#there are horrors going on that you don’t know

[ceilidho]

take me home, country road

[ao3]

You have nothing on your person apart from a hastily packed suitcase and the dress you came into town wearing, on the run from trouble back home. Too bad John's missing a bride that matches your description. Or: the 1800s (mistaken) mail order bride au (chapter 16 + 17) tw: violence, injuries, and misogynistic language

first chapter >> last chapter

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Sinking into fear is the body’s natural response. You let it envelope you without putting up a struggle. It wouldn’t be one that you’d win anyway. Resistance already leaks out of you like tar, pooling around your quivering legs.  

It makes you feel lighter than air, almost buoyant; and conversely, heavier than lead. 

You can’t feel the cold metal of the gun through the layers of fabric separating it from the skin of your back, but you can feel its weight. And you can imagine it burning into you, burning a ring into the flesh, the muzzle leaving faint depressions behind, circular indents.

“Don’t feel so clever now, huh?”

Fear chokes as well as it binds. When the man you remember as Graves (appropriately named, you think, the gravity of the situation sinking into you as well) drawls the words into your ear, any moisture in your mouth dries. 

“Well?” he prompts, shoving the gun harder into your back, almost sending you toppling into the shelf still in front of you obscuring you from sight. “Got anythin’ to say?”

You open your mouth but nothing comes out.

“You a mute, girl? I know you ain’t deaf since you heard I’d been sniffin’ around lookin’ for ya. ‘Least I’m guessin’ you did, since you managed to give me the slip for the whole time I was in town.” He sniffs. “Took me a while to find out you were shacked up with the sheriff. Hiding in plain sight. Couldn’t believe I missed ya when Sheriff Price was damn near the first person I met in this two-bit town.”

You finally muster up the nerve to speak. “Y-you’re making a mistake.” 

The furled upper lip is audible in his voice. “I’d try not to piss me off too much, sugar. Lyin’ just rubs me the wrong way is all.”

“No, you—you really don’t—” 

He shoves the gun harder into your back, making you wince. “Now, I know you’re a slippery little bitch, so I’ll level with you, alright?” Graves murmurs, pitching his voice low to ensure that only you hear. “You make so much as a peep—so much as a fuckin’ whisper—and I’ll shoot. Wink and I’ll shoot. I am dyin’ for you to give me a reason to go with the better half of the dead or alive question.”

There’s no point in lying. It might’ve worked had it been anyone but the man holding you hostage; not a man as stubborn and mulish as him. You nod when he asks if you understand.

“Now get to steppin’.”

He doesn’t tarry long, leading you out of the shop with a hand on your shoulder and . You stare at Miles with mounting horror, wordlessly begging him to look up from the ledger open in front of him on the counter. Your prayers go unanswered though; he doesn’t so much as glance towards the door before it’s swinging shut behind you.

“Remember,” Graves says in a low voice as the two of you step out onto the porch, “not a word. I will shoot anyone that tries to interfere.” 

That kills the impulse to shout for help. 

The thought of letting Graves take you away without voicing so much as a single plea fills you with horror, but you can’t see any other way out. He walks you through the streets like an old friend, the pistol still wedged into your back obscured by his coat. No one seems to notice the wild look in your eyes or the strained edge of your smile. 

Your behavior infuriates you. Demural and soft and wretched. You’ve only allowed one man to put you under their thumb; only one has ever earned the right. 

The thought of your husband is an ache in your chest that doesn’t abate. It thumps with the terrified flutter of your heart. You half wonder if he’ll suddenly appear from around a bend and wrench you into his arms, gun already drawn and aimed at the man attempting to take you away from him. 

“My husband—” you start, tripping over your words. Almost tripping over a rock as well since your spine is too stiff to let you look down at the ground while you walk. “—He can—he can pay you.”

He laughs, a nasty, mocking sound. “I’m sure he’d like to, sugar. Jus' ain’t sure he’s got the cash to pay your price.”

“At least let me ask—”

At that, he jams the gun violently into the small of your back, making you wince agaun. Petrified. Sweat sluices off your brow and drips down your face. “What part of shut the fuck up don’t you get?”

That silences you. Hard to muster up the nerve to retaliate with a gun lodged against the base of your spine. Still there’s so much that bears asking. Why did he come back? Why here—why now? 

The town takes on a dull, listless quality as he steers you away from the more crowded areas. It’s almost like looking through muslin; a veil between you and the world. 

Your eyes dart from person to person as they pass by in the opposite direction, but even those that bother to meet your gaze only smile politely, a couple passing gentlemen chirping, “Morning, Mrs. Price” before sweeping by in a hurry. 

None question the wild, frantic glint in your eye, the look of a horse about to bolt. If they paid you more than a moment’s notice, they might, but even the lady who frowns curiously at Graves, his hand still resting gently on your arm as if he were an old, dear friend, abandons her momentary curiosity when her companion says something of interest, pulling her back into their conversation. The flicker of hope in your belly dies a soundless death. 

There’s something almost phantasmagorical about the entire ordeal. Almost like it isn’t quite happening, like you can’t quite make yourself believe that this is, in fact, real. Like you’re watching from outside of yourself. Though you can see the wooden facades of the nearby buildings and smell the scent of hay and manure from the livery stable, it doesn’t resonate within you as real. 

He meanders through town with you stationed in front of him. A meat shield. Collateral damage. Simply by the way he maneuvers you through the crowd, he reduces you to a body, stripping you of any semblance of personhood. You’re less than meat to him, less than human even—no more than a meal ticket. 

When you muster up the courage to open your mouth the next time someone passes you by, Graves’ hand slides up to your shoulder and he digs his fingers into the bone. A warning. 

“If you think I was kiddin’ before, just try me,” he sneers into your ear, thumb pressing into your shoulder blade until you wince. 

Again, his voice dispels any thought of getting someone’s attention. 

He doesn’t lead you towards the train station like you expect. Instead, he heads to an awning beneath the saloon on the periphery of town where a couple horses are leashed to a post, waiting for their riders to come untie them. The roof of the awning is strung with a dense cluster of overlapping cobwebs. A spider scuttles across the web and into the dark inner recesses of the canopy. 

This far from the center of town, there’s hardly anyone. When you give your surroundings a quick glance, you can’t find a single other soul within earshot, only a single man pushing open the batwing doors on his way into the saloon. Then you’re alone again. 

A tawny gelding chuffs when Graves approaches.  When he suddenly unhands you, it doesn’t click until he’s several paces away from you, running his hand down his horse’s neck and rifling through the saddlebags, emptying the contents of his coat pockets into them. You have to glance down at your shoulder just to be sure. He sheathes his gun as well, tucking it into the holster fixed to his belt. 

“Bought the horse off a drunk three towns back,” Graves explains while loading up the horse.

You don’t respond, still unsettled. It’s the first time since he led you out of the general store that his gun hasn’t been aimed at you. It wouldn’t be practical for him to dress and load the horse one handed. The sun beats down on you, burning the top of your head. This could be your moment—a moment to scream or run away.

But you don’t. You don’t scream and you don’t run because you are, above all else, a coward. Through and through. You’ve been running from your problems for months now, leaving someone else to take care of the mess you left behind. 

Fear paralyzes you; it makes you think too much or not at all. Even now, with Graves giving you the perfect opportunity to turn and run, you can’t stop thinking about the potential consequences. What if he were to shoot you? What if he were to haul you back into town and expose your sins to everyone who gathered around? What if the people in town that have come to see you as one of their own were to gather around your crumpled form and stare at you with vitriol and disgust? 

“How did you—” you start, then pause to breathe, the nausea building again. “I thought you’d left town.”

“You’d’ve liked that, huh?” 

You don’t answer that. You know better than to antagonize a man with a gun. 

He sighs when you don’t rise to the bait, almost pettish. “Wedding announcement. I saw it in the paper—by then, I’d moved on to Lexington, so it took me awhile to backtrack, but I just knew somethin’ about that bit in the paper about the sheriff’s wife hailing from the east coast didn’t sound right. Too big of a coincidence. Had to at least be sure—retrace my footsteps. Lotta money on the line, you know.”

You stare straight ahead at that. You ought to have known. 

(“In the paper. The county sheriff got hitched—of course it’d be a story.”)

“To be honest, that kinda cracked me up. Murderess marrying the county sheriff.” He snorts out a laugh, shaking his head. “Sorta thing you’d read about in a dime novel.”

A new emotion wells up within you. It simmers in your belly, hot and cold at once. Righteous fury. All this time, you’ve been betraying yourself with your silence, allowing men to read your fear as guilt. Complicit in your own ruin. 

“I’m not a murderer.”

The look he gives you is withering. “Sugar, I hate to break it to you, but you did kill a man.”

You open your mouth, but nothing comes out. Nothing ever does, it seems.  But the more you hold it in, the uglier the thought seems, until it erupts from your chest like Vesuvius, lava and tephra shooting out. 

“He deserved it,” you finally spit out, the words coming from deep in your chest. 

Graves doesn’t even pause in his ministrations, back to tightening the saddle straps. 

“He deserved it,” you repeat, spittle flying out of your mouth and landing in the dirt between the two of you. 

“That’s not somethin’ I usually concern myself with,” he finally says, looking distinctly unimpressed when he meets your stare. Bored blue eyes. 

You’re struck by the sense that your life means so little to him that the circumstances surrounding your bounty hardly merit more than a passing thought. If he could spare less, he would. 

It’s the vilest thing in the world to be regarded with such bored contempt. 

“He would’ve—he would’ve raped me otherwise. I didn’t have a choice.” 

At that, Graves pauses. When he looks towards you, his eyes are curiously blank. 

“Better that than what’ll happen now,” he says, the words so perfunctory that it takes a moment for them to sink in.  When they do, you have to swallow back bile.

His glibness shatters whatever hope you’d had left. 

In that moment, you finally acknowledge that appealing to his sense of decency won’t lead you anywhere because it simply doesn’t exist within him. You’ve known men like him before—those more concerned with lining their own pockets than taking care of the vulnerable people around them. The archetype is not uncommon. You should’ve expected it even, especially from a bounty hunter. 

There won’t be any bribing him or talking your way out of the situation you’ve found yourself in. Whatever facinorous end awaits you back east, he’s happy to shepherd you there so long as it earns him his thirty coins. 

How many times do you have to ask yourself if you’re brave enough to do something before you answer? 

When Graves turns to face you again and takes a step towards you, likely to urge you up onto the saddle, you recoil, stumbling away from him. His eyes sharpen at your movement, fulvous wolf eyes narrowing on you. 

“And here I thought you’d stopped pissin’ me off,” he says lightly, a hard edge underlying his words. His hand lifts to rest against the handle of the revolver tucked back in its sheath, thumb flexing over it. 

“What’s the point?” you retort, nostrils flaring. “You either kill me here or I die there.”

You sound braver than you feel, fear making you shake so hard that your knees almost knock together. 

Graves’ smile is all lip, no crinkling around the eyes. “Oh, I won’t kill you, sugar. I’m a better shot than that.”

Your heart pounds against your ribcage, stomach turning over at the thought of him putting a bullet through your shoulder or leg. 

“I’m surprised you won’t just come quietly. You think the sheriff wouldn’t hand you over to me himself if he found out what kinda woman he married?”

That’s been your fear from the very beginning. The one thing that’s kept you awake at night, the nightmare shaking you out of a dead sleep. You’d convinced yourself that him calling the authorities or even escorting you back east himself was an inevitability. That John Price, paragon of virtue, wouldn’t bend the rules for anyone, much less you. 

But the more you think about it, the less sense it seems to make. Every tender word and touch rises to the forefront of your memory. If John has shown you anything, it’s love. He’s proven his devotion a thousand times over, shown you time and again that were you to leave, he’d come running. 

Suddenly, the thought that your husband would let someone take you away from him seems preposterous. It doesn’t align at all with the man you know. He’d go to hell and back for you, would rip out a man’s tongue for speaking to you the way Graves speaks to you now. Hindsight makes that clear. 

You meet his eyes, intention set. “I’d rather just ask him.”

Blue eyes turn to flint, flat. Droll candor shed for ruthlessness. Silence before a storm. 

He’s on you before you even have a chance to whirl around and make a run for it, arm cutting into your windpipe when he wraps it around your neck. He drags you back into the shadows of the awning, out of sight from anyone on the street; your heels score lines in the dirt. You choke, wheezing on your next breath, but his arm tightens, trapping the scream in your throat. 

“Shoulda done this before,” Graves grunts, reaching into his back pocket and pulling out the pair of cuffs he had tucked away. 

When he unhooks his arm from around your neck, you gasp for breath, sucking in deep lungfuls of air. Panic swirls and rises in your chest. 

“Get your hands off—” you hiss, beating his arm with your fist to no avail. He yanks your arms in front of you until your wrists are pressed close together. Your blood curdles at the feeling of cold iron against your skin and the gut-wrenching sound of handcuffs being fixed around your wrists, tightened to the point of pain. You can hardly flex your hands with how tight they’re bound. “Let me go, let ME GO—”

He pulls you in close again. “Don’t think I won’t tape your fuckin’ mouth shut too,” Graves snarls in your ear. Nausea swells in your belly. 

“Please— please don’t do this—” you beg, a sob breaking from your chest now. 

He sighs, long suffering. “Lord knows I tried to warn you.”

Despite the threat, Graves doesn’t tape your mouth shut. Instead, he fastens a rough piece of rope around your head, fitting it between your teeth like a bit. You don’t have it in you to be thankful for small mercies this time. The hemp cord scratches the corners of your mouth when you try to move your lips around it. 

“There,” he says, giving you a rough shake, satisfied. “That’s better. Can finally hear myself think.”

The tears leak out of the corners of your eyes in big, fat droplets, clouding your vision. When he wipes your cheeks with a calloused hand, the nail of his thumb catches on the delicate skin under your eye, leaving a thin cut. The pain makes you flinch, staring daggers at the man in front of you, but he doesn’t apologize for his rough handling. 

Graves heaves himself up onto the saddle first, swinging a leg over with practiced ease. You yelp when he hauls you up after, setting you on the saddle in front of him. Heat crawls up your neck when your skirt billows around your waist, horrified. 

“Save your tears, sugar,” he tells you, gathering the reins in one hand. “You’ll need ‘em for later.”

The horse whinnies when Graves pulls upward and guides him towards the road leading out of town, hooves clopping against the dirt. Your heart shoots up into your throat. 

Galloping out of town, you chance a glance back, head spinning as the world blurs around you. A man stands under the awning you just left, his head cocked as if stupefied. He’s too far away for you to get a proper look at his face though, no way to tell if he’s someone that might recognize you and alert John. You try to scream or wave your hands—anything to get his attention, to let the stranger know that something is wrong. 

You watch until the figure melds into the surrounding town. 

You keep waiting for someone to appear from behind you. A tall figure to darken the horizon, blot it like the moon passing over the sun. 

The last bastion of your hope collapses into rubble the farther away you ride, no man nor horse following you in pursuit. And then a hand grabs a fistful of your hair and wrenches your head back around, cutting off your view.

The plan is to leave the horse in the next town you reach and take a train back east. Graves would’ve done that back in the town you just left, he tells you, but he wanted to put as much distance between you and the sheriff. 

“You never know with men who’ve gotten a taste of married life,” he says when he finally deigns to stop miles from town, sitting on a rock and having a drink while he leaves you tied to the horse by your wrists. You shift from foot to foot, a cramp winding up your legs. “They get themselves a little pussy and lose all sense of dignity or morality. Can’t be trusted to do the right thing.” 

Steam practically billows out of your ears. You have the good sense to keep your mouth shut though, cognizant of the fact that you’re alone out in the middle of nowhere with a man who’d be happy to bring you back dead or alive. Though he hasn’t been quite so explicit, it’s apparent in the way he doesn’t offer to untie you or let you rest as well. The skin under the cuffs on your wrists are rubbed raw from your attempts to free yourself, and from the journey itself, with all the jostling and the persistent cramp in your right shoulder. 

The animal awareness dawns on you during that first rest. He’d taken the rope out when you were far enough outside of town that it didn’t matter if you screamed or not. That’s what stays your tongue now—the creeping notion that you are far from anyone that would be remotely sympathetic to your plight. 

“How much was the bounty?” you ask, more out of morbid curiosity than anything. You balance on one foot to shake the cramp out of the other. 

“Now, I hate to be rude, sugar, but what does it matter to you? It ain’t you collecting the reward.”

Your lips flatten into a taut line, already regretting prying. It’s not like knowing would change anything. 

The break ends sooner than you’d hoped, Graves urging you back onto the horse before taking a seat behind you. It troubles you because you’re not far enough away from town that you couldn’t still be rescued. There’d be more of a chance of John or someone else—one of his deputies, perhaps—coming across you out here. But you don’t have much of a choice. 

Out here, the land stretches on without end. Only the faint blue of a mountain ridge paralleling your route breaks the horizon. The land is flat, sparse apart from the dense shrubbery and trees twisted and bent by the wind. Cottonwood and boxelder. Chokecherry. Dogwood and hawthorn. Lush blooming saltbrush. 

The clear blue sky overhead is almost mocking, the rain from earlier long since abated. There’s hardly a cloud in the sky now. It’d be scenic if you could abstract it from the circumstances. A perfect day for gardening or a brisk walk after being kept indoors because of the rain. You’re still damp from riding through the rain earlier. 

A few bison congregate in a small dip in the terrain, grazing on the wild grass. You stare at them wide-eyed as you gallop along the upper ridge, startled by the sight of so many in one place. 

Despite the sublime beauty of the land, you remain on edge, unable to take anything in or truly enjoy it. Panic and revulsion leave you as gnarled and knotted as the krummholz trees out in the middle of the open plains. Riding with Graves feels nothing like the few times you and John shared a horse. It’s impersonal; transactional. Entirely against your will. 

The sun has only just begun to descend under the horizon when you and Graves approach a ramshackle house situated by itself in the middle of the open plains. Barely more than a barn, and long since abandoned by the looks of it. Age has done the place no favors; wooden slats sag and separate from the exterior of the house, the gaps in between the boards letting in all manner of insects and rot. 

Graves dismounts his horse about a stone’s throw from the hovel. His brow furrows with dissatisfaction as he surveys the abandoned property. 

“Shit,” he remarks, sucking his teeth. “A local back in town swore a family still lived here. Don’t look like anyone’s lived here since Abraham.”

Part of you wishes the former tenants still resided here, on the off possibility that one might take pity on you, but a much larger part of you is grateful for the dwelling’s vacancy. You’ve heard stories before, of families living out in the middle of nowhere. Rumors. Not all bad, of course; it’s common enough for families migrating west sometimes to stop along the way for a generation or two, building more permanent dwellings than the caravans they began their journey in. Many such families were also known for putting up travelers passing through in exchange for goods or help with chores. 

But you’ve also heard other stories. Like the Riley family out near Cherryvale and their homestead just off the Great Osage Trail. They lived out there for more than two decades before the number of lone travelers vanishing off the trail within walking distance of their property pointed the finger of suspicion at them. When the authorities finally got around to procuring a warrant for their property, they found the house deserted apart from the furniture that couldn’t be loaded into the wagon and an infant boy, dehydrated and petrified. 

You shake the story from your head. “…Are we spending the night here?” you ask tentatively. 

He looks at you from the corner of his eye, nostrils flared. “Don’t go gettin’ any ideas in that head of yours. Jus’ because a man’s gotta rest his eyes, don’t mean I gotta give you a peaceful night’s rest. No, I’m leavin’ those hands of yours tied.”

Your hopes deflate at that.��

He helps you dismount before hobbling his horse with a pair of leather straps around its front legs to keep it from darting off in the middle of the night. You wince sympathetically; you have more in common with a horse now than any man. 

The inside of the cabin is just as derelict as the exterior. At the very least, he feeds you. A couple scoops of pemmican straight from the tin. The fact that he insists on feeding you instead of letting you feed yourself puts you on edge. Your spine is stiff as a board through it all, your mouth barely opening up to receive the spoonful of pemmican, the metal clanking against your teeth. You wince, the sound itself tasting of rust. 

At all times, you are aware of the precarity of your situation. You can’t imagine there were any stipulations in the bounty to bring you back unscathed. Though he hasn’t tried anything untoward so far—not so much as made a licentious remark—you don’t know how long your luck will last. You flinch every time he so much as twitches in your direction, sure at any moment his mood will flip and he’ll drag you across the floor and haul himself over you. 

It’s enough to make your stomach hurt, turning over itself. He doesn’t try anything though, and for that you exhale shakily, the tension running off you in rivulets. 

One hour drags into the next. Night blackens the sky, seeping in through the crumbling walls of the cabin. 

“Well,” Graves says, wiping his hands together to dust off any lingering crumbs. “I’m gonna hit the hay.”

“Do…do I get to sleep as well?”

He cocks a brow. “Not much I can do to stop you.”

“It’s just that…” You lift your hands as you trail off, silently pointing out the handcuffs still secured around your wrists, the implicit assertion being that you won’t be able to sleep with the metal digging into the bones of your wrists. 

Graves scoffs. “You can’t think I’ll just uncuff you ‘cause we ain’t in town no more. I got a little more sense than that, sugar.”

“You could use rope instead?” you suggest. 

The seconds he spends considering it are long. You hold your breath as you watch him weigh the pros and cons. 

Finally, he shrugs. “Alright.”

The relief that washes over you is almost palpable. 

He pulls a blanket out of one of the saddlebags to function as a makeshift pillow, setting it up on the floor in the center of the room. True to his word, Graves uncuffs you and loops a double knotted rope around your wrists instead, fastening the rope tying your hands together around his own wrist. Your stomach sinks as he pulls the knot taut. 

He levels a heavy stare on you after giving the rope one last tug. “I don’t usually repeat myself, sugar, but I will this one time. Don’t go tryin’ anythin’ stupid. I’m gettin’ a good night’s rest and so help me if you wake me up—” his eyes flash, gray going steely “—you won’t like the consequences.”

You nod. Swallow back the phlegm clogging your throat. 

True night plunges the old house into darkness, cricket songs slipping in through the cracks in the walls. The temperature also plunges with the setting sun. It gets cold at night, even in the summer months; the draft makes you shiver, the rotting exterior letting in the elements. 

You keep to the wall with the least amount of rotting boards, as far as the rope tethering you to Graves will allow you to go. It would probably be in your best interest to try and get some sleep, but you’re far too restless to calm down. The atmosphere in the house is far too eerie to settle your nerves either; you can’t help but wonder about the family that must have left this place to rot and fade away into memory. 

It’s all you can do to blink back the tears that spring to your eyes when you think about the memory of you that John will have to carry into the future now that you’re gone. It isn’t fair. After everything you’ve had to endure in this lifetime, you thought maybe that this might have been your reward. That John was your reward. 

Your hands drop from your chin to your knees, hopelessness plaguing you again. The thin, sharp whistle of defeat. High and reedy as a death rattle. 

Then your eyes drop to your wrists.

The cord is fastened in a bowline knot around your wrists, difficult to undo without considerable effort, but the material is softer than the cuffs Graves had you in before, and it gives when you pull one hand down while pushing the other up. Your skin bunches around the cord, but it doesn’t cut into you the way the metal did. 

Graves is still fast asleep when you glance over at him. He doesn’t snore, but the rise and fall of his chest under the blanket is steady. Stable. 

The fatigue dissipates from your body the second you put it together. That there’s a sliver of a possibility of slipping your hands out of the rope tying you to Graves. The exhilaration is almost overwhelming. You have to sit with it a beat before acting, wary of letting your guard down too fast.

Time passes slowly as you fiddle with the knot, reaching your fingers as far as they’ll go and gritting your teeth through the ensuing cramp in your wrist. You nearly groan in frustration when your hand twitches and you accidentally retighten the knot. A near crushing blow. 

Please, you mouth more than whisper, frustrated tears clumped in your lashes. Teeth sinking into the flesh of your bottom lip, pinching off the wail rising up your throat. 

Your heart skips a beat when the rope loosens around one of your wrists, enough for you to wiggle a pinkie underneath and slowly shimmy it up the length of your hand. A cramp makes your pinkie spasm, almost causing you to lose your grip. Sweat pools in the cup of your palm. 

When your wrists are finally free, the rope clutched in trembling hands and the basal joint of your thumb scrapped raw from the fibrous rope, you can only sit there, heart beating wildly in your chest. You have to force yourself to remain calm, wary of waking Graves up after all that effort. His eyelids quiver only with his dreams though. 

You glance towards the door on the other side of the cabin. It seems either farther away now that you know it’s within reach. You know better than to just run straight for it though. Weeks of being on the run before finding John have taught you to pace yourself, to push down the fluttering evocation in your chest to make a mad dash for the closest way out. 

Instead, you take a deep breath out, closing your eyes until you’ve calmed down. Then you rise slowly to your feet. 

Your eyes, having long since adjusted to the darkness, scan the room for any loose floorboards. Aside from one obvious corner of the house which has begun to rot away and collapse, it’s hard for you to discern at a glance which boards will groan under the weight of your feet. You have no choice but to guess.

Each step has you on edge, heart in your throat. Your focus shifts quicksilver between the floor and Graves. Waiting for any sudden movement. 

Halfway to the door, you take another cautious step forward and the floorboard creaks under your foot. Your heart stops, eyes flitting instantly over to Graves’ sleeping form. He doesn’t so much as shift. It’s another beat before you’re able to move again, confidence shaken by the noise. You keep imagining him suddenly shooting up from the floor, pistol in hand, the hammer striking the primer, the hiss of gas escaping the barrel. 

The door gives a faint creak when you push it open, so you open it only enough for your body to slip through, wincing when you twitch and accidentally push it open another inch, dragging out the creak. Still, he doesn't wake. You slip past the door, shutting it quietly behind you.  

The moon glows cornsilk gold in the sky. A vast, uncharted land stretches out around you, untouched by human hands, or so changed over the years that any human presence has long since been buried beneath the loam. But when you stare out into the distance, you realize that you have no idea where you came from. Everything looks the same in each direction, no landmark familiar enough for you to orient yourself. You’re out in the middle of nowhere and nothing looks right. 

If you had less strength, you’d fall to your knees. The despair is so immense that you hardly have the strength to hold it all at once. 

The silence lulls you into a false sense of security. You linger for too long, stuck contemplating your options. Coyotes yip in distant packs, their barks carrying across the plains. You shiver at the sound. It reminds you again that you’re on your own now. No husband to come chasing after you if things get sticky. 

Your first few steps away from the cabin are tentative, gliding your legs through the grass and staring up at the cornsilk moon. A combination of indulgence and bewilderment. If you knew the right way home, you wouldn’t waver, but these days, you have no faith in your instincts. They’ve only ever led you off course. 

The gelding that Graves rode in on sits in the grass with its hind legs folded underneath it. With its legs still hobbled, you know removing the leather will take more time than you'd like, but you figure it'll be easier to make your way across the plains on horseback, with the added bonus of leaving Graves stranded. If God were just, he’d starve out here and leave his corpse for the coyotes to feast on. 

You approach the horse cautiously, conscious not to make any sudden movements. Its ears angle towards you as you draw near. Attentive to your presence. 

“Hey there, honey,” you whisper, reaching out a hand and trying to show that you aren’t a threat. Its nose twitches.

Another step forward. Easy does it. One leg in front of the other.

“I won’t hurt you. I promise.” You try to mirror your memory of John in your voice, honeysuckle soft words. 

You aren’t John though. Not even close. You take another step towards it.

It brays when you get too close, skittish. The sound pierces through the night, louder than the coyotes in the distance. Louder even than the creaking door.  

The hair on the back of your neck raises, lips numb. Then the prickling awareness of movement in the house, like an itch on a phantom limb. 

Behind you, the door to the cabin bursts open with a bang, slamming off the wall and ricocheting back. You whip your head around to look only to find Graves’ towering form under the shadow of the doorway, his hair mused and clothes askew. And he looks enraged. 

“Hey!” Graves bellows from the doorway, breaking into a run towards you. “Get back here!”

There’s no time to sit with the regret, no time to bemoan the fact that you didn’t exercise enough caution, that for some reason without a gun leveled at your head, you allowed yourself to forget the very real danger this man posed to you. 

All you can do is run.

The grass whistles around you. You run so hard that your lungs burn, your arms pumping furiously beside you, dress swishing between your legs. You don’t have to look behind you to know that Graves is gaining on you. His body is built for pursuit. Still, you push yourself past your breaking point, not stopping even when you taste blood in your mouth. Mindless; directionless. No idea where you’re going—just away from him. You’d jump off a cliff if you came across one. 

He’s close enough for you to hear now, heavy breathing right behind you. But by then it’s too late. A heavy body rams into you, sending you careening towards the earth, the ground rushing up to meet you halfway. The dirt hardly cushions the blow. 

You hit the ground hard. Head knocked loose of thought, agony ripping across your face. The double blow of a body heavier than yours forcing you into the dirt, so solid that it crushes the breath from your lungs. 

Blood leaks from your lip, most likely split. When you breathe in to fill your lungs, you taste dirt and rust and earth. 

“Insufferable bitch,” Graves snarls, putrid breath wafting under your nose and making your eyes water. He grabs a handful of your hair and wrenches your head up before slamming it back down. Something crunches. Distantly, you wonder if your nose is broken. 

Your ears ring, the rest of his words drowned out by the blood rushing to your face. 

“Please—” you beg, blood dripping from your split lip. 

“Knew I shouldn’ta trusted you—conniving little cunt—c’mere now, get up—”

He rises to his feet over your body, big hand curling around your wrist. You hear your shoulder pop when he yanks your arm behind your back. A rush of cold. A sweat breaks on the nape of your neck. Shock sets in the moment after, adrenaline flooding your body. 

Then a sharp, focused surge of pain. It radiates from your shoulder outward, so intense that you can’t believe it at first. Your whole world reduces down to it. Feathering out down your back; irradiating waves of it. Thoughts scattering and then coming back together around the pain. If you scream, it comes out unbidden. 

“Ah, hell, I didn’t mean to do that,” he grumbles from behind you, likely staring at the unnatural jut of your shoulder. “Alright, sugar, one second—I’ll pop that back in.”

“Nononono—” you gasp, panic lancing through you, but he pays no attention to your words. 

The pain of popping your shoulder back in is excruciating. Relief follows shortly after, but the time between dislocating and relocating your shoulder is so short that it hardly comes as a balm to the pain.

“You…bastard…” you gasp. 

“Wouldn’ta had to do that if you hadn’t run,” he sighs, the sight of your pain subduing his rage. 

It doesn’t stop him from grabbing you roughly by the arm he just dislocated when he finally gets you on your feet though, steering you back towards the house. The pain that radiates up your arm is almost blinding. 

He drags you back to the cabin with a punishing grip. There’s no sympathy when you stumble. Moonlight illuminates the path back to the cabin and shows you the trenches in the wild grass made by your feet. Hardly more than a couple rods. 

The defeat that courses through you upon being dragged through the ramshackle front door is ten times that of earlier. When he lets go of your arm, you collapse in a heap on the floor, aching and sweating. A bag of bones and blood. You’d rattle if someone shook you. 

“I hate you,” you mumble from your spot on the floor, shaking through the pain. “Rot in hell.”

Graves doesn’t respond, but you can almost hear the way he grins.  

No rest for the wicked or the good this time. Graves wakes intermittently throughout the night to check up on you, wary now that you’ve tried to run. Your regret is palpable. You should’ve waited. Bided your time. There won't be another chance now, not after you played your hand so soon. 

The ache in your shoulder keeps you from finding sleep. Every time you get close to it, the pain radiates down your arm and it slips from your grasp, your hand closing around the empty space it leaves behind. Teeth grit, breathing through the pain. Loosening your jaw and panting because the pain overwhelms you when you so much as shift onto your side, the hard floor digging into your elbow. 

Right on the edge of sleep, just as you're about to latch on, a boot catches you in the ribs, jostling you back into the realm of pain. You wheeze, breaking into a coughing fit. 

“Get up,” a hoarse voice grunts above you, empty of sympathy. “We got places to be.”

He has the two of you back on the horse as soon as dawn breaks. Your escape attempt the night before must have spooked him, and you regret it now in the light of day because you know he won’t let you out of his sight again. The metal handcuffs digging into your wrists assures you of that. 

There’s no time for breakfast or time to wash up. Graves makes it a point to be back on the road as fast as possible, repacking his bedroll and stuffing it back in the saddlebag before dragging you up with him. 

The pain is a dull throb after sleeping most of the agony away. It comes back when you move too quickly though, which is hard to avoid on horseback when each gallop echoes through your sore bones and joints. 

The arching sun immixes with the heavens above, rising higher as the hours pass. You ache for a hat; something to keep the heat of the sun off your head. On the horizon, the mountain ridge sits like a spine bursting out from the earth. It’s all wastelands and portents. Evil omens. 

Your heart feels swollen and bruised, like something trampled under elk hooves. 

“Cheer up,” Graves says, tipping your chin up when the sun reaches its peak around midday, the gesture making you so uncomfortable that you almost shudder out of your skin. Your face still throbs with pain. “You should be glad I didn’t jus’ shoot you.”

Your lips pull back, baring your teeth to nothing. 

A shot rips through the air at that, his words commanding it into being. Your head instinctively ducks and even the horse under you staggers, spooked by the sound. Graves curses, tensing up behind you.

"What in the hell—"

You whip your head around to stare behind you, looking for the source of the gunfire. When you find it, your eyes widen.

[distantdarlings]

LET ME // t. nott

RATING: R / 4.8K WORDS

Theodore Nott x Fem Reader

+ SUMMARY - *Requested, based on this* Theodore Nott has been harassing you ever since he found out you had a crush on him. Now, you’ve been paired together for a project for McGonagall’s class and he has nothing good in mind.

+ WARNINGS - SMUT! (P in V), unprotected, sub!reader, Dom!Theo, slightly rough!dom!Theo, marking kink, slight size kink, bulge kink, brief dumbification, brief spit kink, reader wearing a skirt, light enemies to lovers, language, one (1) slap, name-calling, praise kink, slight degradation, public sex, fem!reader, oral (fem!receiving), Theo is persistent, not proof read (lmk if I missed any)

+ MUSIC (listened to while writing) -

Echo - XANU

- - -

Merlin, forgive whatever you had done to deserve the treatment you were currently receiving.

You thought back on every negative deed you’d done in the last year and still hadn’t found anything worthy of your horrendous luck.

The arrogant boy turned to stare you down, malicious intent etched into the unfortunately gorgeous features of his face.

You could feel your face contort into an expression of horror as you tore your eyes away from him and turned to Professor McGonagall.

“Professor, I— you started.”

“All partner decisions are final—no exceptions!” McGonagall finished, as if trying to answer the question you had before you could even voice.

You deflated into your seat, your mood dropping like a brick. If you didn’t know any better, you’d have guessed the entire class was staring at you. The entire student body of Hogwarts knew how you felt about your new Transfiguration project partner, Theodore Nott. The bastard…

You glanced back at up—arms crossed and lips poured—just to find the boy still staring you down, evil smirk painted on his lips. He gave you a sardonic wave, wiggling his fingers tauntingly.

“Fuck,” you sighed, pressed an exasperated fist to your forehead.

Your knee anxiously bobbed beneath the desk, the heel of your uniform shoe beating against the floor in a flurried rhythm.

Luna Lovegood, your best friend, was sitting directly next to you. Intuitive as she always was, you knew she could feel the pure panic radiating off of you. Her hand rested on your shoulder in a small motion of comfort, but nothing could calm you now. You were utterly screwed.

McGonagall finished off the rest of her speech on the instructions for her project, then dismissed the whole class. Luna helped you to gather your things together as you struggled to force yourself to move.

Maybe you’d pissed McGonagall off? Merlin, what had you done to deserve this? You asked yourself the same question over and over again.

Out of the corner of your eye, you glimpsed Theodore flouncing over to you with an unnerving glint in your eyes.

“Well, aren’t I just the luckiest man on earth?” he said snidely.

“Fuck off, Theo,” you growled, intentionally not making eye contact with him.

You made to pick up your books and slide them into your bag, when he slammed his hand down on the cover of one of them, pressing them down against the desk. He pinned your fingers beneath them against the wood—just enough to keep them sturdy, but light enough so that it didn’t hurt you.

“Stop!” You yanked your fingers out from beneath the books, the heavy leather smacking against the table with a thud. Now, you made eye contact with him.

“What are we going to do our project on, baby?” he asked.

“Don’t call me that!” You yanked your books out from underneath his strong hold and shoved them quickly into your bag. “We can discuss it in the library after class.”

“I’m looking forward to it—I’ll be sure we get a quiet corner, you know…,” he stepped closer to you, “…so I can explore every inch of…the subject.”

You sneered in disgust and pulled away from him, his voice still rattling in your ears.

“You’re disgusting,” you scoffed. “I’ll see you later for nothing more than our assignment.”

“Looking forward to it…can’t wait to put those big brains to use. Lovegood.” He nodded politely to Luna before heading off.

You glanced at Luna and acknowledged her slight smile. Everything in you was telling you to snap at her and tell her not to encourage any of the delinquent boy’s behavior, but you couldn’t find it in yourself to ever be very mad at Luna Lovegood. At least, not for long.

Instead, you rolled your eyes and took off toward the door, bag swinging between your shoulder blades.

“Wait up, friend!” Luna shouted lightly, running to catch up with you. You snorted and laughed at her, letting her sunlight hair fall into step beside you.

- - -

By the time your class of the day dismissed and the sun had begun to sink beneath the Hogwarts skyline, you were soaked through with nerves. The saturation of your anxiety had managed to breach every protective barrier you held up, and fill your hands with shudders and your stomach with nausea.

The root of your nerves when it came to Theo came from the consistent comments he insisted on making toward you. It seemed that he loved nothing more than dropping sexual hints into your ear every few days just to watch you squirm. He’d only started this after he’d heard through the grapevine you had a bit of a thing for him.

You’d be lying if you said you didn’t find him attractive, and that his words had absolutely no effect on you, but you couldn’t deny that he was just as annoying as he was charming.

It had gotten to a point when he made these comments, that he loved to joke aloud about your reactions to him, effectively embarrassing you in front of all of your peers. That was your final straw. All resemblance of an attraction toward Theo had melted away and been replaced by hatred.

And yet, as your feet led you to the grand library, you couldn’t stop the rapid pattering of your heart beat. Something about the boy had always been so…irresistible to you. Whether it was the way he always knew where to place his hands when he “accidentally” brushed you, or how he knew exactly what to say when he pressed his lips against the shell of your ear. You figured you should be grossed out and tell him to get away from you, but, unfortunately, you kind of liked it when he did those things.

As you came up to one of the several library doors lining the wall before you, you decided to try and swallow your nerves and focus only on the project. That was what you were supposed to do anyway—this wasn’t a date.

You pulled one of the doors open and slipped into the warmly-lit room. It always seemed to be just a tad bit cozier here than anywhere else in the castle—whether that was from the multiple fireplaces or the sweet aroma that floated through the air. Either way, you loved it.

Your neck craned as you glanced about, trying to glimpse the cocky boy, but to no avail. Wherever he was, he surely wasn’t interested in making it easy on you to find him.

A sigh left you as you started toward the back of the library where a couple tables rested behind a few conveniently placed bookcases. Unfortunately, the feeling in your stomach told you that he surely would be sitting at one of those tables, simply because you knew how his dirty, little mind worked.

That corner of the library was…infamous for its concealed nature. Everyone in Hogwarts had heard the little rumors that fluttered about, of couples getting a bit too friendly with each other while the librarian was downstairs.

Because of those rumors, it had garnered a reputation. And if someone who had a penchant for gossip slipped past you and Theodore Nott studying back there, you’d be screwed.

Once you passed the last book case, zigzagging between the three that formed the perfect labyrinth, you came upon Theo comfortably waiting at the table in the middle. A groan of defeat left you and your head dipped back. You stared at the ceiling for a few moments while contemplating your options—you could still run away.

“Hello, beautiful,” Theo said, leaning his chin down on his propped up fists. “I’ve been waiting so impatiently for you.”

“Whatever,” you sighed. You crossed over to the table and sat across from him—the farthest away you could get. Your bag collapsed to the ground and unzipped itself on the way down. The things you needed for this assignment floated out and landed neatly on the table before you, including a few rolls of parchment, a quill and ink, and your books.

He marveled silently, seemingly trying to hide his fascination at your wandless magic. Perhaps if he studied as hard as you did, he would also be able to achieve it.

“Alright, shall we do this?” you asked, maintaining a bored expression.

“I’d love to,” he smirked. “But I’d love to showcase a bit of my magic as well, if that’s alright with you?”

“What—?” Your voice was cut off with a slight gasp as all four legs of your chair lifted off of the ground. Your fingers wrapped around the sides of your seat to keep you from slipping off.

Theo’s eyes followed your chair as it floated over the table and all the way beside him. Once your shoulders were inches from his, your chair dropped a few centimeters to the ground. A small yelp came from you as you regained your balance and glared at him. Perhaps he was a better wizard than you thought.

“What the hell, Theo?” you demanded, immediately scooting your chair away from him, putting a good few inches between you.

“I just thought we’d be able to work better closer together,” he purred, his arm dropping against the table to cage you against him and the bookshelf a bit to your left. You eased away from him so you were closer to the shelves than you were to him. His eyes never dropped from yours. “Merlin, what is that smell? You smell absolutely divine—”

“Okay, let’s just get this done,” you interrupted him, pushing his approaching body back away from you.

“Mm, alright,” he smiled. “Have you decided on a topic you’re interested in presenting on?”

“Actually, I have.” You pulled your books across the table over to where the two of you were sitting, flipping everything to the appropriate page. There were a couple pages in your notebook where you’d jotted some ideas down earlier today, and you’d figured he’d want to see the different ideas, as it was his grade, as well. “So, I threw a couple of ideas together in my fourth period. We can see what you think of them…”

As you explained the details of all of your ideas, it became increasingly obvious that Theo was not at all interested in what you had to say about the project. Though you refused to look directly at him, the corner of your eyes granted more than enough knowledge.

Theo’s eyes were ravenous as they drew down your body, curving across the most private areas of your body with no shame. You could feel your cheeks burning, but hoped the warm tones from the candles around you would conceal that.

When he scooted a bit closer to you, you kept talking. And when he laid his arm across the back of your chair, you kept talking. And when his fingers began to toy with the ends of your hair, you kept talking. But when he took your quill gently from your fingers and set it down on the table, you finally stopped. You barely made eye contact with him, constantly glancing away and down to the table. You could feel your heartbeat in your ears.

His fingers pulled away from your hair and dropped to your shoulder. They squeezed the hard muscles a few times.

“God, you seem tense,” he spoke lowly, his voice barely above a whisper. His other hand reached up and matched the opposite’s position on your other shoulder.

When he placed a gentle amount of pressure, it expressed a small sigh from your lips. He was right. You were very tense—in general, but especially around him.

“Here, let me…,” he stood and appeared behind you rather quickly.

“Theo, I don’t think this is appropriate. I’d really just—” Your voice cut off as soon as he began to roll your taut muscles beneath his nimble fingers. Your eyes fluttered shut at the sensation, pleasurable jolts of pain shocking across your neck and down your back.

“That’s okay, baby,” he whispered, dangerously close to your ear. “Finish telling me about your idea. I’ll just loosen some things up back here. Fuck, you’re so tight.”

He pressed an especially hard drive against your skin. You bit back a moan at the sensation. You don’t think you’d ever had a better massage in your life.

You wanted to tell him to stop, but it felt so fucking good. And you really were sore around your neck and shoulders.

“Theo?” you tried again.

“Read.” His voice had a commanding tone to it. One hand released your shoulder briefly to grab your books and slide them closer to you, before returning to its position against your skin.

His hands worked their way up around your jaw, cupping it gently, so he could press his thumbs against the back of your neck. You audibly sighed this time without intending to. Embarrassed, you attempted to cover it up with a clear of your throat.

You began to explain the rest of your project plan, small shudders rippling through your voice every time he’d hit an especially sore spot.

By the time he finished and pulled his hands away from you, your body was mourning the loss of him but relishing in the relief it felt. It honestly hadn’t felt far off from a professional massage.

“How’s that?” He walked around to your side, still not sitting back down.

“Er, good,” you chuckled nervously, rubbing your hand along the back of your neck, trying to spread the relief around.

“Perfect,” he smiled, gently swiping his index finger beneath your chin. He sat back down beside you.

“So, what do you think?” you asked.

“About what?”

“The project idea…”

“Oh, yeah, I think it’s wonderful,” he said, shrugging a bit. “I think we can work with it.”

“Theo, did you even listen?” you asked, rolling your eyes.

“Of course, I did,” he chuckled. “It’s just not easy to focus when you have such a gorgeous partner.”

There went your cheeks getting insanely hot again. He thought you were gorgeous? There was no way. Someone must have put him up to this, right? Or he was fucking with you because he knew you had had a bit of a crush on him.

“I—er…” you stuttered hopelessly, pulling your eyes away from his.

He placed a hand on your knee. You could feel the warmth of his skin through your tights. The heartbeat in your ears picked up wildly.

“Don’t be nervous around me.”

“What?” you laughed suddenly. “I’m not nervous, I’m just—you’re just really…friendly? I don’t know. Why are you pretending to be so interested in me? Did someone put you up to it?”

“Why would someone have put me up to flirting with you?” he asked, genuinely confused.

“Because they know I had a thing for you,” you blurted before thinking. “I mean—”

“Nope! Can’t take it back now, my love.” Theo chuckled, an evil smirk printing across his lips. “And, for the record, no one put me up to flirting with you. I just want to.”

His hand slid up to the top of your knee as he leaned a bit forward.

“Theo!” you hissed. “We’re in the library—you can’t do that.” Though you verbally protested his actions, you couldn’t deny the heat building in your stomach at his touch.

Despite the conviction you had for needing to decline him and all of his advances, you couldn’t seem to suppress the need you felt for him right now—a different kind. His eyes remained on yours and refused to look away.

The two of you were in the library, and had seemed to despise each other’s company only minutes earlier, but for some reason, you couldn’t force yourself to stop his rising hand.

Soon, his fingers were toying with the edge of your skirt and his lips were millimeters from your own. You could feel his gentle breath against your cheeks.

“Theo…,” you shuddered at his proximity. His thumb slid slowly down the side of your thigh, the contact eliciting chills along your legs.

“You’ve wanted me for months,” he murmured, lips brushing against yours. “Are you finally going to let me fuck you?”

You gasped slightly as the tip of his thumb just barely brushed your core through your panties.

“Say yes, or I’m not going to touch you anymore.”

As if on cue, his hands pulled back from you and his mouth seemed to hover a few inches away. The cold air hit the spot his hand had been occupying on your thigh and sent a row of shivers up your spine.

“I don’t understand. Is this a joke?” you shuddered.

He shook his head slowly. “Not a joke, I just want you. Say yes, baby.”

“Y—” before you were even able to get the singular syllable out, his lips were pressing against yours and devouring them like a predator.

His hand found its place against your thigh again, the other hand following suit on the other thigh. He pushed them up the expanse of your skin, inching your skirts up in the process.

You moaned against his lips in embarrassment at the sudden loss of dignity.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” he sighed against your mouth. “Let me taste you.” He pressed his lips roughly back to yours.

You gasped for air and pulled away, noses brushing against the other. “Say please,” you managed to choke out.”

“What?”

“Say please,” you repeated. “What, did you think I was going to come here and just give you whatever you wanted?”

“Oh, that’s how you’re going to be?” he smirked. You stared back astutely, not yielding to any teasing he tried to give.

“Alright, baby,” he conceded. He pulled himself closer to you and worked his way up your neck and to your ear, pressing chaste kisses against your flesh. “Please let me taste this sweet cunt. ‘ve been dreaming about it for months.”

You shivered at his words before nodding. You weren’t in your right mind—you couldn’t be.

He slid out of his chair and dropped to his knees. His hands wrapped around your hips and yanked you to the edge of the seat. His fingers pushed your skirt up around your hips and angled you up toward his face, pulling your legs over each of his shoulders.

The cool air flushed against the hot wetness slathered across your thighs. But the shock of wintry air was canceled out quickly by Theo’s hot mouth placing against your clothed core.

Your head fell back against the chair as your hands flew to his honeyed curls.

He swirled his lips across you, gathering your lust on his tongue. Each time you let a little moan slip, he’d echo you with his own louder one. It wasn’t loud enough to be heard anywhere else in the library, but it was enough to vibrate against you and send your head spinning.

The second your thighs began to shake on either side of his sharp jaw, he pulled away from you, leaving you bare and wanting.

“Turn around,” he panted, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Obstinately, you held your chin up and refused to obey him. You wanted to appear strong and resistant as payment for how much of a dick he’d been to you, but with your quivering lips and legs still spread wide for him, you figured you didn’t quite get the point across.

He suddenly grabbed your jaw in one hand, while undoing his belt buckle with the other. Anticipation boiled in your belly.

“Turn around,” he said before suddenly and mockingly tilting his head to the side. “Or do you not understand what’s good for you?”

When you said nothing, he pulled you out of the chair and bent you over the library table. You yelped as your chest collided with the table.

Once on your stomach, he flipped your skirt over against your back and ripped your panties and stockings down your legs until the soaked things were stuck around your ankles.

Then, without another warning, he was sliding into you and stretching you wide. You gasped aloud and gripped at the smooth table, begging to find purchase on anything.

He moaned slightly at the way you clenched around him. He pushed himself into you a little more with each slow thrust, the movement splitting you down the middle. His hands held you tightly in place by your hips, pinning you down against the table.

“Shit, you feel fucking perfect,” he moaned, fingers gripping into your flesh.

Every alarm bell was ringing in your head, telling you to separate and cover yourselves, because you were in public. But, for some reason, you found yourself loving the thrill of possibly being walked in on; of possibly being found with Theodore Nott buried deep inside of you, taking his pleasure from your body.

By the time he’d finally bottomed out inside of you, he was panting and willing himself not to come prematurely.

“I’ve never felt anything this tight,” he groaned.

You hadn’t been able to see the size of him before he started pushing into you, but you had to guess he was the biggest you’d ever felt. Just having his hips pressed to your ass felt like the tip of him was brushing your cervix.

“Ah, fuck, wait,” he said, panting heavily. He rubbed your back as he slowly pulled all the way out of you and stood you up. He turned you around to face him and laid your back against the table.

He brought your legs around him and you hooked them together behind his back. You watched him with deep admiration as his fingers stroked up and down your legs, preparing to explain what he wanted.

“I want to watch me fill you up,” he whispered, leaning down to press a slow kiss to your lips. It was sweet and thick with saliva but, despite everything else he’d so far, this set off a flurry of butterflies in your stomach.

His hands came away from your legs and wrapped around your waist. He watched addictively as his fingers wrapped entirely around your body, his large hands positively dwarfing your small frame. And you could’ve sworn you saw his eyes fill with an inky, black glint as he brought his hips to the underside of your thighs.

He placed his dick on your stomach, reveling in how far up your stomach it went. He moaned at the sight and pulled your right leg up and over his shoulder. He pressed a small kiss to the side of your calf.

“Theo,” you whined, still reeling from the loss of him inside of you. “Please, no more teasing.”

“Be patient, baby,” he whispered against your leg. “I want to remember this moment.”

“Theo,” you urged once more. But his hand came down hard against the outer side of your thigh. You yelped at the pain that radiated down the side of your leg.

“I said to be patient.” He soothed the pain gently with his fingers, still looking down at how big he looked compared to you.

One of the things he’d always had on you was height. No matter if the things he said were stupid and undermining, you couldn’t deny that his size was enough to have the high ground.

“Look, we don’t have all the time in the world,” you sighed, leaning up on your elbows to speak with him. “The librarian could walk in here at any—”

He pushed back into you, choking any other words in your throat. You gasped and fell back against the wooden table, the cold lacquer biting into your flesh.

“Fuck,” Theo all but whined. He pressed his fingers against your lower abdomen where his dick had created a perfect impression. Every time he pulled out then pushed back in, his sheer size forced the body wall up and simultaneously probed a spot inside of you that had your eyes rolling backward.

Without wasting another second, he picked up his pace while dropping his hands down to your still-tucked in uniform shirt. He ripped the material out from beneath the waistband of your skirt, and ripped the buttons apart.

The candles floating overhead illuminated the curves and dips of your stomach, highlighting The valley of your breasts.

Hips still pistoning into you, and left hand holding your waist still, his right hand reached forward again and ripped the clip of your bra apart. Luckily, you’d worn the front access one today.

At the force of the destruction, your breasts fell apart from one another, bouncing against your dampened chest.

“Fuck,” he growled. “Gonna mark this beautiful body. Gonna let everyone know you’re mine. My girl.”

His words sent shockwaves through your system. You tried to reach for him but you couldn’t reach. Your arms fell back down against the table, your lack of anything to hold on to leaving you completely at the mercy of the pace he decided to set.

“T-Theo,” you stuttered, your voice breaking beneath the weight of his abuse.

He leaned down, pushing himself all the way into you for a moment, and latched his lips around a mouthful of your left breast. He sucked roughly on the flesh, pulling the blood to the surface. You whined through the pain that mingled with the pleasure from him below.

Once he was satisfied with the bruise painted on you, he moved toward your neck, sucking and biting just as rough, hips never halting.

“That’s it, baby,” he whispered. “Tell me how it feels.” He nibbled on your earlobe.

You said nothing, your lips unable to form enough to make any words come out. Your fingers still gripped uselessly at the sides of the table. One leg was held uselessly over Theo’s shoulder while the other dangled limply over the edge of the table.

He leaned up. “Tell me how it feels, baby.”

Still, you made no sound.

“Oh, you pathetic thing,” he whispered, lips pressing to your elevated leg once again. “Am I fucking you stupid? Is that what it is? Yeah, baby? Next time, I’ll shove this dick down your throat and see how quiet you are then, you dumb slut.”

Now, within the final moments before your finish, his thumb dropped to your clit and began to rub small circles into the nerves. Your mouth fell open and your back arched to the ceiling as his hips intensified. They forced your finish closer and closer until you were spilling all over him, coating your legs and his stomach.

At the clenching of your core, his release was barreling forward, as well. He came with a long groan and a slow walk down of the brutal pace he’d set with his hips. His spend mixed with yours dripped down your legs.

Finally, with him still inside of you, he leaned forward and pressed his forehead to yours. He eyed you sweetly, caressing soothing lines across your temple with his thumb.

“My sweet girl, you did so well,” he whispered against your lips. “Has anyone else ever fucked you so well?” There was that cocky Theo again.

“Maybe like one other person,” you gasped, trying to catch your breath.

“Oh, yeah? Who?” he asked, suddenly grabbing your jaw again and forcing you to look directly at him.

“Hmm, I’m not sure,” you said. “I think I forgot his name. I’ll probably just forget yours tomorrow, too.” You teased him meanly, smirk building on your lips. This was further payback for all the months of harassment you’d dealt with from him.

He pinched your cheeks together until your lips were pushed open.

“You can forget my name, sweetheart,” he whispered roughly, “but you’ll never forget what I just did to this body.”

His eyes watched yours with an intensity like no other. Then his lips pursed, and you watched as a line of spit dropped into your waiting mouth. It was the ultimate display of humiliation, but also ownership. You belonged to Theo, now.

And even if you forced yourself to forget his name or this day in the library, you’d never wipe the taste of his claim out of your mouth.

“Now, let’s get to work on that attitude, shall we?” Theo asked, voice suddenly chipper again.

He pulled out of you and zipped his pants back up, before selecting his bag off of the chair—which you’d now noticed he hadn’t even unpacked.

“Tomorrow at 6?” he asked.

Then he Disapparated, leaving you entirely exposed and alone.

That son of a bitch.

- - -

Tag List:

@lilymurphy03 , @mypolicemanharryyy , @angelfrombeneth , @clairesjointshurt , @bunbunbl0gs , @acornacreacure, @niktwazny303 , @thestarlithideout, @sarahskakskskskajakwwnwjw , @yhiiil , @xxrougefangxx , @thatblackthorn , @robinyx , @starsval , @jolly4holly , @blvebanisters , @chgrch , @ilovehotmenandwoman , @smutnyrobocikwrakiecie , @synicaljah , @abaker74

[misctf]

Singing a New Tune

Written for Occam's 2000 Follower Writing Challenge

“Babe, I love you.”

Jared smiled down at Julie, as she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him deeply. He had to imagine his girlfriend dreamed of this moment. A romantic kiss at a Tiffany Stabina concert as the star finished out her set with one of Julie’s favorite songs. A slow romantic song- one that Jared knew all too well from frequent replays in the car.  

“Anything for you babe.” He replied, holding her closely in his muscular arms, “I love you too.”

This certainly wasn’t his kind of music. And he didn’t understand the cult-like devotion to Tiffany. But seeing Julie this happy? Worth it. Still, he imagined the other straight dudes here were thinking similarly. In fact, he and the guy next to him shared several looks throughout the night. A silent comradery acknowledging they’d rather be elsewhere. And if they had been elsewhere, Jared would’ve asked the guy for his arm day routine.

“Alright babe, we ought to head out before...”

“To all my fans, I love you!” Tiffany called out, their cheers drowning Jared’s words, “You’ve all been with me from the beginning, and I am so grateful.” She placed a hand over her heart, “But you all know I’ve been criticized.” The fans all booed, “And they’ve come after you too.”

“A bit dramatic.” Jared chuckled, earning a glare from Julie.

“You wouldn’t get it.” She replied, “They go after he for everything.” The jock nodded, not wanting to risk ruining their perfect night, “But when she sings, it’s like she’s speaking directly to you. People just don’t get it.” Jared nodded. There were some things just not worth it.

“I wasn’t going to do this, but I have a new song for you all this evening!” The crowd erupted in screams and applause. Jared groaned, “They say I’m pandering? Then I’ll pander.” She continued, and the crowd got louder.

Jared knew there would be no way of getting Julie to leave now. And he silently dreaded the hours they’d be stuck in traffic. But as the song started and Tiffany’s words echoed through the stadium, his thoughts slowed.

“They say I only cater to a few.”

Jared felt lightheaded, the sound of the crowd growing distant.

“The gays and the girls, oh boo hoo.”

“Julie?” He whispered, but she didn’t respond, “Julie, please...” He felt sick. The world was spinning, everything becoming black, “Fuck, fuck, fuck...” He whispered. He couldn’t move. Was he dying? Was this it?

“But I won’t back down, I won’t apologize.” Jared looked up and saw her. Tiffany Stabina. Standing in front of him, “For making them feel alive.” She strutted towards the helpless jock.

“What...? How is this...?”

“I see you dancing in the dark, feeling completely torn apart.” She sang.

Jared yelped as he felt a cool breeze caress him. And to his horror, he realized he was nude. Butt naked in front of Tiffany Stabina no less. She grinned and approached him, circling his nude figure and wrapping her arms around him.

“Embrace your uniqueness, don’t hide.”

Jared gasped as she placed pressure on his shoulders. He felt the floor getting closer as he lost inch after inch of height. He now stood at eye level with the 5’6” popstar.

“Wait? What did you do to me?” He yelped.

“Now let my music take you for a ride.”

She ran a hand along his muscular arms. Her very touch sent a wave of pleasure straight to his dick, and he blushed as all 10 inches stood at attention. Tiffany smirked, but continued rubbing his biceps and triceps. Her sensual touch was intoxicated, and Jared watched helplessly as his proud muscles started to diminish. His biceps atrophied, followed quickly by his triceps. His slender arms giving off the appearance they hadn’t seen a gym in years. He tried to cry out, but Tiffany placed a finger to his lips, effectively silencing him. He could only watch as her hands roamed his impressive pecs. He had always been proud of his pecs, and he loved when Julie rested her head on his chest. But now, he could only watch as they flattened away.

“Wait...” He was able to force out. But Tiffany was relentless, and her hands roamed down his abs.

He shed a few tears as his abs vanished, leaving him with a flat, slender tummy. There was no way this could be happening. It had to be some type of acid trip or something. Jared kept trying to reassure himself, even as she moved to his legs and quickly destroyed his muscular thighs and calves, leaving his legs slender and dainty. His feet followed, and quickly diminished from size 13s to 9.5s in mere seconds.

“My music is my contagion, unapologetic. Now we’re gonna collide.” Tiffany continued, this time wrapping her hands around his cock, “My fans are my tribe, I won’t divide.”

Jared felt like the wind was knocked out of him from both the pain and pleasure from her touch. And he watched as she shrunk his proud member. The young jock always knew he was well endowed. And he knew how to use it too. But as he watched his dick shrink from its proud ten inches to a mere 3 inches hard, he felt his confidence diminish.

“We’ll rise together, side by side.”

Her hands made their way to his flat ass. He tried to crane his neck to see what she was about to do. But he didn’t need to see. He could immediately feel his ass expand in her hands, filling them with firm, yet jiggly fat and muscle. He let out a moan as she caressed his basketball-sized ass cheeks, and he nearly came when she gave one a firm slap.

“Pl-please stop...” He begged as she placed a hand over his neck, “You can't do thith...” His voice cracked and he winced, “What’th happening to my voithe? Why do I thound like thith?” He begged, his voice cracking, “No, thith doethn't thound right.” His voice settled a few octaves higher, his masculine tone now lost forever.

“So bring on the hate, let the critics rage. We’ll keep on dancing, it’s time to turn the page.”

As she continued to caress his now slender body, and grind against him, he felt off. His dick  softened, as her physicality became less appealing to him. Her bouncing boobs and thick lips didn’t seem to do it for him. Even her touch was losing its pleasure. And he realized in terror what was occurring.

“No, not thith!” He begged, “Come on, come, think of thomething.” He remembered the BJ Julie gave him last night, and even the lesbian porn he watched a few days ago. But his measly member stayed soft, “No... pleathe...”

He felt Tiffany’s hand on his head. His pleading eyes met hers, and he knew he’d find no mercy. His hair restyled itself, and he felt a piercing pain in his left earlobe, which suddenly adourned a diamond stud. But her touch was doing far more than making a few style alterations. In his mind, his memories were shifting. Showering after football practice? Changing in the locker room after a lifting session with his bros? Watching football with his family?

“Oh god...” He moaned, as his small dick hardened and his ass throbbed with need.

He didn’t play football. He got fucked by the quarterback in the shower after a game. He wasn’t lifting at the gym. He was doing cardio and sucking off the gym bros between their sets. He didn’t watch sports like football. He just sat and scrolled on his phone, reading up on the latest Tiffany Stabina gossip and scrolling his socials. And as his new reality cemented itself, Jared’s eyes lost their intelligent spark and became half-lidded, his brain filling with celebrity gossip and how to please guys.

“This contagion’s here to stay, and we’ll celebrate it every day.”

She kissed him on the cheek. And with that, Jared was back. The cheers of the crowd filling his ears, as Tiffany thanked her fans and left the stage. Jared smiled.

“Oh my god! That wath tho amathing!” He cheered, “Tiffany! I love you!” He yelled, “It wath like Tiffany thpoke to me.”

“You felt that way too?” Jared turned and came face to face with a man of similar build. Albeit with slightly bigger arms, “Tiffany, like, totally thpeakth for uth.” He grinned as Jared felt up his arms.

“Wait!” A voice called out behind him, “Did you see the guy I came here with?” Julie asked, looking around desperately, “I swear, he was right here. I...”

“Thorry thithter, I hope you find him!” Jared replied, turning his attention back to the guy.

“Tho weird, thome poor girl athked me about her boyfriend too.” The man replied, “Probably got drunk and left to watch football.”

“OMG tho lame.” Jared laughed. The two smiled at one another, “Tho, like...”

“Wanna go back to my place? I have her latetht album.” The man winked, and Jared shuddered as his ass throbbed with need.

“That thounds delightful.” Jared replied, pulling the man in closer, his smile widening as the man squeezed his ass, “Oh! But like firtht I totally need a thelfie! I want everyone to know I thupport Tiffany and Tiffany thupports me!” He cheered, capturing their kiss on camera and posting it to his socials.

Later that night, Jared and his lover explored one another’s new bodies. Jared gasping at the size of his lover’s cock, moaning as he felt a firm hand squeeze his ass. His moans would continue to fill the room that night. With each thrust of his new lover’s dick, Jared was in heaven. Unaware of his former life or the horror it would bring his former self to see him like this. Just another horny slut- another gay twink dedicated to Tiffany Stabina.

[diminuel]

I said I'd try to write a little companion piece/ continuation to my Luffy time traveling into the past to meet a young Crocodile comic!

As a warning: I know nothing about ships and since this is just a little no pressure project to try to get out of writer's block I didn’t do a lot of research. There is also a plot discrepancy because Luffy mentions Bonney and her abilities which he shouldn’t know based on the frame story I’ve given this fic *lol* Also: I don't know how to write these characters yet.

No beta, sorry for mistakes.

This is a Crocodad AU fic of course! ♥

--

Maybe This Time Part 1 (3.5k)

“Better get down from there, Luffy!” Nami called from the upper deck. “I don’t quite trust these clouds.” Luffy turned to look over his shoulder, feet dangling over the railing. Nami stood with a hand over her brow, looking up at the sky. Luffy turned back to look out at the sea and tilted his head up. The sky had a pretty green hue, nearly blending seamlessly into a dark mist rising above them. A huge dark cloud had formed ahead, casting a shadow over the sea in the distance.

“Just-“

He titled forward, lost his grip on the railing. A swooping feeling of falling tickled his stomach but before he could make a surprised sound he hit the surface of the water. It felt like he was crashing through glass.

And then it was dark.

This wasn’t the first time Luffy woke up after having been tossed into the water, but for some reason he was bone dry. And oddly thirsty.

“Thirsty,” he wheezed, sticking out his tongue to escape the uncomfortable dryness of his mouth.

A small barrel with a straw was held out to him with a curt “here.” Luffy’s attention zeroed in on the offering and he grabbed it without second-thought. A couple of deep gulps of the water later he felt a lot better already. He heaved a sigh in relief. He took the straw into his mouth again, starting a thank you as he turned towards his savior.

Startled, he sucked in water and spit it out again before he could choke on it, right into the face of someone who looked shockingly familiar.

“BABA?!” Luffy yelled. The person in front of stared at him blanky, the water dripping off his face.

Luffy stared right back. Could it be? This wasn’t Baba as he knew him, but much younger. Sure, they hadn’t seen each other in a couple of months, but he couldn’t change that much, right? But who else could it be? The same hair, the same eyes, the same scar, the same unimpressed expression.

A thousand questions rampaged through Luffy’s minds. How was Baba here? Last they had talked he had been still on Buggy’s homebase. Had he saved him? Where was his crew? What kind of island was this? But one question seemed most important.

“Why are you so young?!” Luffy asked, staring at Baba who couldn’t be much older than Luffy was now.

“Huh?”

“Was it Bonney?” The confusion on Baba’s face only grew.

“Who?” he asked. Luffy stared back at him taking in the complete lack of recognition on Baba’s face.

What?

“Don’t you recognize me, Baba?!” Luffy shouted in horror. The corners of Baba’s mouth twitched and his brows drew down. At least that was a marginally more familiar expression on his face.

“My name isn’t Baba,” he insisted. “And no. Should I?” That hit Luffy like Grandpa’s fist of love.

“Yes!!” Luffy argued, feeling overwhelmed and his crew wasn’t even here to help figure this out. Robin or Jinbei would know what to do! Luffy looked at the sea. It was overcast, the sun faint, the air cool. It was most likely early morning. There wasn’t a single ship visible in the bay or beyond. No other people on this beach. He could feel tears form in his eyes.

“What is going on?” he yelled.

--

There were rules for unexpected situations that had been drilled into his head at an early age. Get yourself out of any immediate danger. Figure out where your people are and regroup. Figure out where you are. Eat. Everything else can wait until after you’ve eaten.

Maybe the importance placed on food was just the Monkey family’s way of dealing with problems, but Luffy wasn’t about to complain. The perfectly grilled meat and the little stick that was loaded with huge mushrooms helped to dampen the anxious pit in his stomach. But the moment he looked up and caught a glimpse of the person sitting across from him, tearing the meat straight off the bone in an unsettling lack of finesse, he felt like he was being dunked into sea water again.

Just what was going on here? Luffy had been travelling with his crew, enjoying that exhilarating part of adventuring where you were simply sailing, facing the challenges the sea of the New World threw at you, not yet knowing where the path would take you. And then the next thing he knew he was plunged into water, sank, blacked out.

Nothing after made any sense. Because the person that had saved him…

“You’re staring.” Luffy startled at the unsettlingly unfamiliar voice. He watched the person opposite him pick his teeth. “Do I really look like that Baba person?” Maybe a smart man would keep his mouth shut and Luffy had been raised to have at least a pinch of common sense between his ears but…

Just what was he supposed to do when a young version of his father was sitting opposite him?!

“You do,” he settled on saying, wary. Baba didn’t look particularly upset by his lack of an explanation, not even a hint of annoyance pinching his brow. And that was unusual too.

What was this? A hallucination? Someone’s devil fruit power? Actual time travel?

(And why not into the future so Luffy could at least see cool robots shooting lasers?)

“What did you say your name was?” Baba asked, genuinely curious, then he pointed at the food in Luffy’s hands. “More where that came from,” he promised. “Eat.” And wasn’t that just another strange thing? Why was he so nice to him if he didn’t even know who Luffy was? Luffy stuffed the food in his mouth, chewing morosely.

“Monkey D. Luffy. I’m going to be the pirate king,” he announced, though far more subdued than he usually was when introducing himself. Baba’s eyebrow lifted.

“There’s no such thing as a king of pirates,” he said, chuckling to himself. “Isn’t that the whole point? The freedom?” Luffy swallowed his food, tilting his head in confusion. Baba put his elbow on his knee, and propped his chin in his palm. He grinned at Luffy, the expression open and joyful, almost mischievous. “That’s why I set sail. I want to do things for myself, see what I can achieve on the Grandline!” His grin softened to an expression a lot more familiar to Luffy though he couldn’t exactly place it. “A big adventure before…,” he trailed off and sat up straight, still grinning but not sharing his thoughts.

It was strange to hear Baba talk of freedom and piracy like that. While Baba had given Ace, Sabo and him a lot of practical information on what to expect out of piracy, he almost never talked about how it used to be for him when he just starting out. Luffy didn’t know when he became a pirate, what motivated him or why he gave up that freedom for a warlord position.

He just knew that nowadays everything, even freedom, was shackled by conditions upon conditions. A thousand locks for Baba and Dad to pick before it could be achieved. Luffy had never quite understood it. Freedom was so easy to achieve if you just pushed your boat off the shore.

Maybe this Baba still trusted that freedom was always within reach.

“How old are you?” Luffy blurted out, putting aside the unease about the situation to admit a little bit of curiosity. Even if it was a hallucination or the work of a very capable impostor, he wanted to know more about him. He wanted to know everything about him.

“19,” Baba answered. “And you?”

“Uh, me too,” Luffy said, then lifted his fingers. “46 minus 19.”

“27,” Baba answered right away, chewing on a mushroom. It seems Baba hadn’t yet discovered the “don’t talk with your mouth full” rule.

“27 years?” Luffy repeated in dawning horror, touching his palms to his cheeks. “I’m 27 years in the past?!” He whined and let himself drop onto his back. He stared up at the overcast sky, partially visible through the sparse trees here so close to the shore. How was that possible?! Did they sail into some sort of mystical area of the Grandline and were now all scattered across time? Was that even possible?

Baba’s face appeared in his field of vision, blocking out the sky.

“What are you talking about?” he wanted to know, his hands in his hips as he bent down to study Luffy. “You can’t seriously believe that you’re from the future.”

“But I am!” Luffy insisted and jumped to his feet. Luckily Baba straightened quickly enough to not be hit by Luffy’s head. He grimaced, momentarily distracted by the fact that even now his father was nearly a head taller than him. He shrugged it off. “I know that there is no known devil fruit that will grant the user the ability to go back in time. But there has got to be an explanation for this!”

“Other than you being insane?” Baba offered but judged by his tone and the grin stretching his lips he was teasing, not mocking. Luffy groaned, then crossed his arms over his chest. “You do realize that what you’re saying is improbable.”

“But it’s still true!” Baba didn’t react to his outburst. “I’ve seen a lot of so-called improbable things before! Islands with dinosaurs! Islands that fly in the sky! Islands where people turned into living toys!” Baba lifted his eyebrows at that. Luffy waved him off. “It was just Mingo, don’t worry about it.”

“I’m not worrying about it,” Baba answered, amusement evident. “But it seems like you’ve already travelled a bit. I thought you were new to the Grandline. You look like a rookie.”

“I’m not!” Luffy protested then pointed his thumb at his chest. “I’ve been on the Grandline for 2 years! I’ve got an amazing ship and the best crew in the world!” At the mention of his crew his spirits sunk like an anchor. He hoped they were okay…!

“Where were you when you got separated from your crew? You can’t have been washed ashore from that far away,” Baba asked. Luffy hummed, trying to remember. He scratched his head.

“We’d been on sea for about three weeks after Wano,” he said. “But we hadn’t come into stable climate yet, so I don’t think we were close to an island.”

“Wano,” Baba repeated. “You were in the New World?” He seemed surprised now. Was he doubting him again?

“You’re in the New World too,” Luffy shot back.

“No! We’re on Agaricus,” Baba insisted. Luffy squinted at him. Where had he heard that name before? He was sure he had heard Baba mention it. “The next big island you might have heard of is Alabasta.” Luffy hit his balled fist into his palm in recognition.

“The autumn island where you like to go mushroom hunting!” he said then the words registered. “What?! We’re in the first half of the Grandline?!” Baba looked about as shocked as Luffy felt.

“How do you know that?” he asked and it took a moment for Luffy to realize that he looked wary all of a sudden, his stance a lot less relaxed. Luffy knew that he should be able to defend himself against a 19-year-old version of his father, but he still didn’t want to test that hypothesis if Baba actually started to believe that Luffy was a threat.

“I told you! I’m from the future! I know you!” Luffy defended himself. Baba frowned at him, but his stance shifted just a bit. A soft sound at Luffy’s feet made him look down just to see tendrils of sand slip back down on the floor. He hadn’t even realized that Baba must have manipulated the sand to grab him if needed. When Luffy looked up Baba’s expression was serious, a crease between his eyebrows.

“27 years into the future,” Baba affirmed. “When you and your crew sailed the New World. As apparently I do too.” He rubbed his arms, his face uncertain for the first time. “I’m still alive in 27 years?”

“Obviously!” Luffy insisted, angry at the suggestion that Baba would not make it on the Grandline. “You’re strong!” A small grin appeared on Baba’s face.

“Yeah? So how do we know each other? Am I your captain or something?” Luffy wrinkled his nose but at the same time Baba did too. “Do I insist on everybody calling me Baba like fucking Whitebeard wants everyone to call him Pops?” Baba made a disgusted expression at that. Luffy of course knew that Baba and Whitebeard had history, but as most things of his father’s past, this was something he kept close to his chest. Sometimes his secrecy was quite annoying and it was hard to pretend not to care about what had happened, especially since the old man had meant so much to Ace.

“How can you already have a grudge against Whitebeard at 19?”

“Oh, so you don’t know everything, Monkey D. Luffy,” Baba said, his grim look dropping quickly at the supposed upper hand he fancied himself to have. Luffy wasn’t used to these quick mood changes. Still, instead of answering he grimaced. “What?”

“I don’t like when you call me by my full name. You only do that when you’re scolding me. Call me Luffy or Strawhat.”

“Strawhat?” Baba asked, laughing. Luffy pulled his hat from his back and put it onto his head demonstratively. “And you let me scold you? What am I? Your mom?” Luffy pressed his lips together, the question feeling like someone had upended a bucket of cold water onto his head. But Baba laughed in amusement as if the thought was absurd. “Am I your captain?”

For the first time a different kind of worry made a home in Luffy’s mind. He had arguably no experience in time traveling but he wondered if it was a good idea to let his father know too much. Could Luffy change the past just by being here? Could he change his own present if he messed up here?

Luffy knew that he was a “happy accident.” What if he told Baba who he was and Baba decided to be a bit more careful so that no happy accidents happened accidentally? That’d be horrible! Would Luffy just disappear?! Maybe this was the true danger of this situation!

“You’re not my captain! I’m the captain of my ship!” Luffy insisted, pride in his position winning out over the moment of panic.

“Then what’s our connection?” Crocodile asked and took a step closer to Luffy, a glint in his eyes that Luffy didn’t quite like. He didn’t have a sharp hook to hold under his nose but he had a sharp and menacing grin. “Spit it out, Strawhat.”

“I… I don’t know anything!” Luffy said through pursed lips, looking away. But other than grab him and shake him or worse (as Luffy had seen Baba do to people who annoyed him or lied to him) Baba just blinked at him. Then he threw his head back and laughed.

“I know someone who’s just as horrible as you are at lying!” he said. Luffy wrinkled his nose. Not everyone could lie professionally. “But why don’t you want to tell me?”

“Because I am from the future!” Luffy insisted. “What if I say something that changes something big?! I don’t want that! I like my life! Maybe if someone sent me into this past, this is their objective?! What if they’re trying to kill me by letting me make a mistake here in the past that leads to me not being born?!”

“That seems far too much effort,” Baba said, looking Luffy up and down. “You don’t look particularly strong, Strawhat,” he said his tone annoyingly patronizing. “A stray bullet could kill you.”

“What?! I am strong! And my bounty is higher than yours!” he protested. Luffy would never have said that to his Baba’s face but this young version of him was different. “And I’m not going to tell you what it is!” Baba rolled his eyes.

“At least tell me I didn’t choose something as stupid as Baba as my name,” he said, then he moved his hand and a wave of sand spread over the fire they had roasted their food on, dousing it at once.

“I’ve always done my best to fly under the marine’s radar and it’s hard to break the habit. I haven’t really gotten my name out there yet,” Baba continued. He pointed at Luffy. “But I will! The world will soon hear of the exploits of Crocodile!” Luffy stared at him, taking in his wide, confident grin.

Baba looked impossibly young.

“Yes,” Luffy agreed, not sure why there was a lump in his throat. Baba smiled at him, then he reached out to pat Luffy’s shoulder. “Let’s go.” Baba turned around and started packing up the rest of the cooked meat and mushrooms. He tossed Luffy a bag, then shouldered his own. When he walked away from the camp, Luffy trailed after him.

“Where are we going?” he asked. They stepped out of the outskirts of the forest and back onto the beach. There was a small ship docking on a pier that Luffy hadn’t noticed back when he had first woken up. It wasn’t much bigger than the one Luffy had initially set out on. Far too small for a crew of more than two. Not a vessel that looked suited for the Grandline.

“You’re looking for your crew, right? And a way to get back home, wherever and whenever that might be,” Baba said and then thrust his thumb behind him, towards the ship. “So what do you say, Strawhat Luffy? Want to join me?” Luffy looked at him in surprise. Baba wasn’t exactly the kind of person to make such generous offers to strangers, at least he wasn’t today.

“Fine. But I’m captain!” Luffy said and extended his arm to grab onto the ship’s mast. He pulled himself onto the ship, Baba staring after him. Luffy sat himself down at the helm of the ship. Baba cursed to himself, then undid the rope and gave his ship a powerful shove with his foot. He turned into sand and landed on the ship next to Luffy.

“No way! This is my ship!” Luffy looked up the mast, noticing the lack of a pirate flag.

“Baba-“

“Don’t call me that.”

“Crocodile, you don’t even have a pirate flag!” he said disapprovingly and for the first time Baba actually seemed embarrassed. “Does your ship have name at least?”

“Yeah, it’s the Mind Your Own Business Strawhat!” Crocodile went down into the cabin and then came back with an eternal pose. Luffy couldn’t read the name written on it. Crocodile walked to the steering wheel and then looked up at the sail. Luffy watched as sand spread from Crocodile’s body until the sails were lifted and caught the wind.

“Where are we going?” Luffy asked, inspecting the stemhead but it didn’t seem particularly comfortable to sit on. Crocodile’s ship didn’t even have a figurehead! Maybe he had a banana in his galley so Luffy could put it on the stemhead. The "Mind your Own Business Strawhat" needed least some decoration. Momentarily caught up in his musings, it took him a moment to turn back around to look up at Crocodile behind the wheel. It was strange seeing him there. He had only sailed with Crocodile on the same ship once, leaving Impel Down. He didn’t know why it seemed so strange to see him man a ship himself. He knew that his father was a pirate and yet it seemed odd to realize what that actually meant. That he hadn’t always been a warlord who tended to stay in one place or travel on marine vessels, that he hadn’t always had 2000 people under his command, that he hadn’t always been an emperor’s commander. But he looked comfortable behind the wheel, like he had never done anything else.

“Do you want to go all the way to Wano?” Luffy eventually asked and jumped up to where Crocodile was. “What about your own adventure? Don’t you want to follow the log poses and do your route around the Grandline?”

“I don’t mind making a detour,” he easily said as if it wasn’t difficult at all for him to give up his plans. “And absolutely not, I’m not going to sail into the blue like that just based on your last location in allegedly 27 years from now” Crocodile said with a scoff. “We need information.” He smiled down at the log pose. “And I might have an idea where we could get it.”

To be continued? If you find it too hard to read on here I can post it on AO3.

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Mission Control 12

Warnings: non/dubcon, violence, stalking, and other dark elements. My username actually says you never asked for any of this.

My warnings are not exhaustive but be aware this is a dark fic and may include potentially triggering topics. Please use your common sense when consuming content. I am not responsible for your decisions.

Character: Captain Hydra

Summary: a man marches into your life on a mission

As usual, I would appreciate any and all feedback. I’m happy to once more go on this adventure with all of you! Thank you in advance for your comments and for reblogging ❤️

You don’t know when he stopped, you’re just happy it’s over. For now. You know better than to think it won’t happen again. 

His shadow moves around, vague and ominous. You lay where he left you. The mattress feels thin beneath you, your body sunk from the force of his appetites. Your body aches as his assault scars you more than skin deep. Bitemarks and bruises pulses as your insides knot and tug in ceaseless horror. 

You don’t look at him. You can’t. You listen to him shift around; it sounds more as if the house shifts around him. He leaves the bedroom and you roll onto your side with a rattling effort. You whine and tuck your hand between your thighs, raw from his incessant pounding. 

It’s like something in him broke. There was no control in what he did. No restraint or relent. He is more than inhuman, he is monstrous. 

When he returns, a grunt crackles from him. He comes to the bed and it dips with his weight. He grabs your shoulder and forces you onto your back. You brace yourself for more. 

His cowl is gone. His brows arch and the scar down the side of his face pales with the strain. He raises his hand and you wince. He tilts his head then shakes it as he shows you a handful of the silver packets. You blink in confusion.  

You take a breath and try to speak. Your throat is brittle and dry. You clear it and push a hoarse whisper, “not hungry.” 

He tuts and drops the packets, keeping one in his hand. He points to the label. Day 2 – Dinner. It’s still sealed. He tosses it and takes another, once more tapping the slanted lettering. You think you know what he’s saying. 

You hug yourself and swallow, trying to wet your tongue. “I wasn’t hungry. Stomach hurt.” 

He looks down and sifts through the packages. He turns them over and his forehead wrinkles. He gathers them all and carries them away. 

You stare after him as he stomps out of the room. You uncross your arms and press your hands to the bed. You sit up and look down at the remnants of the nightgown. You free your arms and bring your knees up to hug them. You whimper at the friction between your legs. 

He comes back. His hair is greasy and some has a red tint at the tips. You don’t want to think of what that is. His neck shows a layer of filth and his clothes are stained and dusty. You look down and find much of it smeared on your skin. 

He marches over to you. You cower and he stops at the edge of the bed. He raises his hand slowly, as if to coax you. You stare as he holds it open to you. Your insides throb and you take his hand, not wanting to provoke another episode. 

He leads you from the bed and takes you through the front room into the bathroom. He puts you by the sink and turns away. You shiver, trying to shield your naked body with only your arms. He bends over the tub and rinses it out then puts the stopper in place. 

He faces you and works at unstrapping his body armor. You stare at him, legs trembling, and move to lean on the sink to keep from keeling over. He watches you with a dimple in his forehead. 

He undresses, piece by piece, until he’s naked. You stay as you are until he grabs you. He drags you to the tub with him. You step in at his insistence and he angles you around. He lowers himself first then brings you down over him. The water laps between your feet as it fills the porcelain. 

You can’t relax, even as the heat soothes your tortured muscles. With him so close, you can’t ever let your guard down again.  

He brings his hand up your thigh and around your hip. He tickles your stomach and spreads his hand over one side of your chest. You shiver and steel yourself. He toys with you, not unkindly, and you brace the sides of the tub. 

As the water reaches the brim, he sits you up with him to shut it off. He reclines again, hooking his other arm around your middle. You like this softness less than his rough return. You can handle the cruelty, you expect it, but these moments confound you. It’s like a game you can’t win. 

Silence steams with the water. You don’t move. You can’t. You have to do something. Say something. But what? 

“I’m sorry,” you eke out. You’re not sure why you say that, but you are sorry. That moment flashes in your head, when you tried to use his name. That seemed to set him off. “Thank you for the food and the wood. I’m sorry I didn’t eat it all.” 

He growls but doesn’t say anything. He shifts and nuzzles the top of your head, his hot breath pluming over your scalp. The rigidity slowly seeps from him, thought that underlying stiffness remains. 

“I tried to keep it clean. I didn’t know... what else to do. I... I don’t know why I’m talking. I’ll-- I’ll stop,” you exhale and stare at the corroding mouth of the faucet. 

He drags his hand up from your chest and cups your chin. You twitch and his thumb stretches up to toy with your lower lip. Your grimace and let him poke around. He huffs in frustration then with two fingers, moves both your lips. He traces his touch down to your throat. 

“You want me to talk?” You ask. 

He pushes his nose firmly against your crown. You take that as affirmation. What do you talk about? You glance around and search for anything. You’ve been so bored and yet you can’t think of much. 

“My... my grandma had a tub like this,” you utter awkwardly. “It was her favourite place. She would read in there for hours. Funny, she... she wasn’t much of a kid person so we usually just did our own thing.” You ramble as your voice cracks, “and... we broke her favourite clock. It had a glass cover over it... I... just a silly memory.” 

He hums and caresses your cheek. You gulp again and hold back a quiver. If you can keep him calm for just a little, then you’ll find something to talk about. You just need to think about anything but the here and now. 

[nerd-at-sea5]

are u pro palestine... we have the same interests but i dnt want to follow u if ur weird

honestly this blog is for silly little thoughts about lesbians and such and the occasional personal story or opinion but it’s about time i got one of these. so buckle up long post ahead and it’s not gonna be a cut and paste yes/no answer bc yeah. just read the thing

first of all: im jewish. raised jewish and will forever be jewish. i'm proud of it. i'm not super religious and don't really believe in god but that doesn't mean i'm any less jewish.

second: i believe in a 2 state solution. i don't like terrorists. i think hamas needs to be held accountable for the murders and horrors they've committed, because frankly i think they're a bunch of monsters and terrible people. i don't agree with a lot of the stuff that netanyahu does either because that stuff is also not ok. but overall: fuck hamas.

that being said, i believe that israel has the right to exist. i believe that the jews deserve a homeland where we can be safe. i believe that a 2 state solution is the safest and smartest option. but i will also say that as the correct and historically accurate definition of zionism is to believe in the movement and protection of the jewish state - i am a zionist and i am not going to shy away from what i believe in.

i am aware that people will not like this about me, and i am aware they will try to tell me things about myself that are not true. so i am going to set the record straight and go back to posting about my silly little tv shows.

israel has a right to exist and to defend itsself

hamas are terrorists and should not be in power

i am in favor of a 2 state solution

the people of gaza don't deserve to live in horrible conditions because of the terrorists in power

jews and israeli's don't deserve the hate and abuse that they're experiencing because of people who don't know how to fact check

the hostages should be home. this is non-negotiable, they should be home.

and again - im aware that this isn't the yes/no answer you want, but i can't give that to you because its much more complicated than that.

lastly, if you want to unfollow me for any of these things please go ahead, i don't care. i implore you to fact check yourself before sending hate and threats to people online or in real life (or assaulting/hurting people, seriously just don’t do that.)

if you pick and choose who to engage with online due to political opinions that's up to you, but a difference in opinions isnt 'weird' its just human.

[anotherbananasong]

Promises You Made to Me (2/4)

It’s time for Air to face the clergy alone…

“Nervous” doesn’t begin to cover how Air feels. The pressure from his corset barely comforts him. He’s had Earth at his side almost every moment, day and night, since they mated. Earth is his comfort; he doesn’t know what he will do without him. Earth accompanies him right up to the doors.

Earth: (running a comforting hand over Air’s chest) It’ll be okay, skybird. I promise, I’ll be right out here until you come out. I won’t leave.

Air: (eyes already beginning to water) I don’t want to…

Earth: (reaches up and wipes his tear) Remember, Secondo said not to let them see. (takes Air’s hands in his own, placing a kiss on his fingers) Promise me you won’t say anything that will send you back to the Pits. Okay?

Air: I promise.

As usual, the clergy is seated at their raised podium. Even with their size, the Ancients still have to look up to see them. And to Air’s horror, Sister is right there in the middle. He’s never been able to look her in the face; she strikes such fear in him that he can’t maintain eye contact. Had it been just the clergy, like usual, he may have been able to hold himself together a little better. But not with Sister actually making an appearance.

Sister: (after a disarming silence) This whole “kit” business… Whose idea was it?

Air: (heart sinks from his chest; he knows he was the first to bring it up. but admitting it would send him back to the Pits. and he promised Earth) …

Sister: (narrowing her eyes, satisfied with the discomfort she can see in Air’s glowing eyes) Don’t make this difficult, ghoul.

Air: (even worse, if he says anything that may put Earth in trouble, Earth may be the one going back to the Pits) …

Sister: (flicking imaginary dust from her sleeve) I’m your friend. You wouldn’t want to make your friend mad, would you?

Air: (feeling his lungs tighten with anxiety; he couldn’t answer even if he wanted to) …

Sister: (gives Air a long silence to build the tension) You want to tell me, ghoul. You know I have ways to get my answer. You don’t want me to have to take drastic measures.

Air: (looks down at the floor) …

Sister drills him for forty minutes, alternating between demanding he answer and leaving him in frightened silence. It’s effective, despite Air’s continued mutism. As he sweats where he stands, Sister can see that he’s weak. He’s always been the weakest of Secondo’s ghouls. She may not interact with him often, but she knows what will break him.

Sister: (after the forty minutes of Air’s silence) Tell you what, ghoul; we have a lovely room for you. You can stay there until you’re ready to talk to your friend.

Air: (Secondo said “don’t let them see”, but he can’t help the tears at Sister’s new threat. what does that mean?)

Sister: I’ll have someone take you there, and you can think about your answer. Take your time; I’m a patient woman.

Outside the doors, Earth is pacing. He can feel Air’s torment through their mating bond, but Air is closed off from the comfort and encouragement Earth is attempting to send to him through it. He doesn’t know how long it’s been, but it feels like it’s been years. He finally sits on a bench and focuses on trying to reach Air through the bond, trying to send him a wave of his love. He almost jumps when the meeting room door opens, but his stomach sinks when it’s not Air coming out the doors.

Sister: (businesslike and matter-of-fact) Return to your dorm. He won’t be joining you.

Earth: (didn’t know Sister herself was in that room; no wonder Air was so afraid) What do you mean? What does that mean?

Sister: You don’t need to ask questions; you just need to obey.

Earth: What does that mean, he’s not joining me?

Sister: (tilts her head, giving him a glance over) He has to think about some things. He’ll be staying up here for now. Return to the catacombs, ghoul.

Earth: (rises from the bench) Why is he staying up here? He has to come back with me… Why is he staying up here? What are you going to do to him?

Sister: I said no questions.

Earth: (Secondo said to protect his mate… this isn’t protecting him) No, tell me. Tell me why he’s staying up here. What’s going on? You let him out of there. He’s coming home with me.

Sister: (treating him to one of her terrifying smiles as he approaches her) Don’t ask questions, ghoul; you’ll make this more difficult for him. Choose your actions wisely.

Earth: (considers a million things all at once) … (hisses in warning, a promise that he will retaliate if they harm his mate, and turns to go back to the catacombs. alone)

[josephandrewstarkey]

tears and comfort

warnings: hachi ☹️

words: 420

❧ rafe cameron x reader

Rafe leaned back on the couch, arms crossed as he scrolled through the movie options. “Horror or action,” he said firmly, barely glancing at Y/N as she nestled beside him. “Take your pick.”

Y/N, her innocent smile softening the tension in the room, reached for the remote. “How about… hachi?” she asked, her eyes twinkling. Rafe groaned, shaking his head. “No. You’re gonna cry, and I’m not dealing with that tonight.” “I’m not going to cry!” she protested, her voice light and sweet. “I promise!”

Rafe gave her a hard look, skeptical. “You cried during that dog food commercial last week. You think I don’t know how this is gonna end?” Y/N pouted, leaning her head on his shoulder. “Pleaaase, baby? I won’t cry this time. I promise.”

He sighed, giving in as he always did when it came to her. “Fine. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

As the movie started, Rafe kept stealing glances at her, fully expecting her to break down at any moment. But halfway through, she was still holding it together.

“Told you,” she said with a triumphant grin, “I’m not going to cry anytime soon.”

Rafe chuckled under his breath. “Yeah, sure.”

But when the sad part hit—the scene where Hachi kept waiting at the train station for his owner, even after he’d passed away—he felt her tense up beside him. Y/N’s lip quivered, and before he could even say anything, the tears came pouring down.

“I told you,” Rafe muttered, shaking his head with a smirk. “You always cry.”

Y/N buried her face in her arms, sobbing softly. “It’s not my fault that you don’t have the ability to cry!”

He sighed, wrapping his arms around her, pulling her in closer. “I know, I know. It’s okay baby,” he whispered, his usual harsh tone softening just for her. He rubbed her back gently, letting her cry it out against him.

After the movie ended, Y/N sniffled and looked up at him with red, watery eyes. “Can we watch friends now?”

Rafe rolled his eyes playfully. “Of course baby.”

They settled into a few episodes of Friends, and slowly, her sniffles faded. Y/N, now tucked comfortably in his arms, began to drift off to sleep. Rafe glanced down at her, watching her breathing even out as she dozed off, her face soft and peaceful.

Carefully, he lifted her, laying her down gently on the bed. He brushed a few strands of hair away from her face and bent down to kiss her forehead.

“Goodnight, sweetheart,” he whispered, a rare smile crossing his lips before he turned off the lights.

[kittykat-25]

HOME- An S.Coups Fic

Pairing: Seungcheol x F. Reader

Genre: Comfort, Scoups savings the day

Synopsis: you've never had an issue with hiding your relationship with Seungcheol but he does when your ex gets a little too close.

A/N: this is basically the story from the SVT men’s POV. Straight from when they answer Y/n’s call.

Jeonghan sipped his beer, listening to Mingyu tell Joshua the right way to sauté something, poor soul not noticing the evil gleam in Shuas eye. “So you’re telling me I can chop up anything and put it in a pan and it’s a sauté?” He said, voice cracking from hiding his laughter. “Hyunggg” Mingyu whined making Jeonghan smile more. As close as they all were it was rare they got to spend one night free together like this. “Cheol hurry up.” Joshua yelled as the baseball game started back up, none of them really watching. Cheols phone blasting his ringtone snapped Jeonghan out of his thoughts. A warm smile filled his face when y/n filled the screen. “Choi Seungcheols phone, the other love of his life speaking!” Jeonghan said to his best friend, Cheols girlfriend as he switched to speaker. “Hannie-“ her tone alone made all conversation stop. All eyes turned towards the phone, “y/n what’s wrong?” He asked gently. She was out with her friends from the states tonight, he knew she was excited to see them but she sounded almost broken on the phone. Everything he heard was muffled but he picked up enough of the conversation to be pissed. The other three men started at the phone in horror at what her supposed closest friend was saying to her. “Oh please, we both know you don’t actually have a boyfriend. You just want to make it seem like you have it together over here. When clearly you are losing it.“ y/n’s friend spat. “What the hell?” Mingyu said as him and Wonwoo moved closer to the phone. “Fuck you.” They heard you snip back. A small smile graced his face, you were fighting back. Something you rarely did when they met you. You had met them a month after moving here and quickly won over all of their hearts, becoming a sister to many of them. You and Cheol had been dating for the past 8 months and there was nothing their leader wouldn’t do for you.

He heard the long exhale from y/n, “y/n?” He asked gently. “Please come get me.” Y/n said into the phone. Her voice cracking. Joshua walked to the door “CHEOL” he yelled at their other friend. “What?!” He snappped back walking into the room. “Y/n, we need to go. Now.” Joshua said sliding his shoes on as Jeonghan kept you calm. Cheol grabbed the phone from Jeonghan, “Baby? What happened?” He asked, noticing just how pissed his friends were as he shut the car door. ��“Her friends are dicks, did they tell you your ex was going to be here.” Jeonghan asked, as the car connected the call through the speakers. Jeonghan tried to control his anger, but looking in the mirror and seeing the same protective anger from his friends. He let out a deep breath, noticing the tight white knuckle grip Cheol had on the steering wheel as you spoke. The air in the car turned icy as the sentence came out of your mouth. “He won’t stop making comments and- touching me.” You add that last bit quieter, knowing your audience well. “Shit.” Mingyu whispered as Cheols grip got tighter on the wheel, the car speeding up. It was Wonwoo who spoke, his deep voice coming out harsher “he touched you?” Y/n sucked in a breath before apologizing, “I’m interrupting guys night, I’m so sorry.” Cheol blew out a breath, “Don’t you dare apologize for calling me when you need me baby.” His eyes fill with worry, before masking back into anger. “We’re five minutes away y/n. We’ll see you soon.” Jeonghan calls to you before he ends the call.

“I’m gonna kill him.” Cheol grounds out, “no you’re not.” Joshua says calmly from the backseat. “You know you can’t.” Cheol blew out an exasperated breath. “He touched her Shua.” Joshua patted Cheol shoulder, “I know but Y/N is perfectly capable of defending herself.” “She shouldn’t have to defend herself against her friends.” Wonwoo mumbled, clenching his fist. “Get her out safely. That’s all I care about.” Cheol said, the voice of their leader silencing them all. “What about cameras? Or publicity for this?” Mingyu asked quietly. “I don’t care, Pledis can handle it or I can but I won’t let the media keep me from getting my girl when she needs me. You can stay in the car if you’re that worried.” Cheol snapped. “Cheol calm down.” Jeonghan said calmly. “We all care about y/n, we all heard the crap spewed at her. We just want you to handle this with a clear head. That’s all.” The echos of agreement from the backseat gave Cheol some peace. They pulled up in front of the restaurant, Cheol had just opened the door when he saw y/n slam a knife into the table, seemingly into her exes hand. Although judging by the lack of screaming, you had missed. “That was hot.” Mingyu whispered, “never call my girlfriend hot again.” Cheol said as he strode over to you, Jeonghan hot on his heels.

Crossing the space in record time, Jeonghan knew there was no stopping Cheol as your ex raised his hand to hit you. His friend caught his wrist as Jeonghan stepped closer to you. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” Cheol spat, shoving him away. Jeonghan watched your bitchy friends face light up then completely crash down as she processed who had come to your defense. “please take her to the car.” Cheol said quietly to Jeonghan. As he offered his hand to help his girlfriend up, y/n turned to walk with Jeonghan, his other friends faces a storm of rage. But y/n was smiling as she strode towards her friends. Jeonghan turned back towards the table, just as Cheol leaned down. “If you ever touch my girlfriend again, that knife will be buried somewhere else.” His voice icy, one of the friends flinched away. “She deserves so much better than any of you.” Jeonghan said looking directly at the other girl who had shrunk away before turning on his heel and following his friends out the door.

A/N: soooo apparently I can’t stop with this story because I’m feeling an epilogue with the car ride home👀👀 if anyone would be interested in that!!

Taglist: let me know if you want to be added

@hi-cherry

[solxamber]

Dragon's Favourite Sacrifice – Trey Clover x reader

Trey finds himself volunteering to be the human sacrifice to you in place of his siblings. What he didn't expect was to become your housekeeper instead of being eaten.

Crossposted from my ao3!

The village doesn’t know how to react when Trey volunteers as a sacrifice. He’s fully prepared for the worst, thinking back on all the horror stories the elders tell about the dragon god—the terrifying, ancient being that can destroy their village with one swipe of a claw. At least, that’s what everyone says.

But it had to be done. The village is on the brink of disaster and their last hope was the dragon god that lived in the mountains. The villagers began to proclaim that this was happening because they forgot to send a sacrifice in recent years. And when the current sacrifice chosen turned out to be one of his younger siblings, Trey had no choice but to volunteer himself.

As he approaches the temple, though, Trey wonders why the place looks like it hasn't been touched in years. Not exactly what you’d expect from a wrathful deity.

Maybe they just don't care about keeping things tidy before eating their next victim?

The inside of the temple is surprisingly cozy, but he doesn't have time to think about it. You, the ancient dragon, make your entrance—or rather, you wander in, yawning, and blink at him like you've just woken up from a really long nap.

“Hey… uh, are you the dragon god?” Trey asks, clutching the bundle of supplies he'd brought along.

You stretch, wings fluttering lazily behind you, before giving him a confused look. "Who else would I be? The village’s lost pet?"

Trey blinks. This is not what he was expecting. He was ready for a quick, brutal end. Maybe some fire and brimstone. Not... this.

“Right.” He clears his throat. “I’m Trey, from the village. They sent me as the sacrifice.”

You squint at him like he's just told you the most ridiculous thing you've ever heard. "Sacrifice? They still do that? I haven’t asked for a sacrifice in… decades. I was actually happy to not have my nap interrupted by scared humans. I was going to help with the crisis anyway."

Now it’s Trey's turn to stare. “You… don’t want the sacrifice?”

"Nope." You shrug, completely nonchalant. "You can go back to the village if you want. Or, if you're looking for a change of scenery, the village on the other side of the mountain is kinda nice."

Trey lets out a small sigh, but it’s not exactly relief. “I… can’t. If I go back, they'll think the offering was rejected. My siblings could suffer for it."

You pause, then nod thoughtfully. "Ah, yeah, human politics." You click your tongue. "I hate when that happens. Well, just so you know, the past sacrifices? Yeah, they all ended up in the village on the other side of the mountain."

Trey’s jaw drops. "Wait… what?"

"Yeah." You nod sagely. "They all thought the same thing—'Oh no, the dragon’s gonna eat me'—but I just sent them over there.”

He blinks at you again, trying to absorb all of this information. "So… you don’t actually…?"

"Eat people?" you finish for him, giving him a strange look. "No. That’s gross. Why would I do that?"

Trey's lips twitch upward. A beat of silence passes before Trey clears his throat again. "Mind if I stay, then? I can cook, clean, and—"

You give him a sideways glance, and your eyes light up. "Wait. You cook?"

"Yeah," Trey says, still trying to grasp that he’s negotiating his survival with a dragon.

A slow grin spreads across your face. "Well then, you’re hired. Welcome to dragon duty."

Trey’s not sure whether to laugh or cry at how anticlimactic this has all turned out. He’d prepared himself for noble sacrifice, but instead, he’s somehow signed up for dragon housekeeping duty. With a deep breath, he puts on a smile. "So, uh, what do you want for dinner?"

From that moment on, life with you is… surprisingly comfortable. Trey, ever practical, makes himself useful.

He handles things with the same calm practicality he’d use back in the village, except now, there’s a giant, sometimes snarky dragon looming over him as he goes about his tasks.

He spends his days cooking, tending to the temple’s neglected gardens, and even baking pastries—though you still don’t believe him when he says there’s no oyster sauce in his sweets.

“You’re pulling my tail,” you mutter, eyeing the perfectly innocent-looking cake Trey’s set out in front of you. “I can taste something weird in it.”

Trey just smiles. “Oyster sauce. Definitely.”

You huff, giving up on trying to figure him out, and focus on enjoying your meals and new company instead.

One evening, after a particularly good dinner (with no discernible oyster flavor, much to your disappointment), you glance at Trey lounging by the fireplace. He's been here for a while now, and you find that you're quite enjoying his company. In fact, you're enjoying it a little too much.

"So, you’re not as terrifying as the stories make you out to be," Trey comments one day, setting down a plate of food.

You snort, flipping lazily on your side. "Thanks, I guess. Humans are always so dramatic."

"And the drought?" Trey asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Taken care of," you reply with a smug smile. "Already brought in the rains.”

He nods and settles down next to you, holding a book from the library that you never bothered to visit.

Well, it's now or never. “So,” you begin, almost casually, “I’ve decided.”

“Decided what?” Trey looks up from the book he’s reading.

“That you’ll be my mate.”

He nearly drops the book. “Your... what?”

“My mate.” You stretch your wings, trying to look as imposing as possible—though you’re pretty sure Trey isn’t intimidated by you anymore. “You’re the first human who actually stuck around. And you can cook. That’s mate material.”

Trey is, understandably, at a loss for words. “…You’re serious?”

“Completely.” You flash him that grin again, all teeth and playful confidence. “Unless you’ve got a better offer somewhere else?”

Trey pinches the bridge of his nose, but the smile tugging at his lips betrays him. “No, I think I’ll stick around.”

And just like that, Trey Clover—the supposed human sacrifice—finds himself the mate of a centuries-old dragon. Maybe this wasn’t the fate he expected, but all things considered… it could be worse.

At least the dragon likes his cooking.

[ellynneversweet]

It’s never addressed in-book as far as I can recall (and, in fact, I don’t think it would even get past a publisher nowadays, certainly not in YA) but something I was always curious about with Lirael was how much of Lirael’s suicidal ideation was despair and how much of it was an untrained and unknown Abhorsen feeling what was, in hindsight, a completely predictable call of the void from the perspective of someone who, on some instinctive level, knows that she can just go for a jaunt in death and come back, and whether this is a thing the family. It’d be an interesting twist on ‘btw we have these heritable habit of intrusive thoughts of death, here’s how to cope with that in a way that doesn’t cause your own permanent demise (and also without becoming the kind of necromancer the family has to hunt down).’ They can’t all get befriended by an eldritch horror/ancient god who has decided to hang out in the shape of a friendly dog who will bite you if you start feeling too sorry for yourself, after all.

(I am going to need to reread Clariel, aren’t I? I didn’t love it the first time.)

[baensz]

You know. . . I used to be a normal, semi normal, Kinda normal human being. . .Then ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ came out. . . And a pet play kink came with it! So enjoy my Poolverine/Deadclaws brainrot. (NONE OF THIS IS EDITED, SORRY FOR MISSPELLINGS OR SENTENCES THAT DON’T MAKE SENSE!)

Good boy

Rating: 17+

Warnings: Pet play, Swearing, Mild Sexual content. (Don’t like, don’t read)

Background: Logan has the ears and tail of a Wolverine. Wade and Logan are an established relationship. Logan and Wade live in an apartment together. They’ve been a thing for about a year. I think that it, enjoy!

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

Nights were never good for Logan, they hadn’t been ‘good’ in years. It’s not easy for one to go through as much as he has and sleep peacefully at night. . . How could you? Knowing the people you’ve hurt, the future’s you stole, were never coming back.

Those thoughts are exactly what Logan’s night terrors emulated. It always started off the same way. . .

He’s at Xavier’s school for the gifted, with his fellow X-men, all together in the kitchen. They are all laughing having a good time, Logan is taking in everything silently before he feels a tap on his shoulder. He turns to find a concerned Scott.

“What’s wrong, lo?’ He asks, placing his hand on the small of the older’s back, just above his tail.

“Nothing, just enjoying the atmosphere.” Logan replied, with a small smile.

“Are you sure? Are you sure you aren’t feeling guilty?” Scott tilted his head.

“Guilty? Why would I-“ before Logan to comprehend the question he felt a pressure against his tailbone. The pressure turned into a sharp pain as he realized that he had been stabbed. “UGhh!”

Logan’s legs gave away as he crashed to the floor, scrambling to look towards the culprit of his temporary paralysis. Logan’s eyes widen, Scott is standing above him, welding a sharp pare of blackened claws, while the rest of the X-men gather around Logan’s body.

“You should be guilty for leaving us to die!” Scott shouted. . . But it didn’t sound like the man he knew anymore. This voice was breaking, becoming more disoriented by the second. Logan’s stared in horror as the bodies of his family shifted into contorted and mutilated into the corpse’s that he had left behind.

“N-no. I, I d-didn’t mean too!” Logan pleaded as he watched the blood pour from the animated corpse’s, dancing around his body. Why wasn’t he healing? And why weren’t his claws working?

“it’s all your fault, Logan. IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT!” The voices screamed in unison, clawing towards the man, tearing at his flesh while their cries of agony ring throughout the walls-

Logan shoots up from bed, claws extended and slashing through the air violently. He was drenched in sweat, his sensitive ears were still ringing from the pained cries, pinned back flat as he panted heavily.

The older blinked a few times before stilling his arms. His senses were starting to come back to him. He wasn’t on the floor of the X-Men mansion, being attacked by disfigured versions of his friends. . , he was in his bedroom, the one he shared with— Oh fuck! Wade!

Logan was quick to retract his claws as he turned to his partner’s bedside, expecting to find Wade. (Hopefully not wound.) His body tensed when he saw the empty spot.

The Wolverine jumped out of bed before his mind had time to even register he was awake, sprinting for the closed bedroom door. He didn’t care about anything other than finding Wade and making sure he was safe.

Logan swung the door open, rushing out as his claws shot out of his chuckles for a second time. He was prepared for anything. . . What he wasn’t prepared for was Wade’s confused over the shoulder glance from the stovetop in the kitchen.

“You alright, peanut?” Wade puzzled, clicking the burners heat off, before turning his attention to the clearly paranoid man. Wade was wearing his stupid ‘kiss the cook’ apron over top of his Hello Kitty pj shirt, that matched his pants. Logan examined him quickly before determining that Wade was not injured nor in danger.

“Yeah, sorry…” Logan grumbled, retracting his claws before making his way into the small kitchen. He met Wade half way, sliding his arms around the younger’s thin waist, pulling him closely as Logan captures their lips in a deep kiss.

Wade smiled into the kiss, he gently separated the two as he chuckled softly. “I’m not gonna say I’m not enjoying this, because I am, but you’re never this affectionate in the mornings. What’s got you so worked up, peanut?”

“It’s nothing, bub.” Logan grumbles. Wade tilts his head, giving the other that annoying all knowing look.

“Another nightmare?” The younger pressed softly, caressing his hand on the older’s face, smoothing out his wild facial hair. Logan’s eyes drifted from Wade’s as he nodded pitifully at the floor.

“What was it about them?” Wade ventured further. All his partner did was nod, that’s all Logan felt he could do. He wasn’t good with words, he never was.

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

Logan thought about it. Was there? Could he take away the nightmares? Change the past? fix everything that kept Logan from having a peaceful sleep? As far as he knew, Wade couldn’t do anything of those things, so, he simply shook his head and stepped away from his partner, moving his arms back to his side.

“Well, do you think you could help me? Maybe it’ll get your mind off it.” Wade offered, his smiled was wild and wide, yet comforting. That was a good idea. Whether Logan would ever admit that to Wade was a long shot but he could do something simple, it’s only fair.

“Yeah, what do you need?” The older asked, the two round ears on his head perking up with anticipation. Wade chuckled behind his hand as he pointed towards the cupboard above the fridge. “Can you grab the bread for me, pretty please.”

The Wolverine nodded, setting off to complete his given task, while The Deadpool turned his attention back over to the eggs in the pan. Taking the shaker out of its holder, Wade season’s the yokes, giving them a generous amount of pepper and salt. By the time he’s done, Logan is standing by his side, hand extended towards him, waiting patiently for Wade to take the loaf of bread in the bag.

The younger chuckled as he took it from the other, only to place it on the counter.

“Good boy.” Wade joked, expecting the usual reaction, an angry groan along with a tired roll of the eyes. What he wasn’t expecting was the sound of a delicate thumping against the cupboard as Logan’s face flushed a soft shade of pink.

Wade wasted no time in search for the source of the sound. . . The mercenary felt his jaw drop as his eyes fell upon the sight. Logan’s tail was wagging!!

“No, fucking, way. You like that, don’t you Wolvie?” He pressed, a mix of amusement and disbelief lingering in his tone as he mentally captured every single moment of this interaction in full detail, hopefully for future blackmail, or maybe even one for the spank bank.

“Fuck you. . .” Logan huffed, eyes refusing to meet with Wades. The older would like to believe that he knows the younger well enough to know that you should never look a Deadpool in the eyes. They can always find a way into your mind. Breaking down the walls bit by bit to expose the most vulnerable parts. . . In the most annoying way possible.

“Fuck me? Fuck you! Even your own tail says otherwise, peanut.” Wade chuckles, pointing to the obvious downfall of Logan’s argument.

The Wolverine growls, barring his fangs in a scowl as he quickly grabs hold of his tail, tucking it behind his back, down casting his head as if he should be ashamed for the situation at play.

The Deadpool does nothing but flash a dangerous smile as he advances forward, quick to capture the other, planting a firm grip on Logan’s jaw.

The older’s eyes shot up as he felt the rough hand tug his head back up. Logan swallowed back the repressed whimper as he meets the others eyes. He knows what Wade is looking for and he knows that Wade is going to find it. Logan found a familiar comfort having his emotional walls built up around him, kept him from overthinking every small feeling that hit his heart, but with the combination of the previous nights terrors and now this simple nickname, Logan could feel the walls around him tremble, pieces falling away to give Wade a peak of what was underneath.

Vulnerability. That's biology. No one is born rotten to the core or as hard as stone. . . That person is created through experience whether good or bad. Unfortunately in Logan's case the cards have never truly been in his favour and Wade can see parts of that, He just needs to weaken the walls, not until they crumble, but just enough to see the rest.

Before the Wolverine could clue in on The Deadpool's intentions he felt the mercenary's free hand snake it's way to his hidden wrist, gripping it tightly as Wade crept towards his ear.

“You’re all bark and no bite, huh?" Wade cooed playfully, strengthening his grip on the other.

"Wade. . ." Logan huffed as he winced. His hand began to pulsate due to the lack of blood, sending a chill through his spine.

"That's me" The younger smiled wildly, examining every inch of the older man's face. . . the pink flush overtaking his normal complexion along with a slight glow, probably sweat. His wet, pink lips lightly parted and coated with shinny drool from the excessive panting. Logan looked desperately for an escape. In truth if he was acting like himself at the moment, it would be a simple and rather clean escape, yet, he didn't feel like him. He felt lost in Wade’s grip, out of control and eager for a solution to this agony.

"What's wrong, puppy?" The mercenary cooed, placing the pad of his thumb against the older's tongue. "Cat got your tongue?"

The Wolverine's knees buckled under the loss of control. The walls that once were used to protect him from situations similar to this, were now bursting at the seams. One wrong movement and it's over. Wade will have won. Logan caught himself against the counter, abandoning his captive tail in the process with a whine. His pulsing hand becoming to much to keep his wild tail at bay.

"Aw. That got you, didn't it?" The Deadpool taunted. Releasing the others wrist. Logan's shot a glare at the younger. What was Wade planning? The anxiety of the uncertainty only added to Logan's breakdown.

“Wade, please. Enough…” The older mumbles his plea around the others thumb, his frustration turning into desperation. All of Logan’s instincts were screaming at him to bite down, hoping to tasted the blood of his enemy. . . But then the mercenary spoke up.

“Why not be a good boy for a change, hm?” Curiosity lacing Wade’s tone.

The Wolverine felt his chest tighten, breath hitching in the process. The Deadpool’s thumb vacated It’s space on the other tongue, basking in the glory of the older’s state.

“I-I… you can’t call me that.” Logan stated shakingly as if it was a fact.

Wade laughed, suddenly slapping away the others wrist from the counter, watching Logan’s knees give under his weight, crashing down to the tiled floor, a cry slipping from his lips, due to the sudden collapse.

“What’s stopping me, puppy?” Wade asked, tauntingly as he bent over to meet Logan’s eyes.

“M’not g-good.” The Wolverine swallowed hard, before stuttering softly. “M’ an a-animal”

The Deadpool watched as his partners ears dropped, not enough to lay flat against his head but just enough to express his insecurities.

“Who told you that, peanut?” Wade chuckled. A ping of pain hit his heart as he saw the fear cloud in Logan’s eyes. The older gave his partner a look as if trying to ask him ‘who hadn’t called him an animal?’ And then it clicked in the mercenaries head. Logan truly believed that he was nothing more than an animal. A weapon. A monster. . . Incapable and undeserving of praise. He wasn’t supposed to be the ‘good boy’, after what he did to the X-Men. . . He could never be a ‘good boy’.

“You’re not an animal, Logan.” Wade cooed. Before Logan could get a word out, Wade brought his pointer finger to his partners lips. “Shh, I’m not done.”

The older obeyed as he looked intently into the younger’s eyes, giving Wade his full attention. ‘And he didn’t consider himself a good boy’. Wade thought as he mentally rolled his eyes.

“You are the furthest thing from an animal, peanut. Sure, you’ve done some fucked up shit, but look at who you’re talking to! The king of fucking up shit!” Wade chuckled as he watched Logan’s shoulders slowly lower. It’s working!

“It’s not your fault. . . With the x-men, I mean. You didn’t know, pup. You must be mad to think what the government did was your fault.”

Something in Logan’s eye’s shifted, every muscle in his body suddenly falling. He. . . He was right. Wade. . . As much as it pained him to say it, was right. He- he didn’t know. He always kept beating himself down about how he failed to know. But never really talking in the fact that there was nothing to indicate such an attack. . . He didn’t mean to be selfish.

“I- I could’ve-“ Logan started before being cut off once more.

“Could’ve what? Saw into the future and somehow changed the outcome?” Wade questioned. Logan’s ears fell flat, his eyes downcast towards the tile, expressing every emotion in one defeated sigh.

“You are a good boy, Logan. I don’t care what you’ve done. You can be good. I know you can.” The younger soothed, tilting the older’s chin up with his two fingers. “Just let me help you.”

Wade captured Logan’s eyes. He was stunned at what he saw.

The Wolverines pupils were blown, leaving his eyes pitch black pools of vulnerability, scared and alone. Begging for safety and comfort, feeling stripped away of his dignity as his tail thumps against the floor.

“See, I told you, you’re a good boy.” The Deadpool cooed, hands cupping the others red, flustered face. A long soft whine emanated from the older, as he relaxed into the hold, his tail thumping wildly behind him as he listened to Wade’s sweet praises.

“You’re my good boy.” The younger soothes, taking in the beauty below him, wiping away the light bits of drool that threatened to fall from the older’s soft lips.

Logan felt his heart swell in his chest, because for the first time in a long time. . . He believed it. He felt safe within Wade’s grasp. The older found a comfort in the fact that the younger was seeing him in such a vulnerable state and was staying by his side. When walls fell down in the past it lead to ridicule and shame from the by stander around, keeping the Wolverine from truly believing that this side of his personality could never be loved.

Yet, here Wade was. . . Staring lovingly into Logan’s eyes, silencing every negative thought or emotion that came to the surface. If it wasn’t for the fact that the Deadpools mutation was in fact breaking the forth wall, Logan would be convinced that he was telekinetic.

Just with a simple stare he could make the older man drop to his knees. The younger’s touch keeping him grounded and the praise that fell from the merc’s mouth kept his tail thumping the same repeated rhythm against the cold, wood floor. This man had him under his control and Logan was more than willing to obey, desperate to be a good boy for his master.

“Whatcha say we go deal with this?” Wades words hung thick like taffy as his socked foot pushed against the others obvious erection. Wade felt Logan rut against his foot, whining out a muffled moan, eyes shutting as a shiver shot through his spine.

“P-please!” The older begged as he felt the younger’s foot circle around his clothed cock. Pre-cum soaking his underwear as he withered under Wades control.

“Please? Please, what, pup?” The Deadpool teases as his hands shift to the nape of the Wolverines neck, imbedding his fingers in the roots of the others hair. Logan felt his skin tingle as Wade began to pet, and scratch his scalp.

Logan felt his words slip from his mind as he huffed out soft noises, hoping and praying that Wade could simply read his mind. Take him to the bedroom and fuck him so hard into the mattress that he’ll need to literally crawl out of bed in the morning.

“Come on puppy, I thought you were my good boy. . .” Wade tsked as his foot ceased it’s motion. Logan cried out in desperation as he thrusted his hips against the still foot, begging for friction. Logan opened his eyes once again, heart dropping once he met Wade’s gaze. Tears welling up at the disappointment in Wade’s sight, his tail stopping at the realization before tucking between his legs in shame.

"Aw, no need for tears, cupcake. Talking is hard right now, huh big guy?" Wade soothed, moving his hands through the older man's hair, scratching the most sensitive spots with gentle hands. The Wolverine whimpered as he nodded pitifully, leaning into the warm hands of the Deadpool.

"That's okay, I know what you need." the younger slurred, toned heavy with lust, drawing the older even closer as his hands dropped from Logan's wild hair, earning Wade a sharp whine in protest.

"I think a good boy like you deserves a treat." Wade chuckled to himself as the sound of a light thumping could be heard once more. "What do you think, pup?"

Logan nodded eagerly up at Wade, eyes fixated upon the younger, awaiting his next command with excitement.

"Good boy. Head to the bedroom, I'll be there in a sec." Wade praised, roughing up Logan's hair. The Wolverine huffed as he rose from his kneeling position, tail continually wagging as he made his way towards the bedroom, a small pep in his step. The Deadpool smirking as he watched the other comply, seemingly excited for what was to come.

Wade strides towards the bedroom, his hand gripping the handle tightly. His body tenses as he eyes the fourth wall.

“Sorry for the cock block.” The merc chuckles as he slams the door shut. Leaving the reader questioning what could be happening behind that door.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 9/24/2024

you might be wondering “is my dear friend tumblr user girlfriendsofthegalaxy still unemployed?” the answer is yes. take this cat off my hands please i don’t think he’s causing the unemployment but he certainly isn’t helping

listening

via Wendy @dying-suffering-french-stalkers, Huoy Meas' ប្រគល់ក្ដីស្នេហ៍មកខ្ញុំវិញ. figuring out what this incredibly zippy Cambodian rock song is named and what it's about was really difficult bc spotify is a bane upon this earth and won't let you fucking copy-paste and OCR was not working on the Khmer script. i ended up listening to the first couple seconds of each of her songs on apple music, and finally figured out this roughly translates to Give Me Back My Love and is about begging a fuckboy for closure.

via the spotify discover weekly, Night Club's Pretty Girls Do Ugly Things. all Night Club's songs sound the same so if you like one, great news! i had this song on for a full gregorian hour bc, i am only a tiny bit ashamed to say, i was storyboarding a The Man With No Name fancam to this. i think it would go pretty hard.

Smoke you like a cigarette Choke you like a lariat Fatalistic tourniquet Do you want more?

-

reading

thank you mackintosh.

i did not Adore any of these comics from the library. i sort of enjoyed Night of the Ghoul, a one-volume TPB by Scott Snyder and Francesco Francavilla. i think ive blogged about this before but every once in a while i'll get a bee in my bonnet to read some horror comics even though i am a giant baby about horror movies.

Night of the Ghoul is about how you can't save your dad from PTSD but also about a lost horror film and also about the extremely dad behavior of tracking down every scrap of info about an auteur. there's also a monster.

the subtle art changes from present day to the remains of the film to the non-film flashbacks are well done, imo. the cover screams mignola but the inside pages are really fun pulp nonsense. i love a piece of genre writing that rolls around and delights in being a piece of genre writing.

im doing my level best not to get sucked into tiktok but i DO love watching this lady revive antique nail polish and look for dupes for shades from like the 20s. she found an almost exact dupe for a shade produced during wwii which is crazy insane to me!!!

-

watching

The Asphalt Jungle (1950, dir. Huston), it's a very painterly heist noir. i even like Sterling Hayden in one of the more prominent roles, even though i think he generally has the appeal of undercooked dough.

much like Fritz Lang's M, it presents the criminal element of the city as its own class with its own reputation and reference systems. it got in some trouble with the censors for having a VERY clearly laid out heist plan and execution. it's also got the babiest Marilyn Monroe in one of her earliest roles

this was such a gloriously messy movie. everyone is such a fucking mess. this woman only known as Doll is heartbreakingly, head over heels in love with Sterling Hayden's character. she's a little flighty and bumbling and silly, but determined! they're constantly orbiting the gravitational weight of her desire for this man and desire for a real life with this man. and that's just one subplot! she has maybe five minutes total screentime! she should have gotten a supporting actress oscar!!! everyone acted their fucking hearts out and it was so much fun to watch!

-

playing

monument valley is in the netflix games library this month (i don't actually know what their liscencing agreements would even look like, they and the studios they worked with were very tightlipped about that when they were rolling this out three years ago) but i assume it's going to be on the service for a while. i have never played this game, which makes me feel a little bit like a bad gamer. you can tell it's ten years old from some of the color and texture choices, but WOW did literally everyone take inspiration from this game.

this is the platonic ideal of a phone game. i get why everyone went insane about it and there was a brief boom of geometry-based puzzle mobile games. it is MUCH much harder now to get people to pay money to play a game that has a planned endpoint and planned number of levels, so netflix is a good home for it.

i was often frustrated but always delighted. the level below involves making something happening that made me genuinely gasp out loud in glee. well worth the annoyance of downloading the netflix app and scrolling through the poorly labeled and poorly sorted carousel of games.

great retrospective, a bit about how you need to have tiny teams go off and just kind of fuck around and bring weird stuff back, and a lot about how they actually designed the levels

The end result had a pixel-perfect axonometric aesthetic that not only went hard on its references to Dutch master artist and printmaker Maurits Cornelis Escher, but also dug deep into classic video game design, going right back to early arcade machines and 8-bit titles. Each of the ten levels is like a piece of fine furniture, built with invisible dovetail joints and inlaid with marquetry, stuffed with secret compartments and little design flourishes. Gray cites the world of theatre and stage design, as well as graphics, as important keystones in the way the levels were constructed. ‘Ken would always talk about flower arranging, and how you frame a silhouette of a level on the screen,’ he says.

-

making

update on the Phantom Menace fabric: pinked the raw edges and threw it in the laundry again with a very large quantity of vinegar. 50% poly was too high for it to really do anything, which is interesting. it didn’t lessen the seam edge effects either, which is a little annoying bc the seams were so gigantic and that’s a good chunk of fabric to lose. i am going to buy a camp shirt pattern at some point when i have money again but for now it goes in The Box

also! thrifted a pack of o-rings for jars for a dollar and finally put my grains etc in my pretty jars. they’re going to live in the pantry but today they live out on the countertop

[ancha-aus]

RealAgeAU Drabble - Training

I am back with this AU :D @spotaus

This drabble is a lot earlier than the last few drabbles. shortly after Nightmare's first birthday, and kidnapping.

The gang decides they should really start to learn more about their new powers :3

First Drabble Prev Drabble Next Drabble

*------------------------*

Cross nods as he crosses his arms “You guys ready?”

Dust looks very unhappy to be up already, Horror is next to him trying to get him to stand up. Killer just grins and salutes “Yes sir!” and he throws in a wink.

Cross ignores the obvious flirt as he tells his own body to cool it. Not the time nor place.

Cross takes a deep breath and continues on with what he was saying “Good! It is time we do something which we should have done long ago.”

Killer raises a hand “Make out more?”

Dust just keeps laying in the dirt. Not making a single move to get up “We already do that now.”

Killer nods “We should still do it more.”

Cross sputters and glares “Training! We need to train!” They had tugged Nightmare in for a nap in a nice warm little nest in a sunny spot nearby them. He is still sound asleep and hopefully he will sleep right through this all.

Cross has high hopes for that as Nightmare seemed to hardly wake up whenever they made noise.

Cross glares at the two on the ground “I am serious!”

Horror chuckles and stands by his side “Calm Cookie.” And he rubs his shoulder and Cross feels part of him melt as Horror smiles at him. God what did he do to deserve them all?

Cross feels reassured and turns back to Killer and Dust his two more unmotivated mates, oooh he is still not over the fact he can call them his mates now! “I am serious! We need to practise our new powers!” especially with Nightmare suddenly getting new powers as well. They need to be prepared.

If… if anything like that kidnapping happens again… Cross had been so lucky his powers just… worked with him instead of doing the normal uncontrollable flickering in and out of view. They need to practise this and work on it! They need to be ready!

Killer sighs as he leans on his hand “How do we plan to do that exactly? I don’t have something that we can just work with without going around town and telling lies and hoping it doesn’t backfire. And Dusty still shocks us when he gets overcharged.”

Dust just points at Killer as if to say ‘what he said.’

Horror hums “May be hard… but we need to practise and learn. Having the powers and magic won’t be useful until we can control them and know their limits.”

Cross nods “We can’t count on powers we can’t control. Even if we can’t control it we need to at least understand our limits a bit better.”

Killer pouts “You guys are my limit.” Then he grins and winks as he finger guns at them “And my weakness.”

Dust groans from the ground as he just covers his face with his arm “Can’t believe I agreed to this madness.”

Killer grins and pokes his cheek “You did! And now you are stuck with me!” Killr sounds very happy about it.

Cross glares “Guys I am serious! What is Nightmare gets taken again and we can’t do anything because we don’t understand our powers!?”

Killer’s face grows dark as he crosses his arms “Won’t happen again.”

Cross glares “We don’t know that. That is why we need to practise and learn.” He checks his mates. Killer sighs but gives in with a pout and a nod. Dust may not have moved but he is still here which counts. Horror had been down for this idea from the start.

Cross nods “Good!”

Dust speaks from the ground “How exactly?”

Cross frowns as he thinks “well… we need to figure out what triggers the powers… So try some stuff…” He stands up taller “I will go first!” It is easy! He did this before. He knows how to train and practise new skills or ideas for moves. He just needs to get in the right mindset.

Horror nods and joins Killer and Dust, forcing Dust to sit up right as well.

Cross takes a few deep breaths. Something about his magic makes him able to be invisible. Lets try that first.

He thinks about hiding. About staying out of sight. About following people quietly.

Cross opens a socket but sees this three boyfriends still watching him. Okay. He is still visible.

Mmh.

Cross closes his sockets and thinks. Hiding. Being invisible. Not being noticed.

No exclaim that it worked.

Cross stops as he taps his chin in thought. He is doing something wrong with this. He doesn’t even feel his magic react to his request.

Killer leans on a hand as he watches “No luck?”

Cross shakes his skull “Not yet… It doesn’t react to me thinking and wanting to hide or anything like it… I figured that would be a trigger at least.”

Horror frowns “Nothing?”

Cross sighs as he rubs his neck “Nothing.”

Dust yawns as he watches “Maybe it wasn’t hiding. You weren’t exactly hiding when you went after those assholes who took Nightmare.”

Cross frowns and shakes his skull “I was thinking about following them and not being noticed.” Neither worked.

Dust yawns “I would say you were doing a bit more than just being not noticed or following them but sure. It is a start.”

Killer shoots Dsut a look “I mean. We always notice him anyway.”

Dust snorts and nods “Very true.”

Horror looks at both of them disapproving but shoots him an apologetic smile.

Cross however knows he has a frown on his face. Thinking back to when his powers tended to activate… Generally it was when he wanted to hide or not be seen. But when he thought about more context to when he wanted that. Then it only happened when he was already nervous about something. Normally in some way related to them being discovered and found. Or more specifically, Nightmare being found.

But when it reacted? When it actually did what he wanted and needed? It was when he was focused on hunting down the pieces of filth that took their babybones…

Cross takes another deep breath and focuses. He thinks back to that mad dash. That rushed feeling. The need to get his baby back to his side right that second.

That is when this power had answered. That is when he had had most control. Without even needing to think. It had moved and done what he wanted without having to focus.

It isn’t about focus.

It isn’t about control.

It is about trust.

Cross forces his shoulders to relax. Focusses on the trust he feels in his mates. The trust in himself to do what he can. That he is able.

“Cross you are doing it!”

Cross opens a socket and watches as patches of him are hidden and others aren’t. It doesn’t feel like being gone or being unnoticed… It feels like parts of him are covered in a thin blanket. Cross mentally grabs it and just imagines wrapping himself with it.

And he is gone from view.

“Cross you did it!” Killer cheers “Way to go Crossy!”

Cross however has no control. It is like how he trusts his body to catch him when he jumps off something. How he trusts his body to run and catch him. How he trusts his movement.

It isn’t just a power he can lead or learn to control. It is different. It is like his body.

Cross takes a few steps around. Noticing that he is completely silent as well. huh. Strange. Still Cross speaks just to test “Seems like it isn’t only sight. My steps are much more silent than I am used to.”

Dust tilts his skull confused “Well.. .when you speak we can hear you just fine…”

Horror hums “Like when you want to speak you are obvious. But otherwise hidden.”

Cross shakes his skull and his mates blink confused at him. Cross glances down and sees his is visible again. Huh. As soon as he wanted-no, tried to communicate nonverbal he became visible again.

It isn’t focus. It isn’t thought.

Cross looks up at them “It is instinct.”

Horror, Killer and Dust all share confused looks before looking at Cross.

Cross shakes his skull as he tries to put his thoughts into words “It is instincts. These powers? It is more than just power or magic or movements. It is more than skill. It is about…” he can’t find the words. It is so strange. He is used to having to practise and work and try again and again. Failing over and over until you finally get the basics and then you work from there.

The powers are still finicky. Unpredictable. But they are there. Ready to work at just the right… need? Want? Wish? Hope? Anything for them to work.

Killer hums thoughtful “huh… maybe that is why my stuff just… acts the whole time? Because when I tell white lies I want people to believe it? So it just does the thing…” He frowns “especially with the woman in fur and mud… explains why she hasn’t tried to sue us yet.”

Dust glares at him “Don’t tempt faith…” but he leans on his leg “Doesn’t explain my stuff… the static just grows a lot… and if I don’t use magic we get another thunder storm situation.”

Horror shakes his skull “it does make sense. You want to protect Nightmare. Be ready. Your magic and body and power work together to have everything it needs to act right away.”

Dust frowns before huffing as he looks to the side “Whatever.”

Cross feels his soul give a little flutter. Can you blame him?! Dust looks so embarrassed wit his tiny blush!

Killer grins as Horror “Your turn H!”

Cross nods and quickly changes places with Horror.

Horror seems to think as he stands there. Considering the ground for a moment before making a pulling motion.

The ground shudders and a tiny piece of ground seems to slowly move over while other ground moves to fill in the space left behind.

Killer sighs as he leans against his knee as he stares “Looking good!”

Cross can’t help but agree. Horror has somehow figured his stuff out just passively. By careful and gentle nudging and feeling the powers out. He hadn’t been able to explain just muttered about moving what felt natural.

Killer had sighed wishfully that he wished he could do that stuff.

Cross for one is happy Killer doesn’t have this power. He would either try to dig a very deep hole or just make a very large tower. Cross isn’t sure which option would be worse.

Horror shrugs as he moves back to the group. He joins them and Dust leans against his side. Staring hard at the ground that moved so effortlessly for Horror.

Cross smiles at Horror “amazing.”

Horror shrugs as he mutters “It is physical. I don’t create or destroy stuff. It is about moving stuff one way and pushing other stuff to fill what is left…” he shrugs.

Dust chuckles as he just leans against Horror “That is amazing…” he stares at his own hand and frowns.

Horror just pulls him closer as Killer leans happily against Dust with a large grin “Your lightning is real cool~” Killer lowers his voice in a purr as he keeps staring at Dust. Cross isn’t sure if Killer is trying to flirt right now, or force Dust to believe what he says even if Killer knows his power doesn’t work against them. Killer just continues to talk when he sees Dust roll his eyes. Killer purrs and just lays on Dust as he purrs at him. Dust looks away from him with a tiny blush.

Killer grins and purrs “So much power. Just at the tips of your fingers. Only thing keeping it from exploding and destroying everything is your control and stubbornness to keep it tempered down~ Yet not once did you ever zap Nighty with it.” Killer grins wider as Dust starts to blush and look embarrassed.

Yeah. Cross gets it. Killer can get intense with his affection… Cross also still gets overwhelmed with it.

Cross is happy they know how to help Dust. It sometimes stings a little that those three had already been so close long before Cross joined them. He notices it with moments like these. When he is lost in what to do or how to act or help and-

Oh no Kiler is watching him.

Killer looks at him critically before grinning and pulling him closer until he is right up against Dust and Killer expends to cover both their laps.

Killer grins at Cross with a clearly mischievous look in his eyes “Great idea Cross! And you figured your stuff out so quickly! You just needed a moment to learn and study your skill and boom! You understand it! and thanks to that we could better understand ours! Fucking brilliant and fucking talented. Skilled beyond believe and you know yourself and your magic so well which just makes this so much more impressive!”

Cross knows he is blushing. He tugs his little bandana up to try and cover part of his face. His bandana had been a gift from the others… because he mentioned how he used to have his own bandana much like blue used to have. And they just got him a new one. It is a nice grey one with purple stripes. It is soft and fuck now he is just more embarrassed as he tries to hide from Killer’s compliments with the very gift his mates gave him!

Horror doesn’t stop it. Instead he just smiles at them with that handsome little smile as Dust and him just have to suffer through the storm of compliments.

Killer grins as he looks so happy as he just stares up at them from his spot of honour “And then you guys just look fucking amazing when we have some time to ourselves as well.”

Cross glares as he feels like his skull will explode and he hisses “Killer. Not with Nightmare so close.”

Killer laughs and winks at them “It is fine. He is asleep anyway-”

A small yawn “Are we cuddling?”

They turn around and spot Nightmare standing next to them. One hand rubbing his sockets while he other is holding unto one of the blankets from his other nest.

Dust is quick to focus on their baby “We are taking a break from practise. You slept well?”

Nightmare yawns again and climbs over Killer to get to the spot where Cross and Dust sit against one another. Nightmare gets to his spot which makes him able to snuggle into both their sides. A happy little hum as he closes his sockets.

Cross carefully takes the little blanket and tugs it around their little child. All cozy and comfortable.

Killer’s purring has only grown in volume as he watches them. Perfectly comfortable to lay across their laps with Nightmare snuggled in against all three of their sides.

Horror pulls them closer and sighs happily “A break sounds perfect.”

Cross laughs and nods. Sure they hadn’t practised much yet but they already got their goal completed. Which was to better understand their powers.

Now? He just wants to enjoy this moment. How comfortable and loved he feels between his mates with their son.

*------------------------*

First Drabble Prev Drabble Next Drabble

[sagesparrow394]

Headcanons for if JRWI characters ended up on the QSMP

(Written by someone who’s only watched Wonderlust and up to episode 27 of Riptide) (I have also watched the first five episodes of the Suckening but I’m not included the suckers because that was a while ago and idk if my headcanons will be accurate)

So yeah the Riptide crew probably end up on Quesadilla Island because their ship crashes (rip the Albatross/Millennium Chipper)

Chip would learn Foolish is a builder and also rich and try to get close to him so he can convince Foolish to build him a new ship (bro thinks he can get off the island. lol. lmao.)

You cannot tell me Gillion and Etoiles would not be instant friends. These two are training and fighting together all the time, Gillion smiting those code monsters every chance he gets. As a result, I feel like Gillion would become very protective of Pomme, since she often trains with them too

I think Jay is probably the first of the three to properly question what’s going on on the island, and as a result probably the first to be shown the Order. I can see her getting along with Bagi

Don’t ask me how the Wonderlust crew gets there, idk, some weird magic portal stuff? Maybe???

You think Runt and Tubbo would be friends and bond over create mod? You fool. Runt would see his factories and run excitedly over, only for her face to fall in horror as soon as she steps inside and sees the mechanics. Tubbo would instantly have beef with this sixteen year old as soon she starts ranting about how his machines are not at all optimised and how she could do so much better. They are rivals

I think Blink and Phil would get along. We all know Blink is constantly Stressed, and ending up trapped on a weird island in the middle of nowhere would not help with that. I think Blink would find a sense of solace with the fellow birb man who just wants to chill and look after his kids and try to avoid Lore as much as he can. Like Gill with Pomme, Blink would develop a kind of bond with Chay and Lullah (perhaps they kind of remind him of a young Aeon and himself…)

I haven’t thought much about giving any of these guys eggs. However, I think Troy should get one. The Federation would see him and go “oh we need to give this privileged rich nepo-baby twunk real responsibility and see if he either learns to accept it, or if he fails and has to face being responsible for the death of a child”. Idk, I just think that’d be neat for his character development

Maybe I’ll add more sometime, maybe I’ll change my mind on things as I watch more Riptide and more Wonderlust comes out, who knows

[writercole]

Do It Again

Summary: Watching horror movies with Boone brings you closer...in more ways than one. Words: 1200ish Warnings: Fluff. Also discussion of horror movies but nothing explicit. Credits: @ryebecca on the title help :) A/N: Fall into Fall day 2 and my first Boone fic! He's definitely the weirdest, most awkward dude ever and I love him so much.

Knocking on the door, I felt a little self-conscious. I was either the first to arrive or the last, and neither was a preferred option. The crush I had on Boone rendered me incapable of being in a confined space as him without being incredibly awkward. 

The grin he had when he opened the door dropped, his shoulders drooping when he looked around me and found that it was only me standing there. A shy smile lifted his lips as he returned his gaze to me.

“Tyler said he and Kate aren’t really scary movie people,” I explained. “I think that means they want to be left alone to do ‘couple things’ instead of coming.”

“Sounds right,” he sighed, “Dani and Lily are taking Javi out. And Dexter is working a cross stitch that he’s almost done with.”

“So it’s just you and I tonight?”

He nodded in confirmation and wiped his free hand on his jeans, swallowing hard as he looked at me. I felt just as nervous as he looked. I doubt I looked as adorable, though.

“Or, we could cancel and each do our own thing? If you’re not comfortable with it.”

“No!” he blurted out. “Let’s watch some scary movies!” He stepped to the side and gestured for me to come into the room.

“If you’re sure. I wouldn’t want to -”

“You won’t.”

“You don’t even know what I was going to say.” I stepped into the room with a smile and marveled at how tidy it was.

“I’ve never been more sure. Of a movie date. I mean, a partner. I mean someone to watch movies with,” he fumbled. I managed to catch a hint of redness on his cheeks before he turned to shut the door.

Butterflies swooped in my stomach before my brain chastised them for getting excited. It’s not like he’s awkward because he likes me. He’s just awkward in general. And that’s one of my favorite traits about him.

Seating proved to be an overthinking hellscape. I could sit in the corner, making sure that I wouldn’t get scared and clutch Boone. Or I could sit on the edge of the bed, even though my back would be aching by the end of the movie. I could sit on the floor but…yuck.

The debate in my head raged on for what seemed like hours before I decided to head over to the foot of the bed and take off my shoes. After that, I’d follow Boone’s lead. See where he sat and what he said. 

He followed pretty quickly after, flopping onto the bed into the spot next to the remote. “Your back is going to ache if you sit there for the whole movie,” he said.

I swore internally. Of course he’d remember me saying that my back started to hurt if I sat without support for too long. “I’m just taking off my shoes. Outside germs and all.”

“Oh. Yeah, yeah of course.” 

I really hoped this was a good idea. As much as he said he wanted me here, he seemed more awkward than usual. I scooted up to the headboard and leaned against it. The space between us felt like centimeters. I could feel warmth radiating off of him but also, there was something comforting as well as stiff about his posture. 

“So, what are we watching first?” I asked.

“Slasher or monster?”

“Um…Slasher, I guess?”

“Okay, Freddy, Jason, or Michael?”

“Who?”

“Please tell me you’re kidding. Those are the three most iconic slashers of all time.”

“Which one is the one in Scream?”

“That’s Ghostface.”

“Can we watch that one?”

“Original franchise or reboot?”

“There’s a reboot?”

“Oh you need a horror education,” he sighed as he scooted closer to me, turning to face me slightly.

I tried to ignore the way my heart thundered against my rib cage.

“Original Scream franchise starred Neve Campbell  as the heroine. The reboot has Jenna Ortega. Pretty decent, in all honesty, compared to like, Nightmare on Elm Street reboot. And don’t get me started on how they tried to bring Michael Meyers back. H2O really sealed up the franchise and he just keeps coming back and I don’t understand it.”

He continued on about movies I’d heard of in passing and characters I had no clue about. I have no idea how long he talked but I got lost in the sound of his voice and the way his hands moved as he explained things. He stopped talking and I cocked my head, looking up to find him shying away.

“Sorry, I got a little overexcited there,” he apologized.

“I kind of enjoyed it.”

“Really?” His eyes lit up as he looked back at me.

“Yeah. It’s obviously something you really like and I love listening to my friends talk about their passions.”

“Oh, right, yeah,” he said, shaking his head. “I mean, I’d listen to my friends talk about anything, too.” 

“So, Scream reboot?”

“Sure, if that’s what you want.”

He pressed play on the movie and shut off the lamp, plunging the room into darkness until the movie started up.

Boone’s posture had fallen after I said I’d listen to my friends. I wasn’t sure what that was about, because he was my friend. I’d love it if we could be more but I wouldn’t want to break up the team that Tyler created. And I couldn’t help but be afraid that I’d end up crushing Boone at some point and he’d leave. They always left.

The villain popped out of a closet and I jumped, clutching onto Boone’s arm, just like I feared. Both of our eyes dropped to the spot where my fingers wrapped around his bicep before meeting again. I wasn’t sure what was in his eyes so I loosened my grip and started to pull my hand away.

Surprisingly, his free hand reached over and grasped it before the arm I was clutching draped around my shoulders. He pulled me close and I breathed a sigh of relief at the way he took it all in stride. I shifted against him and heard his heart speed up in his chest.

“You okay?” I questioned. “I mean, you don’t have to -”

“I’m fine,” he whispered as he tightened his arm around me, “great, actually.”

“Are you sure?”

He tucked his finger under my chin and lifted my gaze to his. His eyes searched my face for a moment before he leaned in, his lips touching my hesitantly. 

Shock and delight filled my chest before he pulled back to look me in the eye once more. 

“You kissed me,” I muttered.

“I did.”

“Do it again?”

He smiled and his brow relaxed. "You want me to kiss you again?"

“Please.”

"Okay." Boone slid his hand up my cheek and pulled me towards him, kissing me deeper than before.

Maybe movie night wasn't so bad, after all.