#the blood she has is blood she's stolen from blood banks

[saiyanprincessswanie]

Rightfully His…

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Female Reader

Word Count: 3028

Summary: You thought your husband was a kindhearted, gentleman who was deeply in love with you. When you catch your husband murdering someone in cold blood you freak out and run away from him. Bucky is in search of you and is determined to find you. Will he kill you or will he claim what is rightfully his?

Warnings: Smut, teasing, rough sex, choking, possessive, mention of killing the reader a few times, pet name (sweetheart), brief violence mentioned & minor character killed.

A/N 1: Thank you to my beta readers @lfnr-blog-blog-blog & @pigwidgeonxo 💜 (any mistakes in spelling & grammar are my own. I wrote this on my phone)

A/N 2: divider by @whimsicalrogers & header by me.

Reblogs & Comments on Tumblr are welcomed and encouraged. 😊💜

I do NOT give my consent to have my work translated or reposted on any social media platform, apps, or third-party sites. If you see my work anywhere besides my personal Tumblr & AO3 accounts, it has been stolen. I will NEVER give written or verbal permission to repost or translate any of my fanfics as they’re MY intellectual property. 🚫🚫

It’s been two and a half weeks since you ran away from him. The life you thought you wanted with Bucky was a huge shame. You thought James “Bucky” Barnes was this kind-hearted businessman who swept you off your feet. He was a gentleman, ambitious, caring, protective, and the love of your life. Whatever you wanted, Bucky made sure you had it. It wasn’t about the money and lifestyle though it was how he treated you. He would worship the ground you walked on if you let him. This man was deeply in love with you and you with him.

Now, it turns out he’s a mobster who kills people for a living. Five years of marriage down the drain because you weren’t supposed to be home yet. You had walked in on Bucky interrogating a man strapped to a chair and begging for his life. That life was cut short in front of you as you let out a scream. Bucky looked up at you with both anger and regret in his eyes. He tried to talk to you but you were scared of him and slept in one of the spare bedrooms. Fearful he might kill you next for what you saw. Not wanting to risk it the next day you left. 

You had taken money from your bank account, passport, and clothes and fled your home. Going from bus to bus you traveled as far as you could from him and decided to stay in a small town in the middle of nowhere. Keeping your head down you rented out a motel room. You kept to yourself and hardly ever left the room. This was a temporary plan as you tried to figure out how to leave the country. Anywhere in the world was better than here. 

Where would you go? Could you move on from this marriage knowing who your husband was? What if he tried to find you? The stress got to you as you ran to the toilet to throw up your lunch. Flushing the toilet you go to the sink to brush your teeth. Your mouth is now minty fresh as you ponder the one question that keeps haunting you. Would he kill you if he ever found you? 

Your hands clenched around the sink as you took in your reflection in the mirror. The bags under your eyes show that you haven’t slept much since heading out on your own. Looking away from the mirror you head into the small room and sit on the bed. Your heart mourns for what could have been between you and Bucky. Now that future is no longer a dream for you.

There was a knock at your door that sent fear down your spine. Could it be him? You shake your head at the thought. There is no way he found you in this little town. Again the knock rang out in your room and you slowly made your way to the door. Looking through the peephole you see a woman holding towels. You open it slowly and are greeted by a friendly voice. 

“I have fresh towels for you hun. I know it’s been a few days since you switched them out.” She reached out to give them to you and politely you took them.

“Thank you, I appreciate it,” you mumbled. 

“If you need anything hun you just call down to the front desk and we will get it for you.” The lady turned around and started to push her cart to the next room.

You closed the door and set the towels down on the towel rack in the bathroom. A knock on your door rang out again and you wondered what she wanted now. Huffing you walked to the door and opened it up. There in front of you was your husband, Bucky. He placed a finger to your mouth to shush you. His deep blue eyes stared into your soul as he smiled at you.

“Hello, my beautiful wife. Happy to see me?” He chuckled as you stared at him in shock.

Bucky started to push his way into the room and shut the door. You wanted to scream for help but it died on your tongue. You walked backward until your legs hit the bed and you sat down, tears falling from your eyes. This couldn’t be real. How did he find you?

Bucky took in your features and sighed. He knew you were tired from running for the last two-plus weeks. He could tell you were scared of him and that didn’t help what he was feeling inside. Bucky wanted to yell at you and curse you for leaving him. But he knew you were too frail to take his anger. So he kneeled in front of you and grabbed your hand. 

“Do you know why I’m here sweetheart?” 

Slowly you nodded your head. “T-To kill me?” The tears continued to fall from your eyes as he just stared at you. There was nowhere to run anymore. This was the end of the line for you. 

There was a long silence between you both before he said anything. “As tempting as that is, no, I’m not here to kill you sweetheart. I’m here to take you home with me.”

You looked at him confused by what he said. “But I thought… I mean I saw you kill someone. Don’t mobsters like to tie up loose ends and get rid of witnesses?”

Bucky couldn’t help the laugh that escaped his lips. “Most of the time, yes. But what you witnessed that’s on me for bringing my work home. Do you know why that man was murdered?”

You shook your head no. Did you even want to know at this point? The less you knew the better it was for you.

Wiping the tears that continued to fall from your eyes, Bucky leaned in to kiss your forehead. “That man wanted to kill you. The thought of you being taken from me forever sent me in a rage. You’re my wife and I love you with every breath I take. I tortured that man until I got him to squeal like the pig he was. His reasoning to kill you was to hurt me and the empire that I’ve built. But I vowed to protect you on our wedding day and it still holds true today. I would rather die than see you hurt on my watch. So please understand why I did it. It was all for you.”

His words started to make you feel sick again. Someone wanted you to die? But who? You were merely a housewife. However, that didn’t seem true anymore. You were the housewife of a mobster who ran an empire in New York. He not only loved you deeply but he also killed for you. Killed in the name of love. 

“Bucky, I don’t know what to say. This is all too much for me to take in. So you just regularly kill people who threaten me? Was this the only guy or have there been more?”

He took a deep breath and exhaled. “This wasn’t the first and probably won’t be the last. It’s the head of a rival mob that wants you dead. That’s why you need to come with me so I can protect you. Can’t you see I need you by my side? I’m asking you to trust me and follow me out of here before someone gets to you.”

“How can I trust you Bucky? You lied about your work all these years and pretended to be someone else. It’s like I don’t even know you. How do I know this isn’t a lie to get me to leave with you so you can kill me?”

Your breaths start to pick up as you start to hyperventilate. You could feel the familiar panic attack start to hit. This was not how you saw this playing out. Bucky helped you with your breathing exercises to slowly calm you down. 

Bucky looked at you seriously. “You can trust me 'cause I’m your husband. I only lied about my job but that was to protect you. I see now I should have been honest with you from the beginning. But you do know me, sweetheart. I’m still the same man that you married. Please stop thinking I’m going to kill you. That breaks my heart every time you bring it up.”

Bucky stands up now and helps you to your feet. “We need to leave now, please.” He all but begs you. 

Catching your breath you look for your bag on the table and start to gather all the clothes and items you brought with you. Within minutes you are packed and Bucky goes to the front door and opens it. His best friend and right-hand man, Steve, looks back at him.

“The coast is clear, boss. Though I’m getting word someone is on their way here now.” 

Bucky looks back at you with his hand outstretched. “Come on, let's go home.”

Hearing what Steve said had you holding Bucky’s hand and walking quickly out of the room. Within seconds you are in a black SUV and being whisked away to the private airport just outside of town. Your hand clenched against his as you reached the airport. There was a private jet waiting on the tarmac as you both walked hand in hand and got on the plane. Within moments the plane was in the sky and you were both heading back to New York.

Exhausted from an emotional standpoint you found yourself in Bucky’s lap on the plane with your head under his chin sleeping peacefully. Steve sat in a seat opposite him and smiled at his friend. “I hope you’re right about this boss.”

When the plane landed Bucky woke you up gently by kissing your temple. Your eyes blinked a few times as you stretched your arms over your head. Bucky grabbed your hand again and you both exited the plane where another SUV was waiting to take you home. Driving back home the SUV pulled up to your house on the outskirts of the city. Exiting the SUV you and Bucky walked up the steps and entered the front door. It was exactly how you left it.

“I’m going to head to the bedroom so I can soak in the tub before bed. Is that alright with you?” You questioned, taking your husband's form in.

“Yes, sweetheart, that’s fine with me. I will be up in a minute or two.”

As you climbed the stairs you headed toward the bedroom and shut the door.

Steve watched you both in silence and didn’t speak until you were out of sight. “Do you think it’s smart bringing her back? She could be a liability. Maybe you should have stuck with your original plan after she left.”

Bucky turned to his friend and backhanded him causing Steve’s face to whip to the side. “The decision has been made and she is home now. I can’t live without her. Maybe if you found love Steven you would understand my decision.”

Heading up the stairs Bucky starts to think things out. Truth is it didn’t take them the full two and a half weeks to find you. As soon as you left New York there was a tail on you. Bucky always made sure someone was watching you at all times. So the first day you stepped into that little town he was notified of your well-being. He gave you two weeks to decide what you wanted to do. Were you going to fly and have him chase you around the globe or were you going to come quietly back home to him? Thankfully, you chose right, and now he has you back in his life again. Plus with you going to learn to trust him again he wouldn’t have to kill you after all. Yes, he contemplated it when you first left but his dark heart was against it from the start. He did love you and couldn’t wait to start a family with you. Now that you know the truth he could make you his Queen.

Walking into the bedroom he closed the door behind him. He could see you in the tub from where he stood and licked his lips. You were always a temptress to him and made him weak in the knees. Bucky was gonna make you his tonight to be sure you were never leaving him again. Slowly he started to undress as he made his way to the bathroom. By the time he stood beside the tub, his cock was rock hard. You stared up at him with doe eyes and exhaled with how big and thick his cock was standing at attention. It was something that still had you aching for him, for that stretch between your legs. 

“Sit forward sweetheart so I can sit behind you. I want to help you relax.”

You did as he said and made room for him to sit down. The tub was huge and could sit you both comfortably. Once he got seated he pulled your back to his chest and kissed your shoulder. His hands started to wander your body as you started making soft noises of pleasure. Every gasp and hitched breath made him want to take you more. But for now, he knew you needed this first to relax your mind, body, and spirit. He caressed your breasts and pinched your nipples, rolling them between his fingers. You arched against him moaning his name softly as his right hand descended your body and to his favorite spot between your legs. His fingers found your clit and started to rub it in slow circles making you whine cause you needed more pressure there. The more he teased you the more you whined against his shoulder. This is how he liked you, a moaning mess who begged for what she needed. 

“Please Bucky, I need you. I have to have you inside me.” Your hips moved to the way he was working you and suddenly he stopped, making you huff in frustration.

“I love it when you beg for me. If I’m going to take you it will be in our bed where I can fuck you like I hate you.” He growled out at you. 

Draining the tub both you and Bucky got out and quickly dried off. Heading to the bedroom Bucky grabbed you by the back of the neck and led you to the king-size bed. Reaching the bed he pushed you face down and grabbed your hips. Before you could say anything Bucky had thrusted his long, thick cock into you hard drawing out a pornographic moan from you. His pace was hard as he fucked you deeply. Your hands dig into the sheets as your husband takes you like a useless whore. His fingers dig harder into your hips as he groans above you.

“Take my cock. Every fucking inch of it.” He breathed out over and over. 

“Fuck, yes, Bucky. More…” you begged. 

Bucky’s left-hand moves to your clit and harshly starts rubbing it. In a matter of seconds, you are moaning his name loud for all to hear. Your walls clenching around him almost taking him over that hurdle but he quickly pulls out and flips you over to your back. He pushes you up the bed a little and re-enters you in one painful thrust. Your legs are around his trim waist while he is battering your pussy using you for his pleasure. His right-hand grabs your neck and starts choking you. Your hands fly up to his hand and try to alleviate the pressure on your neck.

“This pussy is mine. You are mine.” He growls out at you. “If you ever leave me again I swear no one will ever find your body. Do you understand me? Nod your pretty head if you understand.”

You frantically nod your head to the best of your ability. As Bucky pounds into your pussy over and over again. After a few punishing thrusts, Bucky feels your body tense around him as you silently scream your release this time taking Bucky with you.  Bucky lets your throat go as he cums with a roar painting your insides with his release.

You gasp for air while Bucky pulls out of you and collapses next to you on his side. The only sound in the room is you both panting in and out. Sex was always like this between you both, rough, hard, and exhilarating. But when he said no one would find your body if you ever left again made you nervous. Was he just saying things in the heat of the moment as usual? It had to have been ‘cause he promised never to hurt you. 

Bucky got up to clean himself off first then returned to the bedroom with a washcloth to clean you up. He was humming when you both crawled under the blankets to get ready for bed. You clung to his side as you rested your head on his chest. Bucky just wrapped you up in his arms and held you. 

“No one will ever mess with you ever again my love. For if they do they will feel the wrath of me pouring down upon them ten times over. You are my lover, my wife, my everything, and nothing will ever tear us apart again.”

“Yes, Bucky.” A part of you loved knowing he would always protect you. That he had the means to do so. The other part was terrified of what this man could do to not only his enemies but to you. Now you were too scared to leave his side ever again. 

You had drifted off to sleep as Bucky started to put a plan in place if you ever left him again. The house did have a nice basement that he could convert into a living area to lock you away from the world. He would never be without you again. I mean you’re rightfully his.

Updated taglist 2024

@americasass81

@astheskycries

@awesomerextyphoon

@caffiend-queen

@caplanbuckybarnes

@denisemarieangelina

@fictional-affairs

@georgiapeach30513

@get0verit

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@jobean12-blog

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@noellez-best-life23

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@princessofdarkwinter

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@spectre-posts

@sweater-daddiesdumbdork

@talia-rumlow

@thefallenbibliophilequote

@what-is-your-plan-today

@wolfsmom1

@thezombieprostitute

@books-and-autumn-leaves

@thats-alittle-gay

@wish-i-had-something-better

@kind-of-crazy-butthatsokay

@princessphilly

@mercurial-chuckles

@floralwsloki

@thelonelywitchandthelonelytides

@winterslove1917

[natalievoncatte]

CW: Violence and such

A wave of air rolled over Lena and she heard the telltale crackle of one of Lex’s portals. Waiting in the shadows, she watched him stumble into the room, bruised and panting.

She wasted no time, stepping forward and shoving the device into the crook of his neck like a stun gun. His body went rigid as she relieved of him of his stolen powers, negating the effects of the Harun-El serum he’d manipulating her into creating. Something else he stole from her.

He stumbled back and turned. She already had the gun out in her hand, aimed at his chest. He backed away, moving to the far end of the room, in front of banks of computers and monitors.

“Hello, sis. I have to say, I’m pleasantly surprised.”

“Save it,” said Lena, raising the gun in front of her to aim at his head.

A heartbeat passed. Lex grinned.

“If you were going to shoot me, you’d have done it by now.”

“I can’t let you live,” Lena said, feeling the weight of each word as it escaped her, weighing her down. “The world will never be safe as long as you live.”

“Oh, dear sister,” said Lex. “Take it from someone with experience. If you’re going to murder someone in cold blood, work yourself up before you get to the scene. It prevents awkward situations like this.”

“Shut up.”

“You might want to make sure you have the right target, while you’re at it.”

Lena let out a long, slow sigh.

“Put your hands on the table and don’t move a muscle.”

Lex laughed. “What, are you arresting me now?”

There was another soft puff of air, and then a shriek of rending metal as the doors buckled in. Supergirl stormed into the room, parting the steel the way a normal woman might part curtains. She stomped into the room, even more bruised and bloody than Lex, hair matted with mud and blood, eyes blazing with righteous fury.

“You,” she snarled. “Murderer!”

“We’ve established that”, Lex said, almost casually.

Lena still held the gun ready, aimed at his chest.

“You can put that down, Miss Luthor. He’s not getting away this time. We can track his portals now.”

“Oh, can you?” Said Lex. “That’ll certainly be a wrinkle in my plans.”

“You’re not making any more plans,” Lena spat, fighting back tears as she thumbed back the hammer on her revolver.

That’s it, Lex’s voice murmured in her mind. Ease the hammer back and you just have to touch the trigger and it’ll go off. I had it tuned special for you. Remember, aim small, miss small.

“Miss Luthor,” Supergirl said, turning to her. “Don’t do that.”

“If you take him to jail, he’ll just get out again,” said Lena. “He’ll just escape and kill more people.” She choked out a sob. “He’ll kill you eventually. We have to win every time. He just has to win once.”

“Sounds like a good reason for you to join the winning team, Lena.”

Lena put her finger on the trigger, and Supergirl stepped between them.

“Don’t,” she said, very softly. “He wants you to be like him. We’re the good guys, Lena. We don’t kill. You’re one of the good guys.”

“No I’m not,” Lena said, her voice hitching.

“Yes you are. I believe you, Lena.”

Lena met her eyes, their gazes linking with that same pull she felt whenever she made eye contact with the Maid of Might, and she faltered. Lex was right. She didn’t have it in her. Not now. Not in front of her. Lena lowered the gun and Supergirl gave her a soft, ethereal, profoundly familiar smile.

Lex shoved a Kryptonite dagger into her back, and Supergirl cried out in agony, green poison ripping through her flesh. With a savage grin, he twisted the knife, breaking off the fragile blade with a hideous snap.

Lena forgot everything but Supergirl as she collapsed to the floor, rushing to kneel beside her. Supergirl convulsed, her back arching brutally as she stared into the void, blood gurgling in her throat.

“Cooked that one up special,” said Lex, panting. “She has minutes at most.”

Lena did not speak. She raised her gun and shot him twice in the chest, two rapid thunderclaps that left her ears ringing, and he toppled back into the wall.

“Fuck,” he choked out. “Guess you do… have it…”

“Shut up!” Lena screamed, “you fucking bastard! Shut up!”

“But that’s not all, Lex choked out. “I’ve got one…” he coughed, “one more… for you…”

Feebly, he reached into his jacket and drew out a remote control, hand shaking as he strained to activate it.

The monitors lit up, assaulting her with a savage truth. She saw Kara Danvers breathe grown men off their feet, blasting the searing heat of a dead star from her eyes, snatch bullets from the air.

“Kara Danvers… is Supergirl.” Lex grinned out, with a rattling laugh. “She’s been lying to you… manipulating…”

Something glinted on his wrist. The watch. The portal watch.

Lena lunged, throwing herself at him. Lex pulled his hand away and shoved. He pushed her back and threw himself on top of her, sending the gun sliding away. Pinning her wrist to the cold floor, he knees into her stomach, crushing the breath out of her in an explosion of pain.

With his other hand, he rapped his chest. “Bulletproof vest. Couple broken ribs. Should have brought a bigger gun, Lena.”

Lex knotted his fingers in her hair, pulling savagely to turn her head, forcing her to look.

Kara lay on the floor, her breath coming in short, shallow gasps. A low moan escaped her throat and she rolled on her side, looking at Lena with eyes streaked with putrid green.

“I’m sorry,” Kara rasped out. “I’m sorry, Lena.”

Lena stared, a hopeless, helpless feeling spreading through her as though she sank into freezing water.

“I for-“ she began, only for Lex to close his hands around her throat.

“Oh, I’m sorry, were you having a moment?”

Lena flailed as he tightened his grip on her, her head pounding and her lungs burning as he crushed down her airway. Lena thrashed, desperate to fight him off.

I’m going to die. I’m going to die and I never told her.

With a scream of animal fury, somehow, Kara threw herself at him, bodily knocking him away from Lena, freeing her.

It must have been the last of Kara’s strength, because she collapsed in a boneless heap, moaning. Lex snarled, jamming his thumb into Kara’s wound.

“Oh my, I hope you weren’t using that kidney.”

Lena rolled. She grabbed the gun, rolled again.

Aim small, miss small.

Bang.

Lex snapped back, away from Kara, his genius fanned out from his skull to paint the wall. Lena ignored the sight, forced herself not to think about what she just did, forced herself to feel no pain as she scrambled to his body and peeled the watch off his wrist, locking it around her own. She had to hope.

The interface was simple enough.

“Almost there,” she told Kara. “Almost.”

The portal swirled to life and Lena began screaming at the top of her lungs.

“Help! It’s Kryptonite, help her!”

Alex stormed through, eyes going wide at the scene before her. She immediately began shouting orders. Someone pulled Lena away from Kara, forcing their laced fingers apart. Lena told herself that Kara was going to be okay, that her hand hadn’t been cold and limp and lifeless, she pleaded for it to be true.

The only thing she said was “let me see Kara.” As they bandaged and examined her, it became a refrain. A chant. Alex finally came in to the medical bay and looked at her, a little piteously.

“Kara’s fine, Lena. She’s at her apartment. We just need…”

“She’s Supergirl,” Lena rasped through her bruises throat, “please let me see her.”

Alex swallowed hard. “I can’t. She’s in surgery to get the Kryptonite out of her abdomen. We can’t go in. It’s very delicate and the procedure has to be done under red sunlamps.”

“Please just let me see she’s alive.”

Alex nodded gently, and helped Lena to her feet. Her head was pounding, her knees pained her, and she ached where Lex had knees and choked her. She had to lean on Alex’s shoulder to walk to the operating room.

They watched through a window and Lena couldn’t help but stare. Kara lay on the table on her side, and oxygen mask over her face. There was blood in her hair and she was covered in bruises -even around her own throat- and she looked so small, so delicate and fragile. Lena pressed against the glass and strained with her entire being not to cry.

Alex placed a soft hand on her back. “Let it out.”

Lena did just that, sobbing into Alex’s shoulder.

“You saved my sister, Lena.”

Lena wept harder. Alex waited for it to stop, for Lena to pull back and swipe at her eyes like a child and step back.

There was a bench outside the operating ward. Lena sat down and refused to move. Eventually, Alex brought her food, but she didn’t eat. Nia tried to cheer her, and Brainy came to give her more details about Kara’s condition, probably trying to soothe her.

Lena waited in silence, needing to know of her sun would ever rise again. She waited and waited until, finally, beautifully, they rolled Kara out. She leapt from her seat and stormed after the medics, Alex joining her moments later.

They put Kara in a bed and connected more equipment to her, and hooked up another IV. The red light coming from the ceiling gave the room an eerie, sanguine glow.

“Why the red lamps?” said Lena.

“She has too much Kryptonite in her system,” said Alex. “We need to flush it out before we can turn on the sunlight and let her heal up fully.”

Lena swallowed, hard.

“Is my lab equipment still here?”

“Yes, why?”

Lena turned without a word. “Brainy,” she called, without looking for him, “get down here and help me.”

In the lab, Lena began to work, drawing on everything she knew, while Brainy structured and prepared the nanites for her.

Seven hours later, she returned to the recovery ward and found Alex quietly bent over her sister’s wounded body. She might have been praying. Eliza Danvers had joined her, and Lena momentarily paused, a little scared of the older woman, for reasons she couldn’t say.

Alex looked up, spotting the syringe of dark fluid in Lena’s hands.

“What’s that?”

“A cure for Kryptonite.”

Alex blinked. “You cured Kryptonite poisoning?”

“No. I cured Kryptonite. She’ll never have to fear it again.”

Alex blinked, and looked at her mother. They both looked at Lena, who nodded and injected the fluid into Kara’s IV.

It only took a few minutes. The green bruises all over her body began to fade and her breathing steadied. She moved slighty, groaned, and reached out.

“Lena,” she whispered.

“She’s okay,” said Alex. “She’s here. Everybody is here for you, sis. Lex got you pretty good but the surgeons and Lena patched you up again.”

“Hurts.”

“I know.”

“Lena.”

Alex swallowed. “I’m going to go get the yellow sunlamps set up.”

“I’ll help,” said Eliza.

As the both left, Lena waited an awkward beat and then rushed to Kara’s beside, lacing her fingers with those of Kara’s reaching hand.

“Kara, it’s me. I’m here.”

“I’m sorry.”

Lena sat down in the chair Alex had been using and smoothed back some of Kara’s hair, to better look into those beautiful blue eyes. Kara smiled softly.

“I lied to you,” Kara whispered.

“I know. I… I can’t say I don’t care but… it doesn’t seem to matter that much.”

Kara sighed. “I want to make it better.”

“I know,” said Lena, her voice cracking. “Kara, don’t worry about it now. Listen to me, okay?”

She gave a slight nod.

Lena sucked in a breath, feeling the ache in her belly and the burn in her throat. The desire to release these words warred with the fear and the anguish and the dread. She was about to reveal a truth of her own, one that she’d held so deep that she barely knew it was there until she saw the light dying behind Kara’s eyes.

The release of them was relief, like unyoking a great weight from her shoulders.

“I love you.”

“Lena…”

“No, please listen. I don’t mean as a friend, Kara. I mean I have feelings for you. Intense feelings. I… I don’t know if that’s something you’d ever want, but if it is, is there. If it’s not, you don’t how me anything. I’m still your friend. It’s just…”

Kara squeezed her hand ever so gently. Lena had forgotten that she even held it. She went quiet, waiting, feeling dread and hope swelling in her chest.

“Would it be forward of me to ask for a kiss?” Kara whispered.”

“No,” said Lena.

Kara’s lips were soft and warm, and though it was awkward to bend and place a soft peck on Kara’s lips, she did. She remained bent over the side of the bed, her forehead resting against Kara’s, sharing something quiet and fragile.

“I’ll make it up to you,” said Kara. “I will, I promise.”

“You already have,” said Lena. “I just hope I don’t screw this up.”

“You wont. I believe in Lena Luthor.”

Lena cracked a smiled, sighing, and ran a hand down Kara’s arm, reveling in her new freedom of touch, now matter how limited.

Alex cleared her throat.

“She needs a full day under the sun lamps,” said Alex, without elaborating.

Lena drew back but did not loose he grip on Kara’s hand.

“She’s going to get every minute of it.”

“Good,” said Alex. “Kara, are you hungry?”

Kara nodded.

“I’ll scrounge up something for you to eat. I have to find Nia first.”

“Why?” said Lena.

Alex offered a smile.

“She owes me fifty bucks.”

[eetherealgoddess]

Someone requested a bonten/purge au in one of my comment sections forever ago. Hope you enjoy!♡︎♡︎♡︎

ꨄWork Nightꨄ

Oneshot - Yandere Bonten/Purge Au

❦You work during the purge❦

Hanemiya Kazutora, Sanzu Haruchiyo, & Haitani Brothers x Reader

Not fully proofread!

MY TR FANDOM WORKS ARE ONLY ON TUMBLR, AO3, AND WATTPAD UNDER EETHEREALGODDESS! REPORT IF YOU SEE IT POSTED UNDER ANYONE ELSE BUT ME!!!

I apologize if I get any Japanese etiquette or culture wrong, I literally have to research the culture for some of my fandom stories so if anything is wrong, please excuse my ignorance.

Notice:

✩Y/n is 18+. I picture her as a black female but you can see her however.

✩Some parts of the story may not be realistic or factual. After all, this is a work of fiction.

✩Although it's a dark 'romance,' I do not condone any of the behavior displayed.

✩Dark content such as: gore, violence, triggering topics, graphic scenes, vulgar language, explicit sexual content, etc.

✩There may be scenes that involve non con and/ or dubcon so don’t read if that makes you uncomfortable

✩That being said, this story is for 18+ only.

Enjoy!

Work Night

Recently, you learned about the extra money you could make by working on Purge night. Usually, you wouldn’t stay out during the ‘holiday’ but you decided to try it. Now, why wouldn’t you just go out and steal from a bank or something? Because, that’s a death sentence. Other people are out doing the exact same thing. At least you’ll still be safe inside. The job is to clean and mandate the shop, protecting the merchandise while it stays closed. Fortunately, the store you work in has never been broken into, or stolen from, nobody really caring for flowers on a night as chaotic as this, which makes your job easy.

Unlike other stores surrounding you, this one is a small business, and the price to protect it was too good to pass. You’re also not alone, currently sweeping the floor amongst the other two coworkers who are taking care of the other chores on the checklist. Hearing tapping on the window, the three of you look up, your body jolting as you eye the masked strangers

“Do you know them?” One of your coworkers questions. You respond with a shake of your head as your grip on the wooden stick tightens while your body tenses. You all stood quietly, examining the tall figures. Blood stains their suits as well as the weapons that are hanging to their sides. One of them moves closer to the window before he taps the metal bat against the glass and tilts his head, the moonlight exposing the red liquid splattered on the white crying mask.

“The doors are locked right?” The other coworker questions.

“Yeah.” You respond breathlessly. Your heart pounds against your chest as a sense of dread forms when they all move closer. You gasp as the man pulls his arms back and slams the bat against the glass. Shards shatter everywhere before they step inside. You hear your coworkers shriek as you all scramble to run towards the back door.

“Fuck!” You hiss just as you move out of the way right before the person with the baton could crack your skull. You make eye contact through the mask, an eerie smile plastered on the white face. You fall in the process, rolling your body out of the way before the weapon could meet your stomach, smacking a piece of glass when making contact with the floor.

“Pesky little thing.” He all but purrs as you get back on your feet. Your head turns to the person with pink hair holding a katana closing in on one of your coworkers who backed into a corner.

“Please! Don’t kill me!” Her legs shake as she holds her hands up, her eyes wide as tears fall down her face. The mask holds a frown that resembles the person’s grip on the weapon before they pull back and penetrate her chest. You gasp right before dodging the machete that almost slices through your neck, turning your attention to the purple mullet who has on a mask that displays an expression of laughter.

You change your direction, running towards the large hole in which they entered, passing the man using the bat to beat your male coworker’s face into unrecognition. You hop through the hole and run aimlessly, your only thought to get somewhere safe and hide from not only your current tormentors, but anyone else who’s lingering around to be a menace on this celebratory night.

“Please, please, please.” You beg to whatever deity can hear you above, your legs burning as you feel tightness in your stomach from running faster than you’ve ever had to before.

You force yourself to sprint through the pain as you hear footsteps behind, not bothering to turn around. Your adrenaline pumps as you continue down the sidewalk. You begin to struggle to breathe the longer you push yourself, attempting to take in deep breaths and releasing as a way to fight through the pain. You knew you couldn’t stop, especially with the footsteps closing in behind you.

You make a side glance to an alleyway and turn into it, hoping to find a way through by a shortcut. Before you can continue, a hand grabs your bicep and snatches you back.

“Where do ya think yer goin?” The random middle aged man pulls you toward him with a gun against your head. He wrapped an arm around your neck and leans closer to your ear.

“Yer gonna do what I say.” He growls in your ear as his grip tightens while you’re frozen.

“My, my. You’re in quite the predicament, huh?” The man with the machete states, amusement dripping from his tone. The guy holding you turns his attention to the three masked men with confusion on his face.

“Who the hell are you? Go away! This is my kill!” He exclaims with anger.

“Your kill? We found her first.” The guy with the bat argues with a chuckle.

Your eyes widen when you notice that the guy with the katana is missing. Fear engulfing your mind you pull your head forward before slamming it back against the man’s nose causing him to release his grip and cover his wound. Blood drips over his mouth as you move just in time for the weapon to slice through his body, the blade piercing through his stomach now stained with fresh blood. The sound of his gun hitting the ground echoed through the alleyway.

Holy fuck! I just almost got kabobed!

You swiftly snatch the gun from the ground and clumsily aim it at all four men whose attention has turned to you.

“Back the hell up!” You exclaim, scared out of your mind as your hand shakes while holding the gun. Your reaction causes smirks and laughs from the masked figures in front of you.

“Go ahead. Shoot.” Your eyes widened at the male with the katana as your grip tightened on the gun.

Honestly the only time you’ve ever seen a gun was on tv so this is your first time holding the weapon. You had no idea how to use it besides pulling the trigger, but for some reason you hesitate. You breathe heavily as you back up slowly.

“J-just stay away from me! Let me go a-and I won’t have to.”

You stupid bitch, just shoot them! What’s wrong with you?

You look up at the sky, noticing how the night gradually disappears as dawn forms.

Thank God! If I can just hold out till this is over, I’ll be free!

“If you don’t wanna get shot then go away! Now!” You demand, voice trembling as you figure out how to cock the gun.

“Oh? You’re giving us ultimatums now?” The tallest one questions with mirth.

“It’s hilarious that you think you have a say in anything just because you’re holding a gun.” The purple mullet states, crossing his arms with the machete still in his hand.

The sound of their phones going off causes them to grab the devices from their pockets and eye the notification.

“Seems to be your lucky day.”

“Boss needs us guys, let's go.”

“See ya next time!”

They all walk away, leaving you holding the gun as you watch them walk off. You release a large breath as your hand is placed on your chest to hopefully ease the pounding of your heart. Gun still in hand you rush off to your home.

“I-I survived!” You laugh out when you make it inside, locking the door behind you.

“I need to smoke some tree on god.” You moan out before turning on the news.

You listen to the news anchor announcing the end of the purge. You set the gun on the table and walk to your bedroom. After you gather your pajamas you take a quick shower, wiping residue grime and blood, thinking back on your dead coworkers with a shiver.

A few months since the traumatic event passes and your life has only gotten weirder since then. First and foremost, you decided that you wanted to get out more considering you have been a loner for most of your life and don’t really have any major accomplishments since graduating from highschool. Considering the purge was a more recent holiday, you knew that your death could approach even sooner than before.

Anytime you had downloaded dating apps, you never took it seriously enough to make friends or partners so you went out of your comfort zone and met quite a few people this time. Unfortunately, it seems as though after about a week or so they would ghost you for no particular reason that was stated. No matter how much you thought you had bonded with someone, they disappeared as if they never existed in the first place.

You didn’t take it personally at first but after a few times you wondered if there was something wrong with you. It wasn’t until there was someone you talked to for longer than the deadline in which the others had disappeared. You couldn’t believe you caught the attention of someone so attractive but you accepted the circumstances regardless.

More time passes as you two get to know each other and bond quickly, becoming closer than you ever had with someone in a long time. So close that you two decide to spend the purge together at your apartment. He offered his place but you wanted to stay in the vicinity of your own home just in case.

You had just stepped out of the shower while he was in the living room. After drying yourself and lotioning up you put on a different outfit. Just as you step out of the bathroom, you notice a presence with a familiar suit sitting on your bed with his leg crossed. Icy blue orbs pierce your own as your eyes widen.

“R-Ran!” You yell in fear as you run out of the room. “Someone broke in!” You run to the kitchen to grab the gun, only to be pulled back by your arm. You eye the unknown man who looks almost identical to the male you had been seeing though you could recognize that purple mullet from anywhere.

“God, why’d you have to drag this so long?”

“Isn’t it obvious? He wanted her all to himself.” A male with golden eyes says from the couch.

“Ah, yeah. You’ve caught me.” The man with mid length blonde and black hair chuckles, walking towards you.

“He even grew his hair out. Ridiculous.” The pink haired man spits as he walks into the room.

“W-What the fuck is going on?” You yell, eyeing Ran with confusion and anger.

“You know, we could’ve just snatched her that night. Why’d we have to wait a whole year?”

“Cuz it’s fun, Kazu. Didn’t you enjoy murdering all of those people she talked to.”

“Whatever. Let’s just hurry up so we can explain it to Mikey so he doesn’t kill her.”

“What the hell are all of you talking ab-!” Before you could finish you were interrupted by an impact on your head, succumbing to the darkness.

You groan as you wake up with a throbbing headache, aiming to rub your head only for your arms to not move. When your vision is back you notice that your arms are tied behind the chair you’re forced to sit on.

“What is it about you that caught those idiots' attention?” You look ahead to see a man with platinum hair boring into you with dark orbs. Your breath hitches as you become wary of your surroundings. His aura doesn’t help.

“I-I don’t know what’s going on! Please, let me go!”

“Did I say you could speak?” You immediately shut your mouth as you eye him with discomfort.

“You’ve distracted my men. Why?”

You didn’t know whether to answer or not though it’s not like you have a response anyway. Considering the memories that recollected you knew that Ran had been one of the masked strangers from that night. You had no idea why he did what he did or how you caught their attention to the point where you’re not dead yet. You don’t want to find out, all you want is to go home.

“I guess we’ll have to find out.”

Your eyebrows furrowed in concern. You have no idea what he means by that. As if cued, the said group of males walk in, Ran with his original short haired purple style that you remembered from a year ago.

“You found her, you deal with her.” The short man states with a stoic expression before he stands from his seat and walks out of the room.

[ramblingoak]

The Cardinal's Bride, Chapter 12: Diavolessa

~~ Please visit The Outlaw Brides Masterpost to catch up and read more stories from this world ~~

Thank you to @tasty-ribz for the wanted poster, @ghuleh-recs for the collage and @gothdaddyissues for the dividers!  For some more amazing fanart check out: @missygoesmeow (1 / 2), @snail-shell2335  here, @vahvco here, @ghulehgwen here, @rabidghoul here, @nocterish here, @enjoy-my-swearing​ ( 1 / 2 ), @blacktie-whitenoise (1 /2), @z-xmyers (1/2/3/4), @foxybouquet ( 1 / 2 ), @delulluart here, _simpera_ on instagram and valkyrieinpink on twitter.  Also thank you to @kissingghouls for all her help and emotional support.

Cardinal Copia x Female Reader: Copia is desperate to find you before you end up in Saltarian's clutches.

Warnings: violence (the usual cowboy violence but Reader is put into danger as well and hurt) a lot of angst and smut (apologies for the vagueness but I'm trying to avoid spoiling anything), nsfw 18+ only mdni, 7,900 words

“You look like shit.”

“Grazie, fratello.”

Secondo snorted, shaking his head once before taking a swig of his whiskey.  The two of them were quiet as they sat in his office.  Terzo was dabbing at his face with a wet rag to clean up the blood leftover from Copia beating him when they were out on the road.  He finally gave up, throwing the bloody rag onto the floor and leaning into the back of the couch. 

“You couldn’t keep your mouth shut, could you?”

“Copia’s smarter than you give him credit for.  He already didn’t want to be out there anyway.”

“Usually he can’t wait to get back on the road.”

“Well usually he doesn’t have a pretty girl waiting for him.” 

Secondo groaned, reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose.  

“Think of all you two could accomplish if you thought less with your dicks and more with your brains.”

“Why are you dragging me into this?!  I wasn’t the one that fell in love with Saltarian’s fucking fiancé!”

“You’ve had your own issues with lovers.”  He rubbed his chest idly, stopping when he felt the familiar chain of his grucifix under the fabric.  “I can’t believe you both gave away a family heirloom.”

“For the last time mine was stolen.”

“Then get it back.”

“That was over ten years ago!  Who knows where she is now.”  

“Considering she was able to steal it from under The Morningstar’s nose I’m sure she’s still out there.  Probably robbing banks now.”

Terzo was silent for a moment, a thoughtful look on his face when Secondo glanced at him.  

“I’ve thought about it.  Looking for her.”  Secondo smirked but when Terzo noticed he quickly shook his head.  “Only to get my grucifix back.  Nothing more.”

“Whatever you say, fratellino.”

Quiet once more settled over them both.  The brothers each lost in their own thoughts.  Terzo eventually groaned and sat up, resting his elbows on his knees and turning to look at his brother.  

“Do you believe him?”  When Secondo raised an eyebrow he elaborated.  “Copia.  That he loves her.”

“Sì.  I do.”  

“What are we going to do about it?”

Secondo was quiet again, staring down at the amber liquid in his glass.  He couldn’t get Copia’s face out of his mind.  The last time his brother had looked that determined was when they were all hiding in the woods, the smoke from their burning abbey heavy over their heads.  Secondo knew then that Copia would stop at nothing to protect his princess, to protect the woman he loved. 

He also knew he had a choice to make now, one that would have far reaching consequences for them all.  Was he ready to fight again?  Was he ready to possibly lose more of his family?  This could be their last chance to get their lives back.  Their last chance to get their church back.  

Secondo wasn’t sure if he still believed anymore.  It was hard to after the last decade.  After everything that had happened, things none of them deserved.  He had built a life here for everyone but there had always been something missing.  Something that helped keep them all together has one.  

He knew what he needed to do.  

“We’re going to fight.”  He stood up, pulling his grucifix out from under his shirt and letting it hang out in the open.  “We’re going to kill Saltarian once and for all.”

“Pay up shithead.”

“What the fuck are you on about?”

“Our bet.  I won.”

“There are a lot of bets between us so you need to be more specif—ow!”

“Copia admitted he loved her!  It was amazing, I think Swiss even cried a little.” 

Swiss gamely nodded his head, grinning when Dewdrop turned to glare at him. 

“Well I didn’t hear it so it doesn’t count.”

“The fuck it doesn’t, Swiss and I both heard it.  Even Secondo did!  You can ask him when we get back.”

“Uh, no thanks.  I’m not sure anyone that brings up Copia or Princess around him will survive.”   Dewdrop glanced up towards where Copia and Aether were riding a bit ahead of the group.  “Is he even gonna let us come back?”

“He better, I left my favorite gun there.”   Sunshine and Dew shared a grin before she held her hand out towards him.  “Now pay up.”

“Lucifer’s balls, fine.”  He rummaged in the pockets of his coat before he came up with a crumpled bill, balling it up even more and throwing it at her head.  “Don’t spend it all in one place.”

The three of them quieted down after that, all lost in their own thoughts.  Sunshine kept her eyes on Copia and Aether, watching how Copia kept getting more and more tense the longer it took them to find Princess.  Rain had picked up her trail heading south, but as of yet they hadn’t run into any other signs of her.  Right now Rain and Mountain were scouting ahead, trying to see if she had stayed on the road.

Sunshine was hoping they didn’t find out she was dragged off of it.

“What’s going on now?”

Swiss’s voice snapped Sunshine out of her brooding and she focused on Copia again, noticing that he and Aether had stopped.  They seemed to be having a heated conversation so she spurred her horse and quickly headed their way. 

“I don’t want to talk about this now.”

“Then when?  Look, Boss, I’m not trying to talk you out of anything, I just want to know what you’re thinking.”

“Aether right now there is only one thing going through my mind and that is that I have to find her.” 

“I know, I know.”  Aether caught Sunshine’s eyes and sighed.  “We’re going to find her Boss, I promise.” 

“Then keep moving!  We’re not going to find her standing around arguing.”  

Copia’s shoulders sagged then and Sunshine could see how exhausted he was, how worried.  She moved closer to Copia, wanting to comfort him in some way but a sharp whistle got her attention.  They all looked up the trail to see Rain and Mountain in the distance, both focusing down on the ground. 

“Do you think they found her trail?”

Copia didn’t even bother answering Aether, he snapped Brizio’s reins and took off towards them.  Sunshine glanced towards Rain again and saw him waving his arms, almost like he wanted them to stay away.  Her blood instantly ran cold and she shouted after Copia.

“No!  Copia stay here!”

She groaned when he didn’t stop, instead riding after him as fast as she could.  He had already reached the two Ghouls and she could see Mountain trying in vain to push him away from where Rain was standing. 

It wasn’t until she got there that she realized why. 

She could smell it first, the sharp smell of blood.  As she got closer she could see that the ground was soaked with it.  Copia was taking a few steps forward, his boots sinking into the wet earth.  His hands were shaking, clenched into fists as his eyes stayed on the ground.  Rain walked up to him, a hat in his hand that Sunshine easily recognized.  The same one Princess had been wearing since they left the farmhouse. 

It was stained with blood. 

Copia only had it in his hands for a moment before it slipped from his fingers and he fell to the ground.  Sunshine was rushing over to him in an instant, her hands falling to his shoulders.  The smell was stronger now and the sight of how much blood there was made her feel sick.  She lowered her head, squeezing Copia’s shoulders when she felt him start to tremble. 

“Copia, I-“

“It’s too much.”

“What?”  She crouched down next to him, freezing when she saw the tears running down his cheeks.  “What’s too much?”

“The blood.  She’s lost too much.”

Sunshine stayed silent, not wanting to admit the same out loud.  It was too much, too much for anybody to lose.  She turned to look behind her when she heard footsteps and she watched as Swiss, Aether and Dew stopped a few feet away, their hats in their hands.  When she looked back she noticed Rain walking along the edge of the trail, stopping and kneeling down after a moment.  He turned her way, pointing down at the ground before disappearing into the underbrush. 

She gave Copia one last squeeze and then stood up, walking over to where he entered,  noticing that the grass was flattened down.  Her stomach turned thinking of Princess’s body being dragged somewhere and left for the vultures.  Tears started to prick at her eyes and she turned back, meeting Copia’s gaze as he watched her from his knees. 

“This is my fault.”

“Copia, no.”

“I got her into this mess, I took her away from the life she was supposed to have.”

“A life she didn’t want!”  Sunshine moved back to his side and knelt in front of him.  “She wanted to be with you.  She loved you.”

“And now she’s dead.”  The words were practically spit from him and he dropped his hands onto the ground, digging his fingers into the bloody soil.  “They killed her.  They took her away from me.”

His voice was seething with rage and she found herself thinking back to that day of the attack, of the fire.  The only other time she had seen him like this.

She opened her mouth to try and reassure him but the sound of someone rushing through the grass stopped her.  Everyone turned to see Rain sprinting onto the trail, his chest heaving and a knife clutched in his hand.

A knife Sunshine recognized.

“It’s not her!”  Rain grinned and stumbled over to Copia, grabbing his arms and yanking him to his feet.  “It’s not her.  She’s alive.”

Your head hurt.

It was hard to keep your eyes open.  Every time you opened them a wave of dizziness hit you.  There was a constant dull throb, an ache that seemed to echo through your whole body.  It hurt, it hurt so much but you were trying to be strong.  You couldn’t give up, you refused to lose hope. 

You didn’t want the bastards to see you cry. 

Their laughter echoed around the small camp.  You weren’t sure exactly how many there were.  At least three of them had met you on the trail but there could have been more waiting further on.  They had rode up right when you had stopped your horse and been about to turn around.  Copia had to have been back by then and all you wanted to do was see him again.  To have him hold you and tell you everything was going to be ok. 

“She awake yet?”

You shivered at the voice nearby.  It was the same man that had knocked you out.  One moment you had been fighting off a man that had gotten behind you on the horse and the next you had turned to see the butt of a rifle descending upon you.  The ground crunched in front of you and you did your best to steady your breathing, trying not to give away that you were awake. 

“Leave her, we’ll deal with her in the morning.” 

“What if I want to deal with her now?”  A shadow fell over your face, blocking the fire.  You could smell his awful stench and it made you nearly gag around the cloth between your teeth.  “I thought Salty was gonna kill her anyway?”

“Who the fuck knows, he changes his damn mind every day.” 

“Wasn’t Goore supposed to nab her before?” 

You felt a hand on your head and fought to stop from jerking away. 

“They were supposed to, yeah.  But The Cardinal kicked his ass.  Took out like twenty guys too.”

“The fucking Cardinal.”  A glob of moisture hit your cheek and you realized the man had spit on you.  “You sweet on him, girl?” 

His fingers suddenly tightened in your hair and you cried out.  You reached up to try to pull him off but he grabbed the rope around your wrists and slammed them back onto the ground.  The man was grinning at you, when you managed to glare at him.  The pain was even more intense with how hard he was pulling on your hair. 

“Hey!  We aren’t supposed to touch her!”

The man holding you was abruptly shoved away and you yelped when he managed one last yank on your hair.  Tears were falling down your face, soaking the rag around your mouth.  You heard them scuffle close by and you pulled away as far as you could, trying to steer clear of them. 

“What does it matter?  We can just say she showed up like that!  Blame it on The Cardinal.”

“Salty ain’t gonna believe that and you know it.  He’s already gonna be pissed about her face.” 

“Well no one else was doing anything!  I wasn’t gonna drag her back to camp kicking and screaming.”  You dared to look over at the men, flinching when you saw their eyes on you.  “We should just kill her and be done with it.”

“I fucking told you Salty wants her alive.  He made some deal with that asshole at the casino.” 

“Fuck.  Fine, whatever.”  He shoved past the man and walked by, kicking dirt on you as he went.  “But if she freaks out again I’m slicing her throat.” 

Things quieted down around you as he walked off so you tried to even your breathing.  The pain wasn’t getting any better but if you wanted to get out of this you’d need to try to fight through it.  You couldn’t help but think of Copia and what he would do when he found your note.  Would he believe the things you said?  Would he even be coming after you? 

“Hey, girl.”  The one who seemed to be the leader crouched down in front of you.  While you were grateful he had gotten the other man to leave you alone there was no kindness in his eyes.  “Do me a favor and stay put, got it?”

You nodded, wincing when your head swam at the motion.  He didn’t move for a moment and you were starting to worry he was gonna hurt you like the other man did but he finally stood up.  His eyes were cold as they looked down at you and you felt like crying again. 

“No one’s gonna save you so you best behave.  We’re getting paid a pretty penny to bring you to Saltarian alive.”  He smirked then, slipping a knife out of a small sheath at his belt and pointing it down at you.  “But we’ll also get paid well even if you’re dead.”

He didn’t wait to see a response, he simply turned and ambled away.  The tension seeped out of you then but you stayed as still as possible.  It was impossible to stop your tears now and they ran down your face freely, pooling in the dirt beneath you.  Silently you begged for help, begged to be rescued and allowed to escape from the fate others had chosen for you. 

You begged to see Copia one last time. 

“There’s ten of them but only three at the camp with her.”

Copia nodded, taking in everything Mountain and Rain had been relaying to him.  The ten men weren’t going to be a problem, Copia knew they could be easily taken care of.  It was the fact that you were there as well, vulnerable, that made things difficult.

“Where’s Princess?”

Sunshine had stayed close to him since they had stumbled upon the blood on the ground.  Acting like an anchor almost.  He appreciated it more than he could say, he appreciated all of his Ghouls right now so much.  They had stuck with him for so long and through so much.  

They deserved an easier life.

“She’s on the ground by the fire.”  Mountain met Copia’s eyes when he glanced up at him.  “We didn’t see her move but she’s tied up pretty good.”

“Probably just sleeping.”  Sunshine fiddled with one of her knives, slipping it into the sleeve of her coat.  “Or unconscious.”  

“We should have Dew and Swiss snipe the lookouts while the rest of us get closer.  Take ‘em by surprise.”

Copia nodded silently, his thoughts still caught up with the image of you hurt and tied up on the ground.  He flinched when a hand brushed his shoulder, turning to meet Sunshine’s eyes.

“They’ll probably leave first thing in the morning, we should hit them right before then.”  Sunshine stood up and slung her rifle over her shoulder.  “Before they’re ready to go.”

“I don’t want to wait any longer, she could be seriously hurt.”

“If she was seriously hurt they just would have killed her.”  Mountain held up his hands when Copia glared at him.  “They wouldn’t waste time bringing her body all the way to Saltarian’s.  They’d just say you killed her and dumped her body somewhere.”

“It doesn’t matter!  She could be hurt and I don’t want her to be alone with them any more than she has to!”

“Damn it Copia, just listen to us!  We don’t want her to be in any danger either but the best way to avoid her getting hurt any more than she might already be is to wait till the right moment.”

Copa turned away from Sunshine and Mountain, his shoulders sagging as their words sunk in.  They were right, he knew they were right but it was killing him to leave you alone there when you were so close.  He sighed and turned back around, ready to accede their point.

“Fine, we’ll wai–”

A sharp yell rang out from the camp and everyone’s eyes whipped in that direction.  Copia took a few steps forward, his legs suddenly shaking from fear.  In front of them the grass started to shake and Dew flung himself into the small clearing everyone had gathered in.

“She’s running!”

Despite his fear Copia couldn’t help but grin, turning towards the rest of his Ghouls and nodding.

“Then let’s find her first.”

Copia would be so mad at you.

Although technically you weren’t running away from him so you supposed it was okay.  You just couldn’t stand to be around those men any longer.  It seemed like they were getting more and more irritated at your presence as the night had worn on.  The man that seemed to be in charge didn’t have as much control over them as you liked and when he had said he was going to sleep for a few hours you had decided that was your best chance.

Running away was much easier without a dress on and you crashed through the vegetation around the camp.  The moon was high enough to help light your way but even then you still had no idea where you were going.  No idea the direction you were stumbling in.  Not that it really mattered, you just needed to get away.  You’d worry about where you were once you were safe.

“Get back here!”

You made the mistake of turning to look behind you, the dark voice startling you.  It was the man that had spit on you earlier and you shuddered, trying to move even faster to get away.  He wasn’t at the camp when you had run and you had hoped he’d be too far away to catch up to you.  

Unfortunately you weren’t that lucky.

He continued to shout after you, promising to make you regret taking off from camp.  The fear started to take a hold of you again and you felt tears prick at your eyes.  No matter how much you begged your legs to move faster it wasn’t enough.  The man was getting closer and closer until finally you felt his hands grab at your arms and yank you back against him.

“Don’t touch me!”  

The man grunted when you kicked back at him, your foot connecting with his knee.  With an angry growl he tried to wrap an arm around your waist but you slammed your head back against his, grinning when you heard the sickening crunch of his nose.  Your glee was short lived and with a curse he shoved you down onto the ground.

“You’re gonna pay for that.”  He reached for the gun at his belt and pulled it out of its holster, pulling the hammer back and pointing it down at you.  “Salty will just have to find another fiancé.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, waiting for the shot.  Pictures of Copia appeared in your mind and you let out a broken sob.  You loved him so much and now you’d never get to tell hi–

A loud shot rang out and your entire body flinched, waiting for the inevitable pain of the bullet.  When seconds passed with nothing you slowly opened your eyes, expecting to see the man still there glaring at you.  Instead you saw him falling to the side, his eyes wide and unseeing.  A figure emerged behind him, stepping into the moonlight and you let out a heavy sob when a familiar set of mismatched eyes became visible.

“What did I say about running away?”

You couldn’t help but let out a laugh but you were quickly overcome with emotion again.  Your hands reached out for him, desperate for his touch.  Desperate to be held by him again.  Copia quickly obliged, dropping to his knees next to you and gathering you up in his arms.  He pressed kisses into your hair as you cried and whispered promise after promise that he’d never let you get hurt again.

The journey back to the casino was mostly quiet.

When you and Copia had gotten back to the camp the sun was starting to rise in the sky.  The Ghouls milling around and cleaning things up.  Sunshine had been the first to rush over, enveloping you and a long hug that brought more tears to your eyes.  When she pulled away she was holding your dagger out to you, the one you had shoved into the first man that had tried to grab you.

“You did what you had to, Princess.”

You nodded, leaning back into the comfort of Copia’s embrace for a moment.  The other Ghouls came up one after the other.  The biggest surprise for you was Dewdrop, he had thrown his arms around both you and Copia with a wide grin on his face.  Copia had to shove him off when he lingered too long but he fell back with a laugh, winking at you before he let Aether take his place.

The calm Ghoul didn’t embrace you, instead he took your hands and started gently unwrapping the rope that was tied tightly around them.  You hissed as they came off, your skin red and raw underneath.  Copia kept an arm around you as Aether rubbed a salve over the skin, quickly wrapping them in some clean cloth with a promise to clean them again when you got back to the casino.

Your other wounds were given a quick check before Aether nodded at Copia and walked away.  Your knuckles were fairly scraped up with a few larger cuts across them.  The wound on your scalp would definitely need to be cleaned but thankfully it didn’t hurt as much anymore.  The throbbing in your skull had faded to a dull ache as well.  You couldn’t wait to get back to the casino and hopefully have a long bath.

You had planned on asking about what had happened with Terzo and what they had done when they’d gotten back to the casino but as soon as you were settled in front of Copia on Brizio you couldn’t keep your eyes open.  The exhaustion of everything that had happened since you had left The Ministry caught up with you and you were asleep in seconds.  You didn’t even fully wake up until you were riding back into town, the casino large and looming in front of you.

Mountain came over, helping you off Brizio easily.  You were turning to wait for Copia but Cumulus was rushing over, Aurora hot on her heels.

“Come on Princess, let’s get you cleaned up.”  

Copia dropped down next to you and prodded you over to the Ghoulettes.

“Go on, let them take care of you.”  He pulled you close for a moment, not seeming to care about all the eyes on the both of you.  “I’ll meet you in my room soon, yeah?”

You nodded and took Cumulus’s hand, letting her pull you towards the Ghoul’s building.  Her and Aurora chatted while they led you to a room full of steaming bathtubs, quickly helping you out of your dirty clothes and into one of the tubs.  You let their words wash over you, too tired to speak much yourself.  In truth your mind was too busy to pay attention anyway.  Thinking about what might happen now with Copia’s brothers, with Saltarian.  About what might happen with Copia himself.

The sun was completely gone when they were done.  Aurora handed you a familiar dark red shirt and you blushed when she grinned at you.  They gave you a robe next and led you up the back set of stairs to avoid the common area.  It wasn’t as loud as you had expected and you imagined that most everyone was probably tired themselves or working in the casino.  The door to Copia’s room was familiar and welcome and you gladly accepted Aurora’s hug when she let you in and left.

You tried not to be disappointed that Copia wasn’t there.

His room was much like it was when you had left it the other night, although it was clear that he had left it in a rush.  You made your way to the bed, dropping the robe on the floor and sitting down.  There was a soft knock on the door and you quickly grabbed a blanket, getting your bare legs covered right as Copia walked in.

“How are you feeling, Principessa?”

“Good.  Better.”  You gave him a soft smile as he walked over, your eyes taking him in.  He was only in his pants and a button up shirt, his suspenders clinging to his shoulders.  “Clean.”

He laughed softly as he knelt at your feet, his eyes roaming over the blanket for a moment before setting a bowl of water and a rag down onto the floor.

“Let’s see those hands, eh?”

Copia was quiet as he cleaned your knuckles.

You stayed quiet too, content to just be close to him.  To be someplace safe with him.  He had scrubbed his face of the grime from the road and the fight so you were able to see him without his paint.  A rare treat that let you see the bags under his eyes, the toll that the life he had been living had taken on him.  You let yourself imagine a different life for him, one that had no battles and no worries.  A peaceful life in the country maybe, on a farm with room for his Ghouls...

And hopefully room for you too.

He pressed his rag into a deeper cut and you hissed, pulling your hand away to cradle it against your chest.

“Mi dispiace, Principessa.  I’m not sure I have the most gentle hands for this.”  He dropped the rag into the bowl of water and sat back on his heels, his hands resting on your blanket covered knees.  “Let me go get Aether.  Or Sunshine?  They’ll do a better job than me.”

“No!”  You dropped your hands over his, covering his own scraped up skin with your own.  “Please, no.  Don’t leave me.”

“I’m not much of a nurse.”

“I don’t need you to be anything, Copia.  I just need you here with me.”

He leaned forward then, moving back onto his knees and dropping his head into your lap.  You felt his lips brush against the backs of your hands, ghosting along the cuts and bruises you had gotten.  His shoulders shook slightly and you couldn’t help but fall forward yourself, burying your nose in his soft hair.

“I’ll never let you get hurt again.”  

Copia leaned back, freeing one of his hands from yours to cup your cheek.  His thumb brushed across your skin briefly before he pulled you close and pressed his lips to yours.  The kiss was one you didn’t think you would ever forget.  It was soft and full of promises, promises neither of you had spoken aloud yet but they were there between you regardless.  All too quickly he pulled away, a soft smile on his face.

It was your favorite smile of his.

“I’m ok, I’m safe.  Thanks to you.”  He ducked his head down like he always did in moments like this but you let him.  Deciding a little teasing would help ease the heavy emotions between you.  “Although I think the Ghouls did most of the work.”

Copia laughed as he took the rag up again, squeezing the excess water out before taking one of your hands once more.

“I don’t know, I think you were doing pretty good on your own.”

You couldn’t help but grin, proud that Copia thought so.  Some of his hair fell across his forehead and you reached out with your other hand to brush it back, letting your fingers linger against his skin a little longer than necessary.  He looked up from cleaning your hand and caught your eyes.  Slowly he turned his head to press a kiss to your palm before looking back down to your hand.

As he worked you let your mind wander, running over every moment you had shared with Copia since you had met.  You had to stifle a laugh at that.  ‘Met’ wasn’t exactly the best way to describe your initial meeting.  The man had kidnapped you after all.  The same man you had spent your nights dreaming about.  An escape from a world of being used as a bargaining chip in your father’s business deals and a future of being something purely ornamental.

But all that changed with a wink and a grin from the man at your feet.

“I’m pretty sure I broke that one guy’s nose.”  Copia chuckled, shaking his head while he muttered something in Italian.  “What was that?”

“Nothing important.”

You poked his leg with your foot, the blanket moving out of the way to expose part of your bare leg.  Copia stopped cleaning your hand when he saw it, not moving at all except for the flexing of his jaw.  

“Tell me.”  He still hadn’t looked away from your leg, like his brain was having trouble processing the knowledge that you were naked save for his borrowed shirt.  You gave him another poke, this time jamming your toes against him a little harder.  “Tell me right now.”

“Have you always been this demanding?”

“Yes.  Now tell me what you said.”  When he remained silent you attempted to poke him again but he grabbed your foot, easily holding onto it when you tried to pull it away.  You shivered when he ran his calloused thumb along the side.  “Copia.”  

“Diavolessa.”

“In English!”

Copia finally looked away from your leg, slowly running his eyes up your body until he was looking right into yours.  His soft smile had now been replaced by that insufferable grin of his and despite how much it annoyed you it was hard not to match it with one of your own.

“Per favore.”

“Per fav–oh!  Copia, no!”  

Your words ended in a shriek as he dug his fingers into the bottom of your foot.  You fell back on your elbows and tried to kick away from him, desperate to escape the tickling sensation.  With a deep laugh he finally relented and let go.  Your back hit the wall beside his bed as you scrambled to get away, the blanket completely falling from your legs and getting pushed to the side with the movement.

He stood up then, his eyes dark as they stayed fixed on you.  Where your boldness came from you weren’t sure but you spread your legs slowly before tucking them under you and rising to your knees.  Copia reached up and shrugged out of his suspenders, his fingers quickly going to work on the buttons of his shirt.

“Come here, she-devil.”

“Per favore.”

His smile was brilliant and it had you moving closer despite him not saying anything.  When you were close enough he quickly reached out and grabbed you around your waist, yanking your body against his.  Your hands landed on his chest to keep yourself steady, your fingers tangling in the dark hair that covered him.  He dipped his head down but you quickly moved yours back, raising your eyebrow when he let out a heavy sigh.

“Please, Principessa.”

You both moved at the same time, your mouths meeting in a desperate kiss.  One of his hands dropped to cover your ass and when his fingers flexed against your flesh you moaned into his mouth.  The noise had him breaking away with a moan of his own but he stayed close, sliding both of his hands down your back until they were gripping the back of your thighs.  

“Copia, wha-”  

He yanked your legs out from under you and when your back hit his bed again you laughed, nearly giddy with happiness.  Copia finished unbuttoning his shirt and pulled it over his head, immediately unbuckling his belt and then working on the buttons of his pants.  In the next moment he was naked in front of you, standing proudly in the moonlight but with fidgeting fingers at his sides.

Copia was breathtaking.  It didn’t matter that you had never seen anyone else like this, Copia was the only one you needed to see this way.  His shoulders and arms were strong, well muscled from years of work.  Your eyes moved down his chest, lingering on his tattoo for a moment before running down to his soft belly and sides.  His thick thighs flexed as he climbed onto the bed, slowly moving between your legs and then reaching out to grip the bottom of his shirt you wore.

When he hesitated you took over and pulled the deep red shirt you loved to steal over your head.  Copia looked you over much like you had done to him, his eyes lingering on the bruises you had received.  He was hesitating again, like he was afraid to move, afraid to touch you.  It was strange not seeing him confident and cocky.  You reached out for his hands, tangling your fingers together and pulling them to cover your heart.

“Principessa…”

“I am here, we are here.  Safe and together.”  You lifted your foot and ran it up and down his thigh.  “Please don’t make me wait anymore.”

“I won’t.  I’ll give you everything.”  He pulled a hand away and slipped his arm around your waist, tugging you across the bed so your head was laying on his pillows.  “Anything you want.”

You reached up to cup his cheek, your fingers brushing against his sideburn.  Copia lowered himself down to settle against you, holding himself up by his elbows.  The moonlight caught his eyes and like always the white one gave that almost otherworldly glow.  You trailed your fingers across his cheek and down to his mouth, running them along his full bottom lip before dropping it down to your chest.  

“I just want you.”

It was like a dam broke between you, Copia swiftly lowered his head to yours and took your mouth in a rough kiss.  Oh you would never tire of this, of the way he seemed to use his entire body to kiss you.  He buried a hand in your hair and tilted your head so he could deepen it.  You opened your mouth under his and his tongue immediately tangled with yours.  

At the same time his hips started grinding down against you, his hard cock brushing across your lower belly.  You could feel him leaking already as the tip moved across your skin, trailing the proof of how turned on he was.  Of how turned on you were making him.  That knowledge had you pressing harder back against him, hooking a leg around the back of his leg to try to get as close as possible.

Copia pulled away, groaning when you ground up towards him again.  He began nipping at your lips, causing little zings of pleasure to shoot through you.  When you tried to capture his lips again he smiled and pulled away just out of reach.

“Patience, Principessa.”  He began to drop kisses down your chin and along your jawline.  His teeth nipped at your earlobe, sucking it between his lips to soothe the hurt with his tongue before letting go.  “I’ve been waiting for this for quite some time.”

“Since wh-oh, since when?”

He didn’t answer at first, content to keep kissing you.  His lips trailed down your neck to your shoulders before moving to your collar bones.  You hissed when he nipped there too but he quickly ran his tongue across the mark, smirking when he looked up to see you watching him.

“Probably since that first day when you busted my nose.”

You snorted, covering your mouth with your hand to try to stifle your laughter.  It didn’t last long though, Copia continued his path down your chest until his mouth was hovering over a breast.  His hot breath had you trembling with anticipation, waiting for him to continue his worship of your body.  It seemed like forever before he peeked his tongue out and flicked it across your nipple, eliciting a sharp gasp from you.

“Copia, don’t tease.  I just…”

His mouth dropped down, pulling the tip of your breast into his mouth and sucking.  Your body bucked off the bed and you buried your hands in his hair to keep him there.  The hot, wet suction of his mouth felt so good and it only amplified when he nipped at your nipple.  You mewled when he pulled off with a pop, your hands trying to keep him close to your chest.

“In my church, Principessa, this is one way we worship.”  He leaned down and pulled your nipple between his lips, hollowing his cheeks and sucking roughly.  Copia slid his free hand up your chest and took hold of your other breast, massaging it between his calloused fingers for a moment before he pulled his mouth away again.  “You are my altar.”  

Your body was trembling in earnest now as he moved lower, his mouth and tongue leaving a trail across your belly button and then stopping right above your cunt.  He pressed his hands against the insides of your thighs, pushing them apart so you were open before him.  You watched Copia lower his head and take a deep breath right over you before he groaned deep in his chest.  

He lowered his head even more until his nose brushed against your clit, teasing around it a few times before sliding his tongue out and across the small nub.  Your hips bucked up immediately, desperate for more contact.  Copia must have been just as desperate as you because he quickly went at it again, tonguing your clit over and over again until it was red and swollen.  

You were a whimpering mess already, your thighs quivering beneath his hands as his mouth worshiped you.  He pulled your clit between his lips, suckling it like he had done your nipple.  The sensation was racing you towards your orgasm and you buried a hand in his hair to try to keep him there.  You wanted to come so badly, you wanted to hit that peak under his mouth.  Copia groaned around your clit when your nails dug into his scalp and after one last hard suck you finally got what you needed, your orgasm tearing through you and making you cry out.

As you laid there panting Copia was still making noises against your cunt, his mouth now lower and his tongue licking long stripes between your lips.  Your hand fell out of his hair and you instead covered one of his hands on your thighs.  You barely had the strength to do anything but watch him, watch as your wetness covered his nose and mouth.  His mustache was soaked and shining in the moonlight as well and it tickled your sensitive skin as he continued to mouth at you.

When he tongued across your trembling entrance you finally moved, your hips jumping up to meet his mouth involuntarily.  Copia chuckled darkly, his eyes finally leaving your wet, pink flesh to catch your gaze.  He didn’t look away as he pressed his tongue against it, his eyes only drifting closed when he was able to push it inside of you and lap at the inside of your walls.  

“Ah!  Copia!”

He kept his mouth on you but you could feel his growl echo into you.  Your cries of his name spurred him on and he lapped roughly at you, closing his lips around your entrance and sucking, like he was desperate for every drop of your previous release.  You didn’t even notice one of his hands leaving your thigh before his mouth pulled away and two fingers prodded at your entrance.  They easily slipped inside and he went to work thrusting them in and out of you, scissoring his fingers off and on to stretch you.

To get you ready for him.

Your blood was so loud in your ears you didn’t even register Copia was speaking at first.  His voice was low as he continued to pump his fingers.

“...mine, Principessa and I will give you everything I can.  Anything in my power.”  

Tears pricked at your eyes as you watched him, as you listened to him.  You were close to another orgasm and you were absolutely desperate for it, your hips moving to meet his thrusting fingers.  Copia pulled his hand off your thigh and gripped the base of his cock, letting out an almost pained groan as he squeezed himself.  The sight of him nearly losing control of himself was all it took for you to hit your peak again and you came with a shuddering cry, your inner walls contracting around his fingers.

You weren’t sure how long you drifted in that zone of pleasure.  The brush of lips across your cheeks finally brought you back to yourself and when you opened your eyes Copia was right there, gazing down at you with such a look of fondness you nearly had to close your eyes again.  He must have wiped his mouth off but his mustache was still in a state and you reached up with a shaking hand to help get it under control, smiling when he rolled his eyes.

“Anything in your power?”

“Sì.”

His cock brushed against you, still hard and leaking.  You spread your legs to try to open yourself up for him again.  Needing to feel him against you.  Needing to feel him in you.

“Only you, Copia.  That’s all.”  He smiled, ducking his head down for a moment to collect himself.  When he raised it up again his smile was wide and you couldn’t help but match it while you brushed his hair off his forehead again.  “At least for right now.”

He dropped his head into the crook of your shoulder, his body quaking with laughter.  You took the opportunity to wrap a leg around his waist and press yourself against his cock.  His laughter turned into a deep groan and he quickly rose up to kiss you roughly.  The taste of yourself on his lips had you whimpering, chasing the taste with your tongue.  You angled your hips so his cock brushed against your cunt and he broke away quickly with a growl.

“Diavolessa.”

You couldn’t find the strength to respond, you had become so desperate for him.  Desperate for him to enter you and make you his.  You continued to rock your hips against him, wanting him so badly you felt delirious with it.  When he began to move back you tightened your leg, worried he was going to move away.  Copia whispered something soft in Italian towards you before dropping another kiss to your lips.

He stayed close, but moved away enough to settle more comfortably between your legs.  You watched with bated breath as he stroked his cock, his eyes briefly falling shut.  Feeling bold you reached out and covered his hand with yours, helping him pleasure himself.  He called you a she-devil again under his breath but you just smiled and continued to touch him.  His cock was hot and throbbing, twitching almost desperately towards you.

“Are you ready, Principessa?”  

You nodded desperately, your mouth falling open when he gently removed your hand from his cock and began to press himself against your entrance.  Your body welcomed him, opening around the head of his cock and stretching as he pushed inside.  You wrapped your arms around his back and clung to him.  Worried that if you let go he would disappear and that this would be a dream.  A sob left you and Copia immediately pulled back so he could see your face.

“I’m sorry, I just…I thought I wouldn’t see you again and now…”

“You’re not going to get rid of me that easily.”  

Copia started to pull out, his cock dragging along your walls slowly for just a moment before he pushed back in.  He continued to move like that until he was finally fully inside of you, his hips flush against yours.  You kept your arms tight around him, holding him close so his face was hovering over yours.

The moonlight still highlighted his face and your eyes traced his freckles as your body adjusted to him being inside of you.  The silver in his hair shone just like his white eye and you couldn’t stop yourself from smiling up at him.  You had to tell him, you couldn’t hold back anymore.

“I love you.”

You weren’t sure what to expect, you weren’t even sure he felt the same but it didn’t matter.  You needed him to know.  Copia let out a breath, lowering his head to kiss you briefly before pulling up with a smile on his face.

“E ti amo.”

He leaned down to kiss you again, over and over along your lips and cheeks and nose.  

“Copia?”

“I love you, Principessa.  More than I can say and more than I have any right to.”  He moved away then, holding himself up by his hands as he stared down at you.  Slowly he began to pull his cock out, stopping when only the tip was inside of you.  “You’re mine.  Forever.”

He pushed back in, slow and steady.  You pressed your head back against the pillow as your body took him, the stretch delicious.  Copia stayed flush against you, watching your face like he was waiting for something.  You let out a breathless laugh as you wrapped both your legs around his waist and kept him close.

“Forever.”

Go to Chapter 13: And You Can Hold Me

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[flamboyant-king]

The world is a stage and I'm God's favorite clown. The heavens cheer for an encore and I'm revived once more.

I have this one scenario that brings Cain to respect Samson more than just some unpaid "bodyguard." I just can't freaking draw it for the life of me. So, have some stuff I drew and have my intentions/the context under the cut. Bazinga.

Eve catches wind of possible treasures that, of course, attract Cain's attention, so she gives them the coordinates and let's them do their thing. Cain and Samson are lured into a cave where they are ambushed by 30-ish drug cartel members because Mr. Cain just loves money, mischief, and manipulation. Before they could even react, Cain is shot multiple times and collapses to the floor. Samson was shot too, but remains standing looking down at Cain. The men taunt Samson for being a poor bodyguard and shoot at him again. Samson is unfazed as he walks over to one of the stalagmites. The men are at a loss, why does it seem like the bullets do nothing? Samson grabs the tip of the stalagmite and kicks at the base, detaching the thing from the floor. The men are intimidated, realizing what is going to happen next.

It's clubbin' time. *beats you to death* *beats you to death* *beats you death* x30

It's a gosh dang mess. Bludgeoned. Crushed. Impaled. Minced. Just blood all over the place. A normal Thursday afternoon for Samson. And a normal episode of Samson goes Bananas broadcasted on Angel TV.

When it seems they're all dead, Samson calms down. It's quiet now. Except for a quiet moan. How unlikely, someone alive after his rampage? He turns around and is absolutely dumbfounded. Cain's lying on the ground rubbing his head like he's hungover. He pushes himself up and looks around. Bodies strewn about and Samson in the middle of it all covered in blood. All of their blood.

"Cain? You're Alive?"

Cain looks at himself now. He's covered in blood too. His own blood.

"Oh. Haha yeah. You see. I can't die. I'm not allowed to die. GOD WON'T LET ME DIE!"

Cain has his spontaneous old man meltdown while Samson just watches. It's a lot to take in and it's a lot to let out. Cain gasps for air and the angels laugh out loud. Humanity is hilarious. Mortality is amusing.

Samson kneels down in front of Cain, placing a hand on his shoulder, mirroring the gesture of when they first met.

"I know I'm here to protect you, but can I promise you this? With all my strength, not only will I keep you safe, but I will also be the one who kills you."

The angels' laughter stops.

Cain chuckles.

"I hope you do."

And then they kiss. No they don't. But wouldn't that be pretty gay? Nah, they leave the cave and go back to their car that's parked a mile or so deep into the forest.

Samson gets in first. Cain has to make a quick phone call to his dear friend, Eve.

Cain hangs up and sits in the car, as well. It's quiet now.

Then Samson starts snoring.

Unbelievable.

--

You know me, I like to have a bit of drama sprinkled in my shit posting just for continuity and like a basis to go off of.

Eve was one of Cain's blood donation "whores," but Samson is here now, so she's relaxing and just gathering information. She usually cleans up the messes Cain leaves behind. Evidence, bodies, or just looting. (I have an example of a mess she cleans up, but that's backstory I might get to.)

Cain will try any and every method to bring in more money, maybe robbing banks, maybe treasure hunting, maybe working a lemonade stand. OH MY GOD, Jacob and Esau running a lemonade stand for Cain that's freaking so stupid. Cain mostly is a loan shark, but he dabbles in the black market with stolen goods and stolen guts.

Samson has some debt with Cain he is repaying by being his "bodyguard." Sending Bethany to stupid fancy Christian academy is expensive. Assisting Cain on excursions, breaking traps, or helping collect pay from certain folks. Samson and Bethany get to sleep at Cain's hideout, but shhh no one can know where it is. Bethany, why did you bring Lazarus here. Gosh dangit.

The practically immortality comes from Cain's Curse "bestowed" on him by God for killing his brother, Abel. (Of which I do have sketched, but that's a mess Eve will have to clean up too.) No harm can come to Cain and those who harm him get returned to them sevenfold. So, if Cain is stabbed, the person would be wrung like a wet towel and slapped across the asscheeks of an elephant and laid down to be trampled on by said elephant.

That's what I got so far. Have Samson all bloodied up close and personal cause gosh dangit I did good on the blood. Love you guys!

Have a good and cringey freaking day.

[jamiesfootball]

more leverage/tl thoughts. any time they need someone undercover in sports or labor, they send eliot. which of course makes sense. for eliot. and also probably au roy.

but consider: jamie is NO good at any of that stuff. he can do a lot of sports, especially anything where you have to be fast or agile, and he takes the boxing job - though he has to fight roy on it, but roy is on his last legs and they all know it. but when it comes to labor jamie doesn't know how to do shit, and he's prissy too. doesn't like getting his hands dirty. he's totally comfortable in his own sweat, sure, but he even gets a bit squeamish at blood he was the one to spill especially if it gets on him (this was never a reason roy cited for why he didn't think jamie should be their new hitter, but in hindsight it's Very Obvious lmao).

anyway, so the team is always like yeah you send in the hitter to fill an undercover role in labor, because his asset is his body, right? wrong. there's a gradient when jamie switches from hitting to hacking, a small transitional period of time where he's doing both, but roy always has to step in for any "hitter" job that isn't... well, hitting. he gives jamie all kinds of shit for being a gen z city boy who doesn't know how to change a tire or whatever, but tbf he's glad for the excuse to only be part time retired lol.

& then when they bring isaac(?) on to be roy's replacement since jamie didn't work out (and roy never stops saying he told everyone so about that), he doesn't know how to do a lot of labor stuff too, but he's happy to learn - unlike jamie, who would do the work of course but he'd whine about it and even when he shut up and bore it you could still tell he hated every second - but usually they don't have time for him to get fully trained in stuff so they have roy on comms talking him thru it and jamie always chimes in with totally wrong info just to be obnoxious aksjfks.

My hand didn't slip so much as it went ice skating, stayed out past curfew, and forgot why we were here in the first place:

"How are you so bad at this?” Roy asked over comms, and it took every bit of his restraint for Jamie not to throw the big-scissors right through the mark’s window.

Bad enough that he had to put up with the older man critiquing his fighting style on a daily basis, and the smugness when he pinned Jamie in a headlock, and the eyerolls when he thought Jamie was being purposely ignorant about some complicated maneuver.

(And he wasn't being deliberately obtuse. Roy just knew more obscure fighting techniques than God, and appeared to think that Jamie should have learned capoeira on the back streets of Manchester while reading a dictionary.)

That's what Jamie had to put up with if he wanted to get better. That was the price of having a stable gig, one that paid per diem even when they weren't on the con. Ted basically paid him to hone his craft, on the off-chance it'd be useful to him later. Jamie banked money, his bones didn't break, and the only note on his head these days were the sticky notes Roy left on his forehead when Jamie nodded off in the breakroom.

("I think it says 'Dante's Inferno,'" Keeley said as they shared a stolen sandwich; Roy really was a good cook. She squinted at the tiny, furious handwriting. "Do you think it's a clue?")

He understood the old man was frustrated; his grandad knee had the structural integrity of a broken bottle that'd been glued back together. He'd be stuck in Beard's weird, smelly little van for at least the duration of the job. But it didn't give him the right to be a dick to Jamie about yard work. Where did Roy get off thinking Jamie had ever learned to prune a rose bush?

"You can't cut it down that low or you risk it having to grow up from the graft."

Jamie yanked the big-scissors back from a deadened stalk. “Then you should’ve swapped me with Keeley,” he hissed.

A while ago she'd been gagging over the comms. Her and Ted had a long debate--the kind Jamie could never get away with--about whether she actually had to clean the mark's bathroom as part of her reconnaissance. Yes, the tank was an excellent place to hide stolen jewels; no, she'd never found one there in her life.

Jamie wondered if the housekeepers wore maid outfits. Keeley would look dead fit in a maid outfit. He'd look dead fit in a maid outfit. Anything would look better on him than the gray, stiff-collared maintenance uniform Beard had presented him without comment.

The earbuds made it sound like Roy was right behind him, whispering disapprovingly, "Keeley's on the inside so she can crack the safe when she finds it. And you're supposed to be keeping a lookout on the armed guards. Focus." The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Focus, he said. Like Jamie had the luxury of forgetting that not ten metres away stood a burly man armed with an assault rifle and a blind spot in the cameras. All Jamie had was a pair of big-scissors and a prickly old bastard in his ear.

Honestly? He'd rather scrub the bathroom.

Jamie could scrub the hell out of a bathroom. Hell, he could scrub a carpet so well the landlord would never find the bloodstain. Roy might get high and mighty when Jamie admitted that he'd never used a drill or whatever, but Jamie knew the ins and outs of patching holes in the wall. He couldn’t change a tire, but he could steal a hubcap in under thirty seconds. He couldn’t slice an onion, but he could make twenty pounds at the grocers stretch for two weeks. Crouched eye-level with the rose bush and with a hidden spycam on his top button, him and Roy faced the same barren pot of twigs. Somehow Roy could see the instructions that would guide it to blooming, but Jamie couldn't. To him the rose bush was a dead thing, simple as that.

The big-scissors in his hand curved sharp and short with a thick handle for wielding. He was sure they had real a name for them, but he was also pretty sure his dad used to have something similar around for threatening the debtors who ran late on payments.

He could use a hammer. Roy never asked him if he knew how to use a hammer.

He made another go at the rose bush and got himself pricked for his trouble.

"Shit!" he swore, and over the comms Roy demanded to know, "Are you bleeding?"

"Don't leave DNA," Beard added. Jamie startled; he'd forgotten about the creepy weirdo entirely.

Danger shifted to his left. The guard rounded towards him, boots crunching in the gravel. "Hey! Is there a problem?"

Roy swore. Beard warned him not to engage.

Jamie rose to his feet with his best charming grin slapped on like a plaster over a nasty prick. He held his bleeding hand out like an offering, and with the other he slipped the big-scissors into the sleeve of his shirt.

One of Rebecca's first rules of the con: if you're uncomfortable, use it to make the mark uncomfortable.

He squeezed the big-scissors tight. "Yeah sorry, mate. Got a bit of a nasty cut--don't want it to infect. Could you point me somewhere I could clean up?"

[queerchainsaw]

I'm not American but seeing the rhetoric of voting blue no matter what here on Tumblr and other social media has definitely confirmed for me that liberalism is a disease and that the US is patient zero. These people are so lost in their own shallow bipartisanship they fail to understand that the months before an election are quite literally the only time politicians will "listen" (and using the word "listen" is generous), the only power, and I mean only power, one has in this specific case is to threaten to withhold the vote, but these dumbfucks are like "so you want Trump to win?" No, shitface, I want Trump to drop dead, but right now you're pledging undying support and allegiance to an administration that is overseeing a literal genocide, and it doesn't matter how many times Harris says "we need to stop the suffering" or some other innocuous bulshit, she, as VP, literally signs off on millions of tax dollar every single week that go, you guessed it, to the Zionist Occupation Project (aka "Israel"). I wonder if these blue-magas understand that "Israel" relies almost entirely on US support, they are not a self-sufficient "nation", if the Biden-Harris administration actually threatened to pull all support, Israel would have no other option but to stop the assault on Gaza and the illegal settling of the West Bank because without American Handouts it would cease to exist within a month (assuming European backers like the UK, France etc. tried to keep it afloat, if they also backed out, Israel would vanish in less than a week), but since all that's been happening is empty threats from the UN and the ICJ, Israel keeps on keeping on, because it has the United States' blind support, and with the world's biggest superpower backing your every move, there isn't a security council or international court on this earth that can stop you.

ALSO, it boils my blood when democrats pretend to care about Palestine while treating it as an "issue" within the grand scheme of some election campaign, this is not an issue, this is the issue, has been for the past 75 years, people are dying every day, land is being stolen, a people is being annihilated, their representatives wiped off the face of the earth and their culture bulldozed and misappropriated by colonizers, this is an American project, Zionism is baked into the Modern American Political System, it's something the two-party system has no disagreements about - Republican or Democrat, money will continue to be funneled into the Zionist Occupation. When people are accused of both-side-zing the Presidential Election (as though it's the biggest sin since Eve decided to have a snack) I have to give a big hearty laugh, because these democrats actually think they're denouncing some obscure resurfacing of the horshoe theory when in fact, in the grand scheme of political stances, Democrats and Republicans are basically on the same side of the aisle, they're both right-wing parties, one is just proto-christofascist conservative capitalist monsters and the other is just faux-progressive diehard-liberal (still christofascist) capitalist monsters, obviously nuance is necessary, and the Republican party is objectively worse (it's their whole shtick), and so when the bar is 6 feet below Hell, obviously one is forced to say the Democratic Party is "better", but that, by no means, makes it a good party. Democrats who say "let's elect Harris and then we'll focus on all the problems of the two-party system and the blatant support of genocide" clearly don't understand that by blindly supporting either candidate, the two-party system has won already and so has the Zionist Project. You wanna do better? : fight the system. Agreeing to fall in line with the expectation of "dealing with these things later" is the biggest bulshit cop-out in the history of human mediocrity, if American "Progressives" weren't, by large, so terminally-liberal they might have understood that over the summer they had an unprecedented opportunity to make the two-party system shake in its boots, by turning away from the democrats, but it only took some light fear-mongering from the Biden-Harris administration for liberals to fall in line and forget all about the inherent injustice of a system that regularly and consistently forces you to chose between the lesser of two evils. Wake the fuck up and smell the tyranny that your day-to-day lives are built on.

It is a tragedy in and of itself that the fate of Palestinians and Palestine is largely in the hands of forcefully-uninformed Americans, but it's important to realize that as long as the US keeps dolling out money, weapons and overall resources, the Zionist Occupation has next to no reasons to stop the Genocide, the power rests in the hands of the current administration, and who in the hell do you think puts the power in the hands of any administration if not the people? get wise dumbfucks

[the-wardens-torch]

FFXIVwrite2024: On Cloud Nine

Prompt #23, Entry #9 (hah!)

Masterpost

((takes place pre - 6.0, after last year's FFXIVwrite stuff ))

"Summoning has been around since the Allagan empire, and its undergoing its biggest popularity surge since emperor Xande's days and no one's gotten hurt. We've got the power of a fucking *dragon* now, my man. You should be on cloud nine! I know I am!"

"Dragons don't even perceive reality or time the same way we do. You're giving anthropomorphic emotions to something that's more a force of nature than flesh."

"Why should you care? Even the rest of the dragons don't care. They never care about mortals unless we piss them off anyway."

"This is a savage world. Regular folks like us have to hedge our bets. And if that means borrowing a bit of power from an entity that would see us dead as soon as look at us, so be it."

"No one cares about Ifrit or Titan or Garuda's feelings. Why, because they don't have any! They're primals! All they know is destruction and conquest and anyone or anything who cares about them is just under their thrall. Why should Bahamut be any different?"

The words of other Summoners echoed through his head. He'd questioned perhaps a dozen in the past few months, and the answer was always the same - not to think about it. The same answer his father had given him. All had sounded disturbingly like the nameless, faceless scientists he had dreamed about. Like Amon. Whom he had seen pierce Bahamut's eyes with iron hooks and rend his flesh with barbed and electrified devices he couldn't begin to understand. The dreams hadn't left, ever since he'd learned the Dreadwyrm Trance on the now empty fields of Carteneau. Felt that stolen rage and anguish flow through his own blood. And behind it all, a crippling, catastrophic sadness. Summoners were supposed to revel in their power, to drink it in and be nourished by it. But he felt like he was being poisoned - like every ghostly borrowed flare was a spray of his own lifesblood. But why did he even care?

His father had unwittingly given him all the information he needed to get to where he needed to go, but it was Reonora's cards that had finally spurred him into action. After that first dream, she had done a three-card reading for him from her Lenormand deck, and of all the diviners he'd met, she was perhaps the only one he trusted. And she had drawn The Coffin, The Lily, and The Bouquet. Death, loving remembrance, and a final gift. Of Who better to help him understand the tragedy of Bahamut than the living being who had known and loved him best? Who mourned him most? Who could gift him with understanding?

Tiamat - brood sister and mate to Bahamut.

Tiamat's longtime home of Azys Lla had only been accessible since the end of the Dragonsong war, and most everyone was already blase about it. Aside from the odd miner, monster hunter or antiquities researcher, it remained mostly deserted. Except for her. The ongoing cascade of chaos that had started with Bahamut's resurrection and ended with the near destruction of Eorzea had all begun with her. If anyone knew why Bahamut was haunting him, it was Tiamat.

The borrowed manacutter's controls were simple enough, and the weak air currents ensured that it remained steady as he passed over the ominously name Quarantine Block. Below him, a bank of smoky yellow clouds obscured all view beyond a malm or so. But he didn't need to see the ground to be reminded of just how high up he was… He already come to terms with there being flying islands, thanks to his amiable avian acquaintances the Vanu Vanu, and the fact that heights had never bothered him. But Azys Lla was hardly Ok'Vanu. there was no basking in soft, clear sunlight and a gentle breeze, no windswept grass underfoot, and no drinking in a breathtaking view of a deep blue sky and puffy clouds. No, this was breathtaking in a different way… As in the way he kept holding his breath because he was afraid something awful was about to happen.

He moved the wisps of hair away from his face with the back of his hand for the umpteenth time. There were so many loose hairs now that wondered if there was even any hair still left in the tight ponytail he'd tied just moments ago. The air itself had a feel here, a sort of oily, suffocating pall, or maybe it was just his nerves, or the fact that he was sweating. His grip was tight on the manacutter's levers, which thankfully weren't sensitive enough to read the trembling of his hands as input.

He could just stop… right? He didn't really even like adventuring most of the time and he could support himself with his leatherwork and music gigs. Just never use that power again and hope the dreams and the crushing sense of… sadness would end given enough time.

As he neared the ominously named island of Antithesis, he was pulled out of his thoughts by the appearance of angular but strangely undulating shapes on the horizon. They were the first thing he'd recognized since coming here, and for the worst reason. Plumes of crystallized, corrupted aether nearly identical to Dalamud's Talons or the shards at The Burning Wall. Evidence that something very wrong had happened there. More and more of them revealed themselves the closer he got, and as he began to swoop in low for a closer look, he noticed more of those ubiquitous chains… But he couldn't be sure what they were linked to.

That is, until he saw the wings.

((These then flow into the established "arc" of Fal gradually befriending Tiamat over the next few years. Reonora belongs to @adeat too. I know most of what I write doesn't make a lot of sense in isolation like this but I am SO HAPPY to be linking my old stuff together. It needs cleaning up but I'm eeby.))

[notwiselybuttoowell]

On an unseasonably warm day in October, the silence outside broken by birdsong and artillery fire, Olga Goncharova sat in her office on the ground floor of the Kherson Regional Museum, a bulletproof vest wrapped around the back of her chair, the windows covered with plywood, and cursed the Russians. “They’re vandals, the people who did this,” she said.

Ms Goncharova escaped from Kherson, in southern Ukraine, in the spring of 2022, shortly after Russian troops poured into the city. By the time she returned, in November that year, Kherson had been liberated. The Russians had evacuated to the other bank of the Dnieper river, from which they have been bombing the city ever since. Ms Goncharova wept when she entered the museum where she had worked for over two decades. “There was broken glass everywhere,” she says. “They had torn some of the exhibits out.”

In fact Russian officials, assisted by local collaborators and the museum’s then-director, had removed more than 28,000 artefacts, loaded them onto lorries and shipped them to Crimea, illegally annexed by Russia in 2014. Gone were the ancient coins, the Greek sculptures, the Scythian jewellery, a precious Bukhara sabre—and even the hard drives containing the museum’s catalogue. Three decades ago, Ms Goncharova says, the museum recovered a collection of Gothic bronzes looted by German occupiers during the second world war. Now the Russians have stolen them.

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022, the loss of life and suffering in Ukraine has been great. Many of its museums have been plundered, too. The country’s ministry of culture estimates that over 480,000 artworks have fallen into Russian hands. At least 38 museums, home to nearly 1.5m works, have been damaged or destroyed.

Ukrainian officials have also sent a number of collections to other parts of Europe to protect them from Russian bombs. These include dozens of Ukrainian paintings from the early 20th century, on display at the Royal Museums of Fine Arts in Brussels before travelling to Vienna and London. When the evacuated treasures will return to Ukraine is unclear.

Artists have not been spared either. Ms Goncharova points to a painting of dried flowers and pottery that hangs opposite her desk. The artist, Vyacheslav Mashnytskyi, from Kherson, went missing after Russian troops turned up at his riverside dacha and requisitioned his boat. Friends who stopped by the house days later found traces of blood. Mr Mashnytskyi has not been heard from since.

Putting a price on the stolen works is nearly impossible, since only a fraction had been appraised for insurance purposes. Last April the un estimated that the war had caused $2.6bn-worth of damage to Ukraine’s cultural heritage. That now seems to be a conservative figure. Tracking what the Russians have looted is also a headache. Many Ukrainian museums, especially smaller regional ones, had relied on paper catalogues, often outdated or incomplete, says Mariana Tomyn, an official at the culture ministry. Some of those catalogues have now gone. Efforts to digitise inventories, which began only three years ago, have taken on a new urgency.

Ukraine will seek redress. Prosecutors in Kyiv are investigating Russian officials and Ukrainians involved in the plunder. Mrs Tomyn is working on a new restitution law and the overhaul of an outdated one on the protection of cultural heritage. And since late October a special army unit has begun to monitor damage to cultural sites. But there is little hope of recovering what the occupiers have stolen. Russian officials will ship Ukrainian collections stored in Crimea to Russia if Ukraine retakes the peninsula, says Vyacheslav Baranov, an archaeologist at Ukraine’s National Academy of Sciences.

There have been some breakthroughs. On November 26th, after a long court battle, hundreds of historical treasures from Crimea were returned to Ukraine from the Netherlands. The collection, which includes Scythian gold carvings from the fourth century bc, had been on display at the Allard Pierson Museum in Amsterdam in 2014. Russia demanded the return of the objects to the Crimean museums which had loaned them. The Dutch supreme court ruled in 2021 that they belonged in Ukraine.

They are not the only ones to make their way back. At the Lavra museum complex in Kyiv, Maksym Ostapenko slowly unwraps a bundle of white packing paper. Out of it emerges a Bronze Age battle-axe. Another bundle yields a sixth-century Khazar sword. In the summer of 2022 the weapons, plus a few other objects probably destined for America’s antiquities market, surfaced at John F. Kennedy airport. The American authorities sent them back to Ukraine a year later. Most were probably excavated illegally in southern Ukraine, near Crimea, says Mr Ostapenko, the museum’s director, or discovered by Russian troops digging trenches. Such archaeological looting has thrived in the occupied territories, he adds. “The damage done to cultural heritage is immeasurable"

[thedeliverygod]

I need help, please.

Essentially back in 2021 when I filed for bankruptcy I used a feature my payroll for my company offers which is to “borrow” money from your following paycheck, I guess like a pay advance. I borrowed the full $500 amount in order to pay my court fees/lawyer fees so that I wouldn’t have to burden my dad.

I figured once my bankruptcy went through and I was no longer paying credit card bills every month, I could handle being short a paycheck a month or two while I bounced back. I tried my best, but life kept getting in the way. I had car problems come up, I had health problems come up. At my bankruptcy hearing in December they decided they wanted me to pay 2 more installments of the court fees early so that I wouldn’t have to go back a second time (I also had to hide my cell phone in the bush outside because they did not provide lockers and I had to worry about it getting stolen the whole time because I have no family/friends in the area to drive and drop me off but that’s another story).

Then my rent went up another $100 and inflation struck everything but especially groceries. I needed every drop of that $500 + the remainder of my paycheck in order to make sure everything got paid.

I won’t say I’ve been perfect and haven’t made unnecessary purchases. It’s a goddamn depressing world and I am trying to keep myself sane with little things.

I’ve sold a lot of “unnecessary” things in my life. Old video games and stuffed animals. Old movies. Old books. I tried to sell cosplays but I left them up on eBay for months with no bites.

I can go to the used book store maybe one or two more times with some things but I think that’s about all I can manage. I’m considering selling some of my Kingdom Hearts figure collection but I’d have to know I’d get a fair price of what they’re actually worth since a fair amount aren’t made anymore. But yeah, the bookstore offers me meager amounts for things so it I only helps so much. For instance I sold my ps3, some books, a Mai sakurajima figure and I think I got like $38 and a few dollars of store credit. Aka it helps but not much. I have an old diamond necklace from my ex boyfriend I’ve considered pawning but I don’t know if that would get me much either.

My mom just got home from a stint at the hospital; she’s relatively okay now but she was in the ICU for an infection, kidney damage and low blood pressure. The latter 2 were mainly from being dehydrated in combo with the infection so she’s mostly better in that regard at least enough to go home. She’s on disability and her husband is retired so they scrape by. My dad has been sick and not working for several months now with leg issues I don’t really know much about because he’s been very vague with me and won’t let me visit.

My parents can’t help me and I can’t help them. It’s been one of the most frustrating feelings on earth.

All in all it’s 4 am, almost 5 am and I’m asking for help because I don’t know what else to do. I’m ashamed of myself and I just am so lost.

Because of the rising costs of everything, I’ve often been over drafting now. I don’t know if I’ve just gotten lucky or what but my bank didn’t hit me with overdraft fees that is until today. I got several right at the same time I deposited money and I’m left with under $40.

I’m still getting my halved paycheck so rent is priority with that and then hopefully one or two bills. But I need groceries somewhere in there. There’s a prescription I need to pick up. I have an overdue medical bill that I’ve pushed aside already in lieu of utilities. And I just am so overwhelmed. Thankfully my cat is well stocked in all his food thanks to my best friend ordering him a Goliath sized bag of dry food and me buying wet food earlier than I needed to so there is that positive.

TLDR: If anyone can donate anything so I can get groceries I’d be so grateful. If I could somehow get to $500 to make it so I don’t have to borrow money for my next paycheck I’d be eternally grateful but I feel like that’s asking too much.

I don’t feel like my situation is bad enough for a gofundme but I do have a ko-fi which I’ll link at the bottom. I am 100% going to be job searching for better pay soon but I have a surgery this month and I need to not mess with my insurance just yet.

I’d gladly write drabbles etc if you would like as a thank you gift but I unfortunately don’t have much else to give. I wish I could draw so I could take commissions.

If you can’t afford to donate, I totally get it. But also if you could reblog and maybe it’ll find it’s way to someone who can? Thank you either way.

I’m sorry if I rambled on too much but my mind is racing. I just want to be able to get back on my feet so once I can help myself I can maybe help my family.

[lunarsands]

ALSMP Fanfic: Mirror Tenfold, Beyond the Wall - Ch 2

Characters: Scott Major, MythicalSausage, Shubble, PearlescentMoon; featuring the return of vampire!Scott but in an alternate way, and actual!angel!Sausage but cursed; with special guests Sparrow and Rusty the Copper Golem

Tags: Canon divergent, AU, crossover between two Afterlife universes, and New Life SMP thrown in for good measure

WARNINGS: Blood, Violence, Injury, consensual blood drinking, PTSD, mentions of death, implied death

Summary: The Mysterious Force that keeps picking people up and depositing them into alternate universes comes for Myth and Smajor this time, and plunks them down near a new set of counterparts -- well, new to Smajor. Myth has met this other version of himself once before, in a place called Sanctuary. At least now there's someone with ten times the number of powers to keep Smajor in check, right?

The vampire returns but he’s not going to want a taste of this type of angel blood.

Follows after the events of Thou, O Kings, Fair Be You All - Part Eight of the Soul Liminality Series | Part Four of The Reality Entanglement Series

(Also available on Ao3!)

[ Chapter One ]

---

Chapter Two

Myth wasn’t sure what his opinion was toward the feeling of warm sunlight and a fresh breeze on his wings. He’d had other things on his mind during his time in Sanctuary, but now, as he and Sausage flew over plains and forests in silence, he had the time to think about it.

However, all it did was make him bitter about how it was never going to last. He shouldn’t bother to get used to it, or even enjoy it. Freedom out in the light wasn’t his lot.

Sausage sailed downward to land on a treetop then propel himself back up into a glide with a blast of gravi. He had no visible wings, but his movements belied experience with them. Myth recalled Shubble’s comment about having gotten them back when she first saw the cursed angel – and remembered the superhero saying he had lost them.

Then he thought about how Smajor had stolen his and pinned them to the wall as a trophy… and how he had come along and destroyed them himself with his withering ability.

He wondered if this Sausage had done the same.

He wasn’t going to ask. He remembered what had happened the last time he found common ground with a version of himself – who had also happened to be a gravital at the time.

After Sausage’s next gravi boost, he glanced over at Myth once his glide leveled out. “You told Shubble there were two monsters. In Sanctuary, you only mentioned one. Have you picked up another since then, or did you mean something else?”

“What do you think I meant?”

“I think you meant yourself – and I think you meant yourself back in Sanctuary, too.”

“And what if I did?” Myth challenged, ready to sneer at another litany of possible redemption.

Sausage only shrugged instead. “It’s your business how you think of yourself. Maybe your world’s view of morality is different from mine. So, maybe it’s not my place to judge.”

“Oh? You jumped right on the judging of that ‘villainous version’ of us.”

“I guess you coming in late meant you missed the… sort of psychic memo from the Protector of Sanctuary. That wasn’t just a parallel version of all of us – it was, specifically, a piece of the Protector’s own soul, and it was his call to condemn him. But, I mean, if you want to confess to consuming a demon’s soul and intentionally destroying an entire universe, I can change my opinion of you.”

Myth decided to go back to scanning the ground. The silence that followed felt like an itch. “Maybe stop being nosy and pay attention to our actual mission. … …The only thing I intentionally destroyed was Smajor. It never stuck. The rest was collateral.”

“Ah, so that’s what the other angel meant about revenge. I wondered if it was just some angelic business between the two of you.”

“Maybe you should have asked him more about it.” Myth snapped his lower wings as if to push the topic of the seraph away, then banked to the right underneath Sausage to change his search area.

The superhero needed to execute another bounce to regain altitude, but soon pulled level with Myth again. “Would he have known anything about a portal in the Ancient City?”

Myth muttered, “You’re not going to stop, are you? It’s been a while; I don’t remember being such a blabbermouth…” He then sighed. “It leads into a limbo dimension containing a gigantic labyrinth. That’s where I first met ‘the other angel’, except he was a gravital at the time. Within that dimension he was able to regain the powers of his three previous lives – angel, wither, thunderborn – and that’s how he and his Scott were able to ‘help’—” He said the word through clenched teeth, “—me knock Smajor out long enough for us to find portals back to our own universes. I suppose it’s a good thing the same hadn’t happened to Smajor and I with our previous powers. Smajor was a gravital at the time, and I was a blazeborn, and we had much more than three or four between us.”

“Ohh! So that’s what you two’s comments were about when I got in the middle of your fight!”

“Yeeaahh,” Myth said with exaggerated, feigned-patience.

Sausage then said blithely, “You know, I think you might avoid misunderstandings better by being less grumpy and stating your case right away.”

“Hmm. Who said I wanted that? I just want to be left alone.”

Sausage uttered one note of a chuckle. “I think you’re just like the rest of us whether you want to acknowledge it or not. You’re protecting your world from yourself and Smajor, right? I’d say that does justify your mood, but you’re also doing the right thing.”

Myth was about to remind him about the cursed part of his existence, but his attention was drawn to a figure on top of a tree – not Smajor, but Shubble, who gave a little wave when she spotted him in return. Myth swooped down without comment, yet Sausage caught on and angled his descent to a different tree, then boosted over.

“Bad news, guys,” Shubble announced. “I found him, but he was with Scott – and they were on their way to Scott’s manor. I didn’t try to stop them or anything. At least we know where he is now, but that can’t be good, right?”

Sausage frowned. “Depends on what Scott intends to do with him. He might have just found himself an immortal blood bank.” He sighed with loud disappointment. “Not great for trying to convince him to give up the evil vampire thing.”

“Guess it works out for you,” Shubble said to Myth. “If he’s Scott’s prisoner, then you just need to convince Scott to hand him over. I bet he was just as weirded out to see someone who looked exactly like him! Even if they never met before like you two.”

Myth didn’t look pleased with the news. “Don’t get ahead of yourself.” He glanced westward. “We probably won’t be able to get there before sunset – well, I could, assuming it’s located in the same place as in my world.”

Sausage raised an eyebrow and grinned. “What makes you think we’re slow? You know how fast I can move when I want to—”

“Because you want to buy time so she’ll be stronger at night,” Myth called him out, pointing at Shubble. “You haven’t been speedy this entire time we’ve been searching.”

“It takes a lot of energy,” Sausage grumbled. “Can’t be chomping on sugar when I need to be ready to capture someone.”

“Either way,” Shubble interjected, “We can still keep moving. We have to do something no matter when we get there. Besides, maybe someone gloomier and scarier than Scott will finally make him think twice! We can solve each other’s problems!”

Myth replied darkly, “It took an outside force to deal with Smajor when he was a vampire. If that’s what you really want, I can handle it.”

~*~

Smajor peered around at the interior of the manor with blatant bitterness. He walked off uninvited to look around, noting similarities while Scott folded up the umbrella he had used to cross the open space between the forest and his home. The vampire, meanwhile, watched Smajor with some amusement, wondering what he intended to find. He wasn’t sensing any fear like he usually did from guests; however, the thing Scott didn’t know about was the anger from this reminder that roiled beneath the surface of Smajor’s mind.

Scott followed him on silent feet, not saying a word as Smajor glanced through doorways, eventually making his way to the trophy room. There, Smajor stared up at the pair of white-feathered wings pinned to one of the walls. Scott was almost disappointed by the lack of admiration for the rest of his collection, then he heard the other make a disgusted noise.

“I remember during one of my earlier lives I came home – my home looked almost exactly like this – and Myth had trashed the entire place. I never found out if he was trying to see if I was hiding inside or if he did it out of spite. But, somehow, he forgot to wreck the dungeon. Maybe he just didn’t want to relive the memory by going down there. I suppose you have a dungeon, too?” He threw an unexpectedly nonchalant glance at his host.

Scott raised an eyebrow. “No. I’ve always convinced guests to stay by other means.”

“Really? You just collected these and let yours go on his way?” Smajor gestured to the wings. “Oh, sorry, I’m here assuming these belong to your Sausage. Maybe they’re someone else’s. I just figured you and I did some of the same things.”

“No, they’re his. But it’s difficult to keep him locked up for long.”

“What a shame. I kept mine as a renewable blood source for quite a while. Such delicious angel blood… Unfortunately, that also sparked part of our rivalry. The other part was me turning into an angel after losing my vampire life. He hated that. I had no control over it, but he didn’t care about that side of things. Oh, but it was delightful to see him get so mad anytime it came up later.”

Smajor now turned a grin toward Scott, who seemed to be looking at him as if calculating something, although Scott’s expression quickly switched to amusement again. “I can’t say I’ve had that problem. Mine just wants to play at being a superhero, so I happen to be a convenient enemy for him. But enough about them.” Scott also wanted to get away from the subject. There was definitely a fixation going on here, but figuring out how to use that to his own advantage would be a matter for after their other business. “We have our experiment to test out, and the sooner the better. If anyone comes across this Myth of yours, I’ll be the first one they try to enlist to help find you. Sausage and his little team have been trying to get me back on their side, even with the whole evil vampire thing.”

“Tell you what: you help me kill that pesky angel, and I’ll help you deal with the goody-goody hero. I did a fair number on the one gravital version I met before. If he didn’t have fishy version of me helping him, he wouldn’t have made it out alive.”

“Let’s get past the first part of this plan. Don’t get too confident about it working – I might end up just handing over your corpse to them and go about my night.”

“You paint such a rosy picture,” Smajor said with a roll of his eyes. “I look pathetic right now, but I had a perfectly wonderful reign of terror for several lives in a row. Myth just got lucky one time and was able to bring me down only because of that.”

Scott smiled to humor him. “Then come along. I let my guests have a nice, comfortable seat before having a snack.” He led the way out and down the hall to an innocuous-looking sitting room lined with bookcases and that had a currently empty deepslate fireplace to their right. Two high-backed armchairs made of dark oak and crimson cushions were in the middle of the room and faced each other, one with a view toward the far wall and the other toward the door. Matching tables sat within arm’s reach of the chairs. Short candelabras sat upon them, the candles waiting to be lit.

They had spent enough time in the other room that the sun had set, so Scott felt it would be fine to stroll over and tie back the deep red curtains in the other two walls, revealing tall, lead-framed windows. The moonlight fell on the assortment of macabre trinkets across the fireplace’s mantle.

“Ooo, spooky,” Smajor said with sarcastic admiration. “We just need a full moon for the backdrop outside, and the cliché is complete.”

“I guess the revolving door of lives took away the fun of theme elements for you,” Scott replied.

“Well, when you don’t get more than half a second to enjoy them, yes. I stopped making bases for myself, oh… Actually, my vampire one might have been the last, anyway. Life just turned into kill or be killed, and tying myself to a new place would have prevented me from hunting down Myth every time he tried to hide somewhere. I only used my manor house for a while – until, like I said, he destroyed it.”

“Fascinating. Take a seat, you can enjoy the view from this one for a little while.”

Smajor plopped himself down in the chair facing the windows, then said thoughtfully, “Myth became a vampire at one point but was too much of a coward to bite me. Missed out on some nectar-sweet floran blood, but also left himself wide open to be staked. I racked up a nice death count on him with that one. It was kind of fun looking so innocent while covered in flowers but surprising everyone with how dangerous that could really be—”

With no warning, Scott pounced on Smajor and ripped the already ragged collar of his shirt while pushing his head toward the opposite side.

“H-Hey!” Smajor protested. “You could have said something first!”

“I’ve been hungry for an hour,” Scott hissed. “You talk as much as Sausage does. Can we do this quietly?” He didn’t wait for a response, going straight to baring his fangs and sinking them in close to Smajor’s jugular – perhaps causing a small mess, but it would be the quickest way to drain him.

And the best way to distract him so he would quiet down, and then Scott could hear his own thoughts.

Meanwhile, Smajor’s brain was issuing forth conflicting orders on how to react. The time spent in utter defeat at the end of Myth’s blade told him to sit still and not struggle, because escape was impossible and death was inevitable. However, another part was telling him that this was not Myth’s style, and perhaps this time he could get away.

Of course, the feeling of fangs embedded in his skin and the way blood was trickling down his chest warned him against those odds. His body decided to act on its own with a squirm and a gasp when it seemed as if Scott was sinking his fangs deeper; or as if he was drawing the blood out in deeper draughts.

A shaky moan escaped Smajor’s throat as the vampire continued. This might not have been one of his better ideas… But then again, maybe angering an angel-turned-wither hadn’t been the best choice from the start.

Well, at least he wouldn’t be dying to Myth’s hands this time.

When Scott had deemed his double’s heartbeat to have slowed enough, he withdrew, although he kept one hand on Smajor to stop him from falling over. He scraped his fangs across his own forearm to open a short line of red, then grasped Smajor’s hair to tilt his head back. “I guess we’ll see in a few minutes if you become a vampire, or something extra, or nothing at all.”

“Y… You… You keep saying things li… like that. What d… does that mean…?” Smajor asked in a faint voice.

Scott now smirked. “I told you I’m not an ordinary vampire. I have some extra powers. You could end up with those instead. You might become a merling, or a thornling. Or a tiny, little mothling that could easily be crushed. Time to find out, because I think you’re going to simply die from blood loss if you don’t drink up…”

He pressed his wound to Smajor’s mouth, giving the dazed man little option but to start swallowing the vampire’s blood. Scott wasn’t sure if he had even heard everything he had said; or, at least, he had no reaction to it. Scott watched with a critical eye, his expression echoing Smajor’s conniving smile from earlier in the day. “If this doesn’t work, you would still make a great blood bank. Plain-old-human immortal blood is really delicious. And if the immortal part holds up, I can drink as much as I want, anytime.”

~*~

Scott hummed to himself as he looked through his clothes to find something that matched as close as possible to what he was already wearing. He reasoned Smajor had drank enough of his blood that it was possible he could turn, although he had passed out mid-swallow and the rest of the gulp had spilled out of his slack mouth. Scott had decided not to double check to make sure he wasn’t merely dead, and left him to whatever transformation might take place, in the meantime going off to fetch a change of clothes.

If this did work, then Smajor needed something to wear that was more befitting a respectable creature of the night. Scott figured they would be close to the same size. The ragged clothing Smajor had now was poorly fitted, so at most, he might be scrawnier than Scott; some new, vampiric strength might help fill him out.

With a new outfit neatly draped over his arm, Scott returned to the sitting room. A bowed head of white hair greeted him from the other chair, as if Smajor had tried to stand up only to stumble and need to sit again to steady himself. His shoulders were heaving as if with heavy breaths. There was a slight twitch, then he glanced up with piercing red eyes. He appeared ghoulish rather than revitalized, so Scott attempted to get a read on him with his various senses; at the moment he was fairly certain he was seeing only an average vampire.

“Welcome back. It seems that it worked. Congratulations, you’re a blood-sucking terror of the night again. Let’s get you looking even more the part.” He nodded to the clothes on his arm, then placed them on the chair that the other had vacated.

Smajor eyed the offering then nodded as Scott turned to a basin he had brought in earlier and wet a towel so his new cohort could clean the blood off himself. He kept one ear out, wondering if Smajor would betray him now that he had powers. All he heard, however, was the ripping of fabric, and assumed Smajor was getting rid of what remained of his shirt.

As Scott turned to offer the towel, he uttered an involuntary noise upon seeing Smajor’s bare chest and the knotted layers of scars in the vicinity of his heart.

Smajor regarded him mildly, then looked down, knowing exactly what had shocked him. “Oh, this? After a while the regeneration between lives can’t keep up and scars become permanent. Myth had a field day stabbing me several dozen times in a row in the same place. Quickest way to stop a heart, obviously. Before all that, though, I had an opportunity to give him a lovely addition.” He mimed raking claws across the right side of his face and grinned maniacally before snatching the towel from Scott to wipe off the semi-dried blood along his neck.

Scott gave no response to that, but did pluck the towel from Smajor’s hands to help, since mirrors were no longer a viable visual aid. “Sounds like quite the interesting existence you’ve led. What did you plan to do now that you have powers again? New reign of terror when you return home?”

“Hmm. I’ll consider it. I’m not sure what the surface looks like, but maybe after Myth imprisoned me in the bowels of the earth and neither of us were rampaging around anymore, the survivors were able to start to rebuilding.”

“Uh-huh…”

“If you and I deal with Myth once and for all, maybe I’ll go easy on them. I could maybe be a benevolent ruler of the night.” Smajor shrugged. “Depends on my mood at the time.”

“I see. Well, we should start coming up with a plan. If my Sausage hasn’t run into yours and seen how wicked he is, and locked him up for the crime of cruelty, then we should have a strategy to deal with both of them.”

“How about a quick stretch of the ol’ bat wings first? I could use a little more taste of freedom.” Smajor grinned with a tamer expression this time.

“Be my guest.” Scott gestured to the doorway, deciding he wasn’t keen on the idea of Smajor going out via the window. He clasped his hands behind his back and once again prodded at him with his other senses in case anything latently kicked in. So far, so good it seemed, as Smajor strolled ahead. If anything, he had an air about him as if he owned the place.

Well, he could take that attitude back home with him, too, although Scott considered the possibility that, after ‘dealing with’ Myth,  Smajor would suggest they conquer this world together as a pair of terrifying, nigh-identical vampires. He vaguely wondered what would happen when Smajor finally clued in to the powers Scott had mentioned earlier but inattentiveness might have robbed from his memory; it would take more than a measly vampire to go up against the rest of this world’s population.

“Actually,” Smajor said thoughtfully, “Speaking of a plan, I owe Myth for a dirty-handed swap when he was a vampire. Let’s start with that and see how we might keep them off guard…”

~*~

As Myth predicted, the trio wasn’t able to reach the manor until after the sun had set. They each took a direction of approach to try to get a look inside through the windows from a safe distance, but this failed to grant them any immediate clues to what Scott might have done with Smajor. They regrouped within the shelter of the bordering forest.

Myth gazed at the covered porch, the next move very obvious to him. “Is walking up and kicking in the door out of the question?”

“I mean,” Shubble flipped her hand over in the air. “I don’t need a door, and since it is night anyway, I can maintain invisibility even better.” Her form became transparent and she sank into the ground to illustrate her point.

“Just be careful,” Sausage cautioned. “Don’t let him – or either of them, if they are both in there – see you.”

Shubble sighed. “You don’t have to keep warning me. I know. The point is to scout and report back. Keep your cool, and don’t you be the one to come kicking the door in after me.” She then sank fully into the ground, not giving him a chance to reply.

Sausage exhaled loudly through his nose, his lips pressed into a concerned line. Myth rolled his eyes upward. “Are you sure you’re not—”

Sausage cut him off curtly, “What kind of hero would I be if I let my sidekick get hurt?”

“Maybe it will help you feel better about it if you saw her as a teammate and not just a sidekick. Have you two ever been in an actual fight against an enemy together? When I first met that shi—that other angel version of us, he and his Scott worked together as equals rather than be worried about which one of them was weaker.”

“We’ve done training together,” Sausage said defensively.

“Not the same thing.”

“Do mutant zombies and endermen count?”

“No. I’ve seen the type of powerhouse you are. I want to know if you’ve gone toe-to-toe with someone else like you. With all the possible powers and internal influences, the whole lot of you have good and ‘evil’ senses rattling around at the same time. Everything I’ve seen of your world so far looks intact, which means there must be a collective agreement to not level the place. If we had kept things up in Sanctuary, you could have brought the entire town down around us. You obviously can’t bring your Scott down with power alone.”

Sausage sighed. “It’s a stalemate, all right? Not one single person here is more powerful than another, aside from those who have no powers – regular villagers and even animals are the ones who need to be protected from anyone who chooses to go to the evil side like Scott has. Shubble used to work with him when she decided to favor her shadowcrawler and phantom abilities, since those work best in the darkness. But she has more of them that function in daylight, so I coaxed her over to my side.”

“The wither in you wasn’t tempted?”

“Almost.” Sausage gazed skyward. “Early on, when Scott favored his mothling abilities and I was favoring my elytrian ones, we took a long trip through The End to gather unique items to share with anyone who would have had a more difficult time travelling across it. At the time it felt like we were forging a close friendship. Then I started refining my gravital abilities, and for whatever reason, he chose to embrace his vampire side. He became a menace to anyone without powers, so I made it my superhero mission to stop him and try to remind him how fulfilling it was to use our abilities to do good things for others.”

“Hmph,” Myth grunted. “Sounds like this is the in between of my world and that other set of us and Scott that I’ve met.”

“The Protector called him The Seraph, but you’re technically one, too.”

“Technically, I don’t count.”

“You counted to turn the tide. We might have been stuck trying to wear down all those magic spells if that bracer hadn’t been destroyed by you.”

“Don’t try to paint me as some hero. It was just an obstacle to get rid of.”

“You’re really stubborn. But we all are, in our own ways, I think.”

“I’ve died almost thirty times and kept coming back to have to deal with Smajor whether I wanted to or not. Call that stubbornness if you want – or some ridiculous idea of entangled fate. I only finally got the upper hand by reviving as this.”

Sausage was about to ask him to elaborate on that, but then Shubble popped her head out of the ground. “Bad news again, guys: there are now two vampire-Scotts walking around in there. I, uh, couldn’t tell them apart from just a quick glance. They were heading for the front door, so we’ll have to come up with a plan quick if we’re going to confront them here.”

Myth uttered a growl and abruptly launched himself upward into the nearest tree. He came back down with a thin branch in his hands, which he snapped in two. He discarded the piece with the less sharp end, then began to storm toward the manor.

“Oh boy,” Shubble said apprehensively as she emerged the rest of the way from the ground. She stayed put, letting Sausage handle this one.

Sausage boosted himself after Myth with a burst of gravi, then clamped a hand around the cursed angel’s stake-bearing arm with a grip of giant-esque strength. “Hold on a second. You can’t get past Scott with only that.”

“It’s not for him.” The muscles in Myth’s arm tensed up reflexively, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to break the other’s hold.

“You still have to get past him to get at yours. Plus be able to tell them apart.”

“I’ll know. I’ve had to look at those eyes while dying almost every time, remember? They’re seared into my memory.”

A door creaked. The voice of either Scott or Smajor said, “Well, well, well. Looks like we have visitors.” The two vampires moved with identical steps off of the porch to stand side by side before their rivals. They wore identical smirks.

Myth narrowed his eyes at them while Sausage slowly let go of the cursed angel; from what Myth could see, both vampires had a nervous look in their eyes despite the smirking.

Those nervous looks had been directed at him.

He let a smug look of his own slide onto his face. Perhaps Scott hadn’t known what a cursed angel was like in person, regardless of what Smajor had described to him.

“Myth!” Sausage suddenly cried, “I’ve been marked! Don’t know which one did it—”

He was cut off as the swap was activated. The vampire that Sausage now stood beside pounced on him, able to catch him off guard enough due to the translocation to bear him to the ground. The one now next to Myth spun around on one foot with the other raised to deliver a tremendously powerful kick to his gut, knocking him right over and leaving him laying winded.

That gave him a clue toward which one he was dealing with. He remembered a kick with that kind of force from the past—

Unless the rules of this universe meant Smajor also gained ten powers when Scott turned him; Myth could think of no other way Smajor could have suddenly become a vampire. Unless they had somehow pulled off one heck of a ruse with a costume. Of course, that meant Smajor would be taken down in an instant by Sausage if he had no powers, just hair dye and…

Well, the eyes would be another story, wouldn’t they?

Myth still had a hold on the improvised stake, so he shifted to where he could get a stab in with it if the vampire he was facing went for another attack.

Except that vampire was now nowhere in sight. Instead, he saw Sausage still on the ground with his opponent straddling his chest, managing to have pinned the superhero’s arms down with his knees and currently trying to drive a dagger into a gap at the top of his exosuit. Myth started to wonder why Sausage hadn’t already used his giant’s strength to throw his opponent off – then a sudden freezing sensation began to spread over his skin on the arm where he held the stake.

Smajor couldn’t already be this proficient with multiple powers. Myth decided to risk it, and hastily transferred the stake to his other hand. “Hey, hero!” He flung the stake toward Sausage’s near hand. The superhero snapped his arm up with no issue, catching the stake while throwing his opponent off balance. Then he boosted himself up to his feet and swung; the vampire who had been on him darted away. Sausage paused a split second to press his free hand to his neck close to his jaw. He glanced at his palm, then moved in pursuit.

Myth turned his attention back to the mysterious freezing of his arm. It was spreading fast. Going on a hunch, he whipped his other fist around above where the sensation had first taken hold. He flinched as he felt a retaliatory pain to his knuckles even though he thought he had hit solid fabric, not a sharp object.

Under his breath he muttered, “Kangaroo. Snow golem. …Thornling.” He threw a harder punch, flinching again, but it was enough to knock who he hoped was Scott out of sneak mode. As the vampire returned to visibility, reeling slightly from the punch, Myth heaved himself to his feet and lashed out with a kick of his own – it landed against his opponent’s side, staggering the vampire, but Myth flinched again. His boots weren’t enough to absorb the thorns effect.

He had something better to fight with, anyway. He drew his sword, the tarnished blade barely gleaming in the moonlight yet revealing its reddish sheen.

The vampire facing him looked unimpressed, which told him for certain that this wasn’t Smajor, who had come to always cower at the sight of it being drawn. “You should know that won’t do much to me. The stick you had might have worked better.”

“No, I think it will do just fine,” Myth assured.

“We’ll see.”

Myth spread his wings then leapt forward with the sword held ready for a slash. A red haze fell over his vision; Scott turned his back on the cursed angel, then triggered the swap, leaving Myth to begin slashing at thin air – but with a sweep of one middle wing, he adjusted his balance and pivoted, continuing the slash in time to strike Scott across the arm.

The vampire yelped in pain and hopped backward, clutching his torn sleeve. He glanced down at it, lifting his hand partway for long enough to see black ichor oozing out of the wound. “What the hell kind of weapon is that?!” he screeched.

“Exactly,” Myth jeered. Then he growled out, “You’ve got angel blood in you. That’s what it does to the holy. Even when it’s a little muddled by other things.”

They were distracted by a shout from Smajor, who was frantically scrubbing at his eyes while Sausage stood poised with a small empty vial in his hand, clearly having flung the contents into Smajor’s face. Myth was the first to snap his attention back to his opponent and stabbed forward with his sword. Scott dodged then stared hard at Myth; the cursed angel was instantly locked into place, but rather than take advantage and attack, Scott ran toward Smajor.

He grabbed the identical vampire and pulled him into the tree line, ducking out of sight from the other two, which freed Myth to move again.

Smajor continued to rub at his face, but peered at Scott balefully from one eye. “Nice time to slip up with Myth. I could have avoided that holy water.” Then he clenched his teeth. “What did he mean, you have angel blood in you?!”

“I guess you did miss all my hints, but I’m sorry, you seem a little dense – especially if that’s the angel you want to kill! Are you insane?! That’s impossible!”

“I’ve killed him dozens of times! Why should it be so hard now? Also, of course I’m insane. What do you think being killed over a hundred times does to a person?”

The proclamation was so calm that Scott realized Smajor was serious about ending Myth. “What do you even expect me to do against him? You could have told me earlier that he wasn’t a normal angel!”

“I said he was an overpowered seraph with goopy wings. Doesn’t that say enough?”

“Seraphs don’t look like that!” Scott grabbed Smajor by the lapels of his borrowed shirt, then winced as the movement made the wound on his arm sting. “Or have weapons that do this!” He now tugged on his torn sleeve, shoving the wound into Smajor’s face to show him the ichor that had soaked into the fabric.

Smajor ignored it for a moment to glare accusingly into Scott’s eyes. “Well, your superhero seems to be broken. All he’s done is chase me around with a stick – up until throwing holy water in my face, that is. How long has he been carrying that around?”

He then shifted his gaze to the wound. For a second, he seemed to be analyzing it, but then he revealed what he had actually been thinking by sticking out his tongue and licking off some of the ichor. Scott snatched his arm away. Purposely feeding the other man his blood was one thing.

Meanwhile, Smajor’s expression became thoughtful. “Hm. Yeah. There is a distinct note of angel blood in there.”

Scott bristled, but then his attention was pulled aside toward the sound of Shubble’s voice as she yelled, “Don’t worry! I’ll flush them out! I think they went this way!”

He smiled in a way that he hoped Smajor would see as sinister. “Perfect. Say, did you have a Shubble in your world?”

“Might have. Wispy little shadow girl?”

“Yeah. She likes to tag along with Sausage. We can use her against him. I’ll go keep those two distracted while you catch her. Just be sure to go slow, and sneak as much as you can. She has animal senses and might sniff you out.”

“Noted. Are you going to tell me why you have angel blood?”

“I did tell you. I’m not an average vampire. I have a few extra powers. Everyone does, that’s why Shubble doesn’t look the same as a regular shadowcrawler, but also doesn’t look wolfen. Sausage was going easy on you if all he did was chase you. But he’s soft-hearted like that. Now enough talking before she hears us!” Scott then disappeared from Smajor’s sight, although he did see the underbrush move as the other headed back toward open ground.

For the moment Myth and Sausage remained where they had last been standing, tense and waiting for a sign of the vampires being ousted from the forest by Shubble. Myth figured he might as well voice his annoyance. “Holy water? You threw holy water at him? You could flatten him into the ground with one hit! What are you doing?!”

“Keeping him busy,” Sausage replied. “If I did more than just lead him around, he might have called to Scott for help, and Scott might have hit you with something worse to stall you so he could go help him!”

Having gotten a brief sample of being stuck in place with tunnel vision taking hold, Myth realized he had to agree. “All right, fair point. But if that does happen next round, you can still just flatten Smajor, then help me.”

Sausage smiled as he looked over at him, mouth opening to make some predictably blithe comment, but he was interrupted by one of the vampires swooping down from out of nowhere – or rather, from the top of a tree – and slamming into the superhero with fists leading, causing him to cry out in pain and stumble.

This was not a reaction Myth expected from someone with the resilience showed in Sanctuary. The invisibility up until collision made him assume this was Scott, confirmed by a quick glimpse of his torn sleeve, and that meant he might have abilities he could stack to hit hard enough to affect Sausage. Myth only took a single step in their direction, however, unsure what type of opening to look for where he might step in. He also kept half of his attention on alert for Smajor either being chased from hiding by Shubble, or launching his own attack.

He wondered if Smajor would have the guts to even think he stood a chance. Myth glanced along the tree line and smirked as he called out, “Did you think I would fall for the trick of switching places with someone identical to you? Or that seeing you as a vampire again would bring back memories, and make me feel terrified? Go ahead, come on out and see how cursed angel blood tastes!”

Not one twig snapped. Myth was almost disappointed that his relentless rival didn’t snark back at him like usual. He kept listening, but only heard the sounds of Sausage and Scott grappling. Somehow, despite the former’s touted strength, they seemed evenly matched, although the visible puffs of breath Sausage was exhaling and his now slowed movements indicated Scott’s snow golem abilities paired with his vampiric strength at night was keeping the superhero in check.

Scott executed a kangaroo-derived kick to Sausage’s midsection, freeing up his hands while apparently not having much impact; it was likely Sausage had taken such a kick before and kept his core muscles rock-solid during a close quarters fight. But the purpose for Scott’s move was so he could slap his hands against either side of the exosuit plating on Sausage’s right arm.

There was a crackle as it became coated in ice, then the green lights within the vent went dark. Scott made a ducking motion, becoming invisible. Sausage’s eyes darted around, alert for where the attack might come from. He raised his left arm in case he needed to compensate for the right arm with a block. Scott became visible again as he landed a punch squarely on the frozen armor piece – which shattered from the blow.

“Really?!” Sausage squawked. “Do you know how much work it takes to repair that?! Come on, now!” He started to shake the numbness from his hand that had been caused by the extreme cold. A startled cry from within the trees had him jerking his head toward the sound as he recognized it as Shubble. “No!” he yelled. Before Scott could attempt to stop him from going to her aid, Sausage dealt a blow to the vampire that was full of repelling gravi and probably more of his giant’s strength than he had intended, because it sent Scott skidding across the ground. He left a long gouge in the grass along the way until he came to a halt almost at Myth’s feet.

In the next breath there was a clicking sound from Sausage’s exosuit as he rapidly switched polarities to boost in the direction of Shubble’s voice. However, he stopped short and nearly fell on his face as Shubble, looking distinctly taller and more muscular, emerged from the brush with one arm around a flailing Smajor’s torso, holding him off the ground, with her other equally massive hand wrapped over his entire face.

“Oh no,” she said, tone dripping with dramatic sarcasm. “A big, bad vampire tried to sneak up on me! Whatever could I do! And he might try to switch places with someone so that I’d be holding them instead! I couldn’t possibly stop that from happening! …Also, no one ever seems to want to listen when I warn them that they wouldn’t like me when I shulk out.”

Smajor stopped struggling and hung in her grasp. From beneath her hand came the muffled words, “I hate all of you.”

Sausage laughed. “Good job! Well, that’s the missing jailbird recaptured. Now we can sort… this… out…”

He began to turn toward Myth with the offer of a smile, but saw the cursed angel raising his sword above the dazed Scott, who was staggering onto his feet with a hand held to his chest where Sausage’s hit had landed, his head bowed in an attempt to recover. As the blade came down, Sausage zipped forth with incredible speed and pushed Scott out of the way.

Perhaps he had intended to block it with his exosuit. Perhaps he had intended to switch to a different power in defense like in Sanctuary. Either way, he failed, and the blade cut into him as the edge made contact with his arm.

His right arm.

[ Chapter Three ]

[winksasleeplesseye]

File #005 - Night Music

City of the Dead

Pairing: Leon Kennedy x OC

Word Count: 3.6k

Fandom: Resident Evil

Warnings: Financial abuse, verbal, slight domestic abuse

Summary: Amara has a slight bit of thinking on her past and what got her to become a cop, she questions Leon’s motives just the same as they make their way through the city.

Previous Chapter Next Chapter

1995

Was it possible for a heart to drop through your asshole to your feet? Your stomach to lurch so violently that it’d come out your mouth alongside the vomit?

Amara does, quite frankly too well, and what had occurred since this morning is more than the straw that broke the camel’s back. 

Her mother constantly made excuses for her father, saying he’d lived a tough life and that with support, he could be helped. But, how could she say that knowing that he had stolen money from his own flesh and blood to support his vices? And this wasn’t the first time either, other times the amounts had been small, nothing Amara couldn’t handle but now, it was different.

Even for someone at her young age, knew better and wouldn’t be around to do that. How could she be around to support the very same person who had hurt her? 

Her small semblance of stability, her control had been rocked so easily. She never wanted to feel as frantic and shattered as she did that morning at the bank. 

The teller eyed her with so much sympathy, or was it pity? Her heart almost seemed like a frog ready to jump from her throat as she backed away from the counter, the floor beneath her swaying a tad as she had to make a dash to the car before anyone could even ask her if she was alright. 

She had never sped back so fast to the base, in the loaner car they always switched out at each new base.

She pulled up to the blue-clad house on a street practically hidden by the cover of trees. An aspect her mother told her the construction company did to give the houses a sense of “normalcy”. Amara didn’t exactly think it gave anything close to normal.

This had been the longest they’d stayed anywhere, thankfully in the United States this time. Monet had moved on only a year ago, college certainly gave her a great excuse to stay in one place. 

Amara loved some aspects of being out of the country but the US had way more things she was more familiar with. 

For one thing, now that they were in California, Amara felt that she could breathe.

Amara never really bothered to learn the actual name of the place they lived, too much of an attachment always made it harder when they inevitably left. But still, she couldn’t help the indelible yet brief mark she knows it’ll leave. 

The city outside the base is not too big, not too small, it’s just right, her Mom would comment. Like Goldilocks. The city sits beside the sea, its own soft sand beach that would rush against the shore. It used to be a tourist attraction before it became overrun with more military personnel. 

Amara would sometimes wish she could stay forever, just letting the sun beat down on her skin, instead of just savoring every moment here considering how fleeting it could be. 

She barely gave care to the car as she practically jumped out without fully making sure it was in park. Rushing past her mother, trying not to let her in on what she was doing. The last thing she needed was to make her mother match her frantic energy. She quietly tore through her parents’ room, she’d learned early where her father tried to hide things. 

When she was seven, while on base in Sydney, he’d make it a point to make a game out of hiding things for her and Monet to look for. It was fun then, hiding silly things like candy and toys, now she was more frantic, afraid her heart would pound out of her chest. 

Amara thanked the powers that be that in his old age, he’d become so predictable. Her money, every cent, is laid out in the bedside table drawer in a secret compartment. 

Last time, she hadn’t been so lucky. But that time wasn’t damn near all her savings. 

Savings she’d been working to fill since she was 15, every odd job, waitress gig, or even errands she ran for others around the bases had gotten her that much. 

“Thank goodness.” A sigh of relief pushes past her lips, a weight had temporarily been lifted as she counted it all. 

At that moment, her mind had been made up, she’d leave and never come back. 

At the same time, she had a ball of anxiety lodged in her sternum, how would she survive? Moving from place to place is all she had ever really known. No, she shakes her head at that, fighting against the voice in her head that instilled her fear of the unknowns. 

She tiptoed from the room, heading to hers. 

“This is crazy,” Amara quietly said to herself, as she looked around her room. Her haven for the past few months. It’s not like she isn’t weighing the pros and cons despite fending herself off from the voice in her head yet again about every wrong thing that could happen. 

What if this happened, what if that happened, what if you ruined your life with one impulse decision and ended up homeless or worse? Amara winces as if someone had slapped her at that thought. 

She threw just about everything she had into backpacks and suitcases, something she’d always been too familiar with. Amara had never quite gotten to a point where she could just unpack everything. Both literally and figuratively. 

—-

Amara wrestled with her decision, wrestling so long that it had now gotten dark outside. Maybe she needed to sleep it off, and have a clear head in the morning.

She went through the usual evening routine with her Mom, setting out the table since the latter so graciously made them all dinner but her Dad was nowhere in sight. She doesn’t exactly consider that an improvement–but it was better than him sitting in a darkened living room in front of the TV, blinds drawn against the beautiful California sunshine and a certain funk permeating the air. “Thanks again, Mom.”

“What, honey?” Her mom blinks and turns her full attention to Amara as she turns off the sink, smiling vaguely. “Could you say that again?” Amara wanted to slap herself for even attempting to talk to her at the same time as the running water, something that was, unfortunately, kind of broken. Something that her father continuously put off fixing, much like everything else. 

“I was just saying thanks for dinner.” 

“Ah, it’s the least I could do. Did you get everything figured out?” Her mother asks.

Amara furrowed her brow. “Huh? With what?” Was her mom already onto her? 

“With the bank this morning? I know you went out and came back, you seemed pretty tense.”

Amara waved it off, putting on her best nonchalant act. “Ah, was nothing crazy. Everything’s good.”  

“Good, good.” Her mother smiled, throwing her a mischievous look but something in her eyes made Amara feel like she didn’t completely buy it. “Now, do you think you can grab me some ingredients for a pound cake? I’d let you do it but you’d burn the house down.”

“Hey!” Amara gasped, a little offended. She wasn’t that bad a cook! So what if she burned mac and cheese once? One time isn’t enough to say she’s a bad cook. 

She does as she asks, grabbing the items and setting them out but her stomach rumbled just looking at the actual food they’d have for dinner. Her mother is a miracle worker with every ingredient and within 20 minutes, the mixture is already in the oven. 

“Let’s get started,” her mother lightly pushed her to the dining room table, “don’t want the food to get cold, do we?” 

Amara sat at the dinner table, watching her mother carefully as she served the food. Off in the distance, she heard a car door slam and could tell trouble was brewing. She couldn't help but now notice the way her mother's hands were shaking, a sign of the anxiety that had become all too familiar in their home.

Just as they were about to start eating, the front door slammed shut, and heavy, stumbling footsteps made their way toward the bedroom. Amara already knows what exactly he planned to do, come in for the money and head back out. But not this time. 

"Hey, what's going on?" Her father slurred, looking around the room with bleary eyes as he came in unceremoniously. If he was angry, Amara couldn't exactly tell but that doesn’t stop her from being on edge. 

Amara didn't answer, but her mother spoke up. "It's dinner time, dear. Why don't you come to join us?"

"I don't feel like eating," her father said, but he still sat down at the table regardless and her mother prepared him a plate anyways. Couldn’t he do that himself? Her eyes focused on the food on her plate as she quietly ate but she could practically feel her father’s eyes searing into the top of her head. It was clear that the night was going to take a turn for the worse.

The tension in the room is palpable. The scent of alcohol reeked throughout the room, there was no denying where the scent was emanating from either. Amara glanced at her mother, who looked like she was anywhere but there. Clearly, she wasn’t going to address the elephant in the room, more likely for her own sanity. 

She just wanted to get through dinner without any incidents.

But it wasn't meant to be. Cutting through the offensively loud silence, Amara's father suddenly turned to her and said, "You think you can just take whatever you want, huh? That money was mine!"

The nerve of him! His money? 

Amara’s pulse pounded in her ears like a bass drum, drowning out everything else around her. She felt her breathing quicken and her hands begin to shake as her blood boiled with rage, immediately standing up from the table. "It was my money, Dad! I earned it!"

Her mother spoke up, "Oh, stop it, both of you. Can't we have one nice dinner without all this fighting?"

Amara shot her mother a withering look. "You always defend him, even when he's clearly in the wrong. For fuck sake, he stole from his own daughter! What are you gonna defend him for next? Murder?” 

That's when her father snapped. He grabbed Amara by the arm and shoved her into the wall. "Don't you ever talk to your mother like that again," he snarled.

Amara had had enough. “Fuck you,” She pushed him out of her way, no longer afraid of him as she had grown to be. As she returned to the living room with her packed bags in tow, her father's rage boiled over.

"You little brat," he spat, lunging towards her. "I'll teach you some respect."

Amara backed away, preparing to grab something to defend herself if necessary. Her mother tried to intervene, but her father continued to yell and curse, his anger escalating by the second. When he finally threatened them both, Amara knew that she had to take action.

She ran for the phone, her heart racing. "I'm calling the police," she said, her voice shaking with anger.

Her father laughed. "Go ahead, call them. They won't do anything."

But Amara was determined. She grabbed the phone and dialed 911, explaining the situation to the operator. As she spoke, she could hear her father's angry words in the background, and her mother's feeble attempts to calm him down.

When the police arrived, her mother defended her father, telling the officers that he had just had too much to drink and that everything was fine. But Amara knew better. She had seen this all before with things on TV, and she knew that it was only a matter of time before her father's small act of anger turned into more violence. 

This was the first time it had ever escalated to that level, a part of her, while putting on a brave face, had never been as shocked as she was at his actions. Over money that wasn’t his, no less. 

The officers handled the whole situation and cared more than she really ever thought they would. Something about it made her not feel so helpless in everything, she wanted to do that for others somehow. 

As the police left, Amara made a final, final decision. She would leave this toxic environment and never look back. It was time for her to make her own way in the world, and she was determined to do it on her own terms.

—-

September 30, 1998.

From that point on, Amara could never really put much stock into anyone. That whole situation really wasn't about the money but really the principle of it all. Losing family and friends in many different ways had made her so afraid of actually caring for others. 

Amara always likened it to shedding your skin and baring your heart, opening someone up to every vulnerability, every vein, every pulse that pumped through it. And every single thing that had occurred had been like someone had taken that very same beating heart and thrown it to the cold, hard floor. 

But then, she ended up here right out of the academy. Raccoon City. She got this job and met people who showed that maybe it wasn’t so bad to bare your heart and rely on others. That people could be tight-knit, an actual family without the mess, and have your back.

Showed her that she could rise above her circumstances and be better. 

And now, even though most were gone, she still tried to be better and was better for having known them. 

She pondered on these things briefly in the moments of silence between the three of them. She straggled behind Leon and Ada, looking at the city streets and what had become of them in such a short amount of time.

She caught a glimpse of herself in the window of a restaurant she had been to before, and usually, she’s never one to be too hard on herself, but Jesus, she’d seen better days. 

Her hair stuck to her skin, no thanks to the endless rain, and would more than likely be unruly when it dried. But on the bright side, it did offer some cleansing of the grime she’d accumulated, though she was sure that her leather jacket, turtleneck, and jeans could never be worn again after tonight. They’d probably be soaked through forever now.

“Road’s out, we’ll have to cut through that shop.” Ada’s voice cuts through her thoughts. The very sinkhole that Ben had mentioned lay before them. 

Leon stood at its very edge, looking down at the scaffolding and things of that nature. Amara joins him, no real or particularly interesting thoughts on what’s down in it but she can’t help but say what comes to her mind first, “Big ass hole.” 

He starts laughing, probably at the absurdity.  “Anything you could’ve said and that’s the best you’ve got?” 

“I mean…my brain is more than a little fried right now, so yes.” Amara starts to laugh with him. She doesn’t miss Ada’s shake of her head as she worked on the lockpicking but she really didn’t care, she needed to laugh at something to keep from going insane. 

“Fair enough.”

“So, I guess it’s my turn to ask you something, what really got you into wanting to become a cop?” 

“You sure you wanna know?” 

“No, I don’t give a shi-yes, I want to know, Leon!” She lightly jabs him in the shoulder. 

Leon took a deep breath before answering. “Ever heard of the Garcetti family?” 

“In passing, go on.” 

“Well, I’m not sure of all of the details since I was just a kid, but I only assume my parents must’ve gotten in bad with the family…long story short, that night I became an orphan.” Leon gives her a strained smile, almost like he didn’t just tell her the most heart-wrenching thing you could tell anyone. 

Her eyes widened in surprise just thinking about it. “Shit, Leon.” 

Leon doesn’t exactly seem to let on at first glance that he’d been through something of that magnitude but Amara is someone who always kind of thinks–thought people lived one story, but after everything, she’s become wise enough to realize people are more than they appear to be.

Leon shrugged. “It’s nothing…—don’t give me that look-“ 

“I’m sorry, Leon. That just really sucks.”

“Yeah well, you asked.” Leon points out. That is a fair point on his end. “If it hadn’t been for the officer that night who protected me, I wouldn’t be standing here today. He’s part of the reason why I felt drawn to it all. It was a long time ago, but I always carry that with me.” 

Amara nodded, understanding. “I get that, somewhat. My dad was in the military, we moved around a lot. I didn’t exactly have the most stable home or many friends growing up. So when I was 18, I joined the academy to get away from it all.”

She went on. “It wasn’t easy, but it was a way for me to have some control over my life and certainly drove me to want to help others in a way that I hadn’t been afforded. That’s part of why I ended up with S.T.A.R.S.” 

Amara smiled softly, thinking of the team once more, even though it was for a short time, they were the first people in a long time that made her feel like she belonged somewhere. 

There was a comfortable silence between them until Ada called them over, finally managing to get the door opened. 

It’d been a while since she’d been to Kendo’s Gun Shop, it wasn’t exactly everyday that she needed a new supply of guns, or ammo, she had plenty at the station at one time or another. 

She and the whole team knew him well enough, she had even gotten the chance to meet his family at one point this past spring. Amara could only hope they’d made it out. 

The shop is completely ransacked, shelves tipped over and shards of glass from the display cases strewn about the floor. If someone were to ask what exactly chaos looked like, this was definitely one of the images Amara would conjure up. 

“Ugh, what a mess,” Ada comments, searching the shelves for extra ammunition. 

In the name of self-preservation, Amara does the same, placing whatever she could into her hip pouch. Moving deeper into the store, suddenly a shotgun cocked and Amara turned to find that Leon is held at gunpoint. 

“Don’t move,” Kendo threatens, his face contorted in fear as Amara quietly peered around the corner of the shelf. She didn’t want to get too jumpy, especially in what had quickly escalated to a tense situation.  

“I’m just passing through, I’m gonna ask you to lower that weapon,” Leon speaks calmly, looking forward, probably just as mindful not to set Kendo off. 

“Like hell you are, you’re gonna turn around and go right back out the way you came in.” 

Amara crouches low, tiptoeing over shards of glass nearing the two of them. If anyone could talk him down, she hopes it’s her. 

"Kendo, it's me," Amara calls out, hoping to calm the panicked man. "We don’t want any trouble."

In the momentary second that Kendo turns his attention to her voice, Leon is quick to turn on him, aiming his gun at him. Amara and Ada both emerge from the shadows, guns already aimed and ready. Kendo looked frayed and exhausted, with bloodshot eyes and a crazed expression. Amara noticed the shotgun was shaking in his hands as he tried to keep it trained on Leon.

Amara can see that Kendo's daughter Emma is standing nearby, her eyes sunken and her skin paler than usual. She knows that Emma is turning, yet Kendo still protected her despite the futility of it. 

"Kendo, lower it," Amara says calmly, taking slow steps forward. "Just like the man said, we’re just passing through.” 

Kendo hesitates for a moment, his finger still on the trigger of the shotgun. Amara sees the fear in his eyes, the fear that's driving him to protect his daughter at all costs.

"Please, Kendo," Amara continues, keeping her voice steady. "We're not the enemy here.”

Kendo hesitates for a moment, his eyes darting between the three of them. Slowly, he lowers his gun, allowing Amara to approach him. Amara can see the relief on Leon's face as he lowers his own gun.

As they talk with Kendo, Amara can't help but feel a sense of sadness and desperation. They're all just trying to survive, to hold on to some semblance of normalcy in a world gone mad. And yet, the odds seem to be against them. It’s at this point that Amara lets it sink in just how many people had been impacted by this, innocent people. 

By the conversation’s end, Amara’s sure none of them feel any better about everything thus far. 

“You know,... it’s one thing to keep the truth from us, but why him?” Leon turns on Ada, a determination in his voice. 

A lone gunshot sounds off from behind the door, and Amara’s heart drops. Please, don’t let there be another shot. 

“I want to stop this. Protecting people like them? That’s why I joined the force.”

Ada turns squarely to Leon. “My mission is to stop Umbrella’s whole operation, we may not make it out.” 

Leon’s response proves to Amara that he was destined for this. “Whatever it takes to save this city, count us in.” 

[thecrimecrypt]

Blockbuster Crimes (Bonnie & Clyde)

The story behind one of history’s most infamous criminal couples.

On 5 January 1930, in West Dallas, Texas, Bonnie Parker, 19, met Clyde Barrow, 21. Bonnie was a bored waitress, estranged from her jailed husband, while Clyde was a petty criminal. 

They fell head over heels in love. Soon after, when Clyde was jailed for burglary, Bonnie smuggled in a gun to help him escape.  He was recaptured, sent back to jail. But when he was released in February 1932, Clyde rejoined Bonnie and they stole a car, committed a string of robberies. That April, Bonnie was caught and jailed for two months. 

And when she was released, she and Clyde embarked on their infamous crime spree, rampaging through Depression-era America with an ever-changing team of accomplices.  They robbed banks and convenience stores, murdering anyone who got in their way. 

In the summer of 1932, the couple travelled with Clyde’s boyhood friend Raymond Hamilton, although he was later jailed.  That August, while Bonnie was visiting her mother, Clyde and Raymond were drinking at a country dance. Sheriff Maxwell and his deputy Eugene Moore approached them in the car park. 

Clyde opened fire, killing the deputy.  As their crime spree continued, they became known as the Barrow Gang. In March 1933, Clyde’s brother, Buck Barrow, was released from prison. He and his wife Blanche joined Bonnie, Clyde and their gang. 

The Barrow Gang committed a string of daring robberies and made headlines across the country, particularly Bonnie - an unlikely criminal.  Bonnie and Clyde even posed for playful photos, brandishing guns. However, the notorious lovers were almost caught in April 1933, when police raided their hideout. 

Bonnie provided cover with a hail of bullets from her automatic rifle as the gang shot their way out.  Two police officers were shot dead as the gang escaped. But the criminal couple had to leave behind most of their possessions in the hideout - including a roll of undeveloped film, containing photos subsequently released to the media. 

They included the now-infamous snap of Bonnie beside a car, cigar clenched between her teeth, and pistol in her hand.  Photos of the outlaws were front-page news. In June 1933, Bonnie suffered terrible burns to her right leg during a high-speed car crash. 

Clyde had missed a detour sign, flipping the car into a ravine, and acid from the crushed battery melted Bonnie’s flesh to the bone.  Her burns were so severe that, from then on, she limped, hopped or was carried by Clyde. 

The following month, they were almost caught during a second raid on a hideout in Missouri.  Buck was killed during the shootout, Blanche arrested and later jailed. But Bonnie and Clyde continued their life of crime. 

In January 1934, they attacked Eastham Prison Farm in Texas, freeing five prisoners, including Raymond Hamilton.  Several guards were shot, one killed by the escaping prisoners - using automatic pistols Clyde had hidden in a ditch. 

As the prisoners ran, Clyde covered their retreat with bursts of machine-gun fire.  After this, Texan prison officials hired special investigator Captain Frank Hamer to track down the couple. 

Hamer soon traced the duo, set up an ambush. Before dawn, on 23 May 1934, Hamer and four police officers hid in bushes along a country road near Sailes, Louisiana. 

When Bonnie and Clyde appeared and attempted to drive away in their stolen car, the officers opened fire - killing Bonnie and Clyde instantly.  Clyde Barrow, Bonnie Parker and the Barrow Gang were responsible for at least 13 murders, including those of nine police officers. 

And while their violent story has been romanticized - their bullet-riddled car is still on display at a hotel and casino in Primm, Nevada - they take their place as one of history’s most dangerous criminal couples. 

The Movie Take

The 1967 double-Oscar-winning film Bonnie and Clyde starred Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway. Some criticize it as romanticized, glorifying the couple’s cold-blooded crimes. 

In the film, they meet when Bonnie thwarts Clyde’s attempt to steal her mother’s car. But Bonnie’s mom said they met over a mug of hot chocolate at a friend’s.  Clyde was portrayed as impotent, but was actively heterosexual. 

Beatty invented this to give his film character more depth. However, Clyde really did chop off two toes in prison!  In the film, the gang are ‘Robin Hood’ types, stealing from rich banks, soft on ‘regular folk’. Yet, in truth, the gang’s main targets were small-town stores and saving banks. 

And, unlike real life - with the pair imprisoned for stints - the film takes place over one long, murderous spree.  But, like all retellings of this infamous due - their story ends the same. The couple die in a hail of bullets. 

[miss-writes-a-lot]

Not-So-Sweet Sixteen (Hurt Hawks Week Day 4: Blame and Family)

(Part of my villian! Suzume au. Implied Dabihawks)

They say never become your parents, but at the same time, one begins to notice that in some way, a small part of you ends up inheriting at least one, ugly little thing from them. That one, maggot of a thing that you always told yourself you would never do or be stuck with when you have kids of your own.

In Hawks' case, it was leaving his behind.

It was supposed to be an easy bank robbery – just a couple of dumb kids with quirks thinking themselves to be big and bad villains trying to hit up one of the biggest banks in Fukuoka. He would be in and out in five minutes.

He doesn't expect to see her there, holding a bag of cash in one hand and a shard of heated but hard glass to the neck of an unconscious receptionist in the other.  He doesn't expect her to listen when that boy tells her to take the cash she has and book it out the side of the building.

He doesn't expect his body to fail him a few seconds too long and get a shard of her glass stuck in his shoulder.

He apprehends the rest of the teens – he gets away thanks to her distraction – and sends a feather after her. Once the other heroes and the police show up, he books it out of the bank.

Admittedly – and he really hates to admit it – he is slower than he usually is. On purpose.

A part of him wants her to get away. Away from that boy, away from this life, away from him. She doesn't want to see him, he can't bear to face her. It makes sense.

But, he's still a hero, and whether she likes it or not, he's still her dad.

He has to try.

He corners her down some tight alleyways. She's got a white knuckle grip on the bags of cash and doesn't look back at him, but she knows he's there. The glass digging further into his shoulder, burning into his muscle is proof of that.

"Suzume!" he shouts, picking up speed, "I know you can hear me! Stop!"

"Fuck off!" she spits back. Her palms start to glow orange.

Hawks narrows his eyes, "Stop or I'll make you stop!"

He hears her scoff. He lands on his feet and detaches his feathers. He sends half of them in front of her to form a sharp red wall while the other half does the same behind him. Her boots screech to a halt, her body mere centimeters from colliding with the wall. She whips her head back at him and his breath gets caught in his throat.

She looks too...old for sixteen. It doesn’t help that she has her daddy’s height, and it’s even less ideal that those blood covered, steel toed boots add an inch or two more. Maybe that’s what all Fathers think of their daughters at some point, but seeing her with scars on her upper left arm and exposed abdomen, the long, clawed raven gloves that match the thick black mask over her equally scared mouth, the dark brown hair where her blonde is supposed to be -

She can’t be sixteen anymore. It’s not possible. 

Sixteen doesn’t run down alleyways with bags full of stolen bags of cash. Sixteen doesn’t have this many scars on them. Sixteen doesn’t have that look of murder in her sunset eyes.

She holds up her fists, calling the shard back to her. It painfully rips out of Hawks’ shoulder and it flies into her hand. She holds it out to him.

“One more step and I’ll cut you!” she threatens.

Hawks hides a hard swallow. He crosses his arms over his chest and stares her dead in the eyes. Their eyes…

“I think you’re shit outta luck there, Baby Bird-”

“Shut up!” she shouts, “The fuck are you even doing? You caught me, asshole. What are you trying to do here?”

“I just wanna talk.”

She scoffs again, rolling her eyes, “Yeah, right. Like I’m supposed to believe that either of you are starting to care about me now?”

Hawks’ eyes widen, “You talked to your dad?”

“You can say that,” she replies with a half hearted shrug, “And I’m gonna tell you the same thing I told him. Stay the fuck outta my life. You didn’t want any part of it when I was around, so don’t even try to start now.”

“Suzi, I-”

“No! No. You don’t get to call me that, Hawks,” her voice drips venom as she tightens her grip around the shard of glass, “I’m not your Baby Bird, or your Chickadee, or your Suzi Q, or - or whatever! I’m not your Suzume anymore. I’m not yours anymore. You made that pretty clear when I left the first time.”

Hawks bites the inside of his cheek. He closes his eyes as the memory of that night burns its way into the front of his brain. His voice echoes in his ears alongside the sound of a slamming door and fast footsteps dashing through tall grass in a dark night full of cicadas. He opens his eyes. She’s still there, still holding the glass toward him.

Her hand’s shaking.

Sirens wail behind them. He hears Suzume swear under her breath. Her head whips around in all directions for an exit that she can’t find - not with him around.

He clenches his fist. 

‘Don’t do it. Don’t do it. You’ll lose her again if you do it. This is your only way to get her out and away from him. Don’t fucking do it-’

He lifts the feathered wall behind her. She stares at the opening in surprise, turning her head back to him.

“Go,” he says, nodding down the alleyway, “We’ll see each other again soon.”

She glowers, “Don’t count on it.”

She takes the cash and bolts down into the darkness. He listens as the click of her heels slowly disappears alongside her shape. He doesn’t leave until he can’t hear her anymore.

But he always hears her. 

He hears her laughs, her cries, her pleas for forgiveness and affection, her worry - he hears it all, like a record on repeat.

And from the sounds of it, Dabi’s been hearing them too.

If only he had listened better.

[yllowpages]

REFLECT : elena finding nate on the island. @ichigokurosaki

The air is thick, to the point she can practically feel the weight of it around her as it hits her face. But the moving air provides some relief as she steers the jeep down what remains of the washed-away stone roads these pirates of legend managed to put down. She saw it all from the air, but even what crumbling pieces of what's left on the ground ... Some of it takes her breath away. ( It's amazing ... Practically inspiring. Different circumstances and she'd let herself enjoy this, explore, even write a story on it — but she can't. )

This story is too ... predictable. And maybe that's why she's doing this. She even feels guilty that, even for a second, she thought she wouldn't. After she closed that door behind her, she told herself she was done ... that she was too tired to do this same dance with him. Over and over again. It was an argument as old as time for them, and, in that moment, she just ... couldn't do it anymore. So she could have walked away ( she almost did ) and let him make his own decisions, whatever they lead to — for better or worse. ( Damn it. ) But she knew she'd never forgive herself if ... — if he never came back.

One moment, all she hears is the sound of the wind, the wheels of the car, and birds in the distance. Then — an explosion. Loud. Like it shakes the whole island. Instinctively, the jeep slows, almost coming to a complete halt as she looks out over the trees : smoke. ❝ Oh no ... ❞ And her foot presses down on the gas, picking up some speed. She has to get over there — wherever there is. She only reaches dead end after dead end until, finally, a way down. Gunfire, now ; the closer she gets, the clearer it becomes. It's Nate. It has to be. ( And he had better be alive. ) Smoke is still rising up above the jungle canopy and she can tell she's heading in the right direction. So she leaves her stolen jeep and takes the leap. Literally.

Elena slides down a muddy decline as quickly as she can. At the bottom, she lands briefly on her hands and knees, soaking her jeans, but she's up as soon as she was down. She reaches down for her holster and takes out her weapon, preemptively, as she pushes on, through the mud and streams and the foliage. Nothing. No one. Through the breaks in the trees she can see the edges of architecture — falling apart. But high above her. That must be where they are. But how the hell does she get all the way up there? ( Maybe she doesn't. ) Elena tries to steady her breathing, but it's hard ( all the air she takes into her lungs just feels like it's filling her up instead ) . And it doesn't get any easier.

All she can do is keep going. She can't stop, she won't ( it's not in her to ) . And maybe her perseverance rewards her. She hears the running water, but that's hardly what catches her attention. ❝ Oh, god .... ❞ It doesn't take even a second for her to take off sprinting, toward the bank of the river. Lying there : it's him. He's soaked to the bone and not moving. A cloud of blood seeps into the water, surrounding his head, and she can see the wound on his forehead, still bleeding. ( This is it : the nightmare. ) A chill runs up her spine and her breath leaves her for a second as she approaches. ❝ Oh, my god— Nate! ❞ She falls to her knees in the water next to him, putting her hands on his shoulder.

Elena rolls him onto his back, but he doesn't respond. ❝ Hey! Nate! ❞ Her hand comes to his cheek, trying to gently rouse him still — nothing. The anxiety is rousing So she presses two fingers under his jaw ... she adjusts them. She waits, the anxiety registering on her face : brows pulling together tightly, lips pressing in. ❝ Shit, ❞ she breathes, winded. No pulse ... but she's shaking, maybe she just couldn't tell. She drops down, pressing her ear against his chest, listening for the sound of ... anything. Again, the tension in her body rises. ❝ Okay, ❞ she mutters to herself as she lifts back to her knees.

( Check for breathing, check for pulse — compressions. ) She stacks her hands on his chest and takes deep breaths just to keep herself present. Steeling herself, Elena begins to push down, counting underneath her breath. Each movement with no change makes her breathe faster, more shallow — but she won't lose her cool. She stops for a moment and listens to his chest again. ( Oh, god. ) ❝ Come on, Nate! ❞ she pleads as she continues the compressions, her face twisting even more in her concern. And then it happens.

Elena flinches for a moment, immediately pulling her hands away, as his body lurches and he coughs up water, his chest beginning to lift up and down with deep breaths. ❝ Oh! ❞ she sighs in relief. She sits back in her hips and leans her head down on his chest again. Air rushes into his lungs, she hears it, she feels it. ( He's alive. ) The movement is a miracle and it soothes her, even as her shaky hands come to grip the fabric of his shirt, clinging as if she'd lose him again. ( He's okay. ) And she stays like that for a few more seconds.

She found him ; she saved him. But this isn't over. ( Sam, the mysterious brother, isn't here. ) It's far from over, she thinks ... That thought stays in her mind as she struggles to pull Nate, still unconscious, from the bank of the river and onto drier ground. In the next few minutes, he'll start to wake up, she'll hear him say her name, and she'll bombard him with the usual questions, to make sure a bump and a scrape are the worst of it. ❝ What happened? ❞ is the next predictable question. But she sits and listens ... just like she would have weeks ago, if he'd offered. Better late than never. ( For better or worse. )

[n0t-1nt3r3st1ng]

Vulture!Wednesday AU Part - 11

Wednesday sat in what could be loosely called the "waiting area" of the hospital, a space that offered minimal comfort to those seeking solace during difficult times. On the small table before her, she had carefully drawn a pentacle, its five points and five sides neatly contained within a circle. It was her own makeshift altar, designed for a unique purpose. In front of the pentacle lay her offerings, an unconventional blend born out of familiarity with her family's preferences.

She knew her family well – their quirks and tendencies. To replace the traditional incense, she arranged a number of handmade cigarettes, ready to be offered up in a ritualistic fashion. And where one might typically find a humble offering of water, she had instead placed a bottle of whiskey, recognizing that her otherworldly contact would respond better to this gesture.

Determined, she leaned over the cigarettes, her breath gently coaxing them to life as their tips flickered into a soft glow. The scent of burning tobacco filled her lungs, and she let the smoke rise upwards for a moment. She placed her hands on the table and spoke:

"In umbra silentia, tenebris voco te, Exi a morte, spiritus antiquus, ad me."

"That's alright, kiddo. I can hear you loud and clear," a tired voice sounded from the cigarette smoke. The smoke began to take on the shape of a human face.

" 'Blood and Thunder' Addams, I thank you for your response," Wednesday addressed the smoking shape.

"Hey, anything for the family. Thanks for not using those 'menthols.' Don't know what your generation is thinking," the voice replied.

"I'm glad you approve." Wednesday poured the whiskey in the middle of the pentagram.

"Oh, kiddo, you're spoiling this old ghost." The voice purred with satisfaction. "What can I do for you? Need help with a history paper again?"

"Not quite. Back in the day, you were one of the best train robbers of your time. You contributed greatly to the Addams family fortune," Wednesday replied.

"Yep, then died like an idiot turning traitor at Shiloh," the voice replied, full of regret. "Can't blame my brother for drowning me in that puddle for it."

"Regardless, your experience in the matter could be useful to me."

"What, the family is robbing trains again?"

"No, I'm afraid we've mostly moved on from traditional crimes. My uncle might rob a bank now and then, but we're mostly lawyers and bankers," Wednesday sighed.

"Does it have to do with that personal project of yours?" The voice asked. "Alright, I'll help with what I can, but it's not a science, you know."

"Still, your experience shouldn't be discarded. If anything, one should build from the past for one's improvement."

"You have a silver tongue, kid. I'll give you that much." The smoke undulated as the voice laughed. "What are you thinking, holdup or derailment?"

"Neither, the train must arrive without delays. If they don't realize their cargo has been stolen, better for me." Wednesday replied.

"Oh, that's a tricky one. Alright, how big is your crew?"

"It's just me and my machine for transport."

"No, that won't do." The smoke shook from side to side. "Trains don't just carry the loot, there are guards. In my time, they used deputies or Pinkertons. Nasty pieces of work."

"Whatever security there might be, I assure you I'm more than enough for it. As far as transport goes, my machine is more than qualified." Wednesday replied, standing tall with pride.

"And if they have a safe?" The voice asked.

"Irrelevant. My means allow me to bypass whatever security they might have."

"Well, kid, gotta tell you, it seems you have it all figured out." The voice said.

"Which is why I must consult with you. My plan is perfect in theory, but theory and application are two different things."

"Kid, gotta be honest, it sounds to me like you're scared. Let me guess, first time going solo?" The formless face stared at Wednesday. "Figured as much. The first time is always the worst."

"I simply wish to cover as much as I can."

"Listen- can you pour me another one?" Wednesday poured more whiskey. "Oh, let me tell you, whiskey in your time has really come along. I mean, what you're doing with them smokes is a crime, but this?... Yeah, this is the stuff. Sorry, I'm going off-mark."

"It's fine, I've got time." Wednesday replied, pouring a bit more alcohol.

"Here's the thing: you ain't gonna know what can go wrong until you go through the whole thing. Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to just wing it. Take your time and do your homework. My advice? If it gets too hard, there's no shame in running away. Any job you can return from is a good one in my book."

Wednesday stood for a moment, her face deep in thought.

"Very well, I thank you for assistance."

"Nah, it's alright. I should be thanking you." The formless face turned to embarrassment. "It's nice talking to the family again. Those of us that go rogue don't get many people willing to talk to us."

"You should try coming to the next ball my family is planning." Wednesday replied.

"Pass, I don't see the family rolling the welcome wagon for me." The face looked down.

"You might be surprised. Besides, you said it yourself, you won't know until you tried it." Wednesday replied.

"Heh, thanks. You really are a sweet kid."

"You take that back." Wednesday replied, insulted.

The voice gave one last laugh as the cigarettes consumed themselves, and the presence vanished.

After meticulously tidying the table and stowing away the alcohol, Wednesday descended into the basement, where her prized possession awaited—the exo-suit. A computer next to the suit tirelessly performed system checks, and with relief, she saw that everything was functioning flawlessly.

Countless hours had been poured into crafting this remarkable exo-suit, ensuring the perfect balance of protection and agility. Her upper body was adorned with a sleek black leather bomber jacket, while form-fitting tactical gloves encased her hands, providing both dexterity and defense. Metallic vambraces covered her forearms, adding to her formidable appearance, and a padded exoskeleton offered protection and support during her aerial exploits.

On her lower half, she donned dark green pants, granting her ease of movement while effortlessly blending into the shadows. Around her waist, a specially crafted utility belt, made of high-tech composite fabric, held an array of essential tools and gadgets, vital for her daring undertakings. Her feet were shod in sturdy boots equipped with talons—metal claws that strategically gripped any surface with unwavering tenacity.

However, it was her face that truly defined her appearance, concealed by a specially crafted helmet fashioned from a modified pilot's headgear. The helmet bestowed upon her a captivating aura of mystery and power, with its pointed beak-like front evoking the image of a cunning bird of prey, inspiring both awe and trepidation.

Within the depths of the helmet resided a sophisticated camera system, granting her unparalleled situational awareness. Her eyes emanated an intense green glow, a testament to the cutting-edge technology seamlessly integrated into the helmet.

This exo-suit wasn't just a mere outfit; it was an extension of her identity, a powerful statement of her resolve. For far too long, she had neglected this part of herself. But now, after surviving one more shift at the Weathervane, freedom would be hers to reclaim the skies and seize what was rightfully hers.