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flaringfoxsoul03 · 10 months

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Hello!!! I would like to request one twisted wonderland match up please. I see your most recent riddle matchup and really liked your writing!

I don’t have any gender preferences

!!I would like for it to be platonic!!

My hobbies include : Playing the violin, photography, playing board/card games, and volleyball.

My personality : Ambivert, Smart (all As), Passionate, Loyal, Kinda Quiet, and Random. I tend to be quiet around people that I’ve just met treating them with respect, but after a while I start to open up and talk more openly. I actually enjoy small talk, and learning about new things. I am also very very forgetful.

Some of my strengths are a positive attitude, having good communication, and my smarts. Some of my weaknesses are my physical strength, (I am physically weak��) and if I don’t connect to someone I would rather just not talk to them at all, and sometimes my stand-offish attitude when talking to people I don’t like or have interest in

Extra: My MBTI type is ENFJ. I like to keep my nails long and when they snag or break I’m down the rest of the day. (It’s a sensory thing for me) I get cold really easily. I love fruit. I can't remember names but I can remember faces.

!!Please stake your time getting to my request!!

!! Also make sure you drink water, eat, and get some sleep!!

My first platonic request?? Ever?? Oh I’m so excited! And you’re so sweet?? Oh bless your soul, I will give you the best reading experience for your platonic loving heart!

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I match you (platonically) with…

Azul Ashengrotto!

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I think this would be a good duo! A great friendship! Azul is such a sweetheart once he finally lets you in. And being friends surely will cause trouble for literally everyone, so I hope you like legal scams! And being the best friend to Azul, he’ll be sure to repay every moment worthy of your platonic love

As I already mentioned, legal scams, or just barely legal. Azul loves to have people forever in debt to him, especially when the really deserve it, it was true back when he scammed you and Grim out of a dorm. Though, let’s be honest, he was already getting out of control back then. After his Overblot, you still ended up being in debt to Azul because of Grim’s whole “feast it up at their new deal” shenanigans, so you ended up working pretty close to Azul and the Tweels for awhile paying back Grim’s accumulated debt. Which often turned into You working and Grim either half-assing it or being chased by Floyd while Azul either worked nearby with Jade or Jade helping you instead. Fair to say, after that event was done, you got invited to have a drink and snack (as long as you paid) and hang out with the boys after mellowing out. That led into your best friendship in the Night Raven College with Azul Ashengrotto

Azul thought your stand-offish behavior was odd and wanted to know every little detail he could, so the drink and snack was the lure. He finally got you talking once he mentioned he played board games with one of the other fellow Housewardens and you asked what kind of board games he played. That’s when he knew he got a sinker, but he didn’t quite realize it also meant him and the Tweels as well. Every night after all the work was done, more often than not you’d be playing board games and card games native to Twisted Wonderland folks with Azul, Floyd, and Jade. Grim would start playing, but he’d fall asleep too quickly due to how much energy he exerted previously so he was often the odd one out. That’s when you officially became part of the Octavinelle group.

Now, for Azul specifically, he had a love-hate relationship for your photography. He didn’t want his pictures to get out (without compensation for doing said photos), but he also wanted to take as many photos of his fabulous looks (so he could make thaumarks off it of course)He couldn’t make up his mind, which where you gave up and secretly took photos of when Azul did look pretty good during one week while he was still debating with himself (often out loud) whether or not he should get you to do a photo shoot with him as your primary target. When you showed him your pictures, he was mortified he allowed himself to be none the wiser about your little paparazzi stash, but also enamored about how well he looked in these! He ended up doing the photo shoot and allowed you to keep copies of him in a photo album for your own personal collection (I imagine you’d want copies of our lovely lil octopus~) but you also added to your debt to Azul for that stunt, yikes

Azul once came over to discuss more business (barely legal business schemes) with you, but heard you playing your violin from an open window in your dorm. He then managed to get you into a gig at the Monstro Lounge which also paid off some of the debt you accrued and start making just enough to make renovations a thing at the Ramshackle Dormitory. Let’s say he’d often try to pull a fast one on you during games as when you inevitably lost, instead of owing more debt to them (yes, they rigged the games against you, who wouldn’t?), you’d play more violin pieces to entertain the guests during shift hours instead of waiting on tables or have the option to do a solo piece on the spot for Azul and Tweels

Our lil octo boy really appreciates having that great positive attitude and awesome communications between you and him that he trusts us over the customers most of the time. He always worries that if something went wrong and tarnishes the brand of Monstro Lounge in anyway he’d be losing out massively since it’s a small crowd to sell to. Luckily, you’re real smart to and have been recording conversations when you can to make sure you have evidence that it really isn’t suing worthy for the customer to be berating you down. You are also what convinced Azul to give every employee a strict guideline on how to use specially designed vocal recorder and better visual security for legal purposes. He even put a notice up on the door of the Lounge that once entering, you will be recorded. Somehow the guests still miss that…

You’re physically weak? So is Azul! Though that’s just him probably mentally holding himself back as Floyd jokes something along those lines to you. He managed to go off on a tangent on how merfolk are pretty strong compared to the other races, just Azul considered weaker than the standard for merfolk. But seriously, need some help doing some real heavy lifting? Floyd and Jade are there to help you out! They’re not just Azul’s muscle, they like you a fair amount too! They don’t even necessarily need orders from Azul to come help you out as one of the perks of being best friends with Azul is that you get two new friends at the cost of being constantly being interesting or fun. Surprisingly, not as hard as you thought it would be, though to some degree you knew it would happen

You get cold pretty fast? No worries! Azul has plenty of massive sweatshirt hoodies and fuzzy blankets to curl up in if you’re hanging out with them. Consider it a well deserved movie night! Bring the exotic fruits and nail polish! It’s time to pamper the amazing Prefect with relaxing like the amazing Queen Boss Slayer you are! Do expect Floyd and Jade to join in, never hurts to have more warm bodies to snuggle up to!

No matter what happens, do expect Azul and the Tweels to con you into taking care of yourself once they get attached and see you prioritizing everyone above you. You matter too, you know that right? They’re kind of idiots (minus the Octavinelle boys in their opinion), but even idiots need to understand the consequences of being stupid without you taking the brunt of the blame. You’re they’re best friend now, mostly Azul’s, but it’s all apart of the deal you got yourself into and honestly? I think you wouldn’t have it any other way

————————————-

And the follow ups are:

Kalim Al-Asim

And

Silver Vanrouge

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

That’s all folks, until next time!

~Fox

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trexrambling · 2 years

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“OK. First one "you can stay here, if you like" might be intriguing with Charlie.” - @nancymcl

*I am not the best voice for Charlie, so we talked, and I changed this one to Cas instead :) *

It’s one of those ‘misty gloom’ days, where the air is thick with fog and rain but it doesn’t really rain, just accumulates into this gross mist that collects onto your clothes and seeps in, slowly drenching everything to the point that you don’t realize you’re soaking wet until the water starts to drip from you hair.

You hate this kind of weather.

Yet here you are, out in the thick of it, duffle bag slung over your shoulder, muttering to yourself while you walk down the roadside.

“Greetings.”

You don’t scream. A scream would have been better, actually. Instead, a half choked squeal burst out of your lungs. ‘Dying cat’ would be a good comparison, or ‘terrified five year old with hiccups’.

“Cas, how many times have we talked about this?” you ask, not looking at the angel who has materialized out of nowhere and is now walking beside you.

He doesn’t answer your question, but diverts with one of his own instead. “Why aren’t you at the motel?”

You roll your eyes. “Sam and Dean and I...we had a...disagreement.”

“Why would an argument constitute your departure?”

You readjust your bag’s strap on your shoulder. “It was a loud disagreement.”

“What did you do?”

Your head turns to stare him down, eyes narrowed. “Why the immediate assumption that I was in the wrong?”

He opens his mouth to answer, catches your eyes and snaps it shut again. Smart.

You both continue the trek down the road for a few moments in silence before he speaks again.

“Where are you going?”

You shrug. “Honestly, I have no idea. I just started walking.”

“It’s darker than usual for one of your walks.”

Your mouth turns up in a small smile. “Yeah. Guess I need to think about where I’m going to crash for the night. Get out of this-” you gesture at the air around you, nose scrunched- “thick fog soup we’re in.”

A hand gently wraps around your upper arm, and then there’s a loud whoosh of wind and your head is spinning in circles as you blink to readjust your eyes in the newfound space you’re standing in, nausea threatening to make you double over.

“You can stay here, if you like.”

You’re thankful for his hand on your arm while your body settles back down. Eyes darting around, you try to figure out where here is exactly.

Windows line an entire wall, floor to ceiling, the night sky crystal clear as stars blink out of the black. You walk over to the glass panes, look down at the sea crashing on rocks below, illuminated by the moonlight dancing on the crests of the waves.

Turning, you see a bed in the corner of the room, a lone lamp beside it illuminating the darkness. Shelves filled with books and parchments, plant stands with vines and succulents and other indoor varieties. You go to finger some of the leaves, notice the large brown spots adorning many of them.

“I’m doing my best to learn how to cultivate these, but there are many weeks where I forget to come by and water the soil.” He’s standing beside you know, brow wrinkled with worry at the state of the plants in the room. It makes you smile.

“Cas, where are we?”

He looks around the space before quickly settling on you again. “I come here to think sometimes, to store things that the Winchesters might need for future hunts, to study texts. I may not need sleep, but I have found that having a space like this has helped me rest, in a sense.”

“So, you brought me to your hidey hole?”

He smiles softly at you. “I suppose you could phrase it that way.”

You let your bag fall to the floor, go to sit on the edge of the bed. “I really appreciate it, Cas.”

“Of course, Y/N. I would do anything to help you.”

It’s such a simple statement, one you’ve heard him say to Sam and Dean in the past. But hearing those words now, when you’re frustrated with yourself and upset with the boys and just not sure what to do next or why you even left in the first place... It’s nice. More than nice. It’s like having a foundation to stand on in the middle of your sea, safe from the water, even if it’s just for a moment.

“I can stay and watch over you, if you’d like,” Cas continues. “You can talk about what happened, what you obviously didn’t do and the injustice that Sam and Dean have placed on you.”

And that’s what you do. Wrapped up in the covers like a burrito, words spilling a mile a minute out of your mouth while Cas sits a few inches away beside you on the bed, nodding his head and just listening well into the night until sleep finally claims you.

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#cas x reader #Castiel fanfic #Castiel drabble #castiel #cas comfort fic #spn fanfic #requests

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notsosilentsister · 2 years

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I sometimes felt awfully lonely when I was younger. I had friends, but like you I didn't feel as close to them as I would have liked. I have close friends now, without ever changing much about my approach to friendship. Some of them are actually the same friends from back then. Turns out it just takes quite a long time for me to really feel close to someone.

But let me tell you, it gets a lot easier to believe in the strength of a friendship once you've been through some shit together, through joy and through boredom, through fair and foul weather; once they've seen you at worst, your most miserable and unpleasant, and didn't give up on you anyway; once you've had a fall-out, and didn't speak for months, and yet managed to overcome your pride and make up again, because you both found the friendship too valueable to just throw away like that; once you've kinda lost touch and happily managed to meet again after years, and find that inspite of all those years and changes between you, you can quickly pick up just where you left off; once you've consistently shared so many small moments of everyday joys and sorrows that never seemed very remarkable at the time, but eventually accumulate into something quite profound.

But I imagine that all these calls for patience might be hard to hear, when you need a close friend now. It's hard to wait for something bitterly needed, especially if there's not guarantee at all that it will ever happen. Some people, through no fault of their own, might wait in vain all their life. Because it's not just a matter of likeability, of social skills, of your own willingness to invest effort of time (which you all seem to have!) - it also takes luck. And that's probably a hard thing to accept. But I think it might help you to accept it; I suspect that blaming yourself for not working hard enough at this migh be contributing quite a bit to your suffering. Some thoughts that helped me be at a bit more at peace while waiting: 1) Just as life paths diverge, they can also converge again. One reason I felt so lonely when younger was that I was always somewhat out of synch with my age group - when everyone talked about getting a driving licence, I found that I hated driving; when everyone talked about getting a boyfriend, I found that I don't do boyfriends; when everyone started really getting invested in their careers, I found that I lost all ambition; when everyone started talking about buying their own place, I moved back in with my parents. But this too shall pass - at some point, everyone got their driving licence, their boyfriend, their promotion, their place (or not! turns out these milestones are not actually as salient for everyone as propaganda might have you believe; my impression of "everyone" has often turned out to be a bit superficial and premature), and there are other topics again to talk about. Some of those are still topics I can't contribute much to (kids, fashion, real estate), but it has been a big relief for me to find that stuff like "Sex and the City" grossly overrepresents the amount of talking about men among grown-up women. Nowadays most of my friends are either in longterm stable relationships without much drama, lesbians, single moms too busy for dating, or older women who have mostly been there, done that. We usually talk about hobbies, health, money, culture, politics, personal development, current events and non-romantic interpersonal drama, all topics where I'm much more at home. When you feel that everyone is heading somewhere you won't follow, you just have to wait a while to find common ground again. Life is so much more than ticking certain boxes; there are so many other things to connect over. It's easy to lose of sight of that, because people do sometimes get temporarily blinded by the box-ticking urge. But as I said, this usually passes. Right now, timing seems to be working against you, but timing can also be on your side. Sometimes stuff happens that makes people grow apart, sometimes stuff happens that makes them grow closer! I grew a lot closer again to an old high school friend, when we both changed careers and started teaching high school at roughly the same time. I have always been fond of my cousin's girlfriend, but we only became really close friends, after my cousin broke up with her. You are probably right to observe that most people have limited "close friend" slots because of their busy lifes and preexisting social obligations, but I think it's premature to write someone off completely just because all those slots are currently filled. Relationships end, kids grow up, jobs might become less stressful once you've established yourself. If there's a general sense of affinity, it can pay off to have some patience and sit out those friendship drought periods. 2) Casual friendships are valuable, even if they never turn into closer ones. This may seem counter-intuitive to an introvert. My social batteries are relatively quickly drained and I do need a fair bit of alone-time to recharge. Spending those valueable social batteries on intimate one-on-one dates with a few close friends certainly seems a lot more attractive than casual friendship activies like small talk, parties and group outings. There's a certain temptation to just not bother, because the cost-benefit/risk-reward calculation seems a bit off for me with those. But I've found it crucial not to give in too much to that temptation. Casual friendships remain important, even once you do also have close friends, actually! Casual friends can sometime cheer you up and distract you from your misery just as well as close ones, they can introduce you to new people and new ideas and broaden your horizons, they can take you out of your bubble, they are sometimes even easier to approach in a crisis, because the stakes and expectations are lower, so it would be easier to deal with a rejection from a casual friend than from a close one and because sometimes someone with a bit more distance to a problem might find it easier to actually help. Learning to appreciate the value of casual friendships was one of the most important steps of my personal growth. 3) Others will never quite see me the way I see myself, and that's okay. The way I see myself is not always the entire truth either. The desire for close friendship is the desire to be truly seen, but was is the truth anyway? I've come to see it not as something already independently existing, waiting to be revealed, but rather something co-created. You say you want a close friends you can be your authentic self with, someone where you feel you don't have to perform. What's stopping you from doing that with the people you currently interact with? You're probably not sure you can trust them that much yet, and I can't say that caution is misguided. It's probably also there on their part sometimes! And that's okay, it's okay to take some time to build trust. The way to do that is to take some smaller risks before you take big ones, to test the waters, see how people handle sensitive information, difficult conversations, less fun aspects of your personality and life. Do they act dismissive, do they immediately change the topic, or can they sit with doubts and sorrows? The things we find difficult to talk about, we like to keep from others - those are the currency of intimacy. Sharing them takes trust, and trust deepens bonds. But I do think it's a good idea to proceed carefully and take your time

#friendship #personal #journal

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dzpenumbra · 2 years

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10/12/22

The landlords came over today. I got about 5 hours of sleep, maybe 6. I started the day well. My mom came over. I showed her some Rimworld, since she was over. Explained the mental health mechanic for the dozenth time, I am still supremely pissed off that I was blown off by mental health professionals on how useful RPG game mechanics can be - specifically Rimworld's Mood, Needs and Passion systems - simply because it's a game. I'm just... I'm actually staggered at how superficial, judgmental, shallow and wasteful that kind of attitude is. But my mom actually listened and asked questions this time, showed a genuine interest. It was a really nice feeling to have someone actually show an interest in something I'm passionate about. It's been a long time.

My landlords came over, they quickly looked over the hot-spots that I pointed out. Then we all stood around and talked. I shared my art, specifically the bird pieces that I drew - the owl that's my profile picture (the complete version), a kingfisher and a cedar waxwing. They were blown away. It made me feel good. I often forget how much talent I have, how much experience I have. And downplay it. It's a nasty habit.

They didn't seem nearly as concerned about the wall and doorframe rot as I had feared, I mean... they barely reacted. They seemed more concerned about looking under the carpet. I'm guessing they're more worried about the foundation than the walls. I guess rightfully so, that does make sense.

So my mom told some stories and we all shot the shit for a while and then they left. Done and done. A 2-3 year phobia. Dozens of hours long fights. Months of recovering from turmoil and panic. Over in less than 20 minutes. Forever. What a feeling! Hard to really process all at once, I have a feeling it will unravel over the next few days.

I laid into my brother a bit this morning. He wrote me back and... yeah, let's just say he doubled down in some respects. I'm sure this is one of his issues that he works through. I was really hoping he would be more communicative about what's going on on his side, but I guess I should be grateful there's any communication at all. It's rough. And like... 2 days before my birthday. So... that's shitty, we had like a family dinner planned, now it's gonna be awkward as fuck for all of us, with him just hiding from me right next door. I'm so tired of this shit.

So yeah. Mixed news. But after my landlords left, I went over the floor plans for my new apartment and compared them to pictures. It's a pretty small place but it's gonna be cozy. I'm pretty excited for it. I'm scared shitless, honestly. I've never been this scared to move ever. Moving was always something I just pulled the trigger on and got done. But that was in my teens/20's. Shit like that, like making yourself just start walking out on a high ropes course tightrope walk kinda thing. Maybe it's anxiety, maybe it's PTSD, maybe it's emotionally rebounding after years on benzos, maybe it's just age... but I have to really force myself to take risks now. Even if they're not... risks. Like pushing through stagefright, I guess. Sucks.

I have a bit of a plan for what stuff I'm going to need for the new place, and I can start sorting through what here I don't need anymore. It's gonna be weird to get rid of my couch... not as much as the futon honestly, though... that was my dog's bed, and my ex's bed when we were fighting before that, and my couch for like 5 years before that. The attachment is huge. I get very, very attached to things. Even more so to people. It's a thing. I hate it, because it causes problems, obviously. I become a hoarder. I save receipts from gas stations I went to on my solo road trip. I save plane tickets to see friends for the first time. Like... relics. Memorial totems, or something. Kinda like the scrapbook approach to life. Because of that, I produce very little waste, but I just accumulate possessions. And now I have to sever those memories.

It should be easy because I don't even use those things. I don't even look at them, very rarely. There was a thick layer of dust on everything. But when I touch them, it's like in some superhero movie where I just flash back to that place, to the memory attached to the object. Like this little unopened package of mini red Solo cups I got around Easter when my ex and I were bouncing back into a good phase... kinda... I got those and a bunch of pingpong balls and mini plastic eggs, and I was going to make a gigantic cardboard obstacle course for them in the studio room and I wanted to race them. And do a leaderboard and maybe even stream or do youtube videos of it. Like a whole competitive league of pingpong ball racing. Since the cups, which were going to be like bumpers in a pinball machine, are still in the packaging, it should be pretty telling of the outcome of that project. It flopped just like the rest. I was just around someone who didn't breathe life into my projects, fan the spark of inspiration into a flame, nope... she just went "that's a cool idea" and went off and did her own thing and never mentioned it again. So... very vivid memory, flashed right back to that period in life, just by looking at a package of cups. It's very hard to put those in the trash.

I've had to do a lot of that this week. I'm glad I started early, I still have a month, I can pace this. But it's pretty crazy. I've been very consumed by grief for a while now, this kind of grief is surprisingly potent. And it clearly feels like grief, like loss. Just by like... throwing out dust covered things. Like, it makes me cry. So... that's a first for me, and I'm kinda just pushing through it.

The rest of the day was just eating lots of food, watching Twitch, playing Rimworld, playing Minecraft, then playing a little Session and heading to bed. None of them hit the spot. Probably because of my mega-dose of social stimulation. Nothing compares to the high I get from that. I was actually getting bored playing all of those tonight. So I think I'm overdue to shift gears into art projects. It's calling me. The hoodie first. I'm thinking maybe doing a black sharpie mandala on the back of my black hoodie. The sharpie should be darker, this hoodie is pretty old and faded. So it should make a really subtle design. And I can experiment using other paint pens and stuff on it and see how they fare through the wash.

It's just sitting down and starting that's the hard part, once I get into a rhythm, it's easy.

So I guess that's on the agenda for tomorrow. Art day. See if I can catch up on... oh god way too many sketchdaily sketches... And get started on the hoodie. I have plenty of shirts to mess around on too. And a pair of pink Converses, which I have had on the back burners for about half a decade now. If I procrastinate that one any longer, they'll be antiques before they're ready for sale.

I'm tired, I'm gonna try to crash.

#diary #journal #stream of thoughts #spilled thoughts #online journal #stream of consciousness

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f1united · 3 years

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Ensemble - Chapter Two: The Girl and The Gift

Charles Leclerc x Reader

Summary: Your Arthur Leclercs best friend. So why, after a random night in London, are you falling for his brother?

Chapter One: The Start

Warnings: Mentions of alcohol and sex.

Word Count: 5.8k

Note: This chapter begins in London and is marked where it switches to Mykonos. There are then some flashbacks mixed in so just watch out for those. Let me know your thoughts, enjoy!

*****

Chapter Two: The Girl and The Gift

Not long after Pierre had joined your table, Charles emerged from the toilets. Pierre had waved his hands to inform him of his updated location as he sat in the empty seat, unknowingly signing himself up for a night full of girly gossip and drama. The evening was spent reminiscing on childhood memories and sharing stories. It wasn't until Nat checked her phone that you realised how late it was getting.

"We better get going," She announced as she checked her phone. "The last train is in half an hour." You lived just outside of London which meant that most nights out were cut short by trains unless you had booked a hotel. You hummed in agreement as you finished your drink watching as Pierre began to whisper in Lucy's ear. They'd been flirting all night so her next sentence didn't come as much of a surprise.

"I'm going to chill with Pierre for a bit, I'll find my own way home tomorrow" The rest of the girls saw it coming too.

"Are you sure?" Katie asked. "I don't want you ending up in London on your own with no way home." She had a point. London could be quite daunting when it was late and dark, especially if you weren't a local.

"Well why don't you stay too?" Charles nodded his head towards you as he spoke. "That way you could leave together." Not one part of you questioned Charles' intentions as he spoke. He remained the responsible 'Arthur's older brother' that was being sensible and mature, making sure that everyone got home safely.

"If that's alright with you?" Your question was answered with a nod of his head. You all began to grab your things and headed outside, saying your goodbyes, telling them to text you when they were home safe as they encouraged you to do the same. By the time they'd headed for the station, Pierre and Lucy were already nowhere to be seen.

"I'm not sure about you but I'm in no rush to go back to the apartment just yet!" You spoke to Charles as you looked at the night sky above you.

"Where do you want to go in the meantime?"

“Have you ever explored London before?" You answered his question with one of your own. He shook his head. "So you haven't seen all beautiful sites it has to offer." The sarcasm was evident in your voice as you pointed down the alley way you were walking past full of black bins and plastic bags full of rubbish.

"I've only ever been here to celebrate races and I can't say I've seen much other than the inside of some bars and restaurants.”

"Well you're in for a long night Leclerc." Two hours ago Charles wanted nothing more than for him and Pierre to go back to the apartment. The lack of alcohol he'd consumed throughout the night was only adding to the tiredness he'd accumulated over the race weekend. However as you dragged him through the streets of London he realised there was no place he'd rather be.

You'd ridden Boris bikes alongside the River Thames, shown him your favourite restaurant in Covent Garden and taken him through Piccadilly Circus all the way to Oxford Street where closed shops lined the dark streets, pointing out your favourite ones as you cycled past. He never did things like this. As a F1 driver it was difficult for him to go almost anywhere without going unnoticed but tonight not one person had recognised him because for the night he was just a normal person with another normal person having a good time.

After abandoning the Boris bikes at the nearest drop off point you both headed towards the apartment. It belonged to Charles' mother and was often used by you and Arthur whenever he'd come to visit and couldn't stay with you.

"You seem happier than when I last saw you." His comment made you smile. It was all he could think about as you wondered through the dark streets. The last time you'd seen him you'd just broken up with your ex. Your relationship had been on and off for years but you'd finally called it quits for good. It didn't take a genius to see the relationship was making you unhappy, the anxiety, tears and sleepless nights were picked up on by everyone albeit your efforts to hide it. Arthur was the only person who truly knew what was going on and it hurt him to see his best friend in so much pain when she thought she was in love.

"Thank you, I'm in a much better place now. I've had time to focus on myself." You'd completely lost yourself throughout the time you were together, focusing so much on what he'd wanted and expected rather than what made you happy. The situation had increased your maturity and for that reason you were grateful your first heartbreak had come at such a young age. You'd correctly assumed that Arthur had made Charles aware of your sensitiveness to the situation to some extent as he made no further comments.

He had approached Arthur with concern after your last meeting. Despite a fun grand prix weekend you'd been blinking back tears and spent most of the time with a blank expression on your face. He hated it. He could see you trying to compose yourself, when he came to thank you for coming you'd done your best to smile, your voice was laced with excitement, but your eyes were empty, drained of emotion. He was grateful to see it had made its way back.

"Did you know I've never been to Harrods?" His random fact was a relief as he quickly changed the subject, allowing your mind to be brought back to the present rather than the dark times from the past.

"Even I've been to Harrods Charles. We should go tomorrow, you'd have a field day in the clothes section." As a part time student most of your spare money went into savings, a fund you'd created for your planned travels when you were done with your studies. It wasn't very often that you brought yourself nice things so despite your multiple trips to Harrods, you'd never actually purchased anything. You could see him deliberating your suggestion in his head.

"You can wear sunglasses and a hat with your mask, just don't wear a bright red Ferrari top and I'm sure we'll be able to keep ourselves to ourselves."

"Don't you have work tomorrow?" His question brought you back to reality slightly.

"I'll call in sick?" you offered. It suddenly occurred to you that this was the longest time you and Charles had ever been alone together and the idea of leaving wasn't something that you wanted to think about just yet.

Charles opened the apartment door with caution, neither of you wanted to interrupt your friend’s spontaneous night, nor hear any of the antics they were getting up to. You frowned at each other as you stepped into the entrance corridor. There were no faint voices, no mumbling or laughs, just the hum of the city that echoed through the slightly open window.

“Maybe they didn’t come back here,” your judgement became increasingly more likely as you followed Charles towards the kitchen and stood around the island.

“I’ll send him a text.” He pulled his phone from his pocket and tapped away before placing it on the marble countertop. It lit up with Pierre's reply not long after he'd set it down. “They went to some hotel, apparently he’s dropping her home in a second.”

“He’s not the type to bring girls back to his home turf then,” you took the bag off your shoulder and placed in on the counter, grabbing a hair tie from inside and gathering your locks into a low ponytail. “Smart move.” Charles shrugged his shoulders at your observation.

He’d never really thought about it before, but he was the same. The few casual hook ups that he’d had over the years had never been in places he spent a lot of time like his house in Monaco, or his favourite holiday home in Mykonos, and never this apartment. Sure, he’d slept with people in those cities, but never in his space. You were right though; it was easier to forget about the crime if you never returned to the scene.

"Do you have anything I can change into?"

“There’s a top on the end of my bed.” You thanked him as you made your way towards his room. “I’ll grab some of my things so I can crash on the sofa once you’ve changed.” You stopped in your tracks, turning to face him as you stood in the doorway.

“I’m not kicking an f1 driver out of their own bed Charles, especially not post race weekend.” You crossed your arms as you lent against the door frame. “I’ll sleep on the sofa.”

“I’m not letting you sleep on the sofa.” He argued.

“It’s one night Charles, I really don’t mind.”

“I’m not letting you sleep on the sofa.” He repeated.

“Well then it looks like we’re sharing the bed.” Your words not only surprised you, but also Charles. Neither of you were sure where this increased confidence had come from, but you didn’t want it to become awkward, so you tried to justify your statement. “Me and Arthur used to share a bed all the time!”

The look on his face as your eyes met with his across the room was one you’d so desperately been seeking without realising it. His head cocked, eyebrows raised and small smirk tugging its way onto his lips provided reassurance, giving you the confidence to confirm that this relationship was very different to your one with Arthur. You already knew it, you had felt it every time you’d looked at him since you were about 16, but this was the first time you could say with certainty that it was reciprocated.

Charles was dying to climb into bed with you. To wrap his arms around you and stay like it all night. He didn’t care about the fact that your hair would be in his face or that his arm would most likely be dead within the first half an hour. He just wanted you there with him, so he could learn things about you that he didn’t already know and fall asleep with the scent of your faded perfume beneath his nose. He suggested that he’d sleep on the sofa because he knew that wasn’t what you were implying.

“I’ll stay on my side,” you offered. “Promise.”

That’s what he was afraid of. Charles was a respectful man, he wouldn’t cross boundaries without permission, but he wasn’t sure how much longer he could go without your touch. The thought of your body lying so tantalisingly close to his while dressed in nothing but your underwear and one of his shirts was driving him crazy.

“I’m a very good sleeper, you won’t even know I’m there.”

You couldn’t stop listing reasons for Charles to join you. He wished you would stop; his head was already full of so many.

“Well go and get comfy and I’ll join you in a minute,” In that moment he made the decision to give in knowing that if this was the only chance he got to lay in bed with you he'd take the opportunity, whether your bodies were intertwined or not. “Do you need a drink or anything?”

“A water would be great!” You smiled as you turned around and headed to the bedroom. Charles spent the next few minutes alone in the kitchen trying to convince himself that this was a bad idea. That it was wrong. You were his brother’s best friend and he shouldn't be this nervous or excited to lay next to you, but no matter how hard he tried to dislike the situation he couldn’t because it just felt right.

By the time he joined you in bed you’d already made yourself incredibly comfortable. He chuckled at the site of you tangled in the duvet before climbing in next to you. You laid facing each other and remained that way as you chatted about memories from the past. Childhood holidays and his earliest racing days to you latest life plans and hopes for the future. That's how you drifted to sleep, listening to his voice was more comforting than you'd like to admit. When you awoke in the morning you were unsure what terrified you more, the feeling of one of you completely reducing the few centimetres of space left between you or never knowing what Charles’ touch felt like.

*****

Maybe that’s why you were so unimpressed when Charles and Pierre joined the several of you seated around the long table on the patio with two unknown girls. The number of cocktails you’d consumed weren’t providing you with a great amount of rationality but then again it was difficult to justify being annoyed when you had no reason to be in the soberest of situations. The only person to blame was yourself, you’d had the chance to experience a night with Charles and a combination of your stubbornness, maturity and (let’s face it) fear of what could happen had meant that you’d missed out.

It was only as she threw her head back at one of his comments that it hit you, you were jealous. It was a feeling you hadn’t felt in years. Ever since your last relationship you had lacked almost every kind of emotion. You’d dated people since but that connection was never really there which is why you were full of confusion at the situation presenting itself to you. The feelings felt foreign to your body and you weren’t sure how to deal with them, so you did the one think that you were too young to do back then. Get drunk and try to forget about them for a night.

"Are you listening? Drink up, we're leaving in a second!" Arthurs voice provided a distraction from your thoughts whilst encouraging them. You tilted your head back as you finished the remainder of your champagne, your arm was already reaching out for the nearest bottle to see if you could sneak in a quick refill. You didn’t even like champagne but after having run out of cocktails about an hour ago you didn’t really have much choice. In any other situation you would’ve declined and waited until you were at the club but you weren’t really in the mood to sober up right now. You got up to follow everyone to the taxis, deciding that the bottle had too much in to be left at the table to waste, but not enough in that you couldn't finish it before you reached you destination. Putting the bottle to your lips this time, you took another gulp.

He noticed. He noticed the vast amount of alcohol you had consumed thus far. The unbothered façade you'd displayed during dinner was picked up by him the second he’d glanced in your direction. Your eyes often met his across rooms, at events, in the paddock, even at family dinners and it was always followed by a shared smile, but tonight you hadn't even looked at him and he couldn't stand it. Although he couldn’t be certain, he had a good idea what the cause was. Guilt was slowly consuming his thoughts. He shouldn’t have felt guilty, there was no real reason to, yet he did.

He knew if he had come alone you would've had a couple of drinks with dinner, just enough to prepare yourself for the club afterwards, allowing the sweaty people and sticky floor to become slightly bearable. He also knew that you weren't a huge drinker and that the lack of food you had consumed at dinner would only worsen the matter which was evident as he watched you fall into a taxi with Arthur and Carla as he climbed into a separate one with Pierre and, what they appeared to be to everyone else, their ‘dates’.

The club was busy, everyone excited to be back on the dance floor after its absence over the past year or two. Although it would've been nice to spend some more time with him, you were thankful that the crowds had engulfed you so you'd lose sight of Charles and her. You'd found your way to the middle of the dance floor and you remained there for hours losing track of time and somehow your friends too.

Unbeknown to you, Charles had lost his 'date' at the first chance he had. He'd met her on a boat during the day with Pierre and when his best friend had invited her best friend for dinner he felt bad for not doing the same. He was sitting at the bar with Pierre who'd picked up on the amount of attention he was paying you as you danced along with random strangers. The Frenchman questioned what he was doing when he noticed Charles tighten his jaw. Charles nodded his head in your direction and the pair watched as a man approached you.

The guy in front of you was only offering to buy you a drink but you knew you were way over your limit. You'd politely declined, naively assuming that he'd disappear back into the sea of faces but that wasn't the case. Your refusal clearly not accepted as he insisted. grabbing onto your arm in an attempt to pull you in the direction of the bar. Yanking your arm out of his grip you instantly managed to sober up as you came to the realisation you were going to have to fight this battle alone.

Charles knew you were a big girl, that you could handle yourself in almost any situation thrown your way, but as the guy reached out to touch you he could've sworn he moved quicker than his Ferrari. His presence shocked you as you flinched slightly at the unfamiliar grip on your waist.

"It's just me ma belle." Charles whispered calmly into your ear, placing a feather light kiss onto your cheek. Relief instantly washed over your body. You wished you could focus on the conversation that Charles was now having with the strange man in front of you but you couldn't. The only thing you could focus on was the feeling of your skin heating beneath Charles' fingertips and the tingling sensation that lingered where he'd planted the kiss. He'd never touched you before, the brief hugs being the most contact you'd ever shared, and now he was standing in a club with his hand around your waist as he fended off a random guy who'd taken an interest in you. "I think we should head home." When Charles spoke it felt as though each word was coated in sex as it left his lips. He hadn't meant it in a sexy way, you knew that. He wanted to take you home so you were safe. However his intense grip on your waist and his stubble lightly grazing your cheek when he leaned in to speak to you was putting thoughts into your mind that you knew shouldn't be there.

You looked up at him, your eyes locking for the first time that night. Your eyes always showed a lot of emotion. Your body language was often hard to read but you always made eye contact when you spoke. He frequently used it to determine what mood you were in but this time he was met with one he'd never seen before. Despite them having a drunken glaze, your dilated pupils held a look of lust. He could've sworn you were mentally undressing him. You weren't. Instead you were thinking of how much you wanted him to undress you.

"I think that's a good idea." He could hear the smirk in your voice over the sound of the music as you let your lips gently brush his ear lobe while you spoke. He shut his eyes tightly and took a deep breath in an attempt to pull himself together. You were disappointed when his hand left your side but satisfied when it quickly intertwined itself with yours. His skin was softer than you were expecting, the rough patches slowly disappearing over the summer break. Your hands remained that way as you walked through the streets of Mykonos. Neither of you spoke, you just remained in a comfortable silence. As the villa came into view Charles was basically marching down the street, his strides increasing as your little legs tried to keep up. He dropped your hand when he reached the door, searching his pockets for the key to unlock it.

The villa was colder than you were expecting, a shiver ran down your spine as the air con hit you. You headed towards the kitchen and grabbed your sweater off one of the bar stools, sliding it on over your outfit.

“So you’d let Carla drive your car huh?” his face instantly broke out in a smile as you relieved some of the tension between you both. “You know that’s not true.” Charles followed you to the kitchen and watched as you perched yourself on the edge of the counter. He poured a glass of water and took a sip before handing it to you which you gratefully accepted.

“You’d let your date drive it instead?” He rolled his eyes as he chuckled at your sarcasm, hoping that you’d forgotten about the girl he’d sat next to during dinner as quickly as he had. “How many girls get a turn before me?” Although he didn't let it show, your question had offended him slightly. Despite his popularity with women he was never one to disrespect them, especially not you. He took a step closer to you, standing directly in front of your legs that were pressed firmly together.

“You’re the only one I want to see in that seat mon Cherie,” That was one nickname that he’d never called you, yet it rolled off his tongue so effortlessly. He leaned against your legs and you slowly parted them so he could stand in between, closing the distance between you both. “I’d let you drive it again in a heartbeat.” Your eyes were fluttering between his eyes and lips, your stare only breaking when he leaned in to speak in your ear just like he’d done in the club. He placed a kiss on your cheekbone and slowly worked his way up to your ear.

“You looked very sexy behind the wheel of my car.” You locked your hands with his while he continued to speak, closing your eyes in a desperate attempt to try and calm your heart rate down. You wanted to say something back, engage more in the conversation, but for the first time in a long time you were at a loss for words. You loved driving, you'd often join the boys go karting growing up and learned to drive as soon as you could, so when Charles asked if you wanted to drive his Ferrari back to your home after your Harrods shopping trip you were more than excited. It was a nice change from the train ride you were expecting.

He'd watched your eyes light up when you realised he was being serious. It was the closest you'd ever been to driving something even remotely similar to an f1 car despite it being different in so many ways. Your smile was infectious as you put your foot down on the motorway, leaving London behind. You'd never even driven an automatic car so this was a completely new experience. He'd taught you how to use the paddles to manually change gears if you wanted to and how to shift through its different modes as you drove around. The only disappointing part of the journey was reaching your destination, your trip home considerably quicker than you would've wanted. After spending the whole time focused on going fast and not crashing, you'd selfishly not noticed how Charles was feeling throughout the drive.

He'd been trying to keep his eyes trained on the road in front of him but couldn't help steal a glance in your direction every now and then. He was always surrounded by fast cars, something he realised after seeing you sat in his driving seat he'd begun to take for granted. He felt overwhelmed with pride, he was the one who was making you this happy. He felt privileged seeing you this free as your hair flew around in the wind while you rested a hand out the side of the car, trying to resist the force of the air pushing it back. It was his turn to be selfish as he realised that he always wanted to keep that moment for himself. He didn't want anyone else to make you feel like this, give you this experience. He wanted to be the one to make you smile.

“Don’t go quiet now mon Cherie.” That nickname. Again. “I think we still need to discuss what happened in the shower.” You instantly snapped back into reality at the mention of the shower. His hand fell from yours and toyed with the bracelet on your wrist. The one that you nervously played with in situations like these. The one that he’d gifted you last year. The one with his name etched into it.

The morning that you'd woke up in Charles' bed you were alone. An empty bed was something you'd become accustomed to over the past couple of years but in this instance it made you awaken quicker. The note left on his pillow stopped you from worrying, he was out on a run.

You respected his commitment to his career and took the opportunity to go for a shower. The warm water felt refreshing against your skin, goose bumps slowly appearing across your skin at the sudden change in temperature. Rubbing Charles shower gel into your skin you closed eyes and lent your head against the tiled shower wall. It wasn't clear at what point you'd become so aroused, but the steam from the shower and the smell of Charles covering you definitely had something to do with it. You allowed your hands to roam your body, his name unexpectedly falling from your mouth as you brushed past your breasts. The careless use of his name had caused your eyes to widen and your hand to clamp over your mouth. It had left you lips so naturally but felt inappropriate to say aloud.

It wasn't until a few days later that you realised he'd heard. He almost hadn’t. If he’d unlocked the apartment a mere three seconds later your words wouldn’t have reached his ears. His run had been sweaty and he was still out of breath but his panting soon stopped. His eyes widened as he heard his name leave your lips and he froze. He didn’t want to announce his presence, he knew he wasn’t supposed to hear it and didn’t want you to feel embarrassed that he had. He didn’t know what to do. He felt as though he was invading your privacy but knew that if he shut the door you’d hear it close and know he was there. So instead he stuck his foot between the door and the doorframe to keep it slightly open as he waited for the sound of the shower to finish running. He tried to focus on something else, anything else, but he failed. All he could think about was you, in his shower, without him and how badly he wanted to join you, just so he could make his name fall from your mouth the way it just did over and over again.

You thought you'd gotten away with it. He'd entered the apartment just as you were stepping out the bathroom and he'd acted as cool as ever. The weekend was slowly becoming a distant memory that you were trying hard not to dwell on, hating that you were missing his presence so much already. It wasn't until you were at work the following week that it became apparent your secret crush was no longer a secret. You were in the office early, earlier than everyone else. That wasn’t unusual, you liked to be in early as it often meant you could leave earlier too. What was unusual was the box placed neatly on your desk.

Although the small parcel was addressed to you, you opened it with hesitation. A small gasp left your lips as your unwrapping revealed a red box, the golden engraving of the word ‘Cartier’ on top. Confused, you gently opened to box revealing a bracelet.

You placed it on your desk as you searched for a note. Despite it being awfully obvious who it was from, you wanted some kind of confirmation or, better yet, a reason as to why someone had put this into your possession. You'd spotted it in Harrods with Charles. You hadn't mentioned it, just spent a few minutes mindlessly staring at its beauty. There was no point even considering buying it for yourself, the price tag was close to your yearly salary. Eventually you found the note.

'I've heard you like to moan it'

You picked up the bracelet once more, analysing it as you did so. It was so discreet, discreet enough that if the note wasn’t a big enough hint you might never have realised. His name. Etched into the inside of the band in the same font as the word ‘Cartier'. Any other name and he wouldn’t have been able to get away with it. No one had picked up on its personalisation in the past year. It had remained your little secret.

You gulped loudly, unsure of what to say next. The dull lighting hid your cheeks as they flushed red with embarrassment, just like they'd done when you'd read his note. Luckily it was situations like these you considered your stubbornness a strength. "All I could thing about was how much I wanted you to touch me Charles." With your lips dangerously close to Charles' ear you'd somehow managed to complete your sentence with confidence. The conviction in your voice had satisfied Charles although it was obvious that he hadn't expected it as he pulled his head back slightly to look you in the eyes. It was the first time you'd seen them so dark out of his crash helmet. They didn't have the same teasing smile paired with them as they did only a few moments ago. For a brief moment your heart dropped. What if he was just teasing you and you'd taken it too far?

"Say something." Your voice was barely audible despite the eerie silence that had settled in the kitchen as Charles picked up on your nervousness. His expression softened but he remained silent, placing his forehead against yours and gently brushing your noses. You both very quickly realised there was no longer the need for words. The last thing either of you wanted to do right now was have a conversation about what was going on because quite honestly neither of you were sure. All you knew was that as soon as the space between your lips closed, there was no going back. You were craving each other's touch and it was as though the kiss you were yet to share would be the seal of approval you both needed to explore each other in a way you hadn't before.

You'd had enough of the teasing, enough of the wondering and what ifs, enough of wasting time without knowing how his lips felt against yours. You moved your head up slightly brushing your lips with his before releasing one of your hands from his grasp and placing it on the back of his head, pulling it down slightly. As soon as your lips pressed against his you became overwhelmed with emotions. You relaxed into it, it felt so right. His hands began to explore your body, one placed on your thigh and the other tracing lines up and down your back, sitting on the counter top had worked in your favour as you wrapped your legs around his waist. It wasn't long before his tongue found yours as you let your hands snake beneath his shirt feeling his back and arms tense beneath you as he lifted you up from the side and placed you on the dining table which was at a slighter lower level.

His mouth left yours and you let out a small groan of frustration, he smiled at the sound as you realised he was only doing it to strip you of the sweater you'd not long ago put on, allowing him to rid you of it, not caring how cold it was anymore. In between the kisses he was placing down your neck you pulled his top over his head. Your eyes were trained to his shoulders as you admired him, only shutting when he re-joined your lips.

The sound of a key turning the lock at the front door caught Charles' attention. There was a high chance he'd consumed less alcohol than you tonight which is why he giggled slightly when you chose to ignore the sound and bring him back in for another kiss.

“WE’RE HOME” Arthur voice echoed round the villa. The sound of his brothers voice was enough for you to release him from your grip.

“Shhhhhhhhhhh, it’s 3am people will be sleeping.” Carla tried to whisper but the tiled walls carried the sound throughout the villa. You didn’t know if anyone else was home, you hadn’t checked and to be honest you hadn’t even thought about it. The only thing on your mind was Charles.

“Y/N and I are in the kitchen,” Charles called back. His eyes never left yours as he grabbed his shirt you'd thrown across the kitchen and redressed himself, not until Arthur stumbled through the door way knocking into chairs and making them squeal as the legs glided across the floor. You both watched as he regained balance and muttered a drunken apology before sitting himself on the floor.

"Good night Arthur?" you laughed slightly at the sight of him on the floor, he'd never been the most elegant drunk but at least he was entertaining.

"Great night." He confirmed as he laid himself down, a laugh leaving Carla's lips as she stared at the state of him. If someone had spoken to you a couple of hours ago you would've probably had a different opinion but as it turned out, you were starting to agree with him.

TAGLIST

@imthebadguyyy @abysshaven @phatyak

#f1 imagine #f1 masterlist #charles leclerc #charles leclerc imagine #charles leclerc one shot #daniel ricciardo #max verstappen #pierre gasly #lando norris #george russell #lewis hamilton #valteri bottas #carlos sainz

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florencwrites · 3 years

Text

ignoring is bliss 〚technoblade〛

in which [reader] struggles with her lover's inconsequent affection, and a good talk is unfortunately inevitable; the silent treatment has never worked well with techno.

"I don't know what you want me to say." His back had still been turned towards me at this point, the rake heavy in my hands as I tried using it to steady myself in the muddy stable. He kept loading dirty plucks of hay onto his pitchfork, the thinly lined buttoned shirt he was wearing easily letting his back muscles shine through.

I stood silently behind him, deliberating my words thoroughly. I hated when he acted like this, I absolutely despised him. He was one of the smartest men I'd ever had the pleasure of meeting, however, the second things went sideways conversation-wise he always played it painfully personally. He would start correcting my grammar or suggest synonyms for otherwise satisfactory sentences. "I don't either."

"I guess that marks the end of this conversation." He turned around to dump his gathered muck in the makeshift wheelbarrow Phil had built us. His face was hard, his brows furrowed and his features lax. He seemed indifferent, his attitude scaring me to pieces.

"Tech, please." I tried, putting one of my hands up to gesture for him to stop walking. He was now barely lifting the barrow from the ground, ready to head off to the dump. He huffed, his eyes meeting the floor as he put the wagon down. "You know I hate it when you call me that."

"I'm sorry," I muttered softly.

He ducked to grip his hands around the handles again, lifting it from the ground. His knuckles were white where they held onto the leather-covered grips. "Speak up."

"I want to have a conversation with you, okay? Stop acting so fucking stuck up and talk to me." His shoulder brushed past mine as he exited the stables, my voice was high in emotions, definitely on the verge of breaking with desperation.

He snorted. "I'll listen to whatever you have to say when you've calmed down."

"He won't talk to me, Phil." I groaned almost obnoxiously loud, taking a sip of water to wash down both my dinner and my agitation. "You know how he gets."

"All pissy? Tell me about it." He chuckled softly, his forearm shielding his bowl from my sight. He shoveled another spoonful of beef stew into his mouth. Phil and I had never been extraordinarily close, he reckoned Techno and me to be undeserving of each other. A terrible pair. And perhaps we were, at times like this I couldn't help but doubt whether or not we truly were the destined lovers we often thought ourselves to be. "I'll bring him some food later."

I laughed at him, a father at heart. A father to anyone but his actual sons, really. A playful grin on my lips, "You're an enabler, Phil."

That night I crawled into an empty bed. One I hadn't even doubted would be just that; empty. He was weak like that, he'd do anything to avoid conflict. Whether that was because he was afraid of what his blinding rage fits would conjure, or whether he was just an impotent coward. Someone who didn't know how to act around uncertainty and immorality and thus resorted to blaming everything on his treacherous temper.

The sheets still smelled of him, I held them to my nose.

There was no reason for us to fight, I hadn't meant to start one. I simply wanted him to realize how different he acted towards me when surrounded by any crowd. He acted so distant it made me doubt not only us, but myself. My heart ached anytime he pulled his hand away from where I tried leaving him a subtle touch. My skin crawled when he no longer referred to me by the mild, but unmissably warm names he had for me.

However, nothing would ever hurt me as much as meeting his eyes in a room of our friends and seeing the love seep from his irises. Physically witnessing his affection turn into nothing short of mere acquaintance.

Everyone knew us. There was no reason for him to act so cold, so distant. Though, I also recognized that perhaps there was an underlying reason. One I simply hadn't thought of, or perhaps one that I couldn't ever imagine. One that he had retained from his troublesome past.

The thing is, it hurt me to think he didn't trust me enough with his reasoning. That he didn't want to tell me about his thoughts. I'd been extremely careful and meticulous with any information he'd granted me, I was sure to never let what he told me change my opinion of him. I vowed to never look at him any different.

So, why could he not promise me the same?

There was no point in pushing myself from my sheets the next morning. I knew how long his episodes usually lasted, I wouldn't even have to try talking to him for at least two more days. Normally, I'd try, though. I'd sit in the grass right next to where he was working outside, just talking to him about anything and everything I could think of. Back then I thought for his silence to mean confusion, I thought his swirling mind simply needed a break. That a distraction would do him good.

I sat in the barely-molten grass for hours, never getting a reply.

His smell was constricting my airways slowly, every inhale making it harder and harder to breathe. What if Phil was right, what if he truly didn't love me, or not anymore at least? What if it was all an act to have a warm body to fall asleep next to, to have an extra set of hands around the cottage.

I kicked at the sheets, desperate to get them away from me, to get them from clinging to my sweaty body. I only tangled my legs further into the mess. The bed creaked loudly against the wooden floor of the attic, a gust of wind running through a small gap in the roof.

I shot up, finally being able to rid my body of the sheets. I huffed a few times, the annoyance getting the better of me. I slung my legs over the side of the bed, now just sitting on the wooden frame, letting my eyes wander over the walls. The pictures of us that were tightly tacked to the planks, photos of our favorite pets and our best of friends. Photos of us with Phil and Tommy, and even a stray photo of me and Wilbur, back when we were kids.

My gaze found its way towards the singular window behind our bed, the only one of two walls that weren't entirely slanted. His red robe stood out like a sore thumb in the feeble blanket of slushy snow that had been slowly accumulating over the course of the night. Summer was officially over once again, and the cold would soon make it so we could no longer afford to sleep alone.

He rarely wore his robe outside of special occasions, he usually would simply opt for one of his brown ones. One was trimmed with a thick deer fur, the leather on it sure to keep all frost out. The other one was his summer one, the more dirty one of the two. It was always stained with blood, since it would also be the one he went hunting with. He disliked hunting in the winter, the harsh winds and easily discernible prints made it no fun, according to him. He stacked up during the summer, drying his meats to allow them to be kept safe for months, if not years.

But now he was wearing his red robe, lined with the finest of polar bear fur. The one that had the special compartments for his potions, and the one I had sown a totem into. For good luck. He rarely wore it for any occasion but war.

He pushed himself from the ground, turning around swiftly; the velocity making his cape whisk dramatically up in the wind. His eyes seemed fixated on the ground until they unwarrantedly shot up to the window I was sitting at. Any other day, I would've averted my gaze. Not now. He knew I was staring, and he was allowed to know so. I held my eyes on him until his feet carried him out of sight, into the house. I sighed softly, I felt entirely forlorn without him, without his caring hands and loving eyes. I let myself fall back into the bed, cuddling the sheets once again as I curled away from the entrance. I reckoned he would have to change out of his robe soon, and I didn't want to face him when he did.

I heard the front door slam, and as predicted the rungs of the many ladders soon creaked in his hold. The worn, practically ancient, trapdoor was pushed ajar behind me. I couldn't be bothered to turn to meet his eyes. However, instead of quietly changing out of his clothes, I felt the bed dip. He sat on the side of it, much alike to how I had found myself just minutes before.

"I don't like feeling weak." His voice was rougher than usual, it kept its usual monotone aura, but for some reason, it felt more emotional than ever before. He cleared his throat as if to try and mask it, to no avail, "I don't love you any less."

I shifted in the bed, though, he quickly stopped me, "Don't look at me, that just makes it harder."

I obliged. He let out a trembling sigh, taking his sweet time to deliberate his next words, "Sometimes we are outside together and I'm afraid that when they see how much I care about you, they will realize that you make me weak." I stared at the wall, still curled into the blankets. I wanted nothing more than to hold his face, look at him as he spoke. Instead, I had to make do with the pictures of his face plastered on the wood. His pointy, flappy ears and peaked nose. The two sharp-looking fangs set in the corners of his lips, ones that seemed to disappear when he smiled. He didn't like smiling for pictures, I didn't have a single one of the two of us together where he smiled. The only ones that showed his beautiful pearly whites were the ones that had me behind the camera, something I only then realized might've not been a coincidence.

"It scares me to think they could hurt you for loving me, that's why I don't like holding your hand in town." I shot a quick look over my shoulder, his back was slouched over, his head in his hands with his elbows propped on his knees. He wasn't crying, he simply seemed lost."I never realized that what scares me even more is the idea of you not loving me at all."

I slowly crept from under the sheets as his words fell silent. I crawled over towards where he was sat, near the foot-end of the bed. I took one of his hands from where he had rested his face on it and pulled it out of the way.

I snaked my arms around his neck, pulling my body into his. I draped my legs over his lap as I held him. His built arms felt tender against my exposed back, however, he held me tight. He squeezed softly as another quivering breath escaped his lips. We sat in embrace for a while.

"That's all I asked for, Tech." I smiled into his neck. "I just wanted to talk, that wasn't so hard, now, was it?"

"Shut up." He playfully tried pushing me away from his torso, underestimating the power of my cling. "You know I hate it when you call me that."

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angelsdevils · 3 years

Text

Murasakibara x Reader

Title: Man Child Fluff No Warning

You had a bag of snacks, when you were walking out of the grocery store. You had long ran out because of the excessive studying and late night snacks. So you obviously had to buy more not only for midnight snacks but for lunches as well. You had no idea though, that carrying a bag of snacks would have made you a target for a certain purple haired giant. You didn’t think anything of it at first, but then started to walk beside you. You could feel his stare on you, or maybe your snacks. You couldn’t tell but it scared you.

“Can I help you?”

“Can I have a snack?”

“Excuse me?”

“I am hungry,” You blinked slightly as he tried to reach for a snack, and you quickly jerked the bags away from him.

“No, I don’t know you. Quit following me, it’s weird.”

“But~”

“No, quit following me,” He began to pout like he was a child and kept following you. You were getting slightly creeped out, on a normal day you would have thought he was cute. Not today, considering he was literally following you.You did the only thing you could think of and called your best friend.

“Hello?”

“Uh, Kagami. Where are you?”

“At the park playing basketball…”

“Which park?”

“The one near my house, why? Is everything okay?”

“No, a giant guy is following me. I am getting really scared.”

“Is he by you now?”

“Yes, and he won’t stop staring at me!”

“Giant guy?”

“Yes…” Suddenly the phone was taken away and you recognized the voice.

“Does he have purple hair?”

“Oh hey Tatsuya… yes”

“Are you by chance carrying snacks?”

“Uh, yeah?”

“It’s Murasakibara, he is harmless. He is part of my team, just give him one snack, I will pay you back.”

“O….kay….” You dug in your back and handed him a bag of chips and he perked up taking them.

“Thank you!” You stared at him weirdly.

“Am I safe?” You asked into the phone.

“Yeah, come to the court and drag him with you if you can.”

“I don’t think I have to worry, he is still following me.”

“Thanks.” He hung up and you looked up at the tall giant.

“You know Muro-chin?”

“Uh, yes. He is a close friend of mine, from back in LA.”

“Oh… I am Murasakibara Atsushi… What is your name?”

“(L/N) (Y/N)...”

“(L/N)-chin...thank you for the snacks…”

“Sure…” It fell quiet and he continued to follow you, you did feel a bit more comfortable around the giant.

“(L/N)-chin, let’s hang out today.”

“Eh? Why?” You looked up at him but he wasn’t even looking at you. You were confused but he didn’t say anything else.

“Anyway, I can’t. Tatsuya told me to bring you to the basketball court, he is going to pay me for the snacks I gave yo~hey,” he had stolen more snacks from your bag after he finished his chips causing you to groan.

“Spend time with me.” He munched on the pocky he stole.

“I just told you I can’t.”

“But, I want to spend time with you.”

“Why? You don’t know me.”

“We can get to know each other.” He was pouting again,and you couldn’t help but roll your eyes.

“What are you a child?’

“No…” He said and you groaned.

“Anyway, here we are… Tatsuya! Taiga!” Taiga came up to you and picked you up and spun you around causing you to laugh.

“Hey there…”

“It’s been awhile,” he set you down and smiled. You didn’t notice but Murasakibara had his cheeks puffed out as you were now focused on your friend.

“It has, I missed you and Tatsuya.”

“Missed you too (Y/N), how much do I owe you?” He asked and you looked at him before waving it off.

“I will let it accumulate so you don’t have to pay me right now.” He cracked a smile and shook his head.

“Well here is your man child, I am going home. I have to clean and study.”

“Can we come over later?” Taiga asked and you thought for a moment.

“I can’t, maybe next time.” Tatsuya said.

“Alright, well you can Taiga…”

“What about me?” You ignored the giant’s question and waved.

“See ya later Taiga…” You left and Murasakibara watched you leave with a small pout. He began to follow you and Tatsuya and Taiga sweat dropped.

“Where are you going?”

“I am going with her…”

“What no you aren’t, stay.” You narrowed your eyes at him shaking your head sighing before leaving. He stayed pouting more, before following you from afar. Taiga and Tatsuya stared blankly at him as he continued to follow you which you didn’t notice.

“He likes her.” Tatsuya said and Taiga shook his head.

“She has no idea…”

“She never does.” Murasakibara stayed far behind so you wouldn’t notice him. He felt like a lost puppy, just wanting attention from his human best friend. When you arrived at your house, you unlocked the door and went in closing the door behind you. You sighed softly and set the bags on the table.

“He is seriously like a puppy, cute but ugh…” You mumbled as you put everything away. Not even ten minutes later you heard the doorbell.

“Taiga is early… wait… don’t tell me…” You walked to the door and looked out the peek whole, to see none other than the purple hair giant.You groaned and opened the door, and stared at him.

“I told you to stay.”

“But, I wanted to be with you…”

“What the heck? You barely know me, why are you following me around like a puppy or a child?” He shrugged slightly looking down, he wanted your attention to become closer to you.

“Can I come in?”

“No…”

“Please?”

“Go back to Taiga and Tatsuya, or go home.”

“I live too far away, and I want to stay.”

“Why are you so stubborn?” He shrugged and you crossed your arms.

“Go. Away.” You closed the door in his face, and locked it. You went back to the kitchen, but suddenly the power went out and it began to storm. You squealed out when the power went out, then you heard knocking on your door.

“(L/N)-chin? Can I come in? It’s storming and cold out…” You saw lightning and jumped slightly.

You quickly opened the door to see him with wet hair and his cheeks puffed out. You quickly pulled him in, and locked the door. You jumped again at the sound of the thunder. You crouched in front of the door holding your ears.

You really hated storms, they scared you. Murasakibara blinked and stared down at you before picking you up and carrying you to the living room.

“P-Put me down,” You stumbled but he sat on the couch and wrapped his arms around your waist securing you to his chest. You blushed slightly and he placed his chin on your head.Despite getting off the wrong foot, you had to admit you felt safe around the giant.

“(L/N)-chin, it’s good I followed you…”

“I guess, still weird.” Your phone began to ring and he grabbed it easily with his long arms before handing it to you.

“H-Hello.”

“Do you need me to come over?”

“I can’t ask you that, this storm is terrible.”

“I don’t mind…”

“I will be fine Taiga, I have a giant here with me.”

“His name is Murasakibara… is he willing to stay the entire time?”

“Uh…” You glanced at him and he took the phone.

“Yes…”

“Oh Murasakibara, hmm okay… thanks.” He handed you your phone back and Murasakibara wrapped his arms tightly around your waist holding you close.

“I will call you later…” Taiga said and you smiled.

“Alright bye.” You hung up and placed the phone on the couch. You leaned into Murasakibara, and slowly began to fall asleep. Typically you wouldn’t have since you didn’t know him, but Taiga and Tatsuya both knew him, and you trusted them both.

“I am hungry…” Okay you did not trust him around your food.

“Sorry, I can’t cook, the power is out. Everything is electric, including my stove…”

“Snacks?”

“....” You sighed before getting up but he didn’t let you go, instead he picked you up and walked to the kitchen.

“I can walk.”

“I like carrying you.”

“Why?”

“You ask a lot of questions.”

“You eat a lot.”

“Fair point… I like (L/N)-chin, so I want to make sure you are okay.”

“How can you like me when we barely know each other?” He shrugged slightly, since you both were in the dark your eyes had adjusted. You could tell he was staring at you then the snacks contemplating if he can carry you and the snacks.

“Put me down doofus.”

“But…”

“Put me down.” He set you down and grabbed the snacks and you grabbed a bag of (favorite chips). You grabbed your phone and made your way to your room, with Murasakibara following behind you. You laid on your bed, and he did the same, placing his head on your lap. You looked at him confused but he ignored it and continued munching on his chips.

“(Y/N)-chin, you are really pretty,” he said, staring at your face. Heat radiated off of your face, and for once you were glad it was dark.

“Uh, thanks…” You heard him set his snacks down and adjusted himself. He then buried his face into your stomach. Your hand began to run through his purple hair and he sighed softly. You set the chips down and stared at the wall, when he wasn’t being weird he was actually pretty sweet. He was actually really cute as well. You felt him stir and you glanced at him, he got in front of your face and placed a small kiss to your lips. You gasped and froze and he placed his hand behind your head so you wouldn’t move away. After a few minutes he pulled away and nuzzled his face into your shoulder.

“W-What was that for?”

“I like you.”

“You can’t like me, we literally just met…”

“Mm so I should wait to date (Y/N)-chin then?” “Yes, wait I didn’t agree to date you.”

“(Y/N)-chin just said yes though.”

“I-” He went back to eating and you sighed softly.

“Fine, but we have to actually get to know each other first.”

“Okay…”

#atushi murasakibara #murasakibara x reader #murasakibara #murasakibara atsushi #fluff #kuroko no basket #Kuroko's Basketball #kuroko no basquet

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noteguk · 3 years

Note

i was wondering how bad influence! jk and oc started interacting? like what made them start talking

[ ! ] this dabble is a prequel to “bad influence”

— words; 1.6k

Your professor was looking at you with expectation, the small piece of paper hanging between his fingers like the sword of Damocles over your head. You were staring at him in silence for a few seconds now, and the whole situation was starting to get awkward.

“So,” he pressed on, dangling the paper in front of your eyes. On it, the name and phone number of one of your classmates. “What do you say?”

When he asked you to stay after class, you expected it would be something related to tutoring. Your professor had mentioned it in passing a few times before, so it wasn’t exactly a surprise when he told you he had found you someone who really needed your assistance. You were beaming with joy for precisely a minute and twenty one seconds until he revealed the name of your student.

Jeon Jungkook.

Before you had any chance to muster an excuse for why you couldn’t — under any circumstance — get close to someone like that, even less tutor him, your professor already had his card up his sleeve. “It’ll be good for your curriculum.”

And you said yes in a heartbeat.

Jungkook was predictable. You knew that he would be late (after all, his cringy bad boy persona would never allow him to follow one single rule in his life), you just didn’t know it would be almost two-hours-late. By the point that you saw that hurricane in human form walking into the library, you had already finished your homework for the entire week.

He had the nerve to smirk at you, and you swore an oath to yourself that you wouldn’t present him with the irritation he was expecting. And you didn’t — with all the patience and kind-heartedness that your parents had pushed down your throat your entire life, you put on your best commercial smile and greeted him like he was just in time.

“Well, now that you’re here, let’s start with the basics and go over some defense cells.” You tugged the heavy Immunology book towards you, quickly flipping the pages towards the chapter that you had chosen for that first session. Jungkook had already taken his typical slouched position on the chair next to you, looking like he was about to slide down to the carpeted floor. “I’d like to know how familiar you are with it, though. Can you start by telling me about the types of lymphocytes?”

He chuckled, running one hand through his hair. “I have no idea what that shit is.”

You took a deep breath and ignored the irritation that was building up on your stomach. You didn’t know how someone could be so indifferent about everything. “Well... that’s why I’m here,” you managed to keep your voice cheerful.

He raised his eyebrows. “You’re here because you wanna get paid, princess. No need to play the Good Samaritan.”

You thought about telling him that you weren’t getting paid, but the idea wasn’t the best one. He’d probably mock you even more for wasting your Friday afternoon tutoring in the name of your curriculum. Not that he knew the importance of that, anyways.

“This is some bullshit.” Jungkook rested his head on his crossed arms, lying over the table, pushing away your pens and notebooks as he did so. His black hair fell over his features as he grouchily mumbled out, “I don’t even know why I chose this class, it has nothing to do with my major.”

You were surprised that he was even majoring in something, instead of just frequenting the campus as an excuse to meet girls. “Well, I can't answer that for you, can I?” You asked, tapping on his book’s hardcover. That little antibody drawing was staring at you in a silent mockery, wondering if you’d be able to make him study — or even care about anything. “But I can help you with the rest. Now, come on. Types of lymphocytes.”

His eyebrows came down to form a confused frown. Jungkook would’ve probably given you the same reaction if you had just called his mother all the filthy names you could think of. “You’re really trying to teach me?” He asked. “Like, for real?”

You sighed. The time you taught your little cousin how to read was less frustrating than that. “It’s kind of my job as a tutor, you know.”

Jungkook rose from his position and leaned back against the chair, his arms crossing before his chest. Beneath them, his strong pecs stressed against the fabric of his white shirt, but you refused to look. “You know that you can just pretend to teach me, I can pretend to learn, and you’re gonna get your credits anyways, right?” He asked as if you were the stupidest person he had ever met. “You don’t need to actually put in the effort, princess. Especially since I don’t give any fucks about immunology.”

If he called you that stupid pet name one more time, you swore you were going to knock him out. “Well, I’m already here, I’d rather do things right.”

He scoffed, throwing his head back and rolling his eyes. “God, you’re so booooring,” he groaned. “Don't you have some charity work to do or something?”

“I’m doing it right now.” You smiled. “I can see that you’re really trying to fail this class, don’t get me wrong. But I’m just trying to do my job—“

“Boooooring,” he sang, louder than the librarian would ever allow if she was close enough to hear him. Jungkook looked back at you, his eyes narrowed. You couldn’t really tell if he was disgusted or just annoyed. “Why do you even care? It’s just some stupid class, it doesn’t even matter. I’ll tell the professor you taught me everything and we can both go home.”

“I can’t do that,” you said, firm.

“Why not?”

“First of all, because that’s wrong,” you told him. Just as you were about to say that, also, his unavoidable horrible grades would make clear that he hadn’t learned shit (which would make you look like a clown instead of a tutor), his laugh ruptured your sentence.

“Oh, come on. You’re kidding me.” He smiled brightly — not a tender one, of course, but one full of perverse mockery. You had never met someone as condescending as Jungkook, and he was managing to push every single button inside you. “That’s wrong? What are you, six?”

You frowned. “You’re the child here, just trying to find a easy way out instead of putting in the eff—“

“What are your dreams, princess?” He interrupted again, leaning his head to the side. You really, really, really hated him. “Wait, no, let me guess. A family, a suburban house, and a dog? A nine to five? Something like that? Having your husband cheat with the babysitter before you’re forty?”

Some part of you knew that he was just trying to make you so angry that you would give up on tutoring him. Jungkook didn’t know that you wouldn’t throw away your obligations so quickly, but he was able to make you mad enough to get an answer. “What are yours?” you spat, kindness long forgotten. “Remaining unemployed, talentless, mentally trapped in your twenties, and fucking desperate milfs for money until you die from an early overdose?”

If your priest had heard you talk like that, he would most surely faint.

Jungkook, however, didn’t seem so horrified. In fact, his disgusted smile quickly morphed into a diverted one, a chuckle leaving his lips. “Uh,” he mumbled. “Interesting.”

The shame from your previous outburst was starting to weigh down on you, but you managed to keep it undercover. “What?”

“Didn’t know you had a mouth on you,” he said, clearly entertained. In a way, you were glad that he hadn’t taken your words to heart, because he could probably snap you in half if he was feeling like it. “You’re always so shy and shit. I thought you were going to cry.”

“I’m not shy,” you spoke, defensive. You had gotten close to shedding a couple tears, but he didn’t need to know that. You hated confrontation. “I just don’t wanna talk to people like you unless I’m obligated to.”

He raised his eyebrows — a silent threat. “People like me?”

There was a second of hesitation from your part that Jungkook didn’t miss. “Yes.” You couldn’t hold his piercing gaze. As much as Jungkook was annoying the shit out of you, you didn’t actually want to have a full-blown argument with him. Especially on university grounds. “People who can’t even tell me about lymphocytes. Now, are you done with your victimization session? Can we start, or do you wanna tell me more about how you’re burning college money and you are so superior because of it?”

He chuckled and looked you up and down — actually looked at you. Weirdly enough, it felt like the first time that Jungkook was actually seeing you, and not the empty shell of a stereotype that he had built for you in his peanut-sized brain. “You’re really trying here, aren’t you?” He asked.

You didn’t know if he was talking about the tutoring session anymore, but you decided not to bite. “Is that a sin now?” And, before he could say anything else, you added, “Page 124. Come on. Unlike you, I don’t have all day to sit around doing nothing.”

He smirked. “You’re more fun than you look, princess.”

And, for the first time, Jeon Jungkook wasn’t predictable — he actually opened the book on the page you told him to.

One hour later, he was already dozing off, a small puddle of saliva accumulating on top of his chaotic notes. Still, you counted that as a victory.

BAD INFLUENCE COLLECTION

#enemies to fuckbuddies: the fic #jungkook #jungkook fic #bts #drabble #bts drabble #bad influence #bad influence jk #bad boy jk #bad boy jungkook #good girl reader #x you #x reader #jungkook x you #jungkook x reader

1K notes · View notes

islesnucks · 3 years

Text

DON'T MOVE ON - QUINN HUGHES X READER

here is the hughesy angst i promised, i cannot believe i wrote it that quickly

likes and reblogs are always appreciated, hope you like it!

Word count: 2.5 k

Warnings: just a bunch of angst and then fluff

Summary: a month after a huge fight that ended your relationship you find out from Brock that Quinn hasn’t been able to move on too

Masterlist

Add yourself to the taglist!

Today marked a full month since the fight that ended it all. You’d like to say you couldn't remember how it happened, how things got so out of proportion you ended up breaking up, but you did. You still remembered every painful detail.

It had been a long day, those that just drain you physically and emotionally to the point you want to get home and sleep so it's finally over. But you didn’t do that because the canucks were playing that night and you thought maybe watching the game at your boyfriend’s apartment and waiting for him to get back after it ended would make you feel better. You were wrong.

The canucks lost that night, it wasn’t a huge loss, just by one goal, a power play goal made by the other team after Quinn had taken a penalty. He obviously put the blame on himself and when he got home things got worse.

With both of you in bad moods things were meant to get nasty, but you never thought it would have reached the point it did. It started as a small fight but quickly things escalated. You knew you didn’t mean the things you were saying, but you weren’t thinking clearly. Suddenly all the little stuff that bothered you about each other started to accumulate and when he said you didn’t support him enough that was the last straw.

How could he say that when you were standing right in front of him in his apartment after having watched his game and waited for him? Even when all you wanted was to go to sleep and forget that day had even happened.

“I can’t believe you just said that. Seriously Quinn I do so much for you and this is how you pay me?”

“Then maybe if I’m such a bad boyfriend we should break up.” He knew that’s not what he wanted, but anger took over and he wanted to hurt you as much as you had hurt him seconds ago.

“Maybe we should.” you quickly replied and the room went silent. You looked at him, internally begging him to say he didn’t mean it, but nothing happened. The silence was deafening.

“Ok then. It’s over.” you finally said, already gathering your purse and leaving his apartment. Not having enough strength to give him a final look as you shut the door behind you and rushed out of the building.

You didn’t cry as you walked to your car or in the drive home, it was like you were on automatic mode, you just drove to your place in silence without a thought in your head.

But once you were inside your apartment it all dawned on you. Your vision got blurry and you let out a suffocated breath. Your legs stumbled and you fell down on the floor with your back against the wall, unable to take in everything that had happened. It was over.

That happened a month ago. You hadn’t talked to Quinn ever since that night. It had been the hardest month of your life. You didn’t realize he was such a huge part of your life till he wasn’t there at night to hold you as you sleep, making you a cup of tea while you studied, pointing at you in the crowd after a goal, rushing out of the lockers straight to your arms after a game, stroking your hair as you lied on his chest to help you relax after a stressful day. He wasn’t there anymore and you missed him with every bone in your body; but he never reached and you were too afraid to see him only to discover he was doing completely fine without you.

Focusing on your studies and work made it easier, you discovered if you had your head occupied the whole day you didn’t think of him. But nights were the hardest, lying alone in your bed with only your thoughts would make your mind go back to that dreadful night and you’d end up crying yourself to sleep. That empty feeling would turn from sadness to anger and vice versa, but no matter how hard you tried to get over him you couldn’t.

That’s why after weeks of pure silence it surprised you when you received a call from Brock. You debated on whether to answer or not, but figured if he called after all this time it was important.

“Hello?”

“Hey Y/N” he answered. “How are you?” You could tell he was hesitant.

“I’m … good I guess.” you replied followed by a long silence. “Why are you calling Brock?” you finally asked, wanting the exchange to be over.

Brock didn’t know how to phrase it, he knew why he was calling and what needed to be said, but he simply didn’t know how to say it without you immediately ending the call after hearing his name.

“It’s about Quinn- please don’t hang up!” he was quick to add.

“What about Quinn?” you asked. It felt weird to talk about him out loud, something you hadn’t even done with your friends.

“He 's bad Y/N. Really bad. He won’t come out of his apartment, only for practices and games, and then he rushes back home and we don’t see him again. We’re really worried about him, all the team and his friends, even his family. He hasn’t been calling them like he used to and Jack had to basically convince their mom not to take the first plane here to check up on him. Even Brady hasn’t been able to get to him. Plus he’s been shit on the ice lately, taking stupid penalties and getting into fights, he’s one bad game away from getting benched.”

“I get it Brock but I don’t know what you want me to do. It’s not my job to fix him.” you told him. The thought of Quinn suffering alone in his apartment broke your heart but after all he was the one who decided to end things and never reached you after it. You knew it was your pride talking, but he had put himself in this position.

“I know, I know. I’m not asking you to forgive him for whatever it is he did. Honestly we’re kind of out of the loop here because he won’t tell us what happened between you two. But please I’m begging you, talk to him. You don’t have to get back together, but I think he needs some type of closure or something. He can’t keep doing like this Y/N.”

You could tell by his voice he was genuinely worried, and you were sure this is something he had talked about with the rest of the team and friends. You hated to admit it but Quinn still had a place in your heart and right now it ached at the thought of him drifting away from his family and friends and even failing at the job of his dreams when maybe a simple talk could help him. So you decided to push your grudge aside, but not completely.

“I have a box with his things, tell him I’ll go by his place to return them and then we can talk.” you said, thinking that the box of his belongings you had packed some days ago and sited by the door waiting for the moment you were strong enough to give them back to him would be a good enough excuse. That was not the answer Brock expected but he knew it was the best he would get.

“Thank you Y/N. I know this isn’t easy for you, but thank you so much.” You hanged up.

You stood on the hallway in front of his door after knocking, waiting for him to answer. You kept repeating to yourself everything would be fine, that seeing him again after a month wouldn't be as hard as you thought, but the moment the door opened and your eyes connected with his, your heart stopped.

He looked like shit. Tired eyes, heavy dark circles around them, messy hair and you’d bet he had been wearing that old shirt and sweatpants for at least three days. You were also surprised to see that he was shocked you were standing on his doorway.

“Y/N?”

“I told Brock I’d stop by today.” you explained.

“You spoke with Brock?” he asked and then you understood his friend hadn’t informed him of everything.

“Yeah he called me yesterday to talk about … well about you.” you said, unsure if telling him you talked about him was the right thing to do. He nodded, still a bit confused but didn’t say anything. “Can I …” you said, gesturing to the inside of the apartment.

“Oh yeah sure.” He moved to the side to let you in. “Sorry about the mess.”

You walked into the all too familiar apartment where you had spent many days and nights, but now it didn’t feel like home anymore. The curtains were almost shut completely allowing little to no natural light at all inside, there were some clothes on the sofa and dirty dishes piling up in the sink.

“So I’m guessing Brock forgot to tell you I’d stop by to drop this.” you said putting down the box on his coffee table.

“He probably did it on purpose. If I knew he was going to call you I’d have stopped him.” he simply said, like it wouldn’t be a dagger to your heart to hear he didn’t want to see you. Maybe after all he wasn’t doing so bad, or maybe it wasn’t because of you.

“If you didn’t want to see me I can go-” You started to turn around, ready to once again leave his apartment brokenhearted like many days ago, but his hand on your wrist stopped you.

“No! It’s not that I don’t want to, it's just that … it’s hard.”

“Hard?”

“Yeah Y/N, hard. I haven’t seen you for like a month. After that fight you just left and I never saw you again.”

“Well you never reached out Quinn.”

“You didn’t either.”

“Yeah but you were the one that decided to break up. You want me to process my boyfriend breaking up with me and then also call to check up on him?”

His hand was still on your arm, making you stand close to each other, so close that you could tell how his posture changed after hearing what you had said.

“I’m sorry about that, about the break up and about every other stupid thing I said that night. You were the best girlfriend I could have asked for.” he said looking into your eyes. You could tell he was being sincere and that softened something inside of you.

“I also said some stupid stuff I didn’t mean. We were too caught up fighting to actually think what we were saying.”

“I’m sorry.” he almost whispered before letting go of your arm and quickly wrapping his arms around your body.

You were surprised at first but didn’t hesitate to hug him back. By the way you were hugging, with his head low into your neck and your arms around his frame, it looked more like you were consoling him, and in a way that’s what was happening. At one point you noticed he was crying, you couldn’t see him but you felt the warm tears against your skin and the way his chest shook between your arms as he tried to hold it in but failed.

“If I could take it all back I would, I really would.” he mumbled against your neck in between sobs. You started crying too, unable to keep on pretending you were fine anymore, unable to keep on pretending you didn’t care.

“I miss you so much Y/N.”

“You do?” you asked, genuinely surprised to hear him say it.

“Are you kidding me?” He pulled away from you to look you in the face, but your arms stayed on each other. “Look at me, look at my apartment. I’m a mess without you. I miss you every second of the day, there isn’t a moment when I’m not thinking about you Y/N. I mean I’m doing so horribly I’ve got everyone worrying about me: my friends, my family, my team.”

“You never called so I thought you had moved on.”

“I didn’t. I can’t move on from you and even if I could I don’t think I want to”

You looked at the mess of a man standing in front of you, crying in your arms, telling you he regretted everything, he missed you. It was clear to see he had suffered as much as you had for the past month. There was no doubt in your mind you still loved him, you tried to push it away but there it was, strong as ever, beating deep in your heart. So you decided to go for it, let yourself be weak one more time and if it didn’t work out then that’s something you’d have to deal with later; but if it did you knew it would be extraordinary.

“Then don’t.” you said and he looked down at you with furrowed brows. “Don’t move on.”

“Is that what I think it is?” he asked, eyes getting bright with hope at the thought maybe it wasn’t all lost.

“I’m willing to try again if you are. I still love-” you started to say but he cut you off mid sentence moving his hands to your face and your words died in his lips.

It felt familiar, like coming back home after a long trip. Both your eyes were closed, enjoying the kiss, savoring every second of it. Tears started rolling down your faces and you could taste them on each other's lips. Tears of joy because neither of you could believe this was actually happening.

“I love you.” he said once you pulled away to breathe, foreheads touching and lips millimeters away. “I love you, I love you, I love you!” he kept on repeating with the brightest smile on his face. You giggled before connecting your lips once again for another kiss, something you could never get tired of.

This time his hands moved to your sides, lifting you up in his arms as you wrapped your legs around him and let out a surprised squeal between the kisses. He walked over to the couch, threw away the clothes that were there with one hand holding you close to him with the other, to then swiftly lay on it with you on top of him.

“I’m never letting you go again.” he said, placing a kiss on the top of your head as you nestled yourself between his arms with your head on his chest.

“That’s fine by me.” you replied, earning a sweet laugh from him.

tagging those who asked or seemed interested:

@lovingbrock @mellany1997 @timothyjimothy74 @itoldmycatsaboutyou @stlbluesbrat @dermybaby

#quinn hughes #quinn hughes imagine #quinn hughes x reader #quinn hughes imagines #quinn hughes fic #nhl #nhl imagine #nhl fic #nhl fanfic #hockey #hockey fic #hockey imagine #hockey fanfiction #hockey imagines #canucks #canucks imagine #Canucks fic #vancuver canucks #vancuver canucks imagine

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sugarstickery · 3 years

Text

An Allegory Within the Dark

This is an unofficial fan translation of chapter 3 of Jujutsu Kaisen’s first light novel, Departing Summer and Returning Autumn by Gege Akutami and Ballad Kitaguni.

Summary: Mahito stumbles across an unusual human in his search for a place to call ‘home’.

Featured characters: Primarily Mahito, with brief appearances from Hanami and Jogo, along with an unnamed novel-only character

Timeline: An undefined time prior to the events of the Vs. Mahito arc

An Allegory Within the Dark

If you want to hide a tree, you go to the middle of a forest.

So if you’re looking to hide a person, you should go to the middle of a city.

Following that logic, it makes sense for curses worthy of being the true humans to set up their hideout in the city center.

Cursed spirits would actually have it much easier if they spent their time in places crammed with fear where humans and the like can’t live: deep in the mountains or in densely wooded areas, for example.

But for a group of curses plotting to overturn the current era, a base in the heart of the city is crucial for invasion and seeking refuge. That being the case, it’s also better to try aiming for a location with a high concentration of negativity.

Anyway, that’s how some employees from a scam business ended up massacred.

“This really is the simplest way to handle it. All of them nest together up here away from the public eye, so clean-up is a cinch.”

Jogo laughed while trampling the burning remains of a corpse underfoot.

Roughly two minutes ago, there were about six humans in the office.

The curses considered a few ways to handle dispatching them but ultimately decided that burning was the fastest, so Jogo quickly turned them to ash.

“But humans used this building, didn’t they? Won’t it be a problem if there’s property management or something?” Mahito asked, poking at an ostentatious vase displayed on a shelf.

Apparently the concern was unnecessary. Jogo tried to answer with a grin, but a nonsensical language cut into their conversation.

“⏁⊑⟒⟟⍀ ⎎⍜⋏⏁ ⟟⌇ ☊⎍⌇⏁⍜⋔”

“Oi, bastard—! Stop talking, Hanami! It makes my head itch!”

Though Hanami spoke in nothing but meaningless sounds, the intention behind it was somehow transmitted directly into the minds of others. This was usually unpleasant and it irritated Jogo.

When he noticed Mahito still looking his way, Jogo continued to explain despite his frustration.

“Hmph... What? There’s no need to worry. I asked Geto what his aim was, and it looks like these were the kind of underhanded humans who got involved in plenty of unethical things.”

“Hm. So basically, other humans won’t actually come close if they get that curse stuff happens here.”

“Exactly. Any respectable, straight-laced human would never come near this place under normal circumstances. It’s the perfect city-center hideout.”

“Is it really?”

“...What is it, Mahito? You don’t seem satisfied. What’s there to worry about? It would put us in a great position to start preparing our plans for the city, and it’s great for a quick escape if we need one.”

“Mm... No, you’re right, but...”

“But what? Spit it out.”

“It’s just... This room is really tacky.”

“Huh?”

With a pop, a small eruption burst forth from Jogo’s head. His narrowed eye looked like a painting of a gently sloping mountain.

“It’s tasteless, isn’t it? Stuff like that gaudy gold lion in the sparkly jar or this cheap-looking sideboard.”

“What are you even saying?! I have no idea what’s gotten into you lately, but you’ve been so annoying!”

“Movies.”

“Movies? Are those overly-embellished portrayals of humans really that interesting?”

“They’re references for my studies on the structure of a soul,” Mahito replied with an ambiguous smile.

If humans could see him, they might be reminded of a proud elementary schooler discussing the knowledge they gained from a book report.

“If I’m being honest, I don’t find the stories that interesting either, but I don’t hate the sense of visual aesthetics that humans have. That said, this room has too many useless colors and really hurts the eyes.”

“Such bratty, selfish complaints... We can just burn or toss anything that’s an eyesore.”

“No need, I’m going to look for a place to settle down on my own.”

“What? Ah, hey— Where are you going?”

Not waiting for Jogo’s response, Mahito waved over his shoulder and vanished like smoke or a gentle breeze, off to who-knows-where.

“Geez… Maybe it’s because he was born from human fear, but even knowing he’s a curse, he tends to be way too frivolous. Watching movies and all…”

While grumbling out his complaints, Jogo took a pipe from his shirt pocket to put in his mouth.

Unlike human cigarettes, this wooden pipe somehow imitated a screaming face when smoked.

“But that Mahito...”

Jogo spun around to survey the room with his one eye.

“...He says that, but it doesn’t seem tacky to me.”

“⊑⏃⋏⏃⋔⟟”

“I already said shut up!!”

You can only find a hideaway that suits you by looking for it on your own.

Mahito wandered through the city with this in mind. He alternated left and right turns on a whim any time he happened across a traffic light, walked alongside stray cats, or sometimes simply went in the direction of clouds that he liked the shape of.

While traveling along his chosen path like this, he keenly felt just how laughable humans were.

Though the city belongs to them, no one walking in and out of it was more free than Mahito.

Everyone seemed constrained. They were captured by ties of obligation and vanity, living in a wide, deep, big city with such narrow outlooks.

Unaffected by the enormous sky sprawling out endlessly overhead, they box themselves into their concrete city with their own hands and limited perception of souls, passing the time by whittling their lives down further and further.

Mahito even learned the words for some of these human concepts to study later.

For example, they call it “morals”. They call it “common sense”. They call it “emotion”.

But a human soul isn’t anything more than the resulting mechanical movement that comes from external stimuli.

And so they let go of freedom and live tightly controlled lives, fearing the judgmental stares of others, stooping to flattery for society’s approval.

“...What a waste.”

Everyone is bound by ostentatious shackles of their own making.

That’s why these curses know there has to be a change, as far as humans go. Those who cannot do anything but crawl in such an unsightly way under the magnificent sky must hand over the world.

Mahito thinks. He ponders over any topic his soul turns toward. He walks wherever the wind blows him.

Before long, the time had come for the sun to descend in the western sky. He could hear the burbling of a river.

“Not bad.”

The hideaway Mahito found was under a bridge, across the river.

It was a tunnel, vacant and huge like a temple.

Pipes ran along the inside, clear water flowing from them and into the river. It looked like wastewater was drained here after being purified, so there wasn’t much discomfort.

Apart from the humid air and the moss that emitted a peculiar grassy smell, it seemed wide enough to splash and jump around in, and the concrete’s cool texture provided a refreshing welcome.

There’s a season that curses are partial to.

Negative human emotions accumulate from the end of winter to spring, and it could be said that the rainy season served as the so-called peak of their ripening.

The inside of the damp tunnel held the same atmosphere. There was a gloominess there in the dim lighting that could easily nurture fear. It gently moistened Mahito’s skin; he felt cozy.

“Yeah, let’s stay here.”

When choosing a place to live, it’s best to trust your instincts.

Perhaps humans should do the same, but what they can’t readily do, Mahito can decide without hesitation. If he’s free when he wanders, then he’s free when he settles down, too.

Mahito stepped into the tunnel in good spirits, knocking solidly on the concrete floor.

The soul’s metabolism smooths out in comforting spaces. But…

“Huh?”

After walking a short distance, Mahito discovered “that”.

He initially thought it was some garbage or something that a human illegally dumped. But before long, it became clear that it was a sack-like silhouette leaning against a wall.

At first glance, it perhaps looked like a mere collection of rags.

But the shape of a soul was there.

—Ah, it’s alive.

Yes, just as Mahito had realized, it was a human.

The tattered clothing and wildly overgrown hair and beard hid his shape, but it was undoubtedly a human.

His exact age wasn’t clear from his outward appearance, but whether he was 60 or over 80, he looked elderly.

Mahito thought it was a bit of a pain.

There was already a visitor living in his precious hideaway.

Of course, taking care of this issue would be an easy matter for him. But he felt the same discomfort as a homeowner finding a stain on the wall of their new house.

‘Anyway, if I’m gonna deal with this, let’s get it done,’ Mahito thought, reaching out toward the old man with a little sigh.

Whereupon, unexpectedly, the old man spoke.

“...I’m sorry if you’re displeased.”

“Hm?”

“I don’t know what you came here to do, but... I’m sure your mood has soured after stumbling across the home of an old fool. But I have nowhere to go, either.”

Mahito was a little taken aback.

The old man was clearly aware of Mahito and turned toward him to speak. This wouldn’t be surprising at all if he was talking to a fellow human.

But Mahito is a curse.

The eyes of a mere human can’t clearly perceive cursed spirits.

It isn’t impossible, though. If humans are born with cursed energy, it isn’t unusual for them to be aware of the existence of curses.

What caught Mahito’s attention was this old man’s lack of ‘eyes’.

As in, he had no eyes in the physical sense. Instead, in the empty sockets that once held them, there was a burn scar that was painful just to look at.

Even sorcerers rely on their eyes to view the world.

They depend on their field of vision to spot cursed spirits. That’s why so many of them use sunglasses and the like to conceal their line of sight, as it helps them remain unaffected. It also helps them maintain a balanced mind when their daily life overflows with curses.

However, that was not the case for this old man.

“Can you see me?”

When Mahito asked, the old man answered with a gentle nod.

“At the very least, I can feel you.”

“But you can’t see the world?”

“Naturally. That includes the scenery, what you look like, what color your skin is, and even your gender. Even so... I know you’re there.”

“...Are you a sorcerer?”

“Most likely not.”

“You’re being pretty vague, even though you’re talking about yourself.”

“For a long time, that’s what I’ve been the most vague about.”

Mahito began to notice something strange.

He can feel the shape of a human’s soul.

He knows the movement of a soul’s metabolism, whether it takes on a harsh form, withers weakly, or flickers with liveliness.

However, this old man’s soul was hardly metabolizing.

It was like a meadow with no wind, or a still sea, or the blue sky on a cloudless day.

No, it would be most appropriate to compare it to a stone.

His soul was like a stone on the side of the road.

No fancy ornamentation, no polishing. Unmoving, unwavering.

Calmly passing the time while growing moss.

That was the shape this old man’s soul had.

No matter how calm or how old a person is, the human soul always flickers.

As the years stack up, common sense doesn’t disappear, selfishness isn’t eliminated, and fear isn’t conquered.

But this old man was different.

The old man’s soul was at peace. He had sincerely accepted that everything would decay with time, but that didn’t mean he would throw his life away. It was truly similar to the way in which nature existed.

It was Mahito’s first time meeting anyone like this.

For a while, the tunnel became something of a den for Mahito.

He had gotten a hammock from somewhere, which he hung up between the pipes. He lounged in it and read, passing the time in comfort.

In a movie about life on a deserted island, a human who was desperate to survive made a hammock. Through it, he was able to regain a little peace of mind.

Since it looked surprisingly comfortable, Mahito gave it a try and it worked out nicely.

The arguments and fights of the outside world didn’t reach the inside of the tunnel, where only the burble of the small stream could be heard.

It provided a good environment for soothing the soul.

While leisurely absorbing new knowledge from his books, Mahito would sometimes absentmindedly gaze up toward the ceiling, or glance down at the corner where the old man squatted, looking as he always did.

“How do you live like this? It’s pretty mysterious...”

In the end, Mahito didn’t kill the old man.

It’s important to note that the old man wasn’t much of a hindrance for him. If it would make no difference whether he was there or gone, then Mahito figured getting rid of him would be more of a hassle.

The old man was just there, even quieter and more carefree than a stray cat.

Mahito knew the phrase: ‘man is only a reed, but he is a thinking reed’.

He found it hilarious and also genuinely liked it. It simultaneously boasted about being trapped in thoughts of the soul, while also showing that humans were frail as weeds.

It could be said that the old man was an unthinking reed, then.

No – he was even quieter than that; more like grass or some type of moss. In any case, the old man said nothing and simply carried on living.

Every now and then, the old man would suddenly shuffle off elsewhere, but he would be back to sleep before Mahito knew it. He was surely getting food from somewhere, but he never seemed to gain weight. If he lost any while in the tunnel, he would eat just enough to gain it back when he left, and no more.

It was a style of living so close to nature that it seemed more like a phenomenon than a life.

“That’s why I seriously wonder if you can see me.”

The suspicion was uttered suddenly.

Mahito wasn’t exactly speaking to the old man. Rather, his tone was that of someone talking to themselves.

But when he noticed that the old man’s soul didn’t waver even after hearing him speak, Mahito finally addressed him directly.

“How long have you been here?”

“Let’s see… I think a few winters have passed, but I’m not sure,” the old man muttered, his reply quiet.

Since they were two beings with souls who were aware of each other’s existence, Mahito felt it would be more natural to chat every now and then.

“Don’t you get bored?”

When spoken to in a soft tone, the old man also responded softly.

“I’ve forgotten how to be bored.”

“How do you usually pass the time here?”

“I don’t do anything, really. I just listen to the sounds.”

“The sounds?”

“The sounds of the water flowing.”

“...Is it fun?”

“It’s not. But I forgot how to have fun a long time ago, too, so it’s not an issue.”

So it was like that. Mahito nodded.

If this old man could no longer even feel the pain of boredom, perhaps his soul was worn down.

Humans of the city gasp and struggle through the hurt of not having enough, yet always wish for more even when they get what they wanted. Their souls grew fat and tattered through the rich accumulation of these negative feelings.

So in that regard, from Mahito’s point of view, the old man had a thin soul – but it could be said that was clever of him.

A fat and full human soul leads to a fear of losing the gratifying present moment, which in turn gives birth to curses.

“It’s hard to get your attention. What’s your name?”

When Mahito asked, the old man looked into the air for just a second.

“I left that behind. You can call me whatever you like.”

“There are humans without names? Even curses have them.”

“If you don’t meet other people, you don’t need a name.”

“Isn’t it a problem if you don’t have one?”

“When is it a problem?”

“When it’s time to be buried.”

“I don’t need a gravestone with a name. I can just be stuffed into a common grave, or maybe I’ll rot undiscovered and return to the earth that way.”

“Can’t you take a joke?”

“…Was that a joke?”

The old man didn’t laugh. Neither did Mahito.

But Mahito had the feeling that this old man was childish, contrary to his appearance. His lack of attachments created an unsullied disposition that might make him younger than he looked.

His interest in the old man simmered and surged.

It was his first time seeing this type of human, his first time feeling a soul with this form. For Mahito, this was a rare specimen.

What kind of path must life take to make this kind of human? What would be the most intriguing shape to make with a soul like that? What uses could one plan for such a person?

And what kind of curse would be born from them?

With these questions fueling his curiosity, Mahito started to chat with the old man.

“Why are you here?”

“…Why?”

The old man looked up toward the ceiling through his unruly bangs.

His eye sockets were empty, but it seems like even without sight, humans tended to stare into nothing when they were thinking. One curiosity of Mahito’s was satisfied.

“You weren’t born and raised in this tunnel, right? As a human, you must have been in that noisy city.”

“Ah, that. I lived a fairly busy life a long time ago. I inherited the house, worked, made money and supported my family.”

“So you were a human in a pretty good position.”

“In human society, yes. Looking back on it now, it was all meaningless.”

“So... what, you basically started living in a hole like a mouse, then?”

“I did that because I lost everything that I needed up to then. I lost my social status, my money, and a place where I belonged.”

“You lost it all?”

“I was tricked. That’s when my eyes were burned, so I lost my sight then, too.”

Mahito incidentally recalled the company Jogo attacked.

“You got tricked, huh? You seem pretty good-natured about it.”

“That’s because I didn’t care much about being tricked.”

“You’re a weird old man. Is this some kind of hobby where you get your kicks when people deceive you or something?”

“I’m just saying, that’s the kind of person I was back then. The ones who tricked me were my old friend and my wife. My eyes were burned in that so-called “accident”¹; they claimed I wasn’t of sound mind and body after that, and under the guise of caring for me, they stole everything I worked for before I knew it.”

“That’s a pretty flashy way to trick someone, isn’t it? You’re talking like it’s someone else’s problem.”

“Those two loved each other, and I was loved by no one. Knowing that was more monumental to me than being tricked.”

It was hard for Mahito to interpret what the old man said.

Love. Is it really such an important word?

It’s said that curses born from love exist in the world. It seems there are tremendously powerful ones among them, too. But Mahito doesn’t understand how the mechanism by which people love each other is any different from a cat’s attachment to a blanket.

Still, Mahito knows for a fact that people are obsessed with it.

“Didn’t you curse them? The ones who tricked you.”

“Not really.”

“’Not really’, huh. You know, normally a human in that situation would get angry and hold grudges, and it would make the shape of their soul deteriorate.”

“It’s true, though. I don’t think I had the energy to even consider seeking revenge or hurting them.”

“...I get it.”

Mahito nodded, filling in the blanks.

Regardless of whether or not he can guess the trends in human emotion, Mahito has studied many movies, novels and poetry so far.

Then there were the humans he tinkered with. Mahito could put together the pieces he gleaned from those things and use them to break down the old man’s story.

“So basically, you were in despair. So much despair that it was like your soul was about to die. That’s how you broke through the creation of grudges and curses and ended up like this.”

The old man slowly shook his head.

“I may have been disappointed, but I don’t believe I felt the intense despair you’re thinking of.”

“Are ‘disappointment’ and ‘despair’ different?”

“They are; this is just my personal experience.”

The old man raised his face, following the memories.

“There was no burning resentment or turbulent sorrow. It’s just... I was tired, I guess. Between work, assets, reputation, my life situation and duties, dealing with others, caring about the family name... I think I was probably just tired and worn out because of it all.”

“And that’s why you didn’t get mad even after being tricked?”

“I was at peace. They say the soul gets lighter after going through disappointments.”

The old man’s voice was calm.

It had a cool quality to it, like muddy water that had been filtered clean.

“I couldn’t see, I had no money, I had no love... But as I was walking through the city with nothing to my name, it all suddenly became inconsequential. And then, as I looked around, I saw the city in a new light.”

“Even though you can’t see?”

“Yes. When you can’t see anything, it’s just sound and wind that goes on forever anywhere you are. I couldn’t even see the walls blocking the city in. It was just endless darkness spreading out forever, like a starless night. For the first time, I understood how wide the world was. And I thought to myself... ah, I’m free, aren’t I?”

Mahito blinked rapidly.

This old man’s thinking didn’t fit any other case he had gathered so far.

Even hearing about his past, he couldn’t understand the old man’s thoughts.

But even from Mahito’s point of view, the old man was certainly free.

Without so much as leaving the middle of this tunnel, he knew that the sky was vast.

Perhaps he knew it better than any member of high society walking around freely in the city. He knew the wide spread of the sky, the soft caress of the wind, the gentle sounds of the water.

This old man, who looked like a simple rakugoka², had no property or social standing. He even lost his connection to other humans... And maybe that’s precisely why he could uncover the elusive meaning of the word ‘freedom’.

He was just existing, just being alive, without attachments, grudges or curses.

“So basically ‘not all those who wander are lost’?”

“Yes, though quoting Tolkien’s works might be a little tedious.”

Mahito smiled when the man immediately caught the reference to a book he just happened to read.

“Were you a bookworm?”

“All I did was cram a lot of information in.”

“It’s good to be well-read.”

If curses are born from the fear that humans feel, could this old man even be considered human?

As Mahito is, he struggles with the expression of human emotions.

But he was calm.

For the first time since coming into contact with humans, he had a feeling of peace.

“I think if everyone in the world was like you, I wouldn’t have been born.”

Mahito looked back at his book.

The old man, staring into nothing as always, fell silent again.

Curses are born from humans, but they also kill humans. There is no way for the two to coexist.

But in this tunnel, a curse and a human were doing exactly that.

Though distorted, this peaceful period of time flowed by gently.

It’s only natural for humans to hate and fear other humans.

Since they can’t see souls, they can only make guesses about the feelings of others, and they’re swayed by their own emotions.

They don’t understand that these things are just a reflection of the soul’s metabolism. They don’t even know where their soul is.

Mahito investigated the matter.

This blind man lost his sight and his connection to others, so his soul received less stimulation.

And so, no longer influenced by unnecessary things in the physical world, he spent a lot of time facing his inner world and reflecting.

“It’s kind of like a monk’s training. Through strong introversion, a person looks at their soul more often.”

Mahito walked around the city, skimming through a beaten-up copy of the Heart Sutra.

It was a sutra handbook that focused on controlling the soul. It looked like humans of the past did their own research into freeing the soul from the material world.

The old man’s life ended up in a similar state without him setting out to do it on purpose.

That was likely how he learned to feel other souls through the darkness he lived in. Mahito concluded this was the reason he was aware of curses.

“I think he was already predisposed, but... seems like it’s easier for introverted humans to show promise.”

If he gave the old man’s situation even deeper consideration, he could probably make a lot of guesses about a sorcerer’s training. There’s even a way to encourage the first manifestation of cursed energy.

In that case, it should also be possible to take a talented person and ‘make’ them into a sorcerer or curse-user.

Unleashing a curse-user made by a curse onto a sorcerer...

That might be a fun experiment. It’s easier to shake up a human’s soul by having them fight other humans, rather than just exorcising curses. Sukuna’s vessel should be no exception.

Although...

—Maybe it’s fine to do that a little later?

Yes, Mahito thought it over at his leisure.

He is free. When it’s time to move, he moves. When it’s time to rest, he rests.

And he was not in the mood to launch that plan into action.

Rather, for the time being, he just wanted to gather knowledge and indulge in thought. He also got some new books and wanted to read fantasy novels while basking in the quiet comfort of the tunnel.

Mahito’s gait became lighter. While walking alongside the throng of people, he even began to hum.

Suddenly, a loud voice rang out from between two buildings.

“—so damn annoying, yeah?”

Looking over that way, he saw two young humans: a man with long, thin hair, and a muscular skinhead. They were undoubtedly people who looked like trouble.

The long-haired man listened as the skinhead rambled on with his complaints, seemingly in some kind of sullen mood.

“Damn, it’s seriously freezing. Anyway, every last one of ‘em just puts on shitty airs, but it’s all just talk. Nothin’ but excuses. Ah, I wanna kill ‘em all...”

“You say that, but come on. You talk big about wanting to beat these guys to death when you’re pissed, but could you actually kill someone?”

“Sure. Ain’t like killing’s hard.”

“Seriously?”

Mahito squinted and listened, the conversation going in one ear and out the other.

It’s not that he disliked the way they acted or how they spoke bluntly about their heart’s desires. But Mahito knew people like this were all talk.

“Yeah– seriously, anyone’s fine, I just wanna kill someone.”

Then maybe you should do it without saying anything.

Better yet, he thought about practicing some killing methods on them. But Mahito felt the light weight of the book in his hand as he reached out, and he stopped.

Rather than sparing any consideration for this, he just wanted to go back to the comfort of the tunnel and read.

“I’ll kill ‘em.”

The skinhead’s grumbling voice sounded like a spell.

But the words would find no power or heart to shelter in. Shut away between these buildings, the most a person can do is talk to themselves. It’s best for humans like this to stick to the narrow back alleys, foolishly thinking they’re enjoying a wide world.

Mahito averted his gaze and made his way back home.

“Why did Gregor become a bug?”

Mahito suddenly asked the old man, not taking his eyes off the novel.

It was a famous book by Franz Kafka.

A story in which a human unexpectedly turns into a poisonous insect.

“The most popular theory is that the bug is a metaphor.”

“Metaphor?”

“It means he was a person who was hated and oppressed within society, treated the same way a human would treat a bug. Kind of like an old man who was suddenly blinded and tricked one day.”

“Is that a joke?”

“Not exactly.”

It was detached and dispassionate, but an answer would come back any time Mahito said something. When conversing with the old man, it felt like talking to a dictionary. He had a lot of information.

He knew about things like the inner workings of the mind and human culture, and he was smart enough to explain it simply in discussions.

For Mahito, who analyzed human souls through books and movies, this old man’s knowledge and conversation helped in its own way.

When do humans get angry? Why do they grieve?

How do they trust and in what ways are they betrayed?

Mahito lived with a different sense of ethics when compared to humans, so there were many things he struggled to interpret. The old man explained them and helped him understand.

He had a strong interest in the experiences of the old man, who had once lived among humans but didn’t act like them.

“After becoming a bug, Gregor eventually hid away like he was told to, but he still ended up being spotted and it led to his death. Jii-san³, why do you think that is?”

“You cannot find peace by avoiding life.”

“That’s a quote from Virginia Woolf, right?”

When Mahito immediately and correctly guessed the source, the old man raised a brow slightly.

“You’re a pretty avid reader, too. Conversations with you are really stress-free.”

“Do you have to go back to living with other humans, then?”

“If you don’t have any attachment to the human world, there’s no need to run from it or stand against it⁴.”

“I see,” Mahito murmured to let the other know he was listening, eyes still on the book.

Even if he wasn’t looking at it, the old man’s perpetually calm soul was aglow in the dark like always.

Mahito read his book in the dim room lit by the brilliance of that soul instead of a candle.

Time quietly flowed through the darkness.

Outside of the tunnel, signs indicating the end of summer crept up.

The end came abruptly.

One day, when Mahito was heading back to the tunnel with an abandoned poetry anthology that he picked up on an aimless walk through the city, he felt a noisiness that shouldn’t have been there.

There were one, two, three swaying souls.

One had a very familiar shape, but it was terribly frail. It was like the dying flame of a candle weakened by the wind.

With the same unchanging gait as always, Mahito stepped into the tunnel.

As expected, the old man was there.

But the unusual thing was the crumpled, strange position that he was in.

He was also sandwiched between two younger men who were looking down at him.

“Oooi, isn’t this bad? Did this guy seriously die?”

A man with long, thin hair spoke in a tone that was not particularly anxious.

“Didn’t I say it? I said I could kill,” a muscular skinhead replied, his voice casual.

“But ain’t this just impulsive?”

“Yeah, well, the old man had some real cheek, looking down on us when he’s this weak. So why not just kick him?”

The skinhead likely played sports, given that his legs were as thick around as logs. Kicking an old man to death would be easier than crushing a can.

The two didn’t seem to have a single scrap of interest in the old man, his life or his soul.

There was no reason, no grudge, no clear murderous intent.

It seemed like they simply arrived at the tunnel somehow. They took the opportunity to do as much violence as they wanted. They beat him on a whim.

It could be said that this way of being is freedom for humans.

Mahito crouched down, peeking at the old man’s face.

The beaten visage of the man with burned eyes came into view. But even at a time like this, his expression was as calm as always.

“Are you going to die?”

Mahito searched for even a mumbled word or two in response.

“...Seems so...”

The old man answered in a hoarse voice. He likely barely had the power left to speak now. It appeared as though the two men didn’t hear him over their loud conversation.

He intently inspected the old man’s soul.

The peaceful soul was not flickering, nor did it hold anger or grief; it was simply coming to an unhurried end.

Mahito was impressed.

This old man had found the true meaning of freedom. He really was released from every tie of obligation in this world. Even on the verge of death, that didn’t change.

Being able to make sure of that with his own two eyes, Mahito felt considerably relieved. In the same way he would watch a flower wither and fall, he observed the old man’s death.

Nevertheless...

“Jii-san?”

He had a feeling.

It’s like seeing a plot twist you don’t want to see if you keep turning the pages of a book.

Or like knowing the contents of a present before you open it.

That kind of buzz spread through Mahito’s chest.

While he puzzled over the instinctive alarm bells screaming at him to stop watching, everything was heading toward its end.

“...I thought I would die alone.”

The old man’s soul dimly flickered.

A smile was on his swollen face.

“...To have someone... here to witness this old fool’s last moments...”

The flicker might have been insignificant, like a single drop breaking the water’s surface. Even so, for an instant near death, at the end of it all...

The old man’s soul ‘metabolized’.

“...Tha...nk... y...”

The old man died smiling.

“. . .”

Mahito’s eyes opened wide, and for a moment, he was frozen.

He thought the old man was different when compared to other humans. To Mahito, he seemed unfettered.

Mahito thought the unique philosophical views stemming from such an extraordinary state of mind had freed him from all the shackles of this world.

But despite all of that, the old man was still captured right in his last moments.

On the brink of death, he clung to someone else so he could avoid a lonely end.

The old man was only human.

For a human, it was likely satisfying enough. Perhaps it was even the proper way for one to die.

“. . .”

Mahito said nothing.

But what felt like a dry wind blew through his chest, leaving him cold.

He didn’t know the name humans gave that emotion. But his consciousness was like yarn tangling in on itself, wriggling around like a worm—

And suddenly, it all cut off at once.

The only thing left behind was the sensation of standing in a dry and barren wasteland.

“—So basically,” the skinhead’s voice echoed. “Police probably won’t do a proper investigation. Not for this old nobody.”

“Hey, hey, hey; that’s still a person,” the long haired man answered lightly.

“Yeah, well, that guy started it.”

“He shoulda looked at who he was talking to before he picked a fight.”

“Anyway, my pants are dirty from all that kicking... That’s a problem.”

“So fussy. That’s what you’re worried about when you just killed a guy? How funny.”

“That ain’t a person. Anyway, don’t you know I like being clean? Ahh, the blood won’t come off... Water doesn’t do any good, right?”

“Yeah, it doesn’t – but more importantly, if you’ve settled down, I’m hungry. Let’s stop by a convenience store.”

“I dunno. If you’re gonna look, buy a bento and let’s get outta here.”

Mahito quickly stood up in the same way one would when they finished looking for something in a store.

A sense of fatigue was deeply ingrained in his body.

Their incoherent voices persisted, reverberating through the tunnel, smeared with excuses and attempts to escape reality. He couldn’t hear the soft burble of the stream.

With deep-seated listlessness, Mahito approached the skinhead as one would move to pick up fallen trash.

Idle Transfiguration. The technique spreads quickly.

And thus, the moment he tapped the man’s back, its shape was no longer human.

“Ee—!!”

If he just killed them, it would create a nuisance in the form of a corpse, so he simply folded it up into something palm-sized and kept it alive.

Then, with a careless sweep⁵ of his hand, he folded up the other man as well.

“Begh—”

It fell silent.

Mahito gathered up the two, now no bigger than chess pieces, and turned his attention down toward the remaining corpse of the old man.

It was now just a bag of meat full of bones. Not even the soul remained, so he couldn’t use Idle Transfiguration to fiddle with it.

He was briefly troubled by its disposal, which served as the biggest inconvenience.

In the tunnel, there nothing but the sound of running water.

It was a day where the sky seemed farther away than usual.

Clouds peeked out from around the buildings and a good feeling was carried in on the wind.

Mahito aimlessly walked about the city.

“Maybe I’ll catch a movie. It’s been ages.”

He picked a tiny, somewhat old-looking theater and snuck in.

He’s had high motivation lately, and it seemed like some unnecessary things had peeled away from his soul, leaving him more carefree than ever.

Thanks to that, he had also begun to toy with humans more often.

If he can fold a person up and make them small, he wanted to test out inflating one instead, but he slept on the idea overnight. It was pretty fun, but he knew that he was getting too absorbed. He also felt that carrying on with too much persistence wasn’t a good thing.

A change of pace every now and then was fine, too.

He hadn’t closely checked to see what was being screened. It was mostly just plain and obscure movies, but if one went in with no expectations, they might come across a surprisingly interesting tale.

Curiously, he had that kind of a feeling.

While walking through the hall of the theater, he casually felt through his pocket, which had grown bulky with the ‘small humans’ that he had touched.

—Speaking of which, he thought that was a nuisance.

He carelessly tossed some of them away.

Opening the door, he stepped into the theater.

Perhaps because it was a weekday, there weren’t many customers. The silhouettes of what appeared to be students filled out a few seats here and there.

From where Mahito stood in the corner, he had a good view of the screen.

Soon, instead of a curtain raising, the theater was engulfed in darkness.

T/N: [1] In this sentence, the implication is that the “accident” was very much orchestrated by the old man’s friend and wife, who burned his eyes somehow and then merely made it look like an accident [2] The rakugoka is the storyteller in rakugo, a form of (often) comedic theater that relies solely on spoken word from the rakugoka, who only uses a fan and hand towel as props [3] A way of referring to old men in general, basically like “gramps/grandpa”; Mahito never calls him by an actual name [4] Essentially, the old man’s saying that he (or anyone) can exist parallel to human society without interacting if they have no attachments to it and can still find peace, contrary to the Woolf quote [5] Kanji reads sweep, furigana reads cleanse (the same word for exorcism that sorcerers use)

Thanks as well to Pixi for help with editing and tl checks! If an officially translated version of the novel becomes available in your country, please consider purchasing it, or consider buying a copy of the original novel in Japanese if possible!

#jujutsu kaisen #mahito #mahito jujutsu kaisen #mahito jjk #jogo jjk #hanami jjk #jujutsu kaisen light novel #translation #departing summer and returning autumn

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rosiehunterwolf · 3 years

Text

Never Put Off Until Tomorrow

Prompts: Chores and Video Games

Word Count: 4,850

Characters: The squad + Pixal

Timeline: between seasons 11 and 12

Trigger Warnings: None

Summary: …what can be done today, yada, yada, yada, we all know the saying. So do the ninja- when Master Wu is drilling it into their heads every minute of every day, it’s kind of hard to forget.

Naturally, it only takes them a week (and the biggest new video game in Ninjago) to do so.

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“Get that gun out of his hand! Without it, he’ll be defenseless and we can take him down easily!” “I’m trying, Jay!” Lloyd said through gritted teeth. “One wrong move and he’ll get me with that thing!”

“Use your powers!” Jay raised his sword and dove at the enemy, forcing him to turn and face him. As their swords clashed with a loud clang of metal, Jay quickly pulled back as Lloyd shot a blast of power at the attacker, who promptly collapsed to the ground.

“Alright! Way to go, green ma- look out!”

Lloyd shrieked as someone suddenly jumped on him from behind, skewering a sword through his skull. The green ninja fell to the ground and vanished in a puff of smoke.

The ninja blinked at the scene before them, speechless.

Jay suddenly let out a whoop, leaning over to high-five Kai. “Way to go, bro! You’re so good at this game!” “He came out of nowhere,” Lloyd huffed, tossing his control to the ground. “He didn’t even give me a chance to fight back.”

Kai reclined, putting his hands behind his head. “Work smarter, not harder, green machine.”

Lloyd scowled, and Nya shot him a sympathetic glance. “Hey, Lloyd, you lasted a whole ten minutes longer than last time! You’ve drastically improved.”

“Don’t feel bad,” Kai winked. “Even Jay couldn’t beat me, I wouldn’t expect you to.”

Cole shook his head. “Dude, you’re unchecked! We’ve only had this game for a week and already, you’re insane. Let’s just say I’m very glad you’re on our team.”

“I’ll say,” Zane agreed. “The Critical Conquest Gaming Tournament is going to have some of the best gamers in Ninjago. You’re good, Kai- we all are- but we all need to be at the top of our game if we want a chance at winning.”

“We got this, guys,” Nya assured. “We’ve fought off serpentine, ghosts, the Overlord, Oni- winning a city-wide video game tournament should be a piece of cake.”

“Speaking of cake-”

“No cake,” Jay snapped at Cole. “Not until we’ve won this thing. I need you to practice.”

“Dude, chill, I’ve been practicing!”

“Then can you show me your double twist dash-melee maneuver?”

Cole blinked at him. “My what?”

“That’s what I thought. Here, let me show you. We’ll try until you’ve got it down.”

“Who put you in charge?”

“You did. Literally. You guys chose me to be the team captain for the competition.”

“Whatever.”

“Lloyd, come here, so he has someone to practice on.”

“Why me?” “Because you need to work on your stealth. Kai got that jump on you surprisingly easily. You’re a good fighter, Lloyd, but fighting doesn’t matter if your enemy kills you before you have the chance. Practice your stealth and dodging on Cole.”

“Ready to get your butt kicked, bud?” Cole reached his hands out, cracking his knuckles before picking up the controller.

“Ha! You wish. The only one who will be getting their butt kicked is-”

The sharp rapping of something against the floor interrupted him, and they turned to see Master Wu standing behind them, his gaze disapproving as he clutched his staff firmly in hand.

“Students, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Uhh, practicing for the Critical Conquest tournament?” Nya said. “I thought that was pretty obvious!”

Wu glared at her. “I know what you’re doing. But I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut all this short. The six of you have many chores to do.”

“Chores?” they cried in unison.

“The past week since you bought that game, you have done nothing but sit around on that couch and play it. In all that time, your chores have piled up. Now, I’m cutting you off. They need to be done, now.”

“But Master!” Jay pleaded. “The tournament starts in only a few hours!”

Master Wu smirked. “Well, I guess you better be fast, then.”

---

The ninja stared down at the alarmingly long list Master Wu had given them, no one speaking a word for nearly a solid minute.

“Why,” Kai groaned, “did we ever put all of these off?”

“Why didn’t Master Wu just let us wait one more day to do the chores?” Jay complained. “The tournament would be all over then!”

“Well, he didn’t,” Cole said. “So there’s no use in complaining. We might as well get started.”

“Alright, guys, if we’re going to get through all of this before the tournament starts, we’re gonna have to divide and conquer,” Nya said. “Let’s see. Zane, Lloyd, you guys take the kitchen. Jay, Cole, you can check the vehicles to make sure they’re operating properly- wait, scratch that, Cole doesn’t know shit about mechanics. Besides, putting you two alone together is never a good idea.”

“Hey!”

“Zane, you go with Jay on the machines. Cole, you’re with Lloyd. Kai and I will work outside on raking and fixing the training course.”

“Hey, no fair, you just gave yourself the easiest job!” Cole grumbled.

“I’ll inform you that raking leaves is very mundane!”

“Yeah!” Kai snapped. “Especially when it’s cold out like this. I’m gonna freeze my fingers off!”

“You’re the fire ninja, you’ll figure something out,” Nya snapped. “C’mon, let’s go.”

“Hey, Cole? You think this is so easy? We can trade places! You wanna trade places?”

“Actually, I’ve decided to be nice and let you take this one.”

Kai glared at him. “You’re only saying that because you know I hate it!” Cole leaned back against the table, smirking. “Maybe.”

“Come on, Kai, we’re going.” Nya grabbed his hand and yanked him out the door.

“I guess we better get working,” Cole sighed. “Jay, Zane, you guys need a copy of your tasks?” Zane shook his head. “I’ve got the list committed to memory. And there’s a lot to do, so we better go.”

As they left the room, Cole turned to Lloyd. “Put a check mark or something by the things the others are doing, so we can see what’s left for us.”

Lloyd made little marks next to the tasks, his pencil slowing as it reached the end. His frown deepened. “I swear, this list is getting longer. Some of these are just ridiculous! Polish the counters? Clean out the oven? Dust the tops of the cabinets? Who does these things?”

“Normal people, Lloyd. It’s not my fault that we’re so busy saving the city that you’ve never done anything more than the most basic chores in your life.”

“I’ve done chores!” “Darkley’s doesn’t count, bud. I bet the only thing you did there was clean spiders out of your bed.”

“They were fire ants,” Lloyd grumbled.

Cole turned on him with wide eyes. “What?”

Lloyd stiffened, suddenly seeming to realize what he had just said. “Uh… I mean… don’t tell Kai, okay?”

Cole stared at him for a moment, before sighing. “I’ll let it go, this once. But only because you’ve had a lot worse things than fire ants since then. Those kids are jerks, though.”

“I know.”

“... They really did that?”

“Yes, Cole! Do I need to show the scars to prove it?”

“No! I was just- you know what, forget I even said anything. Let’s get to work. First up, doing the dishes.” They turned towards the sink, where dozens of dirty plates and cups had accumulated.

“Seriously? Doesn’t anyone ever clean off their dishes after eating?”

Cole shot him a look. “Name one time you did that.”

“Okay, so never, but we’re ninja, not dishwashers! What do you expect?”

“Never put off until tomorrow what can be done today, Lloyd.”

Lloyd groaned. “I can’t believe I’m missing Critical Conquest for this.”

---

“Jay! You’re supposed to be repairing the sentry cannons on the Land Bounty!” “Chill out, Zane, I’ll get to it in a minute-”

Zane suddenly snatched the remote control out of his hand. “Jay! We’re never going to finish in time for the tournament if you don’t focus! Stop playing with toys!” “It’s not a toy!” He gestured towards the small remote-controlled robot. “This thing is going to be a major distraction! It could make it or break it for us in battle!”

Zane eyed the robot skeptically. “This. Distract our enemies?”

“Well, I was going to make it into a smoke bomb, but someone kept pestering me!” “Look, Jay, this isn’t the time to work on your inventions. You can do that later. Right now, you need to fix the sentries.”

“I already looked at the sentries,” he whined. “They were completely fried in our last adventure. I have to rewire the whole thing.”

Zane blinked at him. “Isn’t… that kind of your job?”

“Yeah, well, it’s hard work! I don’t want to do it! I’ll take any other chore on your list.”

“Well, someone needs to do it, and you’re the only one who knows how.”

“Not true! Why don’t you ask Pixal?”

He gestured towards the nindriod, who was tinkering with what appeared to be a small metal box.

“Pixal,” he called, walking over to her, “do you know how to rewire the sentries?” “Yes, but I know for a fact that Jay does, too. I’m not doing it for you.”

“Aww, come on, Pix,” Jay groaned. “Why don’t you have to do anything while the rest of us are all working our butts off?”

She glanced wryly at Jay’s little robot, who was waving cheerfully at her. “I wouldn’t exactly call it that. But I’m not helping because I already did all my chores while the rest of you were playing video games.”

Jay went pink in the face, and even Zane felt himself avoiding Pixal’s gaze.

“Critical Conquest is very important,” Jay muttered.

“More important than making sure all our weapons are operational? Or restocking the medbay?”

“We can do those things any time! The competition is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!”

“Actually, there is another one next month-”

“Shut up, Zane. With our luck, we’ll probably be fighting evil nindroids or will be locked inside a different realm by that point, anyway.”

“I’m not helping you,” Pixal sniffed. “So I don’t know why you’re still here.”

Not taking Pixal’s… not-so-subtle hints, Jay leaned in towards her. “Whatcha workin’ on?”

Pixal eyed him warily. “... It’s a jetpack. I wanted to make something more compact in case I was in a situation where I couldn’t use the Samurai X suit.”

“That’s cool! Although, it might work better if you recalibrated the engines to-”

“Jay,” Pixal said sharply. “I know what I’m doing. Please go work on your chores.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled. “No one ever lets me have any fun.”

Zane shook his head, wandering over to the Earth Driller where he was working on replacing the paneling that had been damaged in the Oni incident.

He couldn’t have been doing so for more than fifteen minutes when the sound of a small explosion interrupted him.

Zane jerked to his feet, dashing over to where the sound had come from.

Jay had jumped back from Pixal’s jetpack, which was now black and smoking.

Of course it was.

“What happened?”

Jay scratched his head nervously. “Well, you see… I really didn’t want to work on those sentries, so when I noticed Pixal stepping out of the room for a moment…”

Zane sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Are you alright?”

Jay grinned. “Right as rain. Not even a scar like last time!”

“Okay, that’s good, now I feel less bad for saying this- what were you thinking?”

“I couldn’t help myself, Zane! She calibrated it all wrong!”

“Well, evidently, you were the one who did it wrong, seeing as it exploded within five minutes of you getting your hands on it.”

Jay jumped nearly a foot in the air. “Pixal! You’re back! Ah… um, I’m really sorry about your jetpack, I was only trying to…”

Pixal marched forward, snatching it off the floor. “It doesn’t matter, it’s done now.”

“I can fix it-”

“You’ve done quite enough,” Pixal snapped. “Why don’t you just go finish your chores now?”

“But-”

Pixal held up the burnt jetpack, shaking it lightly. “You owe me.”

“Fine,” Jay groaned. “I’ll rewire the stupid sentries.”

---

“If I have to rake one more pile of leaves, something is going to end up on fire.”

“Well, luckily for you, that was the last of them.” Nya set down her rake, rubbing her hands together. “Now we just have to dispose of the leaf bags.”

She and Kai glanced over towards the towering pile of leaf bags, and Kai groaned.

“It’s going to take forever to throw these all away!”

“Kai, the dumpster is just on the other side of the Monastery wall!”

“Yeah, but we can only carry a few bags at a time, and we’re going to have to make so many trips!”

“Well, unless you’ve got a better idea, we don’t have a choice.”

Kai paused, his eyes lighting up. “Wait-”

“No, Kai, we are not burning the leaves.”

“I wasn’t going to say that! Although… it’s not a half-bad idea…”

“Kai!” “Okay, okay, no burning! What I was going to say was, why don’t we just toss the bags over the wall and into the dumpster?”

Nya frowned. “We’d miss half of them and then have to go over there anyway and pick them all up.”

“No, we could do it like in Critical Conquest! Remember? The ground-bash move? This is just like that!”

“Kai, that’s just a video game. This is real life!” “Yeah, but wouldn’t it still work?”

Nya frowned, stepping forward and eyeing up the roof of the Monastery. “I suppose if we got the right angle… we’d have to make sure an ample amount of newtons were applied with each hit to reach the correct velocity… and of course we’d have to take into consideration factors like density and wind acceleration per second and its tendency to carry-”

“Okay, okay, enough with your science-y nerd stuff!”

“It’s just basic physics, Kai. I mean, there are a lot of external factors to consider that wouldn’t be present in a lab setting, although I still think it would be quite simple-”

“Would it work or not?” Kai interrupted. “Yes or no, I want a one-word answer.”

“Yes. We just need to get the proper positioning-”

“Can I be the one bashing the bags?”

Nya sighed. “Only if you do exactly as I tell you-”

“Whoooooo!” Kai cried, running off to grab the rake as he swung it around fiercely. “Who’s ready to bash some leaf bags?”

“Kai! I said to do exactly as I say-”

---

Despite Nya’s initial trepidations, the process did not end up being a total disaster, and they actually ended up getting the chore done decently quickly. Now all they had left to do was to test and recalibrate the training course.

Nya glanced down at her watch. Only an hour and a half until the tournament started. Her chances of getting extra practice on those tricky combos were looking slimmer by the second. Hopefully, Kai’s mastery of the game, Jay’s high skill levels, and Cole’s advanced items and power-ups would be enough to help them beat-

“Nya!” Kai shrieked. “I said, turn it off!”

Nya snapped out of her thoughts, glancing up at her brother, who had been knocked to the ground by a whirring training dummy. “Oh, shit!” She spun towards the controls and shut them down, jogging over to Kai. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I think so, I just-” Kai reached for her extended hand, pulling back with a sharp cry as they made contact.

“What?” “My hand,” he grimaced. “It hurts like hell.”

---

“You can’t throw out the Eggo Waffles!” Lloyd insisted, grabbing at the box in Cole’s hands

“Lloyd, they expired three days ago.”

“So what, they’re still edible.”

“They’re going.” Cole gave the box a strong tug, jerking it out of Lloyd’s hands and dropping it in the garbage. Lloyd huffed, crossing his arms.

“Kai would’ve let me keep them.”

“No, he wouldn’t have, because he doesn’t want you to get food poisoning.”

Lloyd paused for a moment, before amending, “Jay would’ve let me keep them.”

Cole sighed. “Yeah, and then you guys would’ve eaten them, and we would’ve ended up with two sick ninja.”

“I wouldn’t get sick! I have these super cool powers that protect me-”

“We don’t have any proof of that. We still don’t know exactly what your powers do.”

“Which means we can’t rule that out yet!”

Cole rubbed his head. “Out of all the people I could’ve gotten stuck cleaning out the freezer with… it had to be you. The one who gets emotionally attached to frozen waffles.”

“I am not emotionally attached-”

“Are you kidding me? He can’t play with this on! This thing is stiff, it seriously restricts his movement!” “It’s not a question, Jay, he needs to keep it on!”

“Is it actually that bad, though? Couldn’t he skip it for one game?”

“Not unless you want it to get worse!” Cole and Lloyd exchanged a glance and stepped out into the hallway, where the other four ninja were gathered.

“What’s going on?”

Zane opened his mouth to speak. “There was-”

“Kai!” Lloyd interrupted suddenly, darting over to him. “What happened to your hand?”

Cole blinked, realizing for the first time that Kai had a swathe of bandages wrapped around his hand.

Kai yelped in pain as Lloyd touched it, and the green ninja recoiled, his eyes widening in guilt. “Oh my gosh, I’m sorry!”

Nya rolled her eyes. “Don’t apologize, Lloyd, he’s fine. He’s just being a big baby about all of this.”

“Am not. It hurts!”

Zane stifled a sigh. “Kai, it is only a bad pulled muscle. Apart from being painful and needing plenty of rest, it’s nothing serious.”

“Well, you don’t know what it feels like,” Kai snapped. “It’s a lot worse than ‘nothing serious.’”

“I scanned you. I am quite certain my diagnosis is correct.”

Nya snickered, and Kai shot her a look. “Shut up, you. You’re the one who did this to me.”

“You’re the one who wasn’t paying attention!” “Yeah, well, you’re the one who was supposed to be-”

“Guys!” Jay cried. “Can’t you see we have more pressing matters at hand? Severe injury or not, Kai can’t play Critical Conquest like this. And he’s our best player!”

“Alright,” Lloyd said. “So we don’t have our best player anymore. That’s bad. But Jay’s still a beast! And Cole, and Nya, and everyone except me, basically-”

“He could be the worst player in all of existence and it still wouldn’t matter,” Cole pointed out. “We need six players to compete or they will disqualify us.”

“But if Kai can’t play, we have no one else! There are no backups!” Nya huffed, turning on Jay. “You’re our team captain! Why didn’t you prepare any backups?”

“Because we know no one else! We live in an isolated monastery at the top of the tallest mountain for miles, what did you expect? Besides, I wasn’t anticipating this to happen!” Zane frowned. “Well, if Kai can’t play, and we have no backup, then our only choice is to drop out-”

“Wait!” Jay cried suddenly. “I think I might have an idea of someone.”

---

“Please please please please-”

Pixal raised an eyebrow at him. “Do you really think begging is going to change my mind?”

“Please, Pixal, we need a sixth player, and you’re the only person I can think of!”

“Why would I help you after you blew up my jetpack?” Kai gaped at him. “You what?”

Jay fought back the heat spreading across his face. “That’s not important right now! Pixal, I promise I’ll fix it, just please compete with us!”

Pixal frowned at him, which wasn’t the most reassuring answer.

“C’mon Pix- I’ll do anything.”

“I don’t know, Jay-”

“We’ll do all your chores for the next month.”

“What?” “We will?”

“Jay, what the heck! We never agreed to that!”

Pixal smiled at him. “I would’ve accepted it if you offered a week, but that’s very generous of you.”

The others shot him smoldering glares, and Jay groaned. “It doesn’t matter, we don’t have time for this.” Glancing down at his phone, he sucked in his breath. “We’ve only got an hour until the tournament! Zane, can you teach Pixal how to play?”

Zane blinked at him. “In an hour?”

“Just cover the basics. We don’t have time for perfection. Just teach her as much as you can before the tournament starts.”

“Alright, I’ll see what I can do.”

As soon as they were out of the room, Jay wheeled around, moaning. “We are so hooped! She doesn’t know how to play! Kai, how could you be careless enough to injure yourself?”

“Oh, sure, blame the victim!” Kai snapped. “Would it kill you to show a little sympathy to your injured teammate?”

“You pulled a muscle, you baby!” Nya groaned. “Pixal’s a fast learner, hopefully, she’ll get the hang of it.”

“Fast learner or not, nothing can beat hours of experience,” Lloyd said. “Let’s just hope the other contestants aren’t as good.”

---

“These dudes are insane!”

Jay continued to scroll through the queued-up players, examining their stats, his jaw dropping. “How much have these people been grinding?”

“So much for an easy win,” Lloyd grumbled.

Zane and Pixal walked into the room, holding their controllers. “I think I’ve done everything I can with Pixal. The competition starts in five minutes, I suggest we get ready.”

“Alright.” Jay turned towards Pixal as Zane worked on setting up the game. “We’re going to need your help, but since you don’t have experience, I think the best move is to have you stay behind us and play defense.”

Pixal smirked. “I’ll do my best.”

“Guys, we have to queue up!” “Are the headsets working?”

“They’re ready, what about the controllers? All charged?”

“We really shouldn’t be checking these kinds of things literally three minutes before the tournament, but yes, they are.”

“Hurry, guys! It’s about to start!”

Zane blinked at the screen. “Jay… you named our team the Fast Chickens?”

“It’s a good name!” The others groaned, and Jay glared at them. “We’ll see who’s complaining when we win this thing!”

Jay fidgeted through most of the opening speeches from the hosts of the competition as they went over rules and procedures. And, after what simultaneously felt like both a million years later and only the blink of an eye, the game was finally starting. They got lucky with their spawn point, and after a few minutes, were able to collect some good resources and get a good start. Cole, Zane, and Nya were able to take down some of the weaker groups before they collected supplies while Jay and the others continued collecting and building up defenses.

Checking the score count, he could see there were already twenty teams down in various parts of the map, and he knew his team had been responsible for felling three of them. Jay couldn’t stop himself from smiling. It seemed like nothing could be going better.

That is, until they suffered a major blow on the southwestern flank of their territory against a high-level team- the CrownViolets, they called themselves. (Which was nowhere near as cool sounding as the Fast Chickens, Jay totally wasn’t insecure about that at all.) After a fierce fight that ended up costing them several lives- and robbing Zane of his last, taking him out of the game- they realized they couldn’t win this fight and backed down, sacrificing a sizeable chunk of their turf.

While still monitoring that boundary, they decided to primarily focus on expanding in the other direction. Their tactic seemed to be working well, and although the CrownViolets kept on encroaching on them from the boundary, the other teams weren’t backing down, and although none managed to defeat the rival team, they were certainly taking their tolls on them. Jay hoped that the other teams would eventually take the Violets out for them, although he had to admit that would be extremely lucky.

They were getting down to the last few teams in the tournament. When the top ten were remaining, special, more deadly weapons were hidden around, and with them, teams began to fight back harder. The Fast Chickens held their own, but by the time they were down to two teams remaining- them and the CrownViolets- both Jay and Lloyd had been killed and eliminated. Only Cole, Nya, and Pixal remained. The CrownViolets still had four players left, but they were weak. If the ninja were strategic enough, they could still win this.

But Pixal was a major hindrance. She had been plenty good at holding back and defending them, but now, with so few left, she was going to have to start playing a more active role. If only Kai had still been there.

“Alright, they’re somewhere around here.” Nya’s character pulled up her radar. “There seems to be two of them right up ahead-”

“Alright, Pixal.” Jay leaned over her shoulder, coaching her. “You’re going to have to start getting offensive. Nya says there’s only two, so there shouldn’t be a problem, but there could be an ambush, or these two could have higher health. We don’t want to take any chances. While Nya and Cole rush them, you should stay back and shoot at them with your launchers. Your character has good accuracy scores.”

There was a flash of purple, and muffled shouting, and Nya froze. “There they are! Let’s get them, guys!”

The three plunged into the fight, and although it was a tough battle, their opponents were relatively low on health, and they ended up eliminating the two CrownViolets- unfortunately, with the loss of Nya before doing so.

“It’s just the two of us left, Pixal,” Cole said, “but there’s also only two of them, as well. We can do this. Just stick close to me. They’re around here somewhere.”

“And that somewhere is here!” Pixal shrieked suddenly, whirling around.

Cole’s eyes widened. “One of their teammates must’ve sent out a distress signal before they died!” He grappled for his weapon, but in his haste, his grip was sloppy.

Pixal, however, barely hesitated, diving at their opponent and attacking in a flurry of blows. Jay’s eyes nearly bulged out of his head as she performed a complex combo it had taken him a full day to learn.

Zane smiled at all their gaping mouths. “I told you to have faith in her.”

Cole was evidently shocked too, and within a few moments, he was dead- although not before delivering a nearly fatal blow to his opponent. Pixal quickly finished him off before turning to face the last remaining player.

“Be careful, Pix,” Jay warned. “She still has pretty high health. Don’t get cocky, or take dumb risks.”

“Dumb risks are your thing,” Pixal corrected, not even batting an eye as she darted past her opponent, slashing her with her sword.

The CrownViolet wasn’t giving up, though. She pushed back, throwing down a smoke bomb and suddenly pushing Pixal down from behind. Pixal rolled out of the way, missing her sword by inches, and sprung up, taking the moment of surprise to her advantage to knock her opponent down. As the rival started crawling away, Pixal’s character took a potion, powering up a special move. The opponent knocked her down as she was waiting to power up, but before she could get a good attack in, Pixal was ready and was blasting her a beam of light.

The girl’s avatar fell to the ground, dead.

There was a beat of silence, then their living room erupted in cheers.

“Pixal! You did it! You won the game for us!”

“I can’t believe it! We actually won! Without Kai!”

“Hey,” Kai yelped. “That didn’t sound like it was meant to be a compliment.”

“What do you mean,” Lloyd said. “That was totally a super nice thing I just said about you.”

Kai narrowed his eyes. “A bit backhanded, don’t you think?”

“Guys, none of that is important!” Cole cried. “We won! Out of all the gamers in the city! We actually won!”

“But I have to know,” Jay insisted. “How did you get so good at the game?”

Pixal shrugged. “I guess you pick up a thing or two watching your team play a game obsessively for the past week.”

Jay blinked. “You’ve been watching us?”

She scowled. “I’ve been doing the chores in here, lightning brain! Repairs, laundry, picking up after you- you’ve just been too obsessed by your game to even notice me!”

“Oh, really? Uh, that’s my bad…”

“Speaking of which, you promised to do my chores, and I’m looking forward to a nice, relaxing evening off.”

“Did I?” Jay laughed nervously. “Hey, did I ever mention that the tournament winners get a cash prize-”

Pixal handed him a mop. “Nice try. Although I still expect my fair share of the earnings by the end of the week. Good luck.” The ninja just gazed at her in horror, and she laughed.

“You’re going to need it.”

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cerastes · 3 years

Note

May I request a review of general coolness and awesome of the horses we saw during the event?

Right, Maria Nearl event!

I liked the event quite a lot, though I do feel like it dropped the ball at the end. That aside, I had a lot of fun the entire time!

First of all, the cast was wonderful. Maria is explicitly not a powerful or skilled fighter to any degree that matters in the frame of strength the story takes place in, being definitely more skilled than the average person and even the average nameless knight, but being woefully outclassed by practically anyone that has a name in the Major. A humble mechanic with a heart drenched in justice, Maria doesn’t even like to fight, and adheres to a knightly ideal and a duty she must fulfill instead to justify her participation in these commercialized bloodsports, which carries the narrative. She is joined by a lovable cast of rambunctious family and family friends, who serve as her mentors and support: Her aunt, who is more akin to an older sister-slash-maternal figure, Zofia, who we are immediately shown is so close to Maria that the moment Maria made a big decision (the participation in the Major) without confirming with Zofia first, she immediately chastised her, wondering why she did not consult with her beforehand. Aunt Zofia is her aunt only due to technicality, as she’s a lady-in-waiting (or, in other words, belongs to a branch family of the Nearl clan, and is actually only 5 years older than Maria) and, more importantly, a decorated, retired competition knight who earned enough in her career that she can live comfortably for the rest of her life, ironically far outstripping the main Nearl house in terms of wealth. There’s also Kowal, an old Ursus mechanic, engineer and smith who mentors Maria in the ways of the wrench, willing to pass his workshop to Maria with her as his successor any day of the week, who himself also used to be a squire to V, an old, retired knight of old who served as Grandpa Nearl’s peerless sharpshooter and who trained Zofia back in the day. Finally, we have Old Marcin, owner of the cast’s favorite hangout, a little bar where he and Maria mediate the infinite squabbles, fights, and arguments that Kowal, V, and occasionally Zofia spark between one another. The event does a great work of introducing the dynamic between these five characters as something extremely domestic and comfortable: You can tell these five are tight and that they have spent a long time together. It’s just another day in their low profile lives when, suddenly, Maria dons Margaret’s old armor and decides to take arms for the main Nearl house, which is currently on the brink of ruin and about to lose its knighthood and nobility titles.

And this decision, and everything this decision means, informs everything that happens afterwards: Zofia tells Maria that if she’s worried about being left homeless, then that’s just foolishness, since Zofia is absolutely 100% ok with Maria moving in with her. She’s loaded. They can live comfortably for the rest of their lives without a concern. Kowal, likewise, insists that Maria is a good enough mechanic that she can earn a living by doing that. But, see, it’s not about a livelihood for Maria, it’s about preserving that for which Margaret and Grandpa Nearl fought and stood for, it’s never about the wealth, it’s about the name, the principle, not the glory, the weight of ideals that blood was shed to nourish and maintain. Maria is not even sure if she’s doing the right thing, but she’s got to do something. Why? Look no further than Uncle Mlynar. A bitter man, a corporate slave, spitting bile at her niece and apologies at his bosses. And the fact that it is very clear that this guy can kick some serious ass -- we never see him without his trusty blade hanging on his hip and, at the end, tells Margaret to square the hell up -- makes it all the sadder: In any other context, Mlynar might be a knight’s knight, hell, Margaret herself says she respects him still, but the Mlynar we see now is an unimportant cog in the capitalist system, just another grunt apologizing to his phone every time his lips part, who gets in hot water just by making small talk because, whoops, your workload accumulated again, better get chop chopping. Mlynar is a very telling character, because he represents everything Maria resents about the current state of the Nearl family: Disgraced, meaningless, existing as an extension of other bigger conglomerates. He is what she wishes to never become, and what the Nearl house cannot be any longer, if she has any saying on the matter.

Maria is not a good fighter. This is important and delightful, because she wins not due to aptitude, strength, or experience, she instead uses her knowledge as a mechanic, her “pegasian sight” (what Grandpa uses to refer to Maria’s incredibly powerful investigative faculties, being able to analyze situations and catch even the smallest details quickly) and the sheer heft of her brass pair of metaphorical horse balls to pull through with clutch victory after clutch victory. Zofia trying to cram as much fundamentals as she can on Maria in as little time as possible so she can survive also helps a lot.

Maria’s victories earn her the possibility of sponsorships, which would, superficially, fix her problems: The main Nearl house would retain status, she’d get a Title, and she would not have to fight anymore. But, see, this is not the point of Maria’s fight. One might say “Maria should’ve just taken the sponsorships”, but that’s not the point of Maria’s fight. She is pushing back against this highly commercialized view on “knighthood”, just like Margaret before her did. Margaret had a clear intent and her passions made her act mostly in anger, as she makes no secret: She hates Kazimierz for what it has become. Maria’s intent is less clear, even to herself, but she’s very much aiming for the same thing, but instead of Margaret’s anger, Maria has her determination. To have taken any sponsorship would have superficially kept the Nearl house afloat, but Maria is not looking to keep the house alone afloat, she’s looking to keep the house and the ideals in which it was built afloat. It goes beyond mere status.

In a world as bleak as Arknights’ and specially Kazimierz, Maria is no doubt naive to the point of frustration... But it is that which we call naive that makes a knight’s knight: Chivalry forged from ideals, sacrifice’s blunt borne from beliefs. The easy way out would’ve ultimately doomed her story, hence why she did not just move in with Zofia, hence why she did not just succeed Kowal and accept his workshop, hence why did not accept a sponsorship: It never was about that.

The very first event of the game, Grani’s Treasure, takes place in Kazimierz as well, but in the isolated outskirts, and we see hard-working, honest people, inhabitants of a nice little scenic hamlet. Now, we see what Kazimierz really looks like: A sprawling megalopolis of neon and concrete where the system shamelessly feeds on whoever sticks out their neck. The contrast couldn’t be harsher, and any hell is upheld by its demons: Czarny was a fascinating character, in that he very clearly held a lot of influence and power... And was extremely replaceable. The moment he messed up badly enough, he was instantly replaced by just whoever the hell picked up the phone next. It’s chilling. One puppet performed poorly? Irrelevant, there’s an endless supply who’ll take his place, provided enough fear and funds. Fear and money. The two currencies of Kazimierz. When a shadow council can just appoint you as the next Spokesman just on basis of you having picked up a phone without any real background check beyond “the previous Spokesman likely intended for this next sack of meat to pick up his phone in case he messed up”, well, congratulations, you’ve crafted a terrifying capitalist hellscape. No wonder Margaret hates Kazimierz so much, given the rot brewing in its underbelly and upper echelons.

And to all this, I have to say: It’s lovely. I loved the world building, implicit and explicit, I loved the cast, I love the themes explored and how characters were used to juxtapose these.

I feel it kinda drops the ball at the end by just... Not having a conclusion? It just sort of ends, which is very weird because events tend to be good at concluding themselves. I assumed we’d get some post-Challenge stages cutscenes to tie everything up like in the past but... No, not really, it didn’t happen. Margaret swoops in, the sisters perform the Ultimate Kamehameha on the Sarkazian Knights, and then it sort of ends one brief talk later. It needed a bigger epilogue, for sure. But this doesn’t ruin the event or anything, just a bit of a weak ending, everything else is still delightful and I loved it very much.

So yeah! The horses sure were wonderful!

#whiskas does stuff #arknights #maria nearl #arknights lore post

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somnambulants · 3 years

Text

see where you’ve been

summary: Natasha is a tease and she likes to see you flustered. 18+ word count: 1.6K.

Spending time with Natasha is the best and worst thing in the entire world.

The best because she’s the single most interesting person you’ve ever met and any time you spend in her presence feels like the ultimate gift.

(You may be slightly biased, considering your overwhelmingly large and borderline schoolgirl-esque crush on her but that was another matter entirely and one you’d firmly decided you were not going to be addressing any time soon)

But, while you coveted every second spent with her like a kid would covet candy, it could also be the worst at certain times.

Times like now.

With her pressed up so close to you that there’s not not even an inch of space between you.

Usually you’d be face down on the mat as she dug a knee into your spine by now.

This is the first time you’ve been able to pin her down and it was almost entirely by accident.

So it’s probably not surprising that you freeze up but it doesn’t make it any less mortifying.

“Okay good….You would probably make a move on the target now, though,” she teases lightly after a second of you just gaping down at her. “Not just grope them.”

Letting her go, you swallow roughly, heat crawling up your neck as you realise your hands are on her chest. God. “R-right. Sorry.”

She winks at you playfully. “Not that I mind.”

You squeak, lips moving soundlessly as you try desperately to think of something to say and come up empty.

The only other occupant of the room -- thank god, you don’t know what you’d do if all the avengers had witnessed this -- Clint makes no attempt to hide his snicker as he does a set of pull-ups in the corner.

As you scramble off her, she gives you a small, slightly amused smile and accepts the hand you hold out to help her up.

You make your excuses and book it out of there the second trainings over.

And If you take a longer than normal shower that night, definitely not doing what you’d normally do in the shower well, then, no one else has to know about it but you.

Still, you know you’re going to have a hard time meeting Natasha’s eyes tomorrow.

And you definitely do. Have a hard time meeting her eyes, that is.

You don’t know how but you somehow make it through your whole workout without once looking her in the eyes.

If you had looked though, you would have seen the speculative, knowing look in her eyes as she watched you fumble your way through training.

And then throughout the rest of the week, too.

And the week after that too.

Of course, you’re no expert in body language, but if you had just looked properly, you would have clearly been able to tell that she was planning something.

And something devious, at that.

The universe hates you. So hates you. Thats all you can think.

You really must have accumulated some major karma to have deserved this.

It’s like Natasha’s taken your normal workouts and upped them by three hundred in their intensity.

You’d thought you’d been a pretty decent fighter before this but you’re quickly realising she’s been going easy on you this entire time.

And it’s also like she knows how much her touch affects you because all of a sudden she’s always touching you.

Every-time she takes you down, her hands are on you. Lingering.

Every. single. time.

You’ve had so many cold showers over the last month, you’re surprised you haven’t picked up hypothermia.

In short, as time passes it just gets worse and worse until eventually you’re just a human ball of tension.

Like an elastic band that’s been pulled too far.

And even though you don’t realise it yet, it’s about to snap.

You yelp as she throws you down again, shoving you onto the floor and leaning down, pinning you there so you’re forced to just look straight up at her.

No matter how hard you struggle, she’s firm, holding you down, and pressing her knee against your stomach as she leans in closer.

Your heart picks up even more, rabbit fast.

“I thought I taught you better than that,” she teases you, making the hair on the back of your neck stand up as you feel her lips brush slightly against the curve of your ear.

You then let out an audible squeak as she lets you go, pulling away with this look on her face you can’t quite decipher.

You must imagine it but for a second you swear that as she goes to move off you, she grinds her hips down against your own ever so slightly.

And all of a sudden, all you can think about is her doing that. All the time. Sans the workout gear she’s currently wearing and on a much nicer, softer surface.

Like a bed.

She’s going to be the death of you. You just know it.

You feel flushed, trembling a little. If you looked at yourself in the mirror right now you’re sure you wouldn't even be able to see your irises from how dilated your pupils must be.

There are times you swear she must know how she affects you. She’s literally trained to pick up on every single thing; there’s no way she couldn’t see your pathetically obvious attraction to her.

Sometimes you’ve thought that maybe she’s just being nice and politely ignoring it, others you’re not so sure.

Other times you think she knows and she likes it.

“Damn,” Natasha is chuckling, taunting you as she throws you down again less than five minutes later, her knees on either side of your waist as she holds you down, her eyes glinting with amusement. “You’re really off your game today, aren’t you?”

The elastic band snaps.

Looking up at her infuriatingly attractive face as she hovers on top of you, victorious smirk on her lips -- god, it’s so attractive, she’s so attractive -- you just stop ...thinking.

You crash your lips to hers before you can stop yourself.

Surprisingly you don’t get punched in the face. No. What happens is much weirder.

She’s kissing you back.

"Finally,” she breathes against your lips. She’s smirking as she says it. You can feel it.

Why is she smirking?

What she says is confusing enough that it sticks in your head, even with the confused state of mess that your own mind is right now.

“I -- what?”

Natasha jerks your head toward her, pulling you into her as she kisses you again, more roughly this time.

“It took you long enough,” she pants, pulling away to breathe and ripping your shirt off you. She pulls it over your head and throws it on the floor. “I’m a little insulted, actually.”

You stare at her, hands freezing where you’d been fumbling with the zip on her jeans. “You...knew?”

“Obviously.” Natasha smirks down at you as you dig your nails into the flesh of her hips harder in response to her mocking tone. “You’re kind of slow, you know that?”

She lets out a surprised sound as you abruptly flip your positions.

Unconsciously, you must have picked something other than frustration from all these practices because she looks genuinely taken aback with you hovering over her all of a sudden.

“You could’ve said something.”

The look on her face fades away into amusement at your words. She hums a little. “I could’ve. But watching you squirm was more fun.”

With a growl, you pull back a little, forcing yourself between her thighs that she gladly parts for you, wrapping them around your waist loosely as you settle your hands on her hips, jerking her towards you as you kiss her again, nails digging into her skin.

This is where what little control you have ends.

In the next breath, she’s manoeuvred you both so that youre now flat on your back beneath her, gazing up at her as she looks down at you, chest heaving a little.

Not even bothering to pull your panties down, she just shoves them to the side as she enters you quickly with one, then two fingers.

You inhale sharply and then whine out loud as she removes her fingers completely after a couple of thrusts, snickering at your clear disappointment.

She brings them up to her mouth and you watch as she laves them with her tongue before pulling them out with a pop, moaning quietly to herself.

“Nat,” you plead, breathing heavily. “Please.”

Natasha smirks. “Well since you asked so nicely.”

Your hips buck up against her as she enters you again. Rougher than before.

With her free hand, she presses down on your throat ever so slightly: not enough that you can’t breathe but enough that it’s harder for you to suck air in between your moans.

“Oh my god,” you pant heavily, your eyes rolling back a little as you adjust to her pace, which is sharp and unrelenting and already dangerously close making you fall apart with the first few thrusts.

Her hand on your throat tightens ever so slightly as you close your eyes.

“Look at me,” she demands. “Look at me or I’ll stop.”

Struggling to obey, you train your suddenly blurry vision on her face and watch as Natasha’s lips curl in a slow, satisfied grin in response.

“Good.”

#natasha romanoff x reader

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gamerwoo · 3 years

Text

[Tales from the Pack] Seungcheol: Stubborn (Bonus)

Characters: Seungcheol x female reader

Genre/warnings: werewolf au, fantasy, fluff, smut during the second half (fingering/eating out, a lot of praise, just cheol being really soft, unprotected sex [remember to use condoms friends!!!], unintentional sorta exhibitionism?????)

Word count: 4,544

Summary: You’ve heard the stories your relatives told you about werewolves when you were younger, but you always thought it was just a scare tactic to make kids behave. Well, up until you woke up in a den full of werewolves.

a/n: this part takes place further into the future during seungkwan’s part, and since it contains spoilers for the future, i recommend skipping this and reading up to part 8 of seungkwan’s series, and then coming back when you’re done!!

Previous | Stubborn Masterlist | TftP Masterlist

Maybe it was because everyone was on-edge about Seungkwan’s condition that was rapidly decreasing. Maybe it was because everybody was still a bit shaken up over Eunjin being what she was. But something was making your old habits of being a thief kick in. You hid in shadows, snuck around the house, and came and went like the wind. Hardly anybody saw you, including your mate.

You weren’t avoiding Seungcheol, not at all. You were just uncomfortable, and that made you want to stay hidden. You assumed it was the tension in the house, but you just didn’t want to be seen, heard, or noticed. Unfortunately, this also happened to effect Seungcheol who now usually had to sniff you out or simply follow the imprinting pull.

The last couple weeks, though, Seungcheol had gotten down your typical hiding places – although, he did almost trip over you while trying to find you because you were crouched down behind the counter while you sharpened the kitchen knives for fun. Today, though, he found you upstairs in Seokmin’s room.

Seokmin was a very positive person in the pack, and all he wanted was for everybody to get along. But because things weren’t working out between Seungkwan and Eunjin and there was nothing he could do, he typically hid away in his room and kept himself busy with reading or singing to keep his mind off of it. But today, you were hanging out with him while he tried to practice his weather power since he hadn’t intentionally used it before. It was only during those nights he had nightmares when it was developing that he’d used it -- but he didn’t even know it was him doing it -- and the few days he was first coping with the situation with Seungkwan. But none of those instances were intentional, so he wanted to hone in on his new power.

“Does it change the weather in town or just in our little area?” you wondered as Seokmin stared out the window, holding his hand out palm-up as his fingers slowly curled inward. Clouds started forming in the blue sky, turning it a grey color.

“I don’t really know,” Seokmin said absentmindedly as he watched the weather start to change at his own will. He suddenly looked over at you with a warm grin. “Do you like snow?”

You frowned, shaking your head. As a thief, you only had bad memories with snow. You didn’t really have a place of your own before, so you associated snow with being cold and struggling for the next few months. Sure, it was kind of pretty, but you never actually enjoyed it.

“What, really?” he asked, surprised that you didn’t like it. “Why not?”

“I was always stuck outside in the cold,” you said with a small pout, looking away from Seokmin and at the familiar grey sky that indicated snow coming.

Seokmin just smiled, “Don’t worry, I’ll show you how to enjoy it.”

“You’re really going to make it snow?”

“Just here – I think…”

Soon enough, little snowflakes began to fall from the sky. All you could do was frown as you watched, dreading when it would start accumulating. You knew you could just come back inside when you got too cold, but it was just the bad memories that were dragging you down.

You heard a soft knock at the door before you heard it open with a very quiet creak. You didn’t even have to turn around to guess who it was.

“What’re you two doing?” Seungcheol chuckled as he walked over to where the two of you were sitting on the floor, staring up at the window.

“Making snow,” Seokmin reported, letting his hand fall into his lap as he turned to look at the alpha. “You like snow, right, Seungcheol?”

Seungcheol shrugged as he crouched down behind and between the two of you, “Yeah, it’s fun – especially seeing the rest of you run around in it.”

Seokmin turned to you excitedly, “We shift and run around outside when it snows. The pack loves it.”

You just nodded, mumbling, “Good for you.”

“_____, do you not like snow?” Seungcheol wondered.

You shook your head in exaggerated movements to really get the point across. Seungcheol just smiled in amusement, putting a warm hand in the center of your back as he stroked it with his thumb.

“You can play with us in the snow tomorrow when it accumulates on the ground,” he suggested, “and if you hate it, I’ll bring you back inside and make you soup. Okay?”

You shrugged, mumbling an, “Okay…”

Thankfully for Seokmin, he didn’t have to sit there and constantly make the weather do what he wanted. Once he got it going, he didn’t have to do anything else until he wanted it to stop.

“C’mon,” Seungcheol stood before he helped you up, “I need to get food in you.”

“Are Mingyu and Danbi back from Jiung’s?” Seokmin wondered.

“You just want to play with Jiwoo,” he chuckled. “Yeah, they’re back.”

“Finally!” Seokmin grinned, hopping up from the floor.

The next morning, you were awoken by the sound of howling and excited yipping. You groaned and rolled onto your other side, burying your face in your pillow to drown it out. You felt Seungcheol’s arms encircle you and pull you to his chest, pressing a soft kiss to the crown of your head.

But then you heard Yeji from downstairs shriek excitedly, “There’s snow everywhere!”

Your eyes opened, staying narrowed. You were definitely awake now.

“Guess the pack saw Seokmin’s little surprise,” Seungcheol said, his voice raspy and deep from sleeping.

Everyone had obviously noticed the snow falling the day prior, but about a foot or two had accumulated quickly on the ground around the house. A few of the wolves had already run outside to play, but apparently some people had just woken up and noticed – and by some people, you meant your overly-excited sister.

Soon enough, you heard feet bolting down the hall before throwing open your bedroom door.

“Seungcheol!” Mingyu was panting. “Seokmin made it snow yesterday, and look outside!”

“I didn’t realize snow on the ground meant everyone forgot how to knock,” Seungcheol said as he sat up and stretched his arms above his head.

Mingyu blushed a bit even though he knew he wasn’t interrupting anything, “Sorry. Are you gonna come outside?”

“In a bit. Let me bundle up _____.”

“_____, we can have a snowball fight!” Mingyu gasped excitedly. “I bet you’ll be really good at it.”

You rolled over, looking up at Seungcheol, “Is that the thing kids do?”

Seungcheol chuckled, nodding his head, “Yes. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re all just very big children.”

After being put in five sweaters, two pairs of pants – one pair being yours and the other being Seungcheol’s just because he thought they might somehow be better for you – and a hat, Seungcheol brought you outside with him while he wore just a sweater and a pair of pants. You looked up at the sky, scrunching your face as snow hit your skin. Seungcheol chuckled as he watched, taking note of how beautiful you looked with fresh snow falling into your hair.

The entire pack was out in the yard, even little Jiwoo who was bundled up in multiple blankets and was being held on Minghao’s hip while her father was enjoying the snow. Most of the boys were in their wolf forms, running around, rolling in it, or trying to catch snowflakes in their mouths. Mingyu was rolling a ball of snow with his muzzle while he helped Danbi make a snowman. Minghao was softly talking to Jiwoo about how pretty the snow was as her large eyes looked around in wonder, it being the first time the young child had seen the white, fluffy stuff. Those of the pack in their human form were tossing snowballs at each other and others while they laughed loudly.

The only person who wasn’t playing in the snow – that you could see – was Joshua. He just said the last thing he wanted was to be pelted with cold things. You couldn’t say you disagreed with Josh.

“How is this fun?” you grumbled, looking back at Seungcheol as you blinked snowflakes off your eyelashes.

“Well just staring at it isn’t fun,” he told you. “Go make a snowman or a snow angel or–”

“_____!” you heard Chan call. You turned your head just in time to catch a snowball to the chest. You froze, staring at the same spot while the youngest giggled. “Come play with us!”

“Ah, maybe after she gets used to the snow, Chan,” Seungcheol told him pointedly as he grabbed your arms and pulled you over to where Wonwoo and Danbi were now making snow angels together. “Why don’t you stay with Wonwoo while I go get changed. He’ll make sure you don’t get hit with anything.”

Wonwoo nodded up at you from where he was squatting down on the ground, not even looking as he put up a hand to block the stray snowball coming his way. As soon as it splattered against the side of his arm, he let it down and looked back down at his sister on the ground.

“See? You’re in good hands,” Seungcheol grinned as he pressed a kiss to your temple before he went back into the house.

Mingyu, who was watching the siblings make snow angels, pressed his snow-covered nose against your cheek as he sniffed your face. Even that made you make a face and recoil away from him, shoving his furry face away.

“So,” Danbi sat up with snow in her hair, “you really have never played in the snow?”

Wonwoo chuckled at his sister as he began to brush the snow from her hair, saying, “Not everybody likes snow, Danbi. Lilly was allergic.”

You furrowed your eyebrows, “How can somebody be allergic?”

“I believe the doctor in town called it cold urticaria.”

“Excuse me?”

Wonwoo just laughed softly, shaking his head.

Seungcheol came back outside quickly, but he was in his wolf form this time. He ran up to you and nuzzled into your hair happily, excited to be able to play outside with his brothers. You couldn’t help but laugh at how happy he was, but it stopped when he moved his nose to nudge you in the side, moving you closer to the chaos of the pack.

“Whoa, what?” you asked as your legs were forced to move forward. “Seungcheol, I didn’t agree to this!”

Still, your mate continued to move your forward so you could properly experience the snow. Of course, the pack noticed this and started to get even more excited. Soonyoung bounded over to you, skidding to a stop and kicking up snow.

The first thing Seungcheol tried to get you to try was making a snowman. He started by poking a snowball on the ground with his nose, nudging it around until it started to roll into a bigger ball. He looked up at you expectantly before he gestured to the growing ball with his head.

You huffed, “Seungcheol this shit is cold. I don’t want to touch it.”

He let out a huff of his own before pointing at the ball sharply with his nose.

You grumbled to yourself about how you didn’t want to, but you did it anyway. You bent down and began rolling the ball around until Seungcheol decided it was big enough to be a snowman base. Then he helped you make the middle and managed to maneuver it on top of the first ball with his muzzle. Then he let you make the head and put that on as well.

Yeji had ventured into the woods earlier with Hansol and Junhui to find pebbles on the ground since the property was completely covered in snow. So she gave you a few from her pocket for eyes and buttons. Then Seungcheol trotted over with a stick in his mouth and handed it to you. You very un-enthusiastically jammed it in the poor snowman’s face. Your fingers were numb, your nose and cheeks were red, and you just wanted to go inside and curl up under some blankets.

To add insult to injury, the wolves were playing too rough with each other, and Junhui skidded straight into your snowman, knocking it over and causing its snow body to splatter on the ground. Seungcheol looked down at the dead snowman body before he growled and leaped at the younger werewolf, wrestling with him for ruining your hard work.

You wished you were the snowman.

You walked into your bedroom with a towel still between your hands as you dried your hair, damp from the snow. However, when you walked into your room, Seungcheol was in there, still without clothes on. He had shifted back downstairs while you went to go get a towel to dry your hair, and now he was digging through drawers to find new clothes for the both of you.

This wasn’t the first time seeing Seungcheol naked. You’d taken showers and baths together plenty of times. But for some reason, your cheeks were heating up – and not just because you had been playing out in the snow.

You walked over to your mate – you knew he could hear you enter – and wrapped your arms around his waist, pressing your nose into his back to warm it while your hands clung to his toned stomach, making him shiver from how cold they felt.

“I feel like an ice cube,” you whined.

“Yeah, you do,” he chuckled. “Do you want me to warm you up?”

You nodded, your nose rubbing against his back. Except, you were thinking of other means of warming up than he was. Most of the pack was still playing outside anyway.

“Alright, let me just find some–”

“Seungcheol?” when you spoke this time, your voice was a lot smaller than it had been.

“Hmm?”

“Y-you don’t have to, like…put clothes on if, y’know…this is more comfortable…”

Seungcheol laughed softly, turning in your arms to face you. He cupped your face between his hands, eyebrows raised, “Is this your way of telling me you want to do something?”

You’d done things with Seungcheol before, sure. But you’d never actually had ‘proper’ sex with him before. It wasn’t that you were scared or didn’t know how, you just always felt a little uncomfortable knowing that the rest of the pack would be able to hear you. But now that they were all preoccupied outside…

You nodded, “I’m cold, it’s for my health.”

“_____, you’re not going to get hypothermia,” he laughed, rolling his eyes playfully. “What do you want me to do?”

“Well…” you began slowly, trying to ignore the heat that was now crawling to the tip of your ears, “I-I think I’m ready for marking.”

Seungcheol’s eyes widened, though he looked more surprised than afraid. The statement just took him off guard. You’d never even mentioned marking other than when you asked about how it worked and if the pain was bad, but you hadn’t mentioned it in a while.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his hands stroking up and down your arms. “You don’t need to feel pressured or anything.”

“Seungcheol, I really want to,” you insisted. “I love you and I want to be yours.”

“You are mine, with or without a mark,” he promised, a soft smile on his face as he placed the bend of his finger under your chin. “Look at Danbi and Mingyu – she wasn’t marked for a long time.”

“I promise, Cheol, I’m asking because I want it.”

Seungcheol nodded, “Okay. Then I’d be more than happy to mark you as mine.”

He smiled as he leaned down to press his lips to yours, softly and playfully at first but slowly growing in intensity and desperation. Your back hit the mattress, making both of you giggle as he toppled down on top of you, making sure to catch himself with his hands as to not actually crush you. But still, his lips never left yours.

“Guess it’s a good thing you don’t have all those layers on anymore,” he chuckled against your lips, one of his thumbs stroking your cheek that was still flushed from the cold.

Seungcheol sat up just enough to pull your shirt off over your head. He let his eyes scan over your body, a warm grumble resonating in his chest as his hands wandered over your soft skin, “You’re so beautiful, you know that?”

“Only because you never stop telling me,” you laughed softly, rolling your eyes.

“And I’ll never stop telling you,” he insisted before he was leaning down again to meet your lips.

His lips moved feverishly against yours like he couldn’t get enough of you. One hand cupped your cheek while the other held him up, his tongue pushing passed your lips to explore your mouth. Your arms were around him, fingers tangled in his hair to keep him as close as possible.

Seungcheol’s lips began to trail downward, leaving open-mouthed kisses down your neck, nipping and sucking on your skin on their way. His hands moved to take your bra off, unclipping it behind you before sliding the straps down. That was tossed off the side of the bed, Seungcheol not even paying attention to where he threw it.

His lips went to one of your nipples, one hand massaging the other and brushing your nipple with his thumb. You moaned out his name softly, arching your chest up as your eyes fluttered closed. His tongue flicked over the hardening bud, looking up at you as he did so to watch every little movement from your face.

Seungcheol’s mouth continued its decent, his hands also moving downward to pull off your bottoms and underwear. You lifted your hips to help, and then he tossed those off the bed to join your bra on the floor.

Now, Seungcheol was laid down on his stomach between your thighs, pushing your legs open to make room for him. Seungcheol had seen you like this before already but it didn’t stop the heat rushing to your cheeks or the urge to close your legs and hide from his eyes that were locked on your heat as the yellow began to dot red.

“So beautiful…” he whispered, brushing his index finger through your folds before teasing your slit.

You whimpered softly, covering your face from embarrassment.

Seungcheol chuckled seeing your expression, dipping his head closer to you, “You’re cute when you’re shy.”

You felt his tongue lick a stripe from your slit to your clit, and you bit your lip to keep from moaning. Your hands went to his dark hair as his lips wrapped around your clit and sucked lightly, flicking his tongue over the bundle of nerves. You already knew what Seungcheol’s tongue was capable of, and yet, it still took you by surprise.

“Don’t keep in those noises, baby,” Seungcheol cooed as he teased his finger at your entrance again. He slowly slid it in, smirking a little at the way you said his name in a quiet moan. “The pack is outside and they’re not paying any attention – nobody will hear you.”

He began pumping his finger slowly, curling it to reach all the spots he’d learned you liked while his lips and tongue worked on your clit. You let out a moan that was a little louder this time, your hips starting to grind up into Seungcheol.

He added a second finger, curling them the same way as he pressed his tongue flat against your clit and let you grind against his face, growling softly as your hands tugged at his hair. He started scissoring his fingers in you, stretching you out for what was to come once he decided you were prepped enough. For now, he just wanted to enjoy the soft moans and mewls that fell from your lips.

You felt a knot starting to tighten in your lower abdomen, so you started rocking your hips faster. Seungcheol noticed the signs of your incoming release – your hips speeding up, the way your eyebrows knitted together, the way your whines started to get higher – and removed his fingers, sitting up and away from you. Had you not known Seungcheol planned on giving you exactly what you wanted very soon, you would’ve never let him hear the end of your complaining.

You watched as Seungcheol stuck his two fingers in his mouth, lapping up your juices as he smirked at you with red eyes, “You taste so sweet, princess.”

“Cheol…” you whined, covering your face with your arms.

He just chuckled, leaning down above you to move your limbs away from your face, pressing a kiss to your lips. He kissed you softly for a moment as to try to get rid of any nervousness you might’ve had before he gripped his member, stroking it a few times to get it fully hard before he was teasing your folds with the tip. He smirked at the way your hips wiggled and bucked up slightly.

He pulled back just enough to look at you, all of the playfulness melting away, “Are you ready?”

You nodded, moving your hands to grip his shoulders.

“Just tell me if you want to stop, okay?”

You nodded again, so Seungcheol lined himself up with your entrance. Then he was slowly pushing into you, letting out a soft groan and an even softer “fuck” as his head dropped into your neck. Your fingers dug into his shoulders as he stretched you out, your eyes squeezing closed. It definitely hurt a little but but not enough for you to want him to stop.

Once he was completely inside, he stilled, his lips brushing across your neck in small kisses to help you relax. When you finally gave him the okay, he moved at a slow pace, trying to make sure you weren’t uncomfortable in any way. You’d done other intimate stuff but he’d never been inside you – and he knew you’d never had sex before – so he didn’t want to hurt you. He was even honored you trusted him with this.

“You’re doing so well, baby,” he hummed, capturing your lips in a sweet kiss as his hips continued to rock at a steady pace.

You let out a quiet moan at his praise, your arms wrapping around his neck to keep him close to you. He smiled against your lips, the happy grumble in his chest vibrating against yours. One of his hands moved down your body, raising goosebumps until he reached your clit. His fingers worked circles into it, drawing soft mewls from you that were music to his ears.

“Do you feel okay?” he asked quietly.

You nodded, biting your lip softly. The pain had slowly gone away, leaving you with only pleasure that was slowly building the knot in your stomach back up. The look you gave him with your eyebrows knitting together in pleasure but your eyes almost begging him to do more was enough to almost send him over the edge, especially with how amazing you felt around him.

“You’re so pretty,” he whispered, using his thumb to gently tug your bottom lip from between your teeth. “My beautiful little mate.”

He sat up as his own orgasm began to approach, determined to get you to cum before he did. He knew it would distract from the pain of marking and that was his biggest priority. Seungcheol wanted to avoid hurting you at all costs, at least for your first time.

His fingers started moving quicker as he started aiming his thrusts into a new spot, making you moan out his name and grip the sheets beneath you.

“You’re doing so good for me, baby,” he moaned, his dark bangs sticking to his forehead with sweat. “Fuck… You take me so well; you’re so amazing.”

Your orgasm started to approach a lot faster than you thought it would, your moans and whimpers growing louder and more needy. Seungcheol could tell you were getting close from the way you clenched around him, but he couldn’t have you cumming just yet.

Seungcheol removed his fingers from your clit, placing both hands on your hips as he rolled his hips into yours. You whined, the quickly building high dying down a little bit because of the loss of stimulation.

“Just hold on a little longer, love,” he grunted, trying to get himself closer to his own high. His eyes closed as his head dropped back, the sight of his toned body shining from the light sheen of sweat on his body making him look godlike. “You feel so amazing, I’m almost there…”

Your high was still building with every thrust of Seungcheol’s hips, though. You pulled him back down to you, trying to distract yourself by leaving little kisses and love bites along the column of his neck and across his collarbones. Seungcheol groaned at the feeling, his hips suddenly sharply thrusting forward into you. With the burn of your orgasm approaching, you bit on Seungcheol’s shoulder – not enough to break skin or anything – to hold yourself back, clenching around him.

That was enough to tip him over the edge, one hand going back down to your clit and rubbing into it quickly. Your eyes squeezed shut as your body tensed with your orgasm.

“Let go, baby,” he said softly, but his voice was a growl.

It hit you harder than any other high you’d had, but it was the second wave that really got you. It came with a sudden sharpness in the crook of your neck, but it had you crying out Seungcheol’s name as your toes curled and your thighs locked around his hips. It felt amazing.

After riding out both of your highs, Seungcheol took his teeth out of you and dragged his tongue across the wound to help it heal. You whimpered at the feeling of him pulling out of you, his release and yours dripping slowly down your thighs.

“It didn’t hurt too much, did it?” he wondered.

“No,” you sighed, letting your fingers drag through Seungcheol’s dark hair. You smiled up at him softly when he pulled away to look at your face. “I love you.”

He grinned, bumping your nose with his own, “I love you, too. Thanks for letting me do this – it means so much to me.”

Your sweet moment was cut off by a knock at the door, which had Seungcheol’s head whipping around to look at the door.

“I want you guys to know,” Joshua’s voice came from the other side, “that I didn’t go outside, and I heard everything. Also, you’re lucky Seungkwan’s on his deathbed or you’d have two disgusted wolves here.”

Your face turned completely red as you hid in Seungcheol’s neck while he laughed at you.

“You said nobody could hear!” you whined.

“Yeah, well,” he shrugged, not seeming to care if his brother heard or not, “I guess I forgot about Josh.”

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