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cordeliawhohung · 5 months

Text

Strangers

john price x fem!reader | masterlist | ao3

interwoven; maledicted

John Price remembers every life he's ever lived. When death takes him in one universe, he's born into the next with all his memories and past experiences still intact. Throughout the lives he's lived, you're the only thing that ever seems to quell the ache in his chest, and he spends every life searching for your comfort. Except, in this life, he's too late

cw: soulmate!au, murder, suicide, feticide, kidnapping, drugging, possessive john price, non-con elements, one shot, dead dove: do not eat!!!

In every life you’ve ever lived, John Price finds you.

He’s drawn to you like an animal is drawn to its cage. The glint of the metal bars look like stars if he squints hard enough, and the smell of blood and iron is the fairest perfume in the world. There is no life that he wishes to live without you in it. Tucked close to his chest in bed at night. Curled up underneath his thumb. Where you go, he follows you, hidden in the shadows until he’s ready to reveal himself as the soulmate who’s been tracking you across eons worth of lives.

It’s a simple curse. One that’s haunted him since he first poofed into existence so long ago he can’t recall how much time has passed. Forever bound to remember every life he’s ever lived while everyone else debates the possibility of a god or heaven, forgetting their reincarnated selves in other universes. It’s a particularly lonely ailment. He had been locked in chains in one life for attempting to convince the world that there was life after death, not through a god, but through sheer human will. Had to sever the artery in his tongue with his teeth and drink down his blood to escape a life of imprisonment, and just like he knew he would, he woke up in his next life a free man.

These days, he spends his lives on something more worthwhile: you. Just as he does, you look the same in every universe with a smile he knows by touch alone and a laugh that is the only melody that can soothe the immortal ache in his chest. He’s fried his brain with drugs and killed his liver with drink, forever carrying the burden of memory, and yet throughout his travels, you remain the only thing capable of soothing that terrible ache that haunts him. If death has already taken you in one life, he kills himself and moves onto the next, a wild man forever on the hunt for you.

The only other thing that stays consistent throughout his many lives besides the desire to be yours, is the taste of fresh tea. He prefers Yorkshire tea, but the Earl Grey they substitute at the shop is fine enough. Quiet muttering fills the air around him as he sits in the corner of the shop, alone with his thoughts. He takes a sip of the tea, allowing the hint of lavender to wash over his tongue as if cleansing him. It’s the only thing that tastes and smells like home. Besides you, of course; but he hasn’t found you yet, and it’s getting late.

Usually, he’s lucky enough to find you by the time both of you are in your twenties. It’s easy to win you over at that age. He holds a maturity well beyond his years, and you hold a wide-eyed innocence that has you in his grasp before you even realize it. But he’s in his thirties, and that has him anxious. Too much time has passed — a decade more than usual — which leaves him with a variety of possibilities. Ones he doesn’t like entertaining.

No matter. He’s learned to be somewhat patient over the countless lifetimes spent searching for you, because it always pays off in the end. All the marriages, the children you have, the love you make. John Price is the luckiest man in the world, being able to replay his favorite memories with you for all eternity. He could never tire of you, would never dream of such a terror.

So when the bell attached to the shop door rings with the entrance of another customer, it quickly turns to music to his ears when he sees you. Afternoon sunlight illuminates the world behind you, blinding him with the beauty you carry across universes and worlds. Your familiar eyes scan the area briefly, hardly paying him any mind before you approach the counter with a grace and poise that has his heart thudding in his throat. He can never get used to the first time. The first time his eyes land on you, he hears your voice, or skin touches yours; it’s the only thing that can tear him apart as well as you do.

He tries not to stare at your ass when you order your drink. It’s always been his favorite physical feature of yours. There’s something different about this version of you, yet still familiar. Nothing is ever entirely unknown to him, not when it concerns you, but you’re glowing more than usual. It’s captivating in a way that makes him feel like a dog, looking at a woman in such a perverse way, but he knows you like it when he stares. You always have in every other life.

When the barista hands you a to-go cup, John knows he doesn’t have long before you slip away. Such a sharp girl, quick on her feet. Always buzzing around, never staying in one place for too long, as if the imprint of your soul enjoyed the chase of him following after you. It’s a game he enjoys very much; one he doesn’t mind entertaining at all.

John rises from his seat, cup still half full, where he slips to the door just as you turn around to leave. His pace is leisurely, certainly in no rush as his hands reach out for the exit, only for him to pause. How silly of him to have left his drink behind, the only reason he even came to that shop in the first place. When he turns around, it’s quick and violent, and catches you so off guard you run right into him.

Piping hot tea splashes around in your to-go cup, and if it wasn’t for John’s quick reflexes and a firm grip on your wrist, you would’ve gotten yourself hurt. Your gasp is sweet and melodic on his ears, and he nearly melts under your gaze as your wide eyes stare at him. Your surprise is cute. As if you couldn’t remember meeting him in countless different universes like this.

“Terribly sorry, darling,” he says as if surprised. His grip loosens on your wrist just as his other hand comes up to rest on your waist. It’s quick, he knows; but in some way, you’re already used to it. “You alright?”

It takes you a moment to catch your breath, and once you do, John feels you slip out of his grasp as you take a step back. Both of your hands come up to hold the cup, afraid of dropping it, and you give him a polite smile and nod.

“Yes, thank you, I… good save,” is all you can manage as you chuckle and gesture to your drink.

John’s hands mourn the absence of your warmth, yet he allows them to politely fall back against his side. His lips yearn to be on yours. For him, this isn’t a first time greeting, but a long awaited reunion. Still, he calms his nerves and hardens them to steel as he chuckles with you.

“Would’ve hated for you to have gotten hurt,” he comments as his eyes glance down at your legs. The brief thought of that searing hot liquid broiling the supple skin of your thighs invades his mind before he can push it away. “You’re sure you’re alright?”

Whatever your response is, he can’t hear it. The dazzling bling of your betrayal drowns out the sound of your voice and everything around him. It’s beautiful; your ring. Its gemstone glints in the sunlight streaming through the windows as if attempting to blind him. No, not blind him. Something worse. It screams at him the very thing he had feared for the last few years; he was too late. Bound to another man in matrimony, a silly mistake you had made before ever seeing the light.

The aftertaste of tea suddenly tastes putrid on his tongue. His sweet mate, too impatient to wait for him in that lifetime. You’d fucked other men in other lives, and though it had always made his stomach turn, John could understand. But marriage?

His teeth threaten to shatter under the pressure of his clenching jaw.

When the sound comes back to him, his eyes comprehend the expression on your face. Discomfort — near disdain. In this universe, John Price is not your lover. He is a man, and only that. One who just so happens to be barring you from the exit.

He remembers himself, and smiles at you kindly as he quickly steps to the side, muttering an apology with a jaw that’s much too stiff. And still, he reaches behind him to hold the door open for you, and despite your apprehension you thank him quietly and say goodbye before you vanish into the streets. Your smell lingers in the air next to him for only a moment before it dissipates and drowns in the aroma of herbs and teas. His face goes cold as he glares at the corner where his now cold tea sits.

This was the first life he ever lived where you married a man that wasn’t him. Something broke. Shattered in his chest where the shards cut him apart from the inside out. When he breathes in, he can smell the blood pooling inside of him and it wakes him up to the terrible realization that — for once in his many, many lifetimes — he’s late. He’s late, and he doesn’t know what to do.

As the sweet smell of tea fades and is replaced by the putrid aroma of London, John tells himself to let it go. So what he wasted thirty plus years just for your heart to already be stolen away from him? There’s a millennia behind him, and a millennia ahead of him. When one life doesn’t go right for him, there’s always the next. Yet as pavement turns to brick and The Thames sprawls out in front of him beyond metal bars, he finds himself hesitating. The idea of letting go can’t quite sink its tendrils into his mind, and his knuckles grow white as he grips the barrier in front of him.

Bitter wind bites at his face as he looks at the water below him. Hesitation. He doesn’t know why it paralyzes him. There’s never been any need or use for second guesses, because he’s always known what’s waiting for him on the other side. All he needs to do is lift his leg, hoist himself up, and then let gravity do the rest. He’s done it before, in some other life. He’s felt his body hit the frigid water with needle-like pain blossoming across his skin just before it swallows him whole. It’s not an easy way to die, but it’s the only thing violent enough that has the capability of smothering the bitterness growing in his heart.

The answer to his confusion comes as a whisper on the back of his neck, where it tingles until it reaches the base of his spine and flutters throughout every cell of his body. Principle. It’s the principle of it all. In every single life, you’ve been his lover, his wife, the mother of his children, and if you are not, then you are dead. Rotten. Decaying in some grave by the time he finally finds you. You’re not just his desire, the love of his life, his reason for being; you are his right.

How long can someone love a soul before it becomes theirs? Before it’s ripped out of their lover and tucked safely away into a cage?

John chuckles as his hand slips from the railing, and he slides them into his pockets as if he had been enjoying the view of grey water and even more grey skies this entire time. Kill himself? No; you’ve been his this entire time. You just don’t know it yet.

He’s only ever done this a few times before; kidnap someone. In a few of his past lives, he’s been a soldier. A stone-hardened man who’s stolen families as bartering tools to make terrorists talk when their mouths were otherwise sealed shut. Killing is a good way for him to let out the anger that builds in a man’s soul after so long, and though he prefers to keep it to people who deserve it, his fingers can’t help but twitch as he watches your husband drop you off at the yoga studio.

Doesn’t he — your husband — deserve it? Death? Shouldn’t he pay the ultimate price for stealing you away from your true lover? The man who’s looked after you for eons? John wants to do it. Kill him. Smell the sanguine aroma that mixes with the harsh gunpowder that expels after a bullet is shot. He wants to, and he could do it, but murder muddles things up more than he would like, and though he’s good at covering his trail, he’d rather steal you away without incident. He’s been carefully plotting this ever since he saw you in that tea shop all those days ago; he can’t ruin it.

A smile pulls at his lips as he thinks about the look on your husband's face, when his pretty little pretend wife doesn’t return home. When he realizes how he’s failed you.

John’s hands tap at the steering wheel as he waits, patient as ever, for your session to end. Silly of you to go to a night class, really. Even sillier of your husband to allow such a terrible thing. If anything, it's greater proof that this new man in this new life isn’t good for you. It could have been anyone sitting in that car park, waiting for you to leave. Waiting to take you home.

Good thing it’s only him.

John exits the car just before eight. Cool air does its best to calm the electricity sizzling in his veins, but ultimately it’s his own mind that stills his nerves. Everything is planned out in his mind with moves expertly rehearsed in a past now forgotten, yet still ingrained in his memory; he knows he’ll get exactly what he wants. You. It’s all he craves. All he ever does.

You exit the studio with a laugh and a wave goodbye to the other women in your yoga class. That pathetic husband of yours is late, which only proves to be good fortune for John as he slips by your side. His feet are dangerously silent on the pavement and his arm is just as warm as ever as he wraps it around your waist, blade in hand. Even through the fabric of your shirt its point is noticeably sharp, and your feet stumble as he presses it against you in warning.

“Not a word, darling,” he whispers, too saccharine to be a stranger.

You listen, just like he knew you would, and he steers you away from the pavement and into the car park. It’s difficult for him not to chuckle as he recalls you in another life. How you once batted your pretty lashes at him, all but begging him to use a knife in bed with you. Not enough to draw blood, but enough to feel the cold sting of it against your skin. He wonders if some part of you feels that way in this life.

Once you reach the car, he slips the zip ties over your wrists in a single fluid motion before opening the door for you. Any onlookers would just think he’s being a gentleman helping you into the car like that, but there’s a method to his madness. As soon as you’re seated into the passengers side, your eyes meet his and they widen with terrified recognition. Not quite the look he hoped for from you, but your expression quickly melts away the moment a needle pierces through your pants and into your thigh. All that’s left to do is buckle you in and drive off.

He likes to pretend he’s carrying you to your honeymoon room as he curls you up into his arms. A sweet bride, passed out against his chest as he carries you to bed, safe in the confines of the cage he’s spent that entire lifetime preparing for you. You don’t stir when he places you in bed, but he lays down next to you as if both of you are resting. He lays in front of you so he can see your face while it’s peaceful; not while it’s twisted with confusion and disgust like it was in the tea shop a few days ago. No, he likes you much better like this. Quiet and pliant.

The tips of his fingers trace the features of your face, and it’s a dance he’s grown to have well memorized. They brush your lips and the tip of your nose before dipping underneath your jaw where they continue to wander. It doesn’t feel wrong, even though he knows you’d beg to differ. He’s done this before, in a life you don’t remember. Touch you like this. Feeling the dip between your breasts and the skin of your stomach. He pats your hands, still bound together with a zip tie — he tells himself he’ll remove them once you start behaving — before caressing your thighs. He wants to slip upwards, to brush his thumb against your clit just like how he knows you like it, but he refrains. He’ll wait until you wake up to do that. Your gasps are always sweeter when you’re aware.

The sweet bliss of numb eternity melts away as the drugs begin to wear off, and when your eyes flutter open you’re met with the face of a stranger. Truly, he’s not a stranger at all. Or, at least that’s what John would have you believe with the knowing smile he gives you. Your bound hands move up and press against his chest, desperately attempting to earn some space between the two of you. This only makes him laugh, and his hand rests on top of yours.

“Easy, darling,” he soothes.

An incoherent response stumbles out from your lips just as fearful tears swell in your eyes. His hand pants yours against his chest before he frowns. The gemstone on your wedding ring stands out like a sore thumb against his palm, and it serves as a stark reminder as to why he had to do all this in the first place. You don’t — or can’t — fight against him as he slips the ring off your finger and places it on the nightstand next to him. He’ll dispose of it properly another time, but for now he just can’t stand to see that proof of ownership on you.

“Please.” It’s the first word you’re able to slur out, and John hangs onto the syllable like it’s dessert. “W-Whatever you want… please… my husband, h-he’ll give it to you just… let me go, please.”

Husband. He hates that word on your lips when it’s not in reference to him.

“I’ve already gotten what I want, love,” he whispers.

Your eyes wrench shut and tears fall free at the realization that there’s nothing you can do to get away from this crazed man. He shushes you as he holds your face in his hands and presses his lips against your forehead. It’s not enjoyable, the way you recoil from him, but giving you the same love he’s given you in every other life feels right. It feels more wrong to withhold it from you.

Because this is his right, isn’t it? Of course it is, and in some sort of way, you seem to know this too. Your hands no longer press against his chest in disdain, and it’s all too easy to prop himself up on his elbow and press his lips against yours. The pressure is firm, as if he’s holding himself back from taking more from you. He groans at the taste of salt on your lips, and nearly chuckles at the way you tremble. It’s a one-sided embrace that you refuse to return, but he tells himself you’ll learn otherwise soon enough.

When John pulls away, your eyes refuse to focus on him as the shame eats you from the inside out. Your entire body is limp, bound hands resting against your stomach as he sits up. Deciding you’ve been behaving well enough, he reaches for the knife on the nightstand and he turns back to you, ready to cut the ties from your wrists.

The very moment the glint of the knife catches your eye is the moment you begin to squirm. Legs thrash and mess up the sheets as you scramble away from him until your head and back is pressed against the headboard. Your chest heaves violently as your terror overtakes you, and John pauses as you retreat. He’s never seen you look at him like that; not in any life he’s ever lived.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he promises.

“Please don’t,” you beg, his assurance falling on deaf ears. Your pleas turn into mindless stuttering for a moment before something visibly breaks in you, forcing you to share a secret that feels like sealing your death: “Please, you can’t just- I- I’m pregnant! Please!”

Everything stops. The world. His heart. It all falls quiet except for the sound of your hyperventilating which is almost as deafening as the ringing in his ears. Pregnant. Anything kind in John’s eyes dies quietly as he clenches the knife in his hand.

Pregnant. Not with his child. It must be a lie — it has to be a lie. You don’t look pregnant. There is no swelling of your stomach. Yet your hands lie on your lower abdomen as if you’re cradling something. Cradling someone. You have never been good at lying in any of your lives, and the candor sheen in your eyes tells him you’re not good at lying in this one, either.

John tells himself he only wants to embrace you. To mourn the life the two of you could have had if you only behaved. He doesn’t register why you’re screaming until the blood covers his hands, and then you fall quiet. His knife sinks into your stomach like it’s butter, and it pulls free from you even easier. You stare up at him, confused. As if you can’t comprehend why he would do this to you.

Ichor flows free from you like a river, and all you can do is gasp and paw at your wound. Your legs flail as John pulls you against his chest, chin resting on top of your head as if this is something he can soothe away with a hug. It’s not. He can’t soothe away your betrayal. Can’t come to terms with the fact you carry another man’s child when you should be carrying his.

“I know,” he shushes with a strained voice. “I know. It’ll be over soon.”

Your death is not kind, and he mourns every minute you bleed in his arms until you eventually still. It’s only when your blood goes cold that he allows himself to cry. Angry, hot tears that sear his skin as they soak into your hair. Damn this ruined life. Damn the years he wasted trying to find you only for you to be soiled by the time you were in his grasp. He hates the gore that stains your being, but he assures himself it was necessary.

In every life, you belong to him. In the lives that you don’t, you’re already dead.

John carefully places your body back on the mattress where he takes in the sight of you. There’s no more glow to your skin, not like there was while you were alive. But you’re dead, and he knows the life inside of you is dead, too. He tries to take comfort in that fact before angling the knife towards himself.

Killing himself is easier than killing you, as driving the knife into his throat is a well practiced motion. It’s something he’s done before, and he’s so used to it he doesn’t even groan at the sting as the blade slices his artery. Darkness is quick to cloud his vision as the blood loss overwhelms him, and he sputters and stares down at your cold body below. There is little comfort he feels when his blood meets yours on the stained sheets of the bed he wished to love you on. The mixing of blood is the only bond the two of you will ever have in that life.

He coughs as he falls forward. Soon, he has no use for any sort of comfort at all.

There is no blood in your next life. No iron taste in your mouth, or rotten flesh haunting your nose. No, there is only ink, paper, and well loved books.

You love your job. Books are your livelihood; the tool you use to escape reality on rainy days, so it only makes sense that in this life you work as a librarian. The building is dated with poorly insulated windows, and a bell that chimes as another patron enters, but that’s what makes it charming. Millions of words have been consumed in that library, and they linger in a way that never leaves you feeling alone.

Several books sit tucked safely in your arms as you wander aisles, on the hunt to return them home. Every shelf is well memorized. You could find any book in that building blind folded, and you hum to yourself as you go to return Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself to its rightful home on the top shelf of the WXYZ aisle.

Your feet are nimble as you climb the step stool to reach the shelf. It nearly reaches the ceiling, which is no small feat for a building of that size. Your arm stretches over your head and you breathe in the scent of stale paper and well loved books. Just as your fingers slide the item into place, the stool below you jerks, and your stomach drops as you fall to the side.

The books in your arms tumble onto the ground, but you’re saved from that same fate as a pair of arms swoop around you. You squeak as your hands grip the shirt of your savior, and you look up with wild eyes at the man. John Price is younger in this life when he finds you. In his twenties this go around. His face is clean shaven, but his eyes still hold the wisdom of forgotten ages and dead worlds.

“Terribly sorry, darling,” he apologizes. His grip on you loosens, but he doesn’t quite cut you free just yet. “You alright?”

“Yes, thank you, I… good save,” is all you can manage through a breathless chuckle.

There’s an innocence in your eyes that has John smiling at you. His hands are kinder in this life. The angry claws that ended your previous life don’t exist anymore. They do not wield a knife in anger; they only hold you with unbridled adoration. It’s the way things are supposed to be, with you in his arms and looking up at him with that innocent gaze, just the way he likes you. For a moment, John worries that you somehow recognize him when you tilt your head, yet as you bashfully return his smile, he takes comfort in knowing that you don’t remember anything.

You don’t remember anything at all.

#core writes #john price x reader #captain price x reader #price x reader #fucked up soulmate au #f!reader

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