#there's a whole lot of stuff i want to mess with :3

[chemicalbrew]

gave in to the ill and playing kz again for fun bc something is wrong with me.... expect more gifs eventually i guess

[puhpandas]

I keep thinking about how on earth they would canonize ggy bc like. at this point if they have to sacrifice Gregory screentime of just him to make something we already know actually canon, I would rather just take the screentime, but on the other hand they have to canonize it if they want to do anything at all with that plotline, and that makes me wonder if theyll stick with it as canon in the games at all or just leave it as background knowledge if u read the book 😭

[bmpmp3]

and you will listen to my halfway unmixed vocal synth covers. you will. my final message (dies in your arms)

all the virvox guys in voicevox humming! yume no tobira piano ver vsqx by leah ocarina and the instrumental is by 友紀!

[astrxealis]

i love the term omnisexual/omniromantic bcs it feels like god

[polarfarina]

I'm watching soooo much adventure time. I play it all day while doing my tasks. I played it while I baked a cake

[ohdeerfully]

K hear me out, a wife! Reader x Alastor and Charlie finds out they had a kid when they were alive. (I don’t mind what the kids name is but make them young and passed due to Spanish flu, dark I know)

omg this has been sitting in my drafts so long, i love requests like this </3 im sorry if it seems rushed, i really wanted to finish it!

Mourning Dove

Alastor x Reader (angst, slight comfort at end) TW: CHILD DEATH, child sickness, reader referred to as a woman but doesnt effect story too much join my discord! ═══ ◈ ══════════ ◈ ══════════ ◈ ══════════ ◈ ═══

You sat yourself unceremoniously at the bar in the hotel lobby, shoulders slouched and cheek squished against the cold countertop. You weren’t one for alcohol, but you didn’t mind the company of Husk. He didn’t say much unless prompted, but that didn’t bother you. It was nice, honestly, after a day of dealing with the others.

“Somethin’ the matter?” Okay. Nevermind about him not saying much.

“Hmm?” You responded, barely peeking up from your finger that dragged patterns in the surface you laid against. “I’m good.”

“You don’t look it,” Husk observed, and you knew he was referring to the discoloration of your eyes and the residual dampness of your cheeks from crying. Your hair was a mess, too. Yeah, you looked like shit. “Tough day?”

“I guess, yeah,” You sighed, pushing yourself up and leaning back in a stretch while your fingers gripped the countertop to steady yourself. “Just thinking about… Y’know.”

He didn’t pry, and you were thankful for that. Husk did know a little, actually, and knew better than to push for more details. After being stuck with Alastor for so long, with the guy owning his soul and all, he inevitably learned some deep shit about him and, by extension, you. He just grunted in response and went back to spot cleaning his bottles of booze.

“(Y/N)!” A chipper voice called your name, and you squeezed your eyes shut in frustration. You thought you were done with all of this for the day, and you were so ready to just go to sleep. “I wanted everybody to join me for dinner today! We have a few new residents, so I want everybody to meet each other.”

You squeezed your lips to prevent a harsh word from responding to Charlie’s invitation. You were so tired. You feigned a weak smile and looked at her. You wanted to say no, to say you needed to sleep, but those huge, pleading eyes of hers caught the rejection in your throat. You tried to reason with yourself that Charlie doesn’t host stuff like this very often. It would just be one night. You’ll survive.

“Okay.” 

She clasped her hands together and jumped on the balls of her feet, thanked you, and took off to find the next resident to invite. You held your head against your hand and you sighed dramatically. Husk looked at you from the corner of his eye, but opted to remain silent. You stood up after a few more minutes of quiet sulking, deciding you should fix yourself up for dinner.

In your room, you gently fixed your hair and threw on a casual outfit. Nothing super nice, just in case food started flying–knowing the antics of some of the hotel residents, it wouldn’t be a surprise.

You slowly made your way to the banquet room, which Charlie had installed for events like today. You could already hear the low murmur of small talk, and you were surprised to see a few new faces. Not a whole lot, just about five, alongside the familiar faces of your friends. Charlie’s hotel was, slowly but surely, becoming more successful.

You spotted Alastor quickly–he was hard to miss due to his height. You settled yourself in a chair next to him at a long table that Charlie had dragged into the room for everybody to sit at. You felt your skin prickle with the familiar sensation of static, which increased slightly as his attention turned towards you. He gave you a grin before focusing his eyes on the racket that was already picking up. You watched his smile curl, a bit sinister, as the sound of shouting caught your attention.

“-my fuckin’ business!” You picked up the tail end of Angel Dust fuming at Vaggie, one pair of arms crossed under his chest. He had a third hand on his hip, with his fourth hand jabbing an accusatory point at the woman in front of him.

“Guys, please!” Charlie pleaded, pressing her shoulder against Vaggie’s in an attempt to move her away from Angel. “I don’t want to scare my new guests away!”

“Tell this bitch to keep her nose outta my shit! I can’t have my fuckin’ life on the line because she doesn’t like my job!” Angel spat. There was a dangerous, maybe even frantic, look in his eyes. Before Charlie could say anything, Angel had spun around and stormed to the table. He ripped the chair out and slammed his body down. All four of his arms were crossed now as he glowered at the wooden tabletop.

You sighed, and felt a headache already forming. 

Angel’s spirits quickly changed when Husk sulked into the room. He had his paws stuffed in his pockets, and glared at the air in front of him. He sat down at the other end of the table, but Angel was quick to stand up and saunter his way over to sit next to the cat. You couldn’t quite catch the flirtatious remarks that made Husk roll his eyes. 

You observed them for a while, watching as Husk slowly grew more comfortable in the small talk he and Angel shared. He would never admit it, but you knew Husk didn’t hate Angel’s company. Husk seemingly said something about you to Angel that made him whip his head up to look at you. You quickly averted your gaze.

Charlie had been standing by her own chair, and a cough from her throat made the chatter die down. You didn’t really listen to the overly sappy speech she had started to give, your mind drifting away in absent thought. You picked your nails into the edge of the table, fidgeting with the light cloth.

Alastor caught your attention by lightly nudging his leg against yours. You trailed your eyes up to his, meeting his red gaze. There was a hint of worry in his eyes, and his grin twitched at the edges as he looked at your exhausted face. He tilted his head in a silent question.

You merely shook your head in response, and mouthed a quick “it’s nothing” and hoped that he wouldn’t press. He didn’t, but you knew he’d ask again in a private room.

Charlie sat down again, and Vaggie rubbed her shoulder, murmuring a silent praise. You dragged your eyes across the table, making note of the handful of new faces. None of them seemed to take Charlie very seriously, but that didn’t come as a surprise. They probably just liked free food.

The food in question seemingly materialized out of nowhere, and you chalked it up to her “princess of hell” type powers that she didn’t use very often. You smiled gratefully and, though you didn’t have much of an appetite, you started slowly picking at the plate in front of you.

The room once again began to rumble with small talk, but at some point the multiple conversations began to melt together until the whole table was talking to each other in one. Charlie was doing most of the heavy lifting with keeping the conversation going.

“-the deal with the Radio Demon and that gal next to him?” You perked your ears when you heard this reference to yourself. One of the new guests, some sort of lizard demon, had a finger pointed at the two of you. He had a slight country drawl in his voice. You saw Alastor’s smile widen when the attention of the table turned towards himself.

“My darling wife,” Alastor stated simply, briefly placing a hand on your shoulder. His eyes were closed as he smiled proudly. You silently nodded with a light, polite smiling. “We knew each other in life. It’s only natural for us to remain together. It would have been a shame for death to do us part.”

“Didn’t think you was the type…” The lizard said slowly, eyeing the two of you carefully. You didn’t blame him; what kind of nut job would marry the Radio Demon? Though, as Alastor said, you were married before Hell, and he wasn’t so… infamous back then. He was actually rather sweet, besides the whole serial killer thing–which, in your defense, you weren’t even aware of till he was shot to death.

“Didn’t think ya were the type to have a kid, either,” Angel piped up absently, one arm thrown lazily over the back of his chair. You watched as Husk tried desperately to shut him up as he continued to speak, but you barely heard the words over the sound of your heart picking up pace, and the increased radio frequency of Alastor’s. His body had stiffened and his eyes had shot open, quickly narrowing as his smile strained and curled dangerously, his gums visible in a snarl. His eyes were not on Angel, but on Husk, whose ears were flattened against his head and a nervous look in his wide eyes.

You weren’t really paying attention though, but you felt the intense tension and rapid prickling on your skin. Your breathing became more labored and you pointed your face to the table to try to hide the building tears in your eyes. You had tried so hard, all day, to push back the memories that kept threatening to resurface. What are the chances that on the same day, the topic was brought up, destroying the wall you had built to contain the anxiety, regret, grief…

You were kneeling by the wrinkled, messy sheets of the twin bed your son had been in for the past couple days. Your heart was tight, and you could barely breathe as you looked at him. He gazed blearily at the ceiling, following the path of the rocking fan. Every breath he took scratched at his throat, as if there were pebbles blocking the path. He barely had the strength to cough. His lips were dry and cracked, and his graying skin still had a flush of fever. You used a damp rag to clean the dried snot under his nose.

You had tried everything. Every recommended antibiotic, every treatment, therapy, exercise; nothing had worked. Nobody knew how to treat the illness. You had even tried to work with witch doctors that Alastor knew. You had spent so much of what little money you had trying to save your little boy.

Alastor was often gone during this time, being the one to go out and find something new to try. You never left the room, even when your husband tried to push you to go outside to stretch your legs or take a shower. He promised to watch over your son. But you just couldn’t, not with David laying on these dirty sheets, looking so frail, weak, and small. You had often called him little dove, and it made you sick to think that your nickname was now like a cruel adjective to describe his current state. A sick, frail baby bird. He had barely eaten in the past eight days, and you didn’t want to admit to yourself that any scratchy breath he took could be that last one.

You stiffened when his head rolled over towards you, and his eyes struggled to focus on you. His cracked lips grimaced for a moment, followed by a sharp, grating cough that made your heart drop and your eyes sting. You reached a shaky hand forward to smooth down his knotted hair.

“Am I going to be okay,” David said weakly. His voice caught on the tightness in his throat multiple times. “I feel really bad.”

“I know baby, but you’re okay,” You said tenderly, continuing to stroke his hair. “Your dad is getting you some new medicine. You’ll be okay.”

You were lying to him, and to yourself. But you couldn’t help but cling on to a morsel of hope–it was all you could do, really. David just looked towards you, his eyes flicking around slightly, unable to truly focus on anything.

“I’m tired.” He said. His breathing was labored.

“I know.”

Your emotions threatened to spill from your eyes as you watched him turn his head back towards the ceiling, eyes shutting. You didn’t want to cry; you couldn’t, not in front of him. You needed to stay strong for him.

You pressed the back of your hand to his burning forehead, and then trailed your hand to his chest, lightly pressing against him to feel his heartbeat. It was slow, and slowing. Your own heart picked up in response. 

You heard the door in another room open, shut, and footsteps quickly pace towards the room. The door cracked lightly, and the tall, thin frame of your husband peeked in. He held a brown back tightly in his fist. With one look into your eyes, he knew something was wrong. Or, well, more wrong than usual. 

You clenched your jaw to prevent any sob from escaping your lips as he sat the bag down on an end table and kneeled next to you, gripping your waist tightly as he looked at David. The boy’s breath had gotten dangerously quiet.

You watched as his eyes opened again.

“I’m tired.” He repeated, weaker this time.

Both you and Alastor leaned towards the bed, his hand on David’s leg as you gingerly lifted the boy’s head into your arms, pulling his light body towards yourself. You shifted yourself up into the bed with him, trying to wrap as much of yourself around your son as possible. You could feel his heartbeat getting slower with every weak breath he took.

“Sleep, then,” your voice trembled. You felt Alastor grip your shoulder, his other hand softly rubbing David’s arm. You couldn’t describe the expression on his face. “I’ll see you in the morning, little dove.” You lied.

“In heaven?” He responded. Your breath hitched at his words. He knew, somehow, that he was dying. How sick it was, for such a young boy to be aware of his impending death. How cruel God was.

“Yeah, I promise,” Was all you could muster. You worried that any more would destroy the dam that held back your tears.

It broke, though, when you felt David’s heart finally stop. You choked on a sob once, twice, before finally you started wailing. Screaming. You held a vice-like grip on the boy, both your arms and legs secured around him. Alastor was still quiet, but he had sat across from you on the bed and pulled you towards him, securing you and David’s still-warm body in an equally tight grip. You could feel his strained breathing and tight jaw against your head. He said something, but you didn’t hear him.

Your mind rushed back to the present when you felt a hand on your back. Your head whipped towards Alastor, who was looking at you. The table was dead silent, and there was still a look of rage in his eyes, but his smile held a softness that was only ever given to you. Your heart still beat strongly, and you struggled to breathe, but you were at least glad that your mind was still back in the present.

Evidently, barely any time had passed. Angel had a nervous look in his expression, which he tried and failed to mask as Husk cursed at him. Charlie was looking at you in worry.

“(Y/N),” She said softly. “...How come you never-”

“Truly, there is no point in speaking of life before death,” Alastor interrupted her, the usual cheer in his voice lilted by a masked emotion. You knew he felt the same grief as you, but he was a million times better at acting naturally. “What a waste of time and emotion.”

Alastor stood quickly, his hand trailing against your shoulders as he walked past you and towards Angel and Husk. Husk’s ears flattened to his skull again as Alastor loomed over them, hands behind his back as a smile twisted his features.

“Husker, my friend,” He said, the cat demon visibly flinching at the mention of his name. “Let’s take a walk.”

Husk didn’t move, and the room grew heavy with tension with every second as the sound of radio frequency got louder and somehow sharper. Alastor bent at the waist, his snarling smile inches away from the panicked expression on Husk’s face. 

“Is the tomcat getting too old to hear?” You barely picked up Alastor’s words, but you definitely heard the threatening tone in his voice.

The cat swallowed hard before standing up. He shot one last infuriated look at Angel, before whipping his head back to attention when Alastor tapped his cane against the ground impatiently. The two of them left the room, and the tension in the air immediately lifted when the door shut.

Charlie startled you when she placed a delicate hand on your upper arm, and she guided you to your feet and out another set of doors. A weak smile touched her expression.

“Do you want to talk about it?” She asked as you both went up the stairs towards your hotel room. You shook your head silently at her offer. She only nodded back, and said nothing more. She opened the door to your room for you, and waited till you settled down in your bed before saying a string of comforting words that you didn’t really pay attention to. The door clicked softly, and you once again began to sob.

Only a few minutes passed before you felt your skin prickle with a static-like feeling. You had grown to find comfort in the odd sensation, and felt incredibly relieved when you knew Alastor was sitting next to you. You didn’t even hear him enter the room.

He pulled you wordlessly against his chest, lying the two of you down. You twisted yourself in his grip till your ear rested against him, listening to the odd drum of what you assumed was a heart.

“Has David been troubling you all day?” He asked you when your sobs slowed and you caught your breath. You nodded. Alastor rubbed a soothing hand on your shoulder blade. You recognized the tone of grief in his voice as he spoke. “What a pesky boy, even all these years later.”

You wrapped your arms tightly around Alastor’s neck as tears began flowing again.

Though you would never tell him, you often hoped Charlie’s idea of redemption would work. Your husband himself would likely never follow that path; you knew he saw no point and enjoyed the power he held in Hell. But, you wished every day to see your son again. To see your little dove.

You had promised him.

[itsastrobixch]

Astrology notes

- gemini / mercury / uranus / aqua change their identity a lot online. They place a lot of importance on their online identity and as they change so does their online personas.

- Mercury dominance if well placed Learnt to talk very early and saturn mercury aspects learnt to speak a bit late or may speak with a bit of hesitation.

- chiron in 1st have deep rooted identity issues and may also not be able to relax in photos and stuff. Some may even go to the extent of not wanting to take pictures at all.

- count yourself lucky if : air signs ask for your advice.. They don't ask option from everyone. Similarly if fire signs seek you out or show you their defeated side and depressed side. They Always want people to seem them as optimistic fiery and determined but like evryone they too go through down times but they tend to bounce back faster than others.

- Mercury saturn or Mercury rx may have great conversations with themselves in their heads but when it comes out it night miss the mark or.. Like not sound as good as it did in their brains.

- all mercury /gemini dominants open 3 to 5 tabs at the same time. And don't finish a single one completely. Change my mind.

- moon pluto tumultuous emotions. Whiplash. One extrene or the other. Mood changes just with a single event. The whole room can feel the shift as well. Moon and Pluto both give out unstable, watery and intense emotions. It can be difficult if negatively aspected. Even if positively aspected it can lead to the feeling overwhelming emotions.

- People with pluto in 1st, their emotions are hidden. No one knows how they feel. Mostly i see geminis get all the credit for their glib tongues. But have you ever seen a Pluto person toy with people when they know they truth ? They'll lie so effortlessly that even the people who know the truth will start to believe the lie is the truth. Their words and their facial expressions while lying is so controlled and natural it's scary.

- Asteroid Cerea shows is how we nurture. Aries ceres is the defender of the group and people who tend to protect people who are defenseless esp animals. Taurus is the comforter. And so on. But aspects and the house in which Ceres is in also plays a major role.

- Uranus / gemini in 3rd house have lots of ideas at the same time but many are unfocused and evrything is gone in a fleet. They may have a brilliant idea but Lose it in the next second. It'll be better if they scribble down their thoughts anywhere somewhere so they'll have a basic idea of what they thought.

- I fucking admire Aries women, esp as a Libra, like how tf..? i used to have a friend, she used to do some pretty controversial shit in high school but like never once let anything get iin her way and is now a part time business woman...like come on...how are you so headstrong ? And somehow things also tend to workout for them

- every mutable person has a box full of drafts all half done and of various types but all undone. Its a mess of ideas and posts half written and lost interest and motivation along the way...but I'll save it for another day when I will want to finish it up.

- If an air sign texts you daily, they like you. Especially instant replies . 🌝

- scorpio, and Venus Pluto aspects also tend to fall for someone who is out of their grasp. they like to torture themselves like that 😂 or they'll think that they don't deserve the person they're in love with. Its Always one or the other with them.

- venus neptune contacts produce the devoted worshipper type lovers. They will worship the ground their love walks on and will turn a blind eye to their faults. This is most definitely not a healthy patter of behaviour. Please don't indulge in this.

- mercury dominants can't fucking shut their brain off. they have a lot of nervous energy. And will Always be actively thinking about atleast two things at once.

- actually now that i think about it, my bffs in high are an Aries sun, me a sag rising and my frnd a leo sun. and i still wonder why the girls didn't like us 😂🌝 if fire signs get together whether they stir up drama or not, it'll either find them or people will hold them responsible for it even if they aren't.

- gemini and Mercury dominants can imitate very well especially the accents. Their adpative ability is out of charts and a bit creepy tbh. how they change acc to people, how they acclimatise to their surroundings ax cultures, they have this ability which allows to be another person if they like.

- mars - pluto negative aspects may have r*pe dreams often even if they haven't had any such encounters.

- pluto in 1st are ironically afraid of death and illness more so than the usual person.

- 11th house sign may show how we behave online.

-geminins have this weird ability to take and soak up information from all over the place and somehow put it together perfectly . they learn stuff from disorderly messes but they seem to understand it with clarity.

[finsplurtz]

Hey gay make more izuku midoriya x top male reader😘

-love anon

— i love that u said hey gay bc I LOVE IZUKU MIDORYTA

a challenge — izuku.midoriya

— dom ! male.reader x sub ! Izuku Midoriya

— contents : pro hero Deku gets fucked before work , u make him walk around at work with dick up his ass and watch him struggle , no condom gng! , lots of cum and :3

warnings : semi public..sex?

✩°｡ ⋆⸜ 🎧✮

Tormenting pro hero deku

Just before work started you were blowing his back out like crazy like you had his back arching and he was shaking like crazy as he came ughhh cutie alert

you were running out of time so you guys fucked raw which was…..normal sorta you guys occasionally used condoms when you didn’t want things to get messy but this time you didn’t

when izuku knew u were abt to nut he started to nudge you away and tell you to pull out and his cute face was making things harder for you so whatever.

you shoved his face into the mattress and he felt your big dick twitch in him as you let your load coat his walls and he whined very breathlessly in response

“Yn i t..told you not to..now I have..to..to clean it” he reached his hand over to his hole and spread it making you flush seeing your cum drip down his legs

“ah- let’s uhm…” you panic looking for a napkin or something, izukus just whining and whimpering on the bed, his face still pressed against the bedsheets. He jolted up feeling your fingers enter him

“no more yn…..~”

“relax ill get it out for you” you’re digging it out and go to look for more napkins and you come across a silicon penis lol! Dildo.

you smile to yourself and go back to your cute boyfriend who was holding himself up on his elbow while he tried getting the cum out himself.

“no izuk baby I told you I’d do it..” you get on the bed and crawl over to him grabbing him by the neck and pulling him into a deep kiss, he’s letting out small moans in the kiss, his hands holding onto your buff arms

he feels you prod something against his hole and he tried to pull away or take a peak at whatever you were doing when suddenly he moaned loudly and bit your lip when you pushed the toy into him.

“augh—! y..n..?” he choked back a moan and looked down to see his hole plunged by a glossy green dildo hehehe

he looked up at you and saw your bleeding lip

“yn we have to go to wor— hnngm~ sto..p..” you fuck him with the toy for a bit before just nuzzling it deep in him and helping him put his briefs on.

“yn what are you doing…”

“take this as a challenge, yeah? see if you can go the whole day at work with this thing deep inside you…” you kiss the corner of his lips and pick him up and off the bed. You place him over your shoulder and start looking for his pants while he groans but doesn’t fight it

You put his pants on and help him get ready while he’s holding into you like it was the last time

Once he was ready you stepped back to look at him, his legs still trembled ever so slightly and he was struggling to even stay still

“yn I don’t think I can…this is…w..weird..”

“sure you can hon, we work together today so…I’ll keep an eye on you, cmon walk” you grab your stuff and urge him to follow and he’s pretty…slow…

taking a couple steps before having to stop in the middle for a bit. You scoff and call him a drama queen before swiftly picking him up and taking him to the car yourself.

the whole day you would stand behind him or hug him from behind just to push the dildo further into him making him shudder underneath you. you would ask him if he was okay in front of people just to mess with him and tell him to sit down, only to push him down on the seat roughly earning a quiet moan from the smaller.

by the end of the day he would be a trembling mess, he wouldn’t be able to even speak to anyone without fucking up some words so you spoke for him.

he would tug on your shirt and you’d lean down to hear him better, “can we..g-go to..the bathroom ple…please…” he said in a whisper. He sounded so desperate and cute you just couldn’t say no so of course you took him into a stall and kissed the shit outta him

“hurts..it hurts yn..” izuku cried quietly, you dipped your hands into his pants and held onto the end of the dildo starting to slowly glide it in and out while comforting him.

“it’s okay baby…you did really good today..nobody caught on surprisingly. After this we can go home and take a nice bath, yeah? Really get you cleaned up..” you held back a smirk watching him lean his head onto your chest and arch his back, small moans leaving his pretty mouth as you fucked him slowly.

“got that baby..?” he’d only nod shakily and grip your shirt tighter.

small tears stream down his face as he feels himself get closer to coming, you notice and stop the movement and take your hand out. He whimpers in annoyance and looks up at you with a small glare.

“see if you can hold it a tad bit longer hon, I mean we can’t make a mess in these clean clean stalls now, can we?” he was going to give you a sly remark but none came to him head, he let out a shaky breath and led him out.

he couldn’t last long, you noticed he was sorta crying in the car and squirming on his seat, you felt bad so you helped him by jerking him off in the car, he was extremely noisy and needy the whole time, he came all over your hand with a shaky moan and you swore that fucker was gonna pass out in your car

you carried him back home and before plopping him in the shower, you decided to just go one round with him and boy was he talkative tonight.

“ack- fuck!! ugh..~ fuck me h-hardeeer..” he was seriously out it, his shyness was obliterated and he was seeing stars.

he was dead asleep when you were bathing him, you washed him squeaky clean, he looked so peaceful all cuddled up to you in bed.

the next morning he couldn’t even stand up, tumbling down if he tried. He scolded you and now has punished you by making you wear condoms every time you guys do it for the next 6 months.

he couldn’t even go 2 weeks without fucking raw tho

a/n: this green fuck is all i think abt ALSO IM ABT TO HIT 1K I WILL NUT ON YALL🙏🙏

[brionysea]

when it comes to the umbrella academy, a lot of people seem to think that the first half is great and the second half is terrible. personally, I think only the first *season* is great, or even good. here's why:

the mission statement at the end of season 1 is fixing viktor, but viktor isn't the only broken one, so you can infer that they're all going to have to fix *each other* - as a family, the one thing their abuser never let them be. and the world's burning down around them because of the most dramatic sibling confrontation to ever grace the earth, but they're holding hands and escaping together and surviving the impossible with the intent to move forward, even if that means momentarily moving backwards. it's a masterful allegory for finally growing up, accepting responsibility for your personal trauma and tragedy and how they shaped you, and the moment you take that power back by choosing to heal your inner child, only after being slapped in the face with the fact that if you don't, it *will* destroy everything you've ever built, ever cared about, and ever could.

and then the rest of the show forgets all of it. as it were, it goes in the *exact opposite direction.*

on the surface, the second season isn't *as* bad as the subsequent ones are. but season 3 and 4's faults can be traced back to season 2 by how it pivoted away from the serious subject matter that the story (not the plot - the *story*) was heavily baked in, leaning hard into the goofier elements instead, without ever understanding the contrast that those conflicting elements served to highlight. it made them both more powerful; the jokes were funnier because you were just devastated, and the trauma was more devastating because you were just in tears laughing. the emotional roller coaster is key to understanding these people, and you *have* to take the serious stuff seriously for it to work. at least half of the show doesn't, and as a result, the emotional moments feel hollow.

controversial opinion: as a character, luther is better in season 1 than he is anywhere else. he's more unlikable, but that's because he's implicitly there to show what *not* to do - even if he'd succeeded narratively by locking viktor up and saving the world, he still failed thematically by emulating their father and continuing the cycle of abuse - so luther's a character that's being very effectively used to add to the core theme of the story. he feels like a real, frustrating person, whose brain chemistry got messed up by years of abuse and isolation, all for the crime of thinking his father loved him and wanted the best for him. not like a made up guy on your screen doing silly stuff solely for your entertainment.

season 2 was also the start of the characters getting love interests instead of storylines, which season 1 never would have *dreamed* of; klaus and dave's tragic romance only served to further klaus's character arc, viktor's creepy boyfriend was actually manipulating him the whole time, five's fractured-psyche-mannequin was a narrative tool to let us see into the head of such an emotionally reticent character, and so on. the romance served the character, but fairly quickly into the show's progression, it felt like the character started serving the romance. five was immune to this curse for a long time due to aidan gallagher's age, which is why he's (for the most part) the best, most consistent character across the show, because they had to use their *imagination* for him and actually *write an arc* instead of falling back on tired romance tropes that any selection of characters could slot into to fill the dead space.

after season 1, the umbrella academy is entertaining, but it doesn't have anything to *say.* which is extremely disappointing when the show initially made such a strong case for what it wanted to be.

[goldfades]

𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋𝐅𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐃 ─ PB⁵

౨ৎ ─ summary | paigey being your girlfriend - a list of relationship "headcanons"

─ warnings | in a bullet-point formatting, i hope you guys like it! fluff (lmk if yall want nsfw ones bc i can provide), paige being DOWN BAD, social media tingz, maybe alluding to being outed but not really, some angst but you can skip over it, paigey being protective (duh), nothing else?

─ taglist | @xocherishxo @iienstein @yazmunson and here's a link to my taglist if anyone would like to join!!

─ ev's notes | THIS IS SUCH LONG MESS BECAUSE I'M HAVING PAIGE BRAINROT RN, but i hope y'all enjoy nonetheless LOL being in my paige era i've read so many of these and i'm sure you guys have as well, so i'm making this as unique (or descriptive) as i possibly can to make it because it's more fun to read (and write cus im a sucker for details)

PRE-RELATIONSHIP STUFF

when you guys first started dating, i feel like paige would be kind of secretive about it

maybe secretive isn't the right word but very... private but not secret type of vibe (at least irl)

not because she doesn't want to show you off, because believe me, she wants to (she's a bragger what can i say)

but just because she wants to keep you all to herself for a while

she knows that as soon as people find out about it, everyone will be talking about it and making assumptions and she just wants to keep you to herself

at least for a couple months

she doesn't care about the public's opinions but she wants to make sure that y'all are LOCKED IN before she makes it public on social media

but it's clear to paige that y'all are very much locked in after the first couple weeks

she's not new to relationships and she's had her fair share but she can tell that it's different now

so the whole "not sure if i wanna hard/soft launch her cus what if we're not a long term" sentiment turns into "i wanna keep this special thing to myself ONLY for at least a couple months"

and of course the entire team knows paige is down bad for you, they've never ever seen her this WHIPPED

because paige seems like she'd be nonchalant and SHE IS... for people she doesn't give a fuck about

so when she likes someone, she LIKES someone

she is extra what can i say

they tease her about it and in any other situation, she would be annoyed but she loooooooves it because it's like "yeah i'm in the best most awesome relationship with the cutest sweetest and kindest girl in the PLANET"

you and paige would've definitely known of each other since freshman year but like... she's kinda intimidating so you sorta tried to steer clear of her

you were really close with some of the girls on the team, specifically azzi so you saw paige kind of a lot

but sophomore year, azzi kind of pushed you guys to be close and since she knows you guys so well, IT WORKED!

you guys clicked so quick and that doesn't happen a lot with paige, it takes a lot to earn her friendship

but you practically ripped down all her walls within like an hour of talking to her

definitely the first one to catch feelings

at least... to her ;)

very much friends to lovers trope with lots of sexual tension cus who doesn't love that?

i feel like after 3 months of being really close friends, you guys would spend like a shit ton of time together

you guys were ALWAYS together

she even tried to convince you to come to practice with her but you said no cus... what the heck

everyone knows... EVERYONE knows that paige likes you

and it kind of becomes like cemented (for paige at least) after she realized you were her literal COMFORT PERSON

like after every terrible, long practice or after losing games all she wants to do is be AROUND YOU so she could forget about everything

especially when she gets injured, she's such a wreck and the only person who made her feel better was you

it wasn't even what you said or what you did, it was simply just you

and after going through such a bad time with you, she realized that she liked you and she can't keep pretending

and she asked you (yaya!) and you said yes cus you liked her back (yaya!) and everything is just YAYA

so it's safe to say she knows she's found her soulmate within a month of knowing you

but she doesn't wanna seem like she's love-bombing you or whatever so she pretended to be nonchalant

which of course FAILS because she's down bad

so she tells you she loves you within like a month of dating

i KNOW it seems bad but you guys both felt it because of the whole injury and spending every moment together

when you know, you know vibes

she told you she loved you after you were there for her through some of the worst times of her life and you said it back of course and it's all cutesy

paige's love language is TOTALLY quality time and touch

even before you were dating, she just liked having her hands on you whether it was like holding your hand while walking through a crowd, or braiding your hair, or putting her head on top of yours or something as simple as just HUGGING you

but she kept it cordial of course cus y'all weren't dating

yeah that was all thrown out the window as soon you became her girlfriend

hands on you at ALL times, it becomes so subconscious neither of you even know you're doing it anymore

so remember that whole secret relationship thing?

well... everyone kind of figures it out online after like 3 months of dating

it was because of paige, poor girl couldn't keep her hands and lips off of you after a particularly hard game and somehow 🤨🤨someone gets a picture and it was all over twitter and tiktok the next day

literally "paige bueckers girlfriend" trending after an hour of getting posted

but neither of you cared too much about it because A. it was totally worth it cus the kiss was 😫😫😫 and B. she finally doesn't have to turn off her girlfriend mode when she's with you at games

cus she has the prettiest and best gf in the world and she wants everyone to know that

the only reason she was slightly annoyed was because she couldn't hard launch you on instagram :( poor girl had potential captions in her notes :( cus she's our little drama queen:(

but that doesn't stop her cus she ends up doing it! (shameless plug right there hehehe)

now that she can freely touch you and just be herself finally, she literally doesn't GAFFF

of course nothing like over the top because sure she loves PDA to a certain extent and she's an athlete so she needs to keep it civil

RELATIONSHIP STUFF

we've already covered how paige is a physical touch and quality time girly

and paige loves spending literally all her free time with you because you just recharge her

but it isn't in like an overwhelming way

paige understand that sometimes you need quiet time (or vice versa) but the thing is she doesn't even need you to talk just being around you is enough

so idk if it's necessarily QUALITY time but just being around you and spending every free second she has with you tells you that she is in love with you

paige is the most protective person IN THE WORLD, not just with you like in general

it doesn't even have to be someone she knows, if she sees someone giving someone else a hard time SHE WILL STEP IN!

and with her friends, y'all have seen her... she does not back down and will literally murder anyone who comes for the people she cares about

so if that's with people she doesn't know, and her friends, you guys can imagine how crazy she gets over you

if somebody says something even slightly consendecing or mean, slap. someone looks at you the wrong way? slap. somebody breaths wrong around you, slap.

obviously she won't lay a hand on them first but likeeee would she back down, nope

she is actually your guardian angel

like at parties, her hand is always on you and she never ever leaves your side

you need to get a drink, she's coming to

if you need to pee? she'll wait in the bathroom for you

yeah don't expect her to leave your side

because even when she IS by your side, there is always a weirdo in your guys' ear trying to get with one (or both!) of you

but yeah she's not afraid to defend you when it comes to literally anything

and this doesn't only apply to strangers, if there is someone that you know (your friend, her friend, etc) she WILL stand by you and defend you

like she doesn't shy away from confrontation, she will say something but only if you want her to

and GOD HELP THEM if you shed a single tear, cus the next morning you bet she's saying something

like i said, paige is a confrontational person and that means she's the biggest communicator

if she has a problem, she will tell you so that you guys can fix it

but sometimes she can come off a little argumentative and like she's just attacking you

she uses a lot of "you" statements so it seems like she's pushing the blame all on to you

so that can be the root of a lot of your guys' arguments when paige is only trying to solve the issues

but of course paige doesn't back down so she will be arguing with you even if she doesn't even know why, she just hates being wrong

but she doesn't let you leave or go to sleep unless the problem is fixed (or at least on the road to being fixed)

she'll give you space, she'll go another room to take a breather but she will not let you leave until it is fixed

usually after the breather you guys can come to an agreement and then paige usually hugs all the anger outta you

cus who could resist her?

if the argument lasts a couple days (it usually doesn't unless it's something serious) paige will talk it out with her mom or her friends

and you'll usually do the same

and paige will force you to sit down and talk about it until it is FIXED because she hates not being able to talk to you

and when you guys do eventually talk about it, especially if it's a serious topic, it will end with tears with both parties

but you guys always make up and everything will be better

okay okay no more angst ... for now hehehe

i feel like paige's nervous tic would be braiding the ends of her hair so i feel like that would transfer to YOU somehow

she just likes braiding your hair!!!!!! or just running her hands through your hair, it would help her relax

and if you're like me, it will help you relax as well

if you're black/have braids, she would only touch your hair if you let her!

paigey takes pictures OF EVERYTHING so obviously that includes you

her camera roll consists of ONLY you atp, like... 20% pics of literally anything else, and the rest would just be pictures of you or something to do with you

and oh my gosh don't get me started on the damn .5's of you, some of them are HORRENDOUSSSS and paige uses them as reaction pictures sometimes

and you found out from azzi that she does indeed use them in the girls groupchat

but she argues that you just look adorable which you respectfully disagree

oh and don't get me started on her tiktok drafts, she has at least 1,000 (rip her storage)

and when y'all started dating she just makes cute relationship tiktoks but she never posts them

EXPECT the "you're spinning me around, my feet are off the ground one" cus she wants to prove to the world that she has muscles

and the tiktok girlies will cry but WHO CARES!

oh and if you're on the basketball team, they will started to fan-girl over you as well

HELLA TIKTOK EDITS

and paige will favorite, repost and comment on them

like the most down-bad, insane comments you can think of

"GET THE STRAP GET THE STRAP!" is one of many ✨✨

if you aren't on the team, trust the tiktok girlies will find a way and they will make edits of you

and paige will do the same

obviously you do the same for her, your favorites are just paige edits atp (mine too)

ESPECIALLY THE GET IT SEXY ONE OMLL

and everyone will make ship edits and cutesy things like

"omg the way paige looks at her" and like a slideshow of paige being like all 😍😍😍

after paige gets more comfortable with like the media knowing about you two, she posts you every five seconds

usually like stories and stuff and especially if you’re also a basketball player, she reposts ALL your stuff

she is a proud gf !!!

she also has a highlight FOR SURE, she loves

also she def has like 10 diff wallpapers of you and her, some are really cute and some are really… 🫣

also paige strikes me as the type to like be texting you ALL DAY

and girl doesn’t care if you reply, she will send you 8 consecutive messages of different things

“omg look at the group chat 😂 *insert screeshot*” “baby they ran out of fucking caramel at dunkin, how does that happen ?” “i ended up going to a local cafe why did this shit cost me 9$” “baby you’re coming to my game on saturday right?” “HAHA look at this meme 😂” “why haven’t you responded to my tiktok’s in 2 days?”

yes she 100% uses the laughing with tears emoji argue with the WALL

or skull emoji

she also sends you 20 minute snapchat vlogs and they’re so chaotic, especially when she’s at practice or something

kk will steal her phone and say hi then you’ll hear them play fighting for like 80% of the vlog

also she does grwm’s on snapchat too when she’s at away games and her morning voice is SOOOO SEXY CUTE

↳ make sure to check out my navigation or masterlist if you enjoyed! any interaction is greatly appreciated !

↳ thank you for reading all the way through, as always ♡

[queen-of-the-avengers]

Mr. Right Now

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~2.3k

Warnings: angst, past trauma of not feeling good enough, it's better off being alone angst, minor fluff at the end

Summary: As a divorcee with three kids, it’s hard to open up to men and allow them into your children’s lives. You’re a single mother who is just trying to get through each day until you meet Bucky. He might be the one you’ve been searching for all this time. Can you put aside your fears enough to let him in?

Squares Filled: band (2021) for @buckybarnesbingo

Author’s Note: any and all comments are greatly appreciated <3

x

The only time you’re able to go to the grocery store in the summertime is when you don’t have your kids hanging off your every limb. Your oldest daughter and son are at a summer camp you were able to get them into while your youngest daughter is being watched by your mother who had some time for you to get errands done.

Whoever said parenting was the best thing in the world was lying because you want to cry most days. It’s not that you don’t love your children, you absolutely love them with all your heart. You want nothing more in the world than to be their mom but it’s hard some days. You’re a single mom to three kids which takes a lot out of you. You have no time to do anything for yourself. Whenever they’re at school, you spend your days taking care of your baby girl and cleaning the house only for them to return and mess it up all over again.

Being a mom is one of the hardest jobs in the world and it’s not for everyone. However, when you had your kids, you weren't alone. You had a husband who you thought would be with you forever. Then, you caught him with a twenty-year-old in your bed and that set you back decades. It took you a long time to find someone else after him, which you did, and you thought you had gotten your second chance at love.

He was a breath of fresh air after struggling for years. You only had two kids at the time but it was still a handful since they were both so young. You and your second husband had a daughter together, and you thought this was it. This is your family.

Then, he left without warning. He told you that he didn’t love you anymore and wanted nothing to do with you or your kids. He threatened to take Abby but you fought him through a lawsuit. He was bouncing between homes and didn’t have a steady income, all of which you had. If you thought your first husband was bad, your second husband broke you completely.

You swore off men after that. All you want to do is take care of your kids and live life on your own. It’s hard but you know you can do it. Your mother has been very supportive of you and helps out when she can but she’s much older and can’t do stuff like she normally could. Your father passed a decade ago so neither of you have him to fall back on. Your brother and sister moved out of the country when they turned eighteen and haven’t looked back since.

You’re truly on your own which you never minded until now.

You fill your shopping cart as you go down the list you made before leaving the house, and you look at the next item on your list. You’re not looking where you’re going and almost run into someone.

“I’m so sorry,” you gasp and look up.

You gasp again but it’s not from the shock of running into him. This man is… You don’t think you ever saw a more handsome man in your life. He’s tall, like a whole foot taller than you, and has dark hair that is not too long. His eyes are bright blue oceans and he is very muscular.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s my fault.”

“No, it’s mine. I wasn’t looking where I was going. Sorry,” you mutter.

You’re about to move around him to continue your shopping when he stops you.

“I haven’t seen you around here and I come here every week.”

“Oh, yeah. I usually get my groceries delivered but I had some time today to do it myself.”

“I’m Bucky,” he smiles.

Damn, he has such a great smile, too.

“Y/N.”

“Do you care for some company while you finish?”

“Sure,” you smile. “So, Bucky, have you lived in Washington D.C. for long?”

“On and off. I used to live here years ago. I just recently came back and am now living with my two best friends. You?”

“I just moved here a year ago. I had to get away from… stuff… I used to live in Nevada and thought a change would do me good.”

“Lucky me that you did,” he flirts.

You can’t help the blush that forms on your face. You’re not used to compliments. You finish the rest of your shopping quickly but you don’t want to stop talking to Bucky. He’s the first man you have had such an easy conversation with in a long time. Your mom wants you to put yourself out there again and try dating but you can’t think of anything worse than that. Dating means bringing a new man into your kids’ lives who will probably leave you. You’re not going to do that to them again so you’ll settle for stolen conversations in the grocery store.

Still, you find yourself not wanting to leave the store because then you’ll have to stop talking to Bucky. However, when your mom calls about Abby crying because she’s hungry and you haven’t pumped a bottle for her. She can eat solid food but she loves your milk more. You’re trying to transition her into solid foods but it’s a work in progress.

“Sorry. I have to get back home.”

“Yeah, of course.”

“It was really nice to talk to you, though. Maybe I’ll see you back here again.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he nods.

You’re gone before he can ask you for your number. You can’t stop thinking about Bucky. You never met a man who could invade all your senses. Your mother left after you got back and you spent the next hour feeding your daughter and putting the groceries away. You put your daughter down for a nap when your phone rings. You take the call when you get to the kitchen to finish with the groceries.

“Hey, Emma.”

“Y/N! You know that band that Leslie goes on and on about?”

“Yeah.”

“They’re playing a gig at The Twisted Bar this weekend. You gotta come with us!”

“I don’t know. I have Abby and I don’t have a sitter.”

“Bring her here. My husband would love to watch her. He’s been so tied with the boys that it’d be nice to watch a girl.”

“Are you sure? What if she gets hungry? She only seems to want my milk.”

“Then pump before coming here. It’s been such a long time since we all went out. Just once stop worrying about your kids. Jace and Lizzy are at camp and it’s likely Abby will sleep the whole night.”

You’re still not sure. Going out with your friends usually ends in one of two ways: either you end up going home early because your kids need you or you end up going home early because all the girls want to do is flirt with men. They’d never cheat on their husbands and they never take it past the occasional flirty comment. When they get like this, guys love to flirt with you and that’s when you call it a night.

You’re not some horny teenager looking for a fun time. You have kids and if these men knew about it, they’d never flirt with you. It’s tiring to go to bars and reject every man because you know what it’s going to lead to.

Still, it’d be nice to go out with your friends since it’s been so long.

“Fine,” you sigh, “but I’m not going there to take some man home.”

“Got it. This is going to be so much fun! Want me to pick you up?”

“No, I’ll meet you there. What time?”

“Six.”

“I’ll bring Abby over at five, then. We can leave together but I’ll need my car just in case.”

You and Emma talk for a little while longer until you hang up. Friday comes quicker than you’d like, and you had just dropped Abby off at Emma’s house. You’re nervous to leave her alone but you’ve been friends with Emma and Robert for decades so you figure you’d trust them with your kids sooner or later.

You and Emma arrive at The Twisted Bar right after Leslie, Jackie, and April get there. It’s a reunion of the decade since you haven’t seen April in years and Jackie for longer. It’s been hard finding time away from your kids.

“Y/N! I’m so glad you finally made it!” Leslie squeals and pulls you into a hug.

“Eh, I figure it’s time to see my girls.”

“It has been a long time,” April comments.

Leslie grabs drinks while you sit at a table that’s near the band that’s setting up. Leslie has been in love with them ever since she saw them opening for Bon Jovi a few years ago. They’ve been slowly rising to fame but they love playing in small bars to stay connected to their fans. Leslie comes back with the drinks and you sip yours leisurely while your friends down theirs quickly. It’s dangerous when you don’t taste the alcohol; that’s how you get drunk quickly.

“Hey, I’ll be right back. I’m going to get some water.”

Your friends wave you off, too invested in the music to listen. You shake your head with a smile and make your way to the bar counter. You look away for a second and run into someone seconds later.

“Hey, Y/N!” You look at the person and see Bucky standing there. “We can’t keep meeting like this.”

“Bucky, what are you doing here?” You pause after hearing how that sounds. “Sorry, that sounds weird. I mean, hi.”

“Hi,” he laughs. “I’m with my roommates. They’re here to see the band. They wanted me to come out.”

“Same.”

“I was hoping to see you. I really liked talking to you the other day.”

“Same here.”

“Can I get you a drink?”

“Sure.”

Bucky gets you and himself a drink before escorting you to one of the back tables. Most everyone is up front listening to the band so the back is clear of crowds. It’s easier to hear him, too.

“So, I know I’ve said this but you… Okay, I’m not very good at this. My friend, Steve, says I need to get out more but I actually like staying in and being alone. I don’t normally do this but I really enjoyed talking to you. Can I have your number?”

Just like that, your entire world shatters. You like Bucky but now that he wants to take the next step, he’s becoming a real person instead. A real person who you might have to take home to your kids. A real person who will just leave you like everyone else. You don’t want to do this to Bucky but you scoff in annoyance.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, fine, Bucky. Look, I gotta get back to my friends.”

“Wait, is it something I said? You don’t have to give me your number if you don’t want to. I just… You’re beautiful and funny. I had a great time with you at the grocery store.”

You don’t mean to be rude or snappy with Bucky but you’re sick and tired of men feigning interest in you only to leave you and your kids. You’re not going to put them through all that trouble if the man isn’t going to stay. If you don’t give men the light of day, then they can’t leave you.

“You want my number?”

“I do.”

“Which number do you want, Bucky?”

“Uh, well, how many numbers do you have?”

You laugh bitterly. “Oh, I have numbers coming out of my ears. For instance, ten.”

“Ten?”

“Yeah. That’s how many months old my baby girl is.”

Bucky’s face doesn’t fall in disgust but he’s not jumping for joy either. Tears prick your eyes but you won’t let them fall.

“You have a baby girl?”

“Yeah. Yeah, sexy, huh? How about this for a number? Six. That’s how old my other daughter is. Eight is the age of my son. Two is how many times I’ve been married and divorced. Sixteen is the number of dollars I have in my bank account. 480-555-0199. That’s my phone number, and with all the numbers I just gave you, I’m guessing zero is the number of times you’re gonna call it. You’re nice, Bucky, but I’ve been down this road too many times. I will not allow my children to meet a man I know won’t stay in my life. Really, it was nice talking to you but no man wants a woman with three children.”

You grab your drink and leave the table but stop when you hear your phone ringing. You take out your phone and notice a number you don’t recognize. Knowing your daughter is with someone else who’s not your mother, you answer it thinking Leslie’s kids are using their phones to call you.

“Hello?”

“For the life of me, I can’t figure out why anyone would leave you. I understand the walls you’ve put up. I understand why you don’t date or don’t trust men, especially around your kids. I understand that you had to put yourself back together multiple times. I’m not dismissing that, but I can promise you that I am not like other men. I don’t abandon people and I happen to love kids. If you give me a chance, I would love to show you that you’re not a piece of ass. You’re not a notch on someone’s belt. You’re a woman who I would love to get to know.”

You turn to face Bucky who has his phone to his ear. The tears are already coming down whether you want them to or not.

“All I ask for is a chance.”

“Okay,” you whisper.

Maybe it’s you who needs to give him a chance. Then maybe, you’ll finally find the one person you’ve been looking for.

x

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[fraugwinska]

I know canonically Alastor doesn't sleep but let's assume it's not because he doesn't have to but because he doesn't want to - he feels powerless and vulnerable when he sleeps, also he is tormented by nightmares.

What if one night everyone is waken up by hotel almost falling apart: walls are cracking, everything is shaking, and a green glow is flowing through the corridors. Turns out, Alastor is asleep and having a very bad nightmare. And unless they want the hotel to fall apart, someone has to wake Alastor up... (reader volunteers as a tribute)

LOTS of angst with a comfor ending? :)

You ask, Anon - and I deliver (at last)! Thank you for being so patient with me! Today just felt right to write this, and I sincerely hope you find it worth the wait! <3 TW: Depictions of Blood - Minors DNI - 2.8k words

The Eye of the Storm

"What the fuck is going on?!"

Another loud boom shakes the ground of the corridor, almost making you trip and fall if not for the handrail you managed to grab. Angels door opened at the other end, a scared squeal of Fat Nuggets faintly audible as Angel stumbled out, clearly as startled and scared as you.

"Fuck, toots, what is that?"

"I have no idea!"

You had no idea, but whatever was causing it, the entire building was shaking like in an earthquake and you were terrified some of the older, worn out parts of your floor could collapse any moment. The cracks on the walls were growing with every rumble, and a bright, green glow had overtook the lamps, turning the usually warm and inviting space into an eerie nightmare.

You exchanged a terrified look with Angel, both of you unsure what to do next. He hurried over to you, his piglet shaking in two of his arms, taking your hand with his free one and pulled you with him. "C'mon, we need to find Charlie, before the fucking ceiling falls on our heads."

You didn't even have the time to reply before the lights went off, a terrified scream leaving your mouth before you could stop it. You heard a string of curses from Angel and felt him squeeze your hand tighter. The both of you ran down the stairs as fast as you were able to in the dim darkness. You tripped several times, but Angel held you steady, trying his best to not fall himself. The lights went on again with another rumble, making the stairway moan like it was in pain.

"Charlie! Vaggie!"

You reached the lobby, where you found the rest of the residents already gathered. Everyone was there, looking shaken and confused, but unharmed. You saw them look around and then up to the ceiling, the cracking of the wood and walls sounding louder and more violent than upstairs.

"Ey, you two, are yo' hurt?" Husk yelled over the noise, his eyes scanning Angel with a worried look.

You shook your head, letting the spiders hand go so he could run up to Husk, who took his pig into his arms and hugged Angel close.

"Is everyone alright? Where's Niffty... and Alastor?" Charlie's voice sounded shaky, and you could tell she was doing her best to keep calm and not freak out.

"I'm here!" The little cyclops girl appeared behind Sir Pentious's hat, her eye wide. "But I think Alastor's not okay."

"What do you mean?" Vaggie asked, her hands stiff on Charlies trembling shoulders.

Niffty looked around, biting her lip. "He has bad dreams sometimes, and he's really scary when he does, and then stuff like this happens. He can't control his powers, and-"

"Wait, so it's HIM who's causing all of this?" Vaggie's eye widened in anger and another boom made the whole lot of you duck as the glasses from the bar fall from their shelves, flooding the floor with shards of glass and debris.

"Yes, but he can't help it, it's his brain messing up! We need to help him!"

Vaggie cursed, while Charlie and the others started to ramble over another.

"Someone has to wake him up, before the hotel really collapses."

"Are 'ya crazy, Charls? We can't go in there!"

"Yeah, at this state, yo' won't know that fucker won't rip yo' to shreds befo' you even reach his room."

"It'ssss better to evacuate, I think."

"And leave the building to fall into pieces? Ugh, maldito idiota de la radio..."

Your head turned worriedly back to the green glowing corridor. Alastor. What the hell kind of bad dream would make him lose control over his powers like that? Niffty said it was his brain messing up, whatever that meant - did he really suffer from nightmares? You felt a sting of worry for the deer demon. You didn't even want to imagine the kind of terrors he had to have in his head to cause something like this.

"I'm gonna go."

Everyone stopped talking and looked at you. Husk gave you an incredulous look, still holding Angel and the pig in his arms. "Y-yo' can't be serious. That's straight-up suicide."

You shook your head. "Someone has to. I'll be fine, just... get out of here, wait outside and make sure no one is getting hurt."

Angel tore himself out of the cat demons grasp, taking you by your shoulders, his eyes pleading. "Toots, Alastor is not himself right now. He can't control what the fuck he's doing, and if he hurts 'ya, I don't... Please, don't do this, that bastard ain't worth it."

You knew the spider demon was worried, and you appreciated your friends' concern, but he didn't know the Radio Demon as well as you did. You were aware of his reputation, the stories of his atrocities and his sadistic nature. You knew how cruel and unforgiving he could be, but you also knew that over the last few weeks, he had shown you a softer, less menacing side. You and him bonded over his love of cooking and your love of eating what he prepared, over your shared interest for record players and classical music and your affinity to magic and the obscure. He could be a lot of things, but he wasn't just the bloodthirsty serial killer most of the denizens of hell made him out to be.

You gave the spider a smile, putting a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. "Don't worry about me, Angel, it's going to be alright. He's my friend, I can't just leave him in there to get crushed by the building."

Before you could be held back, you started to run towards the stairs. Charlie cried out to you, but you ignored her, you just took a last glance back, shouting as you vanished into the darkness.

"Just trust me, and get your asses out of here."

"Fuck."

The group stood there, unsure what to do, and a loud snap coming from the second floor made them turn and run for the doors.

The higher you climbed the stairs, the more intense the shaking and rumbling got. You had to crawl on the steps at times, because it was too dangerous to walk, and you didn't trust your legs not to give way under you. The walls were splitting, the green light was burning in the lamps, and the air was crackling with what seemed like dark magic, ominous glowing symbols appearing and fading in your vicinity.

When you finally reached Alastor's door, it was already hanging from the hinges. It had probably blown when the magic started to burst out in violent waves, the green glow brightly pulsating and threatening from within the inside. You wondered if your heart could beat any faster without giving way. It wasn't the first time you were scared witless, hell wasn't exactly a carnival. But as much as you believed the best about Alastor, he still was one of hell's most powerful overlords. He still had countless bodies in his name. You trusted him, but if Niffty and the others were right - and it seemed to be the case that they were - he had little to no control over himself when lost in a nightmare. Could a demon like him sleepwalk and kill you in their sleep?

You took a breath and squared your shoulders, turning around to call into the room, not daring to set a foot inside yet.

"Alastor? It's me. Can you hear me?"

The rattling of the sudden radio static made the framed pictures on the wall shatter to the ground, and from the edge of your field of vision you noticed the lights fade once more, turning the already ghost-like bedroom almost black. You reached for the doorway and lowered your voice.

"It's me, you have to listen, okay? It's okay. I just came to check on you. It's safe now. You are safe."

No answer, again. The darkness felt suffocating, as if it was about to crush you any minute. You felt dizzy, disoriented, like a rabbit that had caught the eyes of a fox. You didn't dare say anything else, not until you could at least see him, figure out what was going on. With shaking legs, you took a step over the threshold. The lamps flickered again and you tried your best not to stumble as you scanned the room in front of you in between the shutters of brightness for traces of the other demon.

When you found him, you had to bite down a cry of horror.

You wished you hadn't.

He was curled up and violently shaking on his bed, the covers ripped and laying in pieces around his sweating body. His head was almost between his knees, hair spiky and disheveled and his overgrown and twisted antlers slicing the mattress and pillows with every tremor rushing through him. You could barely see him, the flickering lights making his face obscured in the shadows, but what you could see made your heart sink. He was sobbing in between shattering breaths, his chest heaving up and down erratically and his claws digging deep ridges into his torso as his body jerked and twisted, blood pooling into the covers in deep red.

"Al." You couldn't control yourself anymore. The shock, the dread and worry freed your legs from their stupor and you rushed to the hunched form, nearly stumbling on the ripped fabrics.

His eyes flew open at the touch of your fingers, burning in bright crimson with ticking dials as irises, almost completely overtaking his entire eye sockets. The howling of radio static screeched from his lips as the room shook again as he bared his sharp teeth, his clawed hands swiping at you with violent intensity that send you flying on the ground. You tried to catch yourself, but fell to your side, letting out a pained cry as you felt the wound on your waist, dripping with blood and split wide open.

You watched him with wide eyes as his limbs grew, afraid to even move. His stare was petrifying you, you had never seen such violent, uncontrolled expression on him. He growled, his head turning towards you, his mouth, no, maw opening. He looked like he wasn't there anymore, that nothing left was inside besides a manic creature ready to slaughter everything it crossed. A nightmarish beast in its lair that had cornered a small helpless prey, ready to be swallowed alive.

He got up in one swift motion, the pieces of fabric that once were bedcovers flying through the air and a dark aura creeping into your vicinity. Your breath hitched. You couldn't get out of his range with him like that, the open wound kept you from moving fast, and his maw was so big it seemed he could rip you apart by just inhaling.

"Alastor, it's okay. It's me." you breathed, desperate not to lose hope. There must be something that could call to him in the deepest parts of his mind, something that could snap him out of this lucidity. You scrambled back as he stepped in front of you, lowering his head to meet your eye level. His claws dragged on the floor beside him, and in a sudden, swift move, his large hands grasped you, the pressure on the gash blindingly painful.

"I-It's okay, it's not y-you, it's just a bad dream. I'm here to h-help you. Let me..." You gasped, a sob leaving your throat as his claws started to dig into you.

"Nnnghh... Y...-you c..c-c-an't ...-he..lp...m...m-e-e.."

A snarl left his lips and he raised his face into the air, his arms lifting you effortlessly and you whimpered in fear. Pushing through the hazy fog that invaded your brain, you tried again.

"Please, Al, j-just look at me. Wake up a-and look at me. You'll be okay."

"W...-why d-d..id..-.yo...-u co..-m-e... -h..e-re...?"

The blood loss was making you feel faint, and you lifted a bloody hand, desperate to touch him, to reach the man behind the monster. With blurry eyes, you brushed his cheek, his face just near enough your fingertips reached the fizzing skin. It felt like dipping your hand in pure electricity, numbing and painful, but you didn't care.

"Because you a-are scared and h-hurting, and I care about y-you. What f-friend would I be if I l-let you s-suffer alone?"

At your words, his enormous form shivered, and you felt his grip on you loosen ever so slightly. The dials fixed on you were still ticking, but the red of his eyes dimmed. Your other hand came up, slowly, to take the other side of his face.

"Can you wake up for me, Alastor?"

More growling, more shaking.

"Pl-please. Wake up and come b-back to me."

His eyes flicked, the howling static became more hushed and his ears twitched under the forks of his antlers. You took a shuddering breath of relief as the animalistic stare on his face lost its threatening gaze and felt the buzz under your fingers slowly dying down. The sharpness under your hands subsided fully as you saw Alastor shrink back, slowly becoming aware again of his surroundings. The green glow that filled the room flickered and turned into the familiar oranges and reds. You held onto his face and his eyes, not daring to let him go until he had finally settled and transformed back into his regular form, the last clicks of the vanishing dials fading as his irises turned to dim reds once again.

"What happened. Why are you..." The sound of his familiar voice was all you wanted to hear now. As your legs gave away, you didn't fall however, Alastor's slender hands were quick to catch you, his smile confused and irritated. He let his eyes travel down your arms to the wound and pools of crimson surrounding you, and back at your face, now pale.

"What do you think you are doing, dear." he breathed, settling you down slowly on the ground.

"You had a nightmare. The hotel... everything was chaos. I had to come, had to... get you out of it." you stammered, watching him looking around to see the damage, his face warped in realization as he put the pieces together.

"Fuck!"

It was rare to hear the usually so poised and reserved Radio Demon swear, but for this situation you'd agree it was entirely appropriate. But the hotel still stood and he was back, and that was all that mattered. When he took you up in his arms and buried his face in your neck, you felt the more alive than in the whole time on earth.

"You foolish girl. You could've been killed by my hands."

You let him embrace you, his long arms circling around you protectively and his forehead resting on the hollow of your throat.

"But I wasn't." you said simply, smiling weakly into his hair. Your arms felt heavy but they still managed to find their way onto his back, reassuring and tender, letting him know you were fine, mangled maybe, but alive and there. You stayed that way for a moment, both of you unable to move or say something as you found some grounding in each other's warmth and the now peaceful silence.

The quiet was broken, however, when you heard frantic footsteps in the hall outside and the uproarious group of the hotel staff came charging through the opened door, halting when they saw your display. Alastor didn't lift his head, in fact, he didn't move at all. You turned your head, your hand barely leaving his back to give the speechless group a lazy wave.

"Are 'ya ok? I'll kill 'im if 'yer not, I don't give a shi-"

"You were so incredibly brave, oh gosh, look at all this blood. Vaggie, we need to get the first aid kit!"

"I'll get my mop! And a broom, look at the mess!"

"Aye, this fucker really owes you."

"Umm... this is rather... Should we give thossse two a moment?"

"Lo juro por Dios, un día de estos lo voy a matar..."

Through the mass of noise the others made, talking and fussing and scurrying, you heard Alastor's quiet whisper against your bloodied skin, loud and clear.

"Thank you, dearest."

You smiled, closing your eyes and holding him a bit tighter, even if it made your wounded side sting.

"It's okay, Al. What else are friends for?"

[lynnlovesthestars]

Why?

Pairing: Astarion x Reader. Genre: Hurt/comfort, angst, fluff. Warnings: mentions of past abuse, self-harm, astarion is a little bitch that can't accept someone can take care of him, blood sucking, lots of pulling and letting go i guess?, messy emotions for messy people, self doubt and insecurities. Anxiety, panic attacks, nudity but not sexual. (if i missed something, please let me know. Summary: night is that moment when you can take care of yourself, but what if you find someone that needs more care than you? WC: 4.4k

Author notes: omg i finally finished this one, i've been working on it for a while now and initially it was supposed to be published before i started getting requests, which by the way im loving and im diligently working on<3, anyways this was a small challenge for me, i've been trying to work with stuff i wasn't entirely comfortable with to push my boundaries and learn something new, and this came out.. I hope you'll enjoy this read while I work on the next draft<3 love you lots!

When the moon finally made its way in the sky, and dinner had been consumed, you knew you finally had some time for yourself.

You’d take that time to scrub away the blood that stuck to your skin and the filth of the day. Traveling along a river had it’s pros: you found a nice spot along the bed of the Chionthar that seemed perfect for a bath. 

That night the place was particularly silent, the wind was blowing between the leaves and it was the only sound that you could hear until you passed that  funny rock shaped like a bear.

Initially you thought it was an animal, or at worse a beast, but as you delved closer rhe sound became much clearer. 

Heavy breathing.

It was a sound you could recognize everywhere, because it was a sound you’d make on those nights when anxiety would take over and you felt helpless. Since you went through all the hardships of your life, you promised yourself you’d do your best to help people in need, and in that moment there was definitely someone that needed help.

Your stomach was churning as you followed the shallow breaths that reverberated in the silence of the undergrowth. It led to a small clearing where the moonlight was free to enlight as much as possible of your surroundings. On the opposite side from where you came from, someone was coiled on himself, exposing their bleeding back your way.

The slender fingers clawed at their own flesh leaving deep marks, but it was the whimpering that helped you recognize the person in front of you.

Astarion.

Astarion that was completely naked, his nails were digging into his shoulders, and trembling like a beaten puppy. His clothes were scattered around the clearing, they were ripped in the haste of the panic, you assumed.

You rushed to his side, dropping your bag next to him as you crouched and cradled him to you.

“‘Starion” You whispered as you scanned him, from the way he hid his face, to the red streaks along his chest, the pale skin stained with tears and his glassy, raw eyes.

His whole body was a trembling mess as he couldn’t hold back tears. The slow wails were filling you with anguish as you tried to calm him down just enough so he could make out a few words.

“Who did this to you?” You whispered softly, as you slowly dried his cheeks. The question awoke something in him, he slipped out of your arms before you could object and he tried to sit up.

His arms were shaking as he rested his palms on the leaves-covered soil. “No one.” He turned his head away, his eyes subsequently diverting from yours. “It doesn’t matter anyway.” He breathed out as he tried to stop his eyes from getting more and more teary, yet failing at each attempt.

“Yes, it does.” You insisted, raising your palm and reaching for his cheek. Gently you guided his eyes back to you making sure he knew you cared. Making sure that he knew you only wanted to help him.

The pit in your stomach felt like a dark hole in you, swallowing everything with it. You’ve never seen him like this since you two met, not even when you learned his vampirism while he was starving. 

Even when you learned small bits of his past, like how he got turned, he always kept composure, though you knew he was hurting. Now instead he was so vulnerable.

You felt a pang of guilt hit you, you were invading his personal space and he probably wanted to run away, yet he was growing on you, and if there was something about you, it was that no one hurt the people you cared for. 

“Who did this to you?” You repeated still gently yet firm. You caressed his cheek with your thumb, taking your time to wipe away the remnants of his previous tears.

For a moment he hesitated, he wanted to hold back, but then his body gave out, almost slumping on yours. His eyes were duller, his lips were quivering, and he wasn’t sure he could ever form a full sentence properly, but you were there and you were trying to help him. No one ever tried to help him.

For so long he wished someone would waltz in and come to his rescue. He desperately wished someone would shake him awake from his worn coffin to drag him out of those filthy kennels. He wished someone would dry his tears and heal his wounds, yet for 200 years he suffered alone.

Instead you did much more than what he expected: you insisted, you didn’t recoil disgusted or gave up. You sat there trying over and over to patch him up, to find answers, and to find who hurt him so deeply that he’d end up bleeding alone in a forest.

You knew, of course, that he didn’t tell you his whole story when he opened up, it would have been foolish of him to do so since you were a stranger. He didn’t mention the scars that covered his back, or the constant nightmares during his reverie, cause of course elves couldn’t live without over analyzing things, or the true extent of his master’s punishment. You couldn’t have known yet.

His voice was shaky, broken, a whisper as he muttered Cazador’s name, afraid that even saying his name out loud would be too much, like that would make the monster materialize in front of him, but once he muttered his name, he couldn’t stop his words from being vomited out of his throat like sharing all of this with you was a new compulsion bestowed upon him.

“I was meditating when my brain decided to gift me an old memory” He sighed shakily. “And of course the memory was related to whatever is carved in my back. The pain was so vivid it felt like I was back there, hunched as that bastard was having the time of his life.” His voice was feeble, broken, it was so raw you were not sure how to react.

“When I woke up I was covered in blood and everything was hurting.” His eyes widened for a moment like he could rewatch those images over and over again, right there in front of you.

“My body was clearly not mine anymore, I was taken over by this fear that you’d all hate me for whatever this is, so I ran looking for a spot to hide.” He lowered his gaze.

“I guess before I could look around me, I sank on my knees. I felt like I was suffocating, Tav.” He was trusting you with something that he was running away from, something that terrorized him, something that you knew went opposite of his survival instinct. It was something that made him so fragile that he had to run away from a place that he should have considered safe, your camp.

Despite the gushing wounds he still ran, and yet he allowed you to get a piece of his mind, he didn’t kick you away like he’d usually do.

“My clothes were too much, the pain was too much, everything was too much. I'm not gonna lie. I literally ripped everything off before I could even process what I was going to do to myself. The only thing I knew was that the old scars were open again and they were gushing. I could feel it, Tav. I could feel the blood dripping down my fucking back.” His eyes were brimmed again with tears that he couldn’t hold back even if he tried, it was such a haunting feeling he wished he could erase the memory. “I couldn’t stop.”

He looked at his hands, his fingers were covered in blood and specs of his skin were hidden under his fingers. He was so disgusted at the sight that another sob quivered from his lips.

“You’re safe, nothing can hurt you now.” You leaned forward wiping his cheeks with your palms. 

The remorse in his eyes was vivid, he just had trauma dumped on you and he knew you were going to hate him for it, but then you said his name so gently, so caring, that he allowed you to caress him.

You gave him time to ragain as much control as he could muster before you helped him up. He did look in need of a bath undoubtedly, and you had to go to the river anyways, so you asked him if he wanted to join you. You offered to clean his wounds so he could avoid infections, though you weren’t so sure vampires could get infected like that.

You both took your time standing up, his head was pounding so hard that his balance faltered. Your arms were there for him before he could hit the ground.

How was it possible that whenever he'd be deep in shit, you saved the fucking day? Just that day you did it twice and he would have sworn he didn't deserve any of it.

“I’ve got you” You made sure your arms were anchored on him, steadying his movements, and taking the opportunity to ask him if you could clean his wounds. He wanted so bad to refuse but his body felt so heavy, and his eyes pleaded for help no matter how much he’d try to hide it. Astrarion couldn’t recall a single person that cared for him so tenderly.In the past 200 years all he got was beatings, starvation, indifference, it was all so foreign to him, so much that the words you told him bounced in his head incessantly for days. “I know you can handle it yourself, but it doesn’t mean you should have to do this on your own.” I know you can handle it yourself, but it doesn’t mean you should have to do this on your own.” 

It was like a second nature to you, you could read his eyes like no one ever did. 

Yyu guided him towards the river, in that secluded spot you liked. 

You settled down your bag on a stump, and along with it Astarion’s clothes. You decided you were going to clean those after you were done with your baths, and afterward if your fingers didn’t feel too sore, you’d work on fixing the tear along the back of his blouse.

You picked up the small bunch of bottles, and one of the small towels you usually carried around to clean your wounds. 

Astarion let go of your hand only when you picked up those things, and even in that brief instant, his legs could barely hold him up. It was like he was dragged back in the kennels, like he had not fed in goddamned ages, and he lost too much blood to even breathe.

You didn’t notice it until you turned towards him, his body was quivering like a leaf in the middle of a tornado. 

Despite the tremor and the blood, there was still something about him that leaked confidence, like the hurt that was encompassing him was not making him look smaller, or weaker. It was.. real. 

If you thought you saw through astarion when you first met him, this was the moment you realized you were wrong. When you were slammed in front of this raw sight, you knew.

This was the closest you could get to the real Astarion, and it hurt. You didn’t understand why it hurt so much, but it was much worse than any other pain you could recall. It was a feeling that was eating you from the inside cause you knew his wounds were much deeper than what he shared with you so far.

Nevertheless, you didn’t hesitate to throw the bottles closer to the water and pass to astarion the towel, then before he could even understand what was going on, you whisked him up in your arms. 

He wanted to complain- he wanted to rely only on himself-, but his body didn’t agree. It was like it was screaming at him, screaming to tell him that he needed help and that even for a moment, it would have been okay to let someone patch him up.

You sat him right at the edge of the river, where a log was already propped nicely so travelers could clean themselves without the risks of the flowing water, then without thinking too much about it, you stripped off your own clothes, discarding them quickly. You weren’t embarrassed, or rather, you were, but he exposed so much of himself already, that you felt safe to do it as well.

You joined him, sitting yourself in a spot that allowed you to slip in the water effortlessly, while still being close to Astarion. 

The towel was the trick: you dipped the cloth in the water just enough that you could wipe away the blood without soaking the skin, then you’d gently run it down Astarion’s body to wipe it all.

You worked one small patch at a time, starting with his right shoulder and working your way through his scarred body.

His back was towards you, exposing the carving, which you identified as infernal runes. You cleaned him slowly and with a softness you didn’t know you had in you. 

Everytime you’d move away to dip the cloth in the water, his body would soften, even if for a moment, before the towel grazed again on his scars, and he couldn’t help but flinch ever so slightly.

“I’ve got you” You whispered under your breath as you pressed the cloth on his neck, causing a long shudder to run through Astarion’s back.

He wasn’t sure what if was anymore: whether it was the towel still startling him or your words that seemed to mend him like tiny plasters putting his wounds back together. What you were doing for him.. it was nice. You soothed his skin, while whispering supportive words as you took care of him.

“I won’t let him hurt you again” You whispered while taking a moment to squeeze the blood off the towel, before resuming your slow descent. 

As you worked on another patch of the runes, you couldn’t help but stare at the way the moonlight shone on his skin, it was a sight that otherwise you would never see.

Your eyes took in all his form as you cleaned and cleaned, and you could feel your heart running an extra mile.

The slow passing of time started to affect him after a while, his back slowly hunched under the heavy weight of his thoughts, his breath hitched as you diligently traced his back. No one was ever allowed to touch his back before you. He could feel the tears swelling again under his eyes.

You were so concentrated on cleaning that you didn’t notice until he was almost curled up again, and you helped him up. 

You kept your arm around his waist so he couldn’t fall prone as you started working on the wounds on his chest, and that’s when his eyes met yours, the crimson was shining as the tears piled and piled on them, the moon only served the purpose of highlighting them.

Then when you scooted him closer to you and allowed his back to rest against your chest, he was a crying mess again.

This time his lips were moving before his brain could process his thoughts, for a moment you could see his sanity slip away hidden in the drops of his tears. 

“Why?” He pleaded. “Why? Why? Why?” His voice rose between choked sobs.

“Why now?” The more he would ask, the more his voice would raise, until it finally broke in a whisper again.  “Why didn’t you show up earlier? I could have been plucked from...” His words felt like a stab right through your chest.

"Shh" You whispered as you left the bloodied rag on his thigh, and you wrapped your other hand around his waist. 

"I might have not made it in time, but I promise you I'm not leaving your side now" You pulled him on your lap, leaving a soft kiss on his temple. You knew that if he was still alive, you’d feel his chest pound incessantly as everything became overwhelming, but the only sound you could perceive was the rushing of the water. In any other occasion you would have hated the closeness of your naked bodies, you would have been weary of such intimacy, yet it felt different. It felt right.

“Why? Why are you doing this?” He asked when his breath finally set down again, and the only memory of it was the long streaks of tears still sulking his skin. 

“Cause you don't deserve this” You still held him close as you lowered your voice, making sure the sound of the water could shield you both if you needed it, like a bubble around you.

“Liar” His tone matched yours, but with much more spite. “I've done awful things” He shook his head, it was something that heavily plagued him, he’d often have flashes of some of the horrible things he did, and that moment was one of them: he could hear the echo of the screams of the poor victims he’d bring back to Cazador.

“That doesn’t mean you deserved torture.” You cooed. “You didn’t have a choice.” You traced small soothing circled on his hip as you still held him close.

He sighed deeply, he knew you were right as much as he wanted to say that he could have ran away. The memory of the darling boy and the consequence of his action were a fierce reminder of it, everyday of his life.

“You are a fool.” He sneered. “I have stabbed in the back everyone I got close to, and you are still doing…” He pointed at the two of you, at the position you are sharing, at the rag on his thigh, at your arms around him, and the words you just told him. “This.”

“I like taking risks.” You chuckled softly.

“This is not a risk, you are doomed to fail and you are a dimwit” He rolled his eyes, evidently it was obvious for him, unlike you that still believed fairytales.

“Am I?” You didn’t falter, in that moment you felt confident in your choice.

“Are you forgetting the knife I held at your throat darling? What makes you think I wouldn’t do it again?” He retorted trying to make you waver, it was his survival mechanism at the end of the day. If he was able to slither in just enough doubt, he wouldn't’-

Your words caught his attention again right away, as you started counting on your fingers. 

“The fact that we’ve been traveling together for 3 weeks, that I let you feed off me several times and you have not sucked me dry, the fact that you told me about your past, and that you allowed me to just wipe away blood from your back.” You stopped for a moment, building up tension and to perceive what went through his mind in that moment. “..and the fact that you are literally crying in my lap.” You finished.

“Okay what if i'm just manipulating you? How would you tell?” What was the game he was playing? 

“I don’t think that what i witnessed tonight could be faked, ‘Starion” You finally sighed, relaxing your shoulders. You didn’t even feel your body tense up, that’s how much you were absorbed by this conversation between you two, cause it was so confusing.

He didn’t answer anymore at your last remark, he just allowed you to finish your work diligently as he was lost in thought again. 

You made sure his wounds were clean before leaving the rest of his body up to him, and then you finally took your time to properly clean yourself as well as your clothes. 

Drying your skin was by far the hardest step since you carried only one big towel with you: you opted to pat your bodies dry before slipping in your clean clothes, then you’d give him the towel to cover himself, since his clothes were in heavy need of repair.

The walk back to camp was fairly silent, since Astarion was still affected by the blood loss and you were lost in your thoughts.

You left your wet clothes next to the fire where they could dry while you’d rest, and then you started to walk back to your tent.

When you were just a few steps away from your little nook, you remembered.

Instead of sneaking directly into your tent, you made a beeline towards Astarion’s. He was still outside, sorting a few empty containers he had around, while his frustration was palpable in the air.

“‘Starion” You called quietly, avoiding to wake up everyone else.

“What? Are you here to give me your pity?” He scoffed as he was still fixated on the conversation you just had.

“Actually, I was wondering if you needed to be fed.”Your voice betrayed your worry which was loud and clear. “Earlier I noticed you were struggling, and your eyes are.. dulled” You explained, you wanted to pat his shoulder but you stopped just a moment before you touched him.

“So? Are you going to make fun of me if I am?” His walls were back up, the vulnerable elf you saw earlier rushed away behind this mask he carefully handpicked to push you away.

“No, you can feed off me though” You suggested encouraging. “If you want of course, take 

your time, I’ll be in my tent” The last thing you hear was a muffled ‘thanks’ as you made your way to your tent again.

Astarion finally made up his mind, he strode quickly toward your canopy. “Darling?” He brought your attention to him. Your tent’s entrance was wide open, offering zero privacy to you as you were nose deep in some tome.

“Hey, come in.” You smiled, you were glad he was no longer avoiding you. “Can you please unhook the flap?” You asked while you moved the book away from the two of you. “I don’t wanna make you feel too exposed” You clarified.

“I appreciate it, but are you sure you want me to feed off you? I mean I know it’s not the first time, but it’s-” He hesitated, sure he wanted you to stay away, but at the same time that thought made him flinch away, like he should have felt differently.

“Yeah I’m sure” The apple of your cheeks warmed up at the nervousness, especially when you noticed he was fidgeting with his fingers. “You lost so much blood and the shock.. you definitely need to get your fill” 

“Thanks” He avoided your eyes before sitting next to you.

On the other hand you took your time readjusting your little reading corner, making sure it would comfortably hold both of you. 

“Just relax, I’ll take care of everything” He finally gave you the closest thing to a smile after a whole evening of tears. His arms wrapped around your middle as he helped you to lay with him. His touch was impossibly gentle: he moved away your hair and tilted your head to expose your neck, but he didn’t bite right away.

His teeth grazed your skin, sending a shiver down your spine as he held you to him, just like earlier you held him to you. He traveled down your neck with his lips, looking closely for your pulse, or so you assumed, then when he found a nice spot, he sunk his teeth in your flesh. Your body tensed for just one moment as you could feel his lips press around the wound, and your blood slowly leaking out.

Then you became putty in his hands, the dizzying sensation rocked you sweetly as you let it take over you.

He was slow, tender. 

He held your head gently and pulled you impossibly close, almost as he wanted to fuse your bodies.. His legs naturally tangled with yours while he sucked and sucked on your skin like his life depended on it.

It took everything of you to repress the whimpers that would build up in your throat, it was different from all the other times he drank from you: in the past you’d just be very tense, but in that moment you felt like air was directly pulled out of your lungs, like your body was being set on fire. 

He wasn’t in any different condition, he was barely  repressing the moans as your warm blood rushed against his tongue, and his breath was hardly regular. 

Even your blood tasted different, sweeter than before taking over all his senses. It was madness, it was like your blood suddenly turned into a drug he couldn’t resist, making his head spin.

He stopped only when he noticed you were starting to slump in his arms, a sign that you were getting too close to a no-going-back point.

He took time to lap away the blood that was still leaking from the pinpricks, sending jolts down your limbs, and stealing a sweet mewl from your lips. He didn’t concentrate on the sound he coaxed off your lips, cause he knew that if he did he’d probably spiral into insanity, so he focused on the wound he had inflicted, leaving a few kisses right where the pricks of his teeth made home, before reaching for your blanket and covering you with it. 

He didn’t let go of you, or move at all for what it mattered, he had to internalize all those feelings that were overwhelming him before he could walk out. He knew that if he didn’t stop there until he was back in himself, he would have felt dizzy as well, and he wasn’t fond of the idea of passing out on the floor.

Was he blood drunk? Whatever feeling was cursing through his body, he wasn’t sure he could identify it, but moving was not an option anymore when he noticed you were still nudged in his embrace. He tried to sneak away, but you were cradled on him, ‘peace’ crossed his mind before it got swept away by something you’d mumble, he had to wait for a bit to catch what you said since you murmured something he couldn’t quite comprehend, until your voice became clearer.

“I wish I could have saved you sooner” You murmured under your breath. “Stay, i’ll protect you.” Your arms around his waist pulled him closer to you, slotting your bodies together like pieces of a puzzle. Your warmth, your sweet flowery smell, your surprisingly gentle snore slowly lulled him in, closer and closer until he felt safe, and quietude took over him.

[rimunagenius]

It Was Doomed From The Start

ʚ pairing: Kate Martin x Roommate!reader

ʚ word count: 3.1k words

ʚ warnings: RPF!! , stalking, harassment, angst, self reflection (this topic scares me…don’t judge), fluff ofc bc it’s Kate

ʚ rimunagenius speaks: i know the title looks scary, but i promise, it’s nothing bad with Kate and reader. I wouldn’t write angst for them for this story not yet atleast I also wanted to introduce what Kate has reader under in her phone and i’ve also been thinking about adding one shots about how Kate and reader came up with the nicknames for eachother or little one shots of them before or during the events written about in the series (stuff that didn’t make it to the fic)…if i do they’ll be on the series masterlist but let me know if you’d like to see that!! anyways…here’s the long awaited part three!

Part 3

| Series Masterlist |

"C'mon, it's time to get up, sleeping beauty." There was no beauty in how you were currently knocked out in Kate's bed. Your hair is all over your face and pillow; with parts sticking up due to the lack of hairstyle before going to sleep.

You had your mouth slightly open, quietly breathing through it. You needed this sleep. You usually slept way more appealing but this—this was your well-needed catch up on weeks' worth of rest. "Y/n...y/n. C'mon. We have to get ready." Kate leaned over the bed, a hand on your hip, softly attempting to shake you awake. A string of muffled and incoherent curse words left your mouth as you pulled the comforter over your head.

Curling in on yourself to make yourself small and generate more heat. It was a pretty cold morning in Iowa City. "I don't wanna." You whined under the blanket. Eliciting a small giggle from the blonde, she crawled into the bed, almost spooning you before speaking to you softly.

"Well we have to, sunshine. We have classes, and if you still want to eat breakfast, I suggest you get up now." She flipped the comforter off your head, rubbing her hand up and down your arm. "C'mon, let's go." She gave your arm light taps before she then gripped it and started to pull you out of her bed.

"We should not have stayed up so late last night. It's your fault. I blame you.” You pointed in her face, your hair everywhere and eyes closed, preventing her from taking you seriously. “You kept doing that thing you do with your mouth." You mumbled as you now were standing right infront of your roommate, eyes looking up at her, your mascara under your eyes.

"Sorry I was having a good time. From what I remember you didn't want me to stop." She looked at you, wiping some of the mascara fall out away, giving you a bright smile before walking you towards the bathroom.

"Kate, we were drinking and you know that trick is only funny when we're both under the influence. If you would've stopped messing around, we could've finished both movies at a decent hour. I literally fell asleep in your bed and halfway through the movie." You say as you look at her through the mirror, narrowing your eyes before cleaning your mascara and whatever makeup you had on.

She raised her arms in defense, "I mean, what can I say? I'm the life of the party, baby." She said before placing herself on the counter. "Oh, and I already made waffles and yours are on the counter." She sat and watched your do your whole routine, her legs swinging a little every now and then.

"Yes?" You looked at her as you placed a refreshed coat of mascara on your lashes. You could see her staring. She's been doing that a lot lately. It made you feel warm inside and you wouldn’t lie and say you haven’t been doing it more recently also.

"Nothing. Just watching you." She smiled softly as she watched you do your makeup. A small blush casting over both your cheeks. You both knew what it was.

"Okay, creep." You side eyed her before giving her your best smile, just to prove you were being playful.

"Haha. Funny." Kate mocked you, lightly kicking her foot against the side of your thigh.

"Kate? Can you do me a favor?" You looked at your best friend, her blue eyes immediately meeting yours. She nodded her head quickly, eyes trained in yours immediately trying to read your face for anything wrong.

"Yeah, of course. Is everything okay?" She picked up on your nervous look. You sighed, looking down.

"Nick’s still weirding me out, so I wanted to know if you could walk back here to come get me after your class and take me to my next one? I just don't want to be on campus alone with him being around." You looked nervous, almost as if you had a feeling she'd say no. Of course Kate didn't, though. You still haven’t told her about not even going to report him in the first place.

"Yeah, for sure. I can do that. I'll see you in a bit, yeah?"

"Yeah. Okay, thank you. It's just for this class and my next two and then Hannah can take me to practice later." You watched Kate's face soften.

"Y/n, you know i'd take you to every class. It's not an inconvenience. Whatever you need, I got you." She hugged you before saying a small goodbye and watched you walk inside your class while she waited outside.

You went inside and sat down, your phone pinging with a new message.

bear <3

be safe, ily.❤️

sunshine☀️💕

ilym😘

'bear <3 loved "ilym😘"' 

The class went smoothly, you walked outside to see Kate standing, waiting for you. She must have left class sooner to be here on time to not make you wait. God, you were so grateful for this girl.

She walked you to every class before you had anatomy. So far, Nick hasn't spotted you, and you felt a wave of relief wash over you. You didn’t want to put it past him to find you, but for right now, you were taking the win. As you finally made it to anatomy, Juliana had been waiting outside.

You and Kate had been laughing about something she said when you looked over and saw Juliana watching you both, a smile on her face. "Oh, Kate. This is my friend Juliana, the one who's helping me with the girlfriend thing." You introduced your two friends, them shaking one another's hands.

"Hi, I'm Kate. Nice to meet you." Kate greeted, a friendly smile on her face.

"Oh, I know who your are. Y/n has said so many great things about you. You're almost all she talks about in here." Your face immediately grew red. You hadn't realized you talked about Kate so much. Did you really?

Kate looked down at you and smiled. A small blush rising to her cheeks. "Does she now?" She asked teasingly.

"Yeah, she's always going on about how such a great friend you are. How good you are to her. Makes me jealous." She jokingly added, before chatting Kate up some more. You didn't know what it was but something about Juliana being overly excited about talking to Kate, Kate being engaged in the conversation, was something that made a pit grow in your stomach.

You had no idea why two of your friends talking gave you a sense of jealously. It was frankly ridiculous. Shaking the totally absurd assumptions of this otherwise normal interaction out of your head, you looked down at your phone. A new notification from a random account on instagram.

The picture less profile, what seemed to be a randomly generated username had sent you a message. Clicking the message, you immediately felt a ball in your throat form. Suddenly your knees felt like they would give up and the world would swallow you whole from right where you were standing.

maybe you should make her leave…

this won’t be good for you.

she’s not good for you.

make her leave.

it won’t be good for her either.

You looked around, trying to find who had sent it. They had to have been talking about Kate. You knew who it was, just thing to find him to justify that you weren’t absolutely going crazy and imagining this whole thing.

“Hey, you okay?” Kate looked at you, her eyes scanning every inch of your flushed face, her worry growing by the second.

“Yeah, I’m totally fine. I’m just going to walk into class.” You swalllowed before you looked around once more, suddenly seeing him. Lurking at a nearby a table, hat on, just staring right at you. He was sitting a healthy distance away, but watching your every move. Watching Kate. You couldn’t take this.

You hadn’t realized you had been staring, Kate followed your stare and saw him too. Juliana wrapping her arm around your shoulder, kissing the top of your head. You instantly regretted not being able to sell that you were unbothered, due to Kate starting to walk over to Nick.

“Kate! Don’t. I don’t need you talking to him.” You grabbed her arm, and pleaded with her.

“He’s obviously making you very uncomfortable. I thought you told someone about him already. What did he even say?” You did not have the heart to tell her that you let this man harass you for weeks just because you didn’t want to have any conflict. It wasn’t the best decision but it saved a lot of people trouble and you didn’t want to be inconvenience with this stupid thing. You could handle it. You could handle him.

“Kate, I was going to I swear. But I just forgot. You going up to him and telling him off isn’t going to make it better. Trust me. I do not want him to harass or hurt you too. ” You were getting super overwhelmed. Your eyes burning, your vision going blurry, eyes watering.

“Hey, it’s okay.” Juliana said, rubbing her arms up and down your arms. She didn’t have the first clue of what to do other than report this. She just didn’t want to do it without your permission. It was wrong, but it wasn’t her place.

“Hey, can you give us a moment?” Kate asked her. Juliana nodded and walked inside the class but not without staring Nick down before doing so.

“Hey, look. I’m sorry. I didn’t meant to get all riled up over this. But you do need to tell someone, baby.” Her face dropped and immediately started turning red. She should’ve caught herself. It just slipped. You hadn’t noticed because you were avoiding looking anywhere and seeing him.

You hadn’t picked up on the name. Trying to focus on what she was actually saying instead of thinking of all the ways Nick could harm Kate. What did he mean by ‘it won’t be good for her either’ ? All you could think about was her safety.

“I’m sorry, what?” You looked up at Kate, your brows furrowing. Suddenly feeling the biggest migraine come on.

Kate’s face relaxed, sighing before grabbing your face. “I was just saying that we should go report him, and i’ll take you home. I’ll tell coach we caught something and don’t want to get the team sick. We—I just need to get you out of here. Okay? Can you do that for me?” Her eyes stared into yours, wordlessly pleading with you to choose your safety over thinking you’re a burden to someone else.

You nodded, looking behind her to see that Nick had left. He was gone. That’s when you felt a hand grab yours, fingers interlocking. Kate. Immediately you felt more relaxed, more safe. At home. No one could hurt you when you were with the people you loved and cared for. Who cared for you. The team, your friends, were your home. Kate was your home. Your anchor.

Nothing could hurt you, and you were going to do it together. Sending a quick text to Juliana, letting her know the situation, you and Kate started walking to the deans office. Kate sat with you, held your hand, and made sure you were comfortable while telling the dean everything Nick had done to you and said he’d do over the course of the two and a half years you had been here.

It was extensive. It started off so small that you didn’t notice that he slowly integrated into your life. He was obsessed with you. Stalking you. You didn’t realize until it was too late—til it got bad. You and Kate had found out he was a transfer, changing his whole major and career plan to follow yours. He had been to 6 different universities in the last 3 years due to ‘personal’ issues.

Turns out every formal complaint had been waived and disproven. You weren’t the only woman he’s done this to. It was crazy to think that of the many women, the countless evidence of severe mental disorders and psychotic behavior and harassment, he was still allowed into many other universities, was able to appeal the accusations and allowed to leave it behind him.

Kate was in better words, fuming. Her and the dean had gone at it, you trying to mediate before the dean resulted to benching her for her last season. You guys had been in the deans office for about 2 hours. Leaving just in time to send a text to Coach Bluder that you’d both be in absence at practice today.

You two had been walking, still hand in hand, back to your guys’ apartment. “Kate are you sure you want to miss practice today?” You looked at her, eyes still a little bloodshot from the crying you had done. “I can totally just go home alone and say I just didn’t feel good. I’m not on the team, you are.” She still looked upset and very irritated at the situation. She hasn’t said much since you both left. The second you spoke, her face softened. You tended to do that a lot; you changed her mood. Her mood affects yours and yours hers. And only you two could fix it for the other.

“And leave you alone? On campus where a crazy guy is stalking you and making you feel uncomfortable and unsafe? No way. I’d miss as many practices as you needed me to.” She smiled at you, squeezing your hand, before letting it go, and settling for wrapping her arm around your shoulders.

“Thank you, Kate. Seriously. I don’t know what I did to deserve you.” You leaned your head on her, arriving at your apartment.

“Of course. Anything for my favorite girl.” She kissed the top of your head, smiling to herself. She was grateful to have you in her life, she needed you just as much, probably more, than you needed her.

You both helped and healed things in eachother more over the last two and a half years of knowing eachother than anyone had for you both in your guys’ entire lives. “You didn’t do anything to deserve me, you know? Anyone would be lucky to have someone like you. Someone as kind, beautiful, smart, loving, caring, and gorgeous as you. Oh, did i mention you were pretty?” Kate laughed, her cheeks growing pinker by the second.

“Okay, Kate.” You laughed as she unlocked the front door, letting you walk in first. “Thank you. I appreciate you, and I feel the absolute same about you. Any girl who gets you, is the luckiest girl alive.” You smiled at her as you sat the on the couch, her in the kitchen grabbing you both water.

She smiled at you, before you turned to turn the TV on. When you looked away, her smile faltered. You looked at the tv, thinking about what she said. What you had said. You both cared for eachother so deeply. You couldn’t possibly be catching feelings for Kate. Was what you said too obvious…? You had known her for a long time, she was your best friend. That could ruin everything.

Could it? I mean, Kate thought about it over and over, watching your from the kitchen. The way your lips curled slightly when you watched the same reruns of your favorite shows. The way you always sat in the same spot on the couch, next to hers, leaving the perfect amount of room for her but also not enough so that you guys would be touching.

It was hard for the both of you to think this way about the person you have shared a space with for so long. Your roommate. Your best friend. You both needed to figure this out. But it was hard. You couldn’t possibly harbour feelings for the one person you both told yourself not to when this arrangement came to be.

Maybe that should’ve been the first sign. The sign that this living situation was doomed from the moment it was thought into existence; it was doomed from the start. How could you possibly set that boundary, silently in your guys’ head, that you guys couldn’t catch feelings. It would only have meant that you both could’ve seen this coming. I mean, neither one of you turned a blind eye to the other being attractive. Let alone, being eachothers type.

Kate brought you both the waters. Setting them down on the coffee table infront of you. Sitting down in her spot, next to you. You leaned your head on her shoulder almost instantly. Whether you had feelings for her or not, the comfort Kate had brought you was something you couldn’t describe. The need to have the feeling of Kate next to you seemingly growing worse with the feelings.

The familiarity was something you haven’t known since back home. So you essentially chased the feeling whenever you could have it. “Thank you for being there for me, Kate. I mean, truly. I already said it, but thank you.” Snuggling a little closer, bring one knee to your chest.

“Anytime, you know that. I’d do anything for you,” Her voice grew quieter at the end of her sentence. She meant it. “Besides, you’d be completely lost without me, sunshine. You need me.” She smiled when you landed a soft playful smack across her chest. She reached her arm over your shoulders, making you more comfortable.

“You’re right, I do.” You laughed before turning your attention to the TV. You both watched TV the rest of the night, deciding that you’d worry about the Nick thing more tomorrow. The dean telling you that it’d be handled very soon and quickly as possible. So, it was tomorrows problem.

As you both watched TV, you both thought over the fact you may be inlove with your best friend. It may be real and you’d both have to find a way to either move on or deal with it.

And fast.

[stargirllanaa]

Pretty when you cry

Warnings: NON-CON SMUT, Dark!Rafe, Toxic relationship, Abusive relationship, domestic violence, drug-use, manipulation, lying

Summary: Heavily Based on ‘Pretty when your cry’ by Lana Del Rey, like really heavily, Your relationship with Rafe Cameron is falling apart before you’re eyes.

A/n: First smut 🫣 anyway, request are open so hit my inbox with your darkest ideas! I would definitely recommend listen to Pretty when you cry by Lana Del Rey while reading!! Enjoy <3

Wc: 2k

18+ ONLY MINOR DNI!!

Your friend group had planned a fun night all together; you were all going to stay at the beach till dark and watch the stars. You had been looking forward to it; things had been rocky with Rafe, and you just wanted to get out and enjoy a night with your friends and boyfriend.

As you applied your blush, you were completely lost in thought; images of a few nights ago and your encounter with your boyfriend flashed through your brain.

You tried to focus on your makeup routine, but the bruises that were revealed on your wrist when your sweatshirt sleeve fell were a constant reminder.

“Are you serious, Rafe?” You questioned your boyfriend when you caught him in the bathroom doing a line.

“You said you were done... You said you were quitting.” disappointment filled your voice.

He looked up at you with dilated pupils, trying to wipe away the white powdery residue from under his nose.

“I'm sorry baby… I-” he thought to himself for a minute.

You signed in response.

“I should have known…” you softly said under your breath,

“No… listen…I got into a fight with my dad earlier...This is the last time...” The blonde promised you in a shaky tone.

Your eyes shot to the leftover coke on your bathroom counter; there were about two lines left, you didn't want that shit in your house, and more importantly, you didn't want him doing that shit in your house. So you moved your hand over, ready to wipe it straight onto the floor.

But Rafe saw it coming; he had been analyzing your eyes the whole time. He caught your wrist before it came close to the counter; his grip was tight and rough.

“Come on, baby, don't make this complicated.” your boyfriend threatened as his grip got tighter and tighter.

“Rafe, you're hurting me,” you said as your eyes brimmed with hot tears.

“You’re hurting me, y/n!” he pulled you closer to him; the scent of his cologne was so strong it made you nauseous. “You know I'm going through stuff and… mess up sometimes! And I-”

“You promised me, Rafe!” you cut him off. “You promised you would stop.” tears spilled over, and you smiled, lacking happiness. “But you don't care about that, do you?”

His eyes narrowed at your words, and his grip on your wrist became tighter, causing you to let out a sob.

“You clearly don't give a shit about spending time with me because you're high all the time.” you voiced between sobs. “You don't even give a shit about me…you care about one thing,” you said, voice broken as you used your free hand to point at the two remaining lines on the countertop.

Rafe said nothing, but you could tell you were spot on by how he looked around as his breathing sped up.

He dropped your wrist before leaving the bathroom and the lines he had just fought you over; he made sure to slam the door and stomp down the stairs.

You shivered as you thought about how tight he was holding on to you, but he was high, and people do crazy things under the influence. But the problem was Rafe had been under the influence a lot recently.

And every time he hurt you, it would always go the same way; you guys would argue, usually about his drug problem. He would hurt you, usually to make you shut up. Sometimes were worse than others, but it always ended in you sobbing and him profusely apologizing. He blamed it on the drugs…his dad and you would forgive him. Or he would just leave you there and text you ‘sorry’ later.

You missed the days when the two of you first started dating; everything seemed so simple and sweet… So normal.

You and your boyfriend were going ice skating together; you were excited but nervous. It was your first time, and you didn't want to fall and embarrass yourself.

As you entered the rink, you immediately held onto the railing as you tried to keep your feet in place. They were slipping and sliding everywhere, and the railing was your only hope not to fall and bust your ass.

“Baby,” Rafe said with a slight laugh as he stuck his hand out. “I got you; hold my hand.”

You took his hand, one hand on the railing, one in his. He showed you how to push yourself forward and keep balance, but you were still struggling.

“How do you do that,” you said with a chuckle as if he was a professional ice skater.

“Youre cute,” the blonde said with a smile; the truth was you were the girl he had always dreamed of; you were so naive.

You always hoped he would stop using and times could return to how they were, but part of you knew things would never be how they were; they hadn't been in a long time.

Looking back at the mirror, you realized you had been applying blush to one cheek for about 2 minutes. You needed to finish getting ready. Things would be better tonight, at least you hoped they would be.

When you made it to the beach, Rafe wasn't there yet; that was fine, though he was probably late, traffic or something. You tried your best to focus on your friends, the music, and the alcohol, but as the night went on and the stars came out, Rafe's lack of presence was very noticeable. Your friends and even his friends had asked you where he was, and you just responded with a quiet ‘he’ll be here soon.’ was that true? You didn't know. He wasn't answering texts or calls; you even dm’ed him on Instagram, hoping for a response.

But he didn't show up, he didn't come through… he never did.

And as you looked up at the stars surrounded by friends, all you could think about was when Rafe told you that ‘all the pretty stars had shined for you.’

———-

One of your friends dropped you back home after your night out. Rafe was supposed to take you home with him, but it was apparent why that didn't happen.

As soon as you started taking off your jewelry, your phone started ringing; you looked over at it to see who was calling and quickly picked it up.

“Rafe, are fucking kiddi-” you started.

“Open the door. I'm outside,” he stated before hanging up.

You rolled your eyes at the sound of him ending the call; you were so fucking angry. The two of you were supposed to have fun tonight, not fight. He stood you up. He did this shit all the time, using stupid excuses like, ‘I lost track of time,’ ‘my dad and I got into a fight again,’ and ‘I fell asleep.’ But those excuses could only work so many times.

As you stomped down your stairs to the front door, you took a deep breath; you didn't want things to go left more than they already had, but that didn't stop you from opening the door when your gut told you not to.

Rafe pushed past you, letting himself into your house.

“Baby, I'm sorry I lost track of time.” classic Rafe.

You looked down at your phone, taking in the time, then back at him.

“For 4 hours, Rafe?” You scoffed at his words; how many times would he use that excuse?

“The ‘fight with your dad’ would have worked better this time.” you sarcastically stated as you rolled your eyes.

“Don't be like that.” the blonde spoke as he walked closer to you.

“No, don't tell me how to act! You always do this to me.” your eyes brimmed with tears as you thought about how broken your relationship was.

Rafe brought his hand up to your face, initially causing you to flinch, but he brought it closer to the top of your head and began stroking your hair.

“I'm sorry… stuff's been hard for me with my da-.” he started.

“I can't do this.” you tearfully confessed, trying to pull away from him.

His hand paused in your hair, but he still kept you close.

“What do you mean ‘you can't do this?’” your boyfriend questioned, voice mixed with confusion and anger.

“Rafe, let go of me.” you calmly stated, trying to get away before things got ugly.

The hand stroking your hair was now grabbing a handful of it; he pulled you back slightly, but only enough to make eye contact.

“I need you, y/n,” Rafe said as his eyes narrowed.

“Don't say that-” you stated under your breath, looking down at the floor.

“Don't say I need you?” the blonde asked you as he pulled your hair slightly, forcing you to look back at him.

“You know you're just gonna leave again,” you shouted through tears.

Rafe looked away from you, thinking of what he should do; he needed you; you couldn't leave; you couldn't just decide that you ‘couldn't do this.’. He had to show you how much he needed you.

You gasped as Rafe’s grip on your hair tightened as he started dragging you. The pain coming from your head was so brutal it left you screaming for him to stop. Before you knew it, he pulled you up by your hair and pushed you back onto the couch. You were terrified; when you looked into his eyes, they were darker, just like they were the night he grabbed your wrist, and every time he had ever hurt you before, but you were confused; he usually just slapped and pushed you around. This was a different level; he had never taken it this far.

“Rafe!” was all you screamed out before he cut you off.

“You don't think I need you?” he smirked before pushing your hair back so he could see your whole face. “I need you so bad you don't even understand.”

Your eyebrows furrowed in confusion, wondering how hurting you could possibly show that he needed you, but when you saw him start to undo his pants, everything became a lot clearer.

“Rafe..” you trailed off, hoping he wasn't about to do what you thought he was.

“Shhh baby... You’re okay.” the blonde says as he reaches under your skirt.

“No, I can't do this,” you said as you tried to sit up, but your boyfriend immediately pushed you back down.

“I told you to shut the fuck up.” He hissed, clearly annoyed by your words; he had already made up his mind; there was no going back now.

And when you felt him inside of you, you couldn't stop the sobs that escaped from the back of your throat, and when you glanced back at him to see him staring directly into your eyes while taking advantage of you, it made your stomach turn.

“Fuck” Rafe said with a moan, “you're so pretty when you cry.”

[god-i-hope-so]

Every time I read an anti-Bucktommy take it's like they don't understand what they're watching. Like, no understanding of how fiction works at all and a criminal lack of media literacy. And also unable to follow a simple story.

A tv show like 911 will never be like their favorite friends to lovers fics where everything they want to see on-screen is made into words, every little thought, every gesture is described in a flowery way, every single line is doctored to fit the fandom's expectations, using very specific tropes. This is fanwork, this is our business, we love it, we cherish it but this is our stuff.

911 is a tv show. It'll use many types of tv writing techniques to get to the point while having to deal with budgetary constraints, marketing needs, political restrictions and more. Could they have done a better job with reintroducing Tommy? Absolutely. Does it work as it is? Of course, if we're actually looking at what and how they tell on-screen.

A (long) BuckTommy timeline.

🚁 7x03 - Tommy and Buck meet on the day of the rescue, even before we see Buck, Chim and Eddie in the chopper. They first meet off-screen. We don't know what happened then, we don't know how they looked at each other, if they smiled at each other, if they even talked directly to each other. But they met before we see them in the chopper.

We know by what happens later that Tommy makes a strong impression on Buck (who is already in the middle of a real life crisis). We can also assume that Tommy is attracted to Buck based on his looks (and probably also affinity, they do the same job, never underestimate the homoerotic power of male camaraderie), something we also understand later, so it works (but also, the way he looks at Buck at the end of this episode is a subtle hint.) Don't forget that writers know in advance things we don't, that's why we can go back and find the breadcrumbs we didn't notice before or couldn't make a connection with yet.

🔥 Buck wants to know more about Tommy and his work. This is where you, as the audience, should fill the gap based on what we saw before and what comes next. This is where you should be able to do that instead of wanting everything on-screen the same way you put everything in a fanfic. This gap you fill because you're supposed to understand how average tv storytelling works leads to the following point.

🚁 7x04 - Buck contacts Tommy, he gets to visit Harbor. At this point, we can clearly see Tommy is acting flirty in a very subtle and respectful way, because he doesn't really know what's the deal with Buck, but remember the way he looked at Buck in 7x03? Then there's Buck acting... weird. What's his real purpose here? And this was before he even knew Tommy and Eddie were BFF, so Buck was already attracted to Tommy whatever his connection with the 118 crew, even if the real reason was blurry even to Buck himself.

🔥 7x04 - Tommy is now someone they interact with regularly. Tommy is now slowly working his way (back) into the 118 group. He finds a good friend in Eddy (strangely I don't see anyone questioning that. How is that easier than having a simple, passive crush?), apparently spends a lot of time with him, and knows Christopher because he went to Eddie's house 3 times. Eddie definitely knows more about Tommy than Buck at this point.

🚁 7x04 - Buck is clearly troubled by Tommy. Then there's this whole jealousy circus going on, Buck is a mess, his insecurities are breaking the roof and he's more troubled than ever. Is he jealous of Eddy or Tommy? Or both? (it's both) He wants to be the center of the attention. If he feels he's losing this, people will discard him. So he does some stupid shit. And you can see his feelings are also all over the place. But there's more than just fighting for attention, and that's probably why he's slowly starting to be angry. Because what he feels is different and he can't put his finger on it.

The discussion with Maddie clearly shows how he's chewing on his own heart. He didn't want what he had to change and he acted like a kid with big feelings and little control of himself.

🔥 7x04 - Tommy, who's having a passive crush on Buck, takes the matter in hands and kisses him. Tommy having a crush is not less normal than Buck flirting with basically any cute girl showing interest in him. Being more mature, he meets Buck to set things straight, after having talked about it with Eddie. It's not out of nowhere. Eddie and Tommy are not stupid, and Eddie knows Buck. He saw something was wrong. Tommy, being the new addition to their dynamic, thought it was his fault (I think Eddie and Tommy really felt guilty about going to Vegas and leaving Buck just like that lmao That was so bad for Buck's confidence, I felt it in my bones). Excuses turn to clearing the air turn to let's go for it.

Tommy really took a gamble there. If Buck wasn't what he thought he was, it could have been so bad. So, so bad for Tommy and his job. Imagine Buck accusing Tommy of assault? But he took the risk of kissing him because he has more experience and knows how to read the signs. He's not 15, he has experience with men, and closeted men for sure.

And you know, this is a beautiful scene for Buck as a character. The way he realizes why he did all that, what it means about him, for him. I mean, he knew, in a way, but he didn't know. And Tommy was suddenly everywhere in his life, overwhelming while doing nothing. You have to understand that everything is happening in Buck's head and he needed just a little push to open his eyes.

Buck's queer path: unlocked.

🚁 7x05 - First date, first mess but also first lesson. At this point, you can't even doubt about Tommy's intentions anymore. Buck might still be in a blurry phase but Tommy is not sending mixed signals at all (not with that choice of shirt, let me tell you this. My man was set to hit that night). Buck panicked, Tommy even tried to keep him on tracks for the evening, but between meeting Eddie and what it made Buck say... I mean, Tommy could have had a stronger reaction. Why accept the date if you can't deal with it?

But Tommy knows why, he's been there. Buck liked the idea of the date, but once you're there, everything becomes real. So once again, a little push: Tommy is honest and prefers to part ways, but not without saying why. He's not even mad. At this point, Buck really needs to take another step. It's difficult to drag someone else into your own fog. He has all the rights to be troubled, to doubt, to be scared, but you don't drag someone else in this with you. Tommy protected himself from that, also protected Buck from doing something he'd regret, and he did it with guidance.

🔥 7x05 - Buck talks with Maddie about his date and comes out to her, but more importantly: Buck comes out to Eddie. Look. This is canon, and I know we can choose to ignore canon but both scenes are great. And it's still canon. Maddie is obviously accepting and happy for Buck, and we expected no less from her.

With Eddie, I honestly expected at least some discussion like are you sure? or something like that but I think that at this point, everyone at the 118 knows that there's more to Buck than meets the eye. I'd have loved this scene to be longer with more exchange between Eddie and Buck but it is what it is, and Eddie is supportive of his best friend (yes, sorry, their canon relationship is best friends and I love their friendship, even more now that Buck is out).

And yes, this is even more important to show not only a strong friendship between a supposedly cishet man and a bisexual man but also, and we'll see that later, Eddie still trusts Buck around Chris. Nothing changed. So many people associate queer people with predators, we need to see queer people, and especially queer men, being trusted around children, and being safe. This is the right representation.

I know bvddies are trying to find any reason to make this storyline choice look like shit, because they want their ship to sail (and I completely understand wanting that), but accusing the people who like Buck and Tommy together of being homophobes because they cherish the canon beautiful friendship between Buck and Eddie?? We're not talking about headcanons here, about reading between the lines, or being "coded" a certain way (sorry, for me Eddie is not gay-coded. He's a-spec for sure, and I'm going for being demi, but gay? I don't see it anymore at this point of the show). It's about the canon. You know, at this point, things are already moving into place, even if you don't like Buck and Tommy together. This is where canon is at, this is the story. It's not a personal attack against anyone in the fandom.

🚁 7x05 - Buck wants to apologize to Tommy for the failed date, and for his behavior. Oh, accountability, my beloved. We love to see Buck working on himself. This is the real start of whatever will happen from now on between Buck and Tommy. Buck knows he's ready to embrace this new part of himself and he feels like Tommy is the right person to do that with.

Tommy being Tommy, he makes sure Buck knows what all this means. Buck is not a teenager, Tommy treats him as an equal but he also knows how it feels to be in Buck's shoes.

🔥 7x06 - Tommy, a responsible adult, makes time for Buck (and Chim!) even when he clearly could, and maybe should, just decline. This part was used way too often against Tommy by BoBs. Tommy is a fire pilot on call the night of the bachelor party. A FIRE PILOT ON CALL. Do you think his main goal that night is to have fun? Or is it to be a responsible adult who could well be saving lives (while risking his) the same night? Do you know what it means to be on call? You're basically working without being at work, the second your job needs you, you have to be 100% ready. Again, he's a fire pilot (even if he's also sent on ground work that night). His first job would be to pilot a freaking helicopter and accomplish tasks that requires skills, precision and to not be half asleep. You don't play with that responsibility.

So Tommy showing up is indeed huge. He does it for Buck, and for Chim, but definitely for Buck in the first place. He could have stayed home to get some sleep while waiting. Instead of that, not only he doesn't sleep but he ends up fighting a fire for hours. And the first thing people used against him was that he didn't follow the dress code?! No, you guys need to grow up and live a bit more of real life.

And then we have The Kiss (please someone draw them as The Kiss by Klimt, every fandom needs its Kiss fanart). And once again, it's Tommy making time for Buck, and Chim, when he could be home, take a good shower and be in his cozy bed after working on a fire for more than what, 14 hours? This is a man who knows his priorities. And responsible men are sexy as hell, even when it means they can't have fun like everyone else.

Now, if after all this, and mind you, this is all canon, you still think Tommy is a fraud in this storyline, that his budding romance with Buck has no foundation or that he doesn't care about Buck? And don't even get me started on the "but he was a racist and a misogynist before". Yes, he was. And yes, he changed. Like I said: learn to know his character, but also trust Hen. The fact is that at this point of the story, Tommy is great for Buck. He's kind, he's safe, he's trying even when there's no expectations. Be happy for great representation.

Oh, and don't use your hate against the ship or Tommy to be a nasty little shit with the actors and writers. Decency is free.