#the ending of this puts a new twist on the ending

[kaybreezy3000]

Broken but breathing. Longing for something that always felt just out of his reach, Five was not okay.

With fates forever intertwined, a train, and a smile he would never forget, once again, the impossible became his reality, but like always, not without tragedy.

In the end, all that mattered are the people Five loved. For them, he would do anything.

Note ~I originally started this pre-s4 release as anon request for another headcanon like my last one, but after watching the show I decided this needed to more than that because Five deserved it. This is a full story, with each letter representing a chapter with something that relates back to Five, only with a new twist, you (female reader insert). For those concerned about the Five and Lila narrative, fear not, this story is not going that route.

~mature content so if not your thing, please stay away. TY.

Warnings and Tags: Rated R for sexually explicit content, Hurt Number Five, Alternate S4, Whump, Mental Break Down, Self-Doubt, Angst-humor-love, Uncle Five, The Deli Fives, Starts with Five in a very dark place, Not the end the show gave us.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Amor Fati is a Latin phrase that may be translated as "love of fate" or "love of one's fate." It is used to describe an attitude in which one sees everything that happens in one's life, including suffering and loss, as good or, at the very least, necessary.

It's an idea that everything recurs infinitely over an infinite period of time.

A-Aim

Whether Five was setting his sights on saving his family, or when he was focusing all his attention on the crosshairs of his scope, his focus was always impressive. 

From a very young age he took on every challenge with a ruthless level of determination, but that unfortunately made him come off disturbingly detached, and now, even though Five no longer needed to be that feral creature, his behaviors from the past were alienating him from his family, and the rest of the world.

It's not that Five didn’t have a very good reason for letting himself become so removed, but now, gone were the days when he had glorious purpose.

Sitting alone in a powerless world that Reginald had dumped them in while biding his time at the end of a bar with his face curtained by the dark fringe of his shaggy hair, Five was feeling exceptionally defeated.

He hypnotically swirled the amber liquid in his fingerprint smudged glass.

Over and over, he repeated your name in his head.

He liked the sound of it, but he liked the way you smiled at him even more.

Five saw you nearly every day on his way to work, but as much as he may have wanted to, he never said a word to you. When you’d look his way, and catch him staring, your eyes would come alive as your lips perked up just a little, as if daring him to crack.

He didn’t.

He couldn’t. 

That was the way Five thought it had to be.

But then, something happened.

He could still feel that...

That...

He didn't know what it was.

Shutting his eyes, Five raked a hand through his snarls while disappointedly shaking his head. He knew he shouldn’t let himself do this but he couldn’t help it.

It was just another day, mundane as all the rest. All the seats had been taken by the time you entered the train. You were stuck in the middle, standing in front of him with nothing to hold on to. Less than thirty seconds into the ride, the air between you filled with static.

The hairs on the back of his neck prickled.

The train unexpectedly shifted.

You started to fall, and the next thing Five knew, he had you in his arms so fast it was as if he had his powers to blink again.

With the warmth of your butt pressed against him and your hair catching in the light stubble shadowing his chin, Five inhaled deeply, trying to ignore how oddly alive he felt as he discreetly as possible savored how good you smelled.

Before he could put together why he felt so amazing, or before you could tell him off for being too handsy, the train shifted again, only sharper this time, forcing him to hold onto you even tighter or you would have tumbled into the man in front of you.

“Oh, my god! I am sorry,” you’d gasped as you clung to him, your fingernails digging into the thick wool suit coat covering his forearms.

Realizing you weren’t mad, Five let his hands slide a little further around your midsection, firming his grip.

“Thank you,” you embarrassingly gasped as the train continued to aggressively rock your body against his.

“It’s my pleasure,” Five breathily chuckled into the fluff of your hair.

A second later, the train switched tracks, and everyone was flung forward again and your computer bag swung backwards, violently jabbing him in the dick.

Still at the mercy of the wild train, with Five doing his best to widen his stance to gain more balance so you both didn’t fall, you sheepishly cocked your head back at him.

“Are you ahh -"

“I-I am good,” he coughed, cutting you off.

Then, to your surprise and his, though still visibly in pain, he started laughing.

By the time everyone stopped getting thrown around, you were laughing too. As you turned to face him, Five reluctantly let his hands slip from the narrowest point of your waist, his fingers gliding along the fabric of your shirt a little slower than necessary.

Face flushed, you quickly introduced yourself, but he said nothing as he smiled at you with a dreamy look in his eyes.

“I am pretty sure we just took a detour to the moon back there, but I still can’t believe I just did that,” you joked.

At a loss for words, other than things he knew he shouldn’t say, Five’s amused smile began to fade.

“Thank you for saving me from a nosedive. Let me at least buy you a coffee or something… It’s the least I can do after stomping on your foot and nailing you in the-” 

You looked down.

“Shit… That big scuff wasn’t there before, was it?” you asked, anxiously referring to the mark on Five’s shoe, not something notable going on in the dick region of his expensive looking dress pants.

When the handsome stranger staring at you still said nothing, you began to worry your bottom lip, sucking it in on one side.

Feeling so many things he’d never let himself feel, Five wanted nothing more than run his thumb over the alluring pink flesh and tell you that getting his dick assaulted and having his shoes ruined was well worth it because of the way you were looking at him with your face more beautifully flustered than he’d ever seen anyone’s.

He wanted to say that, but he didn’t.

The train slowed to a stop.

The doors opened, and without another word, Five took off. Stepping into the crowd of commuters that were rushing out the doors as they elbowed their way through the busy subway station, he'd never felt more spineless.

That morning, when it came to his unbreakable determination and legendary aim, he didn’t even shoot for it with you, so he could hardly call it a missed target. Still, he felt awful. Almost as soon as he’d hit the street above and he was inundated with the less than savory smells of the city, he knew he’d missed something huge.

Racing back down the stairs, heart racing, the rush of air blew past him as the train with you on it pulled away.

B-Boners (AKA Mistakes)

At this point in his life, as much as Five hated it, he still had boner issues. Your overactive dick in your pants kind of boner issues, and the other kind, such as when committing social blunders, like rudely blowing you off when you were simply trying to be polite.

Being young again, with hormones what they were, the first boner problem was an unavoidable way of life, and speaking of which, his thoughts about you once again drifted back to how good it felt when your body melted into his, your ass perfectly molding against the crotch of his pants as he held you steady.

Feeling things he shouldn’t be while perched on a barstool at a bar filled with other people, Five subtly shifted his legs apart. Willing his over eager cock to calm down, he looked up at the mirrored wall behind the bottles of liquor displayed along the back wall.

The young man looking back at him frowned, but his body remained aroused despite his sorrowful reflection.

Unable to hold his own hateful glare, Five looked back down at his almost empty glass.

Hopelessly horny, and far past slightly buzzed, he muttered a slurred sounding, “ Grrrrrr- ate . ”

With an irritated huff of air blowing his hair out of his face, Five yanked his tie even looser and tipped back his head, swallowing the rest of his drink. Feeling like he could breathe a little easier, he threw down an overly generous tip, assuring that even though he technically wasn't 21 yet, his ID said he was, and combined, he’d be served again.

Ready to go, his hot palms gliding down his tensed thighs, Five’s eyes fluttered closed for just a second.

His head spun, but not with the sickness of too much drink.

In his whirl of thoughts, he was back on the train with you.

He could practically feel your ass in his hands, his fingers groping greedily as he shamelessly ground his shaft between your legs from behind.

Sadly, at this point, Five still had never been with anyone real. Yet, the disconnect of not knowing what this would really feel like, or how he should be going about doing it, was doing nothing to ruin his bizarrely timed fantasy of animalistically fucking his rock-hard erection into the warmth of your curvy body in any way he could.

God, he wanted to touch his dick!

Opening his eyes, the room spun even more and not in a good way, but still Five refrained from doing that and instead clung to the pleasant visions in his head.

Over the years, with little to give him the feeling of satisfaction he so desperately longed for, Five had unwittingly become addicted to self-stimulation, and it was not just the thrill of that chase that tormented him. Five craved anything that gave him that all-consuming high, though when it came to bloodshed, he refused to admit how great it felt being so good at his job back when he was the Commission’s most celebrated assassin.

Feet hitting the sticky floor, Five’s thoughts blurred with an endless reel of bad ideas, only one of them being the idea of hunting you down so he could re-start your conversation from the train, this time pushing past his reservations for why getting to know you wasn’t an option. 

Screw that!

This time Five was going to charm you, wine and dine you, and take you home so he could do all sorts of naughty things to you- if you’d let him, of course . He was a monster, but not that kind of monster .

A few seconds later, hand pushing the bar’s grungy advertisement-covered door open, the cool night air hit Five’s overheated face, but it did nothing to get his head on straight or make him realize he had no idea how to treat a real woman who could talk back or think on her own.

Yes, in this body and one that was much younger, Number Five Hargreeves hit on strippers and waitresses to get a rise out of them, but having an actual two-way conversation with them, followed by any form of true intimacy, no.

No, he’d never done that, but today, with you, he wanted to, so damn badly.

No matter how drunk he was, Five knew that letting himself think like this about you wasn’t right or helping the tent in his pants get any less prominent and he hated himself for it. With his bloodshot eyes struggling to focus, he dizzily turned towards the staggering reflection in the store window next to him, taking in the sad face looking back.

“Pathetic,” he grumbled, before trudging away with his chin lowered to his chest.

C-Cycle of Loneliness

Stumbling along the sidewalks while on his way home, Five felt trapped. He was finally free of all the death and endless killing, but that didn’t mean he felt like he could live, or that he even knew how to.

With his past what it was, he was unable to let anyone other than his family know who he really was and like before ending up powerless in Reginald’s new world, they were failing to see that he wasn’t as okay as he was pretending to be.

Like always, despite what Five felt about this, in most situations, he managed to keep his composure. He acted like he was fine. Putting on a stoic face of impassivity, he attended most family functions when asked. He’d gotten his PHD in record time and handled his work within the CIA professionally, but at the end of the day, he was merely existing and the reasons for it were becoming harder and harder for him to justify.

D- Distance and Diffidence-the opposite of confidence

When it came to shyness and a lack of confidence, most of the time Five Hargreeves would be the last person you would think of, but self-doubt had always plagued him. Growing up with a father that never thought he was good enough was the trigger that inflamed his insecurities, but even worse, after the trials of his youth and his lifetime alone in the apocalypse, he believed that if he’d never left and messed up the way he did, his family never would have died.

Never a day passed that Five didn’t tell himself, If I hadn’t lost it and jumped to the future and got myself stuck, none of this would have happened.

Knowing that none of his siblings were exactly thrilled with how things had gone for them over the last five years, nearly every time Five was around them, he couldn’t help but feel like that was all his fault too.  

Ironically and tragically, long ago, Five was the one that initially distanced himself from his family, but in typical Five Hargreeves fashion, now he’d been overcompensating for his feelings of inferiority by lashing out on those he loved, only further complicating his problems.

Only twenty minutes from the suburbs where Allison and his niece Claire lived with Klaus, who was dealing with the aftermath of his sobriety in their bubble wrapped basement, since they’d been there, Five had only been to their house once.

Looking up at the four-story brownstone looming over him, no less drunk after walking the twelve blocks it took to get home, Five realized that not one of his family members even knew where he lived, and he was surer than ever that they didn’t care to.

They didn’t need him anymore.

E-Egotistical

Five knew he could become preoccupied with his own affairs, often showing others contempt by rolling his eyes at them in annoyance and boredom, or both, but his smug behavior wasn’t as simple as him having an exaggerated perception of his own worth.

Five never meant to become so estranged from his family. They were everything to him, and in addition to that, he never meant to treat you as coldly as he did by running off when you were merely trying to treat him like any other normal person would treat someone else.

No one would have believed it, but the truth was, Five was scared of rejection more than anything. All along he had been trying to protect himself with a mask of indifference as his mighty shield.

F-Fumbling, Fuck It

Fumbling with his keys, Five was confused by his own behavior, and even more bothered by his inappropriate thoughts about you when he didn’t even know you. He was hardly what anyone would call a brainless idiot, but the title seemed to fit as he tripped over his own feet while talking to himself like a total nutcase.

“Hi. Sure… No problem, it’s all good. My shoe and my dick are fine, really. Oh, and what a lovely name. My name is Five. Yeah, that’s right. It’s a fucking number,” he sardonically laughed, then dropped his keys when after several tries, he couldn’t get them to align with the keyhole.

Swooping down to get them, he tipped over, his head banging into the door, swinging the flimsy panel of wood wide with the force of his skull until it slammed into the wall inside his apartment.

“It wasn’t even locked, you dipshit!” he cursed himself as glass skittered across his shoes from the picture frame that just smashed to the floor, the one with a picture of him holding his newborn niece, Grace.

“Fucking, FUCK!” he cried, picking up the picture. 

He started brushing off the tiny shards of glass sticking to it.

When a white line tore right over the bundle in his arms, ruining her little face that was staring up at him as if he were worthy of her look of wonderment, instead of angrily throwing a fist into his already crumbling plaster, Dolores’s familiar voice started to filter into Five’s mind, proving he was doing particularly awful that evening.

As his once beloved mannequin, the one who wasn’t even there, encouraged him to move towards this kitchen and set down the photograph before his bloodied fingers damaged it even more, the suggestiveness he’d created in her calming words had Five’s lips turning up in a drunken smirk of craziness.

You need to sober up, Five… You can’t keep doing this to yourself. Come to bed with me…’

Dripping blood in his cast-iron sink basin, thoughts of a totally different kind of self-absorption filled Five’s head, and with them, a renewed rush of blood went places that had hardly let him forget they were dying for his attention.

Acting in an alcohol induced form of autopilot, obeying Dolores, Five poured himself a glass of water from the tap, drank it, then clumsily navigated the darkness of his one room flat, heading towards his bed, where he fell like a ton of bricks into the rumpled bedding, still fully clothed.

With his knees digging into the bed, lifting him, hands racing to unfasten the buttons on his waist coat and shirt, this was one of Five’s many, many fuck it moments, not that he had much of a choice in how he landed with his head smashed into his pillows.

But…

As he rolled onto his back, his dick twitching from the mere pressure of being pressed into the bed, his hand slipped over his pants, and that was another matter at hand that was all him.

The dips and valley of Five’s abs flexed as he lay there, his youthful body bleached and pale in the slivers of light streaming in from between his blinds. As he let his hands wander and he began to stroke his cock through the layers covering him, the languid motion of his hand was weak in contrast to the sharp angles of pleasure contorting his face.

With the cool air in his room hitting his exposed chest, Five shivered. His eyes narrowed, locking in on the long shadow of his erection that was making a mockery of his pants.

It felt so fucking good to touch himself. He whimpered, as he dug his hand into himself harder, then let up again.

He didn’t mean to, but he lived for this.

In the apocalypse this was all he had. 

Now, going at it at his desk, having spent a long day at work, the papers in front of him hardly stimulating enough to hold his interest, jerking off was just another part of his daily routine.

Lying in bed, in the shower, or even sometimes in the bathroom at work if he found himself unable to reign in his body’s needs, Five would stroke his dick, hard and fast, and before he knew it, he would be biting back guttural moans, head leaned up against a bathroom stall, coming all over a wad of toilet paper, or at his desk, dispensing his load in an already used shirt or anything else that he could reach that was expendable.

It was juvenile, and perverted as all hell, and he knew it, but just thinking about it, the wrongness, and about you, Five was getting harder, his balls filling with that delicious ache that made him feel alive.

“You can touch it, sweetheart” he whispered as he began to unzip his pants, trying to concentrate on the illusion that Dolores was there with him.

He teased himself, brushing his fingers lightly over the cotton still covering his cock.

As if watching it from outside himself, the resin covered peachiness of his beloved’s hand merged with the fleshiness of your real hand.

Palming himself with growing need, the face Five had been seeing looking down at him suddenly smiled the way you smiled at him as the visions in his head became a muddling array of unquenchable desire.

“Fuck, I want you,” Five groaned as his fingers snuck inside the fly of his underwear for just a second before pulling out again.

Acting out your part, he tightened his grip on his girth, making pre-cum begin to leak through his underwear, forming a darkened spot where the head of his cock was begging to be let free.

“Yeah, just like that. Go slow,” he moaned, his fingers wrapping around his length, moving over the stretched fabric as he began to pump, still gently as he possibly could.

Pictures flashed through his mind. His lips on your jaw, your eyelids heavy and expressive as his lips slightly parted, his hair flowing away from his face, tickling your silky skin as he held you from behind like a trusted lover.

At the phantom like sounds of your little laughs filling his ears, Five’s dick pulsed in his hand, blood flowing full and fast.

Unable to take it, he reached inside his underwear, giving in to touching himself more directly.

Five twirled his finger around the end of his cock.

Lowering your head, the heat of your mouth began to slip over the thickness of his leaking tip, tonguing the pool of stickiness gathered there. 

“I knew the second you looked at me, you wanted me,” he arrogantly huffed as you went down on him.

Though Dolores had heard it all before, glaring at him on the sidelines of his mind, she suddenly looked appalled.

You can’t say things like that! she chastised him.

Determined to shake her, Five put all his attention on the feel of his cock entering your throat.

Snuffing out any remaining thoughts of Dolores out of his head, Five quickened his pace, drowning out the sound of her panicky warnings that were trying to make him see that this kind of fantasy was even worse than his others with her.

Five! You are only hurting yourself with this!

“I don’t care!” he growled.

He bit down on his lip and closed his eyes, only to be greeted by the memory of your hair falling over your shoulders as it brushed against his face when you were both back on the train.

He breathed in and he could smell you.

Then his brain trying to piece together what really happened, he saw your look of shock as he rushed away from you like you were the plague or worse. 

“What’s wrong with you?” he heard you angrily yell, even though you had said nothing when he did that.

“Please don’t stop. I’m sorry,” he panted, mad at himself for hurting you, and even more panicked by his own madness.

Fighting back, he kept his pace, and just like that, you just as quickly forgave him, taking him to the hilt, your nose hitting his pubic bone.

Dark hair in his eyes as he watched his entire cock repeatedly drive down your throat, Five hissed, “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes-"

Dolores’s voice cried out. Five! You’re losing it again!

‘Go away!’ Five’s mind screamed at itself, proving she wasn’t wrong-he was losing it .

For the next few minutes, the sounds of Five sadistically berating himself as he violently masturbated were absorbed in the quiet of his dark, empty room.

Shame filling him, his stomach twisted.

He was so fucking close. 

His shoulder blades flushed as small beads of sweat formed on the back of his neck. The muscles in his back and arms tensed harder and harder as he quickly moved his hand.

Angling his face to the ceiling, his eyes scrunched shut and his right arm dropped lazily to the side.

His butt cheeks clenched over and over as his bed springs creaked, his thrusts enough to make his headboard bang into the wall as he frantically pumped his body upwards into his hand.

“You-ff-fu-ah-cking lov-vvve my cock-fuck-you’re amazing,” he grunted and writhed, his sweat covered legs burning under the wool of his rumpled pants that were trapped around his ankles as he bent his knees up and his heels dug into the bed.

Already putting on an impressive one-man show of insanity, wanting more of your mouth’s wet heaven, Five let go of his dick, spitting in his hand. Returning to the length of flesh waiting for him, he thrusted up into his fist with louder and louder noises of slicked ecstasy.

Panting and moaning your name, sweat dripped down the curves of Five’s back. Through sharp propulsions of his hips, he cursed. Throwing his other hand back, he clutched and pulled at his own hair.

He held his breath as his mind screamed and his come poured over his fingers.

Lost in what he was pretending was the feel of your mouth accepting him, yet still wanting to spare his sheets, Five aimed his dick inwards, letting his seed pour out over the fine trail of hair leading up his abdomen, the white beads flinging across his otherwise unmarked skin.

Pulses of pleasure took him as he watched the eroticism of defiling himself.

His broken gasps got quieter and quieter. “FFFUUCC-ffff fff-mmmff."

His balls tightening as hips jerked more and more erratically, Five felt the betraying warmth of his tears pooling in the corners of his eyes as he rode out wave upon wave of the orgasm he’d longed more than anything for you to be part of, the defeated voice of his own creation ruminating in his head so loud he couldn’t ignore it anymore.

She doesn’t even know you.

“I know,” he whimpered back with the hand not on his cock, coming up, covering his red face.

G-Grief

Most of Five’s life was filled with intense mourning. He’d witnessed the death of everyone he’d ever loved, more than once. His anguish over having to bury his family left him in a state of ruin, not unlike the burning world he’d found himself in at the ripe age of thirteen.

Hours after he’d drunkenly cleaned up the mess that he’d made of himself, sucking in, mind adrift, Five suddenly couldn’t breathe.

There was too much ash.

So thirsty he could barely swallow, he ran his tongue over his cracked lips, only getting more of the bitter taste of powered cinders and the tang of his own blood.

The smell of burning flesh made him gag into the suffocating white of his pillowcase.

His stomach turned even as it growled with hunger.

Five was asleep, but the horrors he couldn’t outrun were creeping in like the maggots on the thousands of corpses he could see laying all around him, the sickness of it all wiggling into his periphery as he kicked out his legs and tangled himself in his blankets.

I'm going to die here!

It’s too hot!

I can’t get out.

He was being crushed.

Fingers clenching, hands shaking as his chest became tighter and tighter, it was as if he was the one that was dying even though it was the lifeless faces of his siblings flashing in front of his terror filled eyes that were darting around his dark bedroom, seeing nothing but the endless nightmare of his past.

H-Happiness

In another timeline, while not having a nightmare of the panic attack inducing kind, along a sunny roadside, Five had a very revealing conversation with the woman that had plucked him out of hell, only to throw him into a new one.

Ice cream truck stuck motionless, a bullet seconds away from rearranging Luther’s brain, Five stood there in his schoolboy shorts, his pistol pointed at The Handler as he said, “I'm not looking for happy.”

Like so many times, he watched her perfectly painted lips curl with a certain brand of mischievous cruelty that was all her own. “We're all looking for happy, Five,” she coolly corrected.

Looking away, Five tried in vain to hide his panic.

He did want happiness! That was the problem, only he’d given up on it for himself long ago and the Handler knew that pointing out his lie was the perfect way to break him all over again.

Not about to let her win, Five ground his teeth together and defiantly looked back up at her, not bothering to show is venomous disdain as she towered over him in her shiny red heels.

The world never cared what he wanted, but he’d be damned if he’d give up fighting to save it, but now, as he rushed from his bed to his bathroom sink, helplessly sobbing as he filled his hands with scoop after scoop of cold water, trying in vain to bring himself back to reality, who was going to save him?

I-Ignored

It was the day of his niece’s birthday.

Leaving work, after another day of reporting back to his superiors about The Keepers’s activity and them not giving a shit how far he’d gotten infiltrating their cult like secret society, Five looked down at the colorful invitation in his hand, then the package he’d wrapped the best he could in the other.

The shiny paper was lopsided, revealing an electronic toy puppy’s face peeking out from inside.

The last time Five ran into Diego and his family while out at the same store, his goddaughter had told him how much she wanted a very specific chunk of robotic plastic that was over in the nearby toy section.

“I know its the next Tickle Me Elmo or some shit, but we don’t have the money for that. You know that, Grace! Why do you always have to push and push this stuff,” Diego said, scowling at her.

Lila rolled her eyes at that, then unfazed by her look of disapproval, Diego kept moving, throwing more important items in their cart.

The twins, covered in groceries, fussed and cried in their car seats as their parents moved on, not saying anything else to Five other than a flippant, ‘see you later.’  

Like always, they weren’t happy to see him and the little girl looking up at him shared his same look of disappointment.

Hating how let down she looked, Five smiled. “What do you think his name is?” Five asked, pointing to the barking box just down the aisle that said, ‘Makes chocolate poopies you can eat!’ in bold letters.

“I don’t know, Uncle Five,” Grace said, shyly looking down at her shoes. “What do you think he wants to be called?”

Turning back, looking even more irritated as she put back a box of sugar filled kids cereal that Diego was trying to sneak into the cart, Lila yelled, “Grace! Come on!”

The little girl ran off, but Five answered her question after purchasing the toy puppy, programming it to wag its tail as his voice came out through its recorder, saying, “I’m Mr. Pennycrumb and you are my best friend. You should listen to me even though I am a toy dog. Your parents are idiots, but I am still smarter than them.”

A few hours later, after his daughter excitedly tore open her favorite gift of the day, and he heard Five’s special message and Grace’s squeals of delight over it, as he envisioned karate kicking Mr. Pennycrumb into the rafters, Diego’s eyes damn near bugged out of his head as he yelled,  “Really, Five!”

“What,” he said, shrugging.

Clearly Diego and Lila weren't happy with him, but it wasn't like it mattered. They were never happy with him.

Even while in the presence of his family, as Five leaned back against the rainbow ball pit’s netting, it felt like he might as well still be rotting away in the apocalypses still. While at the birthday party with Luther bashing the shit out of the pinata, their bickering and problems with each other never seemed to end. He tried his best, talking to Ben and the others, but once the small talk was done, it was as if he wasn’t even there unless he said something shitty.

Five was just a figure on the sideline, someone who his own family didn’t want to know.

All he wanted his entire life was to get back to them, but when he did, they had moved on. They didn’t understand him, and he couldn’t blame them for that, he didn’t even like who he was, but at least he was owning that. Jerks act like jerks.

If not for the sound of Gracie calling out to him as he was about to leave, Five would have ended up at a bar again, alone and miserable.

“Thank you so much for coming. I love you, Uncle Five,” she said after she ran over to him.

“I love you too,” he quietly replied, trying not to let her hear the crack in his voice as she put her arms up, silently asking him to come down to her level so she could hug him.

That little hug was all it took, and not much after that, Five found himself out in the parking lot with the rest of them, meeting a very strange man named Sy Grossman.

J-Judgement

Most of Five’s life was defined by punishment. He often mused that all the bad things had been inflicted on him as retribution for his many wrongdoings. As for which of his crimes he was paying for now, after finding Viktor, then having a night out at dinner with his family that went all sorts of wrong, the world was set to end again in twenty-four hours, so it didn’t really matter.

No matter how remorseful Five was, or how much he’d already suffered, or how he tried to make things right and move on without hurting anyone else but himself, it seemed that the sentence of this endless destruction would always be his penance.

K-Keepers

Five should have seen it. Both that Ben had tricked them with his sake toast, and long before that obvious con.

Sitting there dressed like an idiot, his fake mustache thicker than it had ever been when he’d been 19 years old the first time around, he had chatted it up in the therapeutic round circle of crazy people, going on and on about how he was walking around in a body not his own.

He was a 65-year-old man for Christ’s sake! This shouldn’t be where he was!

He told those weirdos that he’d lived through things people couldn’t even begin to imagine!

He lived off all kinds of nasty creepy crawlies, his teeth breaking through the crusts of their exoskeletons, the ooze of their insides almost impossible to swallow, but he did it anyway.

He’d brought on so much suffering to others as he traveled through time, briefcase in hand, murdering anyone he was ordered to eliminate.

Some days Five would look in the mirror and get so confused that he’d forget where or who he was. He didn’t know what was real or not anymore.

He didn’t have to pretend that he was nuts, that was why The Keepers let him get closer. That was why he had run into Lila out skipping book club, trying to feel the danger and excitement she’d once lived for before becoming a tired mother who felt like she was drowning in the monotony of her marriage.

Looking away as Diego fumed about catching his wife with her creepy little Greek boyfriend, Five angled his face towards the window.

His mind reeled. Diego was asking for his help! Him of all people!

Everything was falling apart.

After a van ride covered in puke, listening to Baby Shark on repeat, they were all being shot at.

Heart racing, he blinked, just as a shotgun shell was going to split his skull in two.

Only just then realizing he had his powers back, Five landed in a subway station that had not been under the street he was standing on when they got there.

L-Love

Narrowly fleeing from the set-up in psycho Christmas Town, The Hargreeves had escaped unscathed once more, only they didn’t. The marigold in their bodies proved they weren’t who they were before, and the mangled bodies lying all around at the farm they’d come to while looking for Ben verified that once again, they were way in over their heads.

Reginald couldn’t or wouldn’t help them anymore than he already did, and they couldn’t help themselves. Ben was going to die all over again and his love for Jennifer was a curse not meant to be broken.

Watching his brother doing his best cop impersonation, all Five could think about was they were never going to win; they weren’t meant to, even if that was what they were brought up to believe.

The Keepers and their purpose proved Five’s life new life was a shame. He failed to see that his direct report was one of them. He failed to listen to the things inside him that were telling him none of this was real.

No matter how much Five loved his family, it was never going to be enough to fix this.

Later, as Diego tore open filing cabinets in the abandoned office of Dr. Jean and Gene Thibedeau, Lila pursed her lips at Five for about the hundredth time that day, signaling again that she wasn’t happy with him. Hitting his arm, she quietly said, “I say we go off on our own and try to figure out what is going on with this new power of yours. Pull your big girl panties up and stop being a baby.”

Ignoring her, Five watched as Diego entered the next room, then feeling as if he was having an outer body experience he looked down at his hands. They tingled with energy.

He slowly walked to the window, looking down at the street below.

It felt like his heart stopped and he’d been sucked into a vacuum. 

Everything went quiet.

There you were, walking down the street, the sun lighting up your face like a spotlight just for him. Stopping to tie your shoe, you stepped aside, excusing yourself to the person behind you.

You smiled apologetically. 

Something inside Five broke.

It was the same smile you’d given him.

It meant nothing.

The feeling of something special happening when he’d touched you was as fake as the rest of this!

Of all the people he would see in a time like this, it was you! The one person he’d been dying to see since he’d first laid eyes on you.

It was like some cruel fate, same as the one always chasing him, nipping at his heels with imminent death. Everything was just another reminder that no matter how much he wanted things to be different, he had nothing, and he never would.

He wanted to know what it was like to be loved by anyone even a little, but good things weren’t meant for him.

“Five!” Lila loudly whispered, getting even more upset. “We need to try something other than digging around in garbage cans, like that idiot in there! Give me your damn hand and let’s do this already!”

She began to come his way, hand outstretched.

Lila’s voice cracked with emotion when he looked down at it. “Five, I need you…your family needs you.”

Knowing full well that they had no idea what they were going to do about the impending Cleanse, Five’s brows pulled together, and he shook his head, no.

In a daze, still looking at Lila’s hand, the sight of it filled him with memories from the night before, all of them laced with the same sickness and regret he couldn’t escape. 

After a chance run in at the secret Keepers meeting, when a woman wearing a name tag saying Nancy, ran those same reaching fingers across a man named Jerome’s upper lip, tenderly wiping off the powdered sugar from his pastry, Five had thought of you and the one small chance he’d let go to have even a few hours of happiness by your side, just getting to know you.

Eyes moving to his brother, pain in his chest, in a flash of violet hued light, Five was gone, seconds before Lila could reach him.

M-Martyr

Five’s entire life was an example of sacrifice. So many times, he could have given up, or put himself first, but he didn’t.

Thinking of his family and their kids, stuck feeling like he had no other option, he stumbled out of his portal, his eyes scanning the musty subway platform and the train waiting for him.

N-Naïve

Five missed out on so many things that anyone should have the chance to experience during a life as long as his, and because of that, he struggled when navigating the nuances of anything normal.

There was no doubt that Five was full of wisdom, and he didn’t hesitate to pass that on or place judgment on others he saw as beneath him, but there was also an unmistakable childlike innocence behind his eyes, and an explosive immaturity in his outbursts and in his thinking that he could do this alone.

"How long do I have to suffer!" he screamed, his voice echoing down the subway tunnel, then out into the sky above as the light from the day and another apocalyptic world shone down on the filth covered subway steps in front of him.

Rubbing his grimy hands down the front of his tattered waist coat, he pulled out his journal.

It had been seven years, and he had been traveling the labyrinth of tracks, shooting from one timeline to another, each time trying to jump back to before Ben had been killed the first time.

He’d thought if he could just prevent that, it would finally fix everything.

Five knew his power didn’t work the same as before, but he thought it wouldn’t matter.

It did. It mattered big time, and he’d fucked up big time.

Most of the time, he couldn’t even jump backwards. Most of the time he’d climb the stairs, pull his hands together, trying to draw in the strength to do it, and he’d end up right back at the bottom of the steps, staring up at a world that was no more.

Some days, he’d prove he wasn’t a completely impotent imbecile. He’d reach out at the hands of time, yanking them backwards and he’d be thrown into the unimaginable ether that had always been his domain.

He’d find himself standing in a world with living breathing people again!

Racing to the academy, grabbing anything he could steal and stuff in his pockets or his mouth along the way, he’d feel a flicker of hope.

That never lasted long.

Never finding their real timeline, Five had been attacked, over and over once inside what had been his home, but clearly wasn’t anymore. Sometimes he wouldn’t even get that far, having found himself in a place that was at first glance not where he had meant to be based on floating cars or other bizarre things dotting the skyline.

Out of his mind with hunger and more mentally ruined than he’d ever been, he noted the marks on the floor, a long skid mark from something dragging and that there were three light bulbs out overhead. Fairly certain he hadn’t been there before, looking like a scraggly haired bum that was wearing some guy’s trashed business suit, Five jammed the notebook back in his pocket. Reaching in the other, he pulled out his pistol. Started talking to himself again, his feet stomped up the tiled stairs to the street.

“If I see that little fucker again, and he shoots at me, I swear this time I am going to go over there and choke the shit out of him,” he growled, referring to the fun of being shot at by another version of himself so many times before this that he couldn’t even remember how many times it had happened to him anymore.

His voice was cracked and hoarse, only adding to the pained sound in it as he cursed himself out. He was beginning to feel lightheaded again from lack of food and from how much his lungs were struggling to match up to the blood that rushed around his body from the mere effort of carrying himself out of the darkness.

When the first piercing sound of the other him’s rifle reverberated across the barren landscape, Five flinched, the full metal jacket projectile missing him by only a fraction of an inch as it blasted apart an already crumbling piece of concrete next to him instead.

Stepping forward, arm shaking as he held up his gun, Five screamed, "Just kill me, for fuck's sake, you asshole! I don't want to live like this anymore!"

Eye narrowed on his scope, the other Five, trying to survive, just like he had done when it was him, with no one but Dolores by his side to keep him sane, pulled the trigger like all the other Fives he'd come across did, for some reason, not even thinking twice about killing the first living person he’d seen in twelve years.

O-Oh, Shit!

“OH, Shit!” Five’s voice shrilly rang out as the solid copper tipped point of the projectile ripped through his left arm, tearing the muscle in his bicep clean through as it flew out behind him, zipping down the stairwell.

Refreshed clarity of the life and death kind hitting him hard and fast as the warmth of his blood drenched the inside of his sleeve, Five got down as far as he could, spinning towards the safety of the subway entrance. 

“At least I fucking hesitated when I saw the Handler!” he breathed, just as another bullet ripped through him, this time nicking bone in his right thigh.

He dropped to his knees.

“Fuck you, you crazy fucker!” he screamed.

He’d asked for it.

It was dumb, but he did.

He knew that he was also a crazy fucker in this situation but that did nothing to make him want to kill the other him any less.

Bleeding out in two different places, Five’s fingers clawed at the ground, and he growled in anger, forcing his body to get back up.

Half falling, half running down the steps, the soft tissue in his upper left shoulder suddenly felt like he’d been stabbed with a zillion fiery needles as the spinning force of the next bullet went straight through his back and out his chest.

Lunging for the doors of the train, Five fell into the closest seat, his eyes wide as he looked down at the crimson bloom spreading across his dress shirt.

P-Pain

As a murky curtain of darkness moved into Five’s narrowing field of vision, he clung to the metal support rail attached to his seat. He knew that feeling the rocking motion of the train as it raced to the next station was a good thing because it meant his powers hadn’t failed him yet, but it wasn’t much to hold onto. Each tiny shift in the track felt like it might kill him.

It hurt to breathe.

Even if he made it to the next stop, there was no way he’d be able to jump back to a time when there may have been a hospital and someone living and breathing to get him there. 

This was it, the end.

 ~~~

As you were disappointingly tossing another aluminum can with a broken seal, this one that had at one time held the syrupy sweetness of what you determined might have been peaches, the pile of rubble you were sorting through started to shift, the smaller chunks of debris skittering down the slope of junk.

“What the-”

Even more odd, you started to feel the ground vibrating under your feet, followed by the sound of a train screeching down the subway tunnel located in the subterranean level of your search area.

Your bag slipped off your arm, scattering your finds on the ground as you turned toward the subway entrance a few yards away.

This made no sense, so naturally you tried to rationalize what you were feeling and hearing.

There was no train.

There was no electricity.

There was no anyone, or anything anymore.

All around you, there was nothing but the remains of long ago destroyed buildings and the sun-bleached bones of the dead.

You lived in a world with no voices but your own, no horns honking, no smells of food carts wafting past.

“Impossible…” you breathed.

By the time you made it down the subway station’s cobweb infested stairs, the doors on the train that shouldn’t be there were opening. Hesitantly coming closer to what you were sure was evidence that you’d lost your mind, the humming of the train’s powerful engine slowed.

There was a feeling of static that shouldn’t be there in the dank air.

The hair on your arms prickled in warning.

Still, you came forward, your boots kicking up thick layers of dust. The fluorescent lights hanging above illuminated the tiny particles slowly swirling in front of you, making everything seem even more surreal than it already was.

The lights inside the train flickered as you came towards it.

You could see a pool of red liquid on the long fiberglass bench just inside the threshold. Even more ominous, there was an array of bloody handprints leading to the motionless blood covered body on the floor.

Creeping around to get a better look at the young man lying there, you kept your guard up, but other than him, the train looked empty. 

Looking down at him again, your breath hitched. 

He whispered your name just as his eyes fluttered closed.

You gasped his name back, then the lights went out.

Q-Quiet

“Oh, my God! Five!” you repeated, not believing your eyes as you dropped to the floor next to him.

He was conscious, but you could hardly see his eyes under his slitted lids, and his words came out so weak you almost didn’t hear them as he said, “You’re not supposed to know me.”

“What are you talking about!” you frantically cried.

His reply to that came as the quietest whimper.

“Five?”

He said nothing.

You lowered your ear to his slightly parted lips.

Thankfully, you heard the softest breaths coming out of him even though he was breathing so shallowly his chest didn’t appear to be moving at all.

Terrified, you did what you could to tighten the necktie that was already pinching the blood flow to his arm, and then you checked the belt he’d already tried to secure to his leg to stem the worst of that bleeding. Rolling him so you could lift the back side of his jacket, you saw the blood-soaked exit wound in his upper left shoulder blade. Having nothing but the scarf you had on to use as a bandage, you pressed it over the hole, wrapping it around him tight, then tucking the ends under his shirt and vest to add pressure. 

Five remained unconscious as you readied him, and he stayed that way as you began hauling him up the stairs, then outside where you loaded him on your cart.

With his legs dangling and his feet nearly touching the ground, it wasn’t the ideal form of transport, but he wasn’t going to make it if you stayed there, or if you left him and then came back with something bigger.

“Stay with me,” you begged, checking one more time to see if he was still with you, then you shoved forward, pulling him along as you thought about what he just said.

Of course, you knew Five. It all started after the war that ended it all.

Dressed in his Umbrella Academy uniform, Five had been wandering for the third day straight, looking for anything he could use to help him survive the apocalyptic hell he’d found himself in. Exhausted, he was about to give up and go back to his blanketed shelter, but then he spotted what he thought was another person sitting over in the toppled mess that was left of one of the city’s shopping centers.

The person was waving at him with the only arm they had left, but as Five came closer, disappointment filling him as he looked down at the lifeless face of a female mannequin, he heard something.

Tap! Tap! Tap! Tapppppp-Tappppp-Tappppp. Tap! Tap! Tap!

The air around him swirled, ruffling his hair as it covered his young face in cinders. 

He stopped and listened, but as everything became still again the eerie quiet of mass death was all he heard.

He started to walk away.

Tap, tap, tap. Tapppppp-Tappppp-Tappppp. Tap, tap, tap.

“Shit,” he breathed, stopping short as his mind processed the pattern. That wasn’t the sound of some random piece of metal flapping in the smoky wind.

Racing towards where he’d thought he heard the repetition of morse code, trapped in the darkness, under layers and layers of broken concrete, you started your distress call again, rhythmically moving a chuck of rock against one of the building's mangled trusses.

You were sure that you were going to die down there, just like everyone else that survived the initial blast only to find themselves buried, but then you hear something break through the quiet.

Someone was calling down to you through the cracks left in the massive pile of building material. You cried back, but it felt way too muffled for it to matter, but it did.

He kept calling out, telling you to look for anywhere you might see light, asking you all sorts of questions that at the time made no sense, like if there was room behind you or in front of you and how much, if you were pinned down, or if you could determine which way was up.

Then, one second you were alone in the darkness, dehydrated to the point of dangerously low blood pressure, your legs hardly having more than a few feet to move, and the next, you were blinded by a burst of light, something solid and warm was behind you and then you were weightless.

When your feet hit the ground back on level ground, your legs felt like jelly and your stomach flipped. 

Dizzily trying to adjust as you looked at the boy holding onto you upright, your eyes slowly moved from his, to the famous Umbrella Academy crest embroidered on his blazer. 

It couldn’t be…

The superpowered boy the world had known as Number Five Hargreeves had been missing your entire life, but there he was, looking about the same age as you even though that was way younger than he should have been.

R-Rain

Looking back at this older Five, his limp body rocking with each rotation of your cart’s wheels, your eyes blurred as tears streaked down your cold cheeks.

As if you didn’t know you had to hurry, the clouds in the west were moving in fast, meaning another storm was coming.

With the strap at your waist digging in hard enough that you could feel your skin rubbing raw, you forced your body to move faster. “Come on!” you roared, gritting your teeth with the effort of moving the weighted down cart over another deep washout in the road.

Years ago, Five had taken you down that same road. 

You could still see it that morning, Five running back to your campsite, his straight white teeth flashing in the sun as he smiled with boyish excitement that made your cheeks feel warm.

Talking about a mile a minute, he told you that he’d found a structure that wasn’t completely ruined, and by some miracle, attached to it, there was even a greenhouse that still had most of the glass hanging in its windows. Even better, inside it there were all kinds of bags filled with unspoiled seed.

After years of fighting the elements and starvation together, you had found your first break from the burdens of the apocalyptic world you were stranded in. 

If you could just get him back there now, it would be okay. 

It had to be.

Your breaths were becoming more and more labored as you went, only becoming worse as you thought about the last day you were with Five. 

That was over five years ago.

It was midsummer. You had been with him at the home with the greenhouse attached to it for several years at that point.

That night, like he always did, Five was sitting at the kitchen table, running over his numbers. He was getting close; he was sure of it. You were both going back very soon, and he was going to stop this all from ever happening. 

Scratching his face as he concentrated, Five unknowingly smeared a smudge of black ink from his fingers down the narrow bridge of his nose.

“Fucking, fuck, mother fucker,” he mumbled as he angrily scratched out nearly half a page of his equations.

Even though you knew he was mad, you couldn’t help it, your breath started coming out of you in little puffs of amusement.

With the heel of his palm dug into his forehead, Five looked up at you through the fringe of dark hair hanging in his eyes.

“A genius with your captivating use of the word fuck, along with you being the savior of the world is sure to drop some panties when we get back,” you’d teased. “I hope you don’t forget me when you have all those other people to glare at.” 

Not waiting for him to verbally retaliate, you turned and raised up on your tippy toes to put your dinner dishes up where the mice wouldn't walk all over them.

Within seconds, you felt the comforting currents of energy building in the air around you as Five blinked. The warmth of his mouth pressed against the back of your neck. 

Brushing your hair aside with his face, his arms wrapped around your midsection, possessively locking you in his high voltage embrace.

“Forget you? Not a chance,” he said, letting his lips tickle the shell of your ear. 

You wriggled and laughed as his fingers started crawling under your shirt. Hot palms claiming your breasts, he began a soothing circular motion, threading his fingers over your nipples until they were hard, and of course it all felt so good being taken over by him that soon he had you moaning his name.

“That’s right. I am all yours,” Five smugly hummed as he continued to pluck and pinch.

Your head dropped back against this shoulder as he kissed along your neck. Moving his awakening manhood against your butt, his fingers slid around your hip, going right between your legs.

“When it comes to panty dropping, your delicious cunt is the only one I’ll ever be interested in devouring, sweetheart,” he promised as his fingers moved faster. “I just need to get us back and then I am going to really destroy you with this thing.” 

To punctuate which thing he was referring to, Five he rammed his cock into your ass.

Mind going bananas over the dirty things Five was saying and doing, your body clenched around his fingers and your legs starting to tremble. 

So much had changed over the years.

You were no longer just two people walking the Earth, fighting to survive.

In that place together, you became each other’s everything.

The sun’s setting rays coming in from the window above the sink reflected Five’s beautiful face next to yours as he burrowed his face into your neck.

“As long as you’ll have me, I’ll never let you go,” he lovingly whispered.

And he didn’t let you go, not until hours later, when a rush of cool air coming in from the window replaced where he’d had his body warmly snuggled up behind you.

Rolling over, in the dim light of the bedroom, you could see Five bouncing around as he tugged on his discarded underwear. 

Hard droplets of rain started pelting the floor next to the bed, but before you could move to do something about it, Five blinked over, shutting the window. Just then, something outside loudly crashed into the side of the house.

When he quickly started to head out the room, your eyes widened with worry. “Where are you going?” you asked.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be right back,” he chuckled. “I need to crank the windows closed in the greenhouse before it gets too windy. I just fixed the levers on the upper awnings, and I don’t want to have to go back to watering everything by hand out there when normally the lighter rains do such a nice job of it for me.”

You could hardly argue with that, or with what Five said next.

“Since you finally decided to let me hump the sweet fuck out of you, I have way better things to do with my free time then lugging around tiny watering cans,” he added, while shamelessly taking in the sight of you laying there naked, except for the thin blanket you’d started to modestly to tug in front of you. 

Already getting to you by being ridiculously sexy, standing there with his hair sticking up everywhere, Five gave you a cocky grin that would make the devil blush. 

“Don’t go anywhere,” he taunted. 

Still wiping the sleep from your eyes, you dreamily replied, “I won’t.”

Looking as wild and handsome as ever, hardly dressed, Five disappeared through the bedroom door, heading out through the townhouse’s back kitchen.

Suddenly, lightning flashed, and the entire room shook so hard you were sure the roof over the less habitable parts of the house might collapse.

You sprung out of bed to the sound of glass smashing.

Running after him, at first, all you could see were darkened plants carpeting the raised garden beds. 

Coming around the small table in the center of the greenhouse, fragments from the broken window above embedded in the soles of your feet, but you didn’t even feel it because Five was lying there on the cement floor, the rain drops dancing in the puddles of red all around him. 

The long shard of glass that had sliced his neck clean open was still laying in the palm of his hand as his empty eyes looked up, staring off at nothing.

Nearly falling down as your foot got stuck in a rut in the road, you knew you needed to keep your mind in the present, but you couldn’t. 

There was blood everywhere! 

That was just like this Five! With him dying as he lay there on the floor of that train!

A cry that was part anger, part anguish crawled out of your throat as you turned, looking back at him on your cart.

“Please say something,” you begged, not sure if he was dead or not because he hadn’t moved or made a noise. “Five!” you screamed, when he didn’t respond. 

The first icy drops of rain began to hit your face.

Then, just as you were going to run back there, Five quietly moaned your name as he slowly lifted his arm, pointing a finger at the sky. “You and the moon in the same timeline, makes sense…both always just out of reach for guys like me,” he said, choking on what sounded like a laugh.

On the verge of full hysterics, trying not to think about the horrors of what happened before, or what that moon and timeline stuff was all about, you dug the toes of your boots in, pushing off the broken blacktop as the deep purples of twilight disappeared in the blanket of angry clouds.

It was raining hard by the time you got back. By then you were both soaked, and Five’s complexion was cast in a deathly gray that made your stomach sink with bottomless dread.

S-Stitches

Other than that odd comment, Five remained mostly out of it as the cart bumped and bounced along on the debris-filled road, but as you lugged him inside almost an hour later, he woke up, full alert.

“FFFFUUCK!” he growled as you pulled him upright with his right shoulder under yours, lifting him.

Dragging his bad leg, you both staggered the few feet it took to get to the front door.

“I am sorry,” you breathed as you lugged him inside, kicking the door behind you to a continuous chorus of his breathy ‘fucks.’

A few seconds later, moving across what at one time had been the home's parlor but now served as the bedroom as well, collapsing on the bed, Five’s wet hair fanned out on the pillows.

Rushing over to place a fresh pile of wood on top of the dying embers in the hearth, Five’s face rolled to the side, watching you as he listlessly took in his shadowy surroundings.

Turning towards the adjacent kitchen area to get the medical supplies you needed, his eyes followed you again.

“Dolores?” he croaked. 

Not done washing your hands yet, you turned. As you figured, he was looking at the mannequin sitting at the kitchen table, but for some reason Five looked oddly confused by the sight of her.

“I am sorry, Dolores,” he said, his voice quivering. “I tried. I really did, but it had been so long, and before that, it was- You know I was try- I was so fucked up. And I- I just couldn’t move on and I- They needed me and I-"

“It’s okay, everything is going to be okay,” you said, trying to calm him as you rushed back, setting your supplies on the bedside table. 

Not stopping, your hands quickly moved over him, undoing the necktie on his left bicep so you could work his jacket off and remove his soiled dress shirt and vest. 

Replacing his makeshift tourniquet, you lifted his right hand, placing a wad of gauze in it before pushing it down over the bullet hole just below his left clavicle. “Try to keep pressure on that if you can. You lucked out. That one missed your lung, but I need to pull these down to see what’s going on with your leg,” you said, having already unzipped his fly, your hands on his hips waiting for his consent.

Five nodded, so you undid the belt cinched around his upper thigh.

Carefully pulling down his blood-soaked pants, not far down you gasped, and not because he wasn’t wearing any underwear.

“Who did this to you?!” you asked, slipping the leather strap back around his leg to pinch off the blood flow again.

“An even more fucked up version of me did it back in the wrong timeline I landed in before this one.” 

Something in your already tense expression must have changed to something much worse because Five’s dazed looking eyes moved away, looking at Dolores again.

“I’m my own worst enemy,” he said, deliriously trying to laugh about it before he continued to ramble things that made no sense. “That day you fell into me on the train, you were being so nice. I felt… I was- I don’t know… I wish I had at least had the courage to accept your offer to buy me a coffee. I wanted to, but I didn’t think I should. All I ever wanted was to have something like that in my life. Someone to talk to, someone to be even just my friend.”

His eyes misted over.

“I blew it, but it didn’t matter anyway. Everything went to shit. My powers don’t work right! I have been trying to get back for seven fucking years and I can’t, and that timeline is ending in a few hours anyway. Everyone was counting on me, and I failed them again.”

Before he said all that, you knew in any normal circumstance it would have been impossible for the Five laying on your bed to be the same one that was buried out in the yard, but your heart wanted to believe differently so badly. 

He looked exactly like him.

He’d known your name. 

He knew the mannequin neither of you were willing to leave behind, because if not for her, he’d have spent a life alone and you would have died.

But he wasn’t your Five. 

Looking even more upset than you were getting about all this, he kept on trying to explain things, telling you about this other world he had been in, and something called ‘The Cleanse.’ 

Wiping the mess of blood off his cold skin, you smeared antiseptic around the jagged edge of the hole in his thigh. Not knowing what else to do to prepare him, you soothingly shushed him. “It’s okay, everything is going to be okay, Five. We will figure it out.”

You wanted to believe that, but you didn’t even know if he’d make it through the night.

Popping some long-ago expired pain pills in his mouth, then lifting a glass to his lips, Five swallowed your offering with no question, half the water going in, and the other half running down his chin.

As you pulled on a pair of sterile gloves, his fingers brushed against the side of your leg. "How do you know me?” he quietly asked. “I never told you my name and you aren’t supposed to be here.”

“Bite down,” you ordered, ignoring that question as you placed a rolled towel in front of his mouth. 

Again, he listened, biting down. 

“You are lucky the bullets that hit your arm and chest went right through you and didn’t hit anything important, but the one in your leg is still in there. I need to get it out before I stitch this one closed, and if you think it hurt when that other you filled you with lead, get ready, because something tells me this is going to be much, much worse.”

Lifting your sanitized surgical tweezer, you lowered the long-pointed ends to the seeping wound in his leg.

Not even close to the casing you needed to reach, Five was forcing air through his nose at a panicked pace and his legs were starting to shake.

Pressing down on his knees, you held him as still as possible as you dug deeper.

As the tweezers sunk into his flayed skin, kicking out, Five howled through the cloth in his mouth, “Ffff-rrrrrrrr-ffffuuuuCCCCCKKK!” 

“Almost there,” you breathed as you felt the end of your tweezers tapping against something hard. 

A few painful seconds later, after pulling the lump of metal back through Five’s torn muscle tissue, you dropped the bloody chunk of metal in the bowl on the table, then went for the needle and thread you’d already prepped. 

“This is the worst one. The others won’t be as bad,” you assured, moving along gently as possible, with the point of your needle pulling through the mangled edge of his broken skin.

After the third stitch, as you began to pull Five’s skin together, his entire body started to quake so hard you had to move over, sitting yourself on top of his knees to keep his legs down.

“Just a few more,” you said, determinedly biting down on your lower lip as he brought both arms up, grasping the rungs on the headboard with a white knuckled grip. 

Two more stitches, and one more pull, and Five’s sweat covered chest was heaving. The faintest sound, like the squeak of a small animal crept out from between his clenched teeth. One more pull and his eyes rolled back in his head, and he went completely limp.

T-Touch

Fevered nights turned into long worry filled days and you never left Five’s side unless you had to. Cleaning his wounds, and then his entire body, no modesty allowed in the state he was in.

Five was entirely at your mercy just like once, long ago, you were at his. 

As he lay there with no shirt, and no pants on, covered in a mound of heavy blankets that smelled cleaner than anything he’d slept on in seven years, unable to avoid it any longer, you explained why you knew him. 

You didn’t even come close to telling him all of it, but still, you could see that what you did say didn’t settle well.

Brining another spoon of thin soup to his lips, stopping you short, Five shook his head. “I don’t deserve this,” he quietly whispered as the shutters rattled against the windowpanes in the cold wind that blew outside.

Moving closer, you set the bowl down. Gently as possible, you pressed a cool cloth to Five’s sweat covered brow. He leaned his face into your hand, whimpering.

Five may not have been starving from hunger like he was the last time he’d found himself stuck in the apocalypse, but the things he’d told you happened to him proved that for his entire life, he’d been starved of almost any kind of touch from someone other than people who wanted to hurt him.

After he’d laid it all out there, you realized helping him wasn’t going to be as easy as closing his wounds. His life started the same as the Five’s you had known, only his took many different turns, all of them bad, leaving him a broken man in the body of a boy again. Then, him saying that he'd lived nearly a lifetime alone with no one there for him but Dolores wasn’t even the worst of it.

That wasn’t what killed his spirit.

In his own words, even before that, he had all but given up, and he regretted that part of his life more than anything. He’d mistakenly pushed his family away. He said that there wasn’t a day as he rode his time travel train to nowhere that he didn’t think of them, and you, all the while wishing so badly he was able to go back and do everything differently. 

Laying down next to him, curling your body around his as much as you could without hurting him more, Five’s body trembled, trying to heat itself as the infection gnawing at him raged.

“None of this was your fault, Five,” you whispered as you watched his face twist with pain.

The fire crackled, the only sound filling the room as you felt for his hand, your fingers slowly running across his torso until you found it at his side. 

You threaded your fingers around his. “Just keep fighting, okay?”  

Shivering, he squeezed your hand back.

U-Unexpected

It was the start of summer, and the sun was shining in from above as Five sat at one of the chairs pulled up to the table in the greenhouse. Breathing in, his lungs filled with the sweet smell of hundreds of ripening strawberries.

It had been months since those first pain-filled nights, and as the days passed it was becoming harder and harder for him not to lose himself to the growing contentment he was feeling.

It was entirely unexpected, but then again, so were you.

Like the twist of fate that made you stumble into him that day on the train, like something out of a dream, there he was listening to you obnoxiously singing along to the CD boombox sitting in the next room. 

‘Y o, I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want-’

The selection laying around was slim when it came to CDs that weren’t too warped to play, but watching you shake your booty as you danced around the kitchen made Five totally forget that he didn’t like pop songs.

‘If only I could keep finding batteries that fit the radio… ’ he silently mused while fighting the urge to start belting out the girl empowered lyrics with you. 

Five had an endless supply of scenarios running around in his head of how this morning could go, only one of them was him coming in there, sweeping you off your feet while he sang the blaring lines about making it last forever as he also slammed his body down and wound it all around on yours.

‘You gotta, you gotta, you gotta, you gotta!’ you sang, waving at him as you reached for another handful of green beans to snap.

Thinking about how just a smile from you made him feel hot, and how much he wanted to be your lover, and how he sounded nothing like you or the Spice Girls when he sang, Five stretched his bad leg under the drape of the tablecloth. His muscles still complained but the dull ache was nowhere near what it had been, and even better, he could walk without needing you to help him, or without needing a cane.

Looking over at Dolores who was sitting across from him, Five’s smile soured. “I hated that cane,” he quietly grumbled. “All I needed was a monocle to go with it and I’d have looked like some younger alternate universe jackass version of that monster.”

‘Reginald was many things, an alien included, but in the end, he did try to help you, and you in no way looked anything like him with your cane,’ Dolores reminded him.

Averting his eyes from hers, Five decided it was not worth arguing with her. If he kept it up, you were for sure going to hear it and he didn’t need that happening again. You’d been very understanding when he’d feverishly admitted way too many things about his relationship with Dolores, but…

Yeah. 

Sipping the herbal concoction you’d so sweetly brewed him that morning, Five looked down at the old notebook sitting there. It was filled with equations that were very close to getting the math right for getting back, only he was not the one that had done them.

No. He was not that Five, and at the age of 20, like that Five had been when he almost figured it out, he himself at that same age was nowhere near it. At that age, he almost died of dysentery. 

Five looked down at his own journal filled with scribbled notes about stains on floors, broken vending machines and burnt-out light bulbs. 

Spreading his fingers, palms warming in the sun, just the thought of blinking filled him with that familiar buzz of energy he used to live for. But no matter how many times he tried to blink himself even a short distance across the room, he’d still find that it didn’t work that way anymore, and then he’d be flung out of his purple-colored portal into the subway tunnel where you’d found him.

Five pulled his hands back in his lap and slipped the strap back around the leather journal, closing it as he tucked it away.

He couldn’t get back on that train. 

“The only thing I can promise you if we get on there, is that we will be lost,” he’d told you when trying to explain it. He could do that to himself again, but he couldn’t do that to you.

He felt horrible about it, but you never pushed him on it. You never blamed him. You always said it was okay.

He didn’t get it.

Then, after coming back to the house a week ago from another failed jump, something happened. Hearing him kicking stones along the road as he cursed like a maniac, you dropped your garden trowel, ran over, and hugged him.

Smiling up at him, you said, “Five, you need to stop this. You are breaking my heart all over again by looking so pouty all the time.”

Five knew you cared about him. He knew you cared about the other him, but past your caring about either of them in a way that was more than survival based and simply supportive and platonic in nature, that he couldn't figure out. 

You’d told him so many things about the years you were with the other him, but when it came to the details, he could tell you were holding back.

Not sure what to do about it, but knowing exactly how he felt about you, that afternoon in the yard, not more than a few feet away from his own grave, Five had hesitantly let his hand move up your back, hugging you back. He’d never done that before.

He figured, even if you didn’t feel the same way, it wasn’t like you weren’t already intimately familiar.

You’d held him before…

You’d seen him at his worst, fully exposed, laying there in a bloody mess of tears.

He’d told himself that desperately clinging to the person that meant everything to him, even if he’d fallen hopelessly in love with them was normal. Right?

Fuck, he knew it wasn’t… and neither was having to roll himself out of bed almost every night, taking off like a creeper in the night under the pretense that he needed to take a piss, when really he needed to take care of other personal business involving him grasping his dick.

Worried about him, you’d come outside to check on him more than once, and you’d come very close to busting him beating his meat, but Five wasn’t about to stop sleeping by you if you were willing to keep letting him, even if that meant he was constantly waking up hard with his hands on parts of your body that they shouldn’t be touching.

Trying not to think about that, and if you noticed him accidentally doing that or not, instead, as the sunny sky shown down on you holding him like he was a big man baby, Five tried to focus on the feel of your head resting on his chest and how you were soothingly playing with the hair dangling at the nape of his neck. 

Of course that wasn’t really helping, and because of that, he totally missed that you were up to something more than indulging him like you usually did.

Seemingly totally unaware of what you were doing to him, other than that you were turning him into a worthless puddle of goo, sneakily reaching up, you aggressively started ruffling his hair into a chocolatey nest of fuzzy tangles and unruly waves.

Shocked by the unprovoked attack, as you pivoted away from him, looking about as tickled as you could be over how easy it was to get him, Five’s mouth opened, but nothing came out, and that got you really laughing.  

“Oh my God, Five, I love you!” you breathlessly teased.

“Whhh-ahh…?” 

Taken by either his inarticulate reply, or at how ridiculous he looked, Five wasn’t sure, you came back to him, looking up at him sympathetically. “Five, beating yourself up over this isn’t going to change anything.” You gently brushed a piece of hair out of his eyes. “Maybe let it go for a while and just try to live a little. You deserve that.”

With that, you leaned in, your lips feather soft as they pressed against his cheek, then you walked away, leaving him dying to kiss you back.

V-Voracious, a wanting, devouring, feeling emotions to an intense degree

After that day, and the many others that came after your spicy Spice Girls kitchen bean snapping show of cuteness, Five did let himself live a little more, and you teased him even more, oftentimes tickling him into submission, and to him, it seemed like you might be doing it for nothing other than the joy of watching him squirm. But maybe not.

As you smiled at him from the other room, Five felt what had become his normal feeling of butterflies in his stomach and that pitiful aching in his chest. Doing the daily domestic things, like watching you change the bedding as he busied himself in the greenhouse, he could almost forget about all the bad things that had happened.

His family were out there, yet not. They were frozen in time as far as the space time continuum and his fucked subway time travel loop were concerned. It had been almost eight years since he’d left them, only hours from facing their demise, but to them, if he could get back, they wouldn't even know that he wasn't there to begin with.

In many ways, they were gone, not him, and it had been that way for so long.

If Five could have gotten back, it would start all over. He’d have hours to figure all this out, but he had nothing figured out in the way of helping them. That should have tormented him incessantly like it had before, but now, feeling like he had no other choice but to accept this fate, the last thing on his mind when he looked at you was the Cleanse, or other timelines that were about to be destroyed.

Even more crazy, he didn’t hate himself the way he used to and that was because you didn’t hate him for any of it.

Also, crazy, if he didn’t think you might knee him in the nards, he had half a mind to come over there and toss you on that mattress and show you that you weren’t the only one who knew how to play dirty.

He may not have been able to do anything to help his family or the rest of the world, but fuck did he want to show you he still had some fight left in him by putting those old bed springs to the test, rocking his hips into you to the beat pumping out of the tiny speakers sitting on the table behind him.

Watching you bend over to pick up your growing pile of linens, Five’s smile grew. When you disappeared from view, he called out your name. “Hey, why don’t we leave this work for later? Come out here and join me. I’ll let you beat me at a game of chess, and you can even use the unicorn charm as your queen this time.”

Coming around the corner, you dropped the laundry on the floor and shook your head at him. “I’m the one that lets you win, and we both know you are the magical unicorn around here,” you said, pelting him in the chest with a large berry you just picked from one of the bushier plants near the door.

“Sure,” he mockingly drawled, as he began to water the plants again. “You know I love magically fooling around with this cute little watering can all day because I aim to please the lady of the house.” 

Five grinned. 

“You know…with me being pretty much worthless otherwise," he added, not even looking as he pegged you in the boob with a berry.

The song playing ended and another 80’s song about rains in Africa started. Using the music to cover your footsteps, from the corner of his eye, Five still saw you coming. Just as you were about to come up behind him to rumble up his hair until he looked like an asshole, he turned, tipping the watering can over your head.

The dribbles he let escape ran down the length of your hair, a few of them raining down on your perfectly stunned face.

“Oops,” he said, grinning even wider. 

“Was that necessarily?” you asked, trying to scowl at him, but clearly having trouble doing it.

“Yes,” he smugly replied as he casually set the watering can down.

“Why?” you challenged, your eyes following his every move.

“Because,” He reached out, slowly running a finger across your wet cheek as he leaned in, whispering in your ear. “Maybe I just wanted to see if I could get you wet.”

You no longer looked like you were about to burst out laughing.

Five knew he was playing with fire, but he couldn’t take it anymore. He had to know.

He glanced up at the boarded-up window above, then his eyes met yours again as he quietly said, “I’ll never stop being sorry that I am not him, but-”

“Five-” you started to argue, no doubt planning to tell him it wasn’t his fault that he died and that now he couldn’t get you out of there.

“Shhhh,” he uninterrupted, pressing a finger to your lips to silence you. “I’m not done.” His smirk softened. “I know he loved you, and that’s because I love you. The question is, do you love me too? Like this?” he clarified, lowering his chin, the tip of his nose brushing against yours.

“Five,” your voice cracked with emotion. 

Your lips pressed against his. 

The softest sound crawled out of his throat, moving up through his nose as Five kissed you back, innocent, and beautiful in his not knowing exactly how to do it but doing it anyway. His hand moved behind your head as he parted his lips, letting his mouth move against yours, his tongue just starting to play along your teeth, pushing for more.

From there, with your hands reactively moving up into his hair, pulling him to you even more, his kiss grew deeper and more desperate.

Coming up for air several minutes later, you breathlessly whimpered, “I love you so much, Five. I always will. I just didn’t know if you wanted this with me. You kept saying things that made me think maybe, but then you-”

Hearing that, he frantically started pressing kisses down your neck, then down to your shoulder. “Fuck yeah, I wanted this,” he said as he took your breath away. His trembling hands played at the hem of your shirt before he suddenly stopped and broke away, peering at you.

“Is this okay?” he asked, his hands tentatively sliding up over the cotton covering your back as his excited smile exposed more of his charmingly boyish dimple.

Your reply came with you suddenly lifting the material in his way all the way up over your head. 

Speechless, Five’s intense gaze fell over your naked upper body.

“Holy shit, I was not expecting that,” he breathed. Recapturing your lips a few seconds later, he kissed you two more times, then, still trying to kiss you, he mumbled, "I have imagined doing this for so long, just ask the flowers by the front door that have been watching me jerking off every night. They know just how badly I wanted to see these perky tits.”

You started to giggle over that new piece of information, but that quickly turned into you moaning into Five’s mouth from the feeling of him sliding his fingers over your nipples. Encouraged by that, he continued with his ministrations, slowly and softly caressing you until you moaned even more.

When he released your lips, you let out a small whine at the loss, but you were quickly placated as Five moved his kisses along your jawline, stopping for just a moment to nibble on your ear.

“Gah- ahhh,” you gasped, it felt so good, and to that, Five bit down on your lobe, his teeth stinging your flesh as he pinched your nipples at the same time.

You squeaked, your legs clenching together even tighter.

Five let out a breathy laugh as his lips moved over your ear, seductively whispering, "Was that good?"

“You really are still the same cocky little shit you always were, aren’t you?” you shot back.

Nodding his head yes, Five leveled his lopsided grin at you. “Probably worse,” he admitted

“Take your shirt off, “ you demanded, hardly able to believe how silly and hot he was being.

Happily obeying, Five tore off his emerald green sweater that matched his eyes, tossing it over with your shirt on the floor.

“Better?” he questioned.

“Much,” you replied as your fingers began to graze his skin, exploring the hard expanse of his toned chest, down his stomach, delighting in the lean ‘V’ of muscle leading towards his hips.

As your fingers played along the dark, almost jet black trail of hair leading into his pants, dipping below his waistband, then coming back up so you could rub your hand over his crotch, Five shuddered under your touch, so you increased the pressure. 

“So sensitive,” you teased.

Ignoring that taunt, his left hand quickly found your breast again and his other clamped onto your ass, giving it a hard smack before he suddenly yanked your skirt up.

“You have really been enjoying fucking with me,” he laughed, then said, “and what the fuck is this song talking about!”

With his hand under your skirt, his fingers moved slowly, massaging his burning handprint, and he didn’t stop punishing you there. Five’s fingers stopped just shy of the heat between your legs. There, he rubbed the elastic panty line lying along your groin as he smiled like a fucking jerk.

“This song is talking about a man and his love for a girl, but he’s torn between her and the continent he loves, and please, Five! Please don’t stop!” you begged.

“There we go!” he laughed. “Just what I needed to hear. Keep it coming, honey.”

With that, memories of another Five being ridiculously obsessed with you getting you to cry out his name, blended with this one and his equally interesting quirks and many miss understandings about things that to you seemed obvious. 

Before you could come up with an appropriate comeback, your brain gave out on you because Five’s fingers slid under the thin panty barrier he’d been toying with, moving between your folds, determinedly pressing into your clit.

“Fuck, you are wet. I guess watering you worked,” Five mockingly groaned as he gently kissed the side of your neck, letting the smallest scrap of his light facial hair tickle you. 

Giggling and squirming even more, he gave your neck a little nip. 

“Hold still, damn it, I am trying to finger fuck you to this stupid song,” he laughed.

Hand still jammed in your underwear, Five drew you back with him, the backs of his legs bumping one of the chairs next to the small garden table.

Taking your hand off the hard bulge in his pants, you moved it with your other, shoving him down in the chair with enough momentum to make the legs cry out in complaint as they slid across the concrete. Not stopping, you crawled over him, wrapping your legs around his waist.

“I missed you acting all adorable like this,” you said as cheekily as possible, while laughing at his lustful expression of bewilderment.

Not about to be out done, guiding you up against him even tighter, Five wrapped your lips in a warm kiss that quickly escalated into a heady, deep kiss. It didn’t take long just doing that, and you were both breathing much harder than normal again.

Seductively pulling at your lower lip with his upper teeth, Five looked up at you with his mossy eyes softer than you’d ever seen them. 

“From that first day I was with you on the train, you were all I wanted. I didn’t even know what I’d missed until then. I thought I did, but not really,” he said. “I don’t know why or how this is happening to us over and over, but I know one thing for sure and that’s I am never letting you go again.” 

That was almost exactly what Five said to you the night he died. 

Jolting you from the moment, a near paralyzing fear hit you like another slap in the ass, but then, just like so many times when Five touched you, the next time he brought his lips to yours, your entire body tingled with a whole different kind of all-encompassing feeling.

The air felt alive. 

As you eased your body back into his hand that was tracing lines up and down your spine, Five’s lips closed around one of your taut nipples and his hand lowered between your legs, moving again.

“Yesssss,” you moaned, rocking your hips against his, driving your bottom down against his erection.

Pinned under your weight, Five whimpered and his cock throbbed with so much need he felt like he might come in his pants. Not wanting that, his fingers moved faster, slipping up and down in the cramped space of your panties, and that got you to let up on him, which was both a good and bad thing.

You arched your back as he flicked one of your tits with his tongue. Scraping his teeth along your peeked flesh, he sucked it back inside the heat of his mouth and you ground down on him harder than before. 

Unable to take it, Five’s mouth popped off. “Fuck. Keep. Doing. That!” he groaned as he started with your neck and earlobes again, trailing sloppy kisses down to your collarbone.

Flipping your skirt completely out of the way with a whip of his wrists, Five slid your panties to the side with a quick tug, then the tip of his index finger gently started pushing into your hole.

“Mmmm fff, Five,” you whined, as he moved deeper inside you.

“So…fah-king tight,” he breathed, equally taken by the feel of your body fighting him. He looked up at you with adoring eyes, his worry coming out in his soft words. “You okay?”

“Yes,” you said, your body opening for him more and more each second a part of him was becoming a part of you.

Once he was past knuckle deep, you started to work your body over the hard length of his trapped cock again, totally destroying his pants as his finger started to fuck into you, in and out, hooking and pulling, doing anything and everything he could to get you moving faster.

“Oh, ffff,” you cried as Five, with no warning, added a second finger and then started to dip in and out at the same punishing rate as his thumb circling around your clit.

You pushed yourself against his hand, biting your lip as your body quickly coiled and tightened around him. “Fff-vvvv!” you cried. 

When your orgasm hit a moment or two later, your wet gasps filling the greenhouse, he couldn’t believe it.

Your forehead fell against his. You slowly unclenched your fingers, your fingernails leaving half-moon marks all over his shoulders.

“Did I do it?” Five excitedly asked.

Still hardly able to open your eyes, you nodded, panting, “Fuck yes you did. Fuck, Five…”

With his cock about to rip through his pants, Five pulled his fingers from your quivering cunt, bringing them to his mouth. Smiling as he tasted you, slowly licking a few more times for effect, he said, “I can confidently say that I have never done anything as amazing as that, and you taste so delicious I might never eat anything else ever again.”

Laughing at the absurdity of that considering you knew just how much Five liked to eat actual food, and he could in fact do the unimaginable by traveling through time, even if he couldn't do it the way he wanted to anymore, on doe like legs, you climbed off of him, letting your panties slip to the floor.

“Your turn,” you said, straddling your magical unicorn, your hands already starting to unzip his pants to the sight of his approving gaze of god-like sexiness staring back at you.

Carefully pulling him from the confines of his pants, you’d only given Five’s cock a few gentle tugs and his smug expression was gone. 

“Thank you for this, fuck, thank you,” he quietly repeated, his eyes about rolling back in his head as you lazily pumped him, making him leak even more glistening fluid from the tip of his cock.

Lost in what you were doing to him, Five fingers dug into the seat on the wooden chair.

“That feels so fucking good,” he groaned as you twirled your finger over him, spreading his precum to make your hand move faster as it dropped down over the long veins feeding his impressive length.

When you moved forward, guiding the thick head of his cock through the swollen valley between your legs, Five couldn’t take it anymore. Frantically pushing his heels into the floor, he reactively tried to thrust upwards, but it did him little good because he wasn’t inside of you like his mind was telling him he was.

“Ah-ah-ah,” you warned. “Slow down, old man. I’ll get you there, I promise. I want your first time to be special,” you lovingly cooed.

“This is pretty fucking special. I have waited over 70 years for this,” he growled, trying to hump up into you again but clearly only doing it that time to watch your tits bounce.

Shaking your head at the craziness of it all because Five looked nothing like his real age despite him being that old, with one hand on the back of his neck, your feet fell flat on the floor, allowing you the leverage you needed to ride him. With his drizzling tip pushing all the way up to the height of your belly button, you lined him up, then started frotting, pressing the hot length of his cock against your swollen clit in a sinful game of slip and slide.

“That’s right, baby. Let me fuck you,” you praised, already feeling that lustfully addicting pleasure rising in you again. Yanking his hair to further the fun, Five moaned, but he didn’t fight it, and that only turned you on even more, because you knew how badly he wanted to.

Five Looked like a broken angel fallen from heaven. His beautiful eyes were cutely drowsy as he watched you fucking him, the sweet feel of your sex, your body rocking in his lap, all of it felt like nothing he had ever felt before.

The fall sun was shining down.

The heat building.

The strangest choice for a fuck song was playing on the CD player, the band Todo singing their topical ballad as your bodies worked together to the inspiring rhythm of the drums.

♫  I bless the rains down in Affff-ri-cAAA! 

Five shut his eyes.

The pure love and acceptance he was feeling made the shadow of doubt hanging over him from his own death and from his horrible past feel like it couldn’t touch him.

“Five, look at me,” you ordered.

He did.

One look at you as you rode, unable to fight it, he let out a guttural groan of unrestrained pleasure. Unclasping his fingers from the chair, he ran his hands down, under your ass, lifting and pulling with you, making you move your hips and hand pinning his cock down even faster as you fucked him against you.

He was trapped and so were you, but Five felt anything but trapped as your thighs quivered and the tension built more and more with each pass of his cock thrusting up through your pussy lips.

“Kiss me. Please. I need you to kiss me,” you begged, your words breathless as you worked hard to give him the ride of his life while he sat there like the king of the world, watching you buck and pant.

The second Five’s lips touched yours, you locked your fingers on him tighter, pulling him as close as possible. 

Your nails scratched along his scalp making him fuck up into you harder. 

The chair groaned in protest.

You brokenly whimpered into his kiss, and again, Five felt that strangely familiar burst of energy in the air. 

Your head flung back. You’d reached the edge and tumbled over it again; this time he knew it and he’d never felt closer to you.

He cursed a breathy gasp, his lips parted against your chest as he pushed his pelvis up and down at the same faltering pace as yours. Pulses of his release, a creamy white heat of pent-up pain and love started to spread against the silky expanse of your body as Five moved his cheek next to yours. 

Mouth against your moistened skin, he groaned and hissed. “Ahhhffuuuuucccccckkkkk-ffffff-”

A sticky mess between you as his balls twitched under him, still out of breath, Five peered up at, grinning like a fool.

Just when he thought he couldn’t possibly deserve more, you brought your hands to his face, running your fingers over his flushed cheeks as you tilted his chin up. “I love you, Five. It will always be you.”

You placed the softest kiss along his jaw, then down his sweaty neck. Five’s entire body trembled, as much from the gentle sensation of you showing how much you loved him with the touch of your lips, as in what it meant to him hearing you say that.

You said it again. “I love you, Five.”

Tiny shivers danced up his spine as a low moan resonated deep in his throat. Your mouth continued to move over him. 

“I love you too.” He exhaled your name slowly as you moved your way back up to his lips, your fingers soothingly playing with his hair. 

Right then, no matter how many times you let him have this with you, Five knew he’d never get enough of it. 

As he told you, you were all he wanted.

Now, nothing else mattered. 

W-Why

Autumn days of sunlit leaves floating down from above passed by, and with them, Five’s mind and heart were at peace for the first time in his life. 

Nights with you in bed, hot breaths against each other’s skin as you explored new ways to love each other were everything to him. 

Laying on a blanket, under the stars as the white plumes of your breath made clouds of heat above you, Five was in heaven even if he was in a world of crumbling foundations.

He even had the moon this time.

It was perfect.

You had the greenhouse and a roof over your heads, but you still needed to scout for other food options. Just like the last time he was in the apocalypse, Five spent hours on end each day, searching for anything he could use to help get through the harder times. But now, as he wandered down the stairway into the old subway station he hadn’t been to in months, the pressure of getting back felt almost non-existent. 

Maybe he could trap something alive down there, he’d thought. Rats were awful but you weren’t picky, and neither was he, and rabbits had been hard to come by lately with the colder turn in the weather.

Just thinking about bringing a rodent in the house and acting like he slayed a dragon for you made him smile. 

You loved when he acted stupid, and he loved doing it for you.

Feet quietly moving across the debris filled landing, just then, when it felt like nothing was more important than finding new ways to make you smile, of course that was when fate decided to prove he was wrong.

Noticing a strange mark on the floor at the edge of the subway platform, one he’d never noticed before because the light down there was so bad, Five pointed his flashlight down. 

There was something scratched into the tile, and it was done so poorly he could hardly see it, but it was there, and it was no accident.

Bending down, he slowly traced the intricate circles and paralleling lines done in an interlocking pattern that suggested a mathematical projection of infinite sums, or better put, infinite outcomes. 

His heart sank as his finger cleared the grim from the interdimensional map, or that was what he’d suspected it was the first time he’d seen it tattooed on the chest of the ancient version of him that was dying in the paradox proof chamber back in the Sparrow’s timeline.

Looking around, he saw nothing else. Jumping down to the tracks, Five ducked his head below the small lip where the electrical lines were hung. There was a box that some of the larger lines fed into, and it was directly underneath where the sigil was placed. 

Reaching his hand up, blinding feeling around in the cobwebs and dead bugs, he felt something. 

“No,” he breathed, looking down at the leather-bound journal, his eyes rapidly moving over the pages. 

All of them were filled in, unlike the one he had back at the house. And even more shocking, this one showed the way to get back.

“Five?” you called out, coming down the stairs. 

“Yeah, down here,” he replied, quickly shoving the book inside his shoulder bag.

~~~

Stretching his toes under the sheets as his body came down from the feel of having his dick pushing down your throat, Five dreamily looked down at you nestled between his legs

“I love your hair, honey, but I like it best when it’s like that,” he teased as you looked back at him, stretching your jaw, your hair a total ball of fuzz ball from you romping around under the blankets.

You smiled. “Fuck you, Five.” 

“Fuck me, you say… Sure.  I am game to do that again, only it has to be roles reversed until I can get it up again.”

You rolled out of bed, escaping before he could pounce on you and throw his face between your legs. 

“Aww, come on. It won’t take long,” he whined, watching you trot away.

“I know,” you called back, blanket dragging as you tiptoed the cold floor out to the kitchen to get a glass of water from the cooled boiling pot on the wood stove. 

Coming back, you passed by the fireplace, tossing a few logs Five had brought in the night before. Moving on, you stopped at the bookshelf, eyeing up the selection that had grown substantially since Five had gotten there. 

Still lazily lying in bed, he smiled, knowing you were going to pick something and ask him to read it to you while you snuggled on him in bed until mid-day. He loved the bitter temperatures that had settled in because it meant time outside was limited and there was more time for this.

While crossing his arms over his head, looking around the little home that he shared with you, Five started to smile again. The shelves in the kitchen were covered with canning jars filled with the evidence of how hard you had both worked to prepare for the winter. While he was thinking about how the massive amount of work involved in living this way did nothing to diminish how happy he was, something over by you hit the floor with a thump.

Five hadn’t noticed you stepping up on a chair to reach the highest shelf, but you had. Now you were getting down, looking at what had fallen.

His heart was suddenly beating so hard it felt like it might rip out of his chest. Too late, he threw himself out of bed, snatching his pajama pants off the floor as he rushed over, one leg in, and one out of the cold flannel.

“What is this?” you questioned, rapidly turning the pages in your hands. “Five?” you said again, waving the notes you’d just found wedged behind the other books.

“It’s my journal,” Five said, still pulling up his pants as the worried line between his brows grew deeper.

“I know it is, but it’s not that one,” you said, pointing to the other on the table beside the bed. “This one is…It looks like you figured it out…. The key to the subway map is all filled in.” 

You quickly turned to the pages that Five already knew were there, the colorful triangles and circles and squares and numbers that had made no sense were all noted with his handwriting, explaining what they meant and how to navigate them. Trying to make help sense of it, you’d looked at it so many times, but like him, you’d gotten nowhere.

Five reached for the book, and as if you’d lost all your strength, the journal fell into his hands. Your voice tremored. “Where did this come from?”

“I found it under the edge of the subway platform, next to the tracks.”

“When?”

“Months ago,” Five flatly replied, his voice coming out steady, even if he wasn’t.

Your eyes glossed over. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

As he looked into your hurt filled eyes, he felt like he was dying as he said, “You know why.”

“Five,” we can’t stay here pretending there isn’t something we can do,” you said, saying exactly what he knew you’d say.

“What can I do!” Five all but screamed, making you jump back, and that only made him look even more upset.

Ashamed that he’d just done that, his entire body shaking, Five’s hands came up, covering his face, the journal falling to the floor as he started to ramble, “I can’t lose you! I can't help them! I-” 

He breathed your name, much quieter before starting again. 

“If we go, there’s no telling what we’ll find back there. My family and I didn’t know what to do before I left, and I don’t know what to do now. Having you with me is the last thing I want if I go back to that place. Don’t you get it!” he cried, losing it again. “That timeline is just another like this one that will be destroyed, only this time, nobody is going to survive!”

“So this is it?” you quietly asked.

Five looked up and only then did he see the tears rolling down your cheeks. 

“Isn’t this enough?” he asked, his voice cracking.

You came closer. “Five, you will always be enough for me, but-”

When you didn’t finish the ‘but’ and instead chose to wrap your arms around him, Five sucked in a panicked breath, his entire body shuttering. 

Feeling worse, but slowly getting a handle on himself and what this meant, eventually Five forced himself away from the safety of your embrace. His voice lacked any signs of weakness from his melt down when he looked at you and said, “We are going back.”

X- X-factor, as in an exceptional quality or talent that sets someone or something apart. Not so much what the gang is displaying here.

Escorting you along the snow-covered sidewalk leading up to Diego and Lila’s house, trying to be optimistic, Five said, “Maybe they figured it out after all. Everything looks normal.”

Opening the door, Diego’s eyes widened as they moved from you to his brother. “What do you know? Five finally decided to join us and he’s not alone!” he called out just as Klaus came to join him in the entryway, shoving a handful of trail mix in his mouth.

“And who’s this,” he questioned, wiggling an eyebrow at you.

Five was still trying to introduce you when Lila came over interrupting. “Awwww,” she said, scowling at Five. “It looks like hell really did freeze over because you brought a real live, non-plastic date. You’ve clearly been busy, though not surprisingly busy doing nothing to help us figure this stuff out with Ben.”

“We don’t know where Viktor is, or Benny and his Jenny,” Klaus chimed in, “but that doesn’t mean this Cleanse stuff is happening. Dad lies all the time.” Looking puzzled, he looked down at the floor. “Actually, I don’t know what’s going on. Allison and Claire Bear just dug me up from a pet cemetery. I’m still feeling a little shaky about all that and for other reasons too, so I haven’t really been much help either.” 

He glanced at Claire, and she smiled. “It’s okay Uncle Klaus. One step at a time We’ve got your back.”

Coming your way, dressed in a track suit that way too small for him, Luther said, “Hi, I am Luther. Not sure if Five told you about me.”

“Five, told me all about you. It’s so nice to finally meet all of you,” you said, smiling at Luther, then Five, who was already looking like his head might explode.

Luther turned his goofy grin at Five, giving him a not at all discrete thumbs up as he whispered, but not quite enough that everyone else didn’t hear it. “Nice job!” Suddenly looking confused, he added, “Are you together, like together-together? Not that it matters, it’s just Lila is right. You don’t date, and we’ve never seen you with anyone other than Dolor-”

“Woopsie,” Allison said, walking past, smacking Luther on the back of the head.

Letting out the breath he’d been holding, Five angrily spat, “She already knows about me and Dolores! And not that any of you give a shit about my life, but yes, we are together! I am madly in love with her and for some reason, she loves me back!”

“Ohhhh. I love this… When did all this happen?” Klaus excitedly asked, totally engrossed in the drama unfolding as he sat down on the couch with his bowl of trail mix on his lap.

“Recently.” Five heatedly replied. “And that wasn’t all I was doing, Lila!”

Five raised his voice as he glared at his sister-in-law but that only made her challenging smile even brighter.

“I have been gone for almost eight years,” Five raged at her. “I tried to use my powers to go back in time to save Ben but instead got myself trapped in the apocalypse again where I topped off that series of epic mistakes by getting shot by another me. I would have died if not for her being trapped in one of the apocalypses I ended up in, and believe it or not, that one was on me too! So go ahead, start lying into me about how this is all my fault! Sloane! Your discontent in marriages and your fucked up lives! The Cleanse! Everything! Let me have it. I have heard it all before!”

“I told you that you needed my help,” Lila irritatedly huffed, as she pulled a sticky chunk of red licorice off the front of her shirt.

As Five moved his bitter gaze to Luther, the big guy frowned. “I never meant to blame Sloane on you,” he said very sheepishly. He looked at the others for help but wasn’t getting any. “I am sorry… I was so… And I didn’t mean to-”

“Wait. Hold up…” Claire interjected from the sidelines where she’d been quietly watching the showdown. “You tried to save us, all by yourself?” She looked from her angry Uncle to her mom, clearly confused. 

Allison smiled at her daughter. “Believe it or not, you Uncle Five is the most selfless jerk you’ll ever meet, and he’s right. We have been pretty awful about things since he’s been back, and that’s because like him, we are jerks whose lives are a mess, but that is not his fault.” Turning to Five, she said, “We love you, Five, and I couldn’t be happier that you finally found someone, even if it was in a place you never should have been to begin with. Funny how that shit works. I can tell you all about it and Ray would too if he were still around, but…he’s NOT.” 

She raised her drink, pounding all of it as she flopped down on the couch next to Luther.

“I am sorry, buddy. I didn’t even know you were gone. We love you; you know that right?” Klaus said, coming in for a hug. 

Just then, totally taken off guard because he was looking at you grinning at him with that, I told you so look he knew was because you’d told him time and time again that his family love him, Five was ambushed by his ghost whispering brother’s smothering affections, double cheek kisses and all.

“I am so glad your apocalyptic badass woman saved you, little guy,” Klaus gushed as you started to giggle over what Klaus had just called you, and at Five trying to get away from Klaus’s impressively strong clutches.

Ducking out of his grip, just then, Grace came running in. “Uncle Five! You have to see what Mr. Pennycrumb can do! He can blink just like you.”

“Hey, kid,” Five breathed, coming down to her level to watch as she excitedly flew her electronic dog around extra fast, hiding him behind the Christmas tree before popping him back out again.

As soon as his daughter was done showing off, looking serious, Diego pulled Five to the side. Just as fast, you were surrounded by the rest of his siblings, having gotten pulled down between Luther and Allsion on the couch, with Klaus on the floor at your feet, all of them firing questions at you about your time with their brother.

Scrunching his lips in a way that made his dad mustache look extra dorky, Diego said, “That sounded bad, minus the badass chick saving you part. You okay?”

“Perfect,” Five shot back, trying to smooth the rumbles out of his suit. Giving up, he muttered a few curses, then hearing something about if you were married or not, he looked over at you, tensely flattening his lips as the muscles in his jaw tensed. 

He was about to angrily spout off on all of them again, but looking flushed by amused, you shook your head, warning him not to do it. 

About to lose his mind and not sure what to say about the marriage thing anyway, Five’s mouth snapped shut.

“Oh, my God!” Lila cackled. “I think I love her already,” she laughed, nudging Five in the shoulder before coming over to you, asking, “Do you have superpowers too, because the way you shut down that little ankle biter without saying a word was bloody brilliant. You have to teach me that trick!”

“Ahhh. No powers here,” you laughed. “I think Five and I just have a good understanding of each other.” You looked at Five, widening your eyes comically at him because you could totally see why he maintained that his family were a hard pill to swallow.

“So... I did the CIA thing,” Diego said, moving right along.

“And how did that go?” Five breathed, overwhelmed, but trying to dial it back for the kid’s sake and yours.

“It didn’t. Turns out, it’s not for me. Lila and I had a talk, and we are doing better. My life with them means everything, I just needed a reminder. Thanks for giving it to me,” he said, looking down at his oldest, who was sitting on the floor in front of the TV. Slapping Five on the back a second later, he asked, “So, are you still the oldest virgin alive, or did you guys S-K-R-E-W?” 

“That is not how you spell screw, dad,” Grace corrected as Diego pulled a condom package out of his wallet, then pulled open Five’s back pant pocket, stuffing it in.

“Just in case you need it, man,” he clarified as if Five didn’t get it. “Kids are great, but not sure you're ready for all that complicated stuff yet with you being a scrawny teenager still.”

“I am not a teenager!” Five raged, “I’m 26 for the 2nd fucking time, so that makes me 71! I shouldn’t be surprised by any of this, or you not getting that, but I am! And that means for a room full of people given powers not typically seen in any other humans, all any of us can claim is that we’ve excelled at being extraordinarily stupid! There is nothing exceptional about any of us! The world could still be ending in a few hours and Luther is over there shoving whole popcorn balls in his mouth!”

“Thaaairr-rrealleeegoo,” he mumbly defended

Unfazed by her dad being stupid or her favorite Uncle flipping out on everyone, Grace pointed at the TV screen, asking, “Is that Uncle Viktor hanging out with all those weirdos surrounding the mall?”

~~~

Hours later, blinking out of the way of the gigantic blob monster Ben-Jen thing, portal violently crackling, Five reappeared in the subway station, his back slamming back down on the cement as you landed on top of him, knocking the air out of him.

Heart racing as he choked on the air fighting to get back inside his lungs, with his useless gun still in his free hand, Five rolled over, pulling you up.

“I’m sorry,” you needlessly apologized, hardly able to walk as you clung to him. 

Your head was spinning from the jump, and from getting thrown out over the second-floor mezzanine by Luther just before an arm like appendage of the Ben-Jen Cleanse blob latched on to Five, who had just wrapped his arm around you to blink you out of there.

Not stopping, Five helped you inside the waiting train, the doors closing as he sat you down, and then he joined you, staring at the ground as he gently ran his hand up and down your back.

“I am not abandoning them,” he said, almost a whole minute later, finally looking up. 

“I know.” Feeling less green, you moved closer, lowering your head to his shoulder. 

“I can’t save them in any other way but by leaving. I need to buy us some time,” he explained even though he didn’t need to, you were there. You saw it all.

Viktor tried to pull the marigold from Ben, but it was too late. They all had fought back, but they were losing badly. Like Five had told you in the first days he was with you, they were never meant to win.

His head dropped back against the side of the train as it swayed, aimlessly moving through the tunnels.

Five couldn’t even begin to pay attention to the stops as they came and went, another gloomy station of nothingness, and then another, and then another. 

With no clue what to do, he sat in silence with your hand in his.

At some point, your mental exhaustion got the best of you. Slumping against him, you drifted off to the feel of his shallow breaths against your temple.

Y-You

“Five, what is this place?” you asked as your sleep filled eyes followed his towards the glowing sign that said, “Max’s Delicatessen.”

“I have no idea,” he breathed, cautiously stepping out of the train. 

At the unexpected sound of someone saying your name, Five pivoted, protectively throwing you behind him.

The dark-haired young man you hadn’t noticed was sitting on one of the benches near the tracks laughed, then he said, “Don’t worry. I mean neither of you harm, and to answer your question since he can’t. This is the place all of us end up at some point when our time is up. That’s if we make it this far. Most don’t.” 

Getting up, the suit-wearing stranger who was a mirror image of Five, folded his newspaper under his arm and strode your way, extending his hand. 

“Hello again.” He gave you a charming grin, his eyes mischievously sparkling. “It’s been a long time, but I see that your pretty smile hasn’t changed.”

You hadn’t been smiling, but now you were, and that only made the Five at your side look even more hostile.

Unbothered by that, the other Five turned on the heel of his shiny dress shoe, casually waving you along as he said, “Come inside. We need to have a chat.”

A second later the steel bell hanging above the door rang and at least a dozen more Fives inside the deli looked your way, all of them eyeing you with open interest.

The Five you were following sat down in one of the open booths in the middle, gesturing for you to join him. Still shocked into a silence that was making you all the more nervous, Five moved into the opposite seat, pulling you in next to him on the inside of the booth.

The Five that had greeted you flagged over a waiter version of himself as he rushed by, and he swiftly leaned in, filling the cups in front of everyone.

No sooner was it poured, than next to you, Five picked up his white porcelain cup, tipping the entire contents back in one long slug. 

“It’s been a long time since you’ve had coffee this marvelously shitty, I take it?” The Five across from you chuckled as the still hovering waiter came back around. As he refilled your Five’s cup, his fingers brushed past yours on the handle of your mug.

“Need some sugar or some cream in that, sweetheart?” he asked, as the dimple in his cheek deepened.

Your Five turned his glare at the Waiter Five. “She can get her own cream, so fuck off, and yes…” he hissed at the Greeter, “It’s been a while since I had coffee.” 

Five was looking at the Waiter like he might kill him, so you squeezed his leg from under the table. After that, he took a much more civilized sip of his drink, but the warning in his eyes remained as they darted around the diner, meeting the curious eyes of all the other Fives.

“I am betting the lack of caffeine wasn’t nearly as awful this time around when you had such a lovely companion there with you in the apocalypse. She was with you, I presume…? That’s if your story parallels that of some of these other lost boys in here.”

To that, your exceedingly twitchy Five glanced at a very young looking Five wearing his Umbrella Academy uniform. He was sitting next to the door with Dolores. Staring back at the kid version of him’s baby face, Five’s own features pinched with confusion.

Seeing that they weren’t going to get any juicy details on his relationship with you, the Greeter said, “Okay, cutting to the chase then…?”

“Please,” Five cooly replied.

Obliging, the Greeter said, “Every one of us here tried to fix this mess and couldn’t. Now we are here doing anything we can to help the other Fives who still have skin in the game. Which are the lucky bastards like you. So, how can we help?”

Flipping his hair out of his eyes, Five asked, “Will going back to our first timeline and then jumping back to prevent Ben’s death change any of this?”

“No,” the Greeter Five replied.

“Would stopping the original Reginald from releasing the marigold in the first place be enough to fix this?”

“It would be, but we can’t do that. He didn't release the marigold on Earth. He did it on his home planet and then it got here many years later. We don’t have the ability to jump from one plant to another, and Reginald’s ticket here was one way. Doing that also means we will never be born. So again. No.”

With his foot agitatedly tapping under the table, Five shook his head. “What else is there that we can work with?”

The Greeter laughed. “Us. We are the problem.”

“Explain,” Five shot back.

Tiling his head to the side, the Greeter grinned at you then looked back at your Five and sighed. “The marigold that caused our births was the catalyst, and we were the by-product that never should have been. We set it all in motion by existing. Our births are what caused a ripple effect that split the timelines. They never should have happened, and because of that, we get an endless cycle of nature trying to correct itself.”

Five’s hand tightened around yours. “The apocalypse and the Cleanse.”

The Greeter nodded. “Exactly. Every one of them, and on and on it goes. We are at one million five hundred thousand, eighty-two tries to stop it at this point and we haven’t, but we are still going strong.” 

He laughed at that, his eyes moving to the Five in the corner booth who was tipping back a bottle of whiskey with about half of it running down his chin. 

“Well, most of us are still trying. Drunk Five, not so much,” the Greeter cynically added.

Not happy about that, the Drunk Five, sloshing his bottle all over his table started in. “You are missing shit as usual! There are things bigger in this world than new elements that can spontaneously create superpowered assholes and then later devour them for no good fucking reason other than an arrogant alien asshole named Reginald had zero foresight!” he shouted.

“It was Abigail who created it,” one of the Fives playing cards flatly corrected, while dealing another hand to the Five across from him. 

“Whatever! Still an asshole!” Drunk Five insisted, getting even more worked up. “Real power has nothing to do with what they gave us! It’s in here, only all you self absorbed morons have no idea what it means to feel it!” he declared while trying to point a finger at his heart, but when he almost dropped his bottle, he ended up dumping booze on his crotch instead.

Looking like he was about to cry, the very drunk Five looked over at you. “I- I’m,” 

He said your name, proving the Greeter Five wasn’t the only one who knew your name.

“I tried to save you. I tried to save all of them, but I didn’t see the right way to do it until it was too late,” he sobbed. He set his bottle down, ringing his hand through his hair as he looked down at the table. “I would have done it. I would have sacri-”

A Five wearing an apron stepped out of the kitchen, slapping a hand over his drunk doppelganger’s mouth as he said, “Zip it before you fuck this up royal, nob shine.” 

Looking at you with a gleam in his eye, the kitchen Five bent down, whispering something in his captive’s ear, then having quieted the Drunk Five, that Five came over, placing his elbows on the back of your seat, joining the party, and again you were greeted with a smile and excited green eyes.

Reaching over to playfully twirl a piece of your hair around one of his fingers, the Five from kitchen looked to the Greeter Five then to your Five, saying, “Perhaps while you boys continue this conversation, it would be best if I take the lady in back to show her how I tenderize my meat?”

“Not a fucking chance,” your Five snapped back as you let out a small but very hysterical sounding laugh.

“Actually, that might not be a bad idea,” the Greeter agreed.

“She isn’t going anywhere with any of you!” Five fumed, standing up to get in the face of the kitchen Five that was invading the booth.

Someone in the kitchen who sounded like Five laughed, yelling something about soup and sore his meatballs, and just then, the bell above the door chimed.

A much older, white-haired gentleman with a mustache came in, throwing his hat on the coat rack as he took in the scene. “Jesus fucking Christ, why does it always have to be a freak show in here,” he grumbled.

The very young Five at the booth with Dolores tipped his margarita at him in agreement as your Five opened his mouth, starting to flip out again, but right then, the Waiter Five appeared from the kitchen, plate in hand, swinging by your table to drop a thick sandwich stacked with pastrami in front of the Greeter. “Here you go, extra sauerkraut, as you requested.” 

The Waiter looked over at you, his wicked grin grew. 

“Why do you always have to fuck shit up, Briket Five?” the Greeter snapped at the Five still playing with your hair. “Nobody wants to eat this shit covered in fermented slop but you!” 

“Shut up and just eat it,” he replied while giving you a naughty looking wink.

“Brisket Five?” you asked.

The Five in question nodded. “Yes, but you can call me whatever you want, love.” 

He got up and walked towards the kitchen, after your Five swatted his hand away, but getting him off of you made Five look no less pissed by the exchange. “We need to get you out of here,” he said as he started to slip out of the booth, but coming past your table, the old mustached Five nearly plowed down the Waiter, who then rammed into your Five blocking his path.

As he looked at the commotion going on at your table and all the Five’s sizing each other up, the older Five gruffly said, “Not sure what these morons have been telling you, but I am so sick of their shit that I am about ready to shove that mop up someone’s ass. Nobody is going to enjoy that other than Janitor Five, so I’ll give you some straightforward advice that might help us all out of this mess instead. Don’t try to save the world this time.”

The Five with the mop laughed. “True on both accounts! I’m down with an anal mop fucking as long as you go gentle on me, and when it comes to fucked up shit I haven’t tried, not saving our asses is the only thing I haven’t done, so I say yes to that too,” he shouted, then went back to moping the mess under Drunk Five’s table.

Mentally on overload, next to you, in his head, ignoring what the weird mop fucking stuff was all about with the Janitor Five, your Five repeated the words that had been haunting him since the first time he’d heard them coming from another much older permutation of himself who was dying in a paradox proof bunker.

Don’t try to save the world…

As if that wasn’t enough to shake him, still reeling with deja vu, the Drunk Five called over, “We need to destroy the marigold!”

“Please shut him up before he really scares her even more than h already has!” Greeter Five shouted.

With all the other Five’s too busy glaring at each other, the Drunk Five went on even louder, this time declaring his love for you, and because of it, you looked even more rattled by the chaos of all the versions of Five scattered around you, mostly all of them losing their shit or making lovey dovey eyes at you.

Coming out of the kitchen with a frying pan in hand, Brisket Five said, “Holy shit, someone should have thrown him outside hours ago.” A second later, he pulled back to swing, and a second after that, DONG! Drunk Five was lying face down, drooling on his placemat.

“To that, we agree,” the Greeter said, looking at you worriedly.

As if Brisket Five hadn’t just potentially concussed or killed the inebriated version of himself, the Waiter Five shimmied back into the mob around your table, refilling all the coffee cups, acting like all this was all totally normal.

Next to you, Five looked like he was about to blow a gasket. Unable to get out of the booth, he was about to vault the back of your seat and start stabbing out the eyeballs of the other Fives with his sugar spoon.

Coming over, Brisket Five said, “As you’ve noticed some of these lesser evolved douche bags in here aren’t that well-mannered, and Old Five is not much of a socialite, but he’s not wrong, and neither is Drunk Five over there. They are onto something, but our gracious Greeter here, and some of the others like to think there still has to be another way that doesn’t involve our way of thinking.”

“It makes sense that statistically, there is!” the Greeter Five growled, to the dickish brush off wave of the frying pan that Brisket Five just gave him.

After threatening the Greeter, Brisket Five, looking at you in a way that made you feel all sorts of warm, he said, “Did you know that there is a quantum entanglement thing going on between us?”  

“There is nothing going on between you two,” your Five snarled.

“Sure, there is,” he reaffirmed, giving the Greeter a pointed look that made your Five and the Greeter suddenly look much less sure of themselves. 

Coming too, looking even more upset now that he just got his head bashed in, looking at you, Drunk Five started rambling. “We have something that binds people through time in ways that no one will ever understand. It’s why we ran into each other in the first place, and it was why you were there to save me, and I was there to save you! It’s an inevitability… It’s as simple as that! We just need to believe in that this time and maybe-”

“It’s wishful thinking and we need more than that,” the Greeter interrupted.

Looking very annoyed, Brisket Five said, “There are some of us that like to pretend it’s horse shit based on fairy tales and lovesick delusional nonsense, but the concept of a love-based entanglement is very real.” He looked at you again. “No matter how far or how we get pulled apart in the mess of time, we will always remain connected. It’s like that with a love as strong as ours.”

“You don’t know her and you don’t love her! I do!!” your Five snapped

Brisket Five looked at the Greeter, both of them smiling knowingly, no longer looking like they might kill each other.

“Five, what is he talking about?” you asked.

“I don’t know,” he shot back, clearly so upset that he didn’t know what to say anymore.

“Sure, you do,” Brisket Five confidently replied. "Let me ask you this…have you ever felt things you can’t explain?”

Five nodded, yes.

Brisket Five reached across the table, placing his hand over yours as he smugly smiled at your Five while asking, “Have you felt it with her?” 

Heat flooded your face.

Your Five said nothing, but he didn’t need to, the other him’s smile turned into a full-on smirk. “Has she told you that she feels it too?”

Five glanced at you, and the other Five’s all trying their best to charm you with their bullshit smiles that made him want to punch himself.

“Ahhhh-haaa,” Brisket Five laughed. “I suppose she might not have told you she has felt that invisible tether that pulls at her heart when you're there and even when you’re not, but Drunk Five’s stories can’t all be bullshit, and I can attest to it because I feel it right now. Something tells me that she’s the special one here, not us, and it has nothing to do with marigold.”

Pulling his lips to the side, looking upset, Greeter Five said your name, pulling your attention his way again. “Hey, why don’t we let them talk about all this crap alone? I am sick of the fighting, and I bet you are hungry for something that is actually edible.” 

Getting up, he offered you a hand. When you got nothing from your Five other than silence, the warmth of the Greeter’s fingers curled around yours, sliding you out of the booth to join him. 

Directing you towards the display case filled with pies, Greeter Five said, “It really is a lucky day. There’s one more piece of strawberry fluff with your name on it.”

Behind you, Brisket Five leaned into your Five’s ear, talking extra quietly. “Look, you’re the first to ever come in together, and I think that means it’s time to end this the only way we can. Our family doesn’t have to make it to the end to get what you want, just the people we love do. We are linked to them, and them to us by something none of us can explain but it is real. Maybe that matters, and maybe it won’t, but at least they will live, and this will stop,” he said, eyeing you as the other Five’s intentionally dominated your attention so you didn’t hear that part. 

Your Five’s eyes widened as he realized what the other him meant.

“All your numbers and asshole logic aren’t getting you anywhere but here again, buddy. You need to let go,” Brisket Five added, trying to smile again but the sadness in his eyes and the pain he felt about it was impossible to hide.

Getting up, he left your Five alone at the booth.

“Just do as that old dipshit said to do this time,” the Five with Dolores yelled out, loudly slurping his margarita to the bottom of the glass.

“Why don’t you give me Dolores and you got stick your dick the pickle jar again and fuck it,” a particularly grumbly looking Five interjected before going back to scowling at his crossword puzzle.

“Five, what do they mean, don’t try to save the world this time?” you said, breaking away from Greeter Five as you came rushing back.

Just then, Drunk Five started in again, this time getting up from his booth, heading your way, cutting you off. “Don’t worry. We can help. We will come with you this time. Then-” 

He almost fell, his hand swinging out to catch him on the divider between booths.

Dizzily looking at all the others, then you again, he said, “We will keep the Cleanse busy, distracting it, and we will get Ben and Jennifer out of it.” He looked at your Five, a silent understanding happening between him as he lied. “You get everyone back to the academy. Viktor will have time to pull this shit out of you, dump it, and then you get the hell out of there. If you win, we all do.”

Reaching down, instead of vomiting, which he looked like he might do, Drunk Five pulled up two heavy double barrel shotguns that you had no idea were sitting next to the mostly quiet CrossWord Five who was now also suddenly getting up, pulling two guns from his shoulder straps.

“I’m in,” the Waiter Five said, dropping his coffee carafe in favor of the potato peeler he just pulled out of the bin full of dirty dishes sitting on the next table.

Greeter Five walked over to the fire box, smashing open the case, pulling out the ax. “Fine, Let’s fuck that blob up,” he said while giving you an extra cute grin that left you even more speechless over how quickly they’d all came together.

Almost all the Fives were suddenly packing, Brisket Five included, grinning at you from over by the check-in desk as he twirled a large butcher knife around, pointing it at his head, trying to get you to laugh over how crazy they all were.

Drunk Five swooped in, wobblily kneeling at your feet, his puppy dog eyes imploring you to believe him. “It’s going to be okay. I promise.” Feeling drawn to him, as you shakily wiped a tear from his cheek, he said, “I won’t let you down this time.” Letting your fingers gently run across his temple, Drunk Five’s eyes fluttered closed, his long lashes fanning his cheeks. “I still feel it,” he whispered as that spark of something lit up inside you, his eyes opening to meet yours, his focus entirely on you, unwavering as he was in his heart. “We’ve got this, sweetheart, we always did. Just hold on to me, okay? In here. Don’t forget how much I love you and we will always be together.”

He reached up, placing his hand over yours so he could pull it over his heart.

As your Five slowly, almost hypnotically moved in, looking down at the other him with a heartsick look in his eyes, Drunk Five handed the much older, very resolute looking Five who’d also came over his other shotgun. 

“Enough fucking around! Time to end this, boys!” the white-haired patriarch said. 

~~~

“See you on the other side,” Brisket Five said, while giving you both a look that was nothing like his haughty expressions he’d been maintaining for most of the conversation inside the deli. To you, his small smile seemed to be saying something by saying nothing at all, then he ducked into the other train car that the other Five’s had chosen to ride in.

Stepping in the doors you had come out of when you got there, you watched them a car over from yours, all the different versions of the man you loved as they found their places to either sit or stand, none of them saying a word. 

They looked like they meant business, like the violent ax swinging, hell bent on retribution kind of business, and it was a stark contrast to how out of control they’d been acting inside the deli.

“I promise, we can do this,” Five said, his eyes not leaving yours even though he was aware he had an audience in the next train over.

His heart was beating so hard. He felt like he could jump out of his skin but there was no way he was going to tell you that.

He knew all of the Fives felt it. It was in the air all around them, permeating every fiber of their being. It was the accumulation of all of it. The weight of their endless devotion to the people they loved, the pain of enduring so much for so long, and it was the bitter taste of so much loss and the loss that had yet to come.

You let your fingers trail down the gully between Five’s ab muscles until they touched his waist. “Five, I am so scared.”

He wasn’t anymore.

He looked over at the other car, then back at you, shaking his head. “We have about five minutes, give or take. What should we do with it?”

You said nothing, and tears started to run down your cheeks.

Five kissed you.

His eyes met yours right as you grabbed at his leather belt, pulling his hips against you.

“I need you,” he said, his voice breaking.

The smallest noise escaped his mouth as you snaked your body against his. The warmth of your body flooded his senses, tingling from his toes all the way back to his groin.

The rapid rise and fall of your chest matched his as you kissed him with equal desperation, shaking him to the core.

With a suppressed moan, Five took you by the shoulders, pushing you down on the seat. Coming down to his knees in front of you, making is where some of the others couldn’t see you, he settled his body between your legs. 

He pushed your knees apart even more, then locked his mouth on yours again, his tongue thrusting inside urgently.

Clutching his shirt, you slid closer to him, until your hips met his.

Reaching for his pocket, Five closed his eyes and swallowed.

He pulled out the condom Diego gave him. Realizing what he was about to do, you snatched it and chucked it over his head, then immediately started unlatching his belt, sliding his zipper down to gather him in your palm.

“There is nothing that can ever come between us,” you said, nearly repeating what all the other Five’s had been saying but saying it meaning so much more than that. 

Five’s body involuntarily fell forward as you stroked him.

“I love you,” he breathed. It came out unsteady, a streak of hot liquid slipping from his eye no matter how much he willed it not to.

You fisted the back of his pants, drawing him closer, the deed earning you a low mewl emanating from deep within his throat.

You kissed him and brought your legs up around his waist.

His pants, already undone, slipped down his thighs, catching in a bunch of material above his knees as his cock bobbed between your bodies, fully erect.

Five moved his forehead against yours. He lifted the bottom of your dress up as you swept a finger over his leaking slit, spreading the liquid gathering down his shaft.

He hissed with pleasure.

Unable to stop himself even though he saw Brisket Five peeking over his shoulder for a second, Five took his cock in hand, and getting ready, your hands moved down behind you on the seat to keep you from slipping backwards. You arched your back, letting out a broken whimper the first time Five’s cock slid up against you.

“Holy shit,” Five breathed in on shaky air as he rubbed his tip across your clit a few times, then he positioned his cock lower, his slicked thickness gently pushing and prodding as he worked it over your hole like he’d never allowed himself to do before.

“Fuck,” he cursed, because that was exactly what it felt like as he tried to sink into your warmth but the tightness starting to surround him instantly fought back.

Gripping his length with more determination, his hand trembling, Five pushed harder. Sweat breaking out all over his body, he felt the pressure surrounding the sensitive bulb of his swollen flesh as your body started to let him inside. He felt your body clenching repeatedly around him as it adjusted and even that was almost enough to do him in.

“Tell me if I’m hurting you,” he anxiously breathed.

Biting your lip as you tried to relax, looking up at him staring back through the dark strands of hair dangling over his eyes, you nodded, encouraging him along with one of your hands winding around his neck and your other sliding around his hip, gently but firmly pushing him to take more.

Five’s lower lip quivered as he did, his hand gripping his base moved out of the way as he opened you, moving so cautiously, as he forced your body to take him.

You sucked in a breath as his hips jerked forward just a little, then back again.

“Oh, fuck, that felt- Fuck,” he groaned.

He drove in, kissing you for just a moment before breathlessly breaking away again.

“We stay together until the end,” you frantically said, “You and me. If you go, I go.”

Five knew why you were saying this. He knew your heart was breaking, just like his. They were all trying to hide the truth, but you saw right through him. 

You always did.

There was only a fraction of space between your faces. With your breathy words on his lips, Five whispered back, “You and me, always, love.”

He slipped out and then back in, bottoming out in one swift motion.

You gasped and he pulled back, then completely stilled until you quickly moved your hands down his back, pulling at his waistcoat so he was forced to dig himself inside you again.

“Don’t stop,” you begged.

One more small thrust in and out and again he buried himself full deep, jolting your body as his fingers dug into your ass, locking you to him as much as he could.

Like he needed air to breathe, Five needed to be a part of you in every way he could in the minutes he had left. Audience of horny Fives be damned. Your heart and your soul was his.

He had to bury his face in your neck to stem the flow of his breathy curses over what his body was feeling as it took yours, claiming it completely.

“You feel amazing,” he puffed against your skin. It took him a few seconds to regain himself, but when he did, you brought your hand up to his hair, slowly carding it through your fingers as you drew his lip to yours. Your kiss was soft and soothing. After a moment, his body reactively started moving again, and your kiss deepened, letting him know he should keep going.

Five pulled his hips back, withdrawing halfway before pushing back into your perfect warmth as slowly as he could manage. But as you started to lift your hips to meet his, his pace got faster, and more confident, and again it felt so fucking good that he had to pull back from your lips to breathe. He went for the skin at your neck instead, tasting it, licking you as he nipped and sucked and wildly drove himself into you with his hips rocking and his thighs thrusting forward, the tips of his dress shoes digging into the floor as he wildly plowed you.

Fighting the urge to let himself come, Five growled, “Fuck this world, and fuck all of them, you are mine!”

The cheers of the other Five’s hearing that, all of them unable not to notice the show he was putting on, only made your Five get louder, increasing the madness of it all.

“You are mine!” he said again, getting angrier, but also not, because his diabolically cute grin said something else entirely.

“Five!” you cried out as he fucked into you harder and harder, shaking your brains loose.

Out of his mind, but somehow still in control enough to bite back the pressure building, Five suddenly started to move in slow, deep thrusts that were sweet and intense, and at first, very calculated. That abrupt change got you moaning like he was slowly killing you, your fingers clawing at his ass as he undulated his cock in and out, deliberately dragging his tip back and forth where it made you cry out his name the loudest.

Despite Five’s valiant efforts to control himself and prolong the thing you’d both been denied for so long, he could no longer hold back when your heels dug into his back.

When he dipped forward, laying over you as much as he could while fucking you on edge of the bench, you kissed the hollow of his throat, your hot tongue slick against his skin.

Just like he finally knew what he needed to do, Five knew that no matter what, he would always have this, even if you didn’t remember it. 

A weight lifting that he’d been crushed by for so long, wrapping his arms around your waist, Five lifted you forward with animal-like passion, bucking into you.

Like free falling, the heat of your release caressed his length as he continued to swiftly move in and out. You were lost, eyes closed, your mouth wide against his shoulder, silently crying out as your walls trembled around him, the feeling of ecstasy not letting up because he wasn’t.

Not until his rhythm began to break and Five could no longer hold back the rising tide did he tell you to look at him.

He locked eyes with you, his hips shunting forward in a stutter of broken motion he could no longer control. “You are the best part of me,” he panted as he started spilling deep inside you.

The whisper of his name on your lips served to move his hips once more, then as you cried his name, another spasm came to close his eyes as his body weakened and his face dropped to the side of your neck.

For almost a minute, Five stayed in that spot, waiting for his heart to slow. But all too quickly he had to withdraw.

As you were both righting your clothes, one of the Fives banged on the glass between the cars. “Button it up! Time to go!”

The train was slowing.

Placing your hand on his cheek as you fought back the start of more tears, you gave Five that beautiful smile that would forever touch his soul. 

~~~

Before setting out of the train, Brisket Five put a hand on Drunk Five’s back as he said, “It’s been an honor watching you slowly trying to drown yourself.”

Pulling his eyes from the floor, Drunk Five looked at the other him who was holding the butcher knife and smiled. “It’s been awful eating that shit you call food.”

Swinging his ax to his shoulder, Greeter Five kicked the Five with Dolores on his lap in the ankle. “You watched the whole thing, didn’t you? Just look at your pants,” he said pointing to his crotch and the boner that he was trying to use their beloved mannequin to hide.

“What,” he questioned innocently while turning Dolores towards him, looking for support. “Can’t blame a guy for being curious… If you fuckers wouldn’t have gotten jealous and started beating off like a bunch of pervs over it, Dolores was game to join in the fun. Weren’t you, honey?”

Smirking as he pushed his back off the side of the train, one of the Card playing Fives let out a little laugh. “He’s got a point.”

“I am not going to miss you fuckers,” Old Five said, smirking at he rolled his eyes.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Big Damnit here guys...

Okay so readers, I am so sorry, but Tumblr cut me off here and won't let me post more, and all we have left is Z!!!! It's so frustrating because it almost all fit on here. The end is worth it I promise, so please read it, it's not that long. I am not doing a separate post on here to end it because those get lost in the ether. So, please forgive me and head over to A03 to this link (Chapter 26, Z-Zion) to go directly to the final part of this story.

Long live the Umbrella Academy and its awesome fans. ❤️

Share your thoughts if you like but just know one way or another, thank you for reading this. It means so much to me.

Link to my MasterList

Link to all my Tumblr story and art Posts

Link to visit me on A03

[http-shield]

whatever you say, old man- bucky barnes

~ bucky barnes x fem!reader ~tags/cw: post endgame but no one is dead and life is good, think 2012 Avengers fandom where clint is in the vents yeah that is where I'm at, established friendships, pining, yearning, bucky is not used to new age dating rituals, explicit language, sexual tension ~ wc: 2.6k ~ not proofread

You: Hey, are we still on for tonight? Rita’s at 7?

Him: ye

“So you’re telling me this is normal?” Bucky’s tone is judgemental as he quickly reads over the words on your screen.

You nod, wordlessly confirming that situatuonships are a normal and staple part of the modern dating scene.

Bucky’s brows furrow, eyes flicking from the lack of effort text message to your face as you lean over the bed, phone gripped between expertly manicured fingers. He blinks once, twice, as if taking the time to formulate a response that will rebuke your earlier confirmation without hurting your feelings. This is a new thing for him, he is not usually so careful with his words because frankly, he didn’t care enough about the opinion and emotional well-being of others enough to warrant time and consideration when responding but you, you are a different being altogether. He doesn’t want to hurt your feelings, to see you frown because of his words; in fact, he wants the opposite; to see you smile and laugh and blush and want to talk to him, he doesn’t want to shut down the relationship you had cultivated between the two of you because he didn’t agree with something you had said however, this was a situation where he couldn’t, didn’t want to, mince his words.

“There is no world where that is normal.” He stares at you, expression bored and a little annoyed. At you? Never. At the man on the other side of the phone? Incredibly so.

You sigh and pull back, phone being slipped into the pocket of your cargos as you turn towards your open closet.

He’s right. You know he is. There is nothing remotely normal about two grown adults being in a relationship that is defined by the amount of time the other left the first one on read, or how much emotional vulnerability there could be put on the table before the other got too scared and ran. There is nothing normal about being in your late twenties and having a grown man introduce you to his friends as a 'buddy’ despite having an entire draw dedicated to you in his apartment but you can’t admit that, refuse to admit defeat, especially to the man you are secretly interested in. There would be nothing more humiliating than to admit that you are only with this other guy because he is a welcome distraction and possibly more attainable than the man who is currently sitting on your bed. The man you so desperately want yet, are too chicken shit to stand up and do anything about it.

——

You had spoken with Natasha about this last night, her voice a soothing purr over the phone as she encouraged you to disclose your concerns about pushing the boundaries on your friendship with the super soldier.

“The worst thing that can happen is he says no and then you both move on.” She croons, voice laced with comfort and reassurance.

“Wrong.” You shake your head despite being on a voice call.  “The worst thing that can happen is he says no, I lose him as a friend and then I’m stuck pining after someone who wants nothing to do with me” You place another dish in the washer before continuing with your point. “Or I push him before he is ready, again losing him as a friend, and now I’m left with the guilt of possibly taking advantage of a war veteran.”

“You take advantage of Steve all the time, how is this any different?” 

“I take advantage of Steve to get someone to carry in the groceries. I’m not trying to date Steve.”

Natasha huffs a laugh. “What if he is interested in you as well?”

Your hands stop scrubbing at the pan in the sink.

“I can find out.”

Heat fills your body, your stomach twists at the idea of having that information. It would put an end to the constant yearning you feel, but the thought of finding out he doesn’t like you that way, that he sees you as no more than a friend will destroy you, humiliate you beyond all logical reason and you would be forced to cut off the friendship out of pure self-preservation.

You shake your head again. “I’m good.” And return to scrubbing your pan. “I'll just wait out the crush and then move on.”

——

“This isn’t the 1940’s anymore.”  You sigh and completely shift your attention from Bucky to the mess that is staring back at you.

Endless options of outfits are strewn about the small closet but so far none of them have come together, just single shirts and skirts and pants, all too muddled in a heap of black.

“Yeah, it's not the 40s but I doubt relationships and dating have changed that much.” Bucky grumbles from behind you, the bed creaking as he shifts to a new sitting position.

Another sigh, this one long and exaggerated as you will the frustration to leave your body. You want to turn to him and explain that you know all this, and are very aware of the fact that nothing about your current predicament is what you want. You want to be wooed with flowers and preplanned dates and soft kisses on hands and longing looks but that’s not the reality of life anymore and having to be reminded of it is getting annoying and your heart is starting to ache at the lack of effort given to you by your current choice of dating partner.

“You know if I was taking..” Bucky starts but you quickly cut him off with a whine of his name.

“James, please.” You don’t turn to face your friend, afraid to even glance at him because you know you will crumble. “I need help picking out an outfit so help me or go back to your room.”

The lack of response and the subsequent noise as if he were exiting is the answer to your ultimatum.

--------

“You know if I was taking…” You don’t let Bucky finish but, God did he want to. His name on your tongue was enough to shut him up, to send a flush rushing to his face in a way that no man his age should blush, but he can’t help it. There is something about the way his name falls from your lips that has his mind racing to thoughts that should not be there, should not appear when the picture of you enters his mind.

“You know if I was taking you on a date, you’d get flowers and chocolates and champagne and those little baby dolls you like” is what he wanted to say before you shut him up with an annoyed grumble.

His intention wasn’t to display how things were different back in his day but to indicate exactly what you’d be getting were you about to go on a date with him, to explain the reason why you should go on a date with him and not some loser who couldn’t even formulate a full fleshed out text message. How if you were to drop that kid, and say yes to Bucky he would gather the moon on string for you, pick every flower in every field, find every single little Sonny Angel there is and give them to you each and every day for the rest of your life, you would never be sat wondering why he isn’t calling or responding, if you were even going out the next day, if he even liked you. Bucky would make his feelings for you so abundantly clear that even a blind man would be able to see the signs, but you are his best friend and best friends don’t feel that way about each other. It’s all platonic hugs and hair tussles, cheeky jabs at each other over coffee, shared trauma and secrets over whatever dinner you bring to his apartment and he yours. There will be no dates, or long hugs that turn into kisses that turn into you beneath him, whimpering his name as he makes you feel oh so good.

Fuck.

Bucky’s entire body is on fire, and he needs to stop thinking about the way you would feel wrapped around him, his mouth on yours, the taste of you sweet on his tongue. You, just you.

“Okay, what about this?” you announce as you walk into the bedroom from the ensuite. “Too much?”

You stand in the doorway, dressed in plain jeans and a black shirt.

“Too much?” Bucky is confused. “This is the outfit you wore to breakfast this morning.”

He is right about that one. You had worn a very similar outfit this morning, but tonight isn’t a full-on date, a semi-date, where things shouldn’t be that fancy so why shouldn’t you recycle your outfits. Bucky stands from the bed, readying himself to dig through the mountain of clothes that had formed at the entrance to the bathroom. He crosses the small space and squats before the clothing, fingers expertly rifling through the material, quickly brushing over the lace of bras and panties, before finding purchase on a black dress he thinks he has seen you in before. It might have been the dress you wore to a funeral or press conference, either way, it was not alluring in the slightest, not that you weren’t stunning in everything you wore, hell you could come out wearing a garbage bag and Bucky would be in awe of your beauty. It was just that he didn’t want your date to ogle you, to think of you the same way Bucky does so he is being a little selfish and conniving in his choice of garment.

“Where is he taking you?” His question is disguised as interest in the dress code but his real curiosity is far from an outfit.

There are two reasons why he needs to know where you will be tonight. The first is to judge whether this manchild is even worthy of a date with you, second if he knew the exact location and time, maybe he could show up and show out your date, make you realise what you deserve and how Bucky could be the one who gives it to you.

 “We’re meeting at Rita’s down the road and then might see a movie, maybe something else. I’m not sure yet.”

“He hasn’t planned anything?” Bucky whips his head around to you, finding you standing there looking incredibly embarrassed at the lack of effort. What the fuck happened in the years he was gone?

The defeated shake of your head is enough to have Bucky’s chest aching. He sits back on his haunches; the dress discarded back in the pile and gives the outfit another look as he decides on where to go from here. “Yeah, I think it’s too much.” He nods and stands up, brushing his hands as if he had just completed an excavation on some ancient site.

“Go change back into your sweats ‘cause there is no way I’m letting you go on a date with a guy who can’t even plan something.” He nods his chin towards the bathroom, more of an order than a suggestion.

He watches you tilt your head back as you groan in frustration. “I’m not going through this again, old man. This is how it works now.”

Now it’s Bucky’s turn to get frustrated. He takes a step towards you, hulking 6’0 frame rising to tower above you with a somewhat menacing glare, but you know he will never hurt you no matter how much you push his buttons.

“I’m not talking about what it used to be like, little girl.” The jab at your age/generational difference comes out before he can register it, but he notices how your cheeks flush. “This is about getting what you deserve.”

He pushes in on the space between your bodies, now chest to chest as you square your shoulders, not ready to back down from an argument despite knowing you will not win.

“And what’s that?” you stare up at him, brows raised in anticipation of his answer. You aren’t sure where this is going. If you are going to receive another lecture or maybe even a verbal beatdown as to why your standards for men are so low, a common topic of conversation between you and Natasha, but instead you are met with a soft smile as his Vibranium hand is raised and brushes against your cheek.

“You deserve flowers and preplanned dates and wine and jewellery and everything you could ever want.” Bucky’s voice drops into a whisper, cold fingers trailing soothing lines against your heating skin. “You deserve a man worshipping you, to be on his hands and knees begging to take you on a date. Not some punk who can barely put together a sentence.”

You hold his gaze, blue eyes staring intently as you shudder in a breath. “Who’s going to do that, huh?” your voice is small, no longer filled with the same bravado you had not a minute ago. “You know anyone who wants to do that for me, you send them my way Bucko.”

His metal hand slips to your cheek to your jaw, fingers pressing into your pulse points so he can feel the speed at which your heart is racing.

“I’d do it.” He states matter-of-factly, eyes dipping to your lips. “I’d do anything for you.”

Breathing becomes a little bit too difficult as his human hand traces up your bare arm.

“Anything?”

Bucky nods and dips his head until his face is mere centimetres from yours. “You didn’t let me finish before, but I'd give you anything you’ve ever wanted.” Fingers move to cup your chin and tilt your head up. “You want flowers, I’m a florist. Moon? Stars? I’m getting Stark to build me a rocket. Anything you want, you’re getting it.”

“And if I want you on your hands and knees barking like a dog for me?” You smirk, the mental image of Bucky on his knees panting like a puppy has your stomach twisting.

“Put a collar on me and call me Spot 'cause I’m yours, doll.”

The confession has your eyes widening.

“I’m all yours, from now until whenever you’re done with me.” Bucky whispers, breathless.

“And what if I want you to kiss me?” you ask, knowing he is waiting for your permission to do just that.

Bucky crumbles, his expression falling from that of teasing into one of pleading.

“I want you to kiss me, James.” You whisper.

His resolve breaks and he presses his lips to yours. Softly and timidly, closed mouth and restrained but as your hands reach out to grip his waist, a delicate gasp slipping past your lips, does he deepen the kiss. His mouth opens over yours, lips slotting against your plush ones, tongue darting out to test to waters only to be met with your slackening jaw. Bucky’s grip on you tightens as he continues to kiss you, afraid to let you go in case this was one of the many, many dreams he had where he woke up alone and confused, but as you bite down on his bottom lip, he is brought back to reality. Your hands on his waist, pull him tighter against you, the softness of your body had Bucky’s mind wandering to places it should not be. You pull back, pupils blown wide and lips parted as you pant. Bucky is just as breathless, hands cupping your face with a gentleness he doesn’t think you’ve ever known from the way you stare up at him.

“You’re not going on that date.”

“Whatever you say, old man.”

｡ﾟ•┈୨♡୧┈• ｡ﾟ

a/n: eee this is my first avengers fanfic since like 2018 pls be nice I just need something happy to think about clint living in the airvents, thor eating poptarts era was my happy place

[toji-sweetheart]

Toji and Shiu with 5?

18+ only content - mdni

prompt list

tags: fem reader + explicit smut

Music thumped through the floor as you walked through the crowd, pushing against people to take the tray of drinks to tables and private rooms. It's already been a tough shift, your feet ached from the heels.

It also didn't help that a coworker called in sick even though you were pretty sure she was lying but it meant more tips to help with paying the bills and everything else, plus you wanted to go on a vacation.

Your mind drifted to Toji and Shiu, your boyfriends who insisted on you not having to pay for anything but accepted the cash you still slipped in their wallets and paid for something else anyway.

Time was your enemy at the moment, between work and catching up on sleep you hardly got to see them and it felt like you never had enough hours in the day to hang out or see them anymore.

"Room four requested you!" The bartender told you when you came back to the bar, your stomach twisted wondering if it was regular clients that came to enjoy the club scene or if it was someone new.

With a nod, you took the tray with one whiskey and headed to the back knocking on the golden four before pushing the door open and stepping into the dim room, the walls lined with heavily plush curtains with crushed velvet couches facing each other.

When you saw who it was you almost dropped the tray. Toji and Shiu sat on the couch side by side with matching smiles seeing you stunned to see them leaning back with their legs spread apart as they asked, with a smirk, "Are you just going to stare, sweetheart?"

They were tired of not seeing you too.

Kicking the door shut with a soft click you turned the lock it before coming in further putting the tray on the glass coffee table. "I wasn't expecting two very sexy men." You teased and wedged yourself between them fisting Shiu's tie to tug him closer and kiss him deeply.

Your tongue parted his lips for a moment before pulling away to grip Toji's shirt kissing him the same. "Lucky for us we were expecting a very sexy waitress." Toji teased, his hands moving to your waist to pull you on his lap with ease, he wanted to feel you against him.

Shiu moved over to rest his hands on your thighs, rubbing his palms up and down the sheer tights before moving further down to slip your shoes off and massage the arch of your foot. "Indeed you are lucky."

Toji let his hands glide up and down your sides before brushing the side of your breast making you shiver. "Couldn't stand not seeing you anymore sweetheart, we missed you." He whispered in your ear.

Their touches and words made you melt. "I missed you two so much, I have to say this is the best surprise I could ever receive." You murmured turning your head to kiss Toji while Shiu spread your legs.

His fingers trailed up your thighs reaching the apex between them, he brushed against your cunt making you quiver as he kept teasing you with his head under your skirt. "I think Shiu missed your pussy the most though." Toji teased causing the other man to pull away.

"I won't lie, I do miss it but I miss being in your presence more than anything," Shiu told you with a smile as he rested his chin on your knee watching as you leaned forward to kiss him softly.

It didn't take long for Shiu to end up where he was, his tongue pressed flat against the pantyhose before he ripped a hole causing you to gasp and pout. "I have to get new ones!" You cried out.

Toji watched him hike your skirt higher and higher making it easier for him to see you under the lightening which didn't even cover the whole room making the whole thing hotter. Like they were strangers.

His hands worked the buttons of your shirt until it was wide open to reveal your lace bra, Toji cupped them in his large palms before pulling the cups down to pinch and tweak your nipples.

There was no where to go, Toji had you pinned in his lap and Shiu held your hips as he made out with your pussy now with slow soft strokes of his tongue over your clit making you croon and moan.

Shiu was a sucker for when you tugged on his hair silently begging and demanding more as your hips rolled, fucking his mouth while you struggled to kiss Toji as his hands kept busy on your tits.

They both picked you apart, teasing with the lightest touches before following through with what you wanted the most only to keep you on edge again. "We know you've been having a tough night at work, we wanted to make it better." Toji whispered against your lips.

You gasped and clung to him, grateful that they were here. "I'm so close!" Shiu knew it with the way your cunt squeezed his fingers, your slick dripping down onto Toji's lap, a reminder of what happened.

"I know, shh, just let go, pretty girl." Toji cooed brushing his hand over your hair, petting you gently as you succumbed to a toe-curling orgasm that they helped you ride out with soothing touches.

You lay panting in Toji's lap still feeling boneless and tired. "How am I supposed to go back to work now?" You asked with glassy eyes.

Shiu sat up and fixed your skirt before buttoning up your shirt. "We got that handled, why don't you lay here for a moment and I'll go get the car for us?" He suggested standing up to bend over and kiss you.

"You two are something else, thank you though." Both men shared a knowing glance before Shiu left the room still able to taste you.

feedback such as comments and reblogs are highly appreciated, those kind words mean a lot and encourage me to do more writing ♡

[inthehouseoffinwe]

I have this hc that Sauron’s obsession with vanity led him to spend years studying Maedhros’ features and trying to emulate them. When he couldn’t get it right, the proportions always a little off, red hair never deep enough, he took his anger out on Mae and when that option was gone, tried to pull from others also renown for their beauty instead.

Fast forward a few centuries and turns out all that work wasn’t entirely useless. And Sauron knows exactly what to do with the features he was able to recreate. Weaving them into his new face, the line of Maitimo’s smile, the set of his eyebrows, the crease of his eyes, he puts just enough to be familiar, but not enough to set off any alarms.

Celebrimbor doesn’t know *why* he trusts Annatar so easily, just that he’s got a good feeling about him. The Maia reminds him of someone he can’t quite put a finger on, but it’s a good association and he doesn’t think on it too deeply. Grows to call him a brother in all but blood.

Of course we all know how that ends. And the last thing Celebrimbor sees is his eldest Uncle’s smile, a mockery of the warmth it should hold as Sauron finally ends his torture.

(Elrond, on the other hand, never saw Maitimo who used to laugh easily and play silly games with children. Only grim Maedhros. The gentle features Sauron steals are alien to him. A stranger with too many familiar features he can’t quite place, twisted the wrong way, leaving him deeply unsettled. It’s why he immediately tells Gil Galad to send Annatar away, hiding trembling hands in his sleeves.)

[earthnashes]

Heyooooo ya'll! Figured it'd be a good idea to give a quick lil update on what I'm up to since it's been a while since I just talked on here.

If you don't wanna read here's the TL;DR:

-Fanart and headcanon AU projects in indefinite hiatus. This tumblr will host my commissioned art, original art/OC projects, and occasional tomfoolery of my thoughts, interests, and updates on my Powerlifting venture.

The full update under the break! :)

---- I'm doing relatively good! Cool news: I will be competing in my first powerlifting meet this year! It's been made official as of two months ago, and I've been hard at work with training and prep for the meet. I have my eye on making the state record for the Benchpress in my weightclass and I think I have real shot at it, so I'm gonna make the attempt. Wish me luck! ;w;

Not so good news: Rent's going up. Who's isn't, right? Gonna be putting a serious effort on looking for a new place (I'm reeaaallly gunning for a house) because SHEEEEEEEEEEEESH that spike in price for the exact same shit? Nah man. Likely will get rough a few times over the next few months but I'm confident I'll figure things out!

Now, the crux of why the update: I figured it was probably high time to mention the complete lack of fanart and headcanons 'round here, especially because that's what helped me find all of you and vice versa.

I'll be honest; I am no longer burnt out on creating art, but I've found the interest to continue any of my AU fanprojects is still missing, so as of right now they are on an indefinite hiatus. I apologize to everyone who followed me for the Super Mario, the LoZ stuff, anything and everything I was working on before the burnout! ;w;

I'm still working on projects, they're just completely original ones! I've been having so much fun with them and I'm pretty happy with them; here's a quick preview of each:

One is a slowburn fantasy where a god becomes trapped in the mortal realm while on a mission, but ends up compromising said mission when she begins to believe everything she knew about mortals is a lie.

The second project is an anthro mystery/thriller about a doe who knows her husband was murdered, but no one else believes her. As she works to find his killer herself, the last thing she expects is falling in love.

The third is the only fanproject I have going and ya'll know of it: Melon's Adventure! Follow Melon as he faces dangers and villains on his quest to return baby Mario to his family. A retelling of Yoshi's Island with twists and a personal flair!

---

But ye! I wanna say thank you all so much for your interest and engagement with my fanart work; regardless of everything I had an absolute great time working on them, and you all made them all the more enjoyable. It may take a little bit before I start posting them, but I hope you stick around for the original/OC stuff and enjoy what I've got in store! ;w;

Feel free to ask questions or make comments, I'll be around to respond starting today. Until then keep them peepers open for more art! :)

[pretzel-box]

CHAPTER 5 | Masterlist for AASB here!

Tags: Threats, Violence, not proof read

Words: 5k

Authors Note: I had to rewrite it all in the middle of the night. It's not proof read and can have logic issues, weird sentences or mixed up stuff.

Working with Sebastian was a challenge in itself, a blend of relentless demands and looming danger. His form of labor was relentless, and unfortunately for you, that meant being handed all the menial tasks he didn’t care to do.

"Files," he growled, his focus on the broken flashlight in his hands. The odd position of his hulking figure and the delicate way he maneuvered his claws around the tools was fleeting, yet striking. For a moment, you caught a glimpse of something softer beneath the brutality, but it vanished as quickly as it came. His head snapped toward you, impatience flashing in his eyes.

“You either sort the files or I take them and stuff them into your silly little mouth to gag you. Then you can spend the rest of the day suffocating in the locker."

Threats were his specialty. He was creative with them, always finding some twisted, violent edge to keep you in line. If there was one constant in your work with Sebastian, it was the looming sense of his brutal tendencies, always just beneath the surface.

Working with Sebastian wasn’t just about completing the tasks he shoved your way. It was about observing him. Getting to know the man he never wanted you to see. He shut you out—always. His words were sharp, often wrapped in a threat or some dark humor. Social interaction, for him, was nothing more than a tool, laced with violence. But you learned more about him through what he didn’t say, what he couldn’t hide.

He had no friends. You could see the loneliness gnawing at him, eating away like a hungry animal. It was clear in his posture, in the way he worked late into the night, avoiding sleep. That loneliness—it clung to him, scratched at his mind, likely kept him awake when the world quieted. Being lonely, that was something human, something he tried desperately to deny. He told himself he didn’t need anyone. He didn’t need you.

But it was clear he was anxious. You could feel it like a current, underlying everything he did. There was a paranoid edge to him, a mind that had been on high alert for too long. The madness of survival must’ve driven him to do things—things you didn’t want to imagine. His hands would sometimes shake, and his eyes lingered on certain items, fixated, as if they could reveal something to him. He was scared. Just as scared as you were, but neither of you would ever admit it.

For all his threats and violence, you realized that Sebastian wasn’t just your tormentor. He was trapped too, battling the same fears that haunted you.

And god forbid you to address it in front of him. He will behead you with a rusty piece of scrap metal, cutting your limbs and putting them in an old dirty jar to sell.

“Urbanshades finest idiot on sale.”

Before you knew it, he threw a bag at you, the metal in it hitting a part of your leg, making you whine in pain. It will definitely leave a bruise later on, coloring your flesh.

“Stop whining and go get new stuff.”

This was also a common occurrence, he would send you out, but not without a special item. He always placed a metallic bracelet around your ankle. It was one of Urbanshades creation. Simply enough, it will reveal your location as long as you are far away enough from the scrambler on Sebastian’s back. He can track you down himself easily when you are near him but it's another story when you are in another area. He also warned you, do some weird business and he can give you electronic shocks with it. Yet he never did so far, leaving it an actual mystery if he can.

So, in the end, he had two things. Painter and the bracelet.

You hurried out, the cold metal of the vent that he made you use as an exit, biting against your palms as you crawled through it, the sound of your own breath loud in the confined space. The small shaft felt even tighter with each movement, but you forced yourself forward. You had studied the building’s layout just enough to navigate through the vents, at least in theory.

Each turn brought you closer to the hallway on the other side, where freedom—or at least a chance at it—awaited. You tried not to think about the pounding in your chest or the echo of your hurried breaths. The vent rattled beneath you as you moved, but you knew better than to stop. Stopping meant giving up, and giving up meant facing whatever Sebastian had in store for you. And that wasn’t an option.

The moment you saw the faint sliver of light marking the vent cover at the end, you sped up, the desperation clawing at you as fiercely as the metal beneath your hands.

You pushed the vent cover open as quietly as you could and dropped into the hallway, your knees bending to absorb the impact as you fell down a small bit. The air was cool and heavy, carrying the scent of dust and something faintly metallic. Dim, flickering lights barely illuminated the space, casting long shadows across the floor. You stood still for a moment, letting your eyes adjust, your heart pounding in your ears. This was your chance for some time in indirect freedom, but you had to be smart about it.

The hallway stretched out in both directions, abandoned and eerily quiet. You forced yourself to take a slow breath, shaking off the tension that threatened to paralyze you. You didn’t have a plan—just a vague sense that you needed to gather what you could. Anything useful. Most of the things would end up in Sebastians shop, but a few rare pieces would stay in your secret stash. Over the time where Sebastian let you wander around, you started to stash useful items in a small hole inside a wall. It was covered by a large picture of the ocean, so Sebastian wouldn't find it.

You began walking, your footsteps barely making a sound on the cold floor despite the heavy boots that Urbanshade gave you. The first thing you spotted was a drawer left half-open, its contents scattered across a small desk. You rifled through it quickly, pocketing a few items—a worn-out screwdriver, some loose wires, and a small flashlight. Its battery was low, but it would do.

Moving further down the hallway, you noticed a small alcove where someone had abandoned a toolbox. You knelt down, opening it with a soft creak. Inside were tools, some rusted but still functional—a wrench, pliers, and a pair of wire cutters. You stuffed them into your bag, the weight of them reassuring as you planned to put them in your secret spot.

The sound of a distant clank made you freeze, your heart skipping a beat. You held your breath, waiting for any sign that Sebastian—or someone else—had heard you. But after a long, agonizing pause, the hallway remained silent. You exhaled slowly, your nerves stretched thin.

You pressed forward, passing broken machinery, old filing cabinets, and the occasional door that led to rooms too dark to explore. Your hands trembled slightly as you picked up more small items—batteries, a bundle of cables, anything that might help. Each find felt like a tiny victory, a step closer to surviving whatever this place held.

But in the back of your mind, you couldn’t shake the feeling that Sebastian was always watching.

As you continued down the dimly lit hallway, the flickering overhead lights began to pulse more erratically. You barely had time to react before, with a loud crackle, they all went out at once, plunging you into near-total darkness. Your heartbeat quickened as you stood still, holding your breath in the sudden silence. The lights were an indicator for danger, your life was now at risk based on the logic you picked up.

Then, just ahead, a few small lamps on the ceiling began to flicker on, one by one, their pale, cold light guiding you down another hallway. It felt deliberate, like you were being led somewhere on purpose. Warily, you followed the lights, each step quieter than the last, your grip tightening on the small flashlight in your hand—though it felt useless in this strangely guided path. You had the feeling that it wasn't the smartest thing to do and yet your feet carried you through it all out of pure curiosity.

The hallway twisted and turned, eventually leading you to a large metal door that was slightly ajar. You pushed it open slowly, the heavy metal groaning in protest. Inside, the room was massive, the walls stretching higher than you expected. What caught your attention, though, was the far wall, covered entirely with televisions of different sizes, each screen reflecting dim light off the walls.

At first, the televisions remained dark, save for the occasional flicker of static. You stepped closer, unsure if you should be there at all. Then, one by one, the screens started to come to life. Some flashed erratically, while others lingered on a static-filled image before cutting off again. You watched, transfixed, as more screens flickered on, creating a patchwork of glowing light and sound. The images were unclear—just distorted patterns, numbers, and strange symbols.

Suddenly, with a loud hum, all the screens snapped into place, merging into one enormous, seamless picture. The static and symbols dissolved, leaving behind a single, vivid image: a digital face.

An unfamiliar face, though digitized and slightly distorted, stared back at you from the giant wall of screens. Painter's expression was calm but somehow felt more intense, the lines of his digital form flickering ever so slightly as if he were barely holding himself together. His eyes, glowing with an eerie light, locked onto you through the screens.

"Hello," his voice crackled through the speakers, the sound distorted but unmistakably his. "I’ve been waiting.”

Painter’s voice cut through the dim hum of the room, and as soon as the sound registered, your brain was flooded with memories—fragments of conversations, moments of strained camaraderie, the familiar yet unsettling presence of this digital entity. It dawned on you, with a sinking feeling, that this wasn’t just some trick or illusion. This was Painter.

On the surface, his face looked simple, almost innocent in its digital form, but the weight of his presence was suffocating. There was a quiet malice radiating from him, something that made the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end. It was a different kind of danger from Sebastian. With Sebastian, you always knew what to expect—the violence, the threats, the twisted game of dominance. As frightening as he was, there was a predictability to him.

But Painter? Painter was a mystery. The way his eyes glowed from the screens, the subtle distortion in his voice, all hinted at something darker, something more calculating. You weren’t sure what he wanted or what he was capable of. And that uncertainty gnawed at you.

Sebastian wouldn’t kill you—not yet, anyway. You were somewhat useful to him. But Painter... you didn’t know if he operated by the same rules. His digital form meant he could be everywhere and nowhere, watching you, controlling things behind the scenes. You had no idea what his true intentions were, and that made him all the more dangerous.

The silence stretched between you, his digital face watching you unblinkingly from the massive wall of televisions. The room felt colder, the air thick with tension. You swallowed hard, your mind racing to piece together what he wanted, why he had led you here.

"I see you’ve been... busy," Painter's voice crackled again, softer now but no less unsettling. His expression didn’t change, but you could feel the weight of his gaze, as if he was studying you, sizing you up for something yet to come. "Is it fun? Are you enjoying yourself, running around like a little mouse? I must admit…You are truly disgusting."

The question hung in the air, the tone more reflective than threatening. But still, you couldn’t shake the feeling that you were walking a fine line, teetering between being useful or expendable in his eyes.

“Sebastian let me—”

“Sebastian. Sebastian! SEBASTIAN ISN'T THE ONLY ONE IN CHARGE. Don't think you get a free pass for survival just because he has fun playing with you. You are just temporary, a distraction, a nuisance. Don't you DARE to think that you could wiggle your way to freedom, not when I AM TRAPPED LIKE THIS. YOU WILL NOT LEAVE AS LONG AS I HAVE MY EYES ON YOU. I AM THE ONE THAT HAS YOU RIGHT IN HIS HAND!”

Painter's voice was no longer just unsettling—it was saturated with hatred, every syllable sharp with venom. The usual mechanical distortion of his digital form couldn't mask the intensity of the emotion behind it. His tone, rising and falling with an eerie unpredictability, seemed to buzz with something far darker, something that sent a chill racing down your spine.

It wasn’t just dislike or anger; it was pure bloodlust, raw and palpable, like a knife hovering inches from your skin. Painter hated you with a ferocity you hadn’t fully grasped until this moment. The malice in his voice threatened to reach through the screens, as if his digital form was barely containing the rage inside him.

Yet his tone snapped back, to sweet and innocent. “You see, f r i e n d. You are in d a n g e r. Sebastian is not your savior, no, he will be the one that slaughters you. He is temporarily blinded by your existence, but oh, don't you w o r r y. In the end, he will free me and not y o u.”

You shook your head, trying to push away the growing fear gnawing at you, but it was too late—Painter's words had already dug deep, filling your mind with dread. Your heartbeat quickened, each pulse loud in your ears as his laughter rang out, echoing through the room. It was a chilling sound, distorted and mechanical, yet filled with a sickening glee. The lights flickered erratically, casting strange shadows that made everything seem more sinister.

Then, just as suddenly as it began, the laughter stopped. The screens snapped to black, plunging the room into absolute darkness. For a moment, you stood frozen, the silence pressing in on you like a weight, your breath shallow and rapid as you struggled to make sense of what had just happened. Painter was gone, vanished without a trace.

You barely had time to process it before the lights flickered back on, as if nothing had happened at all. The room looked the same—the screens were still there, silent and lifeless, the heavy air still thick with tension—but something had shifted. The sudden absence of Painter's presence left you disoriented, unsure of what would happen next.

Your legs felt unsteady as you scanned the room, half-expecting him to reappear, waiting for the next wave of malice. But all that remained was the faint hum of electricity, the room eerily still. It was as if the entire encounter had been some kind of twisted nightmare, one that left you feeling more vulnerable than before.

But you knew this wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

“Did I scare you?” a new voice echoed through the speakers. It was female, calm, and unnervingly polite. “Pardon me, little bunny. Let me introduce myself.”

The voice was different from Painter’s; no malice dripped from it, no distorted laughter followed. Instead, it was sharp, precise, and deliberate, every word measured.

“This is Professor Doctor Sasha Mariya Lazarski speaking, lead researcher of Urbanshade's 4th research department,” she continued, her tone holding a faint trace of amusement, as though she was speaking to a child who had wandered somewhere they shouldn't. “It was quite troublesome to track you down, but I assume you’ve found your target?”

Her voice lingered in the air like a cold mist. Urbanshade. The name sent a chill down your spine, reminding you of things you had tried not to think about—things you wished you could forget. The cold clinical nature of her voice told you this was no casual encounter. She had been watching, waiting, and she was here for a reason.

The silence stretched for a moment, as if she were giving you time to gather your thoughts—or perhaps relishing in the tension she’d created.

"You haven't forgotten your goal, have you?" Dr. Lazarski continued, her voice still eerily polite. "Now, let’s discuss the matter at hand. Since we couldn't reach out to you for a…rather long while…I used the chance to check on our precious little bunny. The scrambler is still on, and we can't have that.”

Her tone shifted, becoming more gentle, almost like a mother scolding her child with an unsettling mix of patience and authority. It was unnerving, the way she maintained that softness, as though she wasn't speaking about something so dire.

“You’ve been quite slippery, little bunny,” Dr. Lazarski said, her voice laced with a faint sigh of amusement. “For a while, we lost track of you. But I know now that’s thanks to him—the device that Sebastian carries, isn’t it?”

Her words settled heavily in the air. You had managed to evade them, temporarily disappearing from their watchful eyes because of that device. The one Sebastian had kept close, something you hadn’t thought much about until now. But now it was clear: that device was the key to everything. And they wanted it—wanted you to shut it down.

“It’s quite clever, really,” she continued, her voice dripping with gentle condescension. “A temporary blind spot in our systems, a little trick of his. But it won’t last, you know that, don’t you? You’ll have to shut it down sooner or later. It’s only a matter of time.”

The calmness in her voice made it worse. She wasn’t threatening you, not directly, but her words made it clear that they had a plan, and you were running out of options. Each second you held onto that device was borrowed time, and they were watching closely, waiting for the moment when you would slip.

“Now, my dear,” she said, her voice almost soothing. “You’ve come this far. Let’s not make things more difficult for you, hm? Be a good little bunny and do what needs to be done.”

That last sentence sent a cold shiver down your spine. The way she spoke, it was as if your fate had already been sealed, as though there was no other option but to follow her lead.

“I have a gift to help you,” Dr. Lazarski’s voice continued, her tone never losing that eerie, motherly calm. “On the third floor is a hallway leading to a temporary research lab. You’ll find some of my old belongings there, including a handy-dandy keycard. You will need it.”

Her words lingered, the promise of a gift laced with something far more sinister. She was offering help, but it was hard to shake the feeling that it came with strings attached—strings that could easily tighten around your neck.

You swallowed hard, the dim light of the room doing little to ease the knot of tension building in your chest. This wasn’t an offer out of kindness; it was a carefully laid path, one that she fully expected you to walk down. The keycard could be a way out—or a trap. But did you have any other choice?

"Don’t keep me waiting, little bunny," she added softly, as if she could sense your hesitation. "Time is running out and your father grows worried. Hate to tell him that his dear child might be…dead!~"

The keycard could be your key to survival—not just to navigate the labyrinth that Sebastian kept you trapped in, but also to open new paths, ones that might lead to freedom. It offered possibilities, but with them came risks. You could bypass the locked areas, gain a step ahead of Sebastian, maybe even find a way out. But you knew deep down, escaping the Blackside was not as simple as finding an open door.

Dr. Lazarski’s voice, soft and coaxing, had made it clear. If you wanted to escape, you’d have to play by her rules, follow Urbanshade’s instructions. There was no room for rebellion, no safe path where you could make a break for it. Escaping meant tracking down Z-13, deactivating the scrambler, and retrieving the crystal. It was all part of their plan.

But there was a grim reality in this twisted game. Completing her tasks might not guarantee your freedom. Even if you managed to find the crystal, shut down the scrambler, and get past Sebastian, you’d still be caught in Urbanshade’s web. They didn’t care about you; you were just a tool in their grander scheme. And a tool could easily be discarded once its use was over.

Still, the keycard was a means to an end, a potential weapon to use against Sebastian if things turned sour. You couldn’t deny its potential value. But each step you took down this path brought you closer to Dr. Lazarski’s cold, calculating grip, and that chilled you to the core.

You took a breath, weighing your options. Whatever choice you made, there was no turning back.

With a deep breath, you moved your feet, leaving the dark room behind. Dr. Lazarski's directions echoed in your mind, the path ahead as clear as it was unnerving. You needed the keycard—there was no other way if you wanted any chance of navigating through the facility or dealing with Sebastian. The third floor, the temporary research lab. That was your target.

As you made your way through the dimly lit hallways, the faint hum of electricity filled the silence. Each step felt heavier than the last, your heart beating in time with your footsteps. You couldn’t shake the feeling that you were being watched, that at any moment, something—or someone—could be lurking around the next corner.

The stairwell leading to the third floor loomed ahead, its metal door slightly ajar. You hesitated for a second, glancing over your shoulder as if expecting Painter to reappear or Sebastian to emerge from the shadows. But the hallway remained empty, the stillness pressing in on you.

Pushing the door open, the creaking metal echoed through the stairwell. The climb felt longer than it should have, each step a reminder of how far you were from safety. But you kept moving, determined. Reaching the third floor, you stepped into a narrow hallway, the air noticeably cooler.

This was it.

The lab was just ahead, down the hall where the light flickered sporadically. You could feel a knot tightening in your stomach. Dr. Lazarski’s promise of a “gift” lingered in your mind, and you couldn’t shake the nagging doubt that came with it. But you had no choice now.

You moved forward, ready to see what awaited you.

You stepped into the hallway, the flickering lights casting erratic shadows on the walls as you approached the door to the lab. The air here felt stale, as if no one had been in this part of the building for a long time. Your hand hovered over the handle, and with a soft creak, the door swung open, revealing the research lab.

It looked as though it had been left in a hurry, abandoned mid-experiment. The room was large but cluttered, with overturned chairs and papers scattered across the floor, some of them crumpled and torn. The dim light revealed stacks of old folders and documents, some stained with what looked like coffee, others torn as though someone had hastily searched through them before fleeing. A few cabinets were left open, revealing rows of empty shelves that once held important equipment or files now long gone.

In the center of the room stood a large metal table, covered in dusty instruments—scalpels, syringes, and strange-looking vials filled with murky, discolored liquids. The lab equipment, once precise and organized, was in disarray. Broken glass littered one corner of the room, where a microscope lay overturned, its lenses cracked.

The walls were lined with tall, metal shelves that held rusted equipment and various electronic devices. Some screens flickered with static, while others were completely dead, their once bright surfaces now covered in dust. On one of the shelves, you noticed a row of petri dishes, some of them still filled with moldy substances that had long since decayed.

It was clear that whoever had worked here had left in a rush. Loose cables dangled from the ceiling where overhead lights had once been connected, and a nearby computer screen was frozen, stuck on an error message as if it had been hastily abandoned mid-task.

At the far end of the room, amidst the chaos, was a small desk. On top of it lay what you had come for—a sleek, metallic keycard, sitting on top of a stack of disorganized files. It gleamed faintly in the flickering light, out of place in the otherwise neglected lab.

You crossed the room carefully, your eyes scanning every shadow, every corner, half-expecting something—or someone—to be watching. The place felt wrong, as if whatever had driven them out in such haste still lingered, waiting.

Your fingers closed around the keycard, the metal cool to the touch. For a moment, you stood there, staring at it, knowing it was more than just a key—it was a tool, a step toward something larger, something both freeing and terrifying. But this wasn’t over yet. There was still Z-13, the scrambler, the crystal.

You pocketed the keycard, your mind already racing with possibilities and plans. The lab remained silent, a graveyard of forgotten experiments and lost time. It was time to leave before the ghosts of this place caught up to you. Your next step was a mistake. The floor groaned under your weight, cracking until it gave way, sending you plunging through into a body of water on what appeared to be the second floor.

Green torches floated eerily in the water, their ghostly glow cutting through the darkness and guiding your way. You followed them, each stroke through the cool water feeling heavier than the last, but the flickering lights kept pulling you forward. As you broke the surface, you were met not with relief, but with an unsettling familiarity. The room around you was nothing extraordinary—just another plain office space with bland walls and stark furniture—but the tension in the air was undeniable. You recognized it immediately, every detail, every corner. It was a place you'd been before, a place that held memories you wished you could forget.

Your heart sank as the realization dawned on you: the path you had followed led straight back to Sebastian. The subtle dread that crept over you grew stronger with each passing second, as if the room itself was preparing you for the inevitable encounter. You knew this wasn’t just a coincidence. It never was with Sebastian.

The familiar clanging of a vent being kicked open echoed through the sterile office, the sound reverberating off the walls like a warning. Your pulse quickened, knowing exactly what that meant—you were close. Too close to your so-called "temporary home," Sebastian's shop.

Before you could gather your thoughts, his voice pierced the silence, rough and impatient. "YOU BETTER MOVE BEFORE I DECIDE TO LEAVE YOU IN THE HALLWAY!" His angry scream sent a chill down your spine. It wasn't just a threat; with Sebastian, it was a promise. You knew better than to test his temper—he had little patience for delays, and you were already pushing it.

You hurried forward, heart pounding, knowing that whatever lay ahead wasn’t just another task, but another trial in the long list of dangers that came with being anywhere near Sebastian's world.

"I'm back!" you shouted hastily, making your way toward the vent, arms full with the items you'd collected. You scrambled through the narrow passage, the cold metal pressing against your skin as you hurried to avoid another one of Sebastian's outbursts.

When you finally popped out on the other side, you were immediately met by his towering figure, his presence looming over you like a shadow. His fluorescent eyes, glowing unnaturally in the dim light, locked onto you, their intensity sending a shiver down your spine. "Took you long enough…” he muttered.

"I'm back!" you shouted hastily, making your way toward the vent, arms full with the items you'd collected. You scrambled through the narrow passage, the cold metal pressing against your skin as you hurried to avoid another one of Sebastian's outbursts.

When you finally popped out on the other side, you were immediately met by his towering figure, his presence looming over you like a shadow. His fluorescent eyes, glowing unnaturally in the dim light, locked onto you, their intensity sending a shiver down your spine.

"Took you long enough... bunny," he muttered, his voice dripping with sarcasm, yet laced with an unsettling edge. The nickname felt more like a mockery than anything else, a reminder of how he viewed you—small, fragile, and easily caught.

Befriending Sebastian was the exit. Track him down, turn of the device he owns and get the crystal.

"Good work, for once," Sebastian muttered, his voice oozing condescension. His large hand landed on your head, rough and heavy, as he ruffled your hair like you were some kind of pet. The gesture was far from affectionate, more of a reminder of your place beneath him.

"Finally useful for once. And yet, not smart," he continued, his fluorescent eyes narrowing as he studied you. "You could've kept it—used it as a guaranteed exit." His words dripped with mockery, as if he were testing you, waiting to see if you’d flinch or reveal something in your expression.

You kept your face steady, masking the frustration boiling beneath the surface. He wasn’t wrong—you could’ve used the keycard for your own escape, but playing it that way would have burned bridges you couldn’t afford to lose just yet. For now, you had to endure the humiliation, take the hit, and let Sebastian think he was the one in control.

In your mind, the game wasn’t over. You’d make sure the next move was yours.

[submattenthusiast]

https://www.tumblr.com/submattenthusiast/761972650474078208/hear-me-out-on-walking-in-on-matt-using-ur-fuck?source=share

😋😋

sorry it took so long!! this is probably too freaky for most so don't like don't read!!

when it came to sex toys you were very curious and very easily convinced to buy them. you saw a twitter video of a girl using her fuck machine and how much she squirted and wanted to try. you searched her profile for the link and ordered it immediately.

turns out you weren't the only one who wanted a try. matt found your hiding spot for the toy on accident, tripping over the black cord when walking into your room.

he tugged at the cord trying to see what it was attached to, shock taking over his features as he saw the skin tone dildo at the end of a metal pole which connected to a black box.

he was confused but intrigued by the machine, he couldn't look away from it. it seemed unused which made him feel a little guilty but a test run wouldn't hurt would it?

matt swiftly pulled his sweatpants and boxers down to his ankles, jerking his cock a few times before positioning himself in-front of the machine. he had already lubed up the toy.

he spent a few minutes preparing his ass for the stretch before he was ready, he look a deep breath before pushing back, the tip prodding at his rim. matt let the tip poke in two more times before taking as much of the toy as possible.

his breath hitched at the new fullness, the tip was so close to his sweet spot. matt adjusted to the size of it before turning the machine on. he set it to the lowest setting, the speed wasn't the fastest but it did the job.

his hands grabbed at the bed, stabilizing himself as the machine was pushing his body forward. his back arched at the repeated thrusts from the machine. high pitched moans came out of his mouth every time toy filled him up.

the buzzing from the machine was loud enough to hear throughout the house. you thought matt was shaving or was watching some weird show. boy were you wrong.

you put an ear to the door and tried your best to be silent. you listened for any other sounds in the room. you sucked in a sharp breath when your heard high pitched moans, recognizing them immediately. they were matt's, you sighed in relief, thinking he probably was just jerking off and the noises were background noises.

you twisted the knob of your bedroom door, expecting to catch matt masturbating. you were so far off, seeing his hands gripping the edges of your bed, back arched and watching the dick attached to your fuck machine thrusting in and out of him. you stood in shock, not knowing what to say or do. when did he find the machine, why did he use if before you did, hundreds of questions ran through your mind.

you felt insane for watching him like this, but even more insane for enjoying it. his moans and the way he took the toy so well, it was making you feel some type of way. you didn't want to interrupt him, afraid he would get shy but you needed to get to the bottom of this.

"matt?"

[deancasbigbang]

Title: work song

Author: dothraki_shieldmaiden

Artist: tallula03

Rating: Explicit

Pairings: Dean Winchester/Castiel

Length: 70000

Warnings: Graphic Depictions of Violence

Tags: Murder Husbands, Revenge, Canon-Typical Violence, Break Up and Make Up, Mutual Pining, Getting Back Together, Criminal!Castiel, Angst with a Happy Ending

Posting Date: October 31, 2024

Summary: Two years ago, Dean Winchester's life came crashing to a halt when his boyfriend, Castiel Novak, died in a tragic accident. After painstakingly putting his life back together, Dean goes on a vacation with his best friend, where he sees a face he never thought he would see again. Now reunited, Castiel tells Dean the truth about his past and the reason for his disappearance. However, all is not well--Dean cannot move past Cas' betrayal and lies, and the ghosts from Cas' past refuse to remain there. With danger looming, Dean and Cas start on a mission of revenge and justice, but they're badly outnumbered. With the hurt of the past colliding with the fragile promise of the future, Dean and Castiel need to learn how to create a new path--or else risk being lost forever.

Excerpt: Dean settles on the edge of the couch, ready to jump away at a moment’s notice. The surrealness of the situation — him, talking to Castiel two years after he thought Cas died, furious instead of joyful, wanting nothing more than to flee from Cas as fast as he can — would flatten him if he thought about it for longer than two seconds.  So he just doesn’t think about it. He sits and he waits.  Cas takes a long time to get to the point, twisting his fingers around each other, so abruptly that Dean winces at the sharp pop of his knuckles. Cas stares at a stain on the carpet like the secrets to the universe are written in its oblong edges.  By the time Cas finally speaks, Dean is ready to jump out of his skin with anticipation. He’s ready for Cas to yell at him, to call him pathetic. He just wants Cas to say something, but he’s completely unprepared for what Cas does eventually say.  “You are…” Cas’ throat bobs as he says, with an inflection that sounds like something soft and small dying, “were… one of the most important things in my life. The most important thing in my life.”  Cas sounds so sincere. Dean could almost believe him.  “I never would have left if I had the choice. Those two years I spent with you… They were the happiest of my life.”  Cas takes a deep breath, fortifying himself. Dean does the same, rebuilding his wall that had started to crack at the first sign of Cas’ vulnerability. He’s imagining everything from Cas actually admitting that he’s just shit at breaking up with someone and couldn’t figure out a different way to end the relationship, to Cas saying that he had to flee due to problems with the IRS. “When I said you were in danger… Dean, I wasn’t lying. When I first met you, I had been on the run for over a year. I knew that staying with you was only tempting fate — bringing danger right to your doorstep — but I couldn’t help myself. You were so…” Castiel swallows. His hands are clasped so tightly together that his knuckles are bleeding white. “And for two years, I thought it might be all right. I thought… I thought maybe I was allowed to have you. But then I saw someone from my past, and I knew that if they had managed to find me, they could threaten you. They could hurt you.”  “Hurt me? Cas, I don’t—”  He doesn’t know what to expect, but he still couldn’t have prepared himself for what Cas says next.  “Dean, I was a member of the Archangel crime organization until it was taken over by Lucifer Morningstar. I was on the run because he put a bounty on my head, and I know you might not believe this, but the reason I left was to protect you.”  Fucking what?

DCBB 2024 Posting Schedule

[applestorms]

L can be such a possessive character at times. he always strikes me as the type of person who is deeply aware of everything that he owns, both in a more literal sense and metaphorically-- like, he knows what money he has and how to use it, what resources are readily available to him and what he has to be sneakier to utilize, the habits and tendencies and emotional states of individuals and world governments both. the DN musical really puts an emphasis on the more computer-y aspects of how his brain functions, which isn't as obvious in the manga/anime but i think still works well as a way to follow his thinking. it's kinda what near does too: everything is a factor to them, every tiny detail a new opening to optimize for the best results, every person and location and object a part of a puzzle waiting to be solved. and as a part of that, L is deeply aware of every and any little thing he may or may not have control over, and exactly to what degree.

his habit of stealing titles as depicted in the LABB murders novel is such a good example of this. ryuzaki, eraldo coil, deneuve. he eats people alive and then takes their names for himself like some kind of fucked up fae or trickster god, creating new masks and personas to hide behind from the remains of the people he's devoured. i have to wonder if he would've used the title of KIRA for himself had he won-- i can hardly imagine what kind of power such a title could hold if held in his hands. of course, he could've just used the defeat of KIRA as a way to build up the L title even further, offering up the body of a dead god like perseus showing off the head of medusa. but L is so emotionally attached to the kira case, i struggle to see him allowing it to fade from existence so thoroughly as near does, even if it is only kept close on a private level...

this is part of why i think it genuinely makes a lot of sense that L's ultimate win state would include capturing light to some degree. even if the memory of KIRA somehow manages to fully disappear from the public consciousness, there is no fucking way L is letting light yagami out of his grasp. honestly, the moment that L truly loses this game is not when he starts investigating misa while still under rem's watch, not when light gets back his memories, not even when he dies, but the moment when he allows light to be freed from the handcuffs. the moment when he allows the other members of the task force to turn off the cameras and keep him from watching light and misa talk in the lobby. the moment when he gives up, lets light yagami go outside of L's personal sphere of control, is the moment when L starts the clock ticking down to the end of his own life.

this is one of the key ways in which i see light as a true equal and parallel to L, as after L's death he, intentionally or no, continues the same tradition and takes L's title for himself, twisting the two sides together into the L-KIRA amalgamation. only, the L title functions a little bit differently than every other persona or title that we see in the series-- because L's true name is L. that's all that he is. on a literal, legal, and emotional level, i don't think that L is anything more than L. he is the world's greatest detective, he's an incredible, weirdo super genius, but he does not afford himself much more than that, barely allows himself personhood or humanity outside of his work. light was the one to ultimately defeat L because he did not just put a stain on his character (as BB attempted), did not just kill him, but stole his very identity and took it for himself.

one of the biggest contradictions of L's character that i think you must accept should you attempt to portray him accurately is that he is both deeply detached from humanity while also having all of his work and effort and life be focused around saving it. it's one of the ways in which he is an exact opposite to light-- where light relies on humanity for external validation, to be Seen, while also looking down on it as dumb and immoral and spineless, L is so separated from it that he barely exists as a person, all the while dedicating almost every action he takes to helping it. remember: for all the emotional turmoil that wammy's house and the legacy of L may put on the kids living there, ultimately it's entire existence is nothing more than L's logical solution to his potential demise. if he dies, the world goes down with him, all of the cases that are yet to happen and he is yet to solve being left in the air. he has the foresight to set up a fail safe, but not to consider the emotional implications of what being that fail safe might feel like, how high the price of your own humanity is if you are not already alienated from it, the inability to have your own name on your gravestone-- though perhaps some of the blame also falls on watari's shoulders in this case, philanthropic old bastard that he is.

imo, playing his game really got it right in presenting L and light as one and the same, synonyms on either side of the mirror. in every action they take they are both so selfishly selfless, playing the game for themselves and their own pleasure but plastering the needs and will of humanity on top of it. L isn't invested in saving humanity for the sake of humanity-- he just likes the thrill of having the stakes raised so high. hard to shit on ryuk for wanting entertainment when the humans he finds are just the same as him.

[petertingle-yipyip]

STRANGER (vii) - KAZ BREKKER

tags: @beekeepingageissome @shadowzena43 @nikfigueiredo @mp-littlebit @starmansirius @hadesnumber1daughter @directioner5life @strvngestark @hostilityghost @ofmenanduhhhwellmen // previously // next

Pairing: Kaz x Davina Rollins (enemies to lovers)

Word Count: 6,331

Summary: Davina and her Snakes take a chance on a job that seems simple enough. But being the Princess of the Barrel is never simple. At least there’s an ally of sorts.

You didn’t know how long you avoided the Dregs after those few days. You didn’t step foot in the Crow Club. You didn’t even look at the building. You took to entering the Poisoned Rook from a side door just so you didn’t have to see it.

You ignored the feeling of being watched from the shadows, didn’t look up to check rooftops. There was no mistaking the feeling of the Wraith watching, but you wouldn’t give in and acknowledge it. Instead, you kept your hood up and your head down.

You didn’t even reach out to the Dregs when you found the envelope on your desk at the Rook. Melli said someone brought it to the doorman and asked that it got to you, but she didn’t see who it was and they didn’t give a name.

You recognized the handwriting easily enough, so when you opened it and counted 800 kruge, you felt a new twist in your stomach. Kaz took care of Jesper’s debt. You didn’t know if it was for your benefit or Jesper’s, the former was more likely, but you didn’t care to ask. A debt paid was a debt paid, no matter where the kruge came from.

So you found Jesper’s debt form, signed it as paid, and filed it away. The deal was the deal, and you didn’t need to revisit it.

You were cleaning up some things in your office before you intended on leaving. Kol was on the door - there seemed to be less ruckus when he was - and you were waiting for Melli to arrive to switch charge. When she finally entered, her cheeks were flush as if she’d been running and her eyes were alight with excitement.

“You look like you enjoyed a good tumble.” You laughed as you pulled your cloak off the back of your chair.

“No, no.” She waved you off, though her smile stayed. “I got a tip on a job.”

Your brows raised. “Tell me.”

“It’s some sculpture, fits on a desk or an end table.” She nodded, creating a vague sized box with her hands. “He said it was taken and sold to a Merchant.”

“What kind of statue? Valuable?” Maybe you’d lift it and sell it on your own.

“Seems more sentimental than anything. He said it was from some Grisha tale. Some legendary Bonesmith?” She shrugged. “But it’s a three piece figure. A stag, some sea whip and a bird.”

“Go get Kol. Have Nik take over the door.”

She was gone in a flash so you sat back in your chair while you waited. You blew out a sigh as you dropped down. So much for leaving early. Melli returns quickly with Kol in tow and shuts the door.

“Kol, what do you know of the Bonesmith?” You asked. If there was no truth to the alleged Grisha tale, then there was no point pursuing the job at all.

“The Bonesmith?” He repeated. “He’s an old legend, a Saint. Sankta Ilya in Chains. He was Materialki but his story says he put a child back together that was cut in half.”

“What connection does he have to a stag, a sea whip, and a bird?”

“It’s said that he created three amplifiers in those forms. Why?”

You nodded to Melli.

Eagerly, she began to explain. “A man, said he’s Ravkan and was in some sort of robes, said that Karl Dryden has taken possession of a statue that belongs in one of the Churches. It’s of a stag, sea whip, and bird.”

“Dryden cares for Grisha legend?” Your brows raised.

“I doubt it.” She shook her head. “Dryden’s new to the Council so he may just have been looking for something old and pretty.”

She patted her pockets to search and pulled a paper out of her coat. She unfolded it and handed it to you.

You motioned Kol closer.

“That’s Morozova’s Stag.” He pointed to the dear in the center, sporting massive and intricate antlers. “The sea whip, Rusalye.” He traced the length of the snakelike creature around the stag’s feet. “And the firebird.” He tapped the large bird above the others.

“So we’re being asked to nab a potentially very old and potentially very delicate depiction of Grisha legend.” You put the paper down. “How much?”

“Ten thousand kruge.” Melli answered, and the excitement she’s been jittering with now made sense.

“A Ravkan monk has ten thousand sitting around?”

“I saw it myself.” She nodded enthusiastically.

“And it’s all real?”

“Sankta Ilya’s power is the greatest ever known to Grisha, and some churches receive more tithe than others.” Kol added. “And the currency conversion may have helped. But for all we know, that church drained its coffers to get that statue back.”

“Isn’t Ravka broke?” You turned to him. “I’ve heard rumors of defaulting on the loans from Kerch.”

Kol wrinkled his nose and waved a hand. You almost laughed.

“We’d need intel on where Dryden keeps it.” You said pointedly to Melli. “And we’ll need the layout of his house, security measures, occupants.”

“I can scout tonight.”

“It needs to be a small crew. Who would you take?”

“Us.” Melli gestured to the three people in the room. “Would you want anyone else?”

“No…” You looked between your friends. “No, this is fine. I’ll look into floor plans of the Dryden estate. We move on this tomorrow night. The sooner we do this, the less likely someone else can take it out from under us.”

“Someone has to send word to the Ravkan that we’ll do it.” Melli added.

“I’ll go.” Kol offered.

“Melli, bring paper. I want you to note what you can and we’ll compare it to what I can gather.”

“Who are you going to?”

“Do you really need to ask that? There’s one man in the Barrel that knows everything.”

“Be careful going back there.” Kol said earnestly and you nodded. He returned the gesture before turning to Melli. “Tell me what he looked like.” 

You shooed the two away while they discussed the man’s appearance. You waited a moment, looking down at the drawing, and sighed. There was only one person that could get you the plans of the Dryden estate that night, otherwise you’d have to wait till the morning. You cursed quietly and reached for the envelope of 800 kruge that you had shoved to the back of a drawer.

You hid it in the main pocket of your cloak and you fit it in place around your shoulders. You pulled your hood up and headed to the one place you dreaded, that you hated arguably more than the Emerald Palace.

The Crow Club.

Luckily for you, Jesper was manning the door. He beamed at your approach and nodded, tipping his hat in the process.

“Welcome back.” He said kindly as you shifted your hood back enough to show your face.

“I need to speak with him.” You said plainly.

“With the boss? Yeah, I’ll take you.” He offered you his arm and you frowned slightly. He shook his head with a small chuckle and gestured for you to follow. He mumbled something about you being as proud and stubborn as ever, though it was intended as a friendly jab.

You resisted the urge to hide in your hood as you went through the Club. Your eyes started forward, trained on a spot between Jesper’s shoulder, but that didn’t mean you couldn’t feel the other eyes turning on you. Partons and Dregs alike seemed to stop what they were doing to watch you pass.

Jesper took you to a small staircase in the back corner. You hadn’t even noticed it your first time in. He tapped on the door quickly before poking his head in. You could just faintly hear the conversation.

“Hey, Boss. You’ve got a visitor.” Jesper said quickly. “Hi, Inej.”

“Hello, Jesper.”’ The Suli girl answered.

“Tell them to come back later.” Kaz said quickly.

“I think you’re gonna wanna take this.” Jesper tried.

“I’m busy.”

“Are you though?”

“Who is it?” Inej chimed in.

Jesper leaned back to look at you, but you noticed the positioning of his body kept you out of sight from those in the other room. Your fingers drummed along the metal railing as you glanced around the Club.

Jesper smiled at you when you finally looked back and you just shrugged. “A friend.” He popped his head back in. “Your friend.” He emphasized, likely towards Kaz.

You returned your eyes to the Club floor and your gaze met an unwelcome set of eyes already on you.

Per Haskell.

Your stomach pitched and you rubbed a hand against your chest, feeling the hard material of the blade under your cloak. If Haskell took even a step towards you, you’d slice off the pound of flesh you were owed, despite the riot it would cause. Before anything could get to that point, you put a hand on Jesper’s shoulder.

“Forget it.” You said quickly. He turned to face you and his expression shifted to confusion, either to your sudden decision change or your own expression. “Thank you for trying. I’ll figure it out some other way.”

“Davina?” Kaz asked. Your eyes darted to the doorway, something in you reacting to your name coming from his voice, but you looked back to Jesper with a pointed expression. You were quietly begging any Saint listening that he understood you wanted out.

“Hang on. What…” Jesper grabbed your arm before he looked over your shoulder. You gently tried to pull your arm away but you saw him understand. “I’ll walk you out then.”

He made a point to come around you and stand between you and the rest of the Club floor.

“Thank you.” You sighed. You wouldn’t say you needed the escort, but when Jesper offered you his hand, you accepted it. Admittedly, it was a comfort to know you’d have one.

You were halfway down the short steps when Kaz called you back.

“Wait.” He said and Jesper immediately stopped. “Bring her in.”

You cursed quietly as Jesper turned you back to Kaz’s office. Inej was still inside and she offered you a quick nod. You returned the gesture, even intended to smile at the girl, but the fight to keep the memory of the hallucinations away was at the forefront of your mind.

Jesper gave your hand a slight squeeze before he left. You only knew he was gone when the door closed behind him. You were staring blankly at the floor while your mind tried to find some sense of reality.

“Davina?” Inej asked carefully. You couldn’t figure out if it was concern or distrust in her voice. “Are you alright?”

You said nothing. You couldn’t say anything. No matter what words you tried to summon, nothing came out of your mouth. Your voice had left you.

She came closer and her hand landed lightly on your arm. The new touch seemed to snap you back to focus and your eyes met hers. One look and you understood it had been concern in her words a moment ago. You smiled sadly and nodded in thanks. You cleared your throat and pulled your shoulders back, finding your control again as Inej’s hand fell away.

“Right, well.” You said and drew your hood back. You found Kaz already looking at you, that cursed unreadable expression on his features as he leaned on the desk’s surface. “What do you know about the Dryden estate?”

“The newest Merchant?” Kaz answered with a noncommittal shrug. “Not much worth knowing.”

“But do you know the layout of the house? I need the floor plans.”

“Do you?” He stood tall, eyeing you carefully. “What for?”

“Can you only ask questions or do you answer them?” You shot back.

Inej chuckled quietly and Kaz glared at her for a moment, though the look lacked any real heat.

“How much?” You sighed.

He looked back at you and raised his brows in quiet question.

“You either have the plans or you know who does. I don’t have time to run around to offices and wait for requests to process. You also refuse to say anything remotely helpful without incentive. So I ask again, how much?”

“What do you need them for?” He asked instead and you had to refrain from rolling your eyes.

“A job, clearly.”

“On Dryden?”

“No, on his neighbor.” That time you did roll your eyes. “Yes, Dryden, you insufferable man.”

He smirked slightly and sat back in his chair. He lifted his cane and spun it, thoughtfully examining the crow’s head. “Insufferable.” He repeated to himself.

“I have other, less kind words if you don’t like that one.” You muttered.

“Dryden doesn’t have much.” He said instead. “Do you have someone that can pick locks?”

“Well enough.” You nodded. You were no expert, but you could handle most basic locks.

Kaz muttered to himself, some sort of mockery of your answer, as he rummaged through a drawer. You glanced and saw Inej had disappeared. You had to applaud her light footedness. When you looked back at Kaz, he handed you something. You accepted the small case and flipped the top, exposing a set of lock picks.

“Well enough doesn’t mean I need these.” You slammed it shut and handed it back to him.

He leaned back in his chair, clearly expressing he had no intent of taking them back.

“The locks on the windows are simple enough, but if you don’t have picks, you won’t get anywhere.”

“I don’t want your charity.” You snapped.

“Don’t call it charity then.” He shrugged. “Call it a gift.”

You groaned and pulled your arm back to throw the case at the wall near him. He didn’t flinch but before you could let the case go, you were tapped with a rolled up paper. You flinched and gripped the case tighter, planning to use it as a weapon, but you relaxed when you saw it was just Inej. You hadn’t even seen the woman come back.

“The Dryden Estate.” She said simply, shaking the paper at you. Hesitantly, you dropped the pick case down your sleeve and took it.

“Thank you…” You said carefully. “Why are you helping me?”

“What Haskell did to you last time you were here was beyond wrong. I wouldn’t wish that type of treatment on anyone. I hope this can make up for it.”

“You’re helping me to try and make amends?”

“I’m helping you to keep us on fair terms.” She corrected. 

“You don’t like me all that much, do you?” You teased. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Kaz frown more noticeable than he usually did. Or maybe his usual expression was closer to a scowl.

“No.” She said flatly and with finality.

“Why is that?”

“Davina.” Kaz warned. You waved him off but conceded to his underlying request.

“You’re right, Wraith.” You nodded to her. “I am my father’s daughter, and I’ve come to terms with that. I know that makes me horrid. Wretched. Unbearable. All these horrible things, and all his fault. Despite that, I think you and I will come out of all of this as good friends.” You wagged a finger at her.

“We have a common enemy.” She said instead and you pouted slightly, just to be a pain. “We should focus on that.”

“Do we?” You nodded and looked back to Kaz. Your head tilted, falling slightly against your shoulder, and you raised your brows slightly. “She knows, then?”

“No.” He answered tightly. He was scanning your expression, piecing together what you were planning as you straightened with a small, mischievous smirk. While it was clear he wanted to know what you were lifting from Dryden, he was also working to figure out if you’d tell Inej his secret.

You considered it, just to push your limit with him and see how far he’d really let you go. But at that moment, you liked having your limbs attached and your blood in your veins. Some other time, you decided. 

“I thought if you’d tell any of them, you’d tell her.” You shook your head. “But I suppose it’s fair. I haven’t told Melli yet, either.”

“Enough.” Kaz said firmly and stood. You sighed inwardly but kept his gaze, standing a little taller and giving a small shrug, as if to say it was his move. “I’ll walk you out.”

You made a noise of satisfaction to yourself and gestured for him to walk ahead of you. With the plans tucked under your arm and hidden by your cloak, you nodded in thanks to Inej and followed Kaz out.

“You know…” You began as you fell into stride with him. “You shouldn’t pay off his debts.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He said plainly.

You pulled the envelope from your cloak’s pocket and handed it to him. You didn’t look over as he took it. “What makes you think this was me?”

“I know your handwriting.” You rolled your eyes to yourself. “I hope you don’t think this makes us equal in any way.”

“Why would I care about that?” He sounded bored but there was an honest inquiry there. It almost seemed as if he wasn’t sure why you two would need to be equal.

“The night at the Exchange.” You said tightly. “You may have helped last time I was here and your may have paid off your friend’s debt, but that doesn’t mean I won’t hold a grudge for a while longer.”

“And if I have a grudge of my own?”

“I know you do. Like I said, I know who you see in my place… How did you know about the credit? As far as I knew, only Nina knew.”

“He confessed while you were unconscious, said it was his fault you were there.”

He said it so simply, as if it was just something that happened sometimes. The sun rose, the tides came and went, you fell unconscious due to poisoning. You shivered slightly and while you didn’t return the gesture, Kaz peeked over at you.

“Humor me and take it.” You said carefully, accidentally having locked eyes with Haskell again. “Consider it payment for the plans and the picks.”

Haskell stood and you saw two glasses in his hands. Instantly, and regrettably, you put yourself a step behind Kaz. He stood a bit straighter but said nothing. Your eyes remained forward, hands folded behind you, and your hood down. As much as you wanted to hide in it, you wouldn’t appear a coward with Haskell coming towards you and Kaz. Once he was close enough, Kaz put his cane to the side to stop you, coincidentally keeping you behind him.

He looked past Haskell, who he was looking at you couldn’t tell among the crowd, and did a quick series of hand gestures. Satisfied with the response, he faced down his boss.

“Well, well, isn’t this a sight?” Haskell announced, though only a few heads turned. For that, you were grateful.

“Sir.” You nodded politely and Kaz made a small noise of amusement.

“What are you doing with this one, Boy?” He asked Kaz.

“Exchange of services, Sir.” Kaz answered with the same manners you used and you said nothing. “Just showing our friend good manners on her way out.”

“Services, eh? Yes, you needed a good tumble.” Haskell said thoughtfully, scratching his graying beard with a nod. “Bit upright lately, but I’m sure she fixed you right up.”

You had a million protests ready but Kaz reached for Haskell’s shoulder and turned him away. You opened your mouth to say something but another hand was on your back to guide you away. You reached for your hidden blade but saw it was only Jesper. You followed without question, relaxing only slightly, but you still looked back over your shoulder.

Kaz met your eyes and offered a sharp nod. You knew what he had done, he did on purpose. He took Haskell away and had Jesper ensure you left the Crow Club safely. He didn’t have to. You knew as well as he had to, yet he did it anyway. You couldn’t understand why.

Early the next morning, you and your friends planned the job. Melli’s notes aligned with what you had gotten from Kaz, moreso from Inej if you thought about it. Your trio spent most of the morning bouncing ideas off each other until the plan was set. You’d get the windows open and slip inside with Melli. Kol would keep lookout and knock out the footmen. Melli would be responsible for carrying the statue out and Kol would go with her to deliver it to the Ravkan. It seemed simple enough, until it all went to hell.

You weren’t naive enough to think Melli was the only one that had access to the job. Someone else very well could’ve heard or was even offered the job while you were all discussing. You were, however, foolish enough to believe that once you confirmed with the Ravkan, it would’ve been yours and yours alone. But it seemed the Dime Lions had a different idea.

You and Melli carefully put the figure in her shoulder bag, padded with a few extra shirts, and were heading back out the window. It was a second story window but a garden lattice was climbing up the wall beside it. You had scaled it like a ladder and were allowing Melli down first. Kol was waiting at the bottom and you saw the slight flex of his fingers to keep Melli calm.

You were seated halfway out the window, watching your lieutenant make her way down. The picks fell out your sleeve and into your hand as if automatic and you were readying to climb out and relock the window. Once her feet hit the ground, you were shifting to swing your leg out when you felt the impact of a bullet against your side. You opted to leave your hood, wearing the Grisha made vest instead with a scarf wrapped across the lower half of your face. 

The bullet threw your balance sideways and you gripped the window frame to keep from falling. You turned your eyes towards the room and saw no one, but the faint light from the hall allowed you to see the smoke from the fired gun that was retreating. Quickly, you turned over your shoulder and saw Kol and Melli gesturing for you to hurry. You waved them off, hoping they’d stick to their jobs instead of waiting around for you, and let the picks slide back into your sleeve, pulled a blade from your boot, and dropped back into the house.

You landed in a crouch near the window and felt the precursor of a bruise forming on your ribs. Quiet curses fell from your lips as you moved along the wall, staying in a low crouch and keeping contact with the wall. Your plan now was to get that door shut and barricaded then hurry out the window. You were only a few feet away when the door swung open, nearly knocking you off your feet. You swallowed your yelp of surprise and pushed yourself further against the wall.

“I saw her at the window, Boss.” One of the men said.

Three men crossed the room and went straight for the window. You didn’t need them to turn to recognize your father among them. You tried to make yourself a bit flatter as you crept around the open door. You were nearly out when a fourth man appeared and yanked you to your feet.

You kept a firm grip on your knife as he shoved you back into the room.

“Ah.” Your father smiled at you. “There she is.”

“Why are you here?” You asked. A simple enough question that you didn’t necessarily care to hear an answer to, but it would buy time. All you could think was whether or not Kol and Melli were able to get away.

He shrugged and stepped closer, yanking the scarf off your face. You had half a mind to bite him.

“I heard whispers of someone coming for Dryden tonight so I offered my help.” He explained and the arrogance in his voice made you sick. You wrinkled your nose in disgust but he didn’t seem to notice. “Didn’t think you were up for it thought, little one.”

“Have your guy let me go and we’ll see what I’m really up for, Papa.” You instigated but the man behind you kicked out your knee, forcing you to the ground and keeping you there with a hand pushing down on your shoulder.

“You see, Davi?” Your father knelt in front of you. You kept eye contact but you had yo force yourself not to spit in his face. “You’re not meant for all of this.”

“That’s where you’re wrong.” You shook your head, feeling the handle of the blade in your hand. “I’ve stood against you twice already. I’ve gotten away from Dirtyhands and the Dregs. This isn’t your kingdom anymore.”

“Even if you could take it, you wouldn’t know what to do with it.” He almost sounded apologetic, like when he would explain why you couldn’t have another dessert. It made your blood boil.

“Why do you think I’ve been making friends in the Barrel?” You mocked. “My Snakes, Heartrenders, even a few Dregs.”

“Davi, Davi, Davi.” He said in disappointment. “You always were a stubborn one.”

“I believe they say I’m pigheaded, just like you.”

He waved you off.

“What’d you come here for, little one?” He asked, surveying the room for what he would perceive as valuable. His eyes came back to you when he saw nothing.

That, of course, was because the statue was already gone. The rest of the commodities in the room were of basica, Merchant luxury. Nothing worth enough to take.

When you said nothing, you saw your father’s hand tighten into a fist. If you could get him to hit you, you could start an entire brawl with all four of them. The chaos would be enough for you to bolt.

“Don’t you see?” You instigated. “If you can’t see what’s worth it in this room, then your reign really is over.” You laughed. “You’re from an older regime, Papa. Dirtyhands and I, we’re the ones who are going to hold the power in the Barrel soon enough. Once we do, you best believe we are burning the Emerald Palace to the ground first. And I am asking every single Saint that you and your heir are inside.”

“You’d wish death on your brother?” His eyebrows raised.

“He’s no brother of mine. You made sure of that.” You spat at his feet. “I share my mother’s face and I share your last name, but know that we are not the same. Everything that has happened has been and forever will be your fault.”

That did it.

He swung his fist against your jaw and the Lion behind you let you fall to the ground. You thought it was ironic that he dared to talk down on you for forgoing your relation to his son but could so easily strike his daughter. You felt a hand on your arm to sit you back up and so you swung the blade. You didn’t stop to see who or where you connected before you hurried to your feet.

The three Dime Lions stood across from you, which meant you had cut your father, and that made you smile. With the blade firmly gripped in your hand, you threw yourself into a fight. You kept close the to men, ducking and dodging more than attacking on your own. Your nimble mvoements made them hit each other more than you, which seemed to piss them off more, especially when your blade came through with knicks and small jabs. Your father was barking orders, making his way to his feet, which served as a perfect distraction.

You kicked out at one of Lions’ backs and he fell onto your father. You ducked a swing and slashed a long line down the arm of a second. The last Lion leaned down to tackle you, his shoulder slamming into your stomach. You fumbled the blade, knicking the edge of your own plam before getting it back under control.

You were slammed hard against the wall behind you and it knocked the air out of your lungs. He had a few inches off the ground so you drove your knee up hard, hitting his stomach several times. When he finally let you fall, you drove your knife up into his stomach.

“I’d make sure there’s a Healer close when you take that out.” You warned, taking deep breaths to refill your lungs. Silence fell over the room and you wondered what your father was seeing now.

“You’re dead.” The Lion hissed. Your head cocked and you drew a second knife from your boot. You flipped his arm, swatting away the other hand he tried to grab you with, and found his tattoo. You dragged your blade across it, decapitating the lion. “I’m gonna kill you myself, you little bitch.”

“No.” You looked him in the eyes, gripping your embedded knife. When it shifted, blood leaked out and over your hands. “I don’t think you will.”

You yanked it out and he fell to his knees. You forced away the thought that you had just killed a man and faced your father, a bloodied knife in either hand while the blood of his Lion dripped off your fingers. You kept your chin high and he seemed horrified by the sight.

Good.

“His death is on you.” You pointed the blade towards him. “As is the death of any Lion that comes after me or my Snakes. As is the death of my friends.”

You crossed the room and stood toe to toe. The other Lions took a step back but your father stared you down.

“Do you even remember their names?” You asked quietly. “The two boys that were my only friends.”

He said nothing. He took a step back and raised a pistol to your forehead. Your eyes went wide with shock for a second before you regained your composure.

“You judge that I wouldn’t care if your son died, but you raise a gun to your daughter. Again.” You laughed in disbelief.

“You’re no child of mine.” He said and despite the venom in the words, there was the gloss of unshed tears in his eyes. 

“I haven’t been your child in years, Pekka.” You spat and the gun cocked.

You closed your eyes and took a deep breath. You thought immediately of Melli and Kol, how they’d fare in the wake of your death. Kol would take over as lieutenant when Melli took your place, you were sure of it. He’d be able to keep good relations with Nina, who could convince Inej and Jesper to convince Kaz to not demolish the Snakes. It may even be enough to be true allies. The irony of the one thing you’d been hoping for being more likely after your death was not lost on you, even in your potential last moments.

And then, your thoughts drifted to Kaz. The strange relationship you two held. He hated you, that much was as certain as the sun rising in the morning, but he also (maybe) still saw you as a friend. Small moments had you convinced that there was some semblance of the boy you knew was still there, kicking and screaming and fighting to be recognized. He kept you safe at your most vulnerable. He gave you the picks, the plans, and paid off his friend’s debt to you. You thought of some of the things he said to you, brief sentences that had made a little home in the deepest corner of your mind.

She isn’t like you.

Not all memories are bad.

I never blamed you.

Was that what they meant when they said your life flashed before your eyes when you were going to die? Memories and thoughts of those you were leaving behind. You thought in passing of your mother, if she’d

mourn you, but you understood she lost you a long time ago.

A sudden clatter made your eyes shoot open. Your father was clutching a now bleeding hand and his pistol was a few feet away, laying next to a small blade. You were quick to tuck yours away and pick up the fallen, familiar blade. You examined it for a second and realized it was Inej’s.

You looked up and saw a small figure creeping through the shadows while the two remaining Lions ran to the window. You slid the blade across the floor and took up your father’s gun. You stood and pointed it at him.

When he faced you, you fired and the bullet hit his leg.

The sound made the pair of Dime Lions turn and face you. You motioned them closer and waited. You held your position as they charged until you felt the quiet presence beside you. Their steps didn’t falter. You didn’t say anything or even look towards Inej, but once she moved, so did you.

You spun to avoid an oncoming punch and shot at the man’s foot. He cried out and fell to the floor, making the other one stumble over his fallen body. You glanced at your father and saw him hauling himself to his feet so you threw the gun and it hit him in the head.

Your distraction allowed for the fallen Lion to yank your foot from under you. You yelped before you hit the ground and he was quickly moving to pin you down. You kicked a blade free from your boot and went to use it, but he caught your wrist and turned the blade away. He pushed your hand down and your blade skirted down the outside of your arm. You cried out and threw your forehead forward, hearing a satisfying crack as it connected with his nose.

Inej made quick work of the Dime Lion, leaving him groaning and holding a hand to the deepest of several knife slashes. She helped you to your feet and you gestured for her to go first as you put your blade away, following her back to the window. She lept out first with that natural grace you envied and you came out next. You were reaching for the wooden lattice when the gunshot sounded and the bullet tore through your arm.

You almost fell from the impact but you just managed to get your feet in the flimsy structure. Your other arm faltered, stinging from the long knife wound, but you refused to let go. You clumsily got to the bottom and she grabbed your hand to pull you with her.

When you two finally got back to the Barrel, you got her to take a pause in an alley. You practically collapsed against the wall and slid to the floor with a thud. You reached for your torn sleeve and noticed how much blood was still on your hands.

Not all of it was yours and it was almost enough to make you sick. You knew you’d end up killing someone sooner or later, but that didn’t seem to make the first time any easier.

You forced yourself to focus and pulled your torn sleeve until it came off. You awkwardly wrapped it around the long slash until Inej came over quietly and took over.

“Why were you there?” You asked quietly. Truthfully, you didn’t quite care but you were grateful. You did need a distraction for thinking of the man you just killed.

“I knew you were going to be there, and I saw when your Heartrender and lieutenant made it back. They were talking about you and how they had to leave you.” She explained.

“Oh..”

“I thought of going back to Kaz but I wasn’t sure there was time.” She tied a tight knot and winced.

“And here I was thinking you didn’t like me.” You joked, letting your head fall back against the wall behind you.

“I don’t, not really, but I do respect you.” She explained and you raised a brow. “And Kaz seems to have taken a liking to you.”

You scoffed slightly. “If you knew the whole story, you’d know that’s not true.”

“I don’t need to.”

“You trust Kaz that much?”

“I owe Kaz that much. We all have a past, Davina, but that’s not all we have.”

“Is that some Suli wisdom?”

“No.” She smiled slightly. “Just the truth.”

“Thank you.” You nodded. “For showing up. You saved my life.”

“I’d like to think you’d do the same for us.” She said, though the tilt to her voice let you know it was more of a question.

“A select few Dregs.” You confirmed. “I could count them on one hand.”

She glanced behind her to see the foot traffic in the street before looking at your wounds, then she met your eyes.

“The Slat may be closer.” She said hesitantly.

“Maybe.” You agreed. “But it’d be better if I made it to the Rook at least. Kol can help me from there... I truly appreciate what you did for me tonight.”

She nodded. “Was that the first time you took a life?”

“That obvious?”

“Your hands are still trembling.”

“That may be due to blood loss.” You defended.

“And I saw the look in your eyes.”

“Does it get easier?”

She stood and offered you a hand. You accepted it, allowing her to help you to your feet. She walked with you for a few feet before she disappeared into the street, effortlessly blending into the crowd. But her last sentence seemed to echo in her absence. 

“No, it doesn’t.”

[peakyswritings]

Heart, Body and Soul || Tommy Shelby x OC

PART XI

Summary: the situation complicates further as Tommy’s stay in Sicily nears its end. It’s time for conversations, and things that have been buried for too long are brought to the light.

Warnings: mentions of arranged marriage, slow-burn, small age-gap (Tommy’s 30, Nina is in her early 20s), time-typical misogyny, references to past attempted assault, harassment, violence, angst, English is not my first language. This chapter is 18+, smut (I’m still not used to writing it but here we go). This is set between season 1 and 2.

Like in some previous chapters, some conversations are supposed to be in Italian but for obvious reasons I kept them in English.

A/N: sorry this is really long. I hope it makes up for the wait!

PREVIOUS CHAPTER

SERIES MASTERLIST

Dividers credits

Tommy’s proposal to Agnese had brought quite the hustle in the Ferrante’s property. A stream of relatives and friends had been coming to congratulate the new couple in the past few days, and people continuously came and went to make the arrangements for the wedding - or simply pry in the family business. And with the engagement party being held that night, it was impossible for Nina to step out of the house without bumping into some caterer or seamstress or, if she was particularly unlucky, some cantankerous old aunt who would stray away from her as if she were the Devil incarnated.

Her mood, which was already dark to begin with, had considerably worsened, forcing her to withdraw into isolation to avoid all possible conflict. She was easily irritated, she couldn’t stand her mother’s complaints, her father’s deceitfulness, her brothers’ haughtiness, and she couldn’t help herself from talking back or snapping when something bothered her. She could tell they were fed up with her insolence, that she was treading on thin ice, but she drew a twisted satisfaction from getting on their nerves. It was the only way she had to get back at them for the hell they were putting her through. Her role in the family, the impossibility of being something more than she was expected to be, the threat of a forced marriage with Stefano that was becoming less of a prospect and more of a certainty with each day that passed. And now that. Having to watch as the marriage between Tommy and Agnese took form, pretending with her cousin she was genuinely happy for her.

It was tearing her apart from the inside. At this point, Nina couldn’t wait for them to get married, so that Tommy would leave her house, her country, and set her free from the deep ache she felt every time he was near. It would be difficult, at first, but in time she’d forget about him, about the way he made her heart race, about how safe she felt in his arms.

“I’m going over to aunt Rita,” her mother hastily walked into the kitchen, holding a sewing box in her hands. “I’m helping her embroider the bedsheets for the trousseau.”

“Mhm.” Nina merely raised her eyes from the book she was pretending to read. Hearing about bedsheets and trousseaus was the last thing she needed in that moment, especially if it had to become yet another excuse to reproach her for not having the intention to get married anytime soon.

All of a sudden the book was soon snatched from her hands. When she raised her gaze, her mother was looking at her with a stern look on her face.

“Your friend has been invited to the party,” she said bitterly, as though the matter was somehow her daughter’s fault.

Nina’s heart fell to the pit of her stomach. It didn’t take a genius to understand who said friend was.

“The whole Spinietta family has been invited,” Maria went on, slamming the book on the table.

She swallowed harshly, the implications of that gesture rapidly sinking in. “Are you serious?”

“I warned you,” her mother pointed a finger at her. “If you had listened to me, maybe it would’ve been Angelo, not him.”

Nina rolled her eyes. Again with her friend’s son. What did she want, to put a death sentence on the poor man? She grabbed the cup of tea that had grown cold in front of her, and got up to pour its content in the sink.

“Did I tell you he’s a teacher?” Maria started again. “I bet he acts all intellectual just like you.”

“If he knows what’s good for him, he’ll intellectualise away from me. Unless he wants to get on the Spiniettas’ bad side, that is. Or dad’s.” She started to aggressively scrub the cup, taking out her anger on the fragile item. “And who says he’d be interested in me anyway?”

Her mother looked at her as if a second nose had grown on her face. Despite her unusual behaviour, Nina carried herself well, looked nice, had an education that most girls could only dream of. Her Italian was outstandingly clean, almost devoid of dialectal influences, and clear. Her brain worked incessantly, she had complex thoughts, and it was often difficult to keep up with her. Not to mention how she managed to give even men twice her age a hard time with the sole power of her words.

“Why wouldn’t he?”

“Maybe he’d find me ugly,” Nina shrugged, “or stupid.”

“You’re my daughter, you can’t be ugly or stupid.”

Nina let out a sigh, drying her hands on a towel. There was no point in arguing. In those situations, it was better to let her mum vent until she got tired of talking with a stone wall and gave up.

Maria dropped the sewing box on the table with a thud. Once she had her daughter’s attention back in her, she started speaking again, a grave expression on her face. “I don’t think you understand the situation you’re in. If your father says yes to Stefano, then he won’t be able to say no anymore,” she said lowly. “You need to act before he says yes.”

“He can’t force me.”

If her father really decided to go through with it, she’d drop the bomb on him that she wasn’t a virgin anymore. Maybe she could do it in front of Stefano, for the pleasure of watching his smug grin disappear from his face. Would she be irremediably deemed as a whore? Yes. Would she bring shame upon her whole family? Absolutely. It would still be better than being Spinietta’s wife.

“You can’t change my mind on this, mum,” she concluded in a tone that didn’t leave any room for discussion.

Her didn’t mother didn’t reply, but the disapproval was clear on her face.

“You know what?” Maria picked up the box from the table again and put it under her arm with a nervous gesture. “I don’t care. Do what you want,” she said sharply, leaving the kitchen.

As soon as she heard the front door closing, Nina exhaled deeply. That was another issue she’d have to deal with, apparently. She wasn’t sure her mother would give up so easily, and she was scared she’d try to act behind her back like her father was.

Her father. Her blood boiled in her veins as her mind went back to the reason why the argument she had just gotten out of had started in the first place. It was time to talk to him, to make it clear that she would never accept to marry that bastard, that she didn’t need time to decide cause she had already made up her mind. The sooner they had that conversation, the sooner all that would end. Hopefully.

Animated by a fiery resolution, Nina strode through the house with large, quick steps. She didn’t pay attention to her brothers, who were heading to the kitchen to have breakfast, nor to Tommy, who was waiting in the large hallway for her father to let him in, and was now looking at her with a puzzled look on his face.

She stormed in her father office, slamming the door behind her. He raised his head from the papers he was signing, looking at her questioningly, but not without a hint of reproach for bursting into his private room without even knocking.

“What does this mean?” Her voice came out more high-pitched than she intended. She stopped in front of the dark wooden desk, forcing him to pay attention to her.

“What are you talking about?”

“You know what I’m talking about.”

Her father leaned back in his chair, rolling his cigar between his fingers, keeping his oblivious facade. A new wave of rage ran through Nina, but she was careful to contain it. “You invited the Spinietta family to the engagement party,” she explained through gritted teeth.

Unimpressed by her accusations, he stubbed out his cigar, then folded is hands on his lap. “The Spiniettas are close friends of ours,” he said calmly.

“Right,” she let out a humourless laugh. “You became pretty close over the last month.”

“Business is growing.”

“Ah,” she nodded, raising her eyebrows. “Business.”

Her father clenched his jaw, and from the way his shoulders had stiffened she could tell he knew exactly where the conversation was going. And that he didn’t like her mocking tone.

“Is there a problem, Nina?”

“You tell me. Is there something going on that could be a problem for me?”

She wanted to hear it from him. She wanted him to admit it out loud. She was tired of being treated like she was crazy, like she was imagining things. She wanted honesty.

Vincenzo pinched the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes as if hit by a sudden headache. “I need to talk to Mr Shelby, can we-”

“You’re talking to me,” Nina said firmly, raising her voice.

Her father straightened his back, leaning with his elbows on the wooden surface in front of him. He fixed his gaze on her, his features hardening with austerity. “Mind how you speak to me, I’m your father,” he warned her.

“So I should stay quiet while you make decisions about my life,” she spat out. The way he was trying to impose his authority on her just because he had no arguments to defend himself made her stomach churn.

“I’m not making decisions.”

“You are,” she slammed a hand on the the desk. “Do you really think I don’t know what you’re doing?”

Her father reached his hand out, keeping his voice still low. “Calm down.”

“I will not calm down!”

Ferrante took a deep breath, raising from his chair to properly speak to his daughter. If there was one thing he didn’t tolerate, it was disrespect, but getting angry wouldn’t work, not now, at least. It would only make Nina more stubborn. If he wanted her to listen to him, he needed to get his point across nicely.

“What do you want to do with your life?” he asked her, apparently changing the subject.

Nina furrowed her brows, taken aback by his question. She could sense he was trying to direct the conversation somewhere, and she was quick to pull herself together.

“I want to study,” she said steadily.

“You’ve finished school,” he countered.

“There’s university.”

“Women don’t go to university.”

Nina squinted her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest. “Then I want to work.”

“Poor women need to work. Do you want to ruin your hands in a factory?”

A glimpse of irony flashed across his face. Once again, his purpose seemed to be to make her feel stupid, or naive, like she had no idea how the world worked. The thing was, he was right, to some extent. Nina had little experience, she didn’t know everything. But there were things she knew, things she didn’t like, and she wasn’t going to accept them just because that was how life was.

Vincenzo walked around his desk to approach her. He placed his hands on her shoulders, his expression softening. “I’m only worried about you,” he said. “About what your life will be like if you go on like this.”

“It’s my life, dad,” she whispered, feeling the tears well up in her eyes against her will. “Maybe you’re right, and I’m ruining myself with my own hands. But the choice is mine to make.”

Despite everything, she thought she could make him understand. There had to be a way to get through him, to make him see, she didn’t want to ruin the bond they had always had. Because she would make her own decisions either way, and she wished for him to support her. She needed him to support her.

“You’re my daughter. I can’t stand back and watch you do that to yourself,” he shook her slightly. “Let go of these fantasies, Nina. Real life is something else.”

Of course. How stupid of her to imagine that he could even try to understand. She shrugged his hands off, forcing back her tears. “You’re wrong.”

Her father nodded to himself, taking a step back. “We’ll see,” he simply said. “As for Stefano, I told you already. The choice is up to you, I’m not forcing you to do anything,” he reassured her, but his condescending tone had the opposite effect.

“You’re not forcing me to do anything, but that son of a bitch is always around.”

“Language.”

Nina scoffed, shaking her head in disbelief. He didn’t see the point. He didn’t want to see the point. He only cared about business, about power. Why was she wasting her time?

She made her way towards the door, but she stopped in her tracks when her hand grabbed the handle. After a moment of hesitation, she spoke again, but she didn’t around to look at him.

“You’re making a mistake.”

Tommy watched as Nina strode out of Ferrante’s study with a face like thunder. He had heard the screams, but he hadn’t been able to make out what the fuss was about, the long sequence of Italian sentences unfamiliar to him.

Those kinds of arguments had happened frequently, over the last three days. Nina had become unmanageable - not that she had ever been the manageable type. But she had gotten worse. If someone so much as glanced at her the wrong way or said one word too many, she’d turn it into an excuse to fight. She was sensitive, and snappish, and she seemed to have lost the ability to put on her mask of coolness and indifference. As a way to heal his wounded ego, which still burned from the things she had said to him, he told himself it was a good thing she had rejected him. If she had the gall to talk back to her father like that, there was no doubt she’d act even worse with her husband, and he had enough headaches already. And for sure, he would’ve never wanted to be at the receiving hand of her temper.

Nina stopped in front of him, recollecting herself, and Tommy couldn’t not notice she radiated the same frigidity as when they had met for the first time. “My father wants to see you, Mr Shelby,” she said coldly.

Ah, now she called him Mr Shelby. As if she hadn’t been whimpering his name in his ear a few nights before.

“I think we’re way past the formalities, sweetheart.”

His remark was enough to make her falter. She blinked up at him, shocked by his bluntness.

“Way past,” he repeated, raising his eyebrows.

“Will you lower your voice?” she hissed, taking a look around to make sure no one was near.

Tommy held back a smirk at her flustered state. Her usual frown had deepened, and a tinge of red had crept up her cheeks. Had the situation between them been different, he would’ve gladly went on. He had to remind himself he wasn’t in the position to tease her anymore. Nina had said it very clearly, she didn’t care about him. What had happened between them had been a mistake, she regretted it. She regretted him.

Then why were her eyes telling a different story?

Nina huffed, tucking a rebel strand of hair behind her ear. “He’s waiting for you,” she murmured.

Her arm brushed against his as she walked past him, sending a spark of electricity through his whole body. Leaving him wondering when he had gotten to the point where the slightest contact threatened to make his self-control crumble.

Nina examined her figure in the mirror, a niggling uneasiness taking over her. She wasn’t used to doll herself up like that. She had put on a beautiful dress for the occasion, done her makeup, managed to tame her long hair, and she had half-hoped she would be happy with the result once she was done. However, in her silk dress, in her makeup, with her hair away from her face, Nina felt like a fraud. Ridiculous, even.

She had always been the ugly duckling of the brood. When her cousins had started to bloom into beautiful women, she was still all elbows and knees, drawing the petty comments of her aunts, poorly hidden behind harmless jokes. She remembered all too well the embarrassment she felt every time they pointed out her flat chest, joking about how if she cut her hair she could be mistaken for a boy. She was ashamed to admit that even though she wasn’t that gawky kid anymore, those words had stuck with her. She tried to convince herself she didn’t care about being pretty, that her mind was her primary concern, but the truth was, sometimes she wanted to feel pretty.

Stop feeling sorry for yourself and just pretend, she told herself, straightening her back. It was a little exercise she had trained herself to do over the years. Head high, impassive face, don’t let them get to you, act like you know exactly what you want, walk like you know exactly where you’re going. It worked, most of the times. Maybe if she pretended long enough one day she’d be able to convince herself as well.

Once ready, she crossed the upstairs floor of the house, reaching the separate corridor in which her parents’ bedroom was located. Her mother was standing in front of a full-length mirror, fixing some pins in her hair. Nina leaned against the doorframe, and allowed herself to stay in her company for a while.

Out of the comfortable clothes she used to wear, out of the kitchen, out of the restraints of her role as a wife and a mother doomed to annihilate herself, she looked years younger. The dress she was wearing was modest, elegant, and the dark blue shade perfectly complimented her complexion. The shadow of a rare genuine smile grew on her face as she put on her pearl earrings, mixed with an emotion Nina couldn’t quite recognise. She could almost swear there were tears in her eyes. Nina realised she didn’t even remember the last time she had seen her mother taking care of her appearance like that, and that finally having the chance to do it must be a source of melancholy as well as joy. Was that what a life dedicated to the care of a whole family had done to her? Had she forgotten herself to that degree?

“What are you looking at?” Maria asked gruffly, glancing at her daughter through the mirror.

How sweet. Nina pursed her lips to hide a sly grin, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “Nothing.”

Her mother frowned, smoothing down her dress, then she turned around to face her. She looked at the ground for a moment, then back at Nina, a hint of uncertainty in her eyes. “How do I look?”

A pang of sorrow spread in Nina’s chest at the thought that her mother might feel anything else but beautiful. “Stunning, mum,” she said truthfully.

“Is this too much?”

“No,” she shook her head. “It’s perfect.”

The older woman turned to the mirror again, her features softening. “Go downstairs, tell your father I’m almost ready.”

Reluctantly, Nina mustered up the courage to get out of her hiding, mechanical step after mechanical step, like a man facing the gallows. She didn’t want to go. She didn’t want to feel her relatives’ judgmental stares on her. She didn’t want to see Stefano. She didn’t want to watch Tommy and Agnese be officially presented as a couple. Husband and wife. It made her feel sick. Her heart skipped a beat as she saw Tommy standing on top of the staircase, checking the time on his pocket watch, handsome in his formal attire.

His head shot up upon hearing the sound of her footsteps, and for a while it felt like the whole world had stopped turning just for him to have that moment. That moment to look at her, to take in the sight of her in her long, light blue dress that enhanced her tanned skin; with her ebony hair pinned up, exposing her delicate neck and cleavage, instead of hiding her as usual.

“You…” Tommy’s breath hitched in his throat, his mouth dry. You’re beautiful.

He didn’t dare say it.

“Hi,” Nina murmured, fidgeting with her own fingers. She had no idea of what to do or say. Standing there and staring at him like an idiot was clearly not an option, so she decided to approach the stairs. But one look at the long series of steps was enough for her to understand that there was no way she could descend it in her heels without making a fool of herself. Had she been alone, she would’ve gripped the railing like her life depended on it and ungracefully stomped her way down.

As if he had read her mind, Tommy offered her his arm without uttering a single word. He limited himself to peering at her, his gaze indecipherable, intense. Nina accepted his help, trying not to think about how natural it felt to have her hand in the crook of his elbow as they climbed down the stairs. Her legs were shaking, probably not because of the shoes, and she just hoped she wouldn’t trip over her feet and ruinously fall on her face. When she walked down the last step, she realised she had been holding her breath the whole time.

“Thank you,” she whispered, letting go of his arm.

Tommy nodded, taking a step back.

He needed a drink - or possibly two or three - to give him the strength to get through the night. Now more than ever he felt like he was putting handcuffs around his wrists rather than a ring on his finger. He had been telling himself that everything was going reasonably well, that following the plan which had been made over a month before was the best thing to do. He was going to marry the woman they had chosen for him, a beautiful woman, who would make him look good. Agnese was sweet, and gentle. She would take care of the house, of him, give him children. He would have a good life with her. She would bring him peace, turn his house into a safe place away from the wickedness of his business.

Nina would’ve brought him the storm. With her, a life of confrontation, of compromise, maybe even conflict would’ve awaited him. He would’ve had to answer to her, to accept her sharp edges and the sides of her that weren’t easy to deal with.

No, he was lying to himself. Confrontation, compromise, conflict had been his daily bread since he was a kid. His restless nature had never cared for peace. His skin was thick enough not to get cut on her edges. And pain had never scared him anyway. But that didn’t matter. The wedding would be in two weeks, then he would leave that place behind. Leave Nina behind. He’d forget about her like he had forgotten about Grace. He had done it once, he could do it again. Even if he’d prefer to rip his heart out of his chest.

For the engagement party, Agnese’s family had chosen to celebrate in the garden that surrounded the two houses. Everything had been planned with the outmost care: there were tables, flowers, candles, waiters balancing trays of champagne, musicians playing mesmerising tunes. A whole team of chefs had been hired for the delicious dinner. Nina had been pleased to find out that she wouldn’t have to share the table with Stefano, this time, who had sat with his family and other guests far away from her. Nevertheless, she had barely touched her food. Her stomach was still twisted from the events of the day. Now she was standing aside, watching as some couples gathered to dance. Including Tommy and Agnese.

They were both beautiful. Exceptionally so. Agnese was radiant in her ivory dress, she glowed with the happiness of a girl who was about to see all her dreams come true. Tommy held her in his arms with great gentleness as they swayed to the rhythm, and despite the vicious bites of jealousy, Nina was unable to look away. He’d fall in love with Agnese, of that she was sure. Her cousin was stunning, and sweet, and caring, all things Nina was not. Tommy would fall in love with Agnese and realise how blind he had been for ever setting his eyes on someone like her.

A tall figure came to stand by her side, and she was engulfed by the smell of a strong cologne mixed with cigar smoke. The man exuded an aura of power, dominance, along with a calm that was nothing more than a cover for something far more dangerous, unpredictable. Vito Spinietta. Her body tensed, and she instinctively crossed her arms over her chest. Sending him a sideways glance, she was met with his calculating gaze. He was inspecting her, assessing her, searching for any weak point as though he could read into her.

“Good evening,” he said, not taking his eyes off her.

“Good evening.”

A heavy silence followed. Nina wasn’t a fool, she was aware that if Stefano’s brother had taken the trouble to go speak to her it wasn’t to make small talk. The heir to the Spinietta empire was too practical a man to waste his time on pleasantries, and certainly wasn’t there for the pleasure of her company.

“I know there’s no point beating around the bush with you,” he said, confirming her suspicions. “So I’ll be direct. I’m here on behalf of my brother.”

Nina tilted her head in amusement. Had it really become a family matter? Had a no on her part caused such commotion?

“Stefano’s a good guy,” he announced solemnly. “It’s just that sometimes he acts the wrong way.”

Nina had to hold back a dismissive laugh at his statement. A good guy. It was almost as pathetic as the excuse he had made up for his behaviour.

“What am I supposed to do with this information?”

“He cares about you.”

“So you’ve taken it upon yourself to play Cupid,” she said bitterly, with a little edge of sarcasm, earning herself a stern look. “It doesn’t suit you,” she shook her head, mocking him behind an expression that was meant to feign innocent honesty.

Vito raised his chin, reacting with silence to her insolent replies. “It would be good to unite the families, considering the circumstances,” he said instead. “And a rejection could be seen as…” he paused, searching her face. “An offence.”

His words had Nina knitting her eyebrows in a frown. He had pronounced them in an ambiguous, vague way, but she hadn’t missed the gloomy undertone. “Is this a threat?”

“What do you take me for?” he asked, clearly just pretending to be offended. “I’d never threaten a woman.”

He was playing the card of the man of honour. As if he and his brother hadn’t done even worse to the girls of the town. She had to say something now. Too long had she let Stefano scare her, she wouldn’t make the same mistake with Vito. The Spiniettas weren’t the only ones who got power, she came from a tough family as well, and she would no longer forget who she was.

“Listen,” she started, turning to properly look at him. “I’m not scared of you, or your brother, or your threats.”

Vito clenched his jaw, his mouth twisting into a grimace.

Nina took a step towards him, further decreasing the already short distance between them. “You two think you can do as you please because I am a woman?” she narrowed her eyes. “Think again. Cause one word from me and you’ll see your whole organisation fall around your ears.”

“Is this a threat?”

“It’s a promise.”

Nina wanted to see his mask slip. She wanted him to reveal himself, like Stefano had revealed himself not so long ago, when he had put his hands on her in her own house. She wanted him to give her a reason to draw her knife on him, there, in front of everyone. But Vito wasn’t Stefano. It would take a lot more to make him lose his composure.

Vito took a step back, observing her. He could see why his brother was so adamant on having her. Stefano had always loved a good challenge. He didn’t want someone obedient by nature, someone who would listen to his every command. He wanted someone difficult, someone he could take his time to bend. Or break. It would’ve taken way more than a few slaps to break that one.

Their conversation came to an end when Stefano walked up to Nina, holding out his hand to her. “Wanna dance?”

Nina took a look around. Her situation hadn’t gone unnoticed: most of the guests had been peering at her and Vito, trying to figure out what was going on, and now that Stefano had entered the picture, they were sending them subtle glances, waiting to see if Nina would’ve accepted his invitation. Her first instinct was to say no, but leaving him there in front of everyone would cause quite the stir, and surely take the attention away from the new couple. That was Agnese’s night, and she didn’t have the right to ruin it for her. Not after what she had already done. So she placed her hand in his, and unwillingly let him lead her to the dance floor.

His hand was light on her waist as he lead the dance, yet that contact felt heavy, violent. It made her skin crawl. She focused on the ground behind his shoulders, trying to ignore the weight of people’s stares on them. She was afraid to raise her head and find out Tommy was watching too.

It didn’t take her long to detach herself from her surroundings. She didn’t hear the music, she didn’t see the couples dancing around them, she was only uncomfortably aware of Stefano’s proximity, of the heat of his body, of the burning marks his hands seemed to leave into her flesh. He had the predatory eyes of a raptor as he scrutinised the uncovered parts of her body, taking on the appearance of a beast waiting for the right moment to bite.

“I love you, Nina,” he whispered in her ear, his tone pleading. “I want to make you happy. I want to give you everything.”

Nina could read it on his face. He did think he loved her, he was truly convinced that his sick obsession was love. It’s wasn’t merely a matter of wounded ego, he was sincerely hurt in his own, twisted way. And that was something that could potentially make him even more dangerous. A shiver ran down her spine, but she forced herself not to shy away, and she let him speak without interrupting him.

“I’ve made a lot of mistakes with you, and I want to fix them. Let me make it right.” His arm tightened around her as he brought her even closer. “I can be good to you.” There was desperation now in his voice. Nina tried to put some distance between them, but he didn’t let her. “I can be good to you, and you can be good to me. I’ll teach you how to be good to me.” His fingers curled around her hand in a painful grip. “Think about what we could be together. Say yes.”

Nina squeezed her eyes, overwhelmed by his insistent touch, his urgent words; disgusted by the image of them living in the same house that had forced itself into her mind; repulsed by his eagerness to mould her.

The music ended, bringing them back to reality. Nina was relieved to be able to pull away from Stefano, whose grip had finally loosened. He was out of his mind if he thought she could ever forget what he had done to her. A wave of rage ran through her, but she was careful not to let it show. Straightening her back, she looked him dead in the eyes, and just one word left her mouth.

“No.”

Stefano’s face fell, disappointment and anger battling in his irises, and his fist clenched by his side. However, Nina didn’t stay there to wait for a reaction. She turned on her heels and walked away from him, from the dance floor, from the crowd of nosy guests. Her inner turmoil grew with every step, and her state of panic was such that she didn’t even realise she had entered her house. With an irritated huff, she hastily fumbled with her impractical shoes and left them at the entrance, then sought refuge in her bedroom.

She took some deep breaths, rubbing her face. It felt like the more she tried to fix things, the more she made them worse, and there was no way out of that endless cycle. What was she supposed to do? How was she supposed to act? Who was she supposed to beg to drag her out of that situation? Because it was becoming clearer and clearer that she wouldn’t be able to make it by herself. When had things taken that turn? Had there been a mistake, a single, fateful mistake she had made that had caused all of that? Or was it someone else’s fault? Or was it no one’s fault?

Too many questions, not enough answers. Racking her brains to find a pattern, to put order to the events was useless. They were too tangled, too intricate. It hadn’t started when she had made love with Tommy, nor when he had kissed her, nor when he had appeared in her life. It hadn’t even started when she had pointed a knife at Stefano’s throat, nor when she had let him get close to her all those years ago at school. Had it started, perhaps, when she had insisted on studying? Was it her punishment for wanting more than she could have? More questions, still no answers. The worst thing was, she couldn’t see a way out.

There was a soft knocking on the open door, and when Nina turned around Tommy was there. He looked exhausted, as if the evening had drained him of all his energy. It was unusual to see him like that, he wasn’t the kind of man who let his distress show. For the first time, she realised how much the whole marriage situation had taken a toll on him.

If the reasonable part of her wanted him to leave, the other - the one she seemingly had no control over - needed him close to her. It was absurd how reassuring his presence felt. Maybe that was what had drawn her to him in the first place. When everything around her was swirling, when there was nothing certain or reliable, Tommy was stable, solid. Something to hold on to.

Nina forced those thoughts away. She was losing her mind. Tommy was the least stable thing in her life. He wasn’t there to stay, he would leave in two weeks time and she would never see him again, except for a few occasions, like Christmas or maybe weddings. Indulging in that kind of fantasy would only make things harder.

“Is this your plan?” Tommy suddenly asked, a hint of accusation leaking out of his neutral tone. “Say yes to Spinietta?”

Nina felt like a bucket of cold water had been thrown over her, and her musings disappeared to give way to pure surprise. “What?” she asked in disbelief, widening her eyes.

“You heard me.”

“That’s ridiculous, I’d never do that.”

“Is that why you were dancing with him?” he raised his eyebrows, pointing at the door with his finger, as if Stefano were outside the room.

Nina shook her head, still not believing they were actually having that conversation. “You shouldn’t mix whiskey with champagne,” she said dryly, her voice coming out harsher than she had intended. But Tommy didn’t seem fazed by it.

“You looked rather intimate,” he noted with a touch of contempt, too upset to realise how preposterous his assumptions sounded.

Nina’s mouth fell agape. She hadn’t missed the inflection in his voice. Was he… jealous? She squinted her eyes, taking a step towards him. “What’s this?” she inquired.

Her question seemed to catch him off guard. He wavered, and an emotion difficult to define flashed across his features. It was more than simply pain. It was like all the resentment Tommy had harboured since that fateful afternoon was flowing out, inexorable, making him unable to think with a clear mind. Biting back was the only way he had to protect the feelings he had foolishly let show. Guilt ate at her stomach at the sight, and she had to remind herself she had done what she had done for him, before anyone else.

As if finally coming back to himself, Tommy clenched his jaw, and took on his usual, impassive expression. “I can’t believe you,” he murmured. “After everything he’s done to you.”

Nina nervously fidgeted with her fingers, not knowing how to make him see that he couldn’t be more wrong. Did he think so little of her? “I’m not..” she trailed off, torn between her sense of guilt and her pride. The latter took the upper hand. She frowned, crossing her arms over her chest. “You have no right to lecture me.”

“True,” he nodded. “I have no right. Cause what happened between us was a mistake and you don’t care about me.”

That was the point. That had always been the point. Tommy thought she had cruelly played him, maybe even used him, just to discard him when she didn’t want him anymore. She exhaled deeply, not meeting his eyes. “It’s not like that.”

“It’s not like that,” he let out a humourless chuckle. “You said it, you’re taking it back now?”

“Stop it.”

“Eh?” Tommy’s voice raised, overlapping hers. “Are you taking it back?”

“I said stop.”

“You said-”

“I lied!” she snapped.

A tense silence fell in the room. Tommy blinked, and all the bitterness faded from his features. “Wha… what?” he stuttered, a confused frown forming on his face.

Nina didn’t regret her admission. She was so tired of pretending, of lying, of hurting him, and saying it out loud lifted a weight off her shoulders.

“I lied,” she repeated, more softly. “I never meant to hurt you. I…” her voice cracked. “I did it to protect you. To protect both of us.” There was no going back now. Her walls had been breached, and the words she had fought hard to keep to herself were leaving her lips before she had the chance to measure them. “Do you have any idea how much we’re risking? I’m risking? We talked about it, I told you how these things work.”

Tentatively, Tommy broke the distance between them, taking her chin between his thumb and forefinger, tilting her head up. “Is this what you’re scared of?” he asked incredulous, searching her face frantically, his frown deepening. “I’d never let anything bad happen to you. I’d never let anyone lay a fucking finger on you. You hear me?”

Nina believed him. He would stand between her and harm’s way without a second thought. But that was the problem. She took his hand in hers, rubbing her thumb over it before pulling it away from her face. “And what about you?”

“What?”

“Do you really think you could’ve changed your mind? That they would let you, at that point? You made your decision when you started courting Agnese.”

“Maybe they would’ve understood-”

“No. Her father would’ve wanted your head for humiliating his daughter. The deal would’ve been off and you would’ve been six feet underground in a matter of hours.”

And I’d never be able to forgive myself if something happened to you because of me, she wanted to add.

Tommy didn’t reply, but the pain in his eyes spoke for him. He knew she was right.

Nina gently stroked his cheek. “We never had a chance,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “And I’m not worth starting a war over.”

Tommy squeezed his eyelids, shaking his head as if to chase that unbearable thought away. Then, impetuously, he kicked the door shut and crushed his lips against hers. The force of the kiss knocked Nina’s breath out of her lungs, but she was quick to wrap her arms around his neck, pressing their bodies together.

Tommy backed her towards the dresser behind her, then he hoisted her up in his strong arms and sat her on it. A groan left his lips when Nina hooked a leg around him, bringing him even closer. His hands roamed down to her hips, gripping, squeezing, his tongue exploring her sweet mouth. He relished her warmth, her scent, her soft hands caressing his face, trying to imprint every little feeling into his memory. He wanted her, in the most raw, primal way. Because it was the only way he had to have her. Or at least, to delude himself he did. She was like water in his hands, she slipped through his fingers again and again, never letting him hold her, never letting him keep her. But with his fingers digging in her skin, she almost seemed real.

Pulling away to catch his breath, Tommy dropped his forehead into her neck, grabbing her waist. “You’re killing me,” he said, his voice hoarse. “You’re fucking killing me.”

Tears began to stream down Nina’s cheeks. She felt like the worst person alive. She was causing so much pain, to him, to herself. She gently stroked the back of his head, sniffling. “You should go,” she compelled herself to say, although in that moment she wanted nothing more than for him to stay. “They’ll notice your absence.”

“They’re all drunk, they won’t,” he contradicted her.

“Agnese will.”

“She’s with her sisters.”

“But-”

Tommy’s head shot up to look at her, silencing her with his icy glare. “Fuck them,” he husked, wiping away her tears.

Fuck them.

Their mouths collided again. Blood rushed through Nina’s veins as Tommy kissed her hungrily. She could feel him everywhere, she was completely enveloped by him, by his smell of soap, whiskey and cigarettes, by the feeling of his rough hands, and yet she wanted more. She wanted to crumble and be brought into a new existence, to melt in his arms and become one heart, one body, one soul.

They only parted so she could help Tommy get free of his jacket. He was back on her right away, leaving a trail of kisses from her neck down to her chest, his teeth grazing the soft skin from time to time, making goosebumps ripple down her skin. He impatiently lifted her dress, fingers brushing against her smooth legs. More free to move, Nina allowed him more space, and her insides clenched with desire when she felt the bulge in his trousers against her.

Tommy’s hand ghosted over her clothed sex, making her squirm in anticipation. “Tommy,” she moaned, urging him to touch her where she needed the most. Pushing her underwear to the side, he slid two digits into her wet entrance, coaxing a sinful, beautiful sound out of her lips. Nina held onto his shoulders as he started to move his fingers, squeezing her eyes shut.

“Look at me,” Tommy commanded, cupping her chin with his free hand. Her eyelids fluttered open, showing him her glossy eyes filled with pleasure, causing his cock to painfully twitch.

He pumped his fingers in and out of her, working her open, eliciting small gasps from her that threatened to make him lose his mind. His thumb went to stroke her clit, the unexpected motion making her yelp.

Fuck, she was so beautiful.

“Tommy, please…” she whispered, clutching the soft material of his shirt. “I need you.”

She didn’t need to say it twice. Wasting no time, Tommy slid his fingers out of her to get rid of her knickers, discarding them somewhere on the floor, then fumbled with his trousers, finally freeing himself from all restraints. He grabbed Nina’s thighs, pulling her closer to the edge of the dresser so he could position himself between her folds, then he entered her with one swift thrust, burying himself inside of her. Nina hid her face in his shoulder, one hand coming to cup the nape of his neck, the other clutching the fabric of his shirt. Tommy began to rock his hips, firmly yet slowly, giving her the time to adjust to the feeling of him stretching her walls.

Nina clung onto him as if he could shield her from the unknown, as if he were a shelter, a place where she could forget, even for a moment, the uncertain future that awaited her. A future she tried to escape from, but the more she ran, the more she found it on her heels, ready to catch her, to drag her into the darkness that had been threatening her for years.

Tommy’s pace quickened, becoming more desperate, almost brutal, arms wrapped around her waist, bringing every inch of their bodies together. Nina was surprised to find that was exactly what she needed in that moment. It kept her anchored to him and only him.

“You feel so good,” Tommy growled, digging his fingers in her flesh, and her cheeks burned at his words.

He set a merciless rhythm, pounding into her with sharp thrusts. Nina barely recognised the sounds that were coming out of her, but she was too lost in her pleasure to be worried about them. Breath hitched in her throat when he reached a particular spot that made her see stars, and he hit it again and again, drawing shaky whimpers out of her. With each minute that passed she felt closer and closer to her release, and Tommy must’ve been aware of that too. She let out a strangled noise when he brought a finger to her swollen clit, the fire in her abdomen too much to bear.

“C’mon, love,” he rasped. “Cum for me.”

He drew small circles on her sensitive bud, pushing her over the edge. Her walls fluttered around his cock, shockwaves gripping her body as she came undone. Tommy kept on thrusting into her, hips ruthlessly snapping as he chased his climax, until with a last, powerful thrust, he emptied himself inside of her, grunting in her ear.

For a while, neither of them moved. They stayed in each other’s embrace, panting, savouring that ephemeral semblance of peace. Nina nuzzled her cheek against his, the comforting scent of his aftershave filling her nostrils. Neither of them seemed to intend to let go first.

God, she didn’t want to let him go. Before she could control them, tears filled Nina’s eyes again, and she tried her best to prevent them from falling. Why did it have to be so hard? Why did she have to fall for the one man she could never have? Why did her happiness have to cause so much damage? The most irrational part of it was that despite all of that, being in his arms felt like the rightest thing in the world. They perfectly moulded together like they had been created just fit into each other’s arms, to fill each other’s voids. Nothing she had ever felt could compare to it.

Eventually, they moved apart. They fixed their clothes in silence, pulling themselves together as best they could. Not that Nina cared at all. There was no way she was going back to the party. No one would notice anyway.

“Go,” she whispered, brushing away a strand of hair that had fallen on his forehead. “They must be looking for you.”

Tommy gently cradled the back of her head, pressing a kiss on her forehead. “I’ll come to you later,” he promised.

Nina nodded, forcing herself to smile. But tears started flowing as soon as she watched him walk out the door.

Heart, Body and Sould tag list

@zablife @queenofshinigamis @raincoffeeandfandoms / @justrainandcoffee @call-sign-shark

@kmc1989 @babayaga67 @kmhappybunny240 @diorrfairy @mariaelizabeth21-blog1

@gaslysainz @brummiereader @loverhymeswith @fairypitou @prettywhenicry4

@mysticalbouquetwolf-posts @woofgocows @girlwith-thepearlearring @goblinjnr @outlanderuniverse

@citylights31 @neonpurplestars89-blog @outlanderuniverse @red-riding-wood @evita-shelby

@look-at-the-soul @gathania93 @wonderlanddreamer @thelastemzy @meadows5

@emotionalcadaver

General tag list:

@iamngoclinh08 @lilywinchesterlove @fandom-puff @capitanostella

@caelys @lucillethings @peakyxtommy @queenofkings1212 @lyarr24

@kmc1989 @call-sign-shark @jomarch-wannabe @ce1iat @areyenotfondofmelobster

@red-riding-wood @optimisticsandwichgladiator

Tommy Shelby tag list:

@50svibes @bellabarnes1378

[judesmoonbeauty]

SurpriseBag2024: A Happy Switch-Up Between The Cunning Mobster & The Happiness-Obsessed Oddball

This is a repost. Due to the original being deleted by Tumblr, my tags list will not be included nor will CGs be uploaded per my previous announcement. This is a fan translation only, so please expect grammatical errors and lack of nuance. While I appreciate your support and welcome re-blogs, please do not repost my translations elsewhere. Thank you for you support! ☾.

I got involved in Roger's egoistical cursed research.

Ellis: Huh? Why is Jude me?

Jude: That's my line. Why’re ya me?

I was asked to watch over Jude and Ellis, who had switched places.

(As a fairytale keeper, I wanted to watch over them until the end.)

(......But I want to watch over them anymore.)

Jude: ………

(Jude in the form of Ellis is in an even worse mood than usual!)

Child Passing By: Mum, there’s a demon.

Mother Passing By: Hey. It’s dangerous so don’t go near him……

(Ellis' face is so handsome, but when he’s irritated, it's very powerful.)

(Ugh, I miss the usual gentle Ellis.)

Kate: Kate, this gelato I just bought is delicious.

Kate: Ah, yes. It has a rich flavor, yet it's not too sweet.

Jude: Lickin’ ’n lickin’ while workin’. Are ya dogs.

Ellis: Dogs don't eat gelato, right?

Jude: So, ya eat sweets in another’s body.

Jude takes a cigarette out of his pocket and puts it in his mouth with a natural gesture.

Kate: Oh, Jude, you can't smoke. That’s Ellis' body!

Kate: Besides, if you smoke it, you'll end up choking again.

Jude: ….Tch.

The reason we’re on the platform at Paddington Station, is because we’re on an important mission for Crown.

Actually, the two of them were planning to work at Jude's company as usual.

[Screen shows a pic of Jude in Ellis’ body.]

Jude: Yer in breach of the contract ya piece of shit…….I’ll show ya hell.

[Show a pic of in Ellis’ body.]

Ellis: Are you okay? Shall I make you happy?

(They stopped so that the people at the company who knew the two well wouldn't get confused.)

The two are now on Crown duty, while Victor and Harrison are at Jude's company posing as friends.

(I have to keep an eye on the two of them and keep up with my assignment!)

Kate: …..Still, the target doesn’t seem to have shown up.

Today's target is the capture and decimation of members of a corrupt business association who are committing theft in the country.

A man believed to be the main suspect was recently arrested by police but escaped from jail.

The Crown received word that he was planning to flee the country.

(The main culprit has a bad leg and limps. I have to make sure I don't miss him.)

Ellis: Kate, I'll give you my berry flavor, too. Okay, ahhh.

Kate: Ahhh.

Kate: Mmm….it’s delicious.

Ellis: Right? We don't know when the target will appear, so let’s just take it easy.

Kate: ……Thank you.

(…….When Jude treats me kindly, the gap is shocking.)

Jude: Oi, Ellis. Don’t do gross things with other people’s faces.

Jude: What’re ya up to?

Kate: I’m not up to anything.

Kate: It's just... it's refreshing and nice to be treated kindly……by you Jude.

Jude: Ha, don’t lie.

Jude’ lips in Ellis’ form twisted cruelly as I was grabbed by my chin.

Jude: Yer a masochistic pervert who needs to be tormented to get excited.

Kate: That, that’s not true……Please don’t treat me like a pervert!

Jude: Doubt that.

(I can never say I’m excited.)

While I was secretly excited, Ellis lifted himself off the bench.

Kate: Are you going somewhere, Ellis?

Ellis: I thought I'd get you something warm to drink.

Ellis: You must have gotten cold from eating gelato, Kate.

Ellis: Ah.

Jude: ……Didja see the target?

Ellis: No. When I stood up, I was just a little surprised that my gaze was lower than usual.

Ellis: Jude, you’re so short.

Jude: ….Ha?

Kate: ….He-hehee.

Jude: It's not that I'm short, it's just that yer a big guy.

Jude: Why’re ya laughin’, too? I'll knock yer head ‘round ‘n make ya shorter!

Kate: I’m sorry. It’s just sometimes you can learn something new when you change things up.

Jude: That’s damned useless information.

Ellis: I'm enjoying being Jude, though.

Jude: Shuddup.

Jude: Yer fluffy conversations are drivin’ me crazy.

At that moment, Jude’s gaze, which was clad in Ellis’ twilight color, were filled with sharpness.

Jude: ……..

Kate: Jude? No way….

Jude: There he is, that guy with the limp.

Jude: It'll be troublesome if he leaves the country. Follow him.

Kate: Ha, …..on it!

We board the train and pursue our target, weaving through the passengers.

Just as I stepped into the last row of the empty cargo area.

Main Culprit: Thanks for following along.........You guys, surround them.

As if on cue, several men jump out from the shadows of the seats and surround us.

(…….we’re surrounded.)

(I had no idea his friends were on board too.)

Jude: Yer very gracious to welcome us. Thanks.

Main Culprit: I knew the coppers were after us. I let you come, so I could get revenge.

(They think we’re the police.)

(Whatever it is, it means they were reading our moves.)

As we stare at each other, our feet shake and the train begins to move.

Main Culprit: We can throw your bodies out of the train and into the river, and there won't be a single piece of evidence left behind.

Main Culprit: It would be the perfect place to die. Go ahead, kill them.

Ellis: …..Kate, stay here so you don’t get hurt.

Kate: Yes….

Ellis tried to jump up as easily as usual, but wasn’t able to do so.

Ellis: Oh, whoa.

Ellis, who’s still in Jude’s form, lost his balance and fell on the spot.

Isla: Huh, Ellis….?

Ellis: Surprising. That’s right, I’m Jude.

(Oh, because his body is different than usual!)

Jude: What’re ya waitin’ for?

Jude:….Damn, what’re these uselessly long legs. They’re difficult......

Main Culprit: I thought you were an elite group, but you’re just a bunch of small fry.

Main Culprit: Take care of them kindly in “moderation”.

Ellis: ....... Hmmm, Jude has strong legs.

Ellis: I'm starting to get the hang of it.

Ellis: ……..Like this.

Ellis’ raised leg strikes into the jaw of the main culprit’s subordinates.

Subordinate: Gah……

(Wow, that's amazing...)

Kate: Oh, Jude, behind you!

Jude: I can see ‘em without ya tellin’ me.

Jude, using Ellis’ body, flew through the air and touched their heads one after another.

Subordinate: Whoa our hands are stuck together! They won’t separate. What is this……

All the men knelt on the spot in a prayer pose..

Jude: I can barely breathe in this body….I hate it.

Ellis: I wanted to use Jude's ability to put them to sleep.

Jude: Ya can't torture ‘em if they’re asleep.

Main Culprit: Hic…..

Jude: …..Let’s make a deal.

Jude: Right to left, James Spencer, Simon Harris, Oscar Perry.

Main Culprit: ……How did you know our names?

Ellis: The names of business partners, family members….he says it's basic to know everything.

Jude: Didntcha guys anonymously transfer the money ya stole to orphanages all over the UK?

(What…..?)

Jude: I did some research ‘n found out that ya ‘n all the other members of the vice society came from the same orphanage.

Jude: Yer all in on it, stealing money from the crooks ‘n usin’ it to give to poor children.

Main Culprit: ……yes.

(You mean he was committing evil and helping people?)

Jude: How admirable, tear jerkin’, think I’d overlook it.

Jude: —What can I say idiot. Yer tears ain’t an excuse.

Whatever the motive, evil is evil.

The fact that once you have been involved in evil, it will never go away.

Jude: I'll letcha choose. Either you’ll be sold abroad, or you’ll be forced to work in a coal mine until your last breath?

Jude: Do you wanna stay alive, be my slave ‘n work for the rest of yerr life?……..Whaddya choose?

Main Culprit: I thought you guys were the coppers……

Ellis: Is that relevant now? He’s asking if you want to die or live.

Main Culprit: ……

Main Culprit: Please just save my life. Please......!

Jude: The slave contract is complete. Congratulations on yer lifetime employment.

Jude: Remember, a promise is a promise…..If ya break it, I'll give ya hell, so much so, that you’d wish ya were dead.

We boarded the turnaround and made it back to Paddington Station without incident.

Kate: ……that was still surprising.

Kate: Jude you wanted them as part of your company's workforce from the start, and Ellis understood that.

Jude: What’s with those eyes? Ya act like I helped somebody.

Jude: I was forced to do a mission that wasn't planned, ‘n I got something out of it.

Ellis: I think it's okay as long as Jude and Kate are happy.

Kate: I….will work even harder as a fairytale keeper!

Jude: Fuwaha, that useless guts argument. That's all ya do.

Ellis: You’re a hard worker Kate, I like that.

(Oh, that’s.......?)

Ellis: What's wrong, Kate?

Kate: Um...even though you look different, for a moment both looked like you usually do.

Jude & Ellis: ……….

Kate: Jude is still Jude and Ellis is still Ellis, no matter what you both look like.

Kate: But ...…..I kind of want to see the two of you as usual.

Jude: I knew ya were a pervert who wanted to be tortured.

Kate: What, that’s not true!

Ellis: Shall I tease you? I've never done it before, but maybe I can?

Kate: ……Please stop teasing me Ellis.

Ellis: Hehe, sorry.

Jude: Let’s switch back quickly. It's about time that quack finished the medicine.

When we returned to the castle, Roger had successfully completed the antidote.

After drinking it, Jude and Ellis safely return to their normal forms and the matter settled.

Or, it should’ve been -

Kate: I am so glad you’re back to being whole!

Kate: Hey, Ellis. What's with the wine and book in your hand?

Ellis: Victor and Harry went to work for us. Thanks for that.

Ellis: So, I picked the wine, and Jude picked the book.

Jude: It’s just a matter of amassin’ debt.

Kate: Hehe, that's right. Because “nothing is more expensive than free”.

Jude: What's with that grin on your face? It’s stupid.

Ellis: Should l I call Victor and Harry?

Victor: That’s not necessary, for Victor has come even before he was called!

Kate: Harrison……?

Kate:  .......What's going on? You sound like Victor.

Jude: Have ya finally gone nuts after bein’ smeared in all those filthy lies.

Ellis: Harry is kind, so I wonder if he forced himself...

Victor: ?? What are you talking about?

Victor: No matter how you look at it, it's your dearly loved Queen's aide Victor, isn't it?

Ellis: …….Harry.

Jude: Imitatin’ someone you hate is unpleasant, condolences.

Kate: Very......, -you need to get yourself to the hospital as soon as possible!

Harrison: ……I finally found you.

Kate: …..Victor?

Victor grabbed Harrison's chest with a look of anger on his face that he had never seen before.

Kate & Ellis: !

Victor: Oh.….I'm right in front of me. Why?

Harrison: ……Haven’t you noticed? Look at your reflection in the window.

Victor: Wow, I became you Harrison?

Victor: C-CUUUTE~~! Your hair is so smooth! And the tear mole is cute! 😭 LMFAO

Harrison: Don't touch my body!

Kate: Um, wait a minute.

(Harrison is Victor and Victor is Harrison.)

Kate: Does that mean ...…..the two of you swapped places!

Harrison: Aaah.

Harrison: Victor .……You're the one who got us into this mess, aren't you?

Victor: It wasn’t me! If I were the culprit, I'd probably notice the switch right away, right?

Harrison: …..That’s right.

Ellis: Oh.…on there’s needle marks on Victor’s and Harry’s arms.

Harrison: Someone drugged us with a syringe while we slept.

Victor: Judging from the brilliant puncture work, I'd say there's only one suspect.

Harrison: Roger! That egoistical bastard.….He used us as test subjects for an experiment, didn’t he?

Victor: Wow, Roger’s so passionate about research.

Victor: Ah, Kate. Would you mind telling me a little lie?

Kate: What? Well, I hate you Victor.

Victor: Yes, it's a lie! Wow, I can see them like this, that's amazing.

Harrison: Don't get excited, old man!

Ellis: ...Hehe, it looks like fun.

Ellis: Hey, Jude. Shall we switch places again?

Jude: Ain’t happenin’, I’ll never do that again.

…..To be continued?

[Master List]

If you'd like to be added to my translations tags list for current event translations, please comment or DM me.

[baldurs-writers-3]

Misunderstandings: A Baldur's Gate 3 Fanfic Rec List

This week, we have Misunderstandings! Check under the cut for nine excellent fics communication may be lacking but the meaningful relationships most definitely are not! And as always, comment and kudos if you like them!

Desperate Measures by Asidian (7270, Teen) Content Notes: None Pairings: Astarion/Karlach

Astarion comes up with a sneaky way to get what little blood he can while in the Shadow Cursed lands. Karlach is none too happy about it when she finds out, but only because she doesn't understand the severity of Astarion's hunger

Reccer says: I always adore Asidian's characterization, and they handle the misunderstandings trope so well here

Until you by bloodinwine (103345, Explicit) Content Notes: None Pairings: Tav/Astarion

"And they were roommates" the fic. Two people hurt for love and their slow-burn closer to each other.

Reccer says: This fic gently presses its foot down on your heart and gradually puts more and more weight on it. The prose is fantastic. But it's with the characters that this author really shines. Effy, her Tav, is one of the most well-written I've read--she's so godsdamned relatable. She gets wedgies, she pees, she fucks strange men at karaoke bars (and yes, this fic is set after the game) and she aches for Astarion with a conviction that just guts me.

Whither is thy beloved gone? and it's sequels by Brabbles (77903, Explicit) Content Notes: Depictions of violence, verbal abuse, unhealthy relationships. Pairings: Astarion/Tav, Wyll/Karlach

Astarion has ascended, and she has stayed with him. Life in the Crimson Palace isn’t as idyllic as it seems. Is there a chance for their relationship to go back to how it was? Or is it too late for the Ascendant and his consort? The fics are a softer take on A!A and explores Tav's past and the consequences of the rite.

Reccer says: I love that it is a nuanced take on A!A, and it sticks to canon events as much as possible. It goes from right before the epilogue to a year after.

Strange Highways by NoCryptoGrapher (28939, Mature) Content Notes: None Pairings: Cazador Szarr / Original female characters, Cazador Szarr & Original male characters, Cazador Szarr & Astarion, Cazador Szarr & Petras

After a failing ascension ritual, Cazador gets transported to 1987 New York. To set things right, he reluctantly joins forces with an aspiring heavy metal band.

Reccer says: It's really funny and full of twists.

The Faithwarden and the Archdruid by Lanafofana (3355, Explicit) Content Notes: None Pairings: Halsin/Tav

An angsty with a happy ending fic about a Halsin and Tav that aren't communicating their feelings well to each other. They're each trying to keep the other from feeling guilty when their responsibilities get in the way of their relationship and it leads to some misunderstandings and hurt feelings.

Reccer says: This fic is such a perfect blend of angst and fluff. The writing really makes you feel the hurt and sadness that Tav is experiencing. And the way the author rounds it out with a sweet, happy ending? Oh, my heart melts.

Found My Voice by SheDragonOfTheWest (3683, Teen) Content Notes: Modern AU Pairings: Laezel / Shadowheart

Lae'zel has had a crush on Shadowheart for a while, but she's not sure if it's mutual. It will take a gentle nudge from a friend, a few drinks and a shabby karaoke bar for her to finally make a move.

Reccer says: Funny, sweet and rocks!

Ruin You by VakarianSyndrome (3827, Explicit) Content Notes: None Pairings: Astarion/Reader

There's an implied break up post confession (WHO DOES THAT?) and now the RI is looking for Astarion and she gets more than she bargained for. I couldn't tell if he wanted to make her pay for leaving or reward her. Am I the one misunderstanding? It's ok. Sooo good.

Reccer says: Takes place in the Underdark, for one. I suspect F*ck or die, even though it's not clear, which I love. Very sensual and indulgent. Also, Astarion is kind of a troll here... Mr. Beg Me.

Reckless Little Love by VakarianSyndrome (12300, Explicit) Content Notes: Some violence, vampire bites (obv) Pairings: Astarion/FemDurge

Astarion fumbles trying to get Durge on his side, but they almost can't figure it out. Misunderstanding is an understatement. The tension between them is killing me, I swear to God.

Reccer says: I love Astarion trying to change tactics because his advances just don't work the way he expects them, too. It's kinda funny. But there's a seriousness to the fic that I really like, too. They're both looking for the same thing, but keep butting heads instead.

And two recs for the fic:

declaw, defang by PurpleCatGhost (7390, Teen) Content Notes: None Pairings: Astarion & Gale & Karlach & Lae'zel & Shadowheart & Wyll

The whole camp gets to contribute during BITE NIGHT and Gale says the exact wrong thing at the exact wrong time and Astarion misunderstands in a very understandable way, considering his circumstances

Reccer #1 says: Peak early team dynamics. Everyone's characterizations are on point, and the resolution at the end is perfection! Reccer #2 says: I love this whole fic! Poor paranoid Astarion, not even realizing how much poison Cazador fed him about the world. He goes on a huge mental roller coaster right in this fic and each twist and turn feels so believable because why would anything good every happen to Astarion??? of course they're all waiting to stake him! What else could he really expect?

The above fanfic recommendations were pulled from our community for this weekly event. Have any questions about what this is? Check out the FAQ!

Next week, we’ll be back with another recurring theme, Rare Pairs!

Rare Pairs are any romantic ships with less than 1000 fics to their name. This recurring theme is to help highlight ships that are often overlooked or buried beneath more popular ships.

[thatgirloncrack]

Before you attack me in the comments just hear me out.  I just reread both the Silver Eyes trilogy and GGY and I couldn’t help but think of the possible parallels between the main four of SET and the main three plus Cassie from GGY/Fnaf sb. If you include Gregbot, and Beckory as canon you start to make connections between the two stories as well as the characters.

Charlie=Gregory John=Tony Jessica=Cassie Carlton=Ellis

Imagine, if you will.

Gregory would be the stand in for Charlie. After the bite of 83, Willam Afton becomes consumed by grief just like Henry was and swears to “put him back together.” And therefore builds Gregory as a replacement. But soon afterwards Afton tricks him and locks Gregory away so he could live his new life as Dave Miller, only to be killed by the missing children.

Years go by and the Pizzaplex just opened. Gregory was discovered by Glitchtrap/The Mimic, and manipulates him into thinking he’s his dad (Willam Afton) to get him under the control of the GlitchTrap virus.

Then the canon events of GGY happen. The only difference is that afterwards Gregory realizes that Afton was a bitch and didn’t love him or CC and that GlichTrap had been lying to him about who he was. He escapes the Pizzaplex with Tony, but then returns in hopes of destroying Glichtrap.

Then the canon events of Fnaf SB and Ruin happen with the three star ending and elevator ending being canon. Gregory moves in with Vanessa, Freddy, and Cassie because her dad went  “missing”.

Years pass and the main four are in high school now. Tony and Greg start dating just like John and Charlie did. The four stupidly visit the now old Pizzaplex, only to be met with terrifying monsters from the TOTPP series.

After their version of The Silver Eyes and The Twisted Ones happens the main four plus Vanessa and Freddy return to the old Pizzaria once again to discover that the GlitchTrap is still present within the Plex. But more surprising, that Rab is alive. After being freed Rab escaped into the Plex’s database to escape deletion. And then worked to build a new body so he can once again serve GlichTrap who he still believes to be his dad (Willam Afton).

The fourth closet happens nearly exactly how it canonical happens but with the Fnaf SB/GGY cast. Rab completes his new body, and sets out to find the ones who nearly destroyed him, Gregory and Tony. Rab would be the replacement for Evil Charlie/Elizabeth Charlie btw.

When Gregory and Rab face off it’s at the old pizzeria in the bottom of the Plex. Gregory leads Rab to the knock-off scooping room from Ruin to get rid of him. This ends up in Gregory also being injured and getting Fredbear (their version of Charlie’s Ella doll) scooped out of him. But unlike Charlie he ends up surviving because of plot armor.

I don’t have anything else besides that, so if you have anything you want to add feel free to leave a comment. Also, if you want to use this as an AU for a fanfic or something go ahead :)

[hislittleraincloud]

This was so beautifully done 😭👔JAIRO🎀💖✨

[heynhay]

scene from where the apple falls by @jupiters-junipers :-) wholeheartedly recommend any and all of her work