’re quiet for a long time, letting it sink in. So, he doesn’t remember the bad at all. The pain, the screaming, the empty beds and silent dinners, and you think you could cry from relief and cry from how you’ll never hear him call you dolly again.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, eyes flickering from his food to you, and your shoulders fall at those eyes. You’d fallen in love with those eyes first. They grounded you when your world was toppling—ever so steady, so collected. Now, they’re weary, lost, and you know it’s your turn.

Reaching forward, you lean on your forearm and place your other hand over his wrist. His hand, on instinct, flips over and your hand falls into his so easily. Your skin is burning at the contact as his fingers wrap over your palm.

“I’m sorry,” you utter quietly, choked out and raw, and his eyebrows knit together as they run over your face. “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

“Uh, it’s okay,” he says with a lilt of his lips. He’s trying so hard to be happy.

“You don’t have to lie.”

The hand holding the spoon tightens, knuckles blanching and you smile softly. That’s your Bucky, trying so hard to keep it in. You scoot your chair closer, not letting go of his hand and he sucks in a harsh breath. You can hear it tremble in his throat as you sit down close enough that your knees touch and you tilt your head to catch his gaze.

This could be a fresh start, a voice in your head whispers. He doesn’t remember the pain you brought him. You could disappear.

“It’s okay. I’m nobody,” you tell him quietly. “You don’t have to pretend with me.” He blinks, lips trembling and pale with how hard he’s attempting to keep the cries in before he drops the utensil in his shaking hand and he brings his palms to his face, hiding himself away as in shame but you only chew on your bottom lip, wrap your arms around him.

He leans into you as if on instinct and you suck in a shuddering breath at his soft weight against you. You’re holding the love of your life. Almost.

Cradling his head against your chest, you let him sob as his shaking body shrinks in your arms. His hands wrap around your arm, fingers like knives digging into your flesh. They’re talons that sink and drag down, falling limpy into his lap, and you let your eyes close, simply using your free hand to brush through his hair.

“It hurts so much,” he whimpers, his hot breath against your arm as he pushes the words out, gulping breaths filling the silence and you feel tears slip down your cheeks. “I can’t… I can’t remember anything. I can’t do anything. I can’t…”

“I know.” You pull your chin back, admiring the mess in your arms and you smile for a moment as he lifts his head up and his gorgeous eyes are glistening with tears. He lowers his head again, drawing back in your arms to wipe at his face with weak, shaking hands and you take the napkin to help him.

You gently wipe his cheeks down and his cheeks are burning to the touch.

He’s blushing.

“God, here I am,” he begins miserably, “sobbing on someone I just met. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” The words come out hushed and you smile, running your fingers over his hair again because you know that’s what he likes, and his smile is barely a ghost, but it’s there and that’s all that matters.

“It’s fine. I’m a great shoulder to cry on,” you joke and his smile grows just slightly. “Well, at least it’s better than my first impression on my… ex,” you say, and your throat cinches shut as he arches an eyebrow. You pull your arms back towards you and pick up your fork hesitantly. He nods, eyes focused on you, and you sink the fork into the mashed potatoes, bringing a bite into your mouth.

“How’d you meet them?”

“Uh… at university. First day, freshman mixer or something. I was a bit drunk.” Fresh-faced, doe-eyed Bucky Barnes in a vest and jeans bumping into you. Still a picture perfect moment in your mind where you met eyes with him and didn’t want to be a goner but you were, no matter how much denial was there. “He bumped into me, spilled his drink all over me, and all I could think was, ‘What a handsome guy.’”

“Was he?” His whole face lights up, like he’s genuinely invested in this, and your smile grows, bittersweet as you nod. His smile grows sly and you want to scream. “Better looking than me?”

“I, uh—” You clear your throat— “No. Not better looking than you.”

“So, what’d you say? Or what’d he say?” Bucky asks, sniffing, and you watch as he grabs his spoon again, other hand reaching for the tissue. He blows his nose and you grab some napkins from the napkin holder for him. He dips his head in thanks as you lean against the table.

“Well, he was stumbling through his apology and I just let him finish.” Your body fills with warmth as you remember his embarrassed smile, the way he shoved his baseball cap farther down his head, chin tucked to his chest, trying to hide that face. “When he was done, I opened my mouth to say something polite but what came out was ‘You look like someone I’d very much like to kiss’.”

“And did you?”

“Did I what?” you ask, smiling.

“Kiss him.”

“Yeah.”

He smiles, then, happy for you for a moment before he remembers ‘ex’ and then there’s a silence in the cafeteria.

“Do you love him still?” Bucky asks quietly. His gaze is cast off, some far off corner that you don’t see, and you realize you’re still close to him. Close enough to smell the sickness clinging to his skin, the sweat. He smells like an antiseptic grave of all the memories lost.

“Yeah. I didn’t believe in love until I met him,” you say softly, watching as Bucky raises a trembling spoon to stab at his potatoes. It’s you. It’s you. It’s you. Your heart is screaming, but your mind is a muzzle. “I wish he was here.”

“I wish he was here, too.” He blinks and it’s like he’s back with you again, gaze on yours. “I wish he was here for you. You deserve a shoulder to cry on, too.”

You barely croak out, ‘Thank you’.

[writingsbychlo]

smoke and fire (03)

word count; 10,638

summary; you and thomas almost find some common ground, but clinging to petty hatred might ruin it all.

notes; making some progress, and I know y’all are going to love the tension building.

warnings; burnings buildings, minor burns, reference to injury, reference to explosions.

Humming along to the tune playing from your phone, it was plugged into the speaker atop the counter, the lowest volume you could get it as you tried to keep the volume down. You never had been one to sleep while at the Firehouse, no matter how late at night your shifts were, and while this was your team’s two weeks of night shift rotations, you’d adapted to it easily.

Maybe you’d been forced to. Maybe you’d force yourself to. You weren’t exactly comfortable with the team yet, and something about going to sleep surrounded by people you didn’t know felt uncomfortable to you. You trusted them with your life, your job required that you did, but you would only get restless sleep anyway.

Cooking, however, was something you were comfortable with. Cooking at night while the rest were asleep, the clock barely tickling past 5AM as they all slept until called to duty gave you free time to be with your own thoughts.

The smell of frying bacon was filling the room, lyrics falling quietly from your lips as your hips swung, and you heard the first of your colleagues begin to shuffle into the room. You turned to look over your shoulder, Minho being the first to wake, and you’d learned recently that he was always the first to wake. He was an early bird, someone who normally went for a jog before coming on his shifts, and he groaned, scratching at his stomach while the other arm stretched over his head, trying to wake himself up a little more.

“Smells like bacon. Did you make enough for two?”

“I made enough for about twenty.” You teased, hearing his sleepy laugh, and he came to hop up onto the island counter behind you, bypassing the chairs as he took a seat on the higher surface instead, and he rubbed at his eyes.

“You cooked for us?”

“I cooked for me, and figured I might as well make sure you all get a healthy breakfast in, too. Can’t have you slacking on the job because all you ate for breakfast was three candy bars and a skittle, can I?” You grabbed for a plate, a stack that you’d placed beside yourself, the first one being dished up to your friend. A couple of pancakes from the hot plates, sausages, bacon, eggs, and a pot of coffee, and you dished it up, sliding it towards a seat as he fetched a set of knives and forks for you both, groaning loudly at the sight of food.

“This looks amazing.”

He took a seat on the stool this time, poking at it all in the lower light as he chopped up his food, folding a piece of bacon inside a pancake, and lifting the bundle to his mouth. Serving yourself up and covering the rest, you leaned against the counter in front of him, beginning to chop at your food. As he chewed the mouthful longer, he tipped his head back, a louder and longer groan falling from his lips as he showed his appreciation for the meal, and you covered your snicker with your food, chewing a mouthful and shaking your head fondly.

“Who’s folding porn in here? It better not be Minho, again.”

“Again?” You almost choked on your food as Winston came wandering in, your brow raising as you turned to your colleague, and he sighed dramatically.

“They were filming a tour video for the Firehouse for a thing online, I don’t know.” He waved his hand, shoving another forkful into his mouth, and you realised the men here had never been raised to chew with their mouths closed, as though they were raised wild as teens. “Anyway, I was seeing this chick at the time, and y’know, she was hot. A bit too feisty even for me.”

“I somehow find that hard to believe.”

“Hey, there are things even I wouldn't do!” He objected, and behind you, as he helped himself to food, Winston snorted. “Yeah, not much, though.”

“Anyway, as I was saying, she comes to visit me at work. She’s got her hands all over, she was just dating me because I was a fireman. She drags me behind a truck and we were, well, making out pretty heavily. Like teenagers behind the science block. They caught it on the camera while touring, and had to cut it all out and refilm that section.” He shrugged, like it was no big deal, and Winston took a seat beside him, your eyes fixed on your coworkers, brows raising.

“It was more than just making out. She had her legs around your waist.”

“She did not!” Minho scoffed, crumbs of the food flying everywhere, and you couldn’t contain the laugh as he turned to punch his friend in the arm, the two setting off in a weak match of slaps and punches as they tried to keep eating.

Brenda was next through the door, already seeming to look composed and poised like she’d had hours to get ready, all but gliding through the room, and she flickered her eyes over the two tussling boys. “What’s going on in here?”

“Winston was just telling me about the time Minho got caught on camera kissing a chick behind the trucks.”

“Oh, you mean the girl with her legs around his waist?” Brenda was then immediately drawn into the argument, hissed whisper-shouts as you tried to contain your laughter, and as the hours ticked on from the discussion, your plate slipped into the dishwasher, a fresh pot of coffee being started, more and more of the team began to join the room. The next was Gally. His nose turned up at the offer of coffee, Brenda mocking him for his selective taste in teas, trying to copy his accent too, but he did help himself to a plate of food. Clint and Jeff were next, the two practically attached at the hip, moving as a unit, always one with the other. They were talking among themselves as they got their breakfasts, but took enough time free to offer their greetings to everyone, mumbling a vague ‘thank you’ to ‘whoever had cooked’, before they were sitting at the table and becoming invested in their conversation once again.

Newt came in next, bright and cheery and full of energy, as he had been for the last three days since getting the boot taken off his foot and being able to rotate his ankle and walk normally again, limp barely present now he was like a bright ray of sunshine, rising with the actual sunrise. Fry and Zart followed, passing through as the sun in the room rose, the music being drowned out by the loud chatter in the room, the clattering of cutlery and utensils, with the vague noise of the morning news being turned on for a weather update.

Taking your phone back from where it was placed on the stand, you lifted it up, barely any of the food you’d made remaining, and you felt an overwhelming sense of accomplishment at providing for your team, and never having a single complaint. It wasn’t often that you made this kind of gestures, it wasn’t often worth it, not when you were so used to take your meals and finding a quiet spot to eat alone, but more and more, you’d been finding yourself enjoying the company of the people around you, progressively feeling more included in the conversations and activities as the ripples across the water caused by your arrival began to settle.

Chuck was a late riser, still looking completely dazed as he stepped into the room, a little wobble in his step, and you took the liberty of creating a plate for him, and a large mug of coffee, taking it over to where he had slumped down at the dining table with his head rested on his hands, eyes already closing. Creeping up behind your friend, you leaned down, light snores leaving him as he began to doze off again, despite being surrounded by stimulation, noise and light.

“Boo!”

He jerked violently, almost knocking the food and mug out of your hand as he sat up, looking shocked for just a moment, before red-twinged cheeks were facing your directions, narrowed eyes in a glare, and a scowl on his face. “You suck.”

“I brought you food and coffee.”

He considered it for a moment, eyes sweeping over the plate, before sitting up a little straighter. “Okay, you suck slightly less now.”

He accepted the offerings, digging in almost instantaneously, and you took a seat beside him, sipping the hot drink in your own hands as you absorbed the environment. Making friends was hard when you skipped about so much, even making friends outside of work, as you moved from one side of the city of the other to new houses, never bothering to decorate or properly unpack because you weren’t sure how long you’d ever be in one location.

It was undeniably nice to be surrounded for once, and not be immediately looking for the next exit.

Chuck was happy to just talk, filling the space between you both as he spoke about everything he could think of. He told you about his mother, and his four older sisters, the second of whom was getting married, and the first of whom was halfway through her pregnancy, and how excited he was to become an uncle. He asked you about your bruises, and how the swelling was doing, making you demonstrate the rotations of your arm for him as the muscles no longer ached as you could lift them over your head, some discoloured splotching where the bruises were almost healed was all that was left.

As the clock ticked over, just past 8AM, the room was full. Even Vince having passed through and joined you all for a cup of coffee and a reasonably quick chat, giving into the teasing he was getting from Newt and Brenda about an update on the doctor he’d been seeing, her name revealed as Mary now things were getting serious, and you hoped to meet her one day at the hospital.

It was clear to you that the people here were a family, and despite the friction between you and some of the members, certain ones sticking strong with their guards up against you as they followed in their Lieutenant’s footsteps, you were winning some of them over. Newt had yet to bring it back up, the challenge that he’d issued you of giving it a year, and promising that this house would be different, but you knew he hadn't forgotten the conversations, because every so often, you’d catch his gaze lingering on you when you were chatting to another colleague, and reaching out a little more.

Chiming about your head signalled a call coming in, the room falling from commotion and filled with activity to dead and silent as everyone listened, and the second it was over, all of the chairs were scraping, pots and cutlery clammering as plates were stacked up haphazardly, and the room was cleared in seconds. Only you and Newt remained, being given a free minute, maybe two at the maximum, as you waited for the foremen to grab their equipment and swap out shoes for protective boots, gear in hand as they loaded the trucks.

“I’m going to go and check on Tommy, make sure he’s up.”

You nodded, realising now why the atmosphere around you was so peaceful. There was no walking on eggshells or lingering glares, nothing that might put you off about saying the wrong thing in fear of getting yelled out, or burning gals into the back of your skull, but simply the calm and quiet of being surrounded by people who were at least civil with you, instead of hating your guts.

Grabbing the trays that were barely even warm now, the food having cooled a while ago, you stacked up what was on a single plate, covering it with a quick wrap of foil, and watching as Thomas stumbled on past in a flurry of movement that made you think he might trip, grabbing his boots from the floor and his coat and helmet form the rack, not even bothering to change them before getting onto the squad truck waiting, and watching as it disappeared.

Tucking the reserved plate into the fridge, everything else was left out to be sorted later, and you grabbed the keys from the rack, meeting Newt in the doorway, the two of you jogging side by side to the vehicle. Since the period of time when you’d been driving instead of him while his boot was on, he seemed to have gained a little more trust in you, allowing you to drive the vehicle instead, every so often, despite how precious the rig maybe to him.

Doors slamming shut on either side, and as soon as the engine was on, Newt flipped on the emergency sirens, letting you strap yourself in beside him as you began to pull out of the courtyard, chasing after the red trucks ahead of you both in a rapid pursuit to your destination.

Early morning traffic cleared, the palm of your hand continually pressing down on the horn as people tried to pull back across lanes in the road as soon as the firetrucks had cleared, never having the patience to wait for the ambulances to go through to, but you battled to keep up with them, the smaller vehicle making it easier to navigate and weave through the other cars.

Smoke was already curling up into the air as you arrived, thick and dark, worrying bursts of it, and the stench of gas was filling the car as soon as you arrived on the street, pulling up to the sidewalk and throwing the van into park.

Hopping out of the vehicle, you let out a long breath, trying not to cringe at the smell on the air or the taste it was leaving in your mouth, your stomach twisting a little. You shared a look with Newt, looking around at the situation as you tried to assess it all, feet carrying you closer to the group of firefighters who were coming up with a game plan for the situation at hand. Thomas was already barking orders, hair messy from scratching at it and running his hands through with stress, a look you’d seen several of the men get when things shit the fire, pun intended, and you came to a halt.

Crossing your arms over your chest, Thomas’ eyes flicked to you and Thomas, words pausing in his mouth, snapping shut as he tried to reevaluate the plan. sniffling at the air, he groaned a little, skating his head.

“Alright, Minho’s on shutting these gas lines. Go and find an override until we can get this fixed. Take Chuck with you.” The official firefighter nodded, the unofficial firefighter perking up a little at the task, and pulling on their masks, the two of them set off. “Can I get paramedics setting up a stretcher straight away, we got reports that there’s a family inside, the house that started the fire. Mother was cooking when the main exploded, and it shot right through to her stove.”

You had your instructions, the two of you heading in a quick jog back to the van, because no matter what everyone else did, you had your instructions. The back of the van was opened, and you worked on unfastening the stretcher wheels as Newt prepped the van, a medkit laid out on the shelves and the ramp down. There were already people beginning to inch their way, undoubtedly complaining of headaches and nausea due to the exposure.

There was a breeze along the road, warm and reasonably calm, nothing intense enough to whip up smoke and dust into your eyes, and it was good at clearing away the lingering cloud of gas on the street, but it wasn’t so good for the firefighters. You couldn't help the way that your eye swerve flickering over to the house every so often, bright and roaring as you felt the heat all the way from here, warm cheeks under the burning glare, and you worried the flames would spread.

They were only raising higher, the entire downstairs of the house had taken alight, and Thomas and his team were still trying to work out how to get inside of the house without endangering themselves, and how to get the family out. Brenda was on hoses, dragging the reel down the street to the closest fire hydrant as fast as she possibly could, trying to screen the nozzle into place.

It was easy enough to access people, giving them each a small mask and an oxygen tank, sitting them down on the opposite curb of the sidewalk, and making sure to run along and check on their symptoms again every five minutes. The roads had been closed off on either side, barricaded by police cars and trucks, and Minho and Chuck were returning, helping Brenda with the hose as they went. The first member of the family was being brought out, a young girl being carried by who you assumed to be Gally, purely based on the height of hi as he came running over, the little girl in his arms out cold as she hung limply in his grip, and he rushed to lay her down against the bed.

“Newt, can I get a monitor?”

He yelled his reply, words not making much sense as he fumbled in the back of the van, grabbing at the monitor as best he could, and you began your initial assessment of her. Your suspicions were confirmed as the helmet and mask form the firefighter before you were removed, Gally staring down at you, wide eyes as your hands scanned along her. Tipping her head back, you opened her mouth, checking her throat hadn't become blocked, before using the small flashlight on your keychain to check the reaction in her pupils.

“She’s got some rapid ration to light in her pupils, no brain damage, smoke and gas inhalation isn’t too bad.” He let out a sigh of relief, lips flicking up at the sides as you confirmed her safety to him. Pressing gently along her lungs, you found no broken bones or ribs, making sure to keep her head a little tipped back so her airways were open as best they could be, and Newt rounded the table to the other side Bumping Gally out of the way slightly, the taller boy stepped back, waiting anxiously for more confirmation. It was sweet, his concern for the younger ones, and you’d noticed it over the last month and a half, watching him interact with children was always special. “You got a sister, Gally?”

“How’d you know?”

“Call it a lucky guess.” You teased, watching Newt beginning to cut away the sleeve of her shirt to hook up a child-sized heart monitor band onto her arm. Gally seemed just as panicked, and you’d be willing to bet money on his little sister being young, probably around this girl’s age, and seeing his own family in the victims. “Tell me about her? I bet she’s really cute.”

“She is, actually. She’s going through a unicorn phase, has been ever since turning seven.”

Bingo.

“She likes glitter too, and if you ask her what her favourite colour is, she’ll probably say rainbow. My parents have this neighbour, who is a couple years older than her, but they still hang out. The neighbour just got her first eyeshadow kit, you know, those ones they give away as free gifts with kids magazines and stuff? All the latest gossip on Selena Gomez or High School Musical, or whatever?”

You laughed a little bit, stepping away into the truck long enough to find another of the pre-prepared rows of oxygen tanks made up, and bringing it back with a small mask. Putting the band over her head, a soft beeping took up around you both as Newt confirmed that he couldn't find any further injuries on the girl, her stomach feeling soft and so there wasn’t much likelihood of any internal injuries, she was just unconscious. “Hey, don’t knock those magazines! That’s where I got my first lip gloss from!”

“She’s too young for makeup!” He huffed, the overprotective brother in him shining through to the foreground as he spoke. “So, uh, this little one. She’s going to be okay?”

“Of course, she is. Newt and I are a great team!” You beamed, Newt cheering from a few metres away where he’d wandered off to go and check on the other patients, check they were all still doing okay, no further symptoms arising. Turning the box with the heartbeat to him, his eyes closed in on it, looking as confused as ever. “There’s a lot of symbols and crap that looks confusing, I know, but just listen. Steady heartbeat, nice and strong.”

“That’s good.”

“Yeah, it is.” Pointing to a collection of numbers, the meaning of which was like reciting the alphabet to you but you didn’t have time to explain it to Gally right now. “See these numbers, that means her heart is staying at that strength too, she’s not fluctuating or dipping, she’s doing just fine. She’s got a mask on, and other than a killer headache when she wakes up, she’s going to be just peachy.”

“Thank you.” He finally let his shoulder’s slump, looking back towards the house, and pulling his mask back on, a nod shared between you both as his helmet followed, and with that brief break to check on the young girl he’d saved, he was returning to guide his team.

The flames in the wind were getting awfully close to the other house, despite the teams trying to put out the flames, but there were only two hoses, and they had to focus on getting the downstairs of the current house controlled first. Now that the gas was out, the flames were beginning to be tamed, no longer having an accelerant to burn on, only the fuel of the house, but it didn’t make the charred black marks along the outside of the house any less concerning.

The second patient you were receiving was the father, coughing and spluttering, conscious but in a worse state than his daughter, though he looked like he didn’t care about any of it as his eyes locked onto the little girl, and he tried to put more weight on his own two feet and less on the member of your team who was holding him up.

You didn't get to see who this was, because he was dashing away from the second that the man was showing signs of being able to support his own body, right back into the flames to become a hero once again. You rushed forward as he stumbled, hands grabbing onto him to try and keep him held up, and you walked him backwards slowly as he wheezed, sitting him down on the edge of the truck, his eye moving over to his little girl.

“My girl-”

“-is going to be just fine, sir, don’t you worry. I’ve already checked her out, and she’s doing great. She’s strong, a little fighter!” You offered him a smile, one that he weakly returned, his shoulder’s slumping as he coughed violently. “Can you tell me your name?”

“John.” He wheezed, and you nodded, grabbing a fresh set of forms from the truck and placing them down beside him. Checking his airways and his vision, you deemed him okay, asking him about his pain levels, while preparing a new mask for him, and hooking it all up, twisting the oxygen on and hearing the canister let out a little hiss as it was activated.

“Can you tell me your last name?”

“Davidson.” He muttered, accepting the mask happily from you as you held it out to him, lifting it over his head, and he was covered in soot, ash still lingering in the hair around his head, a light burn on the patches of clear skin on the top, his head ducking as you began to check them over.

“Well, Mr Davidson, I’d say you’re looking rare, maybe medium-rare, but you’ll be just fine.” His eyes creased a little at the sides, a muffled laugh from behind the mask as he tried to take deep and steadying breaths, nodding his head. “You think you can start filling out those forms for me? Get one filled out for every member of your family, and it’ll save you so much time at the hospital, and it’d really do me a solid.”

He held slightly shaking hands out to you, a collection of them all pinned on the board, beginning to write his name slowly, both of your attentions looking up at the sound of snapping wood. The porch had collapsed, the smoke in the doorway clearing a little, but just because the lower flames were beginning to give way, the upper was still burning bright, only catching more heat, and you nibbled on your lower lip.

“Everyone is alright, neighbours are doing a headcount among themselves, but there’s an elderly chap, mid-seventies, name of ‘Mr O’Hare’ seeming to be missing.”

The sound of a pain clattering onto the metal of the ambulance floor before rolling away and hitting the concrete made you jump, both of you turning with raised brows to look at the man behind you, Crouching down to get the pen again, you handed it back to him, and he raised a weak hand to pull at his mask, concern and imminent fear on his face again. “That’s our neighbour.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Mr O’Hare, that’s our neighbour. He hasn’t been doing so well, lately, my wife brings him groceries every week, his family comes to visit. He sleeps a lot, he gave us a key to get in to put the groceries away.” A wash of panic set over both you and Newt, your eyes flicking back up to the house you’d been concerned about, the black marks of charring on the walls beginning to grow as the flames curled over, and as you squinted a little, you found the edges of the rood were already beginning to powder to ash, sizzling orange as the risked igniting.

You grabbed ahold of Newt’s arm, encouraging the man in your care to go back to the sheets he should be focusing on, trying to keep him calm. “Nobody has been in that house yet, Newt. That house is full of gas, the doors and windows are closed. It’s a time bomb waiting to go off.”

“You’d better go and find a fireman, because here comes the wife, and I’m going to need to go to the hospital as soon as she’s checked out.” You only nodded your head, grabbing for your medkit, swinging the bags up onto your shoulders and setting off. The first you came across was Chuck, standing outside of the building at the back of the house, making sure no wires were becoming trapped, and just as you were about to try and get his attention, a blur of movement in your peripherals brought you to a stop.

A concerned neighbour, no idea what was about to happen but you felt like you were watching it in slow-motion as the young man made his way up toward the door, kicking at it roughly as he did, the lock popping as he tried to venture inside for his neighbour. A split second, he’d barely gotten through the doorway, before the loud explosion of a houseful of gas igniting in an instant made your eyes ring, as though your eardrums had shattered. The blast sent you down to the floor, smoke, splintered wood, shards of glass, all flying around you at the sudden implications.

You could hear muffled screaming around you, your fingers digging into the dirt beneath you as you scraped your hands back to your body, and pushed yourself up. Cuts along your skin, nothing you couldn't take care of, simply the light pieces of glass that had flown past, leaving a message in their wake, a warning not to play with anything sharp. Large hands locked onto your body, pulling you to your feet, and you blinked away the stunned feeling you had, watching as the mask was lifted.

Shaking your head little, it all suddenly came back into focus, piercing sounds, the yelling of worried neighbours, and the closer yelling of the man in front of you. Gally. “(Y/L/N), are you okay?”

“Y-Yeah. I’m good, I’m fine. A few bumps and scratches, nothing serious.” He nodded his head, eyes sweeping over you regardless, and you pushed messy hair back out of your face. “There’s someone in that building, though. I was going to suggest going through the door after leaking the gas out slowly, but it’s a bit late for that now.”

You looked around, a cord forming around the man who’d been blasted back, and it wasn’t looking good.

“We’re going to need another ambulance. Call med, get one here.”

He nodded, his head, stepping away from you for a second to bring his radio to his mouth, and your hand snagged onto Chuck’s arm, shaking him a little as he stared in abject horror at the scene before him, his age really showing on his face now. Orange flickered over his features, the presence of freckles on your friend’s face distracted by hair that almost looked red in front of flames, and you shouted his name to catch his attention, wide eyes snapping to you.

“Where’s your team?” He raised a hand, pointing to the smoke of the building, and you nodded your head. He was rattled, and you shook him a little, hands on the lapels of his fireproof jacket for leverage. “Hey, Chuck, listen up. This is no time to freeze, alright? You’re a firefighter, now get someone who can spare a hand on the radio, because there’s someone else who needs saving.”

He swallowed thickly, nodding his head, and bringing the device up, button on the side pressed to talk into, and it crackled for a minute as he put the message out there, waiting for someone to reply. Grabbing his arm, you dragged him along behind you, letting him stand behind you as you shouldered through to find the groaning man on the floor, skin raw and burned, grit stuck to him from where he’d rolled along the floor in the blow back, and you hissed a little, kneeling down.

Dropping your bag and snapping on a fresh pair of gloves, Chuck sent out another call for help, and you rolled the man onto his back carefully. There wasn’t much you could do for him here, except get him on a mask and disinfect his wounds, but it wasn't going to be a pleasant process. A canister of disinfectant was your best bet for covering raw areas this large, and you pulled it out, shaking it aw you went.

“Chuck, what’s wrong?”

You bit your tongue from groaning at who replied, glancing over your shoulder for a second, the nervous boy’s eyes meeting yours, and you gave him a nod, staying focused on your task at hand and waiting for Chuck to speak instead. “We’ve got a situation, Lieutenant. That building that just went up, (Y/N) says there’s someone trapped inside, upstairs, I think.”

“Fuck. Not exactly getting in through the bottom floor, are we?” There was a series of rattles, scuffling as you assumed them to be checking over the rooms, and you swallowed thickly, hearing the wailing sirens of another ambulance beginning to get close enough to you. The conversation around you fell away, letting Chuck and Thomas hash out a plan, before you were looking back to the man on the floor, his eyes wide and on yours, shaking with pain as he still tried to stay strong.

“Hey, that was real brave of you there. Trying to save your neighbour, huh?”

“I just wanted to help.” He mumbled, words broken and light as he tried not to cry them out, his voice strained, and you nodded your head.

“Yeah, and it was admirable. One of the bravest things I’ve ever seen, and I work with firefighters! I’m going to get you patched up, alright?” He nodded his head, gritting his teeth as you warned him that it was going to hurt, before spraying the cleaner over his skin, and a shrieking scream left his lips. It was blood-curdling, and you’d never get used to the way your stomach clenched or your teeth ground together when you knew you were causing someone that pain, even if you were trying to help. It would cool, a foam setting over his skin as it dissolved softly, and the pain faded away as the paste helped start to remove trapped heat from his skin, soothing burns and making him slump back a little. “You hear those sirens, real close now. They’re for you.”

He only nodded, before a hand was finding your shoulder, and Chuck was pulling you back a little, much to your confusion.

“What is it, Chuck? I need to get him loaded onto an ambo’.”

“No, you need to come with me.” Your brows furrowed, his hands finding your wrist, and as the ambulance pulled up, you caught sight of another paramedic, one you’d seen around the halls at the hospital, flagging them down to where the man was as they grabbed a board and set off toward him. “Lieutenant has a plan, best we got.”

“Alright, what is it?”

He stopped you before the truck, opening up one of the storage doors on the side, eyes scanning over you for a second, before he was beginning to pull out equipment. “We’re going to extend a ladder from one window to the other, crawl across, and get him. Then, come back across the ladder.”

“That’s a twenty-foot drop, you’d break bones if you fall, maybe even your neck, and the older man in that house won’t be able to balance.”

“He’s going to have to.” Chuck placed a helmet onto your head, wrapping a jacket around your arms, and you barely caught the mask he was pressing into your hands. “You’re going to have to as well, because he’s going to need a medical check.”

“A medical check? The man won’t even be conscious with the amount of gas built up in there!”

“Good thing you’re coming then. Do your job well, save his life.” The static-covered voice over the radio called out, and you glared at the device, jaw clenching at the insinuation that you ever did anything less than your best. Gally and Winston were unloading a manual ladder from the truck, setting off into the house with it, and you gulped as you felt your friend's hands move along the front of the jacket to fasten it up. Pants came next, a large pair of baggy and protective pants, stepping into them as he held them out to you, as fear filled your body at the idea of having to crawl from one burning building and into another. “Hurry up and get her kitted, Chuck, we don’t have all day! Floors getting weaker up here by the second.”

He followed with boots, a little too big for your feet but they would do, your sneakers left discarded on the floor beside you as he laced them up, and you forced yourself to be strong, just like everybody else had been today. Leaning down to take the radio and make sure it was on for you to speak into, you found yourself rearing into action. “I’m going to get a neck brace from our ambo’ and a blackboard, our best bet is to just slide him across it while he’s unconscious, like a conveyor belt, fastest way.”

“I’ll get you two men and we’ll call in for a third ambo’ to collect him.” Thomas confirmed, and you tried to get used to walking in the heavy material, feeling like your body was being weighed down by all the gear. Newt was just getting himself ready to leave for the hospital, closing up the back of the ambulance, and his eyes scanned over you before a cheeky grin was taking place.

“Wow, look at you. Hot date?”

“Yeah, real hot.” You muttered, jabbing a finger over your shoulder. “I need the backboard and the neck brace, I’ll meet you back at the station, alright?”

He only nodded his head, hanging both pieces of equipment to you and sealing up the van, but before you’d managed to catch sight of the smile that John had sent you, his wife petting their daughter’s hair as they were confirmed to all be alright.

Chuck checked your mask, turned on your tank, and a rush of pure air filled your lungs as you took a breath, before the helmet was being placed over your head, and you already felt like you were burning up from the inside out. You’d dashed into a burning building before, hopped up on adrenaline and desperation, but this somehow felt different.

Like an out of body experience as you felt the wooden flooring chip under your feet, crunching as it burned away to ash, the actors half-fallen apart, and Chuck guided you upstairs slowly the bottom of the house utterly destroyed. Brenda met you at the top, her hands held out for you to take, her fingers wrapping around your forearms as you reciprocated, and she eased you the rest of the way up.

Minho was next, visible through his mask as you got closer, and he nodded his head to you, hands holding firmly onto the hose as he tried to get control over the building once again. It felt odd, like you were walking in one of those simulation arcade attractions or playing a video game, every movement you made never feeling like your own through the layers of equipment.

The ladder was already set up, balancing precariously from one window ledge to the other.

The one opposite you seemed much more secure, not yet tarnished by flames, whereas this one was uneven, the end being held down by Gally, and all the men in the room stood a little teller, springing to action as you reserved. “About time.”

“I was doing my best.” You sneered, brown eyes rolling a little at you through the cover of the glass. Gally took the board from you, tying a piece of rope to each end of it, and checking the length, and you wandered over to the window ledge, looking out and peering down at the grass below.

“I’m going to go over fist, and secure it at the other end for you, then you come over. We get him on the board, send him back. Gally and Chuck will take him out to the ambo’. You’ll go across next, Minho will hold the ladder for you, and I’ll come last, you got it?”

You could only nod your head, feeling like the information was going in one ear and out of the other, and your head spun a little as you watched Thomas climb up and out of the window, crawling his way across the divide in a fast shuffle, no hesitation present, jumping right into the action.

He pried the window open, a precarious balancing act that made your breath hitch in your throat as the ladder-bridge wobbled, before he was slipping inside. Turning back and waving his hands out, Gally sent the board across, a piece of string pulled tighter, and now, you understood what the string had been for, the length reaching all the way from one house to the other, even when the board was taken inside and laid on the floor.

You were next, hands placed on the edge of the window, and jumping back a little as still fighting flames from the lower floors roared up at you. Your back pressed to Gally’s chest, and he placed a shoulder on your upper arm, the tank between you both that had collided with his chest making him huff, but he squeezed reassuringly and pushed your forward again.

“Any time today would be great, (Y/L/N).”

“I’m fucking scared, okay? Give me a damn minute, this isn’t what I do, I don’t go into the fires!” You yelled, hands forming fists as you tried to contain yourself, and Thomas didn’t say anything else after that. You climbed up, one knee pressed to metal that was already beginning to get warm, you could feel it through the protective pants you wore, and your hands sealed around the edges. Bringing the other own up, you found yourself kneeling over a twenty-foot drop directly into a fire from two windowsills, one of which was crumbling. “Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck..”

“You’re doing great, alright?”

His voice was much softer this time, your head snapping up, and while one hand was still holding onto the ladder, the other was reaching out, pointing a little ahead of one of your hands.

“One rung at a time, alright? You can do this, c’mon. This man needs your help.”

The brace you had clipped to your back swung a little, your body moving as your instinct to catch it kicked in, and the ladder rocked, a small shriek leaving your lips. The encouragement he gave you was a nice alternative to the constant feuding, but it was more the other words he’d said that gave you the confidence to go on. Someone’s life was in your hands, and you’d be damned if you took so long being scared that he died before you could help him. Picking up motion, you did as he said, one rung at a time as you moved out toward the middle of the ladder.

“That’s it, nice work.” He nodded, pointing at other spots to put your hands, before lifting his own, offering a thickly gloved hand to you, and you hesitated for only a moment, pausing, before reaching out to take it, and he gripped onto you tightly. “See? I got you, you’re fine.”

He tugged you closer, inching you the rest of the way forwards, and helping you down from the window at the other side, until you were balancing on your feet again. This room wasn’t yet on fire, but smoke was filling it, beginning to seep between the floorboards as an ominous and foreboding orange glow was present, the floor burning away beneath your very feet.

As told, there he was, the old man on his bed, looking as peaceful as though he were sleeping, and you made your way over to him. Smoothing along his body, you tried lifting one of his eyelids, barely being able to get a soft grip through the gloves, and struggling to hold down the tip of your keychain flashlight.

“I can’t do a damn thing with these stupid gloves on!”

“Don’t you da-” You didn’t care, stripping them off and pushing them into his hands as you hissed, not having realised just how much these clothes were shielding you from, the heat in the room almost unbearable on your flesh as your skin tingled. Checking his eyes and his pulse, you found movement of his pupils, slower than ideal but still there, and a low but prominent pulse under his skin.

“He’s okay, we’re all good here.” Thomas only nodded his head, handing the gloves back to you urgently, and moving to unclip the neck support from your pack as you worked. Sealing the plastic contraption around his neck to keep his head secure, you rolled him onto his side, the board coming next, rope beginning to pull tighter as you tried to cross the room to reach him, before finally getting him situated.

Strapped down and sealed on tight, you helped Thomas begin to place him delicately on the ladder, and once again fear was taking you over completely. There were flashing cameras, a group of people far bigger than it had been when you were on the street, and a final ambulance ready to offer assistance.

“That’s a lot of people.” You mumbled, feeling a hand on your shoulder as Thomas pulled you back and away from the window.

“Then don’t look.” He tossed you a glance, before helping Gally begin to inch the man across the bridge, rope always pulled tight to keep him secure, and it felt like lifetimes passed as you watched him go, inch by inch, until Chuck was taking a hold of the top half, pulling it further inside until Gally could take the other, and just like that, the man was safe.

Minho took their place, the man on the stretcher disappearing into the smoke with both of the taller firefighters as Thomas was stuck with you, and you shook yourself out, trying to rid yourself of tension and patting yourself down to check everything was okay.

“Don’t pay any attention to them, okay?” Hands found your arms, turning you to look at him, looking up through the glass to find his eyes. “They’re a distraction, just focus on my voice, and Minho’s voice, that’s it.”

“Okay.”

“Okay? You ready?”

You weren’t sure you’d ever really be ready to crawl over a pit of fire on an unstable bridge between two burning buildings, but you nodded anyway, and climbed up onto the frame. One inch at a time, you made your way across, whimpering a little under your breath with every shake and jolt it made as the windowsill finally started to collapse. You wanted to be fast but cautious, keeping it steady without freezing up, and there was a point in the middle where the hands Thomas had placed on your hips to keep you steady slipped away, but you were not yet in reach of Minho, and you were completely on your own.

Two feet, and then you’d be able to reach Minho, to let him pull you inside and back to reasonable safety, and you were pretty sure that after this, you were never going to be offering to go into a burning building again. One foot, and Minho was lifting his hands up to you, the gentle but firm mumblings to hurry up echoing from Thomas, and then a hand wrapped around yours, giving you the confidence and security to speed up.

When your feet finally touched the ground once again, you were letting out a happy sigh, a kind of high racing through your system at the relief of being safe once again making you feel like you could float in clouds. You turned back, watching Thomas adjust his gloves, the flames in the room behind him beginning to grow as the floorboards started to give way at the cracks, and Minho was holding the ladder secure, but the flames were growing higher, and the charred wood was beginning to give way.

“Lieutenant, you need to speed up, this window is going to give way soon.”

“My glove won’t tie.” He muttered, trying the toggle again, but the plastic clip seemed to have snapped, and as he tried to fasten it again, the creaking of the wood made his head snap up. Surveying the scene, the ladder was already sitting at a slightly uneven angle now, and you swallowed thickly at the sight, now wishing you’d had the bravery to move a little faster. “Right, well, guess we’re going as it is.”

Climbing his way up onto the bars, his body was tilted, slumping a little towards the flames as the team below moved the hose, trying to spray the flames enough to keep them down, but without creating smoke that would blind him. Stepping back, you crossed your arms over your chest, anxiety taking over, and you brought a thumb up to your mouth to chew on the nail from habit. Your thumb hit against the glass of your mask, a low curse on your lips as a single strike of pain moved along your arm.

Thomas was only halfway across, before the ladder was shaking again, a chunk of burned wood falling away as the ladder shuddered and fell, falling onto its side a little further, and Thomas had only stuck to the rung by hooking each foot into the rungs, body leaning into the flames a little more. The sirens, the ambulance pulling away and the shouts of those outside, the burning of flames, creaking of wood, spraying of water, all fell away. It was terrifying, to think that if you had just moved a little fast he could be back by now, if you’d made it to the door to leak the gas faster, or notice the neighbour a little sooner that nobody would have been on a ladder at all.

“Thomas, hurry up!”

“Yeah, thanks for that, I was thinking I’d take it even slower!” He huffed into the comm, and you weren’t sure where your own words had come from, but the desperation and fear of losing a team member had you on edge.

The window was giving easy, the closer he got and the more weight was on that spot, the more it began to crumble, and you saw it give way before it registered, Minho’s hands leaving the handles of the ladder to grab for Thomas, and you heard the grunt he let out as the side of his body collided with the building.

The ladder clattered to the ground outside, and just like that, plumes of smoke were rising as the flames were finally put out, black clouds rising up and blocking your view of the other house as an acrid smell filled the air. Minho had one hand, pulling him, up, and the other latched onto the windowsill, scrabbling. His wrist was exposed, a raw gap between the sleeve and the glove that wouldn't fasten, and you managed to find action on shaky legs, stepping forwards and wrapping your hands around his wrists, helping to pull him up and through the window, protecting the exposed patch.

He rolled over the floor, a loud banging as he collapsed down onto it, splayed out across the floor and relieved. One hand lay across his chest, and your legs felt weak and wobbly from the exertion and adrenaline of the day, and you leaned on the wall for support. Minho patted at your shoulder, a weak laugh on his lips, and the floorboards and you creaked with the weight of Thomas shifting, before you could sense eyes on you, cracking them open to see him standing before you.

“Go, c’mon. This house is still dangerous, you need to get out.”

You nodded, body trembling a little as you tried to control it, following in his steps as he led the way, thick smoke and glowing ass as the house was destroyed, melted plastic and synthetics, like some kind of horror scene, and you supposed that, in a way, it was. When your feet finally found the grass again, you stripped your helmet off from your head, mask following, a gasping breath as you felt the cool breeze sweeping over your skin, and you felt practically layered in sweat. Making your way back to where your pack and your shoes were still laying by one of the firetrucks, you leaned against it, sinking down to the floor as you finally let the tension go.

Your elbows propped up on bent knees, holding up your head as it fell forwards, and you let out a shaky breath, finding that you weren’t a fan of the fire scene. It wasn’t what you were used to, last-minute decisions in burning houses weren’t your forte. You were good with medicine, and you knew how to save lives, that was your skill. Burning buildings and heights over a sinister drop to your death, not so much.

A scuffing sounded beside you, and you looked up, frowning at Thomas as he let his jacket fall down his arms, the red and burned flesh of his wrists shown to you more obviously. He placed it back inside, before turning to you, hand held out to take your helmet and mask from you, silently as he put them back in the correct places within the van. Next up was your jacket, and you stretched your legs out before yourself to lean forwards and strip it off, handing it up to him, and shivering and the sudden cold that took you over as you were down the layer you’d grown accustomed to.

Leaning forwards to undo the boots, you pulled one foot forward, beginning to struggle with the laces that Chuck had down for you, unbelievably tight, and huffing as you finally got it untangled. “You did good in there.”

You paused from where you were loosening the laces down, turning to look up at him, and he wasn’t paying any attention to you, but he did catch your eye for a split second. “Thank you. I hated every second of it.”

His lips flicked up at the sides, and he nodded his head, moving to take a seat in front of you, and pulling your other foot to sit before him on the concrete and beginning to undo the knots. “I can tell, but you pulled through as a part of the team, it was good work.”

“I think this is the longest you’ve ever been nice to me.”

“I’m not being nice, I’m simply giving you feedback. If I wanted to be nice to you, I would be.” He muttered, pulling both boots from your feet and standing back up, leaving you to wince as your heels hit the ground, a shock running up the nerves along your legs. “Hurry up and get yourself up, Brenda is already rolling up the hose, we’re going to leave soon. You’ll have to get a lift back with us.”

“Sure thing, Lieutenant.” Your eyes rolled, standing up to push the baggy pants down your legs, leaving you once again in your paramedic trousers, and kicking them off at your ankles, leaving them in a pile at his feet, a sickly sweet smile on your lips as you bent to collect your bag and your shoes. “I’ll get a lift with Truck.”

You gave him a small salute, walking right past him as his stare flickered between you and the pile of clothing, a growl on his lips, but you were already walking away from him. Gally was more than happy to offer you a lift, holding open the back of the truck, and settled down into the leather seats, the smell of sweat and burn lingering in the cabin. Tying up one shoe, you switched feet, sorting the other out, before slumping into the chair.

Fry was the first back, up into the front seat as he restarted the vehicle, the engine under your feet chugging to life, and as the humming of the engine started up, the pounding behind your eyes becoming apparent, rubbing at your eyes as they closed. Winston was next, sliding into the seats opposite you, Clint following, and you slumped out as they began to discuss the day.

It had been exhausting, everything in you was screaming out for sleep, and with only a few hours left of your shift, you knew you would be collapsing into sleep from the moment you got home tonight. The day had been taxing both mentally, physically and emotionally, and as Chuck squeezed in beside you, your head fell to his shoulder.

“You’re all sweaty.” You grumbled, and he only laughed, the vehicle charging into motion once Gally was in the front seat and the rest of the Truck team were on board, your eyes sliding closed.

The journey seemed to slip away, the headache in your skull pounding away, and you managed to find your phone in your backpack, bringing it up at one point to text Newt and find out where he was, only to discover he'd been back at the Firehouse for almost half an hour, and was probably eating the cereal bars you’d hidden.

The time slipped away, and you felt as though you’d almost drifted off, against your own intentions, jerking up a little as the truck came to a halt.

“You’re tired, huh?”

“Yes.” You muttered, groaning as you forced yourself to your feet and stepped down from the platform of the truck, leaving the men to swap out their shoes and hang up their equipment, and Newt had his arms held out to you with a grin on his face, cooing at you as you stumbled forward. “Stop making fun of me.”

“Someone looks exhausted!” He practically sang the words, and you groaned, slumping into him as his arms wrapped around you, and he laughed in your ear while rubbing a hand up and down your back. He eased you for a second, going quiet as he held you, before pulling back, and squeezing at your arms. “How’s that headache?”

“Raging.”

“I got you some painkillers out.” He mumbled, one arm wrapping over your shoulders and guiding you over to the truck. He had a hot bucket of disinfectant and the mop, and as well as all the cleaning equipment, the smell of chemicals already present and showing off that he’d already started on the work to be done. “If you keep me company, I’ll clean the ambo’.”

“You’re a blessing.” He only nodded, handing you two tablets and a plastic cup of water, you chugged them down, all but crawling through the van to slump into the front seat, legs curled up a little as you rested against the still warm fabric.

The rhythmic motions of the mop along the floor created a soft noise, one that was steady enough to lull you into sleep, and even from in here, you could hear the loud ticking of the clock on the wall outside, every single second passing by being counted off in your head as you matched your heartbeat to it.

“Newt, I need a favour.” You groaned, keeping it internal as you bit on the inside of your cheek at the grating sound of a voice belonging to the person you arguably despised most in the world right now. “I got a little burned up, so I need some treatment.”

“I’m busy right now, Tommy. (Y/N) can do it.”

“I’m perfectly fine, I’ll just wait.” You cowered a little behind your chair as you hoped Newt would let him go, but your meddling blond friend tutted his lips, putting down the mop, and you already knew what was coming.

“Not with those burns you won’t. You don’t mind, right, love?”

“I really, really do mind.” You raised a hand over your head, flipping the pair off, but waiting only a second longer, before standing up. Making your way through the vehicle, you were at least feeling a little better, even if the weight of the equipment you’d worn, the heat and the terrifying near-death experience was still making you feel physically drained, your almost-nap and painkillers had taken care of you mentally. “Fine, but you can come here. I’m not standing up.”

You collapsed down on the edge of the van, a white vest-clad chest filling your view as he came to stand before you, and you reached for your bag, Grabbing at the medkit inside, Newt snorted, hopping down and moving away to empty the mop bucket, whistling obnoxiously. Pulling on a fresh pair of rubber gloves, you wiggled your fingers a little, latex snapping against your wrist as you let the edge go, before moving onto the job at hand.

Doing an assessment of his injuries, you sighed, letting his hand go to sit in the space between you both, to find both the types of disinfectant. Holding up one canister and one clear bottle, a coppery coloured liquid inside, he looked between them both, brows furrowed, before looking back to you. “Which do you want?”

“What’s the difference?”

“This one-” You held up the can, shaking it a little. “-is a foam, it stings a bit more, but it makes a cool covering that makes it feel better. But this one-” You shook the bottle, the liquid inside sloshing a little as a layer of bubbles built up. “-is just a liquid, doesn’t hurt as much, but won’t take the heat out.”

“I literally could not care less. I just want to get something to eat, and go back to sleep.” You shrugged, grabbing a pad of cotton and tipping some of the liquid onto it, making sure the soft bundle was soaked enough, before folding his fingers into a fist, and beginning to clean at the skin, ignoring the hiss on his lips.

“I made you a plate of food, from breakfast this morning. It’s in the fridge.”

You jumped a little as you heard the aww-ing from across the room, both of your heads turning to look at Newt as he leaned on the cabinets not far away, arms crossed over his chest as he was busy with absolutely fuck-all, and you scowled at him.

“You made me food?”

Thomas’ voice was whispered, and you only glanced up at him for a second, before dipping your head in a series of slow nods, confirming his question, and reaching for some burn cream. Smearing it on your fingers, you rubbed it against the back of your hand, warming it up until it was longer as stiff, and rubbing it onto his skin.

“Thanks, that was nice of you.”

“I’m not being nice, I’m simply doing my job.” The neutral expression on his face dropped into a scowl as you grinned, using his own words against him. Switching to a set of wrappings, you adjusted his arm in front of you, placing the edge of the gauze between his thumb and forefinger, you sealed it down over unblemished skin with bandage tape. “You know, it’s actually in my job description to keep the firefighters in peak health.”

With each layer of bandaging, you added a layer of cooling spray, and he grunted under his breath. “You couldn't just accept a compliment?”

“Well, you made it very clear that we aren’t nice to one another.”

“You’re being petty.” He grouched, snatching his hand back from you as soon as the wrapping was sealed up, one more glare at you before he was glaring at Newt, and walking back out of the room and ignoring you both, especially Newt’s laughing. He made his way over to you, still cracking up, his hand wrapped around his stomach, and you raised a brow at him as you began to pack everything away.

“What’s so funny, chuckles?”

“You and Thomas. Your bickering,” You turned to him, shaking your head as you tried to find an argument for his meddling, and pulling off the gloves from your hands. “You’re like a married couple.”

“If married couples argued like Thomas and I did, they’d be getting divorced.”

“I don’t even think you know what you’re arguing about anymore. You’re just getting at each other, now.” He shrugged, pulling you up from where you were sitting, in order to lock up the doors of the ambulance. “You just got off on the wrong foot, but mark my words, you won’t hate each other forever. I already know it.”

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever you say, Newt.”

[tinyboxxtink]

"....So I Married A Monster" *Part 9*

Chapter 8

Chapter 10

[I imagine this is him being a 'dad', lol]

Sorry this took so long ya'll. I love you.

I did my best!

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

“Ma’am, you really need to calm down--” A nurse pulled you back into the bed while you continued to scream and cry.

“No, I need to know where they’re taking that man!” You screamed as you wriggled from her grasp.

“Most likely to surgery, ma’am,” The doctor explained. “He did just get a GSW to the chest--”

“Oh God,” You wanted to vomit. “But the-- the man who just left, he--” You suddenly had an epiphany of where Billy was headed.

“You have to get officers to 5237 Lakeview Shore Drive,” You said in a panicked voice. “He’s going to grab my children,”

“Aren’t they his children as well, ma’am?” The nurse gave you a look.

“He has NO right to them!” You gave her an exasperated look. “And seriously? You think a man who just murdered two--” No, you couldn’t think that way. Rafael was still alive, he had to be.

“Shot, two men,” You corrected yourself. “Deserves children?!”

“No, ma’am,” She shook her head. “Sorry, ma’am. He was just so kind and charming the last time he was--”

“Jesus Christ, are you really that starved for affection that a psychopath flirting with you is the highlight of your career, idiot?” You sneered at the girl who couldn’t have been more than 19. Just a candy striper-- of course Billy would go for her.

“Alright, Addie-- out,” The doctor pointed towards the door. “Make yourself useful and call 911,”

“But there’s already--”

“OUT,” The doctor barked once more. Addie rolled her eyes and stomped out of the room.

“I’m sorry ma’am,” He apologized, patting your shoulder. “You need to stay calm, we’ve stopped your bleeding and stitched you up, but if you become hysterical you could rip them out,”

“I just watched my ex-husband shoot the love of my life and then storm out of here to go kidnap my children, and you expect me not to get hysterical?”

“At least try, ma’am--” He pleaded with you.

“If you call me ma’am one more time I swear to God--” You growled.

“I’m sorry, Miss Y/N,” He corrected himself.

“Doctor you’ve just sewn up my literal anus, I think we’re on a first name basis,” You rolled your eyes.

“Right,” He chuckled nervously. “Listen if you promise to at least attempt to stay calm, I will go check on your boyfriend, alright?”

“Fine,” You sighed.

“Alright then,” The doctor gestured to two male nurses. sending them to find out information on Rafael.

---------

Rafael was indeed being rushed into an operating room, his chest bleeding profusely. It had missed his aorta, but just barely. One wrong movement by a scalpel and he’d die right on that table.

“...He’s lost a lot of blood already, doctor,” One nurse warned.

“Put him on bypass, I need more time to cauterize this wound!” The doctor barked as he sweat through his surgical scrubs.

“Yes sir,” The nurse nodded to someone who brought forward a machine and began hooking it up to Rafael.

“Alright people, we don’t have a lot of time,” He looked around the room.

"Pray for a miracle,"

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

At Your House

Lewis rushed into your house, trying to think of what to do. He’d need to get the girls and run-- it wouldn’t be easy. He’d need a good excuse. God, what would be a good excuse?

Lewis first went to Maggie’s room, gently waking her up.

“Mags? Maggie, wake up baby,” He cooed.

“What’s wrong dad?” Maggie asked while still half asleep.

“We-- we need to go,” He told her.

“Right now?” She turned her head to the side like a confused puppy.

“Yes, right now baby,” He began to grab her things and shoving them into her backpack. “Mommy’s in trouble,”

“In trouble?!” Maggie suddenly shot straight up in her bed.

“It’s fine, I’m sure she’ll be fine,” Lewis tried to keep her calm. “I just don’t want that bad man to get ahold of you and Kylie,”

“He has her?!” Maggie suddenly had panic in her voice.

“Maggie calm down, okay sweetie?” Lewis put his hands on her face. “We can’t let Kylie know, okay? So we’re going to tell her…”

“We’re going to the beach!” Maggie suddenly finished his thought. She was a great liar, quick on her feet. Just a chip off the ol’ Lewis block.

“Great idea baby!” He nodded while she pulled a jacket over her pj’s.

“And-- And we can go to the beach house, the one we used to go to?” She made that adorable little puppy dog face he couldn’t resist. He didn’t exactly “own” that beach house, but whatever his baby wanted, she got.

“Yes, yes of course Mags. Whatever you want sweetie,” He kissed the top of her head before they went into Kylie’s room.

“Kylie, wake up,” Maggie shook her awake while Billy began packing her a bag.

“Where are we going?” Kylie asked sleepily.

“We’re going to the beach baby,” Billy told her as he finished with her suitcase.

“In the middle of the night?” Kylie rubbed her eyes while Maggie helped her put some clothes on.

“Well, we want to be there as fast as we can!” Maggie continued to spin her web of lies, just like her daddy.

“Where’s mommy?” Kylie rubbed her eyes while Billy slipped her shoes on and they headed to the car.

“She’s uh…” He looked at Maggie.

“She’s still a little sick, so she’s going to meet us there later,” Maggie told her while giving her dad a thumbs up. He could cry in pride right now if he wasn’t worried about the cops finding them before he could escape.

“Okay,” Kylie just went along with the story, no questions asked.

Billy went to your key ring and grabbed your keys to your SUV, shooing the girls out into the car. He did a quick look around to make sure he had everything. Well, he had everything that mattered. His girls.

He glared around the room for a moment, pissed off that you had taken away your chances at happiness in this place. It would have been a great life; just him, you and the girls. No cops, no dumbass ADA, just you and him.

Well, soon enough it would be. He was sure Barba was dying right now, if not already dead. Then once he was out of the picture, you’d have no choice but to come back to him. He had the girls. He had your car. He had your happiness.

And soon, he would have you.

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

At The Hospital

The nurses had been forced to knock you out with some morphine when you began to get hysterical over not knowing what was going on with Rafael and your girls. So here you were, waking up groggy and disoriented in a regular hospital room. Soon enough you were alert and back on the anxiety train. You pushed on the CALL NURSE button rapidly until an older woman in green scrubs came rushing in.

“Y’Know that button is for actual emergencies,” She crossed her arms once she noticed you were fine.

“This IS an emergency,” You crossed your arms right back at her. “I asked to hear about my family, and all you people did was knock me out. That has to break some sort of law,”

“Really and what law would that be?” She raised an eyebrow.

“I...don’t know, but I’m sure my boyfriend could find one,” You huffed.

“Highly unlikely ma’am,” She shook her head.

“Why?” Your eyes went wide. “Why wouldn’t he? Is it because he’s dead? Brain dead? Paralyzed and unable to speak?!”

“No honey,” She rolled her eyes at your dramatics. “It’s just an insane notion,”

“...Whatever,” You muttered while she checked your IV’s and stats. “So are you going to tell me how he is? Or are you just here to shoot me up with more morphine?”

“Well, that depends,” She said while inputting your information in her iPad. “Can you keep calm, make sure you don’t rupture any of your stitches?”

“....Not with that tone I can’t,” You didn’t like it one bit. “But I think I deserve to know what’s being done about my children at the very least,”

“Well…” The nurse looked at the door nervously. “See, sweetie here’s the thing--” She walked over and made sure the door was fully closed.

“Oh God,” Your voice trembled.

“It seems your ex-husband has...taken them” She grimaced.

“Oh god,” You repeated. “Oh GOD,” You were going to be sick.

The heart monitor and machines began to beep as your blood pressure skyrocketed, bells and whistles went off as you started to have a panic attack. The nurse instantly started turning all of them off, not wanting to alert anyone of what she had done by telling you.

“Okay okay but LOOK, honey--” She grabbed you by your shoulders, forcing you to take a breath and look at her.

“....If I bring you someone, will you promise to calm down?” She asked.

You weren’t entirely sure you could make that promise, but if it was Rafael she was going to bring you, you’d say anything she wanted to hear.

“Yes,” You nodded vigorously. The nurse nodded back and walked to the side of your bed that had a curtain separating you and another patient. When she pulled it back, you saw Rafael laying in a hospital bed hooked up to wires and tubes, a breathing apparatus on his face. She pushed the bed over so that it was touching yours, almost like it was one big king bed for the two of you.

“Oh my god…” You whispered, barely able to hold it together. “Can I--?”

“Be gentle,” She warned you. You nodded softly before very cautiously stroking the side of his face, whispering to him.

“Baby, I’m here…” You pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I’m here and I’m okay, so you have to be okay, okay?”

“How bad is it?” You looked up to the nurse.

“Well he made it through surgery,” She gestured to his still living body. “That’s always a good sign,”

“Give it to me straight...Marla,” You read her name tag.

“It was touch and go for a while, I won’t lie to you,” She sighed. “But...he’s been stable long enough I convinced them to let me bring him here to you,”

“....Thank you,” You gave her a small smile.

“If it were my Jonas in that bed, I’d never want him out of my sight either,” She smiled at you.

“Nurse Nightingale,” A doctor popped his head in. “Your husband is on line 1,”

“Speak of the devil,” She chuckled, heading towards the door. “I’ll be back to check on you later, I’ll-- see what I can find out about your children,”

“God…” You shook your head and muttered under your breath again.

“I’m sure they’re fine honey. They’re with their daddy at least, right?”

“True,” You nodded with another small relieved smile. If there was one thing you could bet money on, it was that Billy would take care of the girls. He was using them as collateral for sure, but he wouldn’t hurt them.

Would he?

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

Meanwhile

Hours and hours had passed. Billy had made it to the Hamptons with the girls. Luckily for him the people he was ‘borrowing’ the house from still hadn’t made an appearance. Given that it was the beginning of fall and the season was over, he was pretty sure he wouldn’t have to kill anyone to keep them staying there a secret.

The girls were in the living room watching Moana while Billy scrolled through his phone at the latest news blurbs and trending things on Twitter. Obviously “William Lewis” was out in the open again-- shit. People would be looking for him now. But nobody knew where they were-- they’d never find them. Right? He couldn’t go back to prison, not after the hell he went through to get out. He would never go back again, no matter what. Nothing was going to stand in his way, or slow him down. He intently watched Maggie and Kylie-- they were laughing and eating cereal. Maggie could hold her own for sure, but Kylie was just a tot. Could she handle being shuffled around the state? The country?

He seriously began to ponder if the girls were slowing him down.