#there's a brief description of what kind of house they could live in

[heliosphere-underthesky]

Are the Alpha Centauri trinary system like the Sun's siblings? Cousins if that's the case? (Also how is Ceres taller then Makemake when she's smaller then him in real life)

Hi! Actually I'm still not sure, a lot of the stars are friends. Sometimes if they're in the same system, then they could act as if they're family, found family, or even lovers for some. Sun probably sees the Alpha Centauri system as close friends! Earth looks up to them too. The three are likely friends or found family, I haven't thought about them much yet.

Also for the height, I'm still working on them! The main cast should be fixed, but the deuteragonists like Ceres and Makemake are still not fixed.

Although! There's an answer for that too. In the lore, sometimes the Caelestis (personification) aren't always proportional to their real life counterparts. It all roots down to their house size and their ranks.

For example, Halley's comet is taller than Mercury! But Hal ranks lower than Mercury (comets rank lower than planets) and his home is much smaller than Mercury's.

Given this information, you can just imagine how huge the Sun's palace is... or how huge TON 618's manor? Castle? Is.

Heliospheric Lore - Caelestis and Ranks (Toyhou.se)

[peachesofteal]

Simple Math / Part Nine

Simple Math masterlist

Ghost/Soap/female reader 4.1k words - AO3 Warnings-tags: 18+ MDNI. Graphic descriptions of domestic violence. Medical chart from a SANE EXAM. Simon's family history, trauma. Brief sexual content. Hospital setting, nurse!reader, medical inaccuracies. Heavy emotions. Scars. Reader in pain. Hurt/comfort. Kate is a dog with a bone. Penny is cute. POV switches. Simon and Johnny make a discovery, and a promise.

You can’t breathe.

The air is too thin, too tight, and you stand, silent, in the foyer of the home that you’ve been invited to.

A clock ticks on the wall. You count each second, waiting. 

You should leave. You should run. 

Simon’s footsteps echo above your head, already up the stairs with your first bag and work backpack.

He said to make yourself at home, but you can’t move.

The foyer is the foyer of a family. There is a hall tree with little shoes scattered beneath it, a tiny, pink backpack hanging on the hook. Too many wellies to count, all in pastel colors, matching a small yellow and green rain jacket that’s folded on the stairs. There’s a black hoodie, a black jacket, and a green on the coat rack, hung haphazardly with a toss. Men’s sizes, and you notice two pairs of trainers next to one pair of black boots, and two crayons hide, peeking out from under the bench, one blue, one purple, so worn down they’re almost half gone.

A home. A family. 

“Hey, so up-“ You flinch. The jolt has you stumbling, one misstep over another, and he tenses, prepared to steady you, careful hand outstretched, but not encroaching.

“Sorry.” You shouldn’t be here. 

“No, I’m sorry. I know better.” You blink, and the silence is heavy, weighted down like bricks at the bottom of a river. 

He’s still wearing the mask. 

 “Can I… give you a tour?”

“S-sure.”

You lose your breath again in the kitchen.

Simon turns away to the sink, loading dishes into the dishwasher as you stare at the fridge and its collage with a tight chest. It’s covered; photos, invitations, magnets, notes, finger painted masterpieces. You step closer, studying, noticing the way they all fit together, mix matched perfectly, and even in the pictures, the three of them glow effortlessly, too sweet and smiling, happy. Together. A family. A perfect unit.

Your nose tingles, and you blink back the tears that fight forward, wiping away the two that escape and trickle down your cheek. You don’t know why it overwhelms you, why it fills you with grief.

What is it like, to be loved like that? To have a family, like this? 

Get it together. You’re a guest in their house.

It’s too much, and you chastise yourself for getting so emotional over nothing, over something stupid.

You need to be alone. 

Dry sandpaper scrubs the back of your throat when you swallow. “Simon?” He turns, concerned, glancing at the fridge and then back to you, drying his hands on a towel.  

“What is it?”

“Can I… I’m sorry. I’m… tired.” You try to explain your needs but it’s awkward on your mouth, uncomfortable. His expression creases with sympathy.

“Of course, c’mon. I’ll show you.”

“Alright, one more step.”

“’m sorry.”

“You don’t have anything to apologize for, bun. You’re alright.” In the back of your mind, you’re registering Simon’s warmth, the wilted lean that has you tipped into him, slow steps on the stairs, one by one as you fight to stay upright. He’s warm, and pillowy… the kind of comfort you could sink into, disappear inside for a while. It sounds so… nice.

But your shoulder is throbbing. The pain combined with the emotions swirling about in your heart has you on the verge of tears, top teeth dug into your lip, and your molars grind against one other with each step.

“It’s just at the end of the hall.”

You shouldn’t be doing this. Even now, after agreeing, getting in the car, getting yourself here… the desire to bolt runs hot under your skin, buzzing inside your skull, an insistent need.

You’re in their house. Where they live. With their baby. 

What if he comes back? What if he hurts them? 

“Hey.” Simon says your name slowly, ducking down to get your attention. Fuck.

“Sorry, I’m just… exhausted.”

“I’m sure. It’s right here.” He opens the door to a room, flicking on a light switch. The walls are a sage green, a gentle hue that matches the bedspread, framed photos organized into a gallery wall, pictures of smiles and laughter, a tiny Penny in Simon’s naked arms, a candid shot of Johnny in full military regalia, the three of them together somewhere, hiking, with Pen snuggled in a papoose on Johnny’s chest. The bed is the centerpiece, a massive king size piled with pillows, and it looks so inviting, so soft that you want to collapse into it right here and now.

“Wow.” It’s the best you can do, considering the screeching agony vibrating in your shoulder. You try to breathe through it, but the pain only shortens your draw.

“Yeah, it’s our old bed. Very comfortable.” He puts your other duffel down by the dresser, and you try not to dwell on the idea of it once being theirs, where they slept, where they’ve loved one another, held each other, their child, their- “It’s got its own bathroom, just through here.” He’s on the other side of the room, turning on a light that is far too bright, and you squint, jerking away with a gasp. Are you getting a migraine too? “Shit, sorry.” The room spins. You stumble towards the bed, limbs heavy, head full of cement, wooziness blurring your immediate sight. You’re disjointed, a mess of pain and disorientation, and you cover your eyes with a palm.

“Sorry, I think… I think I’m getting a headache. My shoulder-“ it slips out before you can stop yourself, and even with your eyes closed, you know Simon is staring at you, picking you apart with his eyes.

“Your shoulder?” You’re on a runaway train now. It has no brakes. No destination. It just barrels down the tracks, unable to stop for rational thought or pleas of mercy. It has no plan, and it does not heed you. You’re helpless. Hopeless. Lost. Reaching out for a light in the dark, a rope, a life vest, and a sob breaks through to the surface.

“It really hurts.”

“It hurts?” His voice cuts, tone worried. “Which one?” You use your good side to point, shakily.

“I’m sorry. I’m s-sorry.” You try to tell him, try to explain that you don’t mean to cry, or be emotional. You don’t mean to be making a fuss. You’re not supposed to be a problem.

A warm hand lays atop your thigh, thumb rubbing into your scrub pants.

“Sweetheart, you’re in pain. You don’t have to apologize for crying.” Your vision blurs, thick with tears, and fingers gently probe along your shoulder cuff. When you flinch, he swears. “Shhh, alright. Easy.” He’s gentling a spooked horse, carefully feeling along where you ache as you cry through it, unable to stop. “I’m going to go get some ice. We can… wrap it up, if you think that will help?”

“Ye-yeah, okay.” His steps fade, and you try to get your top off, sliding the arm that doesn’t hurt underneath your turtleneck, which is confined by the rigidity of your scrub top.

When you try the other one, the pain is so sharp, a cry bursts from your lips, and Simon sprints up the stairs. How did it get so much worse between the beginning of your shift and now? 

“What happened?”

“I can’t… I can’t get my shirts off.” You uselessly tug at the hem, eyes half open, letting it fall from your fingers, stuck in a loop, frantic movements matching the increasing pace of your lungs.

“Can I help?” His face is lined in concentration, and you spot an icepack on the bed now, with a sling, and a wrap. They’re prepared. Must come home with a fair number of injuries. “Bun, are you with me?” You sniffle and nod. What choice do you have? What choice do you ever have? The pain is too much. It’s all too much, and it boils over until you need to get the shirts off, not caring that it will expose you, or show Simon the very details you’re always trying to hide. You’re too far lost now, too far gone.

If you’re here, in their home, shouldn't you let them see? Shouldn't you let them know? 

The truth is terrifying, the reality of the trust you have in them. You know Simon won’t hurt you, instinctively. You feel safe here, in their home, their old bed, and when he looks at you, you show him, just for a second, the fractured mirror that is your reflection. You show him the pain and the rage and the fear, you give him everything. You shove the girl in the mirror forward, you force her into the sun and you hold her face to the light, trying not to sob as she screams at you in protest.

Just for a second.

“Okay.” He nods, and then cups your cheek. “You’re okay, sweetheart. I’ve got you.” You nod with tears that sting, and then you slowly pull away, slipping back into yourself, hiding the girl in the mirror away, making more promises to her that you’re not sure you’re going to keep.

“We’re going to put this one,” He slowly, carefully lifts the arm with the bad shoulder until it’s resting on his own, “right here. That alright?” A whimper builds, but you give him another nod, breathing through the anguish. There are a million little needles in your shoulder, all stabbing you over and over, ripping and gnawing at the cartilage, or the bone, or the muscle… you can’t be sure. “I’m going to bring your scrub top up now. Is this okay?” his fingers peel it from the turtleneck, and when he gets to your head, you incline your neck, more tears rushing forth.

“Yeah.” You whisper, a tired, pained moan, falling from your lips without permission.

“I know it hurts; I know. Almost there, try to breathe.” He soothes you, and the top slides towards him along your arm. He pulls it free, throwing it on the floor somewhere, his hands returning to your thighs.

“Sorry.” It’s automatic, ingrained. A reaction to pain, to fear, to the idea of being a burden, something that haunts you, every day. He ignores it.

“Ready for the next?” The turtleneck comes less easy, but the two of you are in sync like dance partners. The pain shoots up your arm when you move your neck again, and Simon wipes a few tears from your cheek, carefully leaning you back into the pillows and pulling the comforter down.

There’s a sharp intake of breath, the raw edge of surprise, horror, you’re sure, and you close your eyes. You can't look at him, when you know what he sees. You know what you look like. A roadmap of foolishness. Of weakness. You know the scars are plainly on display, still raised, still ugly. Like you.

He says nothing, only sits at your side, bed dipping with his weight. “I’m going to take your shoes off too, okay?” He narrates and asks for permission with each touch, pulling your sneakers free, satisfying thunk of each one hitting the floor, and then moves on to sliding the ice pack underneath you, wrapping it firmly but not too tight, ensuring it stays in place. He’s tender and slow, thoughtful, your eyes fighting to stay closed, brain and body starting to drift off into uncomfortable sleep. “Not yet, sweetheart.” There’s a rattle, two pills being deposited into your hand.

“What are these?"

“Paracetamol.” He turns the bottle, label out, word coming into focus enough to be verified, and you swallow them down with the glass of water in his outstretched hand.

“Thank you.” The croak stays lodged in your throat, and his eyes crinkle, the sign of a smile.

“Get some rest.” It’s comfort he gives you, leaning forward, pressing mask covered lips to your forehead. Comfort that doesn’t elicit a flinch or a sense of wariness, and you bask in the shine of the sun on your skin, holding tight to it, slipping into a dreamless sleep.

“Banky.” Pen demands, hands outstretched.

“No binky, it’s lunch time. Lunch.” Simon makes the sign for lunch, L shaped pointer finger and thumb, circling the corner of his mouth. He does it a few times, accompanied with the word again and again until Penny huffs and leans back, eyes wide. “You try. You try, lunch.”

“No!” She shrieks, and he shushes her, scattering some banana puffs across her tray.

“Shhh Pen. Bun is sleeping, remember?”

“Bunny seep?” She gives him the sign for sleep, or her sign at least, a palm dragging down her face followed by very dramatic closing lids. “Seep?”

“Yes, sleeping.” Simon makes the sign to acknowledge she was correct. “Good job.” He gives her a thumbs up, and she smiles, sweetness melting away some of the tense worry that's taken up in his heart.

“Puff?” She holds one out to him, but he shakes his head, pointing at her mouth.

“For you. Eat them, eat your puffs.” He signs along with the words, and she mimics him, food in hand, eyes lighting up when she finally makes it in her mouth.

He glances towards the stairs. You’re in the guest room, far enough away that Penny’s noise shouldn’t wake you, but still he tries to keep her preoccupied, distracted from making a fuss.

He wants you to get as much sleep as possible, this morning’s discovery of your shoulder unsettled him more than he’s frankly comfortable with, and the image of your swollen, battered face and neck leers and taunts. 

She’s safe now. She’s here. 

“Dada.” Pen calls, and he smiles, leaning forward to brush his lips across his baby’s soft skin, wispy curls tickling his nose. 

“Love you, baby girl.” He signs it too, and she beams.

“Luh.” It’s supposed to be love, and though the word is a struggle, the sentiment is the same. He doesn’t care that she’s not quite got it yet, he’ll take every word, every syllable he can get. These moments, each moment with his child, Johnny’s child, theirs… is a gift, one he never thought he’d have until Johnny. A privilege.

His phone vibrates with a text message.  

>Simon

>Give me a ring when you get a chance. On the black cell.  

“Thought you were on vacation?” Kate sighs, click clack of keys echoing in the background.

“I am, but if I’m too idle I start to go crazy. The wife likes it when I have a project.” Simon pauses, cocking his head. Penny’s feet kick in the highchair, baby spoon banging against the plastic tray.

“Hang on, Kate.” He drags a kitchen chair over in front of her so he can sit, pinning the phone between his shoulder and chin to twist the lid off the applesauce pouch. “Shhh, here you go." Penny gurgles with a grin at the taste of the fruit, and he smiles back at her. "So, what’s the new project then?”

“The nurse.” Simon’s eyes dart to the floor above his head.

“It’s not a good time.”

“I can talk, you can listen.” She brushes him off, sipping something with ice and then continuing. “I found it hard to believe that a civilian would be able to scrub their footprint like this, so I did a little digging. The more digging I did, the worse my fixation became.” Like a dog with a bone.Simon holds his breath. “I just needed a key, and with those photos you provided, well, things just started unraveling.”

“Kate.” He growls because he can’t manage anything else. He’s trying to keep himself still, heart pounding in his chest. Penny coos, like she notices the shift in her dad’s demeanor, and he immediately attends her, thumbing at a smear of applesauce on her cheek.

“I found a SANE exam from a few years ago. Small hospital in southern Colorado, right over the border from Texas. Patient’s name is Jane Doe, but the photos are almost an exact match.” His stomach lurches, dark clouds shadowing his vision, world splitting into blood and rage. Violence.

He didn’t want to be right.

He wanted to it to be anything, anything but this.

Who? 

Is it the same person that choked you? Beat you? Tore your shoulder damn near out of its socket? 

His gaze drifts to Penny.

They'll need to loop Price in, immediately. 

“Can you send it to me?”

“It’s already in your email.” She speeds past, eagerly. “There’s more. I used the photo to run facial recognition on archives in neighboring states and got a host of hits from Texas. You’ll have to visually confirm, but if I’m right, I’ve got positive ID on your girl.”

“How?”

“School. She graduated high school a year before the rest of her class, ended up with a full scholarship to Rice University in Houston, Texas. Went on to get a bioscience degree and graduated from Rice early.” Pride flutters beneath his ribs, honeyed and heavy. Their smart girl. “She ends up at a different school for pre-med but drops out before the first year ends. Not sure what happened but she started an accelerated nursing program, and breezed through it. You should see her transcripts. I don’t think this girl has gotten less than an A+ on anything since kindergarten.”

“Send them over.”

“Already done. After that, she starts work at a local hospital, and then… nothing. Her paper trail stops. Her job disappears. She’s a ghost except for the sealed court records, and now the Jane Doe medical chart, but that didn’t happen until later. The aliases she’s used over the past few years, they’re in the wind. It’s really quite impressive. She’s either got a connection somewhere, or she’s CIA.” Kate is animated, talking quickly, and he interrupts her to get to the question that’s weighing on him, brushing off the latter immediately. You’re not a honeypot. He spots those a mile away.

“You know her name, then. Her birth name?”

“I do.” She’s silent for a moment, and then she gives it softly. First, middle and last.

He closes his eyes. He tries to imagine you as a girl, on the playground, playing tags with other kids, all of them shouting your name, or as a teenager, in a fight with a parent, one of them yelling your name. He pictures you as a uni student, with your friends, laughing and having a good time somewhere, one of them hollering your name over too loud music. You’ve had a whole life with that name, a whole story. You were a person with that name, and he tries to imagine the way it would sound on your tongue, on Johnny’s, even his.

You’re a ghost now, will you let them bring you into the light?

Will you let them help you reclaim it; the way Johnny helped him reclaim his own?

Kate subtly coughs on the other end of the line.

“Thanks, Kate.”

“You’re welcome. I’ll keep digging. Check your email when you get a chance.”

“Will do.”

“Oh! And the hotel, I sent that paperwork to your email as well.” He thanks her, again, tells her to try to enjoy her time off and hangs up just as Penny starts to fidget, unhappy with being in the highchair for so long without attention.

“Alright, lamb. Let’s get you cleaned up, hmm?” He pulls her free, showering kisses all over her cheeks and neck that make her giggle. “Can’t be wearin’ your applesauce and pajamas over to John and Lou’s, can you?”

Johnny is anxious. Simon can see it a mile away, even before he gets in the room, he notices how he is fidgets, unspent energy and too much time to dwell culminating in an unsettled state.

So, when he kisses him first thing, he makes it long and slow. He drags Johnny’s bottom lip between his teeth, carefully taking his time until he’s sure his partner is half hard beneath his hospital gown and blanket.

“Si.” Johnny groans, and he relents, pulling away to cradle his face between his hands, taking him in, every line, every fleck of gold in his blue eyes, soaking up the healing, healthy glow that glimmers in his skin.

His doctor says it won’t be long now, until he can come home, and Simon is counting the days.

To have everyone, under one roof, feels like a fever dream.

“Missed you.” Johnny noses into his neck, and Simon reciprocates with a kiss to his temple, his cheek.

“Missed ye too.” He pauses, squeezing his hand. “Pen?”

“Alright. Grumpy this morning. Think she wanted to see you.” She did, he knows it, but he tries not to pile it on. Johnny knows their daughter misses him, as much as he misses her. They’re two peas in a pod, best friends, halves to a whole. They’re both suffering. “Went with Lou and John fine. I’ll bring her in the morning.”

“Good.” He nods, tilting his chin for another kiss, and Simon gives it without hesitation, basking in the warmth and familiar feel  of his skin.

When he clears his throat, he pulls away with a sigh. “How is she?”

“In pain. Shoulder is nearly torn out of the socket, and her neck is in poor shape. I had to help get her into bed, she couldn’t get her shirt off. Emotionally she’s… still got the walls up, but she let them slip for a second last night, before she let me help her. And I caught her crying in front of the fridge. Think the photos of Pen got to her somehow.” His stomach twists, new, horrifying possibility dawning on him. Do you have a child somewhere? 

“Did she get any sleep?”

“She hadn’t come down when I left to take Penny, so I assume so.”

“Good. She needs it.” Simon agrees. After injury, after trauma, body and mind need so much more care. More rest, more nutrients, water, protein. More love.

“Kate called.” He bites the bullet, fingers flexing against his knee. “She found a loose end and tugged it.” Johnny straightens. He’s every bit the solider, even laid up in bed. Waxy, soft features turn razor sharp and focused, except instead of his practiced steadiness, he’s chomping at the bit.

“Tell me.”

Simon does. He tells him everything Kate said, almost verbatim. Johnny’s face changes from worried to enraged when he finally gets to the medical chart.

“No.” Johnny’s whisper is faint, thin, papyrus. Brittle and broken, almost washed away, and Simon doesn’t blame him. The chart is horrific for them, was horrific for him earlier, turned his stomach until he thought he’d be sick.

He’s killed. He’s tortured. But to be there when Johnny revealed the handprinted tender skin on your neck, to be there when you cried out in pain last night, when he saw the scars on your body, the cigarette burns that were so familiar, to look at these photos and know that you’ve been brutalized beyond belief, makes his vision run red and his heart ache.

There’s a ghost in these photos. A different girl, but the same, a glimpse of what he saw last night. Still their bunny, their girl. He can see her, through the broken blood vessels and compound forearm fracture. He can see her past the swollen cheekbone and broken nose, the fresh burns on your stomach and torso. The doctor’s notes indicate that you said you were mugged, and sexually assaulted, but refused to finish the SANE exam and took off.

He's not surprised. 

The first time he saw the burns on your naked skin, he swore he could his mother’s screams, and for the hundredth time today, Simon thinks of her. He wonders, if she ever went to a hospital, if she ever begged anyone to help her, or them. He wonders if someone saw what was happening, how she was slowly disappearing, sinking in on herself, and tried to help. He wonders if she felt as alone as you seem to. If she too, became a ghost.

He looks at these photos and cannot fight the pain, the memories.

“Oh, Si.” Johnny cups his cheek, thumb soothing softly across his skin, trying to wipe away the tears that fall. He can’t stop them, not now, and Johnny does not ask, only holds him through it, lets him cry into his hands, pain and suffering of a small, frightened boy coming out of his body in broken sobs.

He won’t fail you. Not like he did her.

After minutes turn long, he takes a deep breath, pressing his lips to Johnny’s palm, and utters a promise as cold as death. 

“We’ll kill them. Whoever it is.”

[loliwrites]

The One You Need | five

🎶 I spent most my life thinkin’ love was out of reach, so maybe just this once, you could be the one I need, if you let me be the one you need🎶

pairing: neighbor!joel miller x f!reader  rating: explicit, 18+ minors dni  summary: when you move into town hellbent on keeping everyone at an arm’s length, your neighbor Joel finds his way into your life. warnings/tags: au, neighbor joel, age gap [reader is late 20s/early 30s, Joel is late 40s], hyper-independent reader, unannounced visitors, actual daddy issues, dysfunctional parental relationship, SMUT, brief oral [m receiving], fingering, unprotected p in v sex, general manhandling, spanking, hair pulling, choking, joel’s a closer, sweet soft aftercare, terms of endearment [sweetheart, pretty girl], female reader, no physical description, protective!joel, soft!joel, dare i say ei!joel, no use of y/n. word count: 6.4k joel miller masterlist | part four a/n: happy new years eve hunni buns! lets usher this year out and the new one in with a bang. literally and figuratively.

Joel took a long, deep breath and held it as he stretched his legs, knees cracking with the tension. He released the breath and relaxed his sore body all at the same time. His lower back was screaming with tightness. The sort that ensured he knew he was no longer as young as he once had been. The kind that told him he never would be again.

Blinking languidly and taking an extra moment to get himself awake, he found himself in an unfamiliar place. It took a couple seconds, and the sight of the stray bolt on the nightstand, until he remembered where he was. In your home. With you. He turned over to lay his gaze upon you; to catch you sleeping. But getting onto his back, quickly noticed that you were no longer in bed beside him. For long enough by this point for your side to have grown cold in the morning air. Joel glanced at the clock unhurriedly. 7:54. Far later than was normal for him. Though partaking in the activities from the previous night hadn’t been normal in his recent history either. 

He got out of bed cautiously so as to not aggravate an already angry back. A groan ripped through his chest when he bent over to grab his jeans and slid​​ them up his legs, opting to leave them unzipped and unbuttoned around his hips as he strode for the bedroom door. All seemed quiet in the house, save for the knocking of some cabinets and silverware. Joel yawned and rubbed his eye with his fist, afterward trailing that hand up to his skewed hair for a scratch. He found you with the noise. Back to him, in front of the coffee machine, with a line of cups in front of you.

Approaching silently, you made no notion of being aware he was there until a hand laid upon your ass. Lips followed suit to the side of your head.

“Morning,” he mumbled, voice deep and gravelly. He squeezed his fingers into the flesh of your backside where you’d traded in being naked for his t-shirt and a pair of cotton pants.

“Hand off ass,” you grimaced through your teeth.

He pulled his hand away and held it up as innocently as possible, staring down at you with a worried gaze. What had happened between late last night and early this morning?

“What’s wrong?”

You huffed and let your shoulders sag. Maybe if you collapsed to the floor, everyone would just leave your house and you could carry on with life. But Joel replaced his hand on you, this time on your mid-back and you only tensed up a little, though was sure he noticed. “My mom and dad are here,”

Joel turned his head to the side as subtly he could muster and snuck a peek of a pair of men’s shoes in the living room he’d never seen before. He looked back at you, “take it we’re not happy about their arrival,”

A glare in his direction was answer enough. “I left because of them,”

He nodded as if assuring you that he needed no explanation. “I’ll get out of your hair. Come ‘round when they leave,”

“No, don​’t go,” you rested your hands on his stomach. “They might behave better if someone else is in the house,”

He let out a breath and seemed to look down at you, authoritatively. You were leaving him in a bit of a situation – if only because you were currently in the shirt he’d come over in. “Still got my other shirt you stole?”

“I didn’t steal it!”

He let out a low hmph.

“It’s in my dresser. Middle drawer on the left,”

If you’d seen it coming, or had any inclination of it, you probably would’ve resisted, but when Joel leaned in to kiss you, it caught you so off guard that you had no other instinct than to kiss him back. To allow his lips to brush over yours softly at first, and then find their placing with more force. A clear sign to any potential onlookers that this is where I belong, against her lips.

✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿

Sitting across from your parents reminded you of every reason why you’d left, and reignited feelings in your body you thought you’d banished after moving away and creating your own little world here. Granted it had only been a month, but your body had felt lighter, your mind freer. Nothing like mom and dad to get you back to feeling inadequate and insignificant. You knew they loved you. Sure of it. But dad was loud and mom was… weak. And from it was born every fucked up conception and fear you had of relationships. Mom and dad made relationships look like a thing to avoid like the plague. To ward them off  any way you could. No price was too large if it meant keeping someone at bay. Someone who may know the dark and scary things about you and then eventually use them against you without so much as a breath or a blink of an eye. To willingly show someone your weaknesses knowing they would inevitably stab you in the back with them…? Why would anyone want a relationship?

It was some point within your father’s rant of how your home was just okay – “I mean, this isn’t what I would’ve done. I would’ve changed this… this is falling apart… you spent how much? For this…?” – that you realized Joel had apparently made himself mighty comfortable in your bedroom. Safely stowed away behind a closed door. Not that you wanted to subject him to the horrors that were the humans who gave you life, but if he’d at least make his earthly presence known, maybe your dad would cool the fuck off.

“For that price you could’ve found something a little nicer somewhere in the valley.” Your dad continued on one of his rants that you’d learned to tune out. Picked at an invisible fuzz on the shirt you wore. “No use coming out here. I’m sure peak summer’s just about the most awful thing. And winter? Gonna be miserable…”

The clearing of a throat saved you. Lifted you from this realm and tossed you into a different one. A better one. All three of you looked up at the same time, but only you smiled when you laid eyes upon Joel standing in the threshold. Arms dangling at his sides, almost uncomfortable with their lack of something to do.

“Sorry to interrupt,” he glanced at your father, not giving heads or tails of what he was really thinking. He took a couple steps into the room, jutting his thumb back over his shoulder, “gotta grab some stuff from my place to fix your door.”

You hopped up from your seat and met him halfway. “I have tools,” sounding too eager to keep him on the perimeter of your property.

“As much as I love that floral screwdriver, it’s gonna take a bit more,” he pursed his lips together, eyes darting over your face to pick up any intricacies of your expression. “Y’good?”

A nod was all you could muster. A weak thing that bowed your head until your eyeline was even with Joel’s chest. You’d turn back to your parents as soon as he turned to leave, but not a moment before then. Why return to that when you could live here for just a little bit longer, almost like you could pretend they weren’t there at all. And in the pause, Joel lifted a hand and curled it to the back of your neck, fingers pressing against skin to inch you closer to him. Just close enough for him to lay a gentle kiss on your forehead. He lingered there with a deep inhale. And having grown uncomfortable with the closeness and perceived intimacy in front of your parents, you pulled away and looked up at him. 

You weren’t sure what he was thinking at that moment. Wasn’t sure of his game plan or endgame. But in the split-second you pulled away from his lips on your forehead, he leaned back in and pressed a quick peck to your lips. And his slight smirk after he stood back to his full height and left was all you needed to see. He’s gonna get the shit slapped out of him.

The front door clicked back in place before you turned back toward your parents to face the questions you knew were coming.

“Who was that?” Your mom asked. She speaks! She breathes! She lives!

“The handyman,”

“You kiss your handyman?” Good question, dad.

“He’s also my neighbor,”

“You kiss your neighbors?”

Instead of answering and opting to sit back down, it gave your dad time to interject yet again.

“He’s kind of old,”

“What’re you doing here? I’d appreciate a heads up,”

Your mom sat forward, “sweetheart, we just wanted to see how you were doing.”

Somehow that name didn’t sound as nice as it did when it came off of Joel’s tongue. And you also knew that wasn’t entirely it. They hadn’t cared to stop by and see how you were doing when you lived in the same town as them. Never dropped in to check out your apartment there. Really you knew it was because the version of you they once held so much control over had slipped away. And with the distance from your move, it seemed that you’d slipped away entirely. Despite dad’s total lack of emotion and mom’s “woe-is-me” attitude, you knew they knew it, too. You’d never be coming back to “old home”.

The front door creaked back open and you turned your head to watch the newcomer who went to great lengths to avoid eye contact. He’d changed out of the t-shirt and into a green flannel, the sleeves halfway rolled up and his renewed presence only halted your dad momentarily from talking about himself.

A fleeting thought passed through your brain about what Joel thought of all this. Did he think you were being too hard on your family? Did he think they were absolute nuts? Did he get why the choice between staying or uprooting your life was an easy one? But mostly you thought about how you didn’t want him to think differently of you because of your parents. You didn’t want him to see shades of you in them and have that change his perception. They were never meant to be here. And you’d moved across the country to have a better chance at that being reality.

✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿

Despite many failed attempts, you finally urged your parents out of the house come evening by insisting there were a few work deadlines you were behind on. Work was always the perfect excuse because they never care to understand what it was you did anyway. They made a half-hearted mention about swinging by tomorrow before their flight, but you made up another excuse about work and knew they wouldn’t fight it. You locked the door behind them and turned, coming face to face with Joel, who stood a few feet away from you, twirling the oven bolt in his fingers.

The only thing you knew to do was take a breath, so you did. Let it sit and linger in your chest hoping he’d be the one to break the silence.

“Back door’s fixed,”

Ever the gentleman.

With a grateful nod, you approached him. The urge to slap him silly had worn off – long after your parents had grown inquisitive of him. You bowed your head forward and rested it against his chest; the feel of his heartbeat serving as a new exercise in grounding. He wrapped an arm around you, hand settling on your ass again, pride swelling in him when you didn’t reprimand it away as you had earlier.

“You wanna talk about it?” A pause was punctuated with his fingers squeezing your backside. Keeping your head firmly against his chest, you shook it. “Y’wanna help me fix your oven?” Another pause was met with another shake of your head and the laugh that rumbled through Joel’s chest was almost enough to pull you out of the funk your parents had put you into. “How ‘bout you keep me company then, while I get to fixin’ it,”

And that you could agree to. Though not before a kiss to try and make everything better. For the first time that day, despite having spent a fantastic night together, a real, substantial kiss was able to take place. Lips meeting and parting in sync, tongues hesitant until they met each other. Even then, they remained even-paced. Like the unhurried, practiced ministrations of old lovers.

He pulled away first despite a groan from you, and took your hand, leading you into the kitchen. You made for the counter and hopped up on it to supervise while he went straight for the next appliance to fix. As he bent down and opened the oven door, inspecting some of the places the bolt could’ve come from, you wondered how much money you would’ve lost at this point had he not insert himself in your life. First with your bed, then the fridge, and the back door, and now this. 

“Y’know, come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you go to work.”

You blinked, realizing you’d zoned out, staring at his ass. You furrowed your eyebrows, “are you implying I don’t have a job, Miller?”

“No, no. Jus’ implyin’ you’re not very good at it,” he shot you a smile. Only a momentary shift in his focus. Long enough to rile you but not long enough for you to respond before he looked back at the oven and wordlessly set the bolt at what looked to be a hole in the hinge to the oven door missing the exact part.

“I’m a copywriter,” you mused, watching as he plucked a screwdriver (one much larger and serious looking than your floral one) from his toolbox.

He started to tighten the bolt into the hole. “Oh yeah? ‘S’pretty cool,”

“Boring,”

Joel gave the bolt a couple more turns with the screwdriver before it was tightened to his liking. He sat back on his knees and closed the oven door. Fixed. “Well it got you this house, so…”

You nodded in agreement. That job had gotten you everything you’d ever wanted. A house of your own far, far away from blood relatives. A sanctuary. Peace. It had even gotten you something you didn’t think you wanted. A ridiculously attractive, handy neighbor.

Joel was back in front of you then. Hands resting on your thighs, he made a spot for himself between your legs. With you on the counter, he now found you at his height, and lowered his forehead against yours. “You wanna go out and get some dinner with me,”

Arms reached forward and wrapped around his shoulders, “when?”

“Tonight. Now,” he smirked and lifted his head just enough to place a gentle kiss to your forehead, “ya nut.”

“Like a date?”

Now he fully leaned back and cocked his head to the side, trying to figure out what was the right answer here. If he said yes, would you read far too into it and climb back into the shell he’d been working you out of? And if he said no, would you be disappointed that he didn’t want to be seen with you in public in that way? As he had done with everything thus far, he decided to go with the truth. Worst case scenario, he’d have to call you out and set you back in line. “Yes,”

And you only nodded. Your arms squeezed over his shoulders, fingertips pressing into the rippling muscles of his back. Surely a date with Joel Miller would be leaps and bounds better than your last date. “Could you do me a favor first?”

Joel smiled. His eyes flicked from yours, up to the top of your head where a piece of hair was threatening to fall loose and dangle in your eyeline. With deft fingertips, he brushed it back and nodded.

“Can you rail me?”

“Are people still saying ‘railed’?” He chuckled and stepped in closer, between your thighs. Hands grabbed on to them with intention. 

This time you were the one to push your fingers through his hair, combing through those graying curls. “I think that’s the best adjective for what I want,”

“Yeah?” He studied you, not needing to search too far to realize there was a correlation between the torrid thoughts in your head about your parents, and you wanting him to knock them out. “I think I might be able to do that,” he grinned, partially disheartened. There was doubt on his end whether his body would fail that specific task after the day he’d spent bent over fixing your back door. “Might have to cut an old man some slack,”

You smiled softly and brushed your fingers through his hair again. With a nod and the hooking of your ankles around his back to cage him between your thighs, you planted a kiss to his lips. Just a chaste little thing to kick things off, knowing it wouldn’t be long before he opted to take the reins. But there was still one territory you had yet to venture into: the blowjob. And perhaps that wasn’t necessarily the go-to first step on the road to getting railed, but you were anxious to check it off the list. A nervousness bubbling at the surface even as you pressed against his stomach and inched him a couple steps back. In your eyes you had every right to be. Though you’d never been flat out told you were bad at it, it was never high on your list of pleasurable things to do and you were sure your general lack of enthusiasm around the act was picked up on by the men on the receiving end. Yet in this moment, you still knelt to the floor in front of him, hands fumbling with his jeans as the nerves manifested by causing your fingers to tremble.

“That’s alright, you don’t have to,” Joel whispered, undoubtedly picking up on your anxiety. He even covered your hands with one of his, giving the permission to stop.

The out was appreciated but it didn’t keep you from the task you’d put yourself to. Despite his hands in the way, you managed to unbutton his jeans and slide the zipper down with skill you didn’t even know you had. “I want to,”

“Y’sure?”

You tilted your head to the side and glanced up at him. That’s all it took. Because you both knew you wouldn’t have gotten on your knees in the first place if you hadn’t genuinely wanted to be there. And before you lost the nerve to remain there, you nudged his pants down over his ass. Quiet giggles of contentment emanating from you when his hands joined in the fun and helped push the jeans down his thighs and past his knees. Now confronted with a growing (literally) situation, it was impossible for you to subdue the involuntary shiver that ran up your spine and attacked every inch of your body. You tried to dispel it by reaching for Joel’s member; the outline of it straining against his boxer briefs. But that sort of luck wasn’t on your side. Had never been on your side. And every boy you’d ever found yourself in this situation with never so much as blinked an eye before they pushed themselves into your mouth.

But this man in front of you. He was steadfastly attuned to you. Picking up on every single one of the cues. At the sight of your entire body shivering, Joel lowered his hand to the side of your face and brushed your hair away from it. He cupped your jaw and tilted your chin up until you looked up at him again. Waiting for him, you raised a hand and traced the outline of his cock in his underwear, giving it a gentle squeeze after your fingers had run its length.

“Don’t stay down there too long,” he said with a smirk, and catching your questioning look, he glided the pad of his thumb across your bottom lip. “I’m not gonna last,”

You tried to suppress a smile so as to not give him any ideas that you were going to mock him for it. The truth couldn’t be further from that. In actuality, you were flattered by the admission, and more than a little thankful that it seemed to serve as another out for you. You’d get to cross something off whatever list you’d made up in your mind, but wouldn’t have to be committed to be at it for very long. That somehow seemed to relieve some of the pressure you’d put on yourself.

“Get to work, pretty girl,” he murmured, taking you out of whatever inner monologue had you so preoccupied. “Just a taste,”

Focused back at his waist, you peeled back his underwear, reaching in with your free hand to take him out of the tight fabric. It wasn’t the first time you were seeing the sheer size of him but being on it face first now made it seem that much bigger. How you ever managed to fit it inside you was one thing. How you’d fit it in your mouth was another. Yet you started on, pressing your lips to the underside of the head softly, and moving down his length with brief kisses. Joel let out a deep breath through his nose and let his fingertips toy with your hair. You hadn’t noticed that his eyes were glued to you until you looked up at him and caught his stare. Opening your mouth and purposefully batting your eyelashes, you took him into your mouth and let your tongue swirl around the crown. It was the first thing you did that made Joel let out a throaty groan. So you repeated the action and got the same lusty response from him. 

“That’s good, sweetheart,”

Your mouth stretched wider around him to accommodate a smile, but then you gently shook your head side to side, working your lips lower and lower on his shaft. At about halfway, you realized there was no shot of taking him in his entirety. The temptation to gag was already there and you lifted your hands to the remainder of his length to help along. But then you felt one of Joel’s hands migrate to the back of your head, tangling in your hair, and your body stiffened on instinct. Flicking your eyes upward and catching Joel with his head tilted back and jaw slack, you kept your body stiff, trying to work through that impact. Then you closed your eyes hoping that if you couldn’t see him, he wouldn’t see you, and the fear growing in your gut would dissipate. 

Maybe it was the tension in your jaw. Maybe he picked up on the tension in your entire body. Regardless, his fingers, albeit still tangled in your hair, seemed to grow gentler. A lack of pressure while still being present. “‘M’not gonna push you down on it,”

Eyes flicked back open to inspect him. A pink hue had arisen in his neck and was working its way up to his cheeks. His nostrils flared in his damnedest attempt to keep himself from thrusting deeper down your throat. Catching that his words were the truth, you relaxed once again; the anxiety fleeing every fiber of your being. Consciously back in your body and picking back up where you’d left off, you tilted your head to the side, allowing the head of his cock to press along the inside of your cheek. The sight of your mouth stretched to accommodate him resulted in a low pitched growl from Joel. Something terribly needy. Hungry. 

You noticed his eyes flutter shut while the muscles in his stomach flexed and released in a steady procession. The sinew in his forearm flexed, too, with the clenching of his fist in your hair. And given slightly more freedom by the lack of eye contact, you pulled your lips off his shaft and replaced it with quick, sloppy strokes from your hand. Your mouth was not far from him for long. Lips navigating around the way your hand held his member up, you pressed them to his balls and smirked to yourself when you saw the way his body responded when you eventually rolled your tongue over them, paying each temporary attention.

Joel kept his promise and didn’t use his grip on your hair to press you down on him, but did use it in order to pull you off of him. Your swollen lips fell open when you were forced to stare up at him, his chest heaving like his heart was trying to break free from its cage.

“That’s enough,” he growled and all but lifted you back to your feet without any help from you. 

It took him no time at all to spin you around with ass pressed back against the edge of the counter. He set one hand on the granite top behind you and cupped the other down past the waistband of your cotton pants. His fingers found your clit with practiced ease. A move he’d obviously spent the better half of his life perfecting. And no sooner did his fingers trail along your slit, your lips met each other with fervor. The barrier of your parents for the most of the day had created a feeding frenzy between you. Neither able to get as much as you wanted fast enough. Mashing of lips and tongues. Teeth grazing against soft, plush skin. You were all erratic movements and whimpering pleas to keep going. Only when Joel pressed two fingers inside of you did your mouth drop open, causing a delay. An airy gasp floated out of your lungs and into the space between.

Joel dropped his forehead to yours, eyes piercing into you though you weren’t returning his gaze. How could you? Fingers down to their last knuckle had you squeezing your eyes shut and doing your absolute best to not become a trembling mess then and there.

“Please… please,” you sobbed, fingernails digging into his back. You knew crescent-shaped marks would be littering his skin despite the flannel. You were marking him. Yours for now. Yours for tonight.

An almost sadistic smile crossed Joel’s lips. Fingers curled inside of you and sent you lurching forward, wrapping up against his chest. Legs already shaking and squeezing shut around his hand. “Look at you. Already begging f’me,” he lowered himself just enough to tuck his head to your neck, leaving love bites on your skin. “Suckin’ my cock got you so wet. Already desperate for it,”

“Joel,”

“Tell me,”

You raised your hips into the heel of his palm, finding that friction on your clit was just about the last thing you needed to get to the first climax of the evening. Fingers curled around the fabric of his shirt, tugging him close as if that was going to be the thing that’d get him to keep his fingers inside you. Really, you knew he didn’t have any intention of letting you go without them. But the new closeness, and the way he towered over you, a looming presence with broad, square shoulders diminishing any size you might’ve had… and the smell of him… You came with a whimper, unable to have forewarned him of the spring being snapped inside you. His fingers slowed only enough so as to not hurt you but never stopped entirely. Even when you tried to wriggle away from him, overstimulated. He just curled his fingers inside of you again, against the spongy front of your throbbing core, and kept you right at the edge you’d just fallen over.

“Please–God, please, fuck me,” you reached forward and wrapped your hand around his shaft again, tugging and stroking him impatiently.

“I know that mouth can do better than that,” he mocked. “Tell me,”

You could cry, wanting something far more substantial inside you than two of his fingers. “I need it, Joel. Please,” stinging tears threatened to fall from the corners of your eyes. “Want you to bend me over and fuck me,” you figured you were on the right track when he slowly eased his fingers out of your dripping hole and replaced them with quick circles over your bundle of sensitive nerves. “Want you to make it hurt,” 

While to you, you didn’t notice any hesitation on Joel’s end. He just spun you around and bent you over the countertop. He kicked your feet out from under you until you were being held up solely by the counter and the press of his hips. But he had clocked your words. Make it hurt. Knew he wanted to remember that. Knew he wanted to talk about that at some later time. 

Make it hurt.

He grabbed your wrists and secured them behind your back with one of his hands while his other went to the base of his cock and notched it at your entrance. Still dripping from your first orgasm, it was enough to not notice the stretch from the head too greatly. But then he moved that hand to the back of your head and pressed against it, holding you down on the countertop. You were defenseless. Unable to move at all. Hands rendered useless and body being held in place for every one of his whims. And there wasn’t any time to process before he snapped his hips forward and buried himself inside you to the hilt. Bottomed out in one fell swoop. A scream erupted from your throat, very nearly feeling like your vocal cords would be on their way to being shredded. Joel shushed you; a hiss between clenched teeth, only giving a second for your string of loud breaths to sound a little less pained before he began to move, stretching you to the max with each drag and push.

It didn’t take long for those screams and breaths to quiet down to nothing. Just a mouth gaping open, sucking wind as his length rubbed against the deepest parts of you. He wasn’t holding back. He was doing just as you’d asked. He was making it hurt. But your quietness was thwarted by his hand coming down hard against your ass. It was only then that you’d realized he’d removed it from the back of your head. A deep gasp filled your lungs with fresh air. The smack had left a sting and burn on your skin, and the returned noise from you spurred Joel on. 

He landed another spank to the opposite cheek, flesh bouncing beneath it from both his hand and the press of his cock. “You like that, huh?” Another spank, this time his hand didn’t pull away on the impact, and instead his fingers dug into your fleshy backside, “look even prettier with my handprint on ya’.” His hips faltered, progress stuttered when you clenched around him, pulling him deeper. He used that momentum to lean forward and bite into the back of your shoulder, “good fuckin’ girl. So fuckin’ tight. Love it so much,”

“It’s yours,” you panted, legs having gone completely out beneath you. You were sure you’d crumble to the floor if he parted from you. Your pulse pounded in your ears.

“Hmm?” he hummed, burying his face in the back of your head, “I’m gonna come.”

“I’m yours. It’s all yours,”

A particularly hard thrust squished you against the counter, your hipbone colliding with it. You yelped and you weren’t sure if it was from the painful impact on your hip or the feeling of Joel spilling into you. He kept himself deep. Short thrusts to fill you with his spend, and only once he’d finished pushing it into you as deep as he could, did he pull out. Though you hadn’t come, you felt well-fucked despite it. Not even missing the rush of a second orgasm. But no sooner had he pulled out, were you being whirled around, facing him now; your ass notched at the cool, stone countertop. He stared endlessly into your eyes and pushed himself back inside you without a second thought. Only when he’d sheathed himself in completely and caught your off-kilter expression, did he move his hand up to your neck, fingers squeezing either side of it.

“Didn’t think we were done, did you, sweetheart?” He squeezed your neck a little tighter and you reached up to hold onto his wrist. You applied no pressure to get him to loosen his grip, just kept it there for the contact. “I know this pussy’s got one more orgasm in her,”

A guttural moan left your body. The new angle was far more conducive to your pleasure. The base of him rubbing up against your clit. Your eyes blinked languidly, threatening to stay closed, but Joel used his grasp on your neck to shake you. Once your eyes fully opened again, he brought his free hand to the back of your head and gave your hair a generous tug.

“C’mon, pretty girl. You can do it. Soak me,”

He mashed his lips back to yours and licked his way into your mouth. It was everything you wanted. Needed. The overwhelmingness of his size. The dominance. The control. Your walls fluttered around him and he urged you on some more. Words of encouragement matched by the strengthening of his hold on your throat or the one in your hair. And when you came, eyes drifting shut and remaining so, body convulsing and squeezing his length, you felt his hands loosening their hold on you. Not leaving completely, but certainly not applying any type of pressure as they had just previously been. 

Your body went limp in his arms. Had it not been for your heavy breaths, he might’ve thought he’d done some actual damage. But your breaths were trying to grow steadier and were mixed with the whimpers of someone who’d asked for one thing, had gotten it, and now needed something else entirely. 

Joel pressed his lips to the side of your head, lingering against your temple as he carefully stepped out of his pants and underwear that had bunched up at his ankles. You groaned at the soft jostling it created for, and Joel just hushed you and tucked his arms around your back and beneath your knees. He lifted you up and kept you cradled to his chest where you complained again. This time a quick mention of his back.

“I got’cha, sweetheart,” he bounced you in his arms just once to get a better hold on your body. “Don’t worry about it,”

Eyes completely shut, too heavy to keep them open for very long, you knew he was carrying you to the bathroom. This man and your pH balance. You wrapped your arms around his neck and held on to him as tightly as you could, wanting no amount of separation. But before you knew it, you felt the cold porcelain of the toilet beneath you. Joel’s hands uncurling your arms from around his neck, then moving to the hem of your shirt and pulling it off, over your head. Soon thereafter, he unhooked your bra and slid it off your arms. 

Concern started to work its way into Joel’s bones. The sight of you, nearly swaying to the side when he released you completely. He made quick work of turning the shower on, fearing you’d topple to the side and hit your head on the way down. Returning to you with urgency, he crouched down and brushed your hair away from your neck, searching for any marks he’d left behind. “Y’alright?” He whispered, finding some red patches on your skin but none too definitive to be seen as marks from his fingers.

Eyes still closed, you pressed a smile, “good.” You blinked your tired eyes open, looking down at your feet as Joel unraveled your pants from around your ankles that had been hanging on by a thread. “You hurt me like I asked you to,”

His eyes flicked up to you. Make it hurt. The words he was holding onto. He held onto these new ones too, keeping them for later. “Maybe too much,” he murmured, gathering a wipe from on top of the toilet tank.

“No,”

Though you’d said it in earnest, he had a hard time believing it. Your eyes were mostly closed. But his eyes were seeing all the consequences of the way he’d handled you. Thinking better of fighting you on that, he helped you up from the toilet. His body kept you upright while he wiped along your slit, cleaning up the mess he’d so haphazardly made. You were pliant in his arms, willing to trust that he’d take care of you as he always had, despite the new territory you’d ventured into today with each other. 

He led you to the shower and carefully peeled his flannel shirt from his body while helping maintain your balance. As he helped you in and kept his chest flush to your back, he caught sight of the bruise forming on the left side of your hip and knew it had been his doing. Easing down to the floor, both sat at the end of the steady stream of water, warm against you both from the shower and from Joel’s body heat. You let your head fall back against his shoulder, turning in toward his neck.

“Sure you’re alright?” He set his cheek down on top of your head and wrapped his arms around you, “I marked you up pretty good.”

“I’m okay,” you insisted. “I don’t break easily,”

“No, I don’t suppose you do.”

Now with open eyes, you tilted your head back and looked up at him. Your smile caught his worried expression and you hoped to dispel it. He’d only done as you asked. And so perfectly so. Maybe he’d ask you about it somewhere down the line. Why you’d asked him to make it hurt? Why had that been the chosen wording? It was evident in his eyes now that he likely wouldn’t be so accommodating to comply the next time you asked him to make it hurt. Yet you raised your hands and curled them behind his head to get him closer to you. Close enough to kiss. Slowly. Tenderly. Quiet assurance that he was still the good man you knew him to be.

[lordprettyflackotara]

dollhouse || jeff the killer || bonus part

SMUT MINORS DNI 18+ tw: spanking, jeff has a daddy kink, slapping, jeff’s just a sadistic asshole in this one, blood, brief description of gore

a/n: what’s this?! a double feature in one day?! yeah fuckers yall got the bonus part! i apologize for the delay my mind stayed lagging. i hope you all enjoyed the mini series <3

“This is our last chance. Dont fuck it up!” You hissed.

Jeff rolled his eyes. “Oh yes because taking out the target is sooo hard. I think I may cry,” He barked sarcastically. Slender had given you both one final chance to right your wrongs. Your last mission had ended with one too many news channels showing the camera footage of you and Jeff escaping the hospital. Nothing too identifying could be found of course, detectives puzzled on how Jeff was able to paint the walls and leave no fingerprints behind.

Little did they know the culprit had burned off his fingerprints ages ago. You crossed your arms, frowning. “The motorcycle was the best thing Ben could find on such short notice?” You asked. Jeff shoved his motorcycle helmet on, reving up the engine. “You are always welcome to walk doll,” He snickered. You stomped over to the motorcycle, shoving your own helmet over your head. You mocked him under your breath, throwing your legs over the seat. You couldn’t decide which was worse, dying at the hands of Jeff driving a motorcycle or being tortured to death by Slender.

As the motorcycle roared to life, you began to wonder just how bad Slender torturing you to death would be.

It was no secret you and Jeff were an item. The two of you were the obnoxious married couple of the mansion, terrorizing not only everyone around you but each other. There was a guarantee if you both were in the same room that you’d bicker until you’d go upstairs and fuck the anger out. It made the other residents sick. Sometimes they’d place bets on who would win the fight. Other times they’d high tail out of the room if you both entered. You’d argue with Jeff until your very last breath and you wouldn’t have it any other way.

Slenderman was not happy with either of you. His alternative was having you both dress up as scarecrows to defend his garden in a hundred degree heat. You both agreed to this mission without hesitation. It should’ve been simple enough, killing the newspaper chief who insisted on covering the story. As you wrapped your arms around Jeff from behind, you realized you never really knew how easy a mission was going to be with Jeff coming along. To you, Jeff was an anger filled imbecile who thought with his rage and not his mind. And to Jeff, you were a smart mouthed bitch who talked too much. The two of you together versus anyone else was a lethal combo.

It was around two in the morning when you both arrived to the house, parking the motorcycle blocks away as to not draw attention from the loud sounds. You grabbed your knife, following Jeff’s lead as he picked the lock to the back door. It was moments like these, when Jeff had shut the fuck up, that you were attracted to him the most. Once he picked the lock you both crept inside, watching each others backs. It was always unpredictable, home murders. There was always the chance the owner had a dog or some kind of pet to try to protect its person. Then there was always the possibility of an alarm system, an investment the chief of this newspaper company should’ve seriously considered.

You both scanned the kitchen and living room. Due to the time you guessed he was asleep, like most humans were. It was quiet enough to hear a pin drop, the ticking of the old grandfather clock the only audible sound. That was, until you reached the main hallway. Thankfully for you and Jeff the chief lived alone, providing them with zero additional witnesses to send to hell. His soft snores alerted you of where he was located. Jeff slid in first, crouching down to the floor on the left side of the bed. You went to take the right, a loud creaking floorboard alerting the newspaper editor awake. He shot up out of bed, grabbing the baseball bat that was laying by his nightstand.

“I knew you’d come for me! You witch!” He hissed. You were caught off guard, his sudden alertness causing you to take a step back. He jumped off of the bed, attempting to swing his bat at you. You barely managed to dodge the attack, Jeff’s arm wrapping around the editors chest. “Surprise bitch. Bet you thought i’d let you kill my girl huh? Fucking stupid asshole,” Jeff snarled. He brought his knife to the editors neck, slicing his throat open in a quick and fluid motion. The crimson paint sprayed out of him, washing over you like a rainfall. It splattered onto your face and body, the editors body slumping to the floor. You frowned as you looked down at your jacket. “Are you deadass Jeffrey? I just got this!” You barked. Jeff raised his eyebrows.

“Are you kidding me? I just saved your life!” He argued. You glared at the dead editor, a pool of his blood forming at both of your shoes. “Oh great. Now it’s on my new heels too. You’re going to have to replace these!” You spat. Jeff threw his hands in the air dramatically. “Oh cmon it’s just a little bit of blood. You’re telling me you can’t handle blood?” Jeff questioned. You crossed your arms, clenching your jaw. “I can handle blood Jeffrey but my tory burch heels cannot,” You gritted through your teeth. Jeff twirled his knife around in his fingers lazily, clearly unamused. “Maybe get better shoes then. Not my fault you made this mission a fashion show,” He replied dryly. You grabbed him by his hoodie, shoving him back onto the bed.

“You’ve got some fucking nerve, you know that? You’re such a fucking dick! I can’t stand you,” You snarled. You crawled on top of you, straddling him as he relaxed against the mattress. “You look pretty hot covered in blood babe, remind me to soak you in it more often,” Jeff grinned. You rose your hand, delivering a sharp slap to his cheek. Jeff’s cocky expression fell, his gaze hardening. “Oh that’s how you wanna play? Fine,” He huffed. He flipped the two of you over, his fingers wrapping around your throat. His grip restricted your airway, a smile spreading across your lips. “You pain addicted bitch. I’ll show you pain,” Jeff growled. He flipped up your skirt, before throwing you over his knees. He delivered a sharp slap to your ass, a painful whine escaping your lips.

“Fucking count them or i’ll leave you to get off on the dead guys dick,” Jeff spat. He delivered another smack, a shock of pain electrical as it went down your spine. “One,” You let out lowly. He slapped your other cheek as hard as he could. He grinned sadistically as your skin turned a dark red. He wondered if he could get it to bruise. “Two,” You whimpered. Jeff’s hand strayed from the mounds of your ass, exploring your drenched panties. “This wet from me abusing you? You really are a pain slut,” He snickered. He delivered three more spanks, your body shuddering in pain as you counted them all. Tears had welt up in your eyes, your body tense as he yanked your panties down your legs.

“Awe don’t cry doll. I’m no where done with you yet,” He purred. Roughly he shoved two fingers inside of you, keeping you bent over his lap. He refused to curl his fingers, his slender digits just barely brushing against your g spot. “J-Jeff I need more,” You whined. With his spare hand Jeff delivered another smack to your ass, causing your waterline to finally flood with tears. “Well you’re not calling the shots, are you babe? Now shut the fuck up and take what I give you,” He snarled. You were a whimpering mess, the slightest touch of your abused skin making you cringe in pain. But Jeff’s fingers. His long and thick fingers. They filled up your cunt so nicely, so good. “What do we say when I make you feel good?” Jeff asked. Your mouth was running dry, tears streaming down your cheeks.

“Thank you,” You mewled. He grabbed a handful of your hair, roughly yanking you towards him. “Call me daddy bitch,” He growled. Your gaze met his dark obsidian eyes, that were determined to see you squirm. “Thank you daddy,” You whined. Jeff released your hair, shoving you back to your original position. You could feel yourself getting closer to the edge, your body hanging on to every little thrust Jeff made inside of you with his fingers. “S-s-so close,” You stuttered. Jeff delivered more harsh smacks to your ass, sadistically chuckling as you whimpered. “Go on then! Be my little painslut and cum,” He huffed. With one final slap you came around his fingers, humiliated as goosebumps spread across your skin from the cold air.

He flipped you around as he pleased, treating you like you were his fuckable ragdoll. “Go on doll, do that thing I like,” He instructed. You grabbed your ankles, placing both of them almost completely behind your head. As Jeff undid his belt he delivered a sharp slap to your clit, causing you to audibly whine. “You sure are a noisy little bitch, aren’t ya?” He asked tauntingly. He wiped away some of your tears, the splattered blood staining his thumb. Lazily he slapped the head of his cock against your folds, before slamming himself into you. You gasped as he quickly began to snap his lips into yours. “I know you can handle it. Your cunt is begging me for more, so fucking tight,” Jeff grunted. He rutted into you like he was in heat.

He pressed down against your thighs, sinking your body into the mattress. His grip was tight you knew bruises were forming, the unholy noises vibrating off of the victims walls. He pounded into your cunt like he despised you and the ground you walked on. You were so addicting, so mesmerizing. He muttered your name as he slammed into you. You held onto your legs, Jeff’s cock so deep inside of you that you were seeing stars. He delivered a sharp slap to your cheek, before roughly grabbing your face. He forced your lips to pucker out like a fish, an evil grin spread across his lips. “Such a stupid fucking whore,” He panted. You hardly had time to process the pain, his cock abusing your g spot perfectly.

You gripped onto his hoodie, your eyes rolling in the back of your head. “Fucking shit, Jeff!” You moaned. You came undone on his cock, squirting profusely over his bottom half. Jeff groaned your name as he came inside of you, his seed painting your inner walls. You both were panting messes, the sound of car doors shutting catching your attention. “Fucking hell,” Jeff grunted. He slid off of the bed, fixing his pants as he looked outside. “The neighbors called the cops on us. Goddammit. Let’s go,” Jeff growled. You shoved your panties on, the two of you running out of the back door of the house. You ran like your life depended on it, ready to go home.

\/

“What’d they do again?” Ben asked. He munched on some kettle popcorn as he floated beside Slenderman. The two were in his office, watching you and Jeff pretend to be scarecrows to defend his garden. “Besides terrorizing my existence they left semen at the scene of the crime. Both of their identities are going to be traced,” Slenderman sighed. He ignored the irritating sound of Ben munching loudly. The blonde had decided to be in ghost form today, allowing him to float carelessly.

“Gross. Hey boss, is there a particular reason you partnered them together in the first place?” Ben asked. They watched as you and Jeff tried to fight with pitchforks, both of you sweating in the relentless heat. “They’re the only individuals in this mansion that’ll love one another. If not for my pairing Jeff would have gotten his fan girl pregnant by now,” He replied. The supernatural creature straightened his back, pausing for a moment. “If Jeff unfortunately reproduces I cannot handle a carbon copy,” Slenderman elaborated. Ben fell upwards, flying around his head. “Oh I see boss! You played matchmaker. Good for you! I always wondered what you did for fun,” Ben chuckled. If Slenderman had eyebrows, he would’ve raised them.

The two watched you launch yourself at Jeff, both of you dressed in ridiculous farm clothes.

“Hey boss you wanna set me up with somebody next?”

“Watch yourself Ben.”

“Yes sir.”

[m1ckeyb3rry]

i just read your sae fic and it was absolutely amazing, gorgeous, life-changjng! and when i went on to check your masterlist for bllk, i was shocked when you were the one who wrote the nagi x reader x kira fic bc I've been following it for a while and then i immediately tapped the follow button :x but if you can (only when you have the time and energy), can you write rin whose family is a host for exchange student! reader from another country? it could be hs or college, depending on whichever you're comfortable with. thank you <33

── CHERRY TREE

Synopsis: You are one hundred percent convinced that Rin Itoshi hates you — and he does, but not exactly in the way you think.

Event Masterlist

Pairing: Rin x Reader

Chapter Word Count: 6.2k

Content Warnings: cheesy and cliched asf, otoya and KARASU <3 make brief appearances, rin is rude ngl but reader is as well, rin does not know what a “crush” is, he’s probably ooc as well atp i should just include that on all of my works jic

A/N: i can’t believe i started bllk because of a rin edit and yet i’ve never written for him…also i’m glad you liked seabird and peregrine anon!! thank you for following 💖 sorry it took me a min to respond to this

Additional: part of my 500 follower event! see the event description and rules to make a request of your own.

If you didn’t know that your parents would probably put you in an early grave for wasting their money, you would’ve caught the next flight back home from Japan in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, you were far too afraid of their ire, which meant you were stuck in this hostile environment until the end of the semester — assuming, of course, that you managed to survive for so long.

Over the summer, applying to your university’s special first-semester-abroad program had seemed like a good idea. You were already going to be traveling far from home to stay on campus regardless, so your reasoning was that you might as well experience a different culture while you were at it. Besides, the program claimed to pair participants with a host family that would be good fits for their personalities and needs — based on a survey, which in hindsight you really should’ve lied on — so you would be living in relative comfort, at least compared to the ancient dorms on the main campus that probably had thirty different species of mold growing on their walls.

Or, well, that had been the plan. Maybe it was even a reality for the rest of the people in the program, who had no doubt been placed in normal homes, with normal people, who had normal children and normal lives. For you, though, it could not be further from the truth — because you had had the great misfortune of being chosen to live in the same house as Rin Itoshi for the duration of your stay in Japan.

To put it simply, he hated you. He had started hating you from the moment you stepped foot into his house and put your things in his brother’s old room, and he had not stopped since. If you happened to cross paths with him, he’d scoff at you, and considering the fact that the two of you lived in the same house, this was a frequent occurrence. Whenever you tried speaking to him in Japanese, he’d wrinkle his nose and respond in English, telling you that you were so terrible at the language, you might as well give up now and move back to your country early. Once, his mother had suggested he take you to hang out with his friends, as you were all roughly the same age, and he had rolled his eyes so hard that it was a surprise they didn’t get stuck in the back of his head.

There was no doubt about it: your mere existence was a burden to Rin. You couldn’t explain it in any other way; after all, how could he have decided he disliked you before you had even spoken? So you did your best to be as helpful and kind as possible, keeping the house neat, cooking food whenever the elder Itoshis had to work late, staying silent if he happened to enter the same room as you, and offering nothing but slight smiles if you were forced into an interaction with him.

“You know,” Mrs. Itoshi began one day, as you were eating the dinner she had made for all of you. Rin was on your right, and Mr. Itoshi was across from him, his jovial face such a contrast to his son’s dour look. “Rin’s on the Japanese soccer team.”

“Wow,” you said noncommittally. You hadn’t known that; you had assumed that Rin’s hobbies involved throwing stones at unsuspecting children and tripping old ladies as they crossed the street. Soccer had been the last thing you expected, though it did explain his admittedly splendid physique. “Very impressive.”

“Not really,” Rin said. 

“Why don’t you take her to watch your practice over the weekend?” Mrs. Itoshi pressed. 

“She’s not interested,” Rin said. Of course, you really weren’t — why would you want to watch Rin and his friends kick around a ball for a few hours? It would be a waste of time, time that you could spend working on homework or clearing your ‘to-be-read’ list. But you also weren’t fond of people speaking for you, especially not him. He was the last person who could claim to know anything about you, so by what right could he say that you weren’t interested?

“Actually, I wouldn’t mind going,” you said, batting your eyelashes at him innocently when he glared at you out of the corner of his eye, his expression one of utter disgust and incredulity.

“There you have it! Be sure to introduce her to your teammates. I’m sure they would love to show her around,” Mrs. Itoshi said. Rin snorted.

“Oh, I’m sure they would,” he said, though when he did, it sounded different than what Mrs. Itoshi had surely meant. But you were obviously the only one who picked up on it, and you didn’t want to make dinner unpleasant, so you could only ponder what he might’ve meant in your head instead of asking him outright, as you really wanted to.

Although it was the weekend, Rin’s practice was early in the morning, before the day could really heat up and make exercising unbearable. That meant it was before even the sun’s rise that you were following after him, your books clutched in your arms as you waited at the bus stop.

“Why’re you bringing all of that?” he said when the awkward silence grew to be too much for either of you to bear.

“I’m planning on getting some homework done while I’m there,” you said.

“Why didn’t you just stay home if you wanted to do homework?” he said as the bus pulled to a stop in front of you and the doors flew open. Due to the early hour, there was almost no one else on the bus, but given your unfamiliarity with the route, you still followed after Rin, sitting across the aisle from him and putting your things on the seat beside you.

“I dunno,” you said. “I guess I wanted to meet your teammates. Since they would just love to show me around.”

“Stay away from them,” he said. “They’re a bunch of NPCs. All of them are probably the worst people you could ask to show you anywhere.”

“NPCs?” you said. “That’s pretty harsh to say about your own peers.”

“It’s not like we’re friends or anything,” he muttered, crossing his arms petulantly. “I’ll call them what I want.”

“Sure, whatever you say,” you said, massaging circles into your forehead to ward off your impending migraine. Rin raised his eyebrows.

“Got a headache?” he said, in that same clinical, detached voice he always used.

“Yeah,” you said. And you’re making it worse. You wanted to add that, but you thought it probably wouldn’t be prudent, so you kept your mouth shut.

“Don’t stay up so late on your phone, then,” he said. 

“It’s the only time I can call my friends and family. They’re in a different time zone,” you explained before pausing. Why did you feel the need to justify yourself? It wasn’t like Rin particularly cared either way. He was just giving you that advice because he wanted to boss you around and be rude to you. It was a symptom of dislike, not worry.

You had imagined Rin to be an obsessively punctual person, but to your surprise, it seemed like you both were actually some of the later ones to show up. Perhaps the rest of the team was even more concerned with earliness than him, or maybe you had somehow caused him to be later than he typically was, but either way, by the time you walked onto the field, the others had already gathered, chatting amongst themselves while they waited for their coach to arrive and start the practice.

“There he is! We were beginning to think the world might’ve ended,” a boy with dark, styled hair and a beauty mark beneath his left eye said with a grin. “Nothing less could get you to miss practice, eh, Rin?”

“It still might have,” another boy said. His pale hair was streaked through with green, and he wore an inviting smirk as he pointed at you. “Yo, girl. What kind of blackmail does he have on you? Blink twice if you need help. We’ll get you out of there.”

“Um, he’s not blackmailing me or anything…” you said, glancing at Rin for aid before remembering that he would probably rather jump off of a cliff, backwards and into the jaws of a dozen waiting sharks, than help you out.

“So you’re hanging out with him willingly?” the pale-haired boy said. “Yikes. You can do much better.”

“I kind of have to hang out with him,” you said. “I’m staying with his family for the semester.”

“Oh, you’re the exchange student!” a third boy, this one with icy blue hair and wide, pretty eyes said. “We’ve heard a lot—”

“All of you, be quiet and leave her alone,” Rin said, finally, thankfully speaking up. “Otoya, don’t even look at her, or I’ll make sure you’re benched for the rest of the season.”

The pale-haired boy — Otoya? — held his hands up in the air and whistled innocently, shooting you a wink when Rin turned to address the rest of his team. You raised your eyebrows but suppressed your giggle, not wanting to condemn him to further rebuke from Rin.

“This is Y/N L/N. She’s the exchange student my family is hosting. She wanted to come watch our practice because…actually, I don’t really know why,” Rin said shortly. “But she’s just going to be doing homework on the bench, so if any of you were planning on showing off to impress her, then you can give up on that idea now.”

Otoya noticeably wilted at this, but the others didn’t seem to mind. The first boy, the one with the beauty mark and the strange hairstyle, gave Rin a thumbs up.

“Don’t worry, Rin, we’ll leave the showing off to you. It’s about time you—”

“Shut up!”

They must’ve begun practicing at some point, but you hardly took notice, too busy typing up the outline for an essay you had due in a couple of weeks to care much about what they were doing. Occasionally, someone would shout out a particularly creative insult, and you would have to pause your work to identify the trash talker in order to be able to congratulate them later, but for the most part, you were lost in your own world.

“Hey.” Just the sound of Rin’s cool voice was enough to send shivers of fear down your spine, and you hastily closed your laptop as you looked up at him. “Practice is over.”

“Okay,” you said. “Will you introduce your teammates to me now? I know you told them who I was, but I’d like to at least meet some people my own age.”

“Nope,” he said. “Let’s go.”

“Hold on, I only even came because I wanted to meet them!” you said. “Outside of school, you’re the only one I know. I get that you don’t want me infiltrating your friend group or whatever, but you literally said you don’t like these guys, so why’s it a problem if I become friends with them?”

“They’re so dull and half-baked that your opinion of this country will actually fall if you interact with them further,” he said. “This is just my national pride talking. Come on.”

You stomped after him. What was his problem? He didn’t want to be nice to you, but he also didn’t want anyone else to, either. Was he that determined to make you miserable? Why couldn’t you have been placed in a family with children who weren’t so weird and annoying? Which question had you answered incorrectly on the survey that had resulted in your match-up with the Itoshis? You wished you could retake that stupid quiz and end up somewhere else. You wished that Rin had been the one sent to Spain instead of his older brother, who was certainly more well-adjusted. You wished that you hadn’t chosen to study abroad at all, that you had instead stayed at home with your friends and had a typical first semester like everyone else.

After that day, you stopped even pretending to be polite to Rin. Both of you were cold, hissing insults whenever you passed in the hallways of the home, leaving the room if the other happened to enter, and generally doing what you could to make each other’s lives difficult. It was only in front of Rin’s parents that you maintained some semblance of civility; after all, making Mr. and Mrs. Itoshi choose sides in your silent war would be unethical and wrong.

“I really don’t get it,” you said to your best friend one night, the covers pulled up over your head, your phone screen dimmed so that you were not blinded by its light. “He’s such a jerk, and for what?”

“Boys suck,” she said, hunched over a calculus problem set. The time difference meant that sun streamed in through her window as she wrote, illuminating the shining graphite of her neatly penciled answers. “Did his teammates mention anything suspicious the one time you met them? They’d probably know better than you or I why he’s acting the way he is. Maybe this is just how he is with everyone — if that’s the case, then you can be reassured that it’s not something you’re doing wrong.”

“Not really,” you said. “He forbade all of them from talking to me. Which, by the way, is a real tragedy, because some of them were super cute.”

“Really?” she said.

“Want descriptions?” you said.

“As much as I would like to say yes, I need to focus on this problem set, and anyways, it’ll just make me jealous, so no,” she said.

“Jealous? Let’s trade places, because at the moment, I’m jealous of you. Maybe all of the guys at your school are ugly, but at least you don’t have to deal with Rin!” you said.

“Is Rin attractive?” she said. 

“No — actually, yeah, I can see why a person would think he is,” you said. Personal biases aside, Rin really was very handsome, and that combined with his aloof arrogance afforded him the aura of a YA novel’s male lead. There was no doubt in your mind that he was popular with girls; however, you doubted he himself was aware of this fact. “He’s such a dick that it cancels out, though.”

“Personality is important,” your best friend said. “Oh, fuck!”

“What?” you said.

“I’ve been forgetting to add the integration constant to my answers. Easy fix, no worries. You can keep talking,” she said.

“Thanks,” you said. “There isn’t really much else to say.”

“Well, if you couldn’t get anything out of his teammates, why don’t you try talking to him?” she suggested. “Ask him to his face why he doesn’t like you.”

“Isn’t that kind of uncomfortable?” you said.

“Not like things can get much worse than they already are,” she said.

“True,” you said. “But the thought of confronting him is actually sickening. I’ll pass. This is character building, isn’t it? I’m going to come back home as an entirely new woman. You won’t recognize my mental strength and fortitude.”

“Sure, looking forward to it. I miss you,” she said.

“Miss you more, but it’s pretty late here, so I’m going to have to hang up,” you said, yawning.

“Goodnight, Y/N, and sleep tight. Don’t let Rin Itoshi bite!” she said.

“Oh my god. Go do your homework,” you said, hanging up before she could respond and almost immediately passing out as the moon rose higher and higher in the sky.

Things between you and Rin continued on in that tense manner for the next few weeks, until you became convinced that your heart might give out from the stress. You couldn’t continue to live in this way. You were supposed to be enjoying your time abroad, not counting down the days until you could finally go home.

Rin was watching a horror movie on the computer when you barged into his room. A woman screamed in sync with your entrance, and you jumped at the jarring sound. Rin did not react, clicking on the mouse to pause the film and then turning in his chair to face you.

“What?” he said.

“What? What? What do you think?” you said.

“I wouldn’t have asked if I had the faintest clue why you were storming into my room in the middle of the night,” he said coolly, crossing his arms. “The movie was finally getting exciting, too. So, what do you want? Hurry up and say it.”

Your eye twitched. “I want to know what your problem is.”

“Huh?” he said. 

“Why do you hate me? What have I ever done to you that’s made you so determined to ruin my life? I could even understand if you didn’t want to hang out with me, but you brought me to your practice and then refused to let me talk to just about anyone! What’s the big idea? I just want to enjoy my semester!” you said.

“Oh,” he said. “That’s easy. You’re ruining my soccer career.”

“I’m ruining your soccer career,” you repeated dubiously.

“Yes,” he said.

“Care to elaborate on how I am accomplishing that, exactly?” you said, your hands on your hips. “I went to one practice, and I didn’t even speak the entire time. If your career can be ruined so easily, then it isn’t much of a career in the first place.”

He huffed in aggravation. “I keep thinking about you. It’s messing with my head. I need to focus on soccer and getting better, but for some reason, I can’t stop my thoughts from wandering to places they shouldn’t. It’s worse because I can’t escape you. If I could have just one day to clear my mind, I could forget about you and get back to considering more important things, but you’re always there, worming your way back in.”

Now it was your turn to be confused. “What?”

“I don’t get it, either. You’re not that special, so why can I quit it? Even my teammates have begun to notice. The other day, Isagi told me to go home early because I was ‘bringing nothing to the team.’ Isagi said that! Yoichi Isagi said that I was useless!” he said.

“That would be a lot more impactful if I knew who that was,” you muttered.

“You’re only here for a few more months, right?” he said. “After that, I can get back to my earlier performance and things will return to usual. Just leave me alone until then.”

Confronting Rin had the opposite effect that it should have. Instead of making things better, they actually became worse. What did he mean by saying that you were ruining his soccer career because he couldn’t stop thinking about you? What a stupid excuse! You weren’t that tiresome, so for him to claim that you were taking over his mind because of that was an offense. 

“Y/N, Rin, will you be alright by yourselves for the week?” Mrs. Itoshi said when, once again, you all were gathered to eat dinner. The Itoshi parents had thankfully not yet noticed the enmity between you and their son, so family meals were a regular occurrence — meals in which you and Rin were made to sit by one another and act kindly, lest you make things awkward for Mr. and Mrs. Itoshi, too.

“It’ll be fine,” Rin said, answering for the both of you, the downturn of his mouth daring you to argue. “You guys should have fun in Spain.”

Apparently, Sae had invited his family to visit him in Madrid for the week that he had off from training, but unfortunately for the both of you, Rin was unable to go due to his practice schedule. It was unfortunate for Rin because it meant he couldn’t see his older brother, who he had the world’s most complicated relationship with, and it was unfortunate for you because it meant you couldn’t get a break from Rin’s dramatics.

The week started off normally enough, which meant that you and Rin did not speak, leading your lives with as much separation as was possible. It was actually easier than you were expecting, mainly because Mrs. Itoshi had left you both enough food to last the week, so you could eat when you wanted to instead of having to sit with one another. Gone were the days of turbulent coexistence at meals; now, you could finally enjoy eating without worrying about the boy beside you! You almost wished his parents would never come back, just because of that rare peace.

The fourth night was when it all went wrong. You were video calling your best friend as a storm raged outside, ranting to her about your professors and the heaps of homework you received every day, when the lights flickered.

“Is something wrong with your wifi?” she said. “You’re breaking up.

“It’s raining,” you said. “Pretty hard. The power’s kinda spotty, but I’m hoping it holds—”

The universe must’ve heard your words and decided to play a joke on you, because in that moment, the lights turned off and your call disconnected with a sad beeping sound, alerting you that your poor connection was what did you in. Pouting, you set your phone aside and stared up at the ceiling of the room, deciding you might as well try to fall asleep, given the late hour. Even if the power was out, you wouldn’t be able to tell with your eyes shut, so it was really the best option.

There was a scratching sound on your window, causing you to jolt into a sitting position once more. Rin had watched a horror movie just like this the other day. You remembered it clearly because you had turned on a rom-com once it had finished, and he had called it lukewarm, which made you so mad that you had turned the TV off and gone to take a shower instead.

What had been the plot, again? Oh, right. The power had gone out, and the victim thought that it had been because of a storm, but it had actually been a serial killer taking advantage of the weather to mess with her house’s fuse box. He had done it so that the cameras didn’t catch him as he climbed into her house through her unlocked window and stabbed her in her sleep. The resolution was that her neighbors saw him and called the police right before he killed them, too — yeah, it was a pretty gory film. Lots of blood and knife wounds. You weren’t sure what enjoyment Rin derived from watching it, but you figured it was another one of his irrational attributes that defied explanation.

Another scratching sound. Had you locked the window? What if the power outage wasn’t due to the storm at all? What if Rin had accidentally manifested the same ending for you as that stupid movie? And you were home alone, too, the scenario was just so similar…

This time, the scratching sound was more like an eerie drag of fingernails against the glass, and you couldn’t help yourself. Squealing, you turned the flashlight of your phone on to guide your way as you sprinted out of your room, racing towards the only other inhabited place in the entire lonely house.

“Rin!” you shrieked, convinced that the shadows were actually ghosts come to haunt you and strangle you and bury you alive. “Rin, wake up! We’re both going to die!”

The door to his bedroom banged open, and you pointed your phone at him, the harsh white glow sharpening the angles of his features, the awkward hang of his pajamas off his body, the way his normally neat hair stuck up in every direction. 

“What are you talking about?” he groaned, using his hand to shield his vision from the blinding radiance of your flashlight.

“Do you remember that movie you were watching the other day? The scary one, with the fuse box?” you said.

“Yeah?” he said, rubbing the sleep from his eyes and yawning. “Point your flashlight at the ground, stupid, or you’ll blind me.”

You did as he directed, belatedly remembering that the two of you very much did not like each other. But beggars could not be choosers, and it remained that at the moment, Rin was your best chance at survival, so you had to stick close to him.

“It’s happening,” you whispered. “It’s literally happening to us right now, as we speak. The serial killer already cut our power, and now he’s trying to break in through my bedroom window, and then — and then he’s going to kill us!”

“I cannot believe you woke me up for this,” he said.

“I’m serious!” you said.

“Seriously dumb,” he said. “Why would somebody try to kill us?”

“Don’t you have any rivals that hate you? Maybe they’re taking advantage of the storm to do you in while they have the chance!” you said, creeping closer to him.

“I play soccer. I’m not in a gang,” he said dryly. “No one’s going to come murder me for being better than them, trust me. Or else I’d already be dead.”

“Go see for yourself, then!” you said. “Wait. But I’ll go with you. People who split up in horror movies always die. There’s real merit to the ‘safety-in-numbers’ theory.”

“How many horror movies have you watched, to make you such an expert on them?” he said.

“You always have them playing, so of course I’ve learnt by osmosis!” you said, inching along behind him as he trudged towards your room. He gave no response bar a click of his tongue as he yanked open the door you had slammed shut in your haste, striding in authoritatively, grabbing your phone and lighting his own way with it instead of relying on your shaky hands.

He pulled the curtains open with a flourish, and you cringed, using his broad back to hide yourself, expecting to see some grotesque face and keeping your eyes screwed shut so you didn’t have to be met with the visage that would spell your death.

“Hey. Y/N. Open your eyes, dumbass. You made me get up because of a damn tree,” Rin said, shaking you by the shoulder. 

“A what?” you said, opening your eyes against your will and then blinking properly when you saw there was nothing there but the boughs of the cherry tree planted in front of Sae’s room. The frenzied wind caused the branches to rub against the window, and this, you realized, was the source of the sound you had been so afraid of. “Oh. A tree.”

“I’m going back to bed,” he informed you. “Wake me up again and you really will be dead, but it’ll be at my hands, not some imaginary serial killer’s.”

You tried. You really tried to stay asleep — you were an independent woman, weren’t you? You had gotten full marks on all of your midterms. You had flown to a different country and learned to live there without much trouble. You had shared a house with Rin Itoshi for the past couple of months, and he was more like a creature out of a nightmare than anything else ever could be. Sleeping alone when the power was out was a piece of cake. You could do it. 

It was not, in fact, a piece of cake, and you could not, in fact, do it. Tip-toeing to Rin’s room, you knocked as lightly as you could, half-hoping that he did not hear. You doubted he had made his earlier threat lightly, after all, and there was a real chance that this action would be your last.

“What now?” Rin said, answering the door a few seconds later. You crossed your arms and stared at the floor obstinately, your pride not allowing you to say anything. He waited for a moment, and then he pinched your upper arm. “Are you sleepwalking? Hello? Wake up if you are, so that I can get to bed myself. I have practice tomorrow, and I need to be well-rested!”

“I’m not sleepwalking!” you said. “I can’t.”

“You can’t sleepwalk? Okay,” he said. “I didn’t really care either way, so there was no need for you to tell me.”

“I can’t sleep at all!” you said. “It’s because of those dumb movies you always watch and those creepy games you play. I keep thinking that something’s going to happen, even though I know that those things aren’t real.”

He narrowed his eyes at you, like he was trying to discern whether you were telling the truth, and then he ran a hand through his hair.

“You have problems,” he said. “They aren’t real, but whatever. Come in.”

“Uh, what?” you said.

“I’ll take the floor, and you can sleep in my bed,” he said, rolling his eyes like you were the ridiculous one for being taken aback by the offer. “That way you can be less nervous.”

It was the kindest thing he had ever done for you, and you almost called him out for it, but then there was another crack of lightning, so you opted not to argue, darting into the room after him and diving into his bed without a second thought.

“Hand me a pillow,” he said, settling on the ground with a blanket he pulled down from the top shelf of his closet. You were about to throw it at him before wavering, considering what he was truly doing for you. Rin Itoshi, who was so careful with his body, who was a pro athlete that required an exact amount of sleep and the perfect balance of nutrients, had woken up in the middle of the night twice and was now offering to sleep on the floor, all because you were afraid of a power outage. 

If only there was electricity! You needed to call your best friend and get her opinion on this. You had avoided telling her the results of your confrontation with him, believing that she would just make fun of you, but for some reason, you thought she might be interested in this development. You thought that she might be the only one who would understand it, because obviously, neither you nor Rin did.

“Um, you can have the bed, if you’d like,” you said, pushing the blankets away reluctantly, your neck protesting at the mere prospect of spending the night on the hardwood. “It’ll be bad for your back if you’re on the floor.”

“It’s not a big deal,” he said. “At least, it won’t be, if you give me that pillow.”

You caved, giving him the pillow and rolling to the opposite side of his bed, which was even larger than the one you were used to. He grunted out a thank you, and then both of you were silent, but it was obvious that neither of you were asleep.

“Rin.”

“Yes?”

“We could share. Your bed is pretty big, so if we put pillows between us, it won’t be weird. Anyways, it’s only until the power comes back, and then I’ll go to my room, so it won’t even be for that long,” you said. The suggestion was met with sputtering from the ground.

“You — me — what — share? No way! No way, terrible idea, why would you suggest that?” he said.

“I just feel bad that you have to be on the floor, that’s all,” you said. “Especially because it’s your room and you’re doing me a favor.”

He didn’t say anything for so long that you were certain he must’ve fallen asleep. “I don’t mind sleeping on the floor for you.”

“Really? I thought you hated me, though,” you said. The bed creaked from an unexpected weight dropping on it, and when you shifted, you saw that he had settled beside you, fluffing up a pillow to serve as a barrier, his face a light pink as he lay on his side to face you. You did the same, peering up at him over the pillow and swallowing when he did not avoid your gaze.

“I do,” he said. “A lot. But I also don’t.”

You furrowed your brow. “I don’t get it.”

“I’ve never been distracted by anyone or anything before,” he said. “That’s why I hate you. I hate things I don’t understand, and I don’t understand why you’re constantly on my mind.”

“Am I that annoying?” you said.

“Yes,” he said flatly. “You’re annoying every time you smile or laugh or say something — say anything, and you’re especially annoying when you act friendly towards my shitty teammates, especially that ninja bastard Otoya. You’re annoying whenever you talk to me, and you’re annoying when you do your homework instead of watching me at the practice you asked to go to. Your lukewarm movies are annoying, and so is your hatred of anything horror-related. It’s annoying that you’re nice to my parents, and it’s even more annoying that you’re better at coming up with insults than I am. You’re the most annoying person I’ve ever met.”

You didn’t need your best friend to translate this for you. Despite what Rin liked to say, you weren’t that stupid — you had been selected to study abroad out of hundreds of applicants, after all, and for the first time, you were so grateful for that fact. Because the thought of somebody else being here, in this bed, hearing these things from rude, haughty Rin Itoshi, was unbearable.

“Do you have a crush on me?” you said. He immediately stiffened, his eyebrows drawing together, low and heavy over his half-lidded eyes.

“No,” he said.

“Sure,” you said. “That’s good, because I’m going to leave soon. It would be problematic if either of us liked one another.”

“Exactly,” he said.

“You’re annoying, too, just to be clear,” you said. “The most annoying guy I’ve ever met in my life. Super annoying.”

“Uh-huh,” he said. 

“I’m telling the truth. Once I go back home, I’ll be incredibly bored. No one back there could ever hope to irritate me even half as much as you do,” you said.

“Good,” he said, and at that you smiled into the softness of his sheets, hiding the expression from him. “They’re not allowed to. You’re the only one who makes me feel like this, so the reverse should also be true.”

“I won’t be able to come here again for a while,” you said after a bit. “Likely years. I’ll be busy with school and work and my friends and family, so it’ll probably be goodbye forever when I go.”

Rin’s voice was sleepy when he spoke, reminding you of the late hour and how early he had to wake up daily.

“Then I can finally focus on soccer again,” he mumbled. “That’s a relief.”

You reached across the pillow to pat him on the cheek. “Yes, you can.”

“After I retire, I’ll come and find you,” he said. 

“That long?” you said. “What if I forget about you by then? Because I might.”

“Don’t,” he commanded. “Wait for me. Let me win the next World Cup, and then…and then…”

 His words trailed off into a soft exhale as he finally succumbed to sleep. You allowed your hand, which still lay against his face, to trace his jawline before retracting it and holding it close to your heart. 

He was definitely still a jerk, but maybe you did not hate him quite as much as you had thought You did. Actually, maybe he wasn’t that bad at all, and maybe you could not imagine what an existence without him, which you had craved so desperately only days earlier, might be like. 

You weren’t sure what would happen if that day he spoke of came, if he did fly across the world to find you after the next World Cup. Would he still be himself, or would he be some gentler version? And what of you? Would Rin Itoshi still be someone you paid any mind to, or, by then, would he just be a not-so-fond memory? The strange boy who may or may not have had a crush on you, who was obsessed with soccer and horror movies, who argued with you constantly and made you more infuriated than you had ever been…well, if you thought about it, then there really was no chance of you forgetting him at all. Not so quickly.

So you sighed, turned away from him and let your own eyes shut as well. The house was dark and still, the familiar hum of the refrigerator silenced, the crushing of the ice-maker temporarily halted. Only Rin’s steady inhales and exhales cut through the blackness, lulling you to sleep despite the atmosphere you had previously found sinister.

“I guess I have no choice, huh?” you said as you, too, drifted off. “Brainless, rude, pesky Rin Itoshi. Fine, then. If that’s how you want it…I’ll wait. Just until the next World Cup, I’ll wait for you.”

[planchettewrites]

Until the Twelfth of Never

SSA Aaron Hotchner (Criminal Minds)/AFAB!Reader

DESCRIPTION: A lonely evening without your husband causes some positive reflection, that is until he comes home again.

CONTENT: Pure fluff, brief and minor allusions to sex, mentions of Haley Hotchner's death, mentions of loneliness.

A/N: Aaron Hotchner, my beloved! Initially, this fic centered around another song, but then I reworked it to a song that fit much better. I apologize for not posting, I've been working on other fics and preparing for my new job. I wanted to make this fic realistic to what it would be like to be married to Hotch, so prepare for some angst. All that said, I hope you enjoy it!

1.9k words | Safe!

Evenings with your husband were usually tranquil. Evenings without your husband were far more tranquil, at least for the most part. As you cared for your stepson, who you loved with all your heart, he kept the house lively. He came into your room and showed you his drawings, or you helped him with his homework, eventually tucking him into bed at night. It was those moments you cherished with Jack. The moments where you could read a story to him about faraway lands and slain dragons or the defeat of monsters or hear him talk about his day at school. However, no matter how much you loved that little boy, there was always a space in your heart missing from your husband’s absence.

You worked during the day, picked Jack up from school, and then returned home to a relatively clean house. Then you cooked dinner, ensured Jack got cleaned up for the evening, tucked him into bed, and watched television until it was time for you to sleep. That was consistently the hardest part of the day, where you fell asleep next to an empty side of the bed. Almost every night and every day, like clockwork, before you sleep and before you wake, you reach out and put your hand on Aaron’s pillow, feeling the soft material under your hands. Some days, you spray his cologne on his pillow to trick your brain into thinking he’s there. 

You learned rather quickly that it’s very hard to be a wife to a husband who rarely comes home. 

In some ways, you don’t feel like you have ever a right to complain. His not being home was the same thing that brought the demise of his marriage to his late ex-wife. The solitude and the silence can be pleasant, but your husband is your other half. You miss him like any wife would. However, when he was home, it was like he never left. He was still the kind, silly, dedicated, and wonderful father and husband he was before he left. When he was home, he always made time for you and his son. He’d take you three out to dinner or the movies and spend plenty of time with each of you in ways where it matters. He’d take his son to school and back, take him to baseball games, and watch Jack’s favorite shows with him. He’d spend time with you in the mornings and at night, ensuring you were happy and all your needs were fulfilled. He’d cook dinner for his family and spend every waking moment with the both of you. 

This week was another week Aaron was gone. He was supposed to return by the weekend, and then he’d return to your arms again. Until then, it was you and Jack. Except for the rest of the week, based on his wishes, he was with his Aunt Jessica. He wanted to see his cousins on the Brooks side of the family. You and the Brooks family got along fine, which is very fortunate for you. You had no ill will towards Haley (nor the rest of the Brooks family, for that matter); in fact, often, as a family, you would visit her grave. 

Needless to say, the Hotchner household was very quiet with your husband or your stepson. As you made dinner, funny enough, one of Jack’s favorites, fettuccine alfredo with broccoli and chicken, you turned on one of your CDs, an assorted mix from songs of the 1950s. Aaron got one of his coworkers, Penelope Garcia, to burn the CD for you. It was a mix of songs that both you and Aaron enjoyed and ones that made Aaron think of you. Songs like “Everybody Loves a Lover” by Doris Day, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, “Please Mr. Sun” by Tommy Edwards, “Fortune Teller” by Bobby Curtola, and so on and so forth. 

One of Aaron’s favorite tracks on the mix was “The Twelfth of Never” by Johnny Mathis. Aaron said it was one of his favorite love songs from that era; the slow melody and beautiful lyrics really spoke to him. In fact, he loved the song so much and associated it with your relationship and marriage entirely that it was your first dance song at your wedding. It was one of the first tracks on the CD since Aaron found the song so representative of your love. 

The music from your CD player blasted throughout the house, with no worry of waking any sleeping children or husbands. Currently, the second track of the mix was playing, “(I Got Spurs) Jingle Jangle Jingle.” Although the lyrics no longer applied to you, you had told Aaron it was one of your favorite songs in college. 

“'Cause I got spurs that jingle, jangle, jingle (Jingle, jangle)

As I go ridin' merrily along (Jingle, jangle)

And they sing, "Oh, ain't you glad you're single" (Jingle, jangle)

And that song ain't so very far from wrong (Jingle, jangle).”

You sang along with the track from nearly the top of your lungs. You danced around your chicken as the pasta was cooking towards al dente. Your broccoli was also being steamed, and the chicken pieces were already cooked. Your hips swayed to the rhythm of the song, the funky orchestra carrying the tune of the music while Kay Kyser sang the lyrics. 

You always preferred to cook with music on. There was nothing like a dull life, you thought. You needed music to carry you through the good times and the bad, the lonely moments or the otherwise not. You twirled by the counters, imagining that your sleep shorts gave you the same twirl as a skirt from the early 1950s. 

“…Oh, Lillie Belle (Lillie Belle)

Oh, Lillie Belle (Lillie Belle)

Though I may have done some foolin'

This is why I never fell.”

You laughed a little to yourself as you sang along to that last lyric. You remember that promise you made in college: never fall for a man who stole your heart. Of course, that all changed when you met Aaron. Upon meeting, the attraction was instant. You met through a mutual friend of your father’s, and even though he was noticeably older than you, that didn’t seem to matter too much. You were a grown woman; you could make your own decisions. You didn’t expect that decision to be falling in love with and eventually marrying Aaron Hotchner, becoming a mother figure to a beautiful boy in the process. Still, you wouldn’t ever regret your heart’s desire. 

“… Oh, I got spurs that jingle, jangle, jingle (I got spurs that jingle, jangle, jingle)

As I go ridin' merrily along (I go ridin' merrily along)

And they sing, "Oh, ain't you glad you're single" (And they sing, "Oh, ain't you glad you're single")

And that song ain't so very far from wrong (And that song ain't so very far from wrong).”

As the third chorus came in with a woman’s voice, you found yourself totally entranced in the music. You did the twist as you stirred your pasta, singing your heart out. Some of you wished that Jack or Aaron were here to enjoy this moment with you, but concurrently, you were having a great time with yourself. The music kept you company, and the gentle hum of the stove fan kept you grounded in reality. 

“… Oh, Lillie Belle

Oh, Lillie Belle

Though I may have done some foolin'

This is why I never fell

'Cause I got spurs that jingle, jangle, jingle (I got spurs that jingle, jangle, jingle).”

You kicked up your feet and continued to sway around the kitchen. While you were by no means a professional dancer, you knew how to dance well enough that you could carry your body to the melody. As the last chorus kicked in, you huffed out a sigh with a smile. All that dancing knocked the wind out of you. You went back to stirring the pasta, finally tasting it to see if your pasta was fully cooked. It was. After draining your pasta, you put it back in the pan to add the sauce as the next song begins. 

Part of you stopped to smile when you heard the opening notes of the next song on the tracklist: “The Twelfth of Never” by Johnny Mathis. Part of you wanted to skip to the next track, avoid the slight twinge in your heart when you heard the song and thought of your physically absent husband, but that’s not what Aaron would want. If Aaron were here, he’d grab you to slow dance, singing along to Johnny’s baritenor with his low baritone. 

“You ask how much I need you; must I explain?

I need you, oh, my darling, like roses need rain

You ask how long I'll love you, I'll tell you true

Until the twelfth of never, I'll still be loving you.”

You sang along under your breath, your eyes closed as you stirred. You sang along to the following verses, swaying gently from side to side, imagining Aaron’s big arms wrapped around you. You wished you could feel his arms wrapped tight around your waist, kissing your neck as you cooked. One of his favorite things to do when he was home was cook together. You kept singing until you felt a presence and heard a familiar voice sing along to the song. 

“Hold me close,

Never let me go,

Hold me close,

Melt my heart like it will snow.”

Your eyes shot open as you turned to the sound of the voice, and there stood your husband in the flesh, leaning against the doorway, looking at you like you were a fresh drink of water in the scoring heat. Such love was apparent in his eyes; it almost made your eyes tear up. You nearly dropped the spoon, placing it quickly on the counter and almost sprinting into your husband’s arms. 

Opening his arms for you, Aaron immediately pulled you into a tight hug, pressing kisses to the top of your head. “I’ve missed you, my angel.” he pressed another kiss to your forehead. “I’ve missed you so, so much.”

Tears were beginning to brim in your eyes as you looked up at Aaron, a smile growing on your face. “I didn’t even hear you come in! When did you get home?”

“A few minutes ago. I heard our mix playing, and I had to come to see what you were up to.” his arms grew tighter around you, one of his hands slithering up your back to cradle your head. “I see that you’re cooking.”

“I’m sorry; if I knew you were coming home, I would’ve made some for you too.”

He smiled. “Not to worry, sweetheart, I ate on the plane ride back.”

Effectively abandoning your dinner, you let yourself melt into your husband’s touch as the last verse of the song began to play, the two of you singing along and swaying to the rhythm. 

“I'll love you 'til the bluebells forget to bloom

I'll love you 'til the clover has lost its perfume

I'll love you 'til the poets run out of rhyme

Until the twelfth of never, and that's a long, long time

Until the twelfth of never, and that's a long, long time.”

At your wedding, you promised to love each other for the rest of your lives, come what may. The song currently ending perfectly encapsulated your relationship with your husband; you two swore to love each other through the hard times and the good, regardless of what life threw your way. You and Aaron would always have each other’s backs, and that is what this song meant to you: that you would love each other until the twelfth of never—which, indeed, was a long, long time. 

[honeysickledream]

'Overgrown' - Simon 'Ghost' Riley x F!Reader | Chapter Two

(photo credit: me [@honeysickledream])

warnings/tags: F!reader, no use of Y/N and no physical descriptions of reader, reader is a healer and midwife, this is set in a very vague ‘middle ages’ time, forced/arranged marriage, some angst, slow burn (heavy emphasis on slow for this entire series), miscommunication, relationship issues, relationship doubts, no smut this time around (again) but still minors DNI, brief mentions of: pregnancy (side character), childbirth and recovery (same side character gives birth off screen) | that's all, I think, but if I missed anything, lmk!

word count: ~1.2k

synopsis: You had married Simon four months ago, the whole thing some stupid forced arrangement. You had left everything you knew behind to live with Simon in his cabin a few miles out from his hometown. You weren't sure you could classify your relationship as a marriage, or even say truthfully that you lived with him because he wasn't around very often. Some part of you hopes things improve, but you're not unwillingly to do what you can to live the life you'd originally planned for.

a/n: a bit shorter than the first part, but that's what I get for procrastinating my first paper of the semester. i have to get my procrastination under wraps (they say after not doing so while in undergrad)

<- Prev. Part | Next Part ->

The walk to town seemed further today. For every step you took, the dirt path seemed to stretch another mile. You’d been up since a little after midnight, deciding to be productive with your time instead of wallowing in your bed, fuming. Four loaves had been baked, the open hearth cleaned of ash and the wood replenished for today’s use. Clean sheets had been folded and put away, a chore you had been putting off since you first hung the linens on the line, and the shelves in the larder had been dusted for the first time in well over a month. You’d even fetched water for Simon’s bath after your own, leaving them before the clean hearth to heat at his leisure. When he was around, he often fetched his own water, but you’d felt the need to do it for him today. Maybe it had been your guilt for how you acted last night that led you to the kind task. A small, silent apology. A show of care, awareness. You supposed it was another sign of guilt when you’d left a little before he woke, still on edge from his return and not wishing to subject him to any more crankiness. No, you decided to bottle up your crankiness in case someone got on your bad side, like the nosy or overly-opinionated family members your patients seemed to have in spades. The south portcullis had just finished rising as the town came into view and the woods were left behind. All but the western portcullis were left closed during the night, though you weren’t sure why. The early risers were already on the streets, the town relatively quiet, a few businesses open and preparing for customers. The baker, a sweet man with a perpetually red nose and an apron that always seemed to have a new flower embroidered on the hem by his daughter, was displaying his fresh loaves with the usual remarkable precision. Across the road, the butcher and his apprentices—his twin sons—were laying out fresh hides on the racks beside their shop. A mother exited her home, flanked by her small army of sleepy children who all had their own ways to grump at her for getting them ready for the day. An elderly couple you’d gotten to know well these last four months, both regularly needing new pots pepper pastes and lavender, barely poultices for their joint pains, were slowly walking their usual route. When they waved to you, you waved back and gave them a warm smile. They had been married for ages, had a gaggle of children who each had gaggles of their own. Their oldest son and his family had moved back to the town a few weeks ago to be close to the aging couple and you saw them often when you did your house-visits. Nice enough folks, the oldest son and his family, and they always made sure to stay out of the way when you went about your business. The son had even tried to give you some extra coin for tending to his parents, which you kindly declined, telling him that you charged the same for everyone, no ifs, ands or buts about it. You turned down narrow road and made your way to the fifth door on the left, rapping your knuckles against the faded red door three times. Today was a one patient day, the other healers and midwives in the town tending to your usual patients as well as their own, and for good reason. The woman who answered was sweaty and out of breath, teeth clenched. You glanced to her gravid belly and gave her a sympathetic look. Apparently your suggested methods of inducing labor had worked, and by the tension in her shoulders and the exhaustion in her eyes, early labor had been going on for quite some time, and the likelihood of a quick transition to active labor now that you were here, was slim. ***

The late afternoon had been greeted by the sweet wails of a newborn, and those stopped outside the home, waiting with bated breath for babe’s arrival, broke out in cheers and song. Once the mother and babe were clean and situated, you began the second part of your duties as midwife: tending to the home for an easier transition. You sent the dirtied sheets and the mother’s shroud to a laundress paid for with the money from your skirt pocket, then prepared a light meal for the family since such excitement and tension could cause a heavy meal to not sit properly. After the new mother’s husband returned, and your final check for her and the babe’s health was completed, you took your payment, stuffed your messed apron into your medical bag and left. As was your tradition following a successful delivery, you popped into the bakery and ordered a small fruit tart. You ate it slowly as you stood outside and watched as the evening crowds began to form as the sky turned a sweet mixture of lilac and peony. The tart was flaky, the sugar on top not yet dissolved, and the fruit inside had just the right amount of tang. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw a familiar figure: Simon. Simon? Your heart painfully skipped a beat as your eyes followed him as he went to the butcher’s. You finished the rest of your tart quickly and dusted your hands off as you wove through the crowds to catch up to him. Seeing him in town was a first, you were nearly sure of that. And you were entirely sure that it was him when you peered through the window of the butcher’s shop, catching the eye of the butcher himself, his twin sons, and finally Simon whose brows rose slowly at you. There was a passing of coin and scribbled-on parchment, then Simon headed right for the door. Right for you. You quickly pushed away from the window and turned to face the crowds of people as if nothing had happened at all. Except it had, and you were sure you were about to be given a plethora of strange looks by Simon. Yet he didn’t give you a strange look. He did search your face, though, then looked you up and down. His eyes lingered on your torso, noting the absence of your apron, you supposed. “Done for the day?” he asked. You nodded. “I only had one patient today, and I’m thankful for that.” You chewed your cheek as you stood there beside him, the two of you looking towards the townspeople who didn’t pay either of you any mind. You looked down and noticed the basket in his left hand, the list inside it, and the money in your skirt pocket seemed to suddenly weigh a ton. Your mind wandered to the flimsy floorboard in your bedroom, the one by your door that you pried up almost every day, and what was underneath it. Money. Most of the money you earned from your profession went into the satchel hidden under the floorboard. A failsafe, an escape plan in case you couldn’t bear to remain in the marriage. “Are you headed to the market?” you asked before you could stop yourself. There was an opportunity lurking if he was. When he nodded, you followed suit. “I’ll come along,” you told him. “Maybe we could talk, too?”

[joannasteez]

to the victors, go the spoils

pairing: cody rhodes x black reader x jey uso

summary/warning/authors note: after the win at fastlane, cody finds himself along with jey at your house, in your bed, enjoying the benefits of being champions. | you know what time it is, im givin smut but its always gon come with some description. explicit at that so minors dni! my first time writing them both so go easy on me ;) slowly becoming a cody girl >>>>

word count: 4.7k

text message | outgoing: nice match. great win. 

text message | cody rhodes: can the victor have his spoils?

text message | outgoing: if he plays nice, yes. 

text message | cody rhodes: i have a friend taggin' along, hows that for nice? 

text message | outgoing: sounds like fun

a small creeping shudder to your skin, this taunting twist of excitement and anticipation. you could feel, see even, from the dimly lit living room where you sat, that slow spreading smile of satisfaction he wore often. or rather, as often as you saw him. both ring side and bed side, cody rhodes, the one they called the american nightmare, had this subtly to him. this dapperness that caught your eye and the draw of your breath. he donned himself in suits and dressed his words in a similar likeness, but was never shy to dirty himself for the fun of it. 

it wasn't often that you saw him, but when he rolled through indiana for a match, he made his way, without fail, to your place. to see you. to talk, to touch, to kiss. to have his fill of fun before begrudgingly leaving. the smallest of pouts tainting his lips before leaving your door, and it's what you craved the most. the idea that you were too good to stay away from, too good to leave. he was a man of business, and you'd slowly, with time, made yourself apart of his business. something he'd need to tend to in an effort to keep close. 

he was patient and clever. at times devious. soft and sweet. always thinking of the next thing to leave you wondering. kind of something like now, as shea butter smooths over fine from hand to thrilled skin. who could his friend be? 

but jey uso feels the same way that you do, left to roam in a clueless sort of excitement. he's sobered enough to control his thoughts, his words less slurry than the way they were at the press conference. but his blood still rushes, and his head swims, this dull light rocking. like the pull in of morning waves. he wonders what you look like, how sweet your voice could be, and there it goes, a tingling in his fingers. his pants, the place right where his dick sits, half hard and almost ready. sounds like fun, your message had read, brief and not leaving much to the imagination. but he figured, if cody had driven so far away from the arena, then you were worth it. 

and "fuck me", the smallest mumble from jey's lips when you open the door to let them in. a champagne silk robe and even silkier looking skin. warm and brown under soft dim light. and that voice? a sly "hey", coyness there but still easy going. a damn angel. it was worth it. 

the tension in the silence is palpable. worthy of a knife. eyes cutting to and from. who'd say what and make the first move when. you pull the door wider, allowing them in, ignoring the heat of cody's blue eyes, deciding to take jey in instead. 

"when cody said a friend, i didn't think he'd be the main event".

jey's head tilts, turning to let his eyes fall everywhere it could. your face, the peak of cleavage, the painted baby pink of your toes. the sultry atmosphere of the house. you were prepared it seemed. his ego having no choice but to bloom. threatening to burst. "you a fan?" 

you shrug, a feigning of disinterest, but the warmth pooling your belly says different. because jey isn't all that shy about checking you out, curious eyes taking this slow trailing over the smaller details, looking, you assumed for the things he liked. and the space is thin between the two of you, taking his jacket, cologne heady. a gravitating thing. and to him you smell sweet, expensive. 

"i watch casually". 

and cody smiles at his genius, easing further into your house. reveling with comfortable steps at the short fused tension building between you and his new tag team partner. you're all but on your knees for jey and he's just only made it through the door."casual my ass. she knows every bit of my entrance music. word for damn word.

your eyes roll playful. hesitating to leave jey briefly before following cody to take his suit jacket."fuck you rhodes".

he mumbles a"you will", before needy hands pull you in, and the seam of his lips push into yours for a more than subtle kiss. tongue following after, smooth and controlling. you'd found in your times with him that a drink or two made him less patient. less willing to follow through with subtlety. he bit gentle and caressed with tough fingers that spurred on a sure to harshen pound that found its way to the crux of your thighs. he was buzzed maybe, but not nearly as drunk as he was at that conference. cheeks not as red and eyes not as glazed. you liked him like this, present enough to follow well through with his teasing. 

and as his lips break from yours, taking on the skin at your neck, your nails run through blonde hair. eyes looking for jey whose already moving closer. 

cody at your ear. "i missed you", suckling gentle just below your ear. "missed you so much i bought a friend for you to play with". 

"you're so good to me", a moan of sarcasm, pulling from him to grab jey. your steps setting off for the living room. 

cody disappears into a hallway, small bag in hand. his voice carrying on. "be nice. i'll be back".

the blunt you'd been pulling from before they came finds its way from an ash tray back between your fingers. but jey grabs easy at the lighter in time to hold it up for you. the spark just at the tip of it warm. you pull, a soft hallow of your cheeks that makes him wonder about other things, before the full inhale. you offer him the blunt and he takes it. touch faint enough that it urges the skin for more. 

"what's your poison jey?" he keeps the blunt between his fingers, feeding you the end to pull again. the smoke making for more heady air. "i've been told i mix drinks good". 

"nah i'm good right now". his eyes fixed on the fullness of your lips. "not tryna fuck around and over do it". 

you point over to the couch, watching his legs set wide and inviting as he sits. ending the burn of the blunt, you walk about the living room. loving the way his arms fall over the tops of the fine leather. he's settled in. that's good, you think.

"how you know cody?" 

"i'm a chef", you started. twisting the switch of another lamp not too far away to see more of his pretty face. "met him a while back at one of my restaurants". 

"oh yeah? one of?" a palm smoothening over the thick hair at his beard. eyeing your legs as you draw closer. "you got it like that?" 

"of course". 

just in front of him you pull the knot of your robe to reveal baby pink lace, and he stops with everything not to hiss with want. but waits instead, your body slotting over him to straddle his thighs. humming with a deep sigh as the nails of your fingers run down the broad width of his chest, before lifting to take purchase at the nape of his neck where the blue of his mullet sits. the hair curling and silky to the touch. cody a slight after thought as you push your lips in to ghost over jey's. this slow faint ride as you speak. 

"i like your eyes. they speak for you". 

"what they sayin?"

and it's what you expect the kiss to be, despite the tension, the heady way need pulses about skin and short lasting clever touch. until now of course, his hands more sure, spread wide and warm at your thighs. gentlemanly enough to kiss with patience, to test the taste of your lips before the slow roll in of tongue, and fuck, its a soft thickness. a deviously low groaning from his chest bleeding into where you hold at his cheeks, as he rushes in for more. 

jey builds as the seconds pour one into the other, his kiss a good sort of sloppy that makes your hips rut and your brain numb, but his hands, as big and damaging as they can be, don't grip too tight. caution like a weight, stifling the more vicious sort of pulling and prying you ache for. 

a whimper sounds from your throat , your hips grinding into his, needy for friction. "touch me how you want. i won't break". breathy but assured. 

and it's all he needs before his fingers grow hard and sharp into supple skin. something like the screwing in of nails. at your thighs, your ass, nearly ripping the stitch of the lace, till he's holding tight at your breast. lips dragging kisses over the ways of your neck, tongue peaking to taste as he goes, till they slip over wet, firm, your nipples tight as he swirls. another one of his moans stretching slow through your skin till it hits nerve. 

your hips work desperate more than anything, the texture of his jeans against the crotchless opening pushing at your slit. as he sucks, licks sloppy enough that his spit drips, you feel yourself growing messy. pussy wet and seeping on the less than soft fabric, on him.

and jey notices, of-fucking-course he notices. smirking devious at the way you fall apart on him already. another swat to already hot skin that makes you throb and hiss. "makin' a fuckin mess on me already". 

"just means i like you", smirking with him even in your haze. your fingers a comb through his hair as you bring him back to suck at you. missing the feeling already. 

and the way you get lost in him is easy. as he grabs and pulls and pinches. licks and kisses. 

footsteps a steady padding behind you, till they stop, and then your head is pulling back unhurried by a hand at your throat. the touch not jey's but demanding all the same. your eyes dim in their pleasure but open enough still to make out cody's face. his sharp features rounding out some at the edges of his jaw as he smiles. 

"open for me sweetheart".

and your lips part, tongue stretching out till you feel his spit drip at it. a satisfied hum strumming  your ears as he bends to peck your mouth. fingers squeezing at your throat to accompany the sensation of jey teasing his teeth at your nipples. sharp pullings that force out moans more broken than whole. 

"i think she's ready for more", cody announces. blue eyes glazing over with this fine layer of lust as he trails slow over you. 

and that giddy way your nerves had split and reformed, splitting to come together again, over and over, after reading cody's text messages, has turned now into something new as your body dips soft into the bed, awaiting more of whatever they have for you. this steady rushing in your blood, frenzied and never ending. and they stare you down in this connected way, hunters after prey, toothy grins and lusty eyes as they guide your body. thighs snugging in jey's head and your knees nailed into the cushion of the bed, his tongue dipping into the soaked mess of your pussy as you attempt to settle into sitting on his face. 

and cody, all lean muscle and fire in the icy blue of his eyes, licking rough into your mouth to take advantage of the sloppy moving your lips take to return his kisses. your own head swimming, high off of the ache twisting at your core from the way jey sucks at your needy clit. his tongue moving, no where near desperate, but eager, determined to drive you to madness. and you like the toughness of them both, the harsher touches and grips to the skin, so when he swats hard at your ass again and feels you drip in his mouth, he groans satisfied. excited. 

his palm comes down, again and again, breaking pleasure into thick skin till you whimper and shiver, lips suckling sweet all the same.

you hiss at the stinging, waiting for that inevitable sinking in of heat as jey caresses where he strikes. something like a gentle storm every time he meets your flesh. harsh and soothing all the same, with these slip ins of pleasure, tongue flat and licking broad at your slit. 

a laugh bristles your skin, just at your forehead, hands trembling and useless as they attempt to pull away cody's pants. you whine, pleading, and he takes a minute from his amusement to do away with the rest of his clothes, springing up hard and warm against your skin. 

another spank rips into raw skin, and you feel the ripple of it at your clit. coaxes your eyes to roll. 

cody thinks he's never seen you so taken by pleasure. ardor sweet off your skin. your touch warm and firm as you fix yourself to stroking the deep pink of his tip. a grunt toppling from him as you let spit string out wet and lazy from between kiss swollen lips. "so damn pretty", he huffs. savoring the slow pull in you take of his cock. 

and your tongue is all silk and gentle touch. a warmth he's missed since his last visit to indiana. but he's patient about getting what he wants, pulls up a foot to sit on the bed for better steadying and lets you work him at a leisure pass. one of his hands unrelenting as it swats at your thigh. "you like a little pain, don't you angel?", voice rasped and a bit dazed. 

"yes", feathered and faint. 

heat overflowing in your cheeks, hips rutting at the flat lay of jey's tongue. a thick finger finding its way to slip into you as you grind wild at him. chasing the release that comes after the vicious knotting in your core. and the sound of the room is lewd, silence burdened by the soft squelch of tongues and the urgent push in of warm taut fingers. jey lavishes you like the taste is heaven sent. something once in a lifetime. like one moment away from the soaked mess of you will do him in to an endless suffering. and for as much as it's worth, your palm grips as the other digs into the sheets, to press in a squeeze against the weight of cody's balls. mouth a sweet suck at the harsh reddened tip of him. 

your words reach out as nothing more than a breath. a quick "oh fuck", that badly sums up the building of tension. hips nearly smothering jey as cody takes your mouth to kiss, a hand at your neck again, swallowing moans and that faithful ability to breathe. the throb in your spine grows ruthless and the spasm of your clit nearly splits your ears. vision blurred as you fight for composure amongst the rage of release. 

the room taking this lax spin, their eagerness driving them to lay you down easy. your legs spreading despite the ache. moaning soft and satisfied, blissed as fingers slip gentle through your slit with a slight shake. simply to savor and prolong even the rush in your blood. a delicate fondling to spread your lower lips, peeling back to reveal, like the prettiest flowers in bloom. the grin pulling along your lips a gentle teasing seduction. and of course the mere way you play with yourself  doesn't compare to jey, that slow thick push in, his strokes measured but yours sloppy, ministrations drunk off the heat of hungry gazes. 

but it's not hard, getting lost in you. your taste, skin supple and balmy. so easy to hold, to melt into. it's no wonder cody travels so far when he's here. jey would to, wants to after this, but even the thought of leaving is a disappointing one. he just wants to stay here, watch you work your way into delirium. wants to help you get there even, losing the rest of his clothes and bringing himself back to you till his knees sink into the bed.

you meet him, your eyes to his. moaning excited, the heaviness of him taking a steady slip over your slit. "pictures last longer"

he doesn't rush. leans his palm into the back of your thigh to spread you more. "Mhmm", leaning down to kiss you, tongue sweeping through for good measure. "Keep talkin' that shit". 

you comb through the blue of his mullet, savoring his mouth, before letting him go. "it's ok to be a fan y'know?" cody brings himself just at your side, thumbs taking to caressing the taut sensitive twist of your nipples. mouth taking purchase at that place just below you ear that seems to be home for him. you cradle him close, senses on the verge of being driven to overstimulation. "cody has me used to the attention". 

"m' sure he does", and jey gets why, every inch of you leaving his blood to rush fast and loose, tipsy off just the idea of digging into you. the fat tip of his dick pushing patient at you, a steady press of his hips, almost reverential in the way he lets you pull him in. inch by sweet inch. "you feel too good not to pay attention to". fire in his fingers, imprinting into the memory of your muscles an ache that only comes otherwise in the most lucid of dreams. you feel, as your lip suffers from the bite of your teeth, that this is once in a lifetime. the stretch, the look of him, your skin being this endless playground for kisses, for men to roam and adore, and fuck, you're sure he's nearly split you to fit. wet still but warm and hugging. but it drives him just as crazy, hips rutting with a mind of their own, seeking pleasure fast, despite his wants to draw out the pleasure. "you holdin' me tight like you been needin' me huh?" 

you whine. "jey". stunned. overwhelmed. pleading "please", but for what you don't know. you just need it.

he can't help but laugh. and it's deep and full of ego. cody joining, warm breath fighting its way under damp skin.  

jey moves only slightly, lifting your leg and shifting to sink deeper.  your back curling with a throb, forcing your breast to push further into cody's mouth. the cruelest, sweetest, chain reaction. 

he huffs, pulls his hips away just enough to tease his tip at the tight ring of your entrance, and the stretch feels new once again, and then again still, good and splitting as nerve breaks and cleaves open. raw and tender to the touch. 

"i get in this pussy and you go speechless".

"shit", whiny. 

"c'mon mama, talk that shit", finding a rhythm, a tempo. something steady enough that it feels too good. so much so that your nails fall at where he meets you to push him away. a miserable try and fail at quelling pleasure. "stay with me baby", voice satin smooth. "m' right here. stay with me". not wanting you to escape him. not without what he'd come all this way for, not without what you needed. 

with a lazy pop of his lips, teeth driving sharp but faint at a taut sensitive nipple, cody traces deft. intention clever as he covers the course of your body, down pass your navel till your clits held swollen and throbbing in between his fingers. he pinches firm, till he gets the moan that he's looking for. the one that drags and whines, stresses out in pleasure so much that it dresses itself as pained. but he knows you well, enough to know that you can take a little plain, a little bite with your bliss. because it only makes your wetter, more pliant. 

and the swell of release is easier to coax out now, a mere snap at your core that hitches breath and spasm's your bones. it'd been something a little more put together before, these sweet drops of arousal at his tongue as you rutted and worked yourself to finish. but now it was something messy. uninhibited and wild. a lusty flood that coats him in a soft creamy white. jey lurches, his hips taking to uncontrolled thrust, moving mindless and raw. deeper to bed himself in the tight vice of you. 

it's addicting, words slurring, running away from him. "goddamn girl, you feel so fucking- fuck!... so good". 

and he thinks he doesn't want to leave, watching you melt into the fine thread of bed sheets. blissed out and breathing heavy. splayed and vulnerable, like some delicate, fierce painting. cody continuing a steady onslaught at your clit. you whine and shiver, high off thrill as your fingertips dig behind the meat of your thighs to keep your legs opened for him. needy still for the fill of him. arousal a mess that leeks its way to the bedsheets. and jey thinks, that when he's good and through, he'll dip his tongue back in you, have you come undone again off his touch till the sun breaks against the horizon. you'll do then as you do now, unraveling untamed as you come, moaning and writhing till you're nothing but a thing to chant his name. 

you'll praise him, tell him how good he is, how good you want to be for him. it'll resound, faithful and messy. slurred by pleasure as you go dumb from the deep pound of his dick. you'll be like what you are now, the perfect spoil for a champion. 

jey feels his core knot up, a twisted burn that scorches out to every inch that he can feel, till he's twitching violent and coming hard. the mess he's made leaking slow, a warm pooling out that he strokes back in. just enough to feel you throb for him one more time.

jey moves then, after he catches his breath, commits the daze of your eyes to memory and settles for watching the break of cody's trim demeanor. this meticulous sort of care for his disposition done away with, once he's had you in his arms. and though cody has abandoned his suits and ties on plenty of occasions to scrap and rumble with men twice his size, only you in recent times, have seen the softness under the shell of him. 

jey takes to laying lazy at the head of the bed, your mouth just inches away from the messy slick you'd made of his dick, as cody pushes a deep arch into your spine. every inch he touches is every inch that throbs with a pulse and with heat. an ache that threatens a breaking, but really its just that beautiful burn of muscle. the blooming of a flame that eats at tension and the hesitancy that comes with distance, because cody had longed for you for some time. to slip his skin against yours, till you'd grown mute from satiation. 

he throbs at the thought even, to feel you tremble about him the way you'd done so messily for jey already, his eyes a cold blue but still scorched with need the way he bares down on you. a stare that fights into your skin, makes you clit flutter with anticipation. 

cody groans, stroking himself. "spread for me angel", and you do just that. face dug into the sheets just inches away from the inner part of jey's thigh, nails pulling at your ass till your lower lips spread. you clench and unclench, again and again, anticipating, and then you moan needy, mindless, cody tapping his tip at the fat of your clit. "there you go", raspy and praising, before he slips easy into the mess of you. grin forming small through his perfect teeth, satisfied. feeling at home. 

and he takes his time, takes the place of your hands as he holds to keep you spread, mesmerized by the wet strokes he gives against the soft pull of your pussy. fucked already, but needing to be fucked still. and he loved these things about you, the width of your wants and that insatiable streak of fulfilling them.

your lips reach for jey, wet kisses at his thigh till you reach to dip your tongue at his slick tip. tasting the mess you'd made together. a fine back and forth between a sweet suckling and these little delicate kitten licks. and he lets you do as you please, enjoying the gentle attention. caressing your jaw even as you move about him. eyes dim and delirious. 

"he made of mess of you, huh sweetheart?", his hips moving deft. ears pricked hot and twitching at the sound of his every stroke. a salacious soaked smacking that drives him further, deeper, till he's buried to the hilt. 

cody throbs warm in you as he takes you. mouth trembly as you give him a not so simple "yeah", your hips pushing to fuck on him. 

and it's not so simple because your nerves continue to split and grow more raw by the second. overstimulated but somehow wanting more. begging filthy and impatient. 

but he meets the demand, guiding you by the nape of your neck till you're upright, knees wider and burying further into the sheets. his hands form harsh against your breast, pinching and pulling to his content, breath erratic at your ear as he fucks you seemingly deeper than before. pussy a dewy mess, his dick nudging and persistent to feel you drool and spasm for him.

and he kisses at your exposed shoulder, hips a ways away from brutal but his lips bloom at your damp skin in gentle ways that leave you feeling drunk. his tongue and teeth licking and nipping, moaning at the tight cling of you. cody revels in the ways that plains of your skin mold into his. a balmy, tender, pressing in that forces his heart to flutter and his mind to numb. grow delirious with thoughts and ideas not so amorous, that lend themselves to a seriousness that comes with sobered talks and resolute feelings. 

you lay forward again, face nudging into the sheets. jey's eyes a sharp focus at your face, at your mouth as it opens, jaw dropped some in a silent euphoria. his hand pulling at his dick with simple lazy strokes. feeling a slow to form stir as he watches cody fuck you. 

"fuck i-", you attempt to speak, the knot in your gut threatening to burst at the seams. "right there, please". 

and cody obliges, steady's his rhythm to something that builds the both of you to bliss, the knock of his hips coaxing you to drip more. your slit dewy and slick as a finger rolls over the twitch of your clit. 

"such nice, pretty manners when you wanna come", he groans, chuckling wry in a dazed sort of amusement. because he knows you, knows the patterns of your pleasure and your needs. the things you say and how you say them, when you tease and when you beg. how your precision grows weak at the feel of an assured touch. his hand swatting quick, the flesh at your ass rippling, the grip of your heat growing tighter, letting him know you're just near release. on the brink of it actually. 

"give it to me, come in me". rushed and whiny. breath short. 

"oh...shit!"

cody's waist snaps. pounds out as you come undone and spasm hard. a feverish shake in your legs as you pull all strength in you to roll your hips into him till he falls into a wild take of bliss. the hard thrumming in his blood spreading till his chest pounds and his fingers twitch. his spend dripping warm as it seeps out. and in his daze, he rubs his thumb through it to soothe over your clit, prolonging the throb there.

"fuck thats so good. thank you", a soft whimper into the tear stains of the sheets. fluttering still but sated. your sayings slurred and brain dizzy in the thrill of release. 

[yelenaslyubov]

A New Frontier: Part 2

a new frontier // part 1 // part 2 // part 3 (coming soon)

main masterlist || yelena belova || requests

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ pairing: yelena belova x reader

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ warnings: little language, and mentions of nudity? (also i did not read this over again after i finished, so possible spelling errors🙈)

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ description: after finding out the challenge that you and the Avengers are up against, you become increasingly nervous. not only are you up against Hydra, but learning new things takes you to new heights.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ word count: 4.1k

“Hydra! But I thought Hydra was destroyed?”

Yelena shhhed you. “Why are you acting surprised about this?”

You didn’t want to admit that you had fallen asleep during Tony’s announcement but you were not sure how to explain your screw up.

“Uhm, I may have possibly fallen asleep when Tony was giving the briefing…”

She looked at you for a moment and then chuckled to herself. “So you’re telling me that you had no idea where we were going, who we were up against, or what we’re here to do?”

You nodded your head embarrassingly.

“Why didn’t you ask?” she said blatantly.

“I didn’t want to look weak or for people to think I don’t take this seriously.”

Yelena looked almost sad for a moment, but it quickly passed. “Well now you know.”

You looked longingly at the facility down below. You couldn’t believe what you were up against now, but then again, you weren’t sure exactly what you were planning on facing in the beginning. Space people? Again?

“Come on,” Yelena said, “we should probably head back before anyone decides to lose their marbles.”

You reluctantly followed Yelena back to the truck and sat down in the passenger’s seat. You looked at the GPS and it said it would take you both about 20 minutes to find base camp. Once you buckled up you looked over to Yelena while she was driving.

“So…what’s Hydra up to now? Why are they back?”

“Apparently there were undercover Hydra agents that lived in the shadows and built this. They’ve been researching and studying new ways to build weapons and other destructive materials. Fun right?” Yelena said in a monotone voice.

“It’s kind of like the nuclear race all over again, except it’s one sided… so I guess it is nothing like that.”

The conversation faded after your words were exchanged. You hadn’t fully processed the fact that you were up against Hydra. You almost wished that there was some sort of alien mutant you were fighting against because it sounded better. This was serious shit.

You tried to take your mind off the anxiety that was suddenly weighing down on your chest. It was amazing how clear the sky was away from light. The stars seemed to shine brighter than ever, and the moon illuminated the vast land that looked as if it extended forever into the long nothingness.

The trees were vessels for your imagination. You imagined running your fingers through their thin bristles and getting lost in their scent. The trees were different out west. They had a way of holding their secrets, almost as if they had seen the history of the world and new places unfold in front of them.

You were too busy daydreaming of other worlds to notice the building way out in front of you with a few warm lights shining from it. The closer you came you could see the log house that sat bundled by trees, and a barn almost bigger to the right of it. It looked cozy enough for what you needed it for, but this was all unfamiliar territory for you, as you had always lived in the city.

Yelena pulled the truck next to the other two. The first two trucks still felt warm so you knew you hadn’t been gone very long. A chill crawled up your spine and made you shiver. I guess everyone was right; the scorching desert finds a way to tame itself at night.

You unloaded your belongings from the truck and headed inside to find everyone crowded in the living room.

“Oh god, here comes the welcoming committee,”

Yelena groaned.

They were all crammed on the two small couches and all along the floor. Some had their arms crossed and others were sound asleep.

“Steve said ‘no one gets left behind,’ so here we are waiting for the two of you to roll in. I hope you’re all safe and sound after your detour,” Natasha said with sarcasm dripping from her tongue

“Listen-” Yelena started.

“It was my fault,” you interrupted. Yelena looked at you with her eyebrows furrowed. “I got car sick so we had to pull off to the side of the road.”

“I’m glad you both are alright,” Steve said. “Let’s wrap it up and get some shut eye. We have a big day in store tomorrow.”

You looked over at Kamala and Kate with worried expressions. A big day could mean anything, but now you knew what was at stake and you didn’t want to find out what it meant.

Everyone split up amongst each other and found their rooms. There were four small bedrooms to choose from with limited space. You carefully inspected where everyone was going to ensure you got the room you wanted. You followed Kate and Kamala to the back bedroom which held three twin beds.

As you looked back, you noticed that Yelena had joined Natasha and Wanda despite her frustrations with them. You had a small pit in your stomach for some odd reason you couldn’t figure out. You watched as she walked inside without a glance. You scurried inside your room promptly so you didn’t draw attention to your staring.

“I call the bed by the window!” Kamala chanted. Kate took the bed in the middle and you settled for the bed closest to the door. The first person to be attacked if anything ever happened while at base.

“This room looks almost like John Wayne decorated it himself. What is that?” Kate looked at a small brass handle that held a glass sort of lamp shade on it.

“It’s an oil lamp,” you responded. “That in itself should tell you how long ago this was decorated.”

The three of you began unloading your belongings into the rustic chests that lived at the end of each of the beds. Space was limited so a closet wasn’t an option this time around. You giggled to yourself at the sheer amount of items Kamala had brought with her.

“So…car sick huh?” Kate asked you in a mischievous tone.

“Yeah uhm, ever since I was little I’ve gotten car sick,” you chuckled.

“But being in the jet doesn’t bother you?”

You were silent for a moment. “I guess so.”

Kate didn’t seem satisfied with the conversation, but you didn’t feel the need to dive into the subject anymore. You were afraid that they would ask too many questions and become curious about you Yelena. If there was nothing going on between you and Yelena, there would be no reason to question it…right?

You finished unpacking your things in silence while the other two girls got ready for bed. You weren’t fully comfortable around everyone yet so you felt it would be better if you got prepared for bed in the bathroom.

When you left the bedroom to find the bathroom, you almost ran straight into Yelena once again.

“We have to stop meeting like this,” you laughed. You soon turned red when you looked down to find Yelena in pants and only a sports bra.

“There are worse things, y/n y/l/n” she said with the slightest of smirks. “See you in the morning for a ‘big day’”

You couldn’t remember in that moment if you had said anything back, as the memory of her frame had burned into your memory. You walked into the bathroom and let out the breath you had apparently been holding in. Muscle memory was in overdrive as you got ready for bed. Your mind was too preoccupied for simple things such as a night routine.

When you entered your bedroom again, Kate and Kamala had already fallen asleep and the room was dark. There was nothing left awake but your mind and soul, and they were both screaming.

You crawled into your cold bed and you winced at the material of the bedding. It was a mixture of the age old fabric and the temperature that it created. You got used to it quickly and found that the bed itself was more comfortable than expected.

Once you had settled, the only thing left to quiet was your head. The image of Yelena hadn’t left since it had arrived. Did she possibly know what she was doing to you, or was she oblivious to the feelings she created within you? You wished now that you had found a way to room with her, but it was better this way. There’s enough trouble between Natasha and Wanda for everyone, the Avengers don’t need another relationship on their hands.

You flipped in bed to get comfortable and you were facing the window. You could see the twinkle of the stars that were peeking through the bristles of the trees outside. The light from the moon usually would have been distracting, but this time it was your guiding light to sleep.

Your eyelids became heavy and fluttered as you admired the moon hung in the sky, and you couldn’t help but wonder what tomorrow held.

.

.

.

Your body jumped and you were awake when a loud knock sounded against the door.

“Up and at ‘em!” Clint yelled outside. All three of you groaned. You could tell by the color of the sky that it was entirely too early to be awake.

As you looked through your trunk for something to wear, you realized the lack of specification in your wardrobe due to your lack of information. You decided on something easy that you could move in, while also trying to fit the form of an Avenger.

The three of you got ready to leave and you already regretted your clothing decision, but you had no choice. Walking down the hallway you noticed everyone in jeans, boots, and their own choice of a shirt. You suddenly became very aware of your separation from the rest of the crowd.

The groggy faces that passed down the hallway all filed outside where Steve and a few others were waiting. They were standing near the mysterious barn that you had seen last night with Yelena.

“Nice of y’all to join us,” Sam said with a smile.

“Like we had a choice, man,” Peter whined.

“Alright,” Steve clapped his hands, “since we’re all here, we can get started. Who has ridden horses before?”

“Oh god,” you mumbled quietly.

You looked around and found that Clint, Bucky, Sam, and Nat were nodding. As for the rest of the group, they looked around awkwardly.

“When have you ever ridden a horse?” Wanda whispered to Nat.

“There’s a lot of things you still need to learn about me,” Nat winked.

While you were worried, Kamala had the biggest grin on her face as she was trying to keep her excitement level to a minimum. You and Kate on the other hand were feeding off of the other’s anxiety. You looked at Yelena and she looked cool as a cucumber. Nothing could ever shake her and that’s what made her so intimidating.

“Well today is your lucky day,” Steve said. “We’ve been provided with a whole herd as you could say. In the barn are an assortment of different horses to choose from, and you will also be learning to ride with them so you feel comfortable with one another before putting yourself in a dangerous situation.”

There was a moment of silence before Yelena spoke up. “So, I get the whole western cowboy bit, it’s funny it really is, but why are we doing it? We have perfectly good trucks and our strength.”

“Great question,” Clint piped up. “Even though those are more efficient methods, in this situation, we are trying to be as stealthy as possible. Any attraction to the abnormal will draw attention, such as an excessive amount of dust being caused by the vehicles or for instance, the power of Avengers.”

‘The power of Avengers’ you thought. You thought long and hard. Hydra was in the process of making weapons of mass destruction, and what would those weapons need? It all starts with a flame.

“What about me?” you asked. “When there does come a time where we need to use powers, what about me?”

You were discovered by the Avengers after a faulty incident involving a fire. You were studying at NYU when a science experiment in your chemistry lab went horribly wrong. The concoction caught fire and you were trapped in the building along with other students. By some miracle, you survived it, but the others perished. Some say that you emerged made of fire yourself, but either way, you remained unscathed after the accident. Ever since then, you’ve been able to harness the power of fire and use it to your advantage. You found that this may be hard in the current situation.

“Uhm,” Steve said hesitantly, “we’ve all briefly discussed that, and for the safety of us here, we’d like to feel the fire to a minimum is possible. Of course there will be circumstances that require you to use them, but keep it tamed for now.” You nodded in agreement.

You felt a bit defeated. Why were you invited on this mission if you weren’t even able to use your powers to your advantage? You understood that you were new, but that seemed even more reason to leave you behind.

“Getting back on track,” Clint clapped his hands together.

“Right, right,” Steve awkwardly laughed. “Today we’re going to pick our steeds for the time being. They’re fully trained and broken, it’s just your job as a rider to become comfortable around your horse so you’re able to have a successful time together. But first, you have to find a horse that you click with.”

You all started to walk off before Bucky called back out to you. “And another thing…with the help of the Wakandans, we’ve been able to provide a vibranium shield around the property that disguises our location. That means it’s important to learn your surroundings and pay attention to your tracker because this shield will be enabled at all times. When outside the shield, the house and the barn, along with everything beside it will disappear and it’ll look as if it’s a normal forest. This is for your safety and ours while completing this mission, so be smart.”

“Everyone convene in the barn to choose your pick of the bunch and we’ll go from there,” Steve announced.

“Woah,” Peter and Kamala said in unison.

“We’re like real superheroes!” Kamala exclaimed and you smiled back. You weren’t as vocal about your opportunity as an Avenger, but this was just as surreal for you as it was for her. You were more reserved about it but it was hard for you to contain yourself once you were fully immersed in the full top secret mission.

Kamala opened the barn door first since she found it so hard to wait. You were greeted with an unpleasant smell that infiltrated your nose, but you tried to ignore it since you figured you would have to get used to the stench. Something brushed against your leg and you looked down to see a banged up barn cat that was rubbing itself all over your legs.

“Oh god, cats,” Kate groaned.

“What, not a cat person?” you asked, surprised.

“No, Lucky is my one and only, he’s all I need,” she said.

You looked around the barn briefly where you found a small workshop that was crowded by old, rusted tools, fine leathers, and other farm gear. There were also black and white photos that were hanging upon the wall of people who meant nothing to you. Though they meant nothing to you, they looked as if they were special to someone else.

Beyond the front wall were the rows of stalls that held the horses you were to choose from. For some reason you felt yourself become very nervous. Of course you hadn’t ridden a horse before, but that didn’t seem to be the cause of your anxiety.

You wanted to be able to pick the right horse that would help you be the most successful. That is, a companion that would keep you safe and listen to you throughout this mission. You didn’t want to make any mistake that would give the impression you didn’t take this position seriously.

You strolled down the soft bedded ground littered with hay and observed all the horses to choose from. There were a couple tan ones, black, and brown. You didn’t feel like any of them were speaking to you, so you kept walking.

Down at the very end of the stall lived one horse. It caught your eye so you decided to take a peek. When you looked inside the dark stall there was a built stallion standing in the middle. His black hair was disheveled and long, but it contrasted well against his tan midsection.

You didn’t know how, but you felt like this was the one. Something about the energy between the two of you was electric and you didn’t want that to slip away. You looked down at his nameplate and gasped. His name was Ember and it was almost as if it was written in the sand long before you had walked upon it. It was fate.

The heavy barn door opened with a long clang and you walked inside slowly. You held your hand out hoping that he could muster up the courage to form a connection.

“Here, boy,” you encouraged him. “I don’t wanna hurt you, I just wanna be friends.”

He walked over slowly and sniffed your palm to gain comfortability, then he nibbled at your hand. It tickled your hand and made you laugh. You rubbed the side of his face and scratched his fur. You were satisfied with your match.

You walked out of the stall and looked around at everyone else. Based on the look of it, it seemed like everyone had made their pick. Without thinking, you found yourself looking for Yelena. You spotted her off to the far right with another horse that was tan and had light hair. The horse looked as if it was licking her face which made Yelena laugh like you had never heard before. Suddenly, you had discovered your favorite sound.

Before you got too sucked in, you looked at the others and could tell by the smile on their faces that they had all matched.

Steve then began coming around to each of it to teach us how to place the halters and saddles on each of the horses. Each of us had to know how to do it on our own in order to even ride the horses. The process was straightforward and before you knew it you were leading each of your horses outside for your next mission.

You joined Kate and Kamala where they stood with their new companions and you were surprised to find Yelena standing by them as well, conversing with Kate. “Hey!” you smiled and they all greeted you.

“Did you see how pretty my horse is?!” Kamala asked you. “Her name is Pumpkin.”

“Mine is Ember.”

“Aw, that’s so cool!”

“What about you, Kate?”

Kate patted her horse on the side. “This is my boy Angus.”

“What happened to Lucky being your one and only?” you sarcastically asked.

“Oh hush. What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

“What about you, Yelena?” you daringly asked. “What about your horse?”

She smiled from ear to ear. “This is Jackie and we match! Look at our hair.” She held up a strand of hair to her horse and the blonde matched the other. “Plus, she’s short like me!”

You had never seen Yelena this excited about something. Granted, you had not spent much time around her, but she seemed like a generally dissatisfied person about things. You were happy to see her so thrilled over something. Your heart seemed to be skipping a beat more than it usually does.

“Now that we’re all here together again, we’ve made it past the easy part. It’s time to connect and ride with your new horse so you’re more prepared to fight out there. We’re going to take turns in the arena so each of you have time to feel them out,” Steve explained.

You took a deep breath and tried to calm your nerves for what was to come. You didn’t know what to expect out of this but you tried to keep an open mind.

People went before you and you watched a couple fall, but more often than not, everyone succeeded. Kate went in pretty neutral and she only seemed to falter once, but she looked as confident as ever; no surprise there. Kamala went in too strong and it paid off for her. She rode around as fast as the wind, only riding with her heart and not her head. It always somehow worked for her.

Then came Yelena. Due to her previous reaction over her new match, you expected her to do decently. When she stepped out on the dirt, she thrived. She looked as if she had ridden every moment of her life. She looked like she belonged out there. It made your whole body seem to relax and prepare for your turn. Her radiance made your sense of self skyrocket.

It was now your turn and you entered the arena with Ember to guide you. Once you jumped on, you slowly tried your hand at guiding him around the fence.

“Nice job, boy. You got it.” You were really feeding the compliments to yourself so you wouldn’t chicken out. It was the only thing taking your mind off of your possible failure. That, and the fact that Yelena was staring at you from behind the fence. It was something you couldn’t get out of your head, but it was also clouding your judgment. You needed to focus on what was in front of you.

You tapped your foot against Ember’s side to signal he could speed up. You seemed to get a hang of it fairly quickly and you were proud. He kept his pace at a stride but you wanted to push it farther.

“Come on, boy. Let’s pick it up a bit,” you instructed him. He started lightly running so that you could test out the water.

You smiled as he galloped around the arena. You were ecstatic that it was going so well. You looked over by the fence to see Kate and Kamala clapping and cheering you on. To the right of them at the edge of the fence stood Yelena who was smiling directly at you. She had her arms leaning over the front of the fence with her flannel buttons opened slightly, causing your arms to turn into jelly. Her braided blonde hair was enchanting, so much so that you didn’t realize you were about to crash into the fence in front of you.

“Y/n, watch out!” Yelena screamed, but it was too late.

Ember had stopped right in his place, sending you soaring over the top of him and over the fence. You landed on the ground outside the fence and you could already feel your back throbbing.

“Shit,” you groaned, trying to pick yourself up off the ground.

You were surprised to find that Yelena was the first person to reach you. “Are you alright?” she asked you.

“Ask me in about 20 minutes,” you mustered a laugh.

“Let me help you up.” Yelena extended her hand out to you. You grabbed it and she helped hoist you up off the ground. Kate and Kamala soon ran after you.

“Are you hurt?” Kate asked quickly.

“I don’t think so.” You dusted yourself off the best you could and you watched your friend’s faces fall down to stare below your waist.

“Uhm, y/n, you might wanna look down,” Kamala whispered.

You looked down at yourself to find that your shorts had ripped up the side. You gasped and tried to hold the fabric together. Yelena saw your concerned face and, without thinking, she took her flannel off to wrap it around your waist.

Kate and Kamala looked between each other and smirked. The situation was made worse when you tried everything inside of you to keep your cheeks from turning red. Yelena was touching you and she gave you her jacket.

“Clearly I was underprepared,” you chuckled.

“I have just the idea,” Kate said. “Shopping trip!”

“Where in the world are we going to go shopping over here, Kate?” you asked. “I don’t really think there will be a mall chilling in the desert somewhere.”

“Unfortunately, we’re going to have to think smaller. Are you ready for another adventure?”

You sighed. “I guess as ready as I will ever be.”

You kept Yelena’s jacket awkwardly wrapped around your waist as you walked across the grass and into the house to accompany Kate on the shopping trip that you never dreamed of.

.

.

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[haveatthee83]

Under My Skin (Monkey D. Luffy/Reader) 1/7

Inspo: Under My Skin by Jukebox the Ghost

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7

Word Count: ~8.5k

Warnings: Angst, arguing, cursing, angry Luffy, discussion of death and dead relatives, brief descriptions of violence.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

Luffy was a very happy person. Plenty of people thought he might not even be capable of feeling negative emotions sometimes. All of that theorizing got swept away with the tide the day Ace had died. The heart wrenching wails of the young captain were enough to make the sea herself weep. Luffy was a real person who felt things like loss, sorrow, rage, and hate. That last one wasn’t one he felt very often if at all until years later when you came along.

You had guided his crew through your island, a large sprawling summer island with rolling sands and sunbaked stones. It constantly sent shivers of familiarity through Luffy and the crew, thinking back to Alabasta. All the Straw-Hats had their eyes glued to Luffy, making sure he was okay, but there was apparently no need, his large smile never leaving his face as he asked question after question about the area, what foods you had there, if it ever snowed, or where did you live on this massive island. You would answer as best you could, curt, little responses between small smiles. “We have all kinds of different fruits, vegetables, and fish, but we’re known for raising boar for meat.” “It only snowed once, and it practically shut down the whole island. No one knew what to do!” “I live somewhere close by; I’ll show you and make you all dinner! Make sure you have shelter for the night.”

At first, all seemed well, Luffy was constantly engaged by the land around him, taking in the sights as you brought them toward your home, but then-

“SANDSTORM!” Your voice pierced through the air as you hurriedly corralled the pirate crew into your home, slamming the door shut and grabbing a large robe of sorts, throwing it over your shoulders, “Feel free to make yourselves comfy, eat or whatever you need.” You assured, slamming the door shut, shoving a large plank of wood through the handle to keep and wind from blowing it open or off its hinges. “I’ll be right back!” You called over the wind.

The crew watched through scratched and dirty windows as you shoved a bandana over your nose and slapped a hat onto your head. An orange cowboy hat. You took it off of a hook on your porch, tightening its drawstring under your chin. The hat wasn’t particularly offensive in and of itself, of course. It was a simple, bright orange with a red banded set of goggles on the brim, which you promptly slipped off of the hat and over your eyes, their blue tinted glass glinting in the slowly suffocating sunlight. You gave the pirates a two fingered salute through your windows before sprinting toward your dune buggy right by your house, speeding off in a cloud of sand to help your town hunker down for the storm.

Logically, such a fashion choice would mean very little to someone. Logically, it might even make one laugh at the similarity, the irony. Logically, it was just a hat. But the way it was the exact shade, exact cut. The way your goggles mirrored the smiley tokens. The way your own freckles sprawled over your cheeks…there was nothing logical about it. Who the fuck did you think you were?

The Straw-Hat crew collectively held their breath, all eyes on their captain. Luffy’s smile finally cracked.

“Hey! What’s she got that for?” He exclaimed, rattling the front door’s handle, making its old hinges groan and creak.

Nami and Usopp both grabbed their captain by the shoulders, trying to pry him away from the door, “It’s just a coincidence!” Nami insisted, tugging harder,

“Nuh-uh!” Luffy called out, kicking wildly at his crew mates. “That’s Ace’s hat!”

Nami whined, “Sanji! Make some food or something and make him relax! Or else I’m knocking him out!”

Sanji didn’t even take time to swoon, getting right to work, raiding your fridge and pantry, looking mostly for some type of meat for the ravenous man who was rapidly trying to tear down your door. The cook practically chittered with glee as he found your store of the famed Boar meat, quickly making a plan in his mind as to best prepare it in such a quick fashion.

“Calm down!” Zoro chimed in trying to help calm down the out of character behavior. The swordsman whacked Luffy on the head, “You can’t do shit till she’s back, dipshit!” He hissed, palming the captain’s head like a basketball.

Luffy let out a strangled cry of anguish, flopping onto the ground, “Stupid hat.” He muttered.

Nami, Usopp, and Zoro let him fall, jumping back, the crew all looking between each other. They had left Brook and Franky on the ship, Robin was holding Chopper to her side, running a hand along his fur, trying to soothe him, Sanji was whirling away in the kitchen, and the other three were sat clueless as to what to do. How do you make someone feel better when you’ve never seen them like this?

Luffy scowled, scrambling to his feet and rushed to your living room, sticking his face against the glass of a window, leaning against the beat-up mint green couch under it. ‘Ugly couch.’ Luffy thought bitterly.

Luffy wasn’t wrong. Your furniture was a true-blue hodgepodge of different pieces you’d picked up doing odd jobs or found on the side of the road and fixed up. Nothing went together and it all had patches and noticeably repaired wooden pieces.

Luffy’s eyes drove over the sandy landscape, peeled for your shadow coming up the drive, but it wasn’t there, not yet.

The Straw-Hats all gathered in the living room minus Sanji and settled around their frowning captain.

“What should we do?” Usopp whispered to the group, sitting on an obnoxious, yellow velvet ottoman. “I haven’t seen Luffy like this in ages.” He muttered, thrusting a thumb over his shoulder to where the man sat.

Robin sighed, holding Chopper in her lap, sat on a purple, floral print wingback chair. “I don’t think there’s anything we can do.” She started, “He needs to talk to her.”

“It’s not his hat though,” Zoro mumbled, leaning next to your mud brick fireplace, “it’s just another orange cowboy hat.”

Nami nodded, legs swung over an emerald, green love seat, “Surely, he knows that?”

Robin shrugged and shook her head, “It’s just his poor mind dealing with the grief.” She suggested.

“What if she knew Ace?” Chopper whispered into the still air of the room, running everyone’s breath stale.

“We won’t know anything until she comes back.” Robin chastised the small reindeer, “Don’t go and put ideas like that out into the universe. It might make things worse.”

Luffy could hear them talking but chose to ignore it, opting to keep his gaze glued on the sand whipping past the window, fixated on a wind chime you had on your porch that slanted with the wind, a wind chime with large, round, red beads hanging from it. Luffy felt his eye twitch as he set his jaw, teeth grinding a bit.

Robin rose from her seat and set Chopper down in her place, opting to walk around your space and see what you were all about. See if you had any good books or any clues as to why you and Ace shared so many similarities.

She travelled over to a small bookcase you had. One can tell a lot about someone based on their bookshelves. The types of readings they kept, the organization, the Knick knacks shoved between hard covers. Her sharp eyes drove over the disorganized covers and broken spines, her hands tucked neatly behind her. There were all kinds of books, with many glass vases and figurines all throughout. She paused, blinking back her shock a bit when she noticed a picture in a frame on the eye level shelf. It was of you, flames wrapped around your skin, a crooked grin on your face, your head topped by that same hat. Your flames burned bright yellow, a long pole in your hand. You had soot and sweat caked to your skin. You were a glass blower. And a Devil Fruit user. With flames.

‘Oh no,’ she thought, quickly looking over her shoulder to make sure Luffy was still preoccupied. Robin looked back at your photo and sighed, acknowledging the inevitable, and left it in place, looking further. You had books of all kinds, books about navigation, astronomy, anatomy, and sailing. You had thick novels about fantasy realms and thin manuals about forges and various vehicles.

Robin’s hands instinctively reached to grab a book from the third shelf. It was worn, with cracked leather binding. The front of it was rather unassuming, bare other than a small engraving of your name at the top. Robin tentatively opened the book, the insides held together with rings, the pages strung in by hand. The first few pages held photos of you as a child, a clipping of your first haircut, your first tooth that you lost, and Robin found a soft smile spreading across her face at the sight of your young, happy face.

The next section held pictures of you as a teenager, one labeled as your first time using your flames, and you held a terrified expression as the yellow flames licked up your arms. The next page showed you glass blowing alongside an old man, the hat now sported proudly on your head, all smiles all around.

The next page made Robin pause. It was a wanted poster. Your wanted poster. Robin quirked a brow at the bounty and the photo. You were worth a cool billion, and the photo of you looked terrifying, your eye glinting through a gap of your flames, your whole body in shadow, and still you had that hat on your head. Robin didn’t have to wonder long about what you had done, the next set of pages were full of clippings from newspapers from all around the world, detailing the adventures of the formidable “Glass Dragon”. You could allegedly form your body into the components for glass and summon flames all around you, namely your breath, to melt them together and form massive glass structures, and tempered glass armor or shields around yourself.

You were in story after story for different raids on the Marines, amassing a body count, encasing entire ships in bubbles of glass, sinking others with glass cannonballs flung through their hulls. The most recent of these adventures is what raised you past the millions. You had killed a high-ranking Marine. An Admiral.

The newspapers didn’t know why you had done it, what your motives were for targeting the marines with such ferocity, but the following page cleared things up. It was a single, small clipping in the middle of the page. It was just text, didn’t even have a picture. It was a simple story about Marines taking out a small fry pirate ship. On it a crew of thirty-nine were all slaughtered. It was thought that no one survived. The article had a simple quote from the now passed Admiral, “Those animals had it coming! Any who oppose the government and turn to piracy deserve to burn.” The statement made Robin clench her teeth, but she couldn’t help but notice, right under the snippet was a handwritten note. A promise. “One survived. And you’ll all burn for it.” It said with a set of tally marks underneath, twenty-five.

Robin pursed her lips, feeling invasive, but pressed on, flipping the page again, finding a large group photo, the crew who was killed. Right front and center was you, beaming with your arms around the two people at your side. Under the photo it was simply labeled “Last family photo” with a date, only days before the date of the slaughter. Robin’s eyebrows pinched in worry, turning the page. What followed were pages and pages of pictures of the passed crew and you, all singed on the edges, but intact. “The Spotted-Salamander Crew” was what you were called, your Jolly Roger sporting freckles and wrapped in green flames.

One photo that caught the woman’s eye was one labeled ‘Captain’ with birth and death dates under it. In the photo was a young man, no more than twenty, posing for a photo with you wrapped in his arms, more like a headlock, holding the camera high above you two, tipping your hat off of your head. He looked so much like you, with many dark freckles over his cheeks. He had bright green flames licking over his shoulders. ‘Another flame user?’

“Robin!” Came a call from Nami in the living room. Finally, Robin closed the book and set it back in place, striding over to the younger woman. Nami waved Robin closer over the back of the loveseat, “Find anything?”

Robin winced, “It’s worse than we thought.”

“How?!”

“She’s a Fire Devil Fruit user.” She whispered to Nami.

Nami paled, slapping her hand against her forehead, “Please tell me Sanji’s almost done cooking!” She whined.

Sure enough, the blond cook had just finished, placing platters of pork and toppings up onto the counter along with warm corn tortillas. He had made tacos.

“Food’s ready!” he shouted, the crew quickly rushing the counter, “She had a ton of tortillas on hand, so I thought I’d roll with it.” Sanji muttered, wiping the counters down.

The cook’s eyes scanned the crew who were up and getting the food. Luffy wasn’t there. Sanji gasped, hand slapping over his mouth. The other crew members looked at him, confused until he pointed over their heads, frantically gesturing to the preoccupied pirate. “He isn’t getting food!” Sanji hissed, threading his fingers into his hair and pulled. “This isn’t good.”

All six of them shared a look, Nami urging Zoro to say something, anything to their captain. Zoro’s eyes widened and he shook his head, “I don’t know what the fuck to do!” he whispered through gritted teeth. Still, Nami insisted, gesturing again toward the stewing man. Zoro sighed, but turned around, “Luffy!” he exclaimed. Luffy didn’t even twitch, “Food’s ready. There’s meat!”

Luffy didn’t care. He felt his stomach growl and he thought the smell was amazing, but he couldn’t find it in him to get up. He felt in every fiber of his being that he needed to stay put, ready to see what your problem was when you came back.

The Straw-Hats all shook their heads and shrugged, “Let’s just eat, I’ll bring him a plate.” Robin insisted, grabbing a plate. They all did the same, with grumbles of worry and agreement. You didn’t have a dining room, so the pirate crew went back to their spots in your living room, Sanji and Zoro joining Luffy on the couch, the stretchy captain between them.

Luffy didn’t even touch the plate next to him, ignoring the soft conversation around him, barely even blinking.

Usopp scanned the room, noticing a record player next to your fireplace, a box full of vinyl records under its little table. The sniper thought, surely this might help. Luffy loved music and dancing. So, he set his food aside, finishing a bite of the juicy taco before wiping his hands on his pants and getting up, quietly stepping over to the player. He just grabbed one from the top of the pile, sliding it out of its sleeve and setting it up, gently resting the needle on its grooved surface.

Fun, rhythmic music with lots of wild drum and guitar came from the record, Usopp bouncing his head to the beat.

Luffy, on the other hand, tensed, head whipping over to stare daggers at the music player, frown deepening.

“What now?” Zoro groaned through a bite of his taco.

Luffy grit his teeth as he spoke, eyes fiery with rage, “Ace liked that song. Danced to it all the time.” He hissed. The whole room seemed to freeze, Sanji choked on a bite of his food, and Usopp frantically moved to take the needle off of the record. Luffy flopped onto the couch, sitting properly, but with crossed arms and slumped posture. “Who does she think she is? Is she trying to copy Ace or something?” Luffy grumbled, “Thinks she’s so great…”

The room dissolved into silence, the only sound was the occasional rustle of fabric when someone readjusted their posture and the whistling of the whipping wind. And that’s how the Straw-Hats sat for another twenty minutes, Luffy never once even looking at the plate of food.

Everyone flinched, Chopper shrieking as the scrape of wood on wood rang through the room. You were back. Luffy shot up, stomping over to wait for you to force your way through. When the door cracked open, you had to fight to not let it swing wildly, forcing it shut behind you. When you managed to get inside, you unraveled your robe from your body, shaking sand all over the floor before taking off your goggles and hat, shaking them out before shaking out your hair. All the while, Luffy sat patiently, an intense glare piercing through you. You, however, didn’t notice. Giggling as you let the sand fall all around you.

“Woo-ee!” you exclaimed, “Wasn’t expecting another storm like this for another month! Sorry it’s interrupting your visit!” you apologized, kicking off your boots, turning them upside down, letting a comical amount of sand accumulate under you. You noticed the uncharacteristic silence and finally looked up, eyes locking with Luffy’s enraged gaze, flinching back in response.

You eyed the pirate, brows pinched together, but continued hanging up your gear by the door, finally hanging your hat on a hook. “Can I help you?” you huffed, trying to keep it light.

Now, people also thought Luffy was a lot more innocent than he really was. He hung around Shanks, Ace was his brother, he’s a damned pirate. All of which became very clear when he opened his mouth, spitting out, “Where the fuck do you get off, lady?”

You blinked, trying to process the out of character attitude, raising your hands up, “I can’t control the weather, dude.”

Luffy shook his head and stomped up to you, reaching over your shoulder and snatching your hat off its hook, shaking it in your face, “This.” Luffy hissed, “Is my brother’s hat. You have his favorite music; you have a damned wind chime with beads just like his necklace. What’s the fuckin deal.”

You scowled, snatching your hat from Luffy’s hands, “It’s not his fucking hat! I’ve had this thing since I was twelve. My uncle gave it to me!” you snapped back holding Luffy back with your foot, keeping him from grabbing it back from you. You huffed and threw it over your neck, letting it hang behind you, “This whole island is covered in those beads, and it’s not my fault your brother has good taste!”

“Had.” Luffy grumbled, clenching his jaw.

You sighed, running your hand down your face, “Sorry, dude.” You muttered, holding your thumb and forefinger over your eyes, “What was his name?” you asked, not moving your hand.

Luffy narrowed his eyes, a fire burning in his belly, “Ace.”

You shook your head, “Don’t know him.” You insisted, dropping your hand to your side, setting your other on your hip.

“Portgas D. Ace. Firefist Ace.” Offered Nami from the living room, a mere four feet away, the whole crew watching you closely.

You blinked a few times, your mouth running dry, “Portgas is dead?” you whispered, your whole body language dropping immediately. You could almost hear a ringing in your ears, a whisper of his laughter. “You’re…Luffy, his Luffy?”

Luffy nodded, jamming a finger into your sternum, leaning in close, “How do you know him?”

You smacked his hand away, snarling out, “We were friends while I was a pirate. Got along cause of our Devil Fruits.” You stated, holding Luffy’s glare, a few of your yellow flames licking at your shoulders, “He got that necklace from me. All that music from over there is from here, my home island. He was friends with my brother too.” Luffy opened his mouth to lash out another question or accusation, he didn’t know yet, but you cut him off, “He got that hat here. From my uncle.” You insisted, getting in Luffy’s space, almost nose to nose.

“Funny, he never mentioned you.” Luffy taunted, lip curled, and fists clenched at his side.

Your eyes ran cold and Luffy saw your chin quiver, your flames all extinguishing at once, “He talked about you all the time.” You whispered, shoving past Luffy, heading toward your bookcase.

Luffy stuttered for a moment, but shook it off and followed you closely, “Why wouldn’t Ace have mentioned you?”

But you just shoved past him again, an aged leather book in your hands. “Sit.” You hissed, dragging Luffy by his ear to sit on the floor in your living room, plopping next to him in front of your coffee table, slapping the large book onto the banged up, glossy wooden surface.

Robin’s eyes widened as she recognized the book, and all of the other Straw-Hats leaned in close to get a look at what you were trying to show Luffy.

You flipped through the pages, ignoring Luffy’s gripes from beside you, slamming a hand down onto the page you were looking for. “Look.”

It was a set of pages labeled “Portgas” with multiple pictures of you, Ace, and your captain, all laughing, in multiple you three were all covered in flames. Each photo was dated and had little details in the margins like, “tried making s’mores with all of our flames, only Portgas’s tasted good.” “dork” and “always stole my hat”. There were pictures of you three on your ship, on the island, at parties, dancing. Many didn’t have you at all, just your captain and Ace.

“Portgas was older than me, so he hung out with my brother most of the time. He was like a second brother to me.” You started, a sad, faraway look in your eyes.

Robin gasped silently, a hand covering her mouth, ‘Her brother was her captain.’ She realized, flashes of words running past her eyes, namely “No survivors” and “One survived.” Luffy was about to hit a sore spot, but Robin could only look on in horror, unable to stop him.

“We all practiced using our Devil Fruits together and hung out anytime he was able to swing by the ship or by here.” You went on, ignoring Luffy’s brewing emotions next to you, “He was my brother’s best friend.”

“Not my fault your brother has good taste.” Luffy mocked, rolling his eyes. It irritated him how you acted like you had a right to mourn Ace like he did. He wasn’t your brother. He was Luffy’s brother.

“Had.” You whispered; jaw clenched.

The crew around you actively flinched, all looking at each other in a panic. All eyes on you as you rushed to your feet, mumbling about taking a shower. Robin quietly slipped away to check on you, following you down a hallway off the kitchen.

Luffy felt a white-hot shock run through him, making his heart skip a beat. He felt like he should feel bad for making you upset, for reminding you of your dead brother like you had reminded him of his, but he didn’t. He couldn’t find it in him. So, he still stewed, greedily taking in the photos in the book in front of him. Luffy couldn’t help the sting in his eyes as he stared at one particular photo. It was of Ace getting his ASCE tattoo. You were there holding his hand as your brother ran the tattoo needle over Ace’s skin, Ace had a dramatic grimace on his face, and you were right there laughing at him. All three of you were wearing matching orange hats.

“Why wouldn’t he have told me about them?” Luffy muttered, fighting back tears.

His crew all panicked again, unsure of how to continue. “Maybe it just didn’t come up?” Chopper offered, tilting his head to try and meet Luffy’s eye.

“I asked him about the hat. I asked him about all kinds of stuff that’s in this stupid book. He didn’t tell me about it.” Luffy felt the fiery pit of anger and grief bubbling inside him again, “Ace hid this stuff from me.”

Nami slid off of the loveseat she sat on and crouched down to Luffy’s level. “I’m sure he had a good reason.” She said trying to lay a comforting hand on Luffy’s arm. He snatched the limb away, making Nami startle.

“Stop being a brat.” Zoro barked, “You’re being mean.”

Luffy just set his jaw again, tapping his finger on the coffee table, “I’m fine.” He insisted, whirling away to a hallway off of the front door, trying to find somewhere to be alone.

“Let him go, marimo.” Sanji insisted, jutting an arm out to stop Zoro from rushing after him, “I think he needs to cool off.” Zoro just grumbled, settling deeper into the ugly, comfortable couch.

“I don’t know why he’s acting like this.” Robin said apologetically as you rushed around your bedroom, grabbing out clothes and a towel for your shower. “He’s never like this. I’m actually quite worried.”

You shrugged, a wry chuckle slipping from your lips. “I’m sorry I brought it out of him.”

Robin worried her bottom lip between her teeth, “I’m serious, he’s always a bouncy little ball of sunshine.”

“Grief does weird shit.” You reasoned, suddenly freezing your movements, looking far off somewhere, somewhere nowhere near the island, “Is Portgas really dead?” you whispered, clutching the shirt in your hand with a white-knuckle grip.

Robin nodded sadly, “I’m afraid so. He died protecting Luffy.”

Your knees buckled a bit, Robin rushing to catch you. You finally let the tears fall, “Did you see it?” you asked lowly, holding tight to Robin’s arm. Robin simply nodded, running a hand up and down your arm.

“Did he die smiling?” you whispered. Robin flinched back, confused, “All three of us said we’d go down in a fight, and we’d be happy about it, a no regrets kinda thing. That we’d all die with a smile.” You explained, face running wet as you let out shuddered breaths, “My brother did. I’m only alive because he protected me. He died in my arms and was smiling, trying to make me laugh before he died.”

Robin swallowed the lump in her throat, taken aback by the similarities between you and Luffy and Ace. “He did. He passed away with a smile on his face in Luffy’s arms.” She muttered back.

You sobbed, burying your face in your hands, “I’m all alone.” Robin tried to reassure you otherwise, sure you had more people in the town, but you shook your head, “I was about to go looking for Portgas because there’s no one left. I’m an orphan, my uncle raised me and my brother. He’s dead. My whole-“ you choked up, “my whole crew was killed, all I had left was hoping to find Portgas and join whatever crew he was in. Now, he’s gone too. Now I’m being hunted by the Marines and all I have is my house.” You practically spilled your guts to the older woman, leaning into her warm embrace. “I don’t want to die.”

Robin knew what it felt like to be alone, to be an enemy of the World Government, she knew what it was like to be the sole survivor of a massacre even. So, as she looked at the shaking young woman in her arms, flashes of a certain captain’s smile, echoes of her own screams rattled through her mind.

“I WANT TO LIVE!”

Her eyes stung with the threat of tears as she shushed you gently, running her fingers along your spine. Should she have asked first? Yes. Did she? No. Did she regret it? Never.

“Come with us.”

You gasped in a breath, ripping your face from your hands, “But-but your captain-!”

“Will come to his senses.” Robin hummed gently.

You wiped your face and analyzed Robin’s features, looking for any dishonesty and you found none, only gentle eyes and a soft smile. A whole new wave of emotions washed over you, new tears welling over your waterline, and you threw yourself into the woman, wrapping your arms around her neck, sobbing into the high collar of her shirt. Robin just smiled, rocking you in the embrace, gently rubbing your back.

“Thank you.” You whispered through shuttered breath, pulling away and wiping your eyes, “I would love to sail with all of you, if you’ll have me.”

Robin grinned, ushering you to your feet and guiding you toward your bathroom, whispering little bits of encouragement into your ear before leaving you alone in the room, heading back to the living room, still smiling.

You took off your hat from around your neck and set it on the counter, looking at your haggard reflection, no sound but the whistling wind and the scratch of sand against the window. Your eyes were red, face puffy. You stared for a moment at your freckles, hating how much they reminded you of your lost loved ones. You took in the dirt and soot around your face, interrupted by your tear streaks and the pattern of your goggles.

You sighed and turned on the water, letting it heat up and took off your t-shirt, looking at your shoulder in the mirror, namely your tattoo you had there. It circled the muscle of your shoulder, a simple black image of a spotted salamander with fire framing its sides. You had gotten it right after Ace had gotten his, your brother doing the inking, and you had sat much more stable than Ace did.

Swallowing a lump in your throat, you began to strip the rest of the way, walking under the rushing warm water.

“She’s coming with us.” Robin said simply, taking a seat back on the purple chair she had claimed, Chopper coming up and sitting in her lap. The other pirates all winced and voiced their confusion and disagreement, silenced by Robin raising a hand, a fierce look of command shining in her eye. “I’m not asking. I’m telling. She’s all alone with a massive bounty. Besides, she’s a glass blower, and she doesn’t even need a forge to do it. You don’t think that would ever come in handy?” she insisted, not allowing any argument. “If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you.”

Robin used her Devil Fruit abilities to summon a hand on the coffee table, flipping to the pages with your bounty poster, the newspaper clippings of your antics with the Marines, and finally the single clipping that told the story of your passed crew, all the while verbalizing what the group was reading.

The group had gasped at your bounty, Sanji even questioning if the picture was really you, a shiver running up his spine. They marveled at your various escapades, all falling silent when they heard about the dead Admiral, Nami asking what he did to piss you off. The little clipping with your promise and tally made them fall silent, all of them understanding. Zoro saying he’d do the same and more if anything like that happened to the Straw-Hats.

“She’s one of us, whether Luffy realizes it or not.” Robin finished, closing the book. “Now, without Ace, she’s completely alone. No family, all her friends were on that crew, and frankly she’s in danger if she stays here.” She said resolutely, holding Chopper a little tighter in her hands. “I asked, she agreed, she’s coming.”

The crew all sat back and nodded, silently running the idea through their heads. “What about Luffy?” Usopp finally asked. “He’s having problems breathing the same air as her.”

Robin shook her head, “He’s grown. He can cope.”

The other pirates all huffed out laughs, a few rolled eyes here and there. “How do we tell him?” Sanji asked.

Nami waved him off, “Let’s wait until tomorrow. Maybe we should wait until we’re like a day away from leaving.” She suggested, “But we shouldn’t tonight. We need to get Luffy to bed and reassess in the morning.”

Little verbalized agreements sounded out from the group.

Luffy found his way into a large, dark room. He groped around the wall to find a light switch, flipping it quickly when he found it. The space lit up and he saw he was in a room with a metal roof and walls. The windows were all fogged from the abuse of years of sandstorms just like this one. The room was full of colorful glass sculptures, they seemed to cover every surface, a rainbow of fragile art in all different shapes and sizes. Luffy walked up to a particular table full of clear glass bottles, a bucket of corks next to them. Each bottle was perfectly uniform, the only reason he could tell them apart was some of them had small bubbles in their surfaces.

He picked one up and looked at it closely, noting some words on the bottom of it. Luffy flipped it over and read it. “Dragon Glass Co.” Luffy glowered at the name, setting it back onto the table and continued exploring. In one area there was a table full of tools, all different types of hammers, pliers, and wrenches scattered all around. In the middle of the table was a wooden box, holes predrilled into the lid, ready for hinges. The box’s lid had a window of green glass, flame etchings on the surface.

Over the workbench sat pictures all over the wall. Pictures of you with an old man, here in this room. Pictures of you and the guy Luffy assumed was your brother goofing off and having fun. There was even a picture of Ace, an embarrassed blush all across his face as he held up a measly glass sculpture, a little orange…blob. The frame had a little plaque, “Portgas’s first time.” Luffy frowned at the double entendre, not appreciating the joke. Luffy turned away from the wall of photos and sighed, sliding down against the wall, curling up his knees into his chest.

Luffy loved his friends, loved his crew with his whole heart, but it wasn’t the same. First, he lost Sabo, then Ace, and it bored a hole into Luffy’s heart, his soul, his very being. He thought he had dealt with it well, thought he had coped like he was supposed to, but there he was, hopelessly and irrationally angry at a woman for just…being friends with his brother. Well, it was more than that to him. It ran way deeper than just that, and Luffy just couldn’t shake the thought, ‘Why didn’t Ace tell me about her? About her brother? Any of it?’ Ace told him everything, or so he thought. Ace would even tell him all kinds of little things like how he liked his eggs, how he hated wearing shirts most of the time because the seams irritated his skin and overheated him with his Devil Fruit. He’d sit and tell Luffy about girls, about his day, about life and love and death and everything in between. But he never mentioned you and it ate at Luffy, like a termite biting at a house’s foundation. ‘Why?’

You padded into the living room, hair still dripping a bit onto your bare shoulders. You had changed into a simple cropped tank top and soft, flowy pants, and still you had your hat hanging from your neck. You didn’t usually wear it around the house, but Luffy’s ranting and snatching made you protective, so it never strayed far from you. “Hey, guys.” You said, sitting next to Nami on the loveseat. “Let me know when you’re ready to turn in for the night and I’ll show you to your rooms.”

“How big is this house?” Usopp asked incredulously, “It looked kinda small from outside other than the big metal garage.”

You shrugged with a smile, “It’s compact, but there isn’t any space wasted.” You said, smile dropping a bit as you continued, “Used to have a lot more people in it.”

Zoro reached over and kicked Usopp in the knee, “Nice going.” He chided.

“It’s okay.” You assured the guilty looking sniper, “It’s just a little raw today.”

Robin’s eyes shot wide, one twitching slightly as she remembered the dates. It was the day before the three-year anniversary of the slaughter of the Spotted-Salamanders. ‘Could any of this get any worse?’

“It’s my brother’s birthday tomorrow.” You muttered, curling your knees up to your chest.

Robin almost choked, ‘I should have read those dates more carefully!’

“It’s also the day he died.” You went on. The Straw-Hats tensed in sympathetic winces, “Marines got a jump on us cause we were all celebrating on the ship. I’m sure you read the articles,” you said, gesturing to the book still on the coffee table. “Made me think twice about being your tour guide, but I thought it’d be a nice distraction.” You said with a light giggle, drawing a snort of a laugh from Zoro and making Robing bite back a chuckle.

“A beautiful woman such as yourself shouldn’t have to go through such suffering.” Sanji said, ever the flirt, eyes practically heart shaped as he stared at you.

You blinked at the man, confused, “Aren’t you like 30?” you asked flatly.

Sanji practically collapsed, “I’m twenty-one!” he whined.

You shrugged, “The facial hair threw me off, sorry.”

“Don’t worry-“ Zoro cut him off with a harsh smack to the back of the head, stopping him from continuing his flirting.

“Shup up, you perv.” He hissed, “She’s not interested.”

Sanji flung himself back up, “Like she’d be interested in you, moss head!”

“I never said that!” Zoro growled, clenching his hand into a fist.

“Cause it wouldn’t happen!” Sanji exclaimed, sticking out his tongue in mockery.

You frowned, “No fighting under my roof, or I’ll make you help me sweep out my house from the dunes when the storm stops.”

“We’ll help you do that anyhow, sweetheart.” Robin assured you, Chopper agreeing in her lap.

You bobbed your head, mulling something over, “Then I’ll make them do it with their hands.” You chided, wiggling your brows at the blanching boys. “In wet bathing suits, then you’ll really feel that sand where you don’t want to.” Making the cook and swordsman fling apart, facing away from each other on their respective ends of the couch.

Nami and Usopp spluttered out laughs, Robin only chuckling quietly.

“You two aren’t my type anyway.” You teased.

Nami perked up, “Who is?”

You kinda shrugged, “I always go for brunettes who make me laugh,�� you chuckled.

Usopp’s mouth worked faster than his brain sometimes, “Did you date Ace?” his crew members immediately sending Usopp glares.

Your face dropped in pure mortification, “Portgas was older than my brother! And was gross! Do you have any idea how rank his pits could get? And he practically was my brother after a while.” You explained, nose scrunched in disgust, “I’ve seen that man make out with a fish when he got drunk,” You started, numbering out the reasons as you spoke, “I’ve had to help him run away from his angry exes on multiple occasions, cause he always was an ass boyfriend to them cause he only existed as a goofy noncommittal flirt when he got around anything with lip-gloss and boobs,” you started to laugh as you went on, enjoying the smiles all around you, “I mean, the longest relationship I saw him have was his friendship with my brother! One time my whole crew had to bail him out because he was being chased off an island because he hooked up with a mafia boss’s daughter the day of her wedding. In the church!” you exclaimed. “I’d have a better time looking for a boyfriend in Impel Down!” The room erupted into laughter; deep belly laughs as you told your stories.

“So Luffy’d be more your type?” Nami teased without thinking. Her eyes shot wide when she realized what she’d said, trying to take it back.

You grabbed her waving hands and told her it was okay, a soft chuckle rumbling through you. “I don’t really know what he’s normally like,” you started, letting Nami’s hands go, noting the heavy tension in the air, “but from what you guys keep saying, yeah, honestly.”

The Straw-Hats let out a collective sigh and relaxed back into their plush seats. “He really isn’t like this.” Chopper chimed, “He’s normally super nice and funny.”

You nodded and shrugged, “Maybe he’ll warm up to me.”

“I’m sure he will.” Chopper insisted with a yawn.

Robin smiled down at the young reindeer, “Sleepy, Little One?” Chopper tried to say no, but a big yawn interrupted him. “Mind showing us where we can get some sleep?”

You nodded and popped up out of your seat, gesturing for everyone else to do the same, “I’ll show you all at the same time.” The whole crew followed you as you walked into the hallway off of the kitchen again, walking past a few open doors to the left, one was the door of a small bedroom with two twin beds, one quite messy and obviously slept in, the other made neatly, dust settling on the headboard. The other door was of a small bathroom, “This is the only bathroom, so share. No fighting.” You said, eyeing Zoro and Sanji with a playful glare. “Feel free to use the shower, I don’t care if you use my soap and stuff.” The group then turned to the right, being met with a large, closed door. You shoved through the group and popped open the door, flipping a light switch, “You all can sleep in here.” You said, ushering the pirate crew into the large room.

It was a simple room, as were most things in your house, with a few windows around two of the walls, a glass door to the outside on one wall. The room had three bunk beds, all securely bolted to the wall and the ground, one up against a wall, the others sat parallel, two hammocks connecting each of them around the top. The room had plenty of space otherwise, taken up by bedrolls and fluffy rugs over the cool stone floor. The walls were covered in haphazardly placed hooks for coats and hats, otherwise scattered with more photos and a few, ornate glass flowers and starburst sculptures hanging from the ceiling, bathing the room in rainbows of light.

The pirate crew filed in with mouths agape in awe, an instant feeling of home filling all of their chests. “Wow,” Nami breathed out, “This is really nice.”

You had a soft smile on your face, gently holding the doorframe, “This used to be where my crew would crash between our voyages.” You said, exaggerating the last word, “My house became our little dry base of operations. Which makes sense cause my brother was the captain and I was the first mate,” you chuckled.

“You didn’t say you were first mate,” Zoro stated with a furrowed brow.

You shrugged, “Never mattered.”

“Did you make these?” Robin asked, reaching a hand up to touch a blue starburst.

“Yup! Made em with blood, sweat, and tears…and a bit of me,” you laughed at the perturbed faces of the pirates around you. “Here, watch!” you exclaimed, shooing everyone away from you in a wide berth, placing a rounded fist to your lips, blowing through the gap. The pirates all watched in curious awe as a small, molten hot balloon of glass blew out of the other end of your fist, using your free hand to cradle the glass. All the while, small yellow flames licked up your arms and flicked around your face, most of them blowing into the bubble of glass in your hand. When the glass was about the size of a coconut you took your fist away from your mouth, pinching your hand closed, grabbing the glowing glass with your free hand, both of which were glowing with heat. You quickly got to work pinching at it, pushing and pulling at its shape with ease, making it into something the Straw-Hats couldn’t quite make out yet. When you were satisfied, you held the glass out in front of you, the glow dying from your hands and the glass. When it fully cooled, the Straw-Hats were able to see that it was a small, red sculpture of Chopper! Little hat, hooves, and all! You carefully knelt down in front of the reindeer, handing it to him with care.

Chopper took it eagerly, shocked at the cold, solid feeling, “It’s me!” he exclaimed, a giddy smile on his face.

You nodded right back, a big smile on your face, “You can put it in your window and watch it make some of your room red.” Chopper excitedly handed the glass off to Robin next to him, launching you into a quick hug before a loud yawn sounded next to your ear, making you giggle. “Where do you want to sleep, Chopper?” you asked, holding him to your shoulder as you rose.

“Hammock,” he said sleepily, pointing with a hoof at the closest one. You complied quickly, placing him into the swinging fabric, tucking him into a plush pillow.

The other human pirates huddled around Robin, looking closely at the small sculpture of their little reindeer doctor, enamored with the detail.

“So cool!” Usopp whispered, poking at glass Chopper’s head.

“You guys ready to sleep?” you asked, startling the group other than Robin who had watched you walk up.

Zoro and Usopp nodded, climbing into different bunk beds with little “Good night”’s.

Sanji and the girls looked between themselves, “I don’t usually go to bed until pretty late, cause I’m prepping breakfast.” The cook said with a shrug.

You waved him off, “Don’t even think about it, I’ll make breakfast in the morning. Take an early night.” You commanded, shoving him toward one of the bunk beds. Sanji put up no fight, just awkwardly shifted under the covers, a little unsure of what to do with himself.

You then turned to the girls, curious what their reasons were.

“I refuse to sleep in the same room as that pervy cook.” Nami said simply, crossing her arms.

You just shrugged, “You can take my bed.” You suggested.

“I can’t take your bed.” She declared, the heat of embarrassment flushing her cheeks.

“I insist.” You assured, “Just don’t touch the other bed. You’ll know which one’s mine. My name’s on the headboard.” You gently shoved Nami into the hallway, turning away so she couldn’t argue, looking at Robin with a quirked brow.

“I want to make sure Luffy gets to bed first.” Robin said, guiding you by the middle of your back out of the room, flicking off the light but keeping the door open. “You head to sleep, and I’ll grab him.” She whispered.

You nodded and walked away from her, into the living room and plopped onto the beat-up couch, grabbing a blanket off the back and relaxing into one of the plush pillows you had there, resting your hat over your eyes, “Light switch is by the front door, sleep well, Robin.” You said, voice muffled by the hat over your face.

Robin smiled and went ahead and flicked off the light by producing a hand out of the wall, her night vision better than most. Robin quietly strode down the hallway Luffy had stormed off into and quickly found a single door, opening it as silently as possible.

When inside, Robin’s eyes searched the workshop, taking in all of the colors, mostly looking for a certain straw hat. Her eyes locked onto the curled-up figure of her captain, his eyes staring blankly, straight ahead.

“Captain.” She called, walking her way over to him, crouching in front of him. His eyes never moved, staring through her, “Captain, it’s time to go to sleep.” She said softly. Luffy didn’t even acknowledge her, “I’m going to give you one more chance to get up on your own, or I’m dragging you to bed kicking and screaming.” Robin stated, resting a hand on the young man’s head.

Luffy took her hand off his head, “I’m not tired.”

Robin shook her head with a smile, “It’s late, you’re usually asleep by now. Let’s get you to bed.”

“Why does she get to know all this stuff, why’d she get so much time with him?” Luffy asked, tears pricking at his eyes.

Robin’s heart pulled, “I don’t know, Luffy. These things happen, and sometimes we never know why.” She whispered, “Maybe you could ask her to tell stories about Ace, learn what she knows about him. I’m sure he’d be happy to know you two were getting along.”

A few tears fell from Luffy’s eyes, “If he would be happy we were around each other, why’d he never tell me about her?” he insisted, shoving his face into his hat.

Robin pursed her lips and sighed, “I don’t know, Luffy. But you’ll never get an answer unless you get to know her properly.” Luffy shrugged, face still hidden, “C’mon, let’s go to bed.” She urged, grabbing the young man’s hand and rising to her feet, Luffy reluctantly standing with her.

When they stood straight, Robin gently took Luffy’s hat in her hands and pushed it back onto the top of his head, exposing his watery eyes and red nose. Without a word, Robin pulled him into a hug, resting her chin on top of his head. They stayed there for a while, who knows how long, until Luffy yawned, making Robin pull back.

Silently, Luffy let the older woman guide him through the dark house into a room with windows that filtered in a bit of light, the light snores of his crewmates filling Luffy’s ears. Robin gestured to the beds and hammocks, waiting for Luffy to choose where he wanted to sleep, and he slowly trudged his way toward one of the hammocks, hoisting himself up into it. Robin followed closely, helping him settle into the covers.

When her captain was comfortable, she patted his chest and slipped toward the empty bunk bed, the boys taking over two. She cuddled under the covers, looking at the bed above her. She was drifting off to sleep, her eyes fluttering shut. That’s when they snapped open, landing on a small, white envelope tucked between the boards above her. She reached up and tugged it out of its confines, reading the envelope in the dark. It had Luffy’s name on it, and it said it was from Ace. Robin’s heart dropped into her feet as she realized what it said. She quickly shoved what she thought might be a letter into her pillowcase, her heart beating rapidly in her chest. What could be in that letter? Why was it hidden in your house if it was for Luffy?

[starkskeep]

From amongst the clouds came the flames (r. stark)

From amongst the clouds came the flames r. stark imagine

Pairings - Robb Stark x Targaryen!Reader

Word Count - 2,307 words

Warnings - Brief mention of assault (non-descriptive), arranged marriage

A/N - A lot of the thoughts of the reader in this imagine, I do not agree with. I wanted to experiment with an unreliable narrator, and thus, mc's experiences will alter how they see the world around them.

Request - don’t know if you still accept requests but could you please write an imagine with Robb and a Targaryen reader who have agreed to an alliance in order to conquer against the lannisters but they always butt heads and she always goes against his words until one night he kind of admits his feelings for her mid argument and they kind of… you know.

You had never expected to be where you were now. As the only living child of Elia Martell and Rhaegar Targaryen, you knew that it was your blood right to sit upon the Iron Throne. The gods had spared you when Tywin Lannister’s Mad Dog stormed the Red Keep and brutally murdered your mother and siblings. A childhood illness had kept you in the arms of your nursemaid that night the woman was quick thinking enough to sneak out through the servant’s quarters amidst the chaos. Pretending you were her child until you were well enough to sail, the faithful servant brought you to Dorne where you were raised by your mother’s family. Treasured by the Martells as the last living connection to Elia, you grew up wanting for nothing. Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken. There was never anything that stood in the way of you getting what you wanted.

That is why it was so surprising, as you stood in Oberyn’s chambers at Sunspear, that you heard of how Oberyn was planning to take you far north. He planned to align with the self-proclaimed King of the North and the Trident. “Doran should have never agreed to take Myrcella Baratheon as a ward, much less give her a place in our family. Accepting a Lannister’s deal? It is an insult to Elia’s memory.” Your favorite uncle spits out. He stops pacing and whips around to face you, looking like his moniker amongst the flickering candles. “Dearest niece. I have arranged an alliance in order to combat my brother’s moronic decisions. Tomorrow morning, you will board a ship that will take you to the Riverlands.”

You stare at your uncle in shock. “The Riverlands? But that is where…You are giving me to the Starks? Selling me off to the boy king? I thought I meant more to you than that. I thought the memory of my mother meant more to you than that.” All your life, you had been told of how your father abandoned your mother for Lyanna Stark. He left your family—his wife and children—to die in the Red Keep in the most horrific of ways because he wanted to pursue the Northern woman. You do not fully blame Lyanna. She was a young girl and Rhaegar was the crown prince of the Seven Kingdoms; it would have been hard for her to deny your father. Yet, you do not hold much kindness in your heart for the Starks. From their blood came the final thread to unravel the tapestry of House Targaryen.

The blood rushing past your ears limits how much you actually hear from your uncle, but you know the words that made it pass ring true. “This is a marriage that you are talking about. You know that they will not agree to an alliance unless it is bound by an oath. The Starks believe Lyanna to have been stolen away by my father. They sided against the Targaryens in Robert’s Rebellion. An alliance with them will have to be ironclad for them to even begin to think about helping me. They are not like us. They despise the Dornish tendencies. I will be trapped in a marriage with a man that I do not even know, much less love, unable to find comfort outside of it.” There is pain lingering in the shadows of your words. Dorne is the only home you have known and now you are being forced out of it by your very family. Being sent into the cave of the wolves nestled in an environment very different from the one you grew up in.  

Oberyn looks at you with pity. He wishes that there was another course of action that he could have taken in order to give you the Iron Throne on a golden platter. “Yes. It will be a marriage. I will not deny that. It is what Catelyn Stark and I have arranged. She has assured me that her son will not harm you. That is the only thing I can promise you from it. You will have your power. You will have your revenge. In that, you will find your happiness.” Your uncle walks over to you and draws your shaking form into his arms, trying to bring you comfort after his words took it from you. “You will sail to Riverrun in the morning. I have ensured that you will be allowed to bring your dragon. Nym, Obara, and Tyene will join you. They will serve as your companions and as your protectors.” A kiss is placed on the crown of your head. “You will not be alone. I swear to you.”

The journey from Dorne to Riverrrun was long. Made longer by a route carefully constructed in order to avoid detection. Extended even more by the events that will occur once you reach your destination. You are not someone who appreciates being married off. As you exit the ship, swallowing the rising bile in your throat, you spit the bonfires burning in the wolf king’s war camp. Though you do not want to admit it, the army that fights for him seems quite large and will likely fit your needs quite well. 

Your small retinue is met by one in turn. A woman you infer to be Lady Catelyn Stark greets you with pity in her eyes. She sees her daughters in you. A young woman suffering from the actions of her parents and their cruel world. The others that join her are most definitely not pitying you. Their eyes are hardened. The Northmen do not trust Targaryens or the Dornish and your hair and features certainly mark you as the blood of both. You are led into the castle of Riverrun and then escorted into the makeshift war council room. Your cousins are forced to wait outside, not allowed inside, and not trusted enough to be privy to the inner workings of the Northern Army. Silencing what you know are protests brewing with one glare, you step inside. Robb Stark and his closest advisors are huddled around a table. Tension fills every crevice of the room. It suffocates you.

Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken. The words of your mother’s house ring in your head as you curtsy. You may show deference to your future husband at the moment but you will never be something to be controlled. “Greetings, Your Grace. It is an honor to be welcomed here in Riverrun.” The words are like poison on your tongue. They taste vile. It is a miracle that you are able to keep your voice and your expression from betraying your true feelings.

Robb looks you up and down. He observes the way you stand, your facial ticks, and the controlled lilt of your voice. You are pretty. The proof of the stories told about House Targaryen’s beauty stands in front of him. With the looks of a queen and pure ambition burning in your violet eyes, there is no doubt that you will make a powerful ally. A true leader fit to rule beside him as long as his people can overcome their historic distrust of your ancestors. You are the blood of the dragon. To Robb, you are an enigma that can never be tamed. “Aye. We have prepared what we had for your arrival.” The Northern king eyes those that surround him, judging their reaction to you before continuing to address you. “I did not want to be a king that had his wife chosen for him. I was raised as a lord with the promise to marry for love. It seems like we are both being forced into this marriage. I do not want to meet you in the Godswood full of false hope. This will be a transactional marriage only. The buildup to this will not be extended. You and I will marry tonight once you have bathed and rested. Do you have any objections to this?”

There are no objections from you nor from anyone else in the room. They all know why this marriage is occurring. You will being Dorne into an alliance with them. Though Robb has expressed no desire for the Iron Throne, those on his council that do believe that you will provide legitimacy for him in the eyes of the people. A Targaryen returned to power by a Stark that rules beside her. The ceremony is rushed. You are wedded and bedded before the sun rises the next morning. A new era begins as the first rays shine over the lands of Westeros. 

A marriage of equals proves to be much more butting heads rather than intriguing conversations. There are very few conversations between you and Robb that end in anything other than an argument. How you should act, how you should speak, how Robb should address you etc. The previous argument was about how the food being served at Riverrun was too bland for your taste. You and your cousins were used to the flavorful spices of your home’s dishes. You won that argument and watched on in barely concealed glee as the faces of Robb’s men reddened as their palates were introduced to new tastes. The argument before that was about how the dragon has taken to antagonizing Robb’s men. You explained that your dragon was bored. You were not being allowed to take it on flights as you were in Dorne for fear of your safety. Robb won that argument and your dragon was moved to a field a good distance away from the war camp.

“My queen, you cannot expect a man to be comfortable with sending his wife onto the battlefield.” Robb looks you dead in the eyes as he speaks. He is in total disbelief that his wife wants to join him in the march south. He was raised by his mother and Lady Catelyn is a proper lady. The only girls Robb knows who would willingly ride into battle is the Mormonts of Bear Island and his little sister. 

“Me aiding your army with my dragon is one of the reasons we were married. You need me and my beast just as much as you need the Dornish men.”

“I do not care if it is for a second or for a week. A battlefield is not a place for a noblewoman, especially if that woman is my wife and the queen of my people. You will not be put in harm’s way. I have already made up my mind. I will not have my queen join me in battle. This decision is final.”

“I have brought you my dragon and my uncles’ armies yet you still deny me a place beside you. I cannot believe this!”

Authority seeps into Robb’s voice as he responds once more, frustrated with your lack of understanding. “My queen you do not��cannot—understand where I am coming from because you never lived in war. Your entire existence has been one of privilege and freedom. You have never been denied a meal. You have never had to lose a friend to war. You have never had to deliver news of a son’s death to a weeping mother.” Robb shakes his head. “I will not risk the safety of my wife, not while I still draw my breath.”

“I lost my entire family to war and the Lannisters when I was just a babe. It was pure luck that I was able to escape. My mother was brutally assaulted and killed by the Mountain when Tywin Lannister seized the capital. Because of them, I had to grow up without my parents and my siblings. Do not lecture me like I am one of your men.” You spit out. Indignant fury coats every word.

“I am sympathetic but it will not change my decision. Bringing you into battle with me would put everything and everyone at risk. The Lannisters will want your head even more than they want mine. You are the greatest threat to their reign.”

You know you will not be able to win this argument nor will you be able to convince Robb to let you join him in the march. Instead, you turn to leave with a plan already forming deviously in your mind. When you reach the doorway, you turn to have the last word. “I shall sleep in my own chambers tonight. Do not expect me in your bed tonight, Your Grace.” The title is sneered mockingly upon your departure. 

A/N - I'm sorry this took so long to post. My life was consumed by schoolwork. I wanted to get this out for the anon who requested it. There will be a second part that reveals MC's plan and it will include the requested smut. It wasn't meant to be two parts but the imagine was already quite long by the time I reached this end. It would be far too much if I were to include the plan and the smut in one part.

[g0ry0re0]

"One Love, One House", Josh Futturman (Future Man, 2017, TV Show) - Imagine

Description: AU where Josh never beats Biotic Wars. Instead, he lives with you (his partner) in a cozy little apartment in L.A. / Josh Futturman x GN!Reader

General Notes: Established Relationship, Gender Neutral Reader, Pure Fluff/Comfort, Second Person POV, Lots Of Physical Touch (some a bit sensual/intimate?), Not A Lot Of Dialogue, Reader Has Some Internal Dialogue (“italics”)

Author's Note: Posting my first official imagine on tumblr, yippee! Also, my titles will almost always be inspired by songs ("Sweater Weather" by The Neighborhood, song link at the bottom of the post). Enjoy this short blurb!

Word Count: 1,031 Words

California needs the rain, that's what everyone always says, and you agree. You love the rain...

Just not right now. You did not have the best day at work and leaving was all you could think about. On top of that, driving in Los Angeles was already terrible enough. But when it rained? God, you wanted to be home already.

Mental and physical state being in rough condition, you finally hop in your car at the end of the day and start the twenty-minute drive back to your apartment (though, in reality, it was an hour's drive with this weather and L.A. traffic). Your safe haven.

Walking into your apartment felt like the weight of the entire world finally lifted off your shoulders. Your back cracks as you roll your shoulders to slip off your jacket, the warmth of the room enveloping you as you leave your shoes by the door and walk into the adjacent room, the living room (a.k.a. The Game Room, as dubbed by you and Josh the moment you moved in).

You could see Josh's messy hair popping up over the couch, facing away from you with his headset on. He must've gotten out of work early. Not totally unusual, but still welcome nonetheless. You're not sure if he knows you're home as he seems very entranced by his game. Of course, he was playing Bio Wars again, he couldn't get enough of that game. Sure he played others, as well as some with you, but he was addicted to that game in particular.

You walk around the couch, him still not taking his eyes off the screen until you plop down across from him and put your feet up on his lap, immediately relaxing your sore bones by lying along the couch. He jumps a little but finally faces you, just for a brief moment, and flashes you a smile before turning back to his game.

"Hey, hun. How was work?" He asks distractedly, but still smiling, clearly happy that you're home now.

"Not great," you sigh and rest your forearm over your eyes. "Everything hurts. Happy to finally be home, though." You mumble, already feeling your eyes flutter shut from exhaustion.

Josh hums in response, seemingly hyper-focused on his game, but he was listening. He always listened to you.

You both sit together, basking in the contentedness of the moment. The warmth of the apartment was amplified by the warmth you felt from your feet resting on Josh's lap. The aches in your body were slowly melting away the longer you lay on the couch, your breathing starting to slow down. It was quiet, but the sound of rain could be heard faintly from the somewhat open (broken) window in your kitchen, gently watering the half-dead tiny plants sitting on the window sill. You could also vaguely hear Josh's game coming from his headset, the ambiance slowly bringing you a sense of peace.

You remove your arm from its resting spot on your face and cross both over your stomach, wrapping yourself up almost cocoon-like. Your eyes are still closed, and your breathing slows even further, despite your efforts to fight off the sleep you so desperately need. You can feel Josh set down his controller on the side of the couch and you can hear indistinct voices coming from his headset. Must be some kind of cutscene.

Suddenly, you can feel Josh's rough hands squeezing your feet. Your closed eyelids flutter a bit and you sigh out of appreciation. Josh seemed to appear distracted more often than not, but he always paid attention to what you communicated to him, both verbally and subtly. This man adored you, he practically worshiped the ground you walked on. He would do whatever he could to see you smile, and right now, the signals bouncing off your body were telling him that you needed a little more attention than what he was currently providing.

He promptly paused his game and took off his headset, placing it on the coffee table before looking over at you. You weren't asleep yet, but you were dangerously close. He gently smiled at how serene you looked, probably staring for a bit too long before he snapped out of it. He tapped your left knee, prompting you to open your eyes and maintain eye contact with him for longer than two seconds since you got home. He was still smiling gently at you as he brought his legs up on the couch and started crawling between yours. He slowly made his way to you, softly caressing your calves, your thighs, and your hips with his hands along the way before laying his head on your stomach and beginning to settle down.

He rests his hands on the sides of your waist now, tenderly squeezing while making the rest of his body comfortable between your legs and on the couch. Your arms untuck themselves from around your torso as he does this. You rest one of your hands on his head, scratching delicately, pulling a deep, contented sigh from him. He mumbles something unintelligible as he relaxes against you, pushing a quiet, single laugh from you.

"What'd you say, love?" You ask quietly, continuing to gingerly scrape your nails along his scalp.

"Nothin', just happy you're home." He slurred sleepily before pressing a delicate kiss to your clothed stomach.

He then resumed his position with the side of his head resting against the exact middle of your tummy, his hands still lovingly gripping your sides. You hum happily and close your eyes again, your and Josh's movements both slowing to a halt as you fall into a shared slumber. The warmth you felt earlier has only increased, Josh quite literally working as a weighted blanket, both your body heat keeping one another fulfilled. Any aches you felt before were gone, intertwined bodies relaxing against each other appreciatively. Breaths and heartbeats slowed and in sync, the downpour heard outside and the ever so quiet Bio Wars soundtrack playing from Josh's headset, lulling you and Josh into a tranquil sleep.

Masterlist Link

Divider: saradika and saradika-graphics on tumblr

Gif: harryshumjjr

[like-a-bantha]

Lost/Loss

Summary: Everything changed after Eriadu. Hunter becomes withdrawn, and you can't help but worry about him. You do what you can to show him you're there for him.

Pairing: Hunter/GN Reader (No Y/N, no descriptions of reader's appearance)

Rating: T

Warnings: Angst, mentions of major character death

Word Count: 1.7k

AO3 | Masterlist

One week of radio silence. Our contact was supposed to get back to us five days ago with intel on Hemlock and his captives. Instead, we’ve sat around on Pabu tensely awaiting a holocall that we’re beginning to lose hope in receiving.

Phee was kind enough to offer us room in her home, and free reign of her holotable, to act as a sort of base. It’s been quieter since we were last gathered around this table. The usual boisterous laughter and interrupted rants replaced with worried silence broken every so often by a sea breeze that no longer carries the joyous sound of Omega and Lyana playing just outside. That mission, Hemlock, the Empire, took so much from us; it’s taken an incredible amount of effort from Hunter, Wrecker, and I to not allow these forces working against us to take our hope on top of it all.

Echo and Rex referred us to this contact not long ago, someone who they’d worked closely with during the war, someone they trust. I commed Echo. Hunter advised against it, said it wasn’t worth it, that all we could do now was wait. I snuck out to the Marauder to use the long distance com anyways. Of course, the conversation was brief, and he has as much information as we do. Sit tight. Waiting game. All that.

“How’re they holding up?” His voice low, even with the volume adjusted to its highest setting. He’d mentioned returning to Coruscant last time we spoke, it must be the middle of the night there. We always did have terrible sleeping schedules.

“Not well, but I mean…” I trail off, we both know the reason, we both hold some foolish hope that not saying it will make it less true, “They miss you.”

“But you don’t?” There’s that sass, that glint of normalcy I’ve both craved and feared these past two months.

A laugh escapes me as if on instinct, it sounds foreign, “Nah, thought I’d never shake you. So clingy.”

“You’re one to talk, you do realize it’s 0100 here?”

This, our shared brand of humor and sarcasm, too, feels so distant to me now. Slowly, it comes back to me, “Oh, I’m so sorry, did I wake you up? Were you sleeping?” 

“Like a baby.” His warm chuckle crackles through the com speaker, and mine through his. The silence that follows is warm, easing his way into broaching the question, “I take it he’s distancing himself again?”

I sigh, a deep sigh only brought about by reality, “I get it, I really do — and, honestly as bad as it sounds, I wish I didn’t because this kriffing hurts — but withdrawing like this, I don’t know why he can’t see it’s only making the feeling worse.”

“Have you told him that?”

“‘Course. He just says something about how we can’t give up and stares at the holotable. I don’t want to give up, I can’t give up, I just hate seeing him like this.” 

Echo hums, but just as he begins to respond, static and unintelligible voices play loudly through the speaker. “I’m sorry, I’ve gotta go. Good luck.”

I nod, wiping at my misty eyes as I reach for the switch to end the transmission, “Be safe. Talk soon.”

Silence. Mournful, somber silence echoes through the lonely hull of the once lively ship. Everywhere my gaze falls sits a piece of their history, our history; one of Tech’s unfinished projects, a drawing of the ship Omega had called extra credit, Echo’s favorite brand of instant caf. Unable to withstand the weight of these memories, I decide to take my leave and the silence follows me back to the cottage.

I return to a rare sight: an empty house. No Wrecker sitting at the kitchen counter disassembling and reassembling explosives. No Phee asking him to take it outside. No Hunter hovering over the holotable awaiting a call. No com to tell me to hurry back, mustn’t have been an emergency.

I make my way over to the holotable, fingertips gliding across its rounded edge as I approach Hunter’s usual seat. When I pull out the chair, I’m met with a sight that would normally make me laugh. His shredded scarf that he’s grown so attached to, destroyed on our last mission to gather intel, along with his prized bandana that appears to have shrunken in the wash. The best I can muster is a bemused huff, taking the bundle of abused fabric into my arms as I sit. Suddenly, I’m struck with an idea. It could be a very stupid idea, of course, but a very good idea doesn’t always equate to a very smart idea. It’s a perspective thing and seeing as the only perspective available at the moment is my own, I figure I may as well get to it before more perspectives show up.

After careful work, I neatly fold remaining fabric and stash it in my pack with my tools; as the designated mender of the group, I know firsthand there is no such thing as too many fabric patches. Returning to the table, finished product tucked delicately in my vest pocket, approaching voices grow louder and louder.

“I’m telling you, it looks good! Stop fussing, leave it… yeah, like that,” Phee’s voice nears the door, and I’m sure I hear Hunter grumbling about something. The door whooshes open and my eyes widen with surprise. When I meet Phee’s gaze, she seems to silently plead for backup, “You’re back! What do you think?”

She gestures to an unamused Hunter, visibly fighting the urge to fidget with the hat he’s wearing. It doesn’t look bad on him, very few things would, but he doesn’t exactly look comfortable. Unwilling to hold the spotlight any longer, he grabs the floppy brim and removes it from his head, tossing the garment onto the table as he takes the seat next to me. Unable to help myself, I lean forward with a smile and run a hand through his slightly disheveled hair.

“That bad, huh?” Phee sighs, Wrecker following closely behind as she heads for the kitchen.

“I liked it,” The glee still empty from his voice, even at something that would’ve garnered one of his trademark laughs a few months ago.

“Me, too, big guy.” Phee sets a crate of groceries on the countertop. Wrecker’s taken to cooking. Though he’s been much quieter these days, Wrecker seems like himself again when he’s preparing a meal.

Hunter’s gaze is locked on the table, silences between us were never tense like this. When he speaks, he doesn’t look at me. “How’s Echo.”

It isn’t a question, more of a remark, maybe even an I told you so if I really read into it. I answer it like a question anyway, “Good, but no word from the contact.”

He hums. The silence that follows deems the told you so unnecessary.

I reach into my vest pocket. Now’s as good a time as any. “I made you something.”

He hums again, gaze flicking away from the table for half a second in question. Right now, that’s probably the best I’ll get. I place an open palm on the table before him. After a moment's hesitation he rests his hand atop mine, palm up, and I look to his eyes as I delicately drape a band of maroon fabric with thin gold stripes across his fingers.

Hunter’s expression is unreadable, regarding the gift silently. I bite my tongue, attempting to hold in any preemptive apologies in fear that I may have overstepped. My flat expression shifts only when I see his eyes begin to well up, before the first sorry can push past the floodgates he turns to me with the faintest smile. A smile I haven’t seen in too long. His grip tightens around the bandana as he rushes to pull me into a tight hug. Instantly, my arms wrap around him, tears forming in my own eyes. “I love it,” his voice low, he places a kiss on my temple, “thank you.”

“I’m sorry I can’t do more.” My voice comes out a whisper, all of the words I hold back seem louder. “We’re going to get them back, Hunter.”

“Not without a fight.” He says grimly, holding me tighter, as if he’ll lose me the second he lets go.

“I know,” I pull back to look into his eyes, my hand coming up to cup his tattooed cheek, “but we fight as a team. We can’t keep bottling all of this up, we need to take care of each other, ourselves.”

Hunter rests his forehead against mine as he sighs, “You’re right.”

“I know. How’re you feeling?” He shuts his eyes as my thumb gently ghosts back and forth over his cheekbone.

He thinks for a moment before releasing me, opening his palm to look at the bandana in his hand. “Lost,” he turns the garment over, examining the back, “Loss. I couldn’t protect them. You, Wrecker, Phee, you’re all I’ve got now and I’m afraid I won’t be able to protect you either.”

“Tech protected us. Omega, too. I think it’s cruel to put that duty solely on yourself, Hunter. It’s an impossible weight to carry on your own,” A tear falls from my eye, quickly sliding down my cheek before landing on my pant leg, “please, let me carry some.”

“Giving it away doesn’t sound easy, either.” His own tears threaten to spill over, I hope I never get used to the subtle, somber shake in his voice, “But I’d like to try.”

When he looks up with a sad, weary smile, I can’t help but lean forward and place a small kiss to his lips. I begin to withdraw, but Hunter’s palm cups my cheek and pulls me back in for a longer, gentler and tearful kiss. This time, the silence that follows is peaceful as he rests his forehead against mine once more.

His loose hair falls around his face and I accidentally pull a few strands into my mouth as I inhale. He chuckles a bit as I pull away, a sound I’ve missed dearly. I can’t help but let out a small laugh of my own, reaching up to once again run a hand through his curls, “It’s gotten so long.”

Hunter smiles, turning the bandana over once more before presenting it to me, “Do the honors?”

With a smile and a nod, I take the cloth from his grasp, delicately wrapping the fabric around his head and tying a single knot.

“It’s perfect,” He places a soft kiss to my knuckles, taking my hand in his, “thank you.”

The holotable chirps. Incoming transmission.

A/N: Someone pointed out Hunter's hair looks longer, plus the new bandana, I just had to get this out of my system. Thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed! Let me know what you think, comments mean the world to me! <3

[guilty-pleasures21]

The perfect guy

The project

The new guy

The lie

The new body

The hospital

The first time

The suit

The virus

The escape

Warnings: mentions of sex and a brief description of penetration (p in v).

----------------------------------------------------------

     Miguel held his breath as Dr Connors went over the results of all his medical tests on his tablet. He'd worked extra hard over the past week to get himself to at least the basic level of fitness expected of a living human being. It hadn't been easy, but the presence of his pretty little girlfriend - she was his girlfriend now! He still couldn't believe it - had helped a lot. 

     “All right, everything seems good,” Dr Connors finally decided, looking up to flash Miguel a pleased smile. “You can go home now.”

     ‘Home’. X's house. The place he'd only ever been able to see through artificial cameras for so long. He glanced over at X, buzzing with excitement at the thought of going home with her. She returned his enthusiastic smile, but was careful to maintain some distance between them. 

     ‘I can't show you too much affection while everyone else is around, querido,’ she'd told him after getting off of him that first morning before any of the nurses came in and saw them together. ‘They'll take me off the project if they think I have feelings for you.’ 

     ‘Do you have feelings for me?’ he'd asked, nervous to hear her response. She'd given him a reassuring smile, her features still glowing from sleep and happiness. Dios, she was pretty. 

     ‘Of course!’ she'd replied immediately, scurrying back over to him to give him a kiss on the cheek. ‘I love you, Miguel! More than anyone in the whole world.’ 

     He’d grinned and responded in kind, holding onto that fact as he’d endured the never-ending tests they’d put him through to assess his new body and superpowers.

     Eddie's eyes narrowed in suspicion as he watched the silent exchange between X and her AI. But it wouldn't do any good for him to hurl accusations about their relationship without some form of proof. He slid his gaze over to Miguel and frowned at the dreamy-eyed look the machine-turned-man continued to give X. No matter - he'd be able to find evidence soon enough.

     The first thing he did when they got home was jump onto the sofa, just as he'd seen her do so many times. But he hadn't accounted for their vast difference in size and the sofa gave a loud groan after he'd landed on it. 

     “Miguel! Are you okay?” X asked, her eyes wide with concern as she rushed over to him.

     “Yeah, I'm fine,” he reassured her, sitting up and causing the sofa to let out another creak. “Is it supposed to make that sound?”

     X folded her arms across her chest and wrinkled her nose at him. 

     “No,” she huffed. “You're too strong, Miguel, you can't jump on the sofa like that! You could break it.”

     “I'm sorry,” Miguel apologised quickly, flashing her a sheepish look. “I just … I always see you do it.” X sighed and gave his shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

     “It's okay,” she waved away his apology, her expression melting into a smile. “Just be a little careful. You're a lot stronger than I am.”

     “Okay,” Miguel agreed. He placed a hand over his stomach, feeling it rumble in protest, then he looked back up at X in question. “I'm hungry.” Another feeling he'd quickly learned about after being transferred to his body. Although this one was a negative emotion - one he'd do anything to prevent. X sank onto the seat beside him.

     “I can order some food. Or …” An excited look overtook her features as she thought of an alternative solution. “Do you want to go out? We can get you some new clothes too!” She'd gotten him a few shirts, sweatpants and boxers for after he'd woken up, having measured the dimensions of his body the day before. But she didn't know what he'd feel comfortable in once he'd gotten up and she wanted to give him as much autonomy as she could, considering that his entire life had previously been limited to whatever screen was closest to her. So, she'd held off getting too many things, not expecting them to be confined to the hospital for more than a week. Miguel's lips curled at the ends automatically when he saw the happiness on her face.

     “Okay.” Then he thought of another idea. “Can we go to the supermarket too? I want to buy some groceries so I can cook for you.”

     X grinned at the wholesome request. “You … want to cook for me?”

     “Yes. Food is an important aspect of human relationships,” Miguel recited, quoting the information he'd spent years gathering. “I … want to take care of you, querida.”

     X leaned closer to him and wrapped her arms around his neck, giving him a hug. Miguel responded in kind and curled his arms around her waist, then lifted her onto his lap. Hugging was another expression of human affection - one that he adored considering how soft his precious little girlfriend was. X snickered at the sudden movement - at how easy it seemed for him to just pick her up and move her around. 

     “Miguel …” She pulled back to admire his handsome features, the pure, unadulterated joy on her face causing a warm feeling to seep into his chest. Then she got up and gestured to the door. “¡Vamos!”

     Eddie walked in a circle around Miguel, assessing his suit carefully. Margo had coded the nanobots to stay close to the AI's skin, revealing to his onlookers every curve and line of his imposing muscles. It was a little tight, in Eddie's opinion, but at least it wouldn't restrict his movements or get ripped up in a fight. He stopped in front of the AI and pointed to his hands. “Activate your talons - the suit should rearrange around them so it doesn't rip like fabric.”

     Miguel released his claws and the nanobots re-organised themselves around them, exactly as Eddie had described. “Technically, talons are for birds of prey - I'm a mammal, so these would more likely be considered ‘claws’.”

     Eddie rolled his eyes as he grabbed Miguel's hand to take a closer look. “Yeah, yeah. You're a hyperintelligent AI with access to everything on the Internet. Super impressive.”

     Miguel frowned, his muscles tensing with irritation. He always experienced a lot of negative emotions whenever Eddie was around. It wasn't jealousy - that was when someone else had something you wanted, and this man had absolutely nothing that Miguel could ever want. It was … well, protectiveness when it came to X, offence when the smaller man was being sarcastic and frustration when he wouldn't treat him like an actual human being; a living thing of flesh and blood just like him. Miguel glanced over at X standing by the window and took a few deep breaths when he saw the reassuring smile on her face. Now there was someone around whom he never experienced any negative emotions. She was always so sweet and supportive, so patient with him as he got accustomed to his new body, constantly checking in on him to make sure he felt safe.

     Eddie released his hold on Miguel and turned to face Margo. “Are the cameras working?”

     “Yup!” Margo confirmed, her gaze locked on the screens that reflected Miguel's point of view. “Ready to go when you are.” 

     She looked up and flashed Miguel a thumbs up and an encouraging smile. She could be even more sarcastic than Eddie, but without all the malice that poisoned Eddie's every word. Miguel liked how enthusiastic she would get whenever they discussed his programming - she'd specialised in it, so had more detailed knowledge on the matter than X did. Plus, it felt good to make friends. Miguel nodded in agreement, giving her a smile in return, then turned to Dr Connors for approval. The older man looked up from his position behind Margo and gave Miguel a nod, permitting him to make his way over to the window. Miguel walked over to X and she grabbed his arm when he reached her, then released it quickly so as not to arouse suspicion. 

     “Don't push yourself, Miguel: tell us if anything hurts or doesn't feel right, okay?” she beseeched him, eyes wide with concern. “We'll be tracking you over the cameras and the microphone, so everyone will be able to see and hear everything you say, ¿entiendes?” She paused to give him a warning look and Miguel nodded in understanding - no cheeky flirtations or tender declarations of his love for her tonight. Not until they were home again, at least. 

     “Sí, arañita,” he reassured her. It was a new nickname he'd given her after she'd shared with him all the research she'd done to understand how his spider DNA might affect him. She'd looked so cute, eyes wide with curiosity as she'd thrown at him all the information he'd already gathered with a quick search in his head. He'd asked her a few questions after, just so he could keep seeing that adorable expression on her face, and she'd jumped up on his lap in excitement, grabbing his wrists and brushing her fingers along his body as she'd explained his physiology. They'd stayed up extra late that night - ‘for research purposes’, Miguel had insisted, showing her exactly all the things his body could do. X curled her fingers around his wrist and gave him a gentle squeeze. 

     “Okay. Be careful, Miguel. I'll see you later, ¿bien?” He raised his arm slightly, causing her hand to fall down to his, and brushed his fingers against hers.

     “Hasta luego, arañita.”

Miguel deactivated his mask and gloves as he bounded over to X, barely concealing his excitement. “So? How did I do?”

X flashed him a smile, her eyes never leaving her monitor as she tracked his vitals and typed up his latest mission report. They'd been doing this for almost a month now and Miguel had already managed to take out three of the city's most wanted criminals. The project had been deemed a massive success as a result, so they'd left X to look after Miguel while the rest of them continued to try to replicate her research. “You did great!”

Miguel picked her up and lowered himself into her chair, setting her on his lap as he settled into his seat.

“Your body is regulating itself perfectly!” X informed him, keeping her eyes on the screens in front of her - she'd gotten used to the way he'd just pick her up and move her around like she weighed nothing at all. Then she twisted her head back to fix him with a knowing smile. “But your hormones are still a little high, Mr Spiderman.”

Miguel wrapped himself around her and grinned against her ear. “Maybe you can help me fix that, mi arañita hermosa.”

She giggled as he started pressing soft kisses down the side of her neck, then grabbed his hands to stop them from wandering all over her body. “Miguel. You should go take a shower, querido.”

He lay his head on her shoulder and kept his arms curled tightly around her small form. “Hmm. Can you help me, arañita?”

X let out another laugh. “You know how to shower, Miguel.”

“Mmm, I think I need a little more help,” Miguel argued. “Just a few more times. And then maybe I’ll get the hang of it.”

She rolled her eyes affectionately at his insistence: he had all the knowledge of the world at his fingertips - of course he knew how to take a shower.

“Fine.” She swung her legs together and turned around to look up at him. “But just a few more times, right?” Miguel slid his hands beneath her shirt and bent over to nip at her earlobe.

“Just a few more times,” he agreed unconvincingly. “Then I’ll probably figure it out. Maybe.”

X giggled as he began kissing her neck again, his hands running all along her torso and squeezing her smooth curves. Then he stood up and started ushering her towards the shower. “Come on. Vamos.”

“F****ck,” Miguel groaned, bracing himself against the wall as his c*m shot out of him and into her. The best part about having a physical body had to be the sex. It just felt so good, having her soft curves pressing up against him, her warm p*ssy squeezing his dick tight. And when she’d let him come inside of her? Mierda, that was probably the best part. He sighed as his cock went limp after having pumped all of his semen inside of her. Then he relaxed his muscles and stepped back slightly, giving her some space to catch her breath.

She loosened her grip on him as she came down from her high, her chest heaving as she tried to catch her breath. She’d thought he’d have needed a little more time to get used to his physical body, but he was so freakin’ good with it! His hands, his mouth, his … everything! She brushed her fingers along his cheek and smiled at the elated look on his face. “You ready to go to bed now, querido?”

Miguel grinned and took hold of her hand before turning to press a kiss to her palm. Then he guided her arm around his neck and leaned forward to start kissing her. He kept his mouth firmly on hers as they made their way over to the bed and X giggled as she stumbled back onto it. Then he crawled up on top of her before she could move and pinned her down against it.

“Miguel,” she whined, turning her head to the side so he couldn't kiss her mouth. “It's getting late. Can we go to sleep?”

Miguel sighed into the crook of her neck, disappointed. Then he rolled over onto his back, letting her curl up against him. They lay like that for a while, surrounded by the comfortable silence, then X pushed herself up onto her elbow and began tracing the lines of his chest with her finger. “Miguel?”

“Hmm?” he hummed, his hand gliding up and down her back lazily.

“Do you think …” she paused and bit on her lip as she slid her hand up the side of his face. She stroked his cheek softly, her expression nervous as she ran her fingers across his jaw to brush his lips. Then she crawled on top of him and rested her head on his shoulder, thinking.

“How do you know your feelings for me are real?” she asked finally. “How do you know I didn’t just code them into you?”

Miguel's eyes fluttered shut as she ran her fingers through his hair, the soothing sensation causing him to fall drowsy. “Did you code my biology?”

“No,” X replied easily. “I just did your initial coding. You did everything else on your own.”

“Right,” Miguel agreed matter-of-factly. “So even if I did code them into my brain, I must have wanted them there, right?” He paused for a moment to let her digest his words, his long fingers travelling up and down her back reassuringly.

“Which means I must have had them anyway,” He finished. X rubbed her thumb along the side of his neck, thinking.

“Mmm,” she agreed softly, realising that he was right. It was true that she'd initially created him to be ‘the perfect guy’ for her, but you couldn't code feelings into an AI. So yes, she'd created him specifically for her to fall in love with, but she hadn't created him to fall right back in love with her. She lifted her head to press a kiss to his cheek, then she slid back onto the bed and snuggled up against his side. “Good night, querido, I love you.”

Miguel pressed his lips to the top of her head, relieved. “Good night, cariño. I love you too.”

He sat on the fire escape of the building across from her apartment, her work tablet clutched tightly in his hands. His gaze was fixed on the loading bar as it crawled across the screen, torturously slow - he'd be doing her a favour by getting rid of this thing once he was done with it. Then finally: ‘venom virus uploaded’. He snickered with delight, then disassembled the tablet and crushed the pieces to bits. The spurt of victory continued to rush through his veins as he climbed down the fire escape, then tossed the scraps of the tablet into the rubbish bin. He grinned as he pulled the hood of his jacket over his head and began strolling back to the bus stop: that would show that dumb AI not to mess with him.

Tags: @jadeloverxd @migshusben

[sparrowrye]

Demi Demon || Alastor x Reader, A3 part 16

Synopsis: Alastor disappeared for 8 years, leaving you confused, crushed, and angry. You spent those years building up your new self and protecting the haven from dangers left and right. What will happen when he returns to the new changes? Will he return anytime soon? Could you even go back to the way things were?

Previous part

Part 16: reminisce

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

Reagan's wedding wasn't the only big surprise. Spencer, our first news reporter, had been planning something for awhile. He ran the printing and reporting companies but somehow had the time to work on his secret project. We were so big that we needed to have reporters on the inside to keep everyone updated. It was no surprise to everyone when I appointed him as the head of it all.

"Don't forget, I'm looking for your opinion." The sweet cartoon-looking man was practically bouncing towards the door. The building looked like any other ordinary building except the brick on the front was a bright red, unlike the cream palette for all the others.

Alastor and I followed him through the doors that had a sign nailed to them: PROJECT IN PROGRESS. DO NOT ENTER!

The foyer was a closed off room with nothing but tile under our feet. Alastor's cane tapped loudly on it as we followed Spencer into a long gallery. A sign on a pole pointed to one of the walls where a row of pictures started. The first one was a framed black and white photograph. It was a picture of our house but from a far distance. There was nothing but green grass and the steep cliff behind it. This had clearly been taken well before the haven had been built.

"Where did you get this photograph?" I asked, stepping closer to examine it.

"Husker gave it to me," he answered. "I thought the black and white gave it an older, more nostalgic touch."

Next to the frame was a sign that read:

Once upon a time, our haven started like this. Take a look —>

I followed the sign and looked out a small window. The sight matched the photograph almost perfectly. Buildings and streets stood in front where there was once only a large open field. I could remember Husker and Alastor telling me how far I was allowed to go from the house when I first arrived. I used to play fight and chase Husker through the grass or snow. It felt like yesterday, yet also a decade ago. How old was I now?

I didn't have time to think about it as Spencer lead us down the gallery. There were all kinds of photographs, all black and white, hanging on both sides. A few backless benches sat in the center.

"All these pictures came from Husker or Charlie and her group," Spencer explained. Every photo had a brief description and the photo's owner underneath it. The pictures ranged from basic construction of the first log houses, to a group of children surrounding Ms. Vivian, to the many discussions I had with Charlie's group in the library.

My throat tightened as the nostalgia creeped its way up. I felt for Alastor's emotions and found fondness and contentment. How was he not feeling any nostalgia from these photos? It felt like my life was on replay.

Alastor made a comment about sequence and Spencer was quick to make the adjustment. While they talked, a certain photo in the beginning corner caught my eye. I slithered off to examine it, finding an old photo of Alastor and I in the living room.

I was kneeling in front of the fire and Alastor was watching closely from one of the chairs. His legs were crossed, as elegant as ever, and his chin rested on the back of his hand as he leaned over the armrest to watch me.

It looked like the photo had been taken from the stairs. Why was I by the fire? What was I trying to do? Ignite it?

Husker was fixing the electricity in the dinning room while practiced lighting the fire in the sitting room. I had seen Alastor and Husker snap their fingers but when I did it, nothing happened.

"It's all about intent, dear." I jumped at Alastor's voice. He stood behind me with his hands behind his back like always. The stupid cane was like a third eye.

"I've got it." I turned my back to him and stared down at the dead logs. I heard him walk past me and sit in one of the chairs, his red eyes never leaving me. I let out a tense sigh. "What do you want?"

"Absolutely nothing."

I scoffed. "I find that hard to believe." I tried again with the fire but nothing happened. "Why are you always watching me?"

"What ever do you mean, dear?"

"Stop calling me that. And I mean every time I'm doing something you're hiding somewhere watching me."

"Is it a crime to watch my soulmate?"

"Don't call me that either." My tail whipped hard against the floor. I was getting frustrated with him and myself. I knelt down and grabbed one of the embers. I could ignite my own hand but how could I not ignite a simple stick?

"Sometimes it's all about imagination," he said, drumming his claws against his cane. "Surely that's not something you're lacking in."

My lip curled in a snarl. I looked down at the hot ember and put it in the corner of the fire place. I looked at one of the logs and closed my eyes. I remembered seeing Full mages lifting air when they wanted to move something. Maybe I could do something similar.

I turned my hand palm up and pictured small flames sticking out from under the wood. They slowly grew bigger until they were catching the neighboring logs on fire. I felt the heat on my face and snapped my eyes open to a working fire. My shock turned into a smile. I had done it.

"Nicely done," Husker said from the stairwell. I stood up and brushed off my pant leg.

The memory subsided and I blinked back to reality. How long had that been? Twelve years? Fifteen? How old was I? I had to think back to a time marker to try to figure out how many years it had been. My fingers moved as I tried to count.

"Darling?" Alastor called. I turned as he approached, leaning into him when he rested his hand on my hip. I rubbed my cheek against his chest and wrapped my tail around his ankle.

Imagine what my old self would say if she saw us now.

I would enjoy the look on your face, he returned. He placed a kiss on my head. "Come, we have more to see."

We went up a set of stairs at the end of the hallway to reach the second floor. This one was all about the haven's development from a town into a city.

These photos were ones Spencer had taken when he first arrived. There were pictures of Vivian's classes and her new assistants, pictures of Althea running to and from her many patients in her first healing hut, of Vilcin bringing out food in the grand hall when food was free for everyone during certain time frames, and so many more.

There were some that had me in the background or around the kids we brought from ring fights. Alastor wasn't in any of them, especially the ones at the end of the hallway. I noticed these photographs included the more expansive part of construction, as well as certain events that happened in Alastor's eight year disappearance.

One image was of my group sitting on Arleen's store porch. Everyone was too busy chatting to notice the camera pointed directly at them. Vivian and Althea were talking, Vilcin smiling softly at them, and me...

I didn't look happy but I didn't look sad either. The more I think back to that conversation, the more I remember. I had spent the night in one of Althea's medical beds because of a bad Alastor hallucination. This was the morning after she had managed to wrangle our group together for a cup of tea or coffee.

The third floor was a little more recent. This was entirely comprised of events that happened within the city. Things like news buildings being opened, big tournaments, and more. I was shocked to find a photo of me standing in front of Lucifer at the gala. That was the night I had presented Blackwater's soul to the King of Hell. Spencer must've gotten that from Vox who likely had cameras all around.

I praised Spencer for his hard work and creative thinking. Alastor gave his share of compliments, which he reserved only for those worthy of such a thing from him, and we left him to his new adjustments.

On the walk back, I replayed my entire life. The cages felt like a distant nightmare, the terrifying instances with Alastor like another life, and the eight year absence as painful as yesterday. I was in my thirties now. So much had happened in such little time. What was a hundred years going to feel like? What was two hundred? How did Alastor manage to even remember everything from the centuries he'd been alive?

Alastor pulled my mind back to my body. I blinked at the front porch, arm wrapped securely around his, and glanced up to meet his eyes. "Sorry."

"Not to worry, my dear." He walked up the new porch and opened the door for me. "I suspect things may grow more challenging when you near your first century."

My first. How many more can I handle?

He caught my hand as I passed and brought it up to his lips. He looked at me through his long eyelashes. "I will be there every step of the way."

****

Months passed. As things progressed rather closely between Alastor and I, things were far from perfect when it came to Nym and Thatcher. The siblings were constantly arguing with each other and it often turned into a physical fight. I was constantly yelling and fixing the burn marks they left behind. I started to worry they would burn the house down from of their Slight magic.

Alastor never said anything about the arguments, choosing to remain silent as I struggled to parent them through the start of their teenage hood. Reagan had gone through the same phase and I remember have plenty of difficult conversations about starting fights with people. This time it was more difficult because Nym and Thatcher were 1) two individuals and 2) more reactive than Reagan.

The smallest comment sent Nym exploding up the stairs and screaming her head off at me or Thatcher. The boy wasn't much better. He was quieter than his explosive sister but his comments and insults seemed to always hit right where they hurt most.

Finally, I separated the siblings into their own rooms so one occupied my old room and the other had Husker's. It was the perfect decision because they were happy to spend time in their own rooms and decorate it how they wanted.

Even so, they still refused to bring any friends over.

I managed to coax Thatcher into helping me cook dinner twice a week. He enjoyed the mindless work but always had a watchful eye on what I was doing. The more we made dinners together, the more talkative he grew. It became my one and only way to connect with him.

Nym wanted nothing to do with cooking and everything to do with physical activities or, oddly enough, a tough game of cards or chess with Alastor. Several times I had caught them playing a game in the library. I knew who the winner was by Nym's eloquent way of cursing.

Things smoothed out around the New Year's celebration. Groups and families decorated their homes or streets with lights and brightly colored decor. Charlie certainly didn't shy from the opportunity to have a big celebration. She insisted on having one with everyone who made the haven possible.

And she meant everyone.

Alastor was far from happy when he heard that Lucifer and Vox would be attending her party. He argued that Lucifer barely lifted a finger to help and that Vox had no ties. To his great disappointment, I argued that Lucifer had taught me a lot on my Angelic powers, which directly benefited the city I was protecting, and that Vox was part of my deal to spread the word about the city through his stations.

Needless to say, it was a very hot topic in the house.

I didn't help as much this time since big parties weren't my thing and the evening would go well into the night. Arleen, in all her mysterious, beautiful wonder, had put together another lovely dress for me. It was shorter than the last one to account for any dancing activities. As much as I enjoyed wearing a matching red with Alastor, I enjoyed wearing my own trademark purple. The dress was short in the front and slightly longer in the back. It had an open back and used several black straps to keep it on my shoulders.

The event was held in one of our large event buildings. Husker was managing the bar--typical--and a live band played in the corner of the of room. I enjoyed flustering my old friend whenever Angel left his proximity for a dance. I had a drink or two before the spider Demon finally convinced me to have a dance or two. Alastor remained at the bar, unamused and bored with the event. He had been brooding since dawn and I was growing tired of dealing with it.

I finished a second dance with Angel and asked Husker for water. I wasn't planning on dancing again but the second song had a beat I couldn't ignore. My taste in music had broadened since Vox had given me a phone with access to the Internet.

Speaking of whom, the electrocuted tv screen jumped in front of me. "Mind if I dance with you?" he asked over the music. The bodies jumped around us and caged me in. "After all the work we've done together?"

My good mood was influencing me. His claws were cold to the touch as I laid my hand in his, letting him pull me further into the crowd and in a slightly larger pocket of space. He moved quickly but never took his eyes off me. I was shocked when I had yet to step on his feet or vise versa. I hadn't expected him to be decent at dancing.

There was something about his smile. It wasn't an evil smile or a mischievous one, either. He just seemed...happy. So, I allowed another dance.

But I should've known by the intensity of his stare, by the green edges of my vision, by the way the little hairs on my arms stood up, and by the dark aura coming from the bar that I Alastor was very unhappy about it.

I wasn't doing anything wrong or bad but I distinctly remember my conversation with Alastor about dancing with other people. It had been a long time ago when I asked Husker and Charlie for dancing lessons. Nerves made my heart race but I reminded myself that I was allowed to enjoy a celebration, one that I didn't have to plan or monitor.

I had a feeling that dancing with Vox was like a slap to Alastor's face.

The song ended on a loud beat and Vox held me in a dip, hair brushing the floor. The shattering of a glass didn't reach everyone's ears, but it definitely reached mine. I turned my head to see Alastor wiping his hand on a rag while Husker cleaned up broken glass shards on the counter. Alastor's eyes flashed over to mine as sharp as a cat's and as quick as a snake's.

Vox brought me up and gave a low bow. "Thank you for dancing with me," he said. His tone touched a spot on my heart. If only he had been like this all along. Working with him would've been far more enjoyable.

We separated into the crowd and I noticed him pulling another girl onto the dance floor. I dragged my feet as I made my way over to my soulmate, tail waving behind me and claws clicking together nervously.

Alastor's discarded jacket was tucked somewhere behind the bar. His winter outfit was slightly different which allowed him to take off the jacket if needed. Over his long sleeve he wore a black vest that hugged his figure perfectly. There were small, red details that could only be seen if someone looked hard enough. That someone was me.

The look he was giving me was...a look.

He had his signature smile but it looked like a cross between a smile and a snarl. His eyes were sharp and had the faint outline of his radio dials in his pupils. His eyebrows were also a strange cross, not quite far up like usual but not quite a glare. He looked like he was trying to hide his annoyance behind a genuine smile. It didn't make sense but the look he was giving me sure did.

He dropped the rag and leaned down close to my face. "May I have a word, love?" he asked, each word pulling taught as he spoke.

"Of course." I wrapped my black claws around his leading arm and walked out onto the brightly lit porch. The winter air cooled my cheeks instantaneously. The rainclouds prevented me from seeing the bright stars but that wasn't where my attention was at the moment. I was too busy trying to keep my nervous hand from holding onto his arm too harshly.

He was quiet and very still for a minute. Then he gently took my hand and pulled it across his chest so I was standing in front of him, back to his chest. He pressed a fleeting kiss to my neck, then planted several more on the way down to my shoulder where the straps held up my dress. He went back up to my ear and pressed his nose to the spot right behind my ear. It was sending goosebumps up my arm.

"Have you found another man to take my place?" he asked in my ear, radio filter practically surrounding me.

"What?" I tried to turn my head but his hand snapped up to hold my jaw in place. I grabbed his wrist and flapped my ear against his nose. "Let go--"

"Have you grown tired of me, dear? Have I bored you so much that you are seeking attention from him?"

"Your jealousy is really bad, Al," I retorted, a smile edging on my lips. He wasn't as upset as I thought. He was just feeling a little ignored; a little forgotten. He was an attention-whore after all.

He let out a deep hum, one that nearly filled my chest. "I like when you use that nickname. It should be the only name that comes out of those lips." He released my jaw and traced his hand down my chest, across my stomach, and settled on my hip, pulling me flush against his front. I could feel his warmth radiating off him like the sun.

"Alastorrr," I purred, earning a wider grin and another chuckle. "If you wanted my attention you just needed to ask."

"Hmm, I'm not asking," he said in my ear, lips grazing across my skin. "I'm telling you. I will have your attention now."

He let go of my wrist and I pressed the palm of my hand to his cheek, feeling his eyelashes brush on my own cheek as he closed them. I moved my hand further up to thread my fingers through his pink hair. I gently massaged the area around his ears and antlers, drawing out heavy sighs and hums.

Then I tightly squeezed the bottom of his ear and he reared back, a pained noise escaping him. I shoved his hand off my hip and spun to face him head on. His hand had come up to hold his injured ear. "Why--"

"I'm not one to boss around, Alastor." I rolled his name off my tongue again, my lips quirking into a smirk. His shocked expression returned to the one he had before but with more intent.

"Is that so, my dear?" He took one step to be up close and personal again. My head was tilted back to meet his eyes, defiance and smugness written all over me. Now we were playing a game.

"I thought you knew me better than that, love." His smile nearly turned genuine before he recomposed himself. He lifted his red claws to touch my shoulders but I had beaten him to it, glancing down at his waist to hook two claws on his belt loops, and jerking hard to make him stumble into me.

His claws found my shoulders and the tips were dangerously close to puncturing my skin. "Careful, darling, you don't know what game you're playing."

"Oh I think I do." I kept him pulled firmly against me and rested my cheek on his chest, making him canter his head just to keep eye contact with me. His claws felt like they were shaking.

"Last warning, my dear," he moved an arm to wrap around the back of my shoulders, attempting to trap me against him instead of the other way around. "If you say yes, I will not be held responsible for what happens tonight."

I moved my footclaws so they were up against his ankles, my tail coming around to wrap around one of his knees. I lifted my head, licked my dry lips once, and let go of his belt loops to run my hands up his chest. "Yes, Alastor."

The one side of his smile flatlined. His shadows engulfed us both, sprinted up to the house, and manifested us in his room. The door was slightly open but his tentacles were quick to slam it shut, his hand coming up to my chest and shoving me away. My ankles hit the footboard of the bed and sent me to falling backwards on the thick cover. I lifted myself up on my elbows in time to see him hook a claw on his bow tie and pull it off his neck.

I licked my lips again.

He snapped his fingers to remove the black vest and began unbuttoning his long sleeve, taking long strides to the side of the bed. He had gotten half way down as I moved further up the bed. His antlers had lengthened a little more, darkness surrounding us and making it impossible to see anything other than him and the red sheets.

He put one knee on the bed and a claw near mine. I pushed myself up to a hand, all my teeth sharpening to a point to match his smile, and leaned forward to catch the aggressive kiss. Instead, his other red claw came to my chest and shoved me back down on the mattress. I let out a breathy snarl as he moved to straddle me, hand never leaving my chest.

As retaliation, I brought my tail up to wrap firmly around his deer tail. It made him visibly shudder and a tentacle came out to pin it down. My hand around his wrist was peeled off and also pinned. I smiled wide, running my long tongue across my newly sharpened teeth. His beady red eyes watched intently until my other hand found his thigh.

He grabbed that one too and came forward to plant a kiss on my slightly exposed chest. I didn't let him have access to my neck so when he attempted to grab my chin, I grabbed his ear again. Another tentacle came out to pull my wrist tight into the mattress.

"You don't get to challenge me," he growled in my ear, now able to pull my chin to the side and run his tongue along my skin. It sent a satisfying chill down my spine. "You gave the word, now you must suffer the consequences."

Despite his words, I could hear his thoughts reminding me he would stop as soon as I gave the word. The safety net shoved the bad memories down. I let his magic surround my mind as a constant reminder that he was with me. This was who I wanted to be with.

"I'm not so sure suffer is the right term, Alastor," his name came smoothly off my tongue.

"By the time I'm done with you, it will." Before I could answer him, he bit down hard on the top of my shoulder. My knees came up since my hands were pinned, quickly earning yet another set of tentacles to hold them down. He licked at the injury he caused and added, "Don't worry, I'll make sure you get your pleasure in the midst of it."

He moved his one leg to rest his knee snuggly in between my legs. His tentacles pulled my legs wider. "That's...ch-cheating," my voice wavered.

"There were no rules set in place," he said in between licking up my blood. "Perhaps you should have thought about that before agreeing."

I went into his mind and held on tight to it, making him go very stiff. A moment later his magic grabbed mine and pushed me back into my mind.

"I told you, my dear, you don't know what game you are playing." He filled my mind again, forcing me to think of nothing other than him. I could feel the burn of his touch and see the green of his magic. It was just him.

He finally let go of my mind and I found myself completely bare underneath him. I snapped his name like a curse and attempted to my pull my limbs free to cover myself. His claw came up to brush the back of his fingers across my cheek like he always did.

"You are mine, my deer. There is nothing to hide from me."

It was then I noticed he was also bare, leg still firmly in between my own. He moved to my neck again, our skin touching and sending sparks into my brain. I felt lightheaded as his mind fit perfectly with mine like two puzzle pieces. He placed light kisses everywhere from my cheeks, to my chest, to my arms, to my stomach.

I gasped when his tentacles pulled my legs up. I fought against the pressure but they pull my legs wider like it was nothing. Alastor ran his tongue between my folds in one long lick. I leaned my head back to let out a very satisfied sigh.

I yelped when his fingers slid inside and curled dangerously well. My edges burned from the width of two fingers but the pain was nothing when his lips found my sweet spot. He moved his tongue in a deliberately slow circle.

"Al please..." I begged. "Go faster."

He paused to speak. "You're playing my game, baby."

The new endearment made my chest fill with butterflies. It moved into my stomach when his fingers curled again. He withdrew his fingers then pushed back in, curling them at the end before pulling out and repeating. His tongue now made up and down movements, but as slow and torturous as before.

I pushed against the tentacles despite knowing they wouldn't budge. I grabbed the sheets and flexed my toes. I lifted my head to see his eyes closed and head moving between my legs. I dropped my head as the familiar feeling started to rise.

He paused and blew cold air. I whimpered and looked down at him. "What was that—"

"Make more noises, my love." He licked his lips with that stupidly long tongue of his. "The more you make, the faster I'll go."

To make his point, he dragged his tongue between my folds as slow as possible. I let out an irritated sigh as my head hit the covers again. My horns had disappeared so I wouldn't puncture the mattress.

I didn't want to give in but I desperately wanted him to move faster. I would get nowhere near my high unless he picked up his pace.

"I hate you," I groaned.

He sucked hard on my sweet spot. I choked on another yelp. Being unable to move my limbs only increased the amount of stuff dripping out of me. He pressed his tongue against the spot and let out a hot sigh. The warmth elicited a moan and he moved his tongue slightly faster.

Fine, asshole.

He stopped. I mentally facepalmed.

"Language," he said. "I think I'm being rather generous with my offer."

"I think you know exa-ah-ctly what you're doing." He pushed in a third finger. I rubbed my cheek into the mattress to diffuse my frustration.

"You set the pace, love."

He kissed just above my spot before continuing his work. I pulled against the tentacles one last time before finally giving in. I let out a long sigh that turned into a moan at the end. His pace quickened.

I turned my face the other direction as I mumbled his nickname. It didn't take long to lose my mind and let out more noises. His fingers continued to curl inside, pushing just right on something, and pulling me ever closer. My fingers and toes flexed repeatedly as I started saying his full name.

His tongue was finally moving at a pace I wanted. I begged him not to slow down. I begged him to keep going and let me reach my high.

"Ah! Sensitive, Al!" I called. His free arm trapped my hips to the bed. He reached into my mind to sense for a painful or a different type of sensitive. The latter allowed him to continue.

"Push through, dear." He spoke quickly to get back to his task. It made my legs shake uncontrollably and tears fall down the side of my face. My elbows came up as I bit on the cover. My breathing turned to whines. Every muscles tensed. His tongued burned.

"Al...Alastor!" My voice pitched high as I reached my climax. He slowed his movements by half and drew it out even longer. My moan went on until I was out of breath. I pushed out as much air as I could from my lungs until stars dotted my vision.

Then the sensitivity turned sharp. My body jerked once and he stopped. I sucked in fresh air as his tentacles gradually receded. My chest heaved and my legs clamped lazily around his leg as he came back up to my face, tongue licking his lips.

"Are you alright?" he asked, genuine concern filling his voice.

"Uh huh," I nodded. He leaned down and gave a firm but gentle kiss.

"That's my girl." He kissed my cheek, then my neck, then my chest, then draped his tongue over my nipple. It sent electricity down my legs despite my exhaustion.

His other hand covered my other breast and massaged it. My free hand threaded through his hair as I watched him suck on my nipples. His teeth grazed them occasionally and sent a funny feeling through all my nerves.

"How did I get so lucky," he whispered to himself. He abandoned my breasts as he looked straight at me. "Are you ready?" I nodded my head but that wasn't enough for him. "Tell me yes, love."

"Yes, Al."

I felt something in him snap. The dominating, aggressive aura returned as quickly as it had gone. His hand moved down my side and lifted one of my legs up again. It fell over his shoulder as his other arm lifted my hips off the mattress.

The pain came first.

My head fell back against the pillow. Alastor breathed through his teeth as he tried to push himself all the way in. My hands grabbed the pillow as I whimpered from the size difference.

When he was finally in all the way, he leaned over and left soft, feathery kisses along my chest and stomach. His breaths in between kisses were hot and heavy. I opened a tear-filled eye to see his hair sticking to his face.

After what felt like forever, I had finally adjusted. He licked up the tears that had fallen on the sides of my face, quietly asking if he could move. His voice was much deeper and filled with need. With permission, he began to move and my back arched off the bed, voice whining his name.

His face was surprisingly the most attractive thing during it all. The way his brows knit together, his eyes squeezed shut, and his hair swaying with the movement, and his muscles working under his skin and fur. He was feeling this way with me. I was the one making him feel good.

His claws drew blood as we reached closer to our climax. I breathed his name through moans and practically cried when he sucked hard on one of my nipples between thrusts.

He abandoned my leg so I could wrap both around his waist. He leaned in close to my ears, moans filling my head and bringing my even closer. "Use those claws. Please."

I practically finished right there when he said please. My hands attached to his back and dug into the skin. He groaned when they finally broke skin. He begged me to say his name and I moaned it in its entirety as I came undone. He followed a moment later, hips slowing as he rode out his high.

We breathed in each others faces for several moments.

He kissed me gently. "I love you."

I held his cheeks in both hands, eyes meeting his beautiful red ones. "I love you too."

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

Author's Note:

Part 17 comes out same time tomorrow! All of these are pretty long so enjoy and please let me know your thoughts!

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

Taglist:

@wendigonamecaller @saccharine-nectarine @martinys-world @thesimpybitch @papas-ghoulette @masochist-downfall

[ideas-on-paper]

A hypothetical look at the childhoods of Carlo and Romeo

Despite Carlo and Romeo being two of the most central characters of Lies of P, what we know about their backstory is next to marginal. We know that the two of them went to school together and were best friends (perhaps even more than that), but their time in Monad Charity House is only presented in snippets and fragmented memories, and despite being highly significant, their characters remain elusive - like shadows cast over the entirety of the story, always present, never tangible.

Thus, many have filled the gaps left in their characterization with their own imagination. As for myself, I was curious what their early lives might have been like, before they met at Monad Charity House - and since it was the closest thing to the game's setting I could find, I did some research on Victorian children and their upbringing.

What I found out, however, left me absolutely shocked and made me keenly aware of just how awful Carlo and Romeo's childhood must have been, going by historic standards. As pretty much everything during the Victorian Era, a child's upbringing was very dependent on social class - however, no matter if you grew up in a rich or poor family, each came with its own kind of suffering, and regarding the question of "What were Carlo and Romeo's lives like before Monad Charity House?", the brief answer would be: "Probably not great."

As for the long answer... I should mention this is my own interpretation of Carlo and Romeo's backgrounds, and none of this is officially confirmed. However, given what we know about the two's origins, I consider it quite plausible, and what we can conclude from it might not only give us better insight into their personalities, but also some of the real-life background behind the original fairy tale of Pinocchio.

Just as a fair warning, though: This is about to get a little depressing.

[Spoilers for Lies of P!]

[CW: mentions of very questionable parenting methods, depression, suicidal ideation, poverty, parent death, child labor, abuse and exploitation of children]

Carlo

For this analysis, I'm going to assume that Carlo was born into a fairly well-off household. (The description of Carlo's portrait calls him "an aristocratic boy", and since Geppetto is the mastermind behind Krat's puppet technology, I assume he'd have his fair share of the profits.)

By the standard of their time, upper-class children were quite spoiled: Unlike their working-class peers, they never had to worry about who was going to provide food for them, and the horrors of child labor were never of any concern to them. You would think that being born into a rich family doesn't leave you a single thing to wish for - you'd have nice toys, fine clothes... and well, everything, except for parental affection.

For the most part of the day, upper-class children wouldn't even see their parents - they were only summoned to appear before them at a set hour of the day, and during these occasions, they had to address their fathers as "sir". Essentially, meeting your parents was more like an audience with a stranger, a rare privilege strictly regulated by formality. Children were expected to act prim and proper, only allowed to speak when spoken to, and thus unable to express their true feelings, thoughts, or opinions. Any show of affection was extremely rare - Winston Churchill (1874 - 1945) once remarked that he could "count the times he had been hugged by his mother" as a child.

The parents were more or less completely absent from their children's lives, and when there actually was interaction between them, the children were expected to unconditionally obey their parents. Osbert Sitwell (1892 - 1969) once commented: "Parents were aware that the child would be a nuisance and a whole bevy of servants, in addition to the complex guardianship of nursery and school rooms was necessary not so much to aid the infant as to screen him from his father or mother, except on some occasions as he could be used by them as adjuncts, toys or decorations." (Can you imagine? Geppetto taking Carlo to some big social event to show off his "perfect little son", and Carlo just standing there and silently enduring the ordeal, looking at his father all the while and wondering "Did he ever realize I'm not one of his puppets?")

So, by the standard of the time period Lies of P is set in, Geppetto neglecting his son isn't even anything terribly unusual - in fact, that's perfectly normal Victorian upper-class parent behavior.

Since they didn't take care of their children themselves, upper-class parents would hire a nanny to raise them. Nannies would be instructed what kind of behavior and morals the parents wanted instilled into their child, and they would be responsible for their education as well as teaching them manners, propriety, how to dress and so on. As such, the nanny effectively acted as a substitute for the parents - and given that maid puppets exist and Geppetto probably wouldn't let any strangers near Carlo, Carlo's nanny was most likely a puppet as well.

The daily life of upper-class children was based on strict routine - some like to say it operated with "clockwork regularity". Breakfast would be served at 8 o'clock in the morning, dinner at 12 o'clock, and tea at 6 o'clock.* Children would very seldom leave their room, except to take short walks in the park with their nanny. Education would mostly be given at home by a tutor, which included basic lessons like reading, writing, and arithmetic, but also "socially appropriate skills" like dancing and playing the piano. (Since we see a puppet giving piano lessons to a child in the intro, chances are Carlo's tutors were also puppets.)

*Eating times varied throughout the Victorian Era; a "dinner" might also be a meal eaten during midday.

The rest of the time, children would have nothing to do but to play with their toys (except on Sundays, which was forbidden). Rich families had the luxury of being able to afford the most elaborate of toys, such as automated dolls, clockwork trains, and jack-in-the-boxes, which were extremely popular among children. In fact, since clockmakers were also the ones to build toys, I could imagine Geppetto actually made the toys for Carlo himself. (However, I feel like this only would have made Carlo loathe them; in his eyes, it would've been proof that "father pays more attention to the toys he makes for me than actually looking at me".)

In short, the life of Victorian upper-class children was lonely, depressing, and stuffy to the point of suffocating. Given these circumstances, I would actually be surprised if this didn't leave mental scars on Carlo. It has been documented that a lack of parental affection causes psychological issues lasting all the way into adulthood, such as low self-esteem, trust issues, anxiety, difficulty with social relationships, and lack of emotional control. Also, considering Carlo was probably surrounded by puppet servants all day, he wouldn't even have had a single human being to interact with most of the time - something which most likely had a detrimental effect on his psyche.

Given this dreary existence, it would make absolute sense for Carlo to look nothing short of depressed in every depiction we see of him. The feeling of emptiness when being pressed into the corset of others' expectations is actually something I'm well acquainted with - it feels like walking beside yourself, like your body moving while actually feeling dead inside. A bit like a puppet on strings, if you will. With his life being a monotonous routine controlled by someone else, it wouldn't be surprising if Carlo had difficulty still seeing a purpose in it. (There have been some theories going around that Carlo committed suicide; at the very least, I think it's highly likely he had suicidal ideations during his youth.)

Perhaps this is where Pinocchio - the character from the fairy tale - might have become something like an identification figure for Carlo. Pinocchio was a puppet, but instead of doing what his creator intended - what his father expected - he did whatever he wanted. I'm sure Geppetto gave him the book as a measure to educate him, but it ended up having the opposite effect. In fact, it might have been what first taught him the concept of freedom: Geppetto's puppets only ever did what he told them to, executing the exact actions he had programmed them with, over and over again - but Pinocchio showed Carlo that it didn't have to be this way. (I've seen a lot of interpretations of Carlo disliking puppets, and while I can see where this is coming from, I don't think this is because Carlo disliked puppets in general. Rather, I think he saw them as "extended arms" of his father and a symbol of his need to control everything around him; otherwise, it would be a little strange for Carlo to be attached to the story of Pinocchio so much.)

However, I think beneath all the pent-up frustration and hatred, there was also the wish for his father to love and appreciate him. At the end of the book, Pinocchio returns to his father after all the hardships he had to go through, and the two reconcile and live happily ever after. Since Pinocchio's father goes looking for him when he disappears, perhaps Carlo believed that if he rebelled against him and put himself in danger, Geppetto would realize that he actually cared for him.

So, if Carlo was very prone to temper tantrums and acting defiantly towards his father, it might have been on one hand to show that he didn't want to be part of Geppetto's perfect stage play anymore, and on the other because he was vying for his attention. Due to his upbringing, however, Carlo wasn't really able to communicate his feelings in a proper way. (I like to imagine Carlo as a very emotional person, but having difficulty to actually express his feelings.)

Geppetto, however, wouldn't have the sensitivity to understand this - he most likely would've tried to rectify his son's "mischievous behavior" by disciplining, as was typical for the time period (in general, it was believed that you had to "beat the evil out of children" for them to become a good person). Of course, that wouldn't have made things better - in fact, I wonder if part of the reason Geppetto sent Carlo to Monad Charity House was that he was just at a loss what to do with the boy. Since all of his educational measures were fruitless, perhaps he thought that sending him to the boarding school would finally put Carlo on the right track - although the result of that probably was also quite different from what Geppetto expected.

Romeo

Meanwhile, poor Victorian children had to live in a completely different, brutal reality - for them, day-to-day life was a literal struggle to stay alive.

We know that Romeo was an orphan, and according to Eugénie, that's not much of a rarity in Krat. Indeed, street children existed in abundance during Victorian times: It wasn't uncommon for working-class children to lose one or both parents - due to unsanitary conditions in Victorian slums, many people died of disease, and given the hazardous working conditions in factories and coal mines, accidents were commonplace. However, the term of a Victorian orphan was actually a little broader than that, also extending to children who ran away from home due to hailing from alcoholic and neglectful families. Often, mothers who were single or had a child out of wedlock would also simply abandon their children. Whatever the reason for their situation, these children were forced to fend for themselves at a very young age.

In the Trinity Sanctum in Krat Central Station, there's a note mentioning a "pickpocket who was overconfident in a gamble" and "had his heart stolen and died". Since Romeo made "a deal with the devil" (the "devil" presumably being Geppetto who turned him into a puppet), people have interpreted this as referring to Romeo. Turing to crime to support themselves was not a rarity among poor Victorian children - in fact, half of the defendants tried at the Central Criminal Court of England and Wales between 1830 and 1860 were aged 20 or younger. There were even organized gangs of child thieves who were trained in pickpocketing by a "captain", similar to those from Charles Dickens' novel Oliver Twist. (However, the items that were stolen most often were actually not purses or pocket watches, but handkerchiefs; silk handkerchiefs had a pretty high resale value, and the thieves would take them from pockets, rip out the initials, and resell them for a good price.)

We can't be sure whether Romeo teamed up with a few other kids or not, but personally, I'd wager he did - it would be much safer to operate in a group in case one of them gets in trouble, and overall, Romeo's personality seems a bit too caring for a lone wolf. (As the King of Puppets, he was not only determined to save as many humans as possible, but also possessed the unconditional trust and loyalty of the other puppets. To me, this means he most likely cared about them, and they cared about him in return - if it was just programming, the puppets probably wouldn't be lamenting his loss after he dies. Compare this to Geppetto, who has to use force and coercion for others to obey him.)

Also, since the notes in the Trinity Sanctums always seem to have a connection to the place where they're located (factory worker -> factory; cleric -> cathedral; "greatest singer"/Adelina -> opera house), that would mean the train station was most likely Romeo's base of operations.* (Train stations tend to be very popular among thieves, since it's easier to pick pockets in the confusion of people boarding or getting off trains.) This would imply that Romeo didn't grow up in Monad Charity House since he was an infant, but arrived there at a later point during his childhood.

*EDIT: I just had a thought that the note in the Trinity Sanctum could also mean the train station is the place where Romeo died. (All the other notes are connected to murder or some other violent action, and since we can assume they were written by Arlecchino, he was probably more interested in that.) Since Geppetto has his secret workshop wagon in Krat Central Station, maybe the place where he built P is the same where he built Romeo.

Since there were so many orphaned children, the few orphanages that existed couldn't receive all of them. Instead, workhouses were established as institutions for all kinds of destitute people - including orphans - who were unable to support themselves and were given lodging and food in exchange for labor. However, many children actually preferred living on the streets, rather turning to crime than going to the workhouse. At a first glance, this may seem a bit unreasonable - surely, not having to run around in worn-down rags and steal your food just to survive would at least be an improvement?

Well... Turns out, not really. The conditions in Victorian workhouses were notoriously awful - they were overcrowded, unsanitary, and cruel places to live. Daily routine was strictly regimented, consisting of 9–10 hours of repetitive and physically demanding labor and very little free time. What little food there was was of poor quality, privacy was basically nonexistent, and the dozens of inmates sleeping together in dormitories often had to share their beds - children usually had to sleep up to four in a bed. The consequences for refusal of work or any kind of rule violation were beatings, deprivation of food, being locked up in solitary confinement in a dark cell, and other draconian punishments.

If this doesn't sound like a very hospitable atmosphere, that's because that was the exact intention behind it. Workhouses weren't meant to support poor people - they were supposed to scare them into finding work and make a living for themselves. Victorians viewed poverty as a self-imposed misery, and if you were a pauper, that was because you were lazy, retarded, or made bad choices in life. That's why beggars, vagrants, orphans, criminals, and mentally ill people were all indiscriminately housed in workhouses, because from the Victorian point of view, they all belonged to the same category of people: A stain that had to be removed from the public eye, either by forcing them to support themselves or by making use of their work force once they had donned the workhouse uniform. They were a nuisance to society, and their treatment in the workhouse was sure to make them feel that.

One of the worst fates for workhouse children, however, was to be hired out as pauper apprentices: Usually from 10-13 years of age, but sometimes as young as eight or seven, workhouses would send pauper children to factories in the countryside for an "apprenticeship". This "apprenticeship" involved factory owners buying children from orphanages and workhouses and making them sign a contract that lasted until they were 21 years of age, dictating that the apprentices had to be provided with food and accommodation, and in exchange, the factory owner was free to make use of their working power.

So in summary, workhouse orphans were essentially sold into slavery. This was all that much easier to do with children who had no parents and no other means to support themselves, and thus were free to be exploited by their employers. Some of the recollections from these former pauper apprentices are just utterly horrific - and in this case, I think it's appropriate to let the victims speak for themselves.

John Birley, who lost his father when he was two, lived in the Bethnal Green Workhouse for a time after his mother died of illness when he was around six. He was sent to Litton Mill as a pauper apprentice, and he had this to say about his experiences in an interview with The Ashton Chronicle in 1849 (source):

The same year my mother died, I being between six and seven years of age, there came a man looking for a number of parish apprentices. We were all ordered to come into the board room, about forty of us. There were, I dare say, about twenty gentlemen seated at a table, with pens and paper before them. Our names were called out one by one. We were all standing before them in a row. My name was called and I stepped out in the middle of the room. They said, "Well John, you are a fine lad, would you like to go into the country?" I said "Yes sir". We had often talked over amongst ourselves how we should like to be taken into the country, Mr. Nicholls the old master, used to tell us what fine sport we should have amongst the hills, what time we should have for play and pleasure. He said we should have plenty of roast beef and get plenty of money, and come back gentlemen to see our friends. The committee picked out about twenty of us, all boys. In a day or two after this, two coaches came up to the workhouse door. We were got ready. They gave us a shilling piece to take our attention, and we set off. I can remember a crowd of women standing by the coaches, at the workhouse door, crying "shame on them, to send poor little children away from home in that fashion." Some of them were weeping. I heard one say, "I would run away if I was them." They drove us to the Paddington Canal, where there was a boat provided to take us. We got to Buxton at four o'clock on Saturday afternoon. A covered cart was waiting for us there. We all got in, and drove off to the apprentice house at Litton Mill, about six miles from Buxton. The cart stopped, and we marched up to the house, where we saw the master, who came to examine us and gave orders where we were put. [...] Our regular time was from five in the morning till nine or ten at night; and on Saturday, till eleven, and often twelve o'clock at night, and then we were sent to clean the machinery on the Sunday. No time was allowed for breakfast and no sitting for dinner and no time for tea. We went to the mill at five o'clock and worked till about eight or nine when they brought us our breakfast, [...] We then worked till nine or ten at night when the water-wheel stopped. We stopped working, and went to the apprentice house, about three hundred yards from the mill. It was a large stone house, surrounded by a wall, two to three yards high, with one door, which was kept locked. It was capable of lodging about one hundred and fifty apprentices. Supper was the same as breakfast - onion porridge and dry oatcake. We all ate in the same room and all went up a common staircase to our bed-chamber; all the boys slept in one chamber, all the girls in another. We slept three in one bed. [...] Mr. Needham, the master, had five sons: Frank, Charles, Samuel, Robert and John. The sons and a man named Swann, the overlooker, used to go up and down the mill with hazzle sticks. Frank once beat me till he frightened himself. He thought he had killed me. He had struck me on the temples and knocked me dateless. He once knocked me down and threatened me with a stick. To save my head I raised my arm, which he then hit with all his might. My elbow was broken. I bear the marks, and suffer pain from it to this day, and always shall as long as I live. I was determined to let the gentleman of the Bethnal Green parish know the treatment we had, and I wrote a letter with John Oats and put it into the Tydeswell Post Office. It was broken open and given to old Needham. He beat us with a knob-stick till we could scarcely crawl. Sometime after this three gentlemen came down from London. But before we were examined we were washed and cleaned up and ordered to tell them we liked working at the mill and were well treated. Needham and his sons were in the room at the time. They asked us questions about our treatment, which we answered as we had been told, not daring to do any other, knowing what would happen if we told them the truth."

In case there were any surviving family members, the children were sometimes deported without their knowledge. In 1849, Sarah Carpenter related the story of her lost brother who was taken away from Bristol Workhouse to The Ashton Chronicle (source):

When I was eight years old my father died and our family had to go to the Bristol Workhouse. My brother was sent from Bristol workhouse in the same way as many other children were - cart-loads at a time. My mother did not know where he was for two years. He was taken off in the dead of night without her knowledge, and the parish officers would never tell her where he was. It was the mother of Joseph Russell who first found out where the children were, and told my mother. We set off together, my mother and I, we walked the whole way from Bristol to Cressbrook Mill in Derbyshire. We were many days on the road. Mrs. Newton fondled over my mother when we arrived. [...] My brother told me that Mrs. Newton's fondling was all a blind; but I was so young and foolish, and so glad to see him again; that I did not heed what he said, and could not be persuaded to leave him. They would not let me stay unless I would take the shilling binding money. I took the shilling and I was very proud of it. They took me into the counting house and showed me a piece of paper with a red sealed horse on which they told me to touch, and then to make a cross, which I did. This meant I had to stay at Cressbrook Mill till I was twenty one.

So, if the situation in the Lies of P universe in any way resembles that during the real-life 19th century, and if these street children are in any way smart, I think it's very understandable they'd want to stay the hell away from the workhouse or any similar institution. Of course, it would be easy to attribute this to laziness, but honestly, I'd say they just wanted to avoid the abuse. (You could pose the question whether there are even any lowly paid jobs for children to do in the LoP universe, since a lot of those were probably taken over by puppets. However, if you ask me, that might only lead to employers trying to underbid the price that puppet laborers would cost, which would lead to serious wage cuts for any human workers - we know there was a violent protest of the factory labor union, which might have happened for a reason like this. Also, I reckon the puppet industry itself would create new branches of "dirty work", like recycling parts from scrapped puppets, disposing of puppet junk, etc.)

In fact, these harrowing stories happen to have quite a few parallels to the original fairy tale of Pinocchio. Did you notice? The children are taken away in coaches and carts, in a way that conceals their presence (e.g. in a covered cart or in the dead of the night), which is very reminiscent of the Coachman picking up boys at night (in the book, the coach is described as having wrapped wheels, so it doesn't make noise and can't be discovered). At first, the children are told they can make a fortune by working in the textile mills and will have plenty of time for leisure - in A memoir of Robert Blincoe from 1828, it's even mentioned they tried to lure children into working in a cotton mill by telling them that "they would be transformed into ladies and gentlemen" when they arrived there, that "they would be fed on roast beef and plum pudding, be allowed to ride their masters' horses, and have silver watches, and plenty of cash in their pockets". This sounds quite similar to the Coachman promising the boys unlimited play time and freedom if they come with him to the Land of Toys. However, as both the pauper apprentice children and the boys from Pinocchio had to realize, all of this was a fraud to exploit them for what is essentially slave labor.

This also suggests that with his depiction of the Land of Toys, Carlo Collodi was doing more than just telling a horror story to scare kids into behaving. He was commenting on a real-life problem - and this, exactly this, is what Collodi wanted to warn his young readers about. In that sense, the boys turning into donkeys might also be a metaphor for what their employers saw them as: livestock, to be used and abused as they pleased.

Because the living conditions of workhouse children were so appalling, there was clamor for change, specifically among the reformist middle class. It was argued that orphans and destitute children should be housed in an institution meant exclusively for them, rather than together with criminals, cripples, and lunatics. The movement really began to pick up speed in mid-19th century, and many orphanages were founded by private benefactors and philanthropists. One of the most influential was Thomas John Barnardo, the founder of the charity Barnardos, who built homes for waifs, strays, and all kinds of children in need to provide them with a place to live, food, and education.

In general, there was an effort to make education accessible to even the lowest classes. Sunday Schools and Ragged Schools were established, which allowed poor children to take classes without having to pay a fee, giving them more opportunities in later life. However, the parents of working-class children were often against them going to school, since it meant that they couldn't work to earn additional income for the family. This is why attending school was made mandatory for all children between 5 and 10 in 1870, with the leaving age being raised to 11 in 1893. (This is also what Carlo Collodi meant by saying "for the love of God, get yourself some education" - because if you didn't, you would be stuck in a circle of bone-breaking labor forever.)

The Monad Charity House fits quite well into this historical frame: We do know that the Rose Estate was originally a charity organization for poor children, but was turned into a boarding school after Lady Isabelle and the Monad family started sponsoring money. Since charities for poor children are a phenomenon of the mid- to late-19th century, it's possible the situation was a lot worse before in the Lies of P universe as well. Romeo might not have gone there willingly (perhaps he was caught during one of his thefts), and truth be told, Victorian schools weren't the most rosy of affairs (if you'd like to know the details, feel free to check out this page). However, given what could've been his fate, Romeo probably considered himself lucky to be alive and not exploited by someone else for donkey work. (Still, one thing that should be kept in mind is that the Alchemists' patronage of the Rose Estate probably isn't based on purely altruistic motives: Since all of the children are trained as Stalkers, Alchemists, or Workshop Technicians, all of them ultimately become part of Krat's economic apparatus.)

It seems almost miraculous that two boys coming from such different worlds would develop such a strong bond. However, despite this, they had one experience in common: pain. Although the way in which they suffered might have differed, they both knew what it's like to be abandoned. Romeo had to grow up in a society that didn't care whether he lived or died, and since all Carlo ever received from his father was scrutiny or cold ignorance, he probably felt the same about him. Living in a cruel world where the odds were stacked against them, it's easy to see why these kindred souls sought comfort in each other.

In any case, if the untold backstory of these characters was crafted with this in mind, my sincerest compliments go to the people of Neowiz for not only taking such a nuanced approach to child education in a historical context, but also for doing so with respect to the original story by Carlo Collodi. It may be really subtle at times, but you can't deny how much effort the devs put into the themes - themes that are so universal to human psychology that they continue to be relevant today, and undoubtedly made the story resonate with a lot of people.