I think you're either team ghost x civilian wife! reader where the rest of the 141 have no idea you exist or team they know and it's a very familial like and I'm the first one
simon who does everything he can to keep you his secret, even more so when your family starts to grow. when he's finished with a mission he will spend the next 48hrs barely sleeping, moving around to make sure no one is on his tail before making it home into your arms.
it's not that he doesn't trust the 141, but you and your family are far too precious to trust anyone with. you've heard the stories of all of the other men, are sure you would need only one look at them to be able to guess which man belongs to the many names he's told you over the years, but you're aware they don't know that you exist.
that on the rare nights simon ventures out to meet them for a sole pint between missions they think he's holed up in some bachelor flat back in manchester, perhaps with a string of women that come and go, but they couldn't be more wrong with his wedding band hidden under his gloves when he's home like now or safely in his drawer at home when he's on missions.
and it's not that he doesn't wish he could shout about you from the rooftops. everyone in your town knows that the big scary man whose face is always conveniently hidden in the shadows has a missus at home who brings your chubby babies to the toddlers and drops your kids off at school.
but the 141 don't know about you, not until enough time has passed since simon retired to consider it safe enough. simon with his aching joints and trembling hands, the ringing in his right ear and back pain that requires at least two, hour long soaks in the bath a week. simon the husband and dad who has butterfly clips in his hair and at least one nail painted from the game of hairdressers his oldest likes to play, a bright pink plaster on his knee to match the youngest, and one hand on your belly at all times with the third (and final in your opinion but simon is working on that) of your brood.
simon who is out for drinks with the 141 three years after retirement and slips and says something about moving house and the hassle, the rest of the men deciding they will help and so simon decides it's finally time. but he doesn't forewarn them about his family before the day, standing in the garden of your packed up house that your family has outgrown while the men stumble out of the van they hired only to stop dead in their tracks when they see you.
you who is waving in the doorway, a toddler on your hip and looking like you're about to pop while another child - maybe six or seven by their guesses - swings from simon's arm, with a dog jumping up paws on his chest. and like the man he is he doesn't explain, just jerks his chin towards the piles of boxes and empty moving van he's started to pack.
"think you can start making a move on that?"
a few hours later and still no explanation from simon, he's in the first van packed with all the furniture and bigger boxes with you and the kids and the guys follow behind, slack jawed and still confused as they stay speechless until they pull up at the new house.
they're still staring at you as you pile out of the first van and you're shaking your head, elbowing simon in the ribs and muttering a "put them out their misery, Si" and they swear they almost drop dead when they see how gently he handles you, an arm around your waist and a kiss to your temple as he guides you and the two gremlins towards the guys while the dog starts sniffing around its new home.
"fellas, this is the missus and kids," he says and you roll your eyes, holding out your hand towards them and introducing yourself by name, adding on the kids who beam up shyly at these strangers.
that seems to shake them out of it. john takes your hand first, shaking and turning to simon with a "you hide her away in case we try to steal her from you?" he winks and you and only grins wider when simon's hand on your hip seems to squeeze tighter. gaz and soap are bending down and coaxing your two girls out of their shyness, complimenting their light up trainers and asking if it makes them run faster before cheering them on as they run to the front door and back.
they set you up on a fold out chair and do all the heavy lifting as you point them and the boxes in their arms to their correct rooms. later, Simon treats them to dinner (a takeaway) and has you sitting on his knee with the girls in bed and for the first time he spends a night with the guys telling you stories of Simon "Ghost" Riley.
"they're lyin' love," he'll mumble in your ear at every story, "don't believe them do ya?" his hand strokes up your back, squeezing your neck.
"yeah, babe, believe you," you say while smiling at the men around your new dining room table, men who have saved your husbands life more times than he can count, and you find yourself curling closer to simon because of that
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The Proposal
This mini fic was inspired by the anon prompt to @faeriekit linked here and all the development that Faeriekit did for the idea. This fic is perilously regional. I half expect angry yelling from other areas of the Midwest.
Original post
Word count: 2718
Masterpost of my Archive Down Fics is here.
Jason came to with cream cheese stuck under his fingernails and in the creases of his fingers. He looked around the room wildly, trying to understand the situation he was in. The kitchen smelled fucking weird. He sniffed the air. Meat? Like, ham and also vinegar?
He washed his hands really well, grimacing at the greasy texture. Then he reconstructed what must have happened by the debris. This was not his first post-blackout rodeo, but usually he was reconstructing a literal crime scene.
There was an empty pickle jar on the countertop. There were packets of deli meat in the trash.
There was some kind of abomination on his nicest plate, which was obviously made of cream cheese wrapped around pickles, blanketed by the meat, and sliced thin like sushi rolls. It was lovingly protected by a perfect sheet of cling wrap.
“The fuck?” Jason said, a little scared and pissed off.
He paced the kitchen for a while and then went to pace on the balcony, because he needed a smoke to process this culinary abomination but something in his gut wailed at the tragedy of ruining it with cigarette smoke. Which was absurd, partly because the plate was in the refrigerator. He sensed in his bones that it needed to cool until the cream cheese was as hard as it would get, so that he could safely transport it. Transport it fucking where? Was this an assassination attempt against Batman? That sappy motherfucker was probably the only man in the world who would choke that down to make Jason happy.
He had a long drag on his cigarette and tried to ignore the way his fingers shook.
“Okay,” he said, squeezing his free hand shut and opening it. Maybe stimming would prompt his brain to go brr and explain this. “Did I have a stroke? Maybe I was possessed?”
It was hard to tell. He ground out his cigarette and tossed the butt in the tray before venturing back inside. He was calm. He was more centered. He flicked on the kitchen fan to clear out the pickle stink and then he went and put on his coat and grabbed the plate.
Why was he doing that?
The compulsion led him three blocks before he realized where he was going.
Not far away from the safehouse he was in, some college freshman had wasted the Joker when the clown tried to drag him into a van. He had called the police, crying the whole time in shock about being a murderer.
Jason had not been on the scene. He had only heard through comms. He had been out of town when the Joker got out. He had been rushing back on his bike, heart pounding and sick with nerves at the thought of his family out there without him.
And then the fucker had failed to secure the first victim for whatever sick play he’d had in mind, and the poor out of town kid who had apparently never heard of the Joker was breathing a sigh of relief that ‘oh, this wasn’t like, a birthday clown? Whew, that’s alright then,’ previous guilt over ending a life all gone.
Jason liked that. It was hugely undignified that the Joker had been got by someone who didn’t even know who he was. If he’d known, it would have killed his ego. As it was, Jason had laughed himself nearly sick before barricading himself inside to read the file Timmers put together on Danny Fenton.
Well. If his gut said that he should deliver this horrific dish to Fenton as thanks for the murder, well…
Jason grimaced. He just wouldn’t be seen doing it. If Fenton thought it was an assassination attempt and called the cops, Jason would never fess up.
He broke into Fenton’s apartment, very glad that the guy was in class at the moment. He mourned the loss of his plate but honestly, this was the least destructive black out he’d had, so it was whatever. He put the pickle rolls in the fridge, looked around, and then left. He was done. He’d thanked Fenton, or whatever (maybe he’d attacked him, honestly, Jason didn’t know how he would react to finding that trash in his fridge.)
It could end now.
The next morning, Jason scrubbed away a yawn and realized that he had just scraped a mess of chopped snickers bars into a bowl that already had clouds of something white and -
He took out a piece and bit into it to confirm that it was perfectly cubed green apple.
“I am possessed,” Jason said in horror, looking around the counter to see what the Pit Madness had cooked up this time. Why did the fucking Lazarus Pit know these recipes?
The white shit was a mix of cool whip and vanilla pudding, apparently. There was an untouched bottle of caramel sauce waiting innocently.
“...Does that go in?” Jason wondered, vaguely horrified.
Well, maybe an evil witch was doing this to him. Bottoms up. He poured caramel in until it felt right, guided by what had to be someone else’s goddamn ancestors, and then mixed it all up with a spoon.
This looked a lot better than the last thing. Jason scraped it into a bowl and then stole a spoonful of it to try.
“Holy shit. It’s like eating a caramel apple,” he said, muffled around the food. He swallowed and genuinely considered taking more.
Nope! His gut said nope. This was another offering for–
“Hold up, offering?” Jason put it in the fridge, clingwrap on top, and let his mind be blown. He put his face in his hands and just reeled. He was making offerings for this motherfucker now. He opened his phone, intending to search the things he’d been blackout making and froze.
His lock screen was Danny Fenton’s police intake photo, looking pretty relaxed after he'd been told the booking was a formality.
“I don’t remember doing that!” Jason frantically changed it back to his old lock screen, a grimy alleyway with a hilariously shaped filth puddle and one of his favorite rats.
He snuck this dessert thing into Fenton’s fridge, collected his clean plate with some relief, and left. He didn't know if Fenton had eaten that shit or if he'd thrown it away, but at least he'd washed the plate.
“That was the last time,” Jason told himself, pacing around his room. He wasn’t– that was two days in a row now that he had a normal day, went out on patrol, went to bed, and woke up in his kitchen. It wasn’t going to happen again.
He chainsmoked all day to such a degree that Stephanie Brown saw him, whined “Dude,” in disbelief, and jumped off a building while holding her nose to get away from him. It was a fair reaction. He had a shower before patrol so that no one could make a connection between Jason, stinkiest man in Gotham today, and the Red Hood, a guy who owned a shower.
Patrol went fine. He caught himself veering past Fenton’s shitty apartment building twice but no one was nearby enough to call him out for it.
He went to bed and got a jumpscare because at some point of his most recent fugue state he'd gone out and bought a bunch of wedding magazines and made them into a nest. He made a roar of frustration and pushed them off the bed with only a twinge of interest in what that swan centerpiece was made of.
Jason went the fuck to sleep, determined to walk this off.
He woke up the next morning in his kitchen. “Cream cheese, again,” Jason complained. He gave the bowl he was mixing a furious stir and then shoved it in the fridge.
Cream cheese, chopped meat, and chopped green onion. He searched the internet to identify the fucker. This was a cheeseball.
…He frowned, thinking of the fugly mess in the bowl.
It was the larval form of a cheeseball, he amended.
Why did he know this shitty recipe.
Stomach tight with dread, he looked up the other things. Day one was a pickle roll. Day two was snickers salad.
These were all real Midwestern potluck dishes. He hadn't made them up. Why did the pit know these recipes?
The Snickers salad offended him as a concept and he bitterly regretted finding it delicious.
“Salad,” Jason repeated in aggrieved disbelief. It was good but it was no goddamn salad. “I could just make him a real salad. Will this end if I bring Fenton good food?”
It wasn't the worst idea. He put a pin in it.
Grimly, as if he was going off to war, Jason researched how to shape the ball. If he was doing this, which apparently he was for no goddamn reason, he was going to do it to perfection. When he was done he wrapped it up tight, got an assortment of crackers, and left it at Danny Fenton’s apartment with a sort of tired resignation that this might as well be happening.
This time was different. This time, Fenton was home.
Jason barely avoided being seen by rushing out the window over the sink and hiding from the immediate line of sight. He was, however, close enough to hear–
“Holy shit, is that a cheeseball? Who loves me?” and then some truly ghastly, wet crunching as Fenton tore through the crackers and cheeseball like a wild beast. It felt like being in a horror film. Jason very badly wanted to leave. Jason very badly wanted to crawl back inside and present himself for a scrap of Fenton’s approval.
What the fuck? What the fuck!
He fled. And this time, he decided to take action. He was going get out of this sick mind trap and-
“Nothing wrong with you, it's not a curse,” Zatanna said, bored about it. “Whatever is going on is safe, sane, consensual, and none of my business.” She portalled away before Jason could argue that it did not feel sane. He was having an entirely new category of mental breakdown and when one of the Bats found out about it, he was going to be a case study.
Fine. He gritted his jaw. New plan. Maybe he could beat the curse by showing it up.
He called out of crime for the day and ignored the confused commentary in the background of his phone call– can he do that? Of course he can, he’s the friggin’ boss– and spent it furiously researching. He needed a crowning achievement. He needed to find out what was sacred in this culinary tradition, master it, and then tell the compulsion to suck on bricks.
Casserole. The answer was a casserole.
Jason scrolled through dozens of recipes, scowling fiercely. That was no good. That offended his senses. He just knew that would be bland. He-
“Do I want to make that?” Jason asked aloud, puzzled by his fixation on the old-fashioned goulash casserole recipe. Worcestershire sauce– he didn’t have that in this safe house for sure. Beef, pasta, tomatoes… yeah, okay. This was the one. For no fucking reason at all, this was the one.
He went out shopping like he usually went on life-or-death missions, full of grim purpose.
He got back and assembled his ingredients. It was not exactly a challenge to follow the recipe. Jason turned off the stove top and froze in place. “I don’t have an ancestral pan,” he said, horrified. Holy fuck. How could he dare to give it in a regular baking pan- he had to get one. Where the fuck does one acquire an ancestral casserole pan on short notice?
Panicked, he called the Manor, hands shaking as he packed the whole thing up and stuffed it in the fridge to keep it food safe until he could bake it.
Bruce answered, sounding a little choked up. “Hello, Jason, so glad-”
He hung up. He texted Tim. “I need you to steal something for me from the Manor.”
“You’re allowed in, you gigantic freak,” Tim wrote back.
Jason did some meditative breathing and resorted to outright pleading immediately. “What do you want? I will give you whatever you want. I just need an ancestral casserole pan.”
“I am NOT stealing from Alfred’s kitchen,” Tim wrote back. Which was fair. “Drake ancestral pan alright?”
Jason thought about it. It was still a family pan, sorta. By the transitive property, and that was a perfectly good property. He sent back a thumbs up, his GPS pin, and the word “Hurry.”
A while later, Tim dropped off a glass dish, loudly said “I don’t wanna know,” and slammed Jason’s door shut.
Fine. He was already moving his stuff from the now-cold frying pan into the casserole dish. It went into the oven from there. Jason spent the bake time trying to think of new coping mechanisms, because apparently smoking wasn’t up to this level of mental fuckery.
He waited out the bake time. He let it cool enough to be safe to travel with but hot enough to deliver warm. Jason grappled to Danny Fenton's apartment for the fourth time in four days, let himself in, and nearly jumped out of his boots when he realized that Fenton was in the kitchen watching him.
“Hey,” Fenton said. He was sitting on his counter in his pajamas, eating ice cream out of the bucket with a spoon. He was certifiable. Jason wanted to cross the room and kiss whatever Fenton would let him. Hands, face, feet, whatever.
Wow, weird.
“...Hey,” Jason said, way too late.
Fenton crunched down on his ice cream. “...That a casserole?” He said.
Jason nodded wordlessly, feeling very grateful that he had his hood on. He put the casserole down on the counter. He took a step backwards to flee.
Fenton pointed at Jason with the spoon, wholly unintimidated by the heavily armed man who'd broken into his house. “This is a proposal.”
Oh. Oh, motherfucking shitsocks. Jason felt weak through the knees. It was. Why was- why was he proposing??
Fenton took in his shock with a detached air. “Huh,” he said, like he'd learned something from this. “Um, it's nice of you and all. Have you been like, fixated on me for a while or- ohhh. I avenged you, didn't I?” He dropped the spoon in his ice cream carton and slapped both his palms down on the countertop. “He killed you? That sucks, man,” Fenton empathized. “I get it. I think if someone smashed the portal with a hammer I'd be down on one knee.”
Jason's brain was simply not running any program any longer. He gaped. He wasn't coherent enough to ask why Danny knew he'd been murdered by the Joker, but he had his shit together well enough to be fixated on the point.
“Um, it's not usually me being chased,” Fenton said. He made a face. “I… huh, I think I'm flattered.” He very obviously gave Jason a once-over. “I suppose this is your way of showing that you're a provider.” He heaved himself off the counter and went to investigate the casserole, sniffing and lifting the lid. “Oh, fuuuuuuck,” Danny groaned. He sniffed appreciatively. “Good demonstration of your husband material, t-b-h.”
Jason resisted the urge to tackle him to the ground.
“That's the good stuff.” Fenton closed it back up, but not before giving his ice cream spoon a considering look.
Oh, yuck. This guy was so grungly. Jason needed him badly. He shuddered.
Fenton looked at him.
Jason looked back.
“Do you wanna try moving in and see how we get on?” Fenton offered. “Take it slow, no wedding just yet.”
“Absolutely.” Jason full-body twitched with just how eager he was. “How do you feel about swans?”
“Neutral,” Danny said, after a brief moment of consideration. “I like stars, though.”
Okay, so that would be their wedding theme.
Jason only realized he'd said that aloud when Fenton's eyebrows shot up. Mortified and really wondering what was wrong with him, Jason offered a weak smile.
Fenton made a considering noise. He crossed his arms. He looked Jason up and down. “...Can you grill?” He asked. “Like, beer chicken?”
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