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#this finale is going to cliffhanger us I just know it
bloopitynoot · 2 days
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Reading SVSSS: Chapter 13
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For those who don't know, I am reading SVSSS for the first time and sharing my thoughts!
If you have not read it, there will be spoilers! Consider this a warning.
Also- if you want to follow along, I am aiming to post updates daily. You can find all the posts in the tag bloopitynoot reads SVSSS. You can also check out the intro post for context on my read.
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I'm here! Finally posting yesterday's read.
Last night I was watching critical role and making flower crowns for the ren faire today and I totally lost track of time. But I did read earlier and I have the notes!
Anyways; no tea- I slammed this coke zero. The flower crowns ended up being real cute though.
Here we go; last chapter of book 2!
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I'm already nervous :( this chapter is titled coercion. Coercion of who?
Well. Shen Qingqiu arrives and the mountain is already under siege- solid start. p283
This is less a reflection on this current chapter and more a thought about the longevity of this character; but I feel like Luo Binghe is going to inevitably perish. The reckless abandon in which he approaches anything Shizun adjacent is going to end this man. Like in this chapter- fully just tells everyone he's of demonic heritage- 0 fucks, no care for his own life now or in the future. Sure, he's powerful as hell but like eventually he has to sleep. p284
Oh gosh. Both Yue Qingyuan and Liu Qingge are in a bad way AND they are in the same room as Luo Binghe. p285
Okay but to be fair, when it comes to the body of Shen Qingqiu I am on the side of the sect here. Like bare minimum even if this man supposedly committed all the crimes (he didnt and they do know this) he still deserves to have proper death rites. Luo Binghe did do some unhinged things. pp 286-287
RIP Shang Qinghua LOL everyone knows you are an opportunist with nary a loyal bone in your body. Congrats on your entire sect knowing now p288
OOP. the audacity of Luo Binghe to Liu Qingge "ah! The loser I defeated" I mean not wrong but you dont have to be a dick about it. p289 Luo Binghe is so cocky!
and here we have SQQ inserting himself into mortally dangerous situations that he could have walked away from. The self sacrificing he has been doing this entire book (intentional or not) is so wild. This man cannot do anything in a stealthy way- everything dramatic and loud and at the centre of attention. p290
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WAIT! "caught you shizun" p290 He did know! I had a suspicion!
What did you expect SQQ ofc he meant to draw you out. He could have tracked you but he lost the ability to do so with the other demon. p293
as an aside I am now wondering how this is going to work out. The Zhuzhi-Lang can also torture and track him at a distance- this is going to be a later problem for SQQ and Luo Binghe no doubt
oh poor buddy "you're not a fool...I am" p293
ooooooo. "didn't my sweetness make shizun oh-so happy?" p294. that's not even it oh no so much emotional damage
Also Shang Qinghua exposed again with the mushroom info p294
I am on SQQ's side with this one. How can the sect be mad about him not going there right away when he was kind of underground and also had to relearn how to move his own body p295
I am annoyed at Liu Qingge and I think, maybe, unjustifiably. I feel like his character is complicated and eventually I want to read a character study or two about him for more insight. What prompted this is: he is both acknowledging that SQQ is doing something utterly selfless for the sect but also pissed that he's doing it at all. Like- is it him feeling inadequate? Or is it how he feels about SQQ or the sect? idk- I will continue to think about him. p297
Luo Binghe was not satisfied with mushroom-zun he also wants the original body?? p299
RIP all of SQQ's dignity and his mental health "I've already submitted to you" p299 his word choice though LOL
His body is missing?!?!?!?!?!? p300
what a cliffhanger! Now I need to know who stole his corpse! If it ends up being 2 SQQ's OR that Luo Binghe's dad is using SQQ's original body I am done done LOL.
We finished book 2!
Thank you to those who have been reading along- this has truly been so fun! I appreciate all the comments and clarifications; they have been helpful and have been making this reading process super engaging. Getting to chat about the thing I am enjoying with others who also love The Thing has been a solid highlight of my days!
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deluweil · 4 months
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Read a post earlier today talking about how "Sorry I'm late" may be about a pregnancy, and I am not negating it - because speculations and all. (Madney speaking imo)
But I think buddie-wise, if it does happen - I think that the "I'm sorry I'm late" part is about Eddie and Buck actually being late - late to realize, late to do something about it, late to be together, at least this season.
I have a feeling that Eddie may actually start the next season in isolation, medically speaking, like maybe he gets infected by something and in true NCIS LA and H50 Style, he will be in actual isolation.
Another near death experience, with a whole new outlook on life, hopefully, would give him and Buck who would probably, naturally, be the one to look after Christopher in the meantime, time to reflect about new realizations and time to miss each other in a whole new way.
Just a thought.
I also wonder if Eddie's family will find out about Buck getting Christopher just in case something happens to Eddie, before Eddie gets hurt or after.
Because that would also explain the "reset" button so to speak, there is no way his parents would see it with a kind eye.
👀👀👀
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fisherrprince · 1 year
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So how was stormblood? I know it's very hit or miss for people, so what're your thoughts?
I understand why it’s hit or miss! It — to get to the point i would be straight up lying if I said I was an unbiased consumer because I’m not, I’m a coastal American mid 20s rando with a Lot of very current cultural baggage around concepts like patriotism and freedom. And Hamilton references. It all has a sweet and strong and very anti-occupation message (along with themes I very much enjoy dissecting like the constant assertion that it Doesn’t Have To Be This Way, or the expansion into You may not understand this person but you must be able to accept them,) but when combined with Stormblood’s shakier coherence in writing and dialogue and pacing, it comes off as A Bit Off. to me. And I think it missed ever so slightly just due to how it was all structured and set up with the characters we have and motivations we have because the stuff OUTSIDE or Adjacent to the main story, despite how out of place it could feel, was structured great!! Like the Kojin and the Ananta trial and the Kugane mishaps and trying to murder Zenos twice and the ghost ship. Could the main structure have come across very well yes absolutely! It does it on and off it succeeds in there often! But sometimes it doesn’t. I can see a lot of where concepts were promised and not fully delivered, pacing was a bit off, things just happened without really belonging there (despite how much I loved Susano, he could have been better structured. same with many instances and also I feel like the unethical science should have been MORE IMPORTANT THAN IT — maybe it comes back. Who is that scientist.), sometimes dialogue felt somewhat canned. I feel like in a consequences-heavy expansion, many things just didn’t have important consequences, which was very strange
HOWEVER! I cannot give the new gameplay features abd dungeons any crap they are all SO GOOD. And so PRETTYYYYY. And there were so many solo duties that ruled! Every dungeon in this expansion was like whoa this is a PLACE im in you know what I mean??? I’m in a place that’s big and there’s people and there’s NEW MECHANICS and active time maneuvers (??!!!!!!!) and unique fights! I can jump on the roofs in Kugane! And, mind you, when the dialogue was good, it was good. Lyse has a fantastic voice actor. Alisaie is my favorite girl elf creature in thw world. Estinien is like the best p- the guy ever. also m’naago is my new friend. The tower was a great part of sb to me despite my singular gripe. I think Zenos’— I know it’s controversial to some people because he does assume your wol to be a bit more murderous than some people would prefer their characters be and doesn’t take no for an answer, but his um speech did something to my brain a little bit
ON that note the ending was very fast?????? Or like — not FAST, but I wasn’t expecting Zenos or Shinryu to go down in one fight. Two co-op fights, right next to each other. I kind of wanted to beat him up myself. And when Zenos was so impossible to beat before. I was expecting both of them to be WAY harder. Though Shinryu is a COOL fight I’d do the royal menagerie again in a second. I was kind of expecting a three stage trial? Like Nidhogg? I love going into space hiiii big dragon where were you this whole time… u were shafted… but u could not be suffered to live so. Maybe if we’d gotten an instance of fighting the dragon alone after beating the trial?? Could have been Themes. I don’t know
anyways no I can’t quite pin it down, but I’ve said it before I think they had the outline for the story and then built it and went oh this is too much and not enough at the same time and got stuck writing the whole thing after getting stuck in the story they already had. A COMMENDABLE job for getting turned around like that, way better than a lot of video games stories out there, good gameplay and areas that didn’t feel too empty. glances at coerthas falcons nest area. I think the ways they did the exploration thing was good, having us venture further into occupied territory etc, but so much exploration stuff felt oneoff and not there to do much for someone who has been skipping almost all of the side content except stuff I’ve been told is good. It almost felt like they were Trying New Stuff a lot, and some of it succeeded some of it failed. Such is trying stuff!! Such is trying to imitate what you had while making something new and exciting! And I can’t fault them for that
so like — putting aside the fact that I haven’t done post-sb which is like missing 40% of the Thing according to past expansions and my thoughts very well might change, i would 100% do the fights again, maybe watch some cutscenes, but I don’t think I’d NG+ this one. where is that lady selling buuz it is a CRIME i did not get to have any buuz let me buy one yoshi p
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avirael · 4 months
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Vargsången
It had been around a week since they had found refuge at Camp Dragonhead, when Rael woke especially early one morning. They usually got out of bed early enough to watch the sun rise with no problem whatsoever but this particular morning they rose with an uneasy feeling.
Before they left their room Rael glimpsed out of the window, where big white snowflakes were wildly dancing in front of a dark cloudy sky. It would be difficult to get A‘viloh out of bed today, Rael thought as they put on their boots which they had placed next to the door the evening before. It was then that they noticed the carefully folded piece of paper someone had pushed through the small gap between the door and the dark wooden floorboards.
With a confused expression on their face they picked it up and unfolded it to see a small and very familiar handwriting. Instantly that uneasy feeling flared up again. Quickly Rael read the short letter and found their worst fears confirmed.
Dear Rael,
I am sorry to leave you like this but I know that you would have tried to stop me. I am aware that this plan is madness but I simply cannot go on with this uncertainty any longer. I am returning to Ul’dah to find out what happened to our friends. I know it is dangerous but I ran and hid from the consequences of my actions for long enough to know that I will not find peace this way. Don’t come looking for me and please keep Tataru and Alphinaud safe.
Forgive me. If you can.
Your friend,
A’viloh
„This idiot!“, Rael growled as they threw another glimpse out of the window and then hurriedly left their room. Without knocking they tore open the the door across the corridor but found A’viloh’s room empty. As fast as they could they ran down the stairs, ignoring the greetings of the few people who were also up early and threw open the door leading to the yard. The blizzard they had already seen from the window felt a lot stronger and colder up close and to Rael’s frustration not a single footstep was to be seen in front of the house. No traces where he would have gone. The evidence long destroyed by the storm. How long was he already out there? And what had he been thinking at all to go out alone in a weather like this??
Whispering another string of profanities Rael stepped outside and ran across the yard. With one strong push they threw open the heavy double doors that led to the commander’s office. They hadn’t even reached the desk on the opposite side of the room yet when they urgently addressed the Elezen sitting behind it. „Lord Haurchefant!“
Surprised the man looked up from the paperwork’s on his desk and smiled at Rael.
„Please, I told you to drop the formalities. How may I help you.“
„We have a problem!“, Rael continued and the worried tone in their voice was enough to make Haurchefant’s smile turn into a more serious expression. „What happened?“
„A’viloh!“, Rael exclaimed in frustration as if that one word was explanation enough and waved around the piece of paper they still clasped tightly in their hand. „He ran away! To find our friends it seems, but all he’s gonna accomplish is get himself killed. I don’t need to be from around here to know that someone without experience is going to freeze to death all alone in that storm out there! And even if he miraculously makes it to Ul’dah, Ilberd and the other traitors will without doubt be waiting for him and he doesn’t stand a chance against all of them alone.“
„Breathe, my friend.“, the Elezen said and gestured for Rael to calm down. For a moment he looked out of the window in thought and nodded. „Unfortunately you are right. With this weather it is very dangerous out there…“
That information didn’t do much to calm Rael down. „How can we find him in that blizzard? I don’t know when he left or how far he got. I fear he—„
„Say no more.“, Haurchefant interrupted them. Without further hesitation he stood up and walked toward the door, grabbing a thick woollen coat from a coat rack beside the door. „I will find A’viloh and bring him back. You stay here where you are safe. No! No argument, please. I’ll be faster without you.“
Nonetheless Rael followed him out to the yard where he shouted for one of the guards to immediately bring his chocobo.
Rael tried to convince him that they would cover more ground if they both went searching for A‘viloh but Haurchefant pointed out that Rael would most likely get lost too and that he didn’t like to have to search for them both out in this storm. Reluctantly Rael promised to wait for him at Camp Dragonhead and watched him check his gear, get on his chocobo and vanish into the storm with worry written all over their face.
***
The snowflakes and the ice-cold wind felt like sharp little blades on his face. He cursed this storm for not the first time today and he also cursed himself as well.
What had he been thinking?
Not much honestly.
There hadn’t been a storm when he had sneaked out long before anybody else was awake. The whole night he hadn’t slept, once again thinking and wondering. Back then this part of his plan had seemed to him the easy part. He had more wondered about how he would cross Gridanian territory and make it into Ul’dah unrecognised than what else could happen on his way there when at first only a few big snowflakes had begun to slowly fall from the sky. In his determination he had barely taken notice of them, only when the clouds got darker and darker, the snow more and more and finally the wind picked up, howling and biting, he had realised that he hadn’t planned for something like this to happen. He had already walked quite a bit of distance and the Observatorium couldn’t be that far anymore. Maybe he could hide there until the storm died down. So he continued onwards. But with every minute passing he saw less and less of where he was going and soon he realised that he had no clue anymore where he was at all or in which direction he needed to walk. And with every passing moment it only seemed to get colder.
So now there he was, blindly stumbling through the snow, hoping that a settlement, a house, a fire, anything would show up before his eyes. But instead he couldn’t even tell anymore where the white ground beneath his feet ended and where the sky with it’s veil of wind and snow begun. He had no idea what to do.
For a moment he contemplated to scream for help, but who would hear him out here with this howling wind? He tried anyway and found that he barely made a sound, his voice only a distant whispering even to his own ears. Oh, I’m going to die here, he thought, no one will ever find me. That thought made him shiver even more violently than he already did and hot burning tears started to gather in the corners of his eyes. They were long frozen on his cheeks before they could reach his chin.
Nonetheless he took off his gloves, tried to wipe the weird sensation away but his face and hands only felt cold and numb. Instead he lowered his fingers to his lips, tried to warm them with his breath but even breathing felt more and more painful and exhausting by now, let alone putting one feet in front of the other.
Finally he tripped. There hadn’t even been a stone or a branch, just his frozen clumsy feet that felt so heavy. Without much of a sound he fell into the deep cold snow. Absently he tried to blink the snow out of his eyes, not that he would have seen much anyway. At first he weakly tried to push himself back up but his whole body felt so horribly heavy and tired. Oh yes, he was tired, so very tired. Maybe he just needed to rest for a moment. It all didn’t really seem that bad anymore now that he lay here in the soft white snow. It felt strangely warm really. For a moment he even thought he heard a voice calling out his name. Saw a silhouette between the dancing snowflakes. A hand stretched out towards him.
With a peaceful smile on his face his eyelids drooped and his mind faded to darkness.
***
How long was he gone now?, Rael wondered as they paced about the room, around the big table with all the maps, back and forth between the roaring fireplace and the window facing south.
For the third time now they pulled up their collar and stepped out into the empty frozen courtyard. Everyone at Camp Dragonhead who wasn’t on guard duty had been clever enough to seek shelter from the storm indoors and as Rael worriedly looked towards the gate, it‘s silhouette barely visible against the myriad of snowflakes, they wondered if Haurchefant’s decision to leave in search for A’viloh on his own had been a good one. Maybe something had happened to him.
Should they follow him?
No, they would get lost without a doubt…
Should they alarm the whole camp about their commander’s absence?
But what should the soldiers do about this?
Helplessly Rael raised their face to the sky but all there was were dark storm clouds and more questions they couldn’t answer. There was nothing to guide them, to tell them what to do. No gods, no teacher, no whispers, no vision. Nothing at all. Rael, who always knew what to do or at least had an educated guess about what might prove helpful, never felt that useless before.
Almost violently they pressed their eyes shut and tried to summon up the answers they needed by sheer force of will. A lonely figure at which the wind tore mercilessly. Determined but also futile. Forcing any sign to reveal itself to them had never worked before and neither did it now. There simply was nothing they could do.
Why haven’t I seen this coming?
Eyes still closed they started to shiver, fighting against the burning sensation building behind their eyelids. Their mouth twitched no matter how tightly they pressed their lips shut. Instead they breathed through their nose, heavy shaky breaths which turned to white clouds in the air.
Then a horn blared above. Rael flinched and realised that a guard on the fortification wall had given a signal. They didn’t know what it meant and still Rael fixed their eyes on the barely visible gateway, hoping, praying to whatever was willing to listen. Please, let them be safe.
At first Rael feared they were imagining it but then clearly something moved between the sea of snowflakes. A dark form, something - no, someone was coming closer. Rael almost stopped breathing. Once they realised it was truly Haurchefant on his chocobo, they almost fell to their knees in relief.
Only as Haurchefant carefully climbed off of his chocobo, Rael saw that he wasn’t wearing his coat anymore. Instead he had held it in place bundled up on the saddle in front of him, to make sure it didn’t fall down and also keeping it close to himself for warmth. As he lifted that small bundle into his arms and slowly stepped towards them Rael couldn’t stifle a sob any longer and desperately ran towards him.
A’vi!
Wrapped in the way too large piece of clothing was the small Miqo’te, entirely motionless. His skin so pale and cold. Frantically Rael searched for a sign of life - a sound, a movement, a pulse - but there was none. He looked like a dead thing and that fact smashed Rael’s heart to a million little pieces.
It had been too late. They had lost him.
***
Darkness. Endless and suffocating.
A moment ago he thought there had been light.
There had been snow too.
No…
Dark angry water. Hissing like the wind.
A thunderstorm. Or a blizzard.
But there had been sun too, right? Once. Warm pleasant sunlight. Hot bright sand.
Yes, it had been warm. But why was he feeling so cold then?
Why had the sun left him all alone in this cold, cold darkness?
Suddenly he heard a voice calling his name.
It sounded so far away and then suddenly so close. So worried.
He couldn’t quite remember if he knew it but it felt friendly. It felt warm and welcoming.
It felt safe. He could rest now.
***
When Haurchefant had arrived back at Camp Dragonhead cradling poor A‘viloh in his arms, the Miqo’te had no noticeable breathing or pulse at all. He had looked like a corpse and Rael had already feared he was dead. Nonetheless Haurchefant had hurriedly brought him indoors. Loudly he had yelled orders left and right and suddenly the whole camp was in turmoil. In fact it was still early morning and it only had been this sudden unexpected ruckus that had awoken Tataru and Alphinaud as footsteps and loud voices rushed past their bedrooms. They watched puzzled as the servants quickly brought lots of blankets as well as warm dry clothes to replace A’viloh’s frozen ones and also wood for the fireplace and warming pans for his bed.
Immediately Rael had begun to work. For a few terrifying moments they had sat there in silent focus trying to find a sign of life from A‘viloh. Heartbeat, breathing, aether. Nothing… nothing… nothing… then: a shy heartbeat after all. So slow, so weak, easy to miss. But it was still there and Rael refused to let it vanish! They never had to heal a patient with hypothermia before and only could guess what to do exactly. It wasn’t a open wound they could close or a poison they could extract. Instead all they could do was use their magic to steady his heartbeat and help slowly warm his body up.
Both, Tataru and Alphinaud, stood there by the door speechlessly staring in shock, not knowing or understanding what had happened. They saw Rael’s face and didn’t dare to ask either. Not until Haurchefant reappeared. The servants had urged him to change into dry, warmer clothes too and now he returned pressing warm drinks into the helpless spectators hands and shooing them off, back to their rooms, against quiet protest.
“Please, the healer will arrive any moment now. There is nothing you can do in the meantime. I promise I have you informed at once if anything changes.“
Bleakly Rael noticed that his choice of words didn’t specify if this would be a change for better or for worse. A few moments later the healer, torn from his sleep on Haurchefant’s demand, arrived but he also left rather quickly again.
Rael had only let this ishgardian doctor close to A’viloh because they had hoped that maybe he knew better how to help him than they did considering he needed to have more experience with cases like this. But the Elezen hadn’t done much at all and only claimed that the poor Miqo’te’s life now lay in Halone’s hands. Rael had sharply laughed at this statement but it had really sounded more like a menacing bark. Why did this sharlatan bother to come here at all? Once again they had to do everything by themself if they wanted it done properly.
Just to make sure, they tried every kind of healing magic they could think of hoping that maybe some of it would help, even the ancient spells his mother and the oracle had taught them. When no immediate response was visible - had they really expected one? - they kept on monitoring A’viloh’s heartbeat as well as his still very thin aether and supported both as good as they could using their own.
For hours they sat there silently working their magic, carefully trying to ration their own power reserves as long as possible. They were almost exhausted, almost out of aether themself. Their fingers were shaking and their eyelids felt heavy. It wasn’t healthy and they knew they couldn’t do this much longer.
But at least it seemed to work. For a short happy moment they thought everything would be fine again.
Then the fever hit.
***
The darkness scared him.
It was cold and wet and inescapable.
The wind turned to howls of wild animals and these again soon to laughs and mockery.
Their hungry fangs and claws reached for him in the darkness. Trying to pull him down.
He tried to run but he wasn’t moving at all.
He tried to shake off the claws digging into his skin but their grip was too strong.
He tried to scream but couldn’t make a sound.
Then with a sudden jolt he was falling. A long horrible fall through infinite darkness.
When he finally hit the ground he was in the cold, freezing snow again.
Just that it didn’t feel cold at all anymore. But soft and warm.
There was that voice again, calling his name.
An unfamiliar voice.
No, that wasn’t true. He knew this voice.
It was the only voice he ever wanted to remember.
If he ever realised he forgot this sound, the pain would destroy him.
Between the veil of snow there was a hand reaching out for him. A worried face.
Arms holding him tight. Keeping him warm.
So familiar eyes of molten gold.
A loving smile.
His favourite thing in the world.
Oh! Now he remembered!
He understood. At last, no miracle to save him.
Finally…
Laqa.
***
„Laqa…“
Shocked Rael looked up from the hand they carefully held between their own.
Haurchefant couldn’t know the meaning of this feverish mumbling but Rael did and it terrified them, the panic plainly visible on their face.
„The healer warned us that the fever might make him hallucinate...“ the elezen offered in an attempt to console them.
„I know that!“, Rael snapped harshly.
It wasn’t fair but they had no nerve to hear things that were plainly visible. After the fever had appeared Haurchefant had called for the ishgardian doctor again. At least this time he had offered a potion that was supposed to lower A’viloh’s fever. So far it hadn’t shown any effect though. But that wasn’t Haurchefant’s fault.
„I am sorry, I didn’t mean to yell at you…“
The Elezen shook his head. „I know, my friend. You’re tired. Don’t you think it would be better to rest for a while?“
„No, I’m fine. I will stay.“ It did sound hollow even to them.
„You know, you did everything you could, right?“, Haurchefant asked while putting a hand on Rael’s shoulder and Rael hated how it almost sounded like they had lost this fight already.
„I know… Would you mind leaving me alone for a while?“ Hopefully that hadn’t sounded rude again.
He hesitated, then he nodded slowly. „No more magic though, alright? I don’t want you to collapse too.“
Rael just shrugged. It wasn’t the answer Haurchefant had wanted but he left anyway. With a heavy sigh they returned their gaze to A’viloh’s pale face as he mumbled something unintelligible.
Oh, why hadn’t they noticed he was planning something? Where had they gone wrong?
Probably when A’viloh’s smile had fooled them into thinking that he was alright. As if a few nice words and some hot chocolate could fix everything that was wrong. Rael had wanted to believe it but should have known better. No matter how much they had told themself that he was stronger now, braver, healthier… mostly he seemed fine and then suddenly tiny things could still throw him off course. It was a tricky thing for Rael to assess how A‘viloh would react sometimes. Like a broken mug that had been kitted. There were bits and pieces that were still alright or had healed fairly good, the damage almost invisible, and then there were the spots were all that kept the ragged shards together was too much glue, unevenly filling the wounds. Ugly and weak, easily broken apart again. On his really bad days Rael still feared that there were some small pieces of him irrevocably lost, never to be found again, sunken to the bottom of the sea and impossible to replace.
Barely audible, like a knife to Rael’s heart, the poor fever-dreaming Miqo’te whispered, „I‘ve missed you so much, Laqa.“
„No!“, Rael yelled almost angrily and threw themself at A’viloh’s chest protectively. „You can’t have him yet!“
It was ridiculous! Who were they even talking to? Instead they turned their pleading gaze to the Miqo’te’s feverish face.
„Please, A‘vi! Tell him that he has to wait a little longer… please… he would want you to live your life first, wouldn’t he?“
Of course A'viloh didn’t answer.
Desperately Rael buried their face in the Miqo’te’s shirt and started to sob. „Please don’t die. I cannot do this without you…“
***
The sea washed around his feet, then retreated again with a slight pull.
He couldn’t care less.
Everything he cared about was right here with him.
Arms as warm and comforting as the late afternoon sunlight wrapped tightly around him.
With his eyes closed, his head rested between Laqa’s shoulder and neck, he felt safe and at peace. He felt at home.
When had he last felt that way?
It didn’t matter anymore.
He would never have to let go of him again.
Vi…
this so familiar voice whispered as he pressed a kiss into his hair.
Slowly Laqa loosened his embrace and instead cupped A’viloh’s face gently with both of his hands.
It is time, Vi…
For a moment they just looked at each other, smiling, before their lips met halfway for a long kiss.
Finally Laqa pulled back a little and immediately A’viloh missed him again.
This hadn’t been enough. It would never be.
With a smile on his face Laqa rested his forehead against A’viloh’s.
You have to go now.
***
For days A‘viloh wandered between sleep and death, two things that sometimes looked horribly similar like only siblings could.
The fever had ebbed away and risen again but never completely left him alone.
Neither had Rael.
Day and night they had remained by A’viloh’s bedside, refusing to leave unless it was really necessary.
Alphinaud had brought food and water for them both and sometimes even Tataru had joined them for breakfast or for dinner. Every now and then Lord Haurchefant had brought tea as well. All of them had tried to cheer Rael up and also tried to convince them to get some rest. Both very unsuccessfully. Although they appreciated the effort.
When they were alone Rael talked to A’viloh. They felt a little crazy for this because they didn’t know if A‘vi was hearing any of this at all but still… they sat down on the bed beside him, held his hand in theirs and told him everything they had ever wanted to tell him.
How much they admired him for the person he was, despite everything. How much they had enjoyed traveling with him and also how much of the world they still hoped to show him. All the places Rael had visited on their journey and thought A‘vi would love. They told him how much they wished they could show him Golmore. They sang him the lullabies their mother used to sing for them and told him everything about their home and also about themself. About all the qualities they lacked and he possessed. About his kindness and how he so easily won over the hearts of everyone he met. About how Rael finally understood what it felt like to be as terrified as him. The fear and the guilt. How sorry they were for not seeing that he hadn’t been okay.
The thought that maybe against all of their efforts A'viloh simply didnt want to wake up again almost made them cry once more. In the end Rael lay there beside him with their head rested on A‘viloh’s chest. His heartbeat the only solace for their sorrow, a lullaby for their troubled mind, their tired eyelids almost closed.
„Wake up, A‘vi… Please. Just say something…“, they whispered a final plea.
Apart from the crackle of the fireplace and the wind rattling at the window the room was silent.
Almost asleep suddenly a quiet raspy sound startled them.
„…Rael?“
In surprise the viera shot up and indeed saw tired green eyes slowly squinting at them.
„What are you doing here?“, A‘viloh‘s voice asked hoarsely.
„A‘vi!“, Rael exclaimed in disbelieve and realised how stupid this must look. Hurriedly they jumped up, pretending to get him some water to hide how embarrassed they were. „How are you feeling? Does anything hurt? Here! You should drink something! I‘ll go and ask for some soup too, you really need to -“
A’viloh chuckled and made them stop. Confused Rael turned around and looked at him cheekily grinning.
„What?“, they blurted out awkwardly.
The Miqo'te shook his head. „Nothing… Soup would be great, I think I am starving… and also thank you for worrying about me.“
„You are such an idiot, you know that?“, Rael asked while crossing their arms in front of their chest and staring at him in the best imitation of anger they could pull off.
A’viloh just laughed. This time Rael was wary to trust it.
Oh, they would give him quite a lecture! It was a good thing he couldn’t run off in his condition. But first they would get some food.
#ffxiv#ff14#final fantasy xiv#final fantasy 14#ffxiv writing#ff14 screenshots#ffxiv screenshots#ffxiv gpose#gpose#Aviloh Tia#Rael Hyskaris#the title is the name of a song because I was uncreative and I will use every possibility to show you her songs#I will put the link in the comments in case anyone cares#I edited the pictures because the in-game weather was so underwhelming…#They call it SNOWSTORM and there are like 5 tiny snowflakes???#not much rambling this time because I honestly dont know what possessed me to write 4200 words...#I considered cutting this in half but I didnt want to leave you with a mean cliffhanger#And you wouldnt have believed me that I was going to kill off A'vi anyway right?#RIGHT?!#A good chunk of the second half was never planned like this...#then I looked at some of my favourite screenshots and decided to add the last bit from A'vi's PoV#This is for you! I know you are reading this and I know you miss Laqa: So here he is like you always imagined A'vi would dream about him!#<3#And the last bit with Rael made me struggle because i wasnt sure how in-character this would be for them.#They got attached to this silly little miqo more than they care to admit haha...#I like to think that while Rael doesnt like hugs and stuff like that in general they got a little used to it with A'vi...#They also know that it comforts him so...#Can you imagine A'vi's confusion waking up with that grumpy bun cuddled up to him? :D#He messed up and he knows that so he doesnt tease Rael about being flustered xD#And how can Rael be angry with him if they are just so happy he woke up!
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thankskenpenders · 3 months
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The Lara-Su Chronicles: Beginnings review
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The day has finally come. Many, understandably, thought we'd never get here. Maybe we shouldn't have gotten here. We've been through so much. Lawsuits, reboots, redesigns, unreleased NFTs, empty legal threats over the fact that movie Knuckles has a dad, an attempt to license out Scourge the Hedgehog to fans that immediately got canceled (in both meanings of the term), and many, MANY idiotic Twitter controversies. But now, here we are.
Thirteen years after first announcing it in the middle of his legal battles with Archie and Sega that changed the American Sonic comics forever, former writer Ken Penders has released the first part of his new series: The Lara-Su Chronicles.
Yes. I had to buy the book. I had to take one for the team. Look at the fucking URL of this blog, a blog I've been using to talk about the American Sonic comics for nearly a decade while the specter of this book loomed in the distance. The one time I've actually been paid to write an article about anything in any professional capacity, it was an article about the Penders lawsuits. I'm cited on his Wikipedia page. There was no way I was going to skip reviewing this, and there was no guarantee that scans would ever turn up online given the incredibly small audience for this trash. (Only 166 people preordered this, and even that number feels way higher than it should be.) No, I had to preorder it to ensure I could get a copy and cover it for the blog... even if that meant my name would be forever immortalized in the list of "supporters" in the back of the book. These are the sacrifices I must make as a woman who stumbled ass backwards into being an amateur Archie Sonic historian.
So, what exactly is in this book? How much of it is new? How bad is it? How did we even get here in the first place? How can this exist without Sega pursuing legal action? What happens next? And, most importantly... why are there multiple depictions of an Archie Sonic character breastfeeding in this book?
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I'm here to answer those questions as best I can, and in agonizing detail.
First, for those just tuning in to this decades-long saga or those who maybe don't know the full story, here's a refresher on the background info.
"What the hell is this?"
The Lara-Su Chronicles is Ken Penders' long-dreaded long-awaited continuation of his 1994-2006 run on Archie Sonic, ignoring everything written after he left by other writers like Ian Flynn. In particular, it picks up from the cliffhanger ending of the 2003-2004 arc "Mobius: 25 Years Later," which was set in what Ken considers the definitive canonical future of the series. It stars Knuckles' daughter from that future era, Lara-Su, among other new and returning characters. The project was first announced near the start of Ken's legal battle with Archie in 2011, and he's been posting WIP previews online for about a decade. Now, after all this time, a Lara-Su Chronicles book finally exists.
We'll get to the actual contents of that book in a bit.
"He can do that without getting in trouble with Sega?"
Believe it or not, yes, he can.
Thanks to the outcome of Archie Comics' woefully mismanaged lawsuits against Ken (yes, they sued him after he started filing for copyrights, not the other way around), he now has full legal ownership of every story he wrote for Archie Sonic and every character he created for the series. This was explicitly granted to him in the terms of the settlement between him and Archie (acting on behalf of Sega). He can even reprint his old Sonic material as-is to his heart's content. The main catch is just that he can't write new stories featuring Sega characters or trademarks, and his new stories also have to be distinct from Sonic at a glance to avoid confusing readers. As such, reprints can't use Sonic iconography on the cover, a few Sega characters (mainly Knuckles) have been renamed and slightly redesigned in the new stories, and the art style has been changed to less closely resemble Sonic. But otherwise, he can do whatever he wants with his own characters.
All of this is because Archie lost the original copy of Ken's work-for-hire contract that signed over the rights to his work. Without that (or any alternative that was considered permissible in court), his comics and characters are the property of their creator by default. Yes, those old comics are full of Sega stuff, but Sega doesn't automatically own the copyright for every drawing of Sonic in existence. And Sega put their stamp of approval all over those comics and let them get sold at retail for decades, even though (in the eyes of the court) there was no legal paperwork granting them ownership of any of it. It's almost like they were unwittingly distributing a fan comic for years and declaring it a fair use of their property, and now there's no takesies backsies. It's a strange and unique copyright situation. Again, they worked all this out in the settlement. And, yes, fans have long speculated that Ken stole and destroyed his own contract to regain the rights to his work, but frankly Archie was so incompetent throughout the lawsuit (it went so bad that they had to fire and replace their lawyers midway through) that I completely buy the idea of them just losing important legal documents.
Also, in case it needs to be spelled out: while Ken's a weirdo, it's ultimately a good thing for creatives everywhere that Archie lost their lawsuit against Ken. We do not want to live in a world where corporations can claim ownership of peoples' work without the contracts to back it up. That would be an incredibly dangerous legal precedent to set. And more comic creators, and artists in general, should own their own work! Corporations are not your friend! They'll delete your work for a tax write-off in a heartbeat! It's just bewildering that this guy, of all people, was the creator who ended up successfully getting his shit back, and that this is what he's doing with it.
"What about his old collaborators? Are they involved? Is he paying them?"
Ken is mostly doing The Lara-Su Chronicles solo, though he has, in fact, talked about compensating the artists involved in any material he's reprinting. The ones who give enough of a shit to get paid for a small scale reprint of something they did 20 years ago, anyway.
On the subject of his collaborators, it's also worth pointing out that Ken's wasn't the only contract that was lost. Most of the early Archie Sonic writers from before Ian Flynn's time seem to be in the same boat as Ken, with the ownership of their stories and characters defaulting back to them. Again, Archie fucked up big time. But like I said, most of them don't really seem to give a shit. For most of them, Sonic was just a random temporary gig they took to pay the bills while Marvel was busy going bankrupt in the '90s, not the thing that defined their entire careers.
The only other Archie Sonic contributor who's tried to do anything on the level of what Ken is doing was writer and editor Scott Fulop. In 2016 he attempted to sue Archie for the unauthorized use of what are now retroactively considered his copyrighted characters and stories, and he even announced a standalone comic about his most famous Sonic character, the recurring villain Mammoth Mogul (sort of a pastiche of DC's Vandal Savage and Marvel's Kingpin, with wizard powers added for spice). However, Fulop lost his lawsuit because he didn't put together a particularly compelling case. Since then he seems to have wiped all traces of his ill-advised Mammoth Mogul comic and his company, Narrative Ark Entertainment, from the internet. For now, this leaves The Lara-Su Chronicles the only project of its kind.
"What about those other Archie Sonic reprints he just announced?"
At the time of writing, Ken is once again claiming that he's trying to get the band back together to reprint all of Archie Sonic, now under the bad new banner "Floating Island Productions: MOBIAN LINE" that I can't imagine he consulted literally anyone else on.
So, like, look. As we've established, Ken can reprint his own stories. And if he can work something out with the other contributors whose contracts were lost, he can print their work, too. But there is no fucking way he's getting his hands on Ian Flynn's run, which Sega undoubtedly holds the copyright for. Even if they don't, Ian needs to maintain a good working relationship with both Sega and IDW if he's to keep his job, so he'd never go for this. Not to mention that Ian and Ken just... don't get along! Ken's whole plan here seems to be predicated on IDW going out of business (a thing he REALLY wants to happen) and freeing up the Sonic comic license, after which he knocks on Sega's door and goes "hey I've still got dirt on you guys," blackmailing them into giving him the Sonic license back so that he can reprint the later comics. Every step of this plan is ludicrous. It's never gonna happen.
He's been saying he wants to reprint the whole series for a few years now, though. This isn't really anything new. And despite his lofty plans that set Sonic Twitter ablaze, he quickly backpedaled. The only specific things in the works right now are a "two-volume omnibus" of all of his Knuckles stories and a collection of artist Scott Shaw's work on the very early Archie Sonic issues, since they're on good terms with each other. I have no idea how Ken plans on packaging these when he can't put any Sega characters or the Freedom Fighters on the covers, but these projects are small enough in scale that there's a decent chance they'll see the light of day. Scott Shaw only did like five issues. But anything beyond that? I'll believe it when I see it.
Or, y'know, this could've all just been a publicity stunt for his new book. I wouldn't put it past him. Let's just focus on the book that actually exists.
"So he finally did it? He made a whole Lara-Su book? It's out? He finished it??"
Yes and no.
The book that's out now is The Lara-Su Chronicles: Beginnings, a prologue for the series of seven graphic novels Ken somehow plans on making, even though it's taken him 13 years to put out literally anything new. I don't know whether or not this counts as book one of seven, because it only features 30 pages of new comics. 30.5 if I'm being generous.
Most of the book is actually just a reprint of his infamous Archie Sonic storyline "Mobius: 25 Years Later", which ran from issue #131 to #144 in 2003-2004. (Again, yes, he can reprint this, he just can't put Sonic on the cover.) Why's it infamous? Well, Ken had been building anticipation for this future era of the series for basically his entire run. We kept seeing King Sonic and Queen Sally from the future. Knuckles' entire backstory hinges on his dad having a vision of this future. Several years before Silver the Hedgehog was created, it was Lara-Su who was Sonic's equivalent to Future Trunks, the cool-looking child of one of the main characters who traveled back in time to try and prevent a dark future. Believe it or not, yes, there was hype for Lara-Su. And then we finally got M25YL, and none of that cool stuff happened. Instead it really ended up being about how unbearably boring the middle aged Sonic, Knuckles, Sally, and co. are in this peaceful future where Robotnik is dead and they're all married with kids, forced into traditional nuclear family gender roles. Lara-Su is present, but she mostly just does generic teen girl stuff and complains about how Knuckles won't let her do anything even though she REALLY wants to be the new Guardian of Angel Island, like, super bad! Come on, dad!!!
In its original printing, this meandering arc ended on an abrupt time travel cliffhanger that Ken was never able to follow up on before he left Archie in 2006. This new printing slightly changes that ending, using the unresolved timey-wimey shenanigans as a convenient excuse to alter the entire timeline. This creates the slightly different world of The Lara-Su Chronicles, where the few relevant Sega-owned characters have been replaced and everyone is ten times uglier.
After this, we finally get two short new stories picking up where M25YL left off: "The Storm," starring Acorn Kingdom super-spy and known creep Geoffrey St. John, and an early release of the first chapter of The Lara-Su Chronicles: Shattered Tomorrows, the first full TLSC graphic novel.
And now that we're all on the same page about what we're looking at, let's actually talk about the book!
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The cover
Let's start by beating a dead horse. The cover art: it's still bad! But why is it bad?
The cover is, of course, based on Patrick Spaziante's cover from Archie Sonic #131, the start of the "Mobius: 25 Years Later" arc. (Ken did the layout for that cover, though, so in the eyes of the law he's the original creator who owns that cover.) That cover was, itself, a tribute to the iconic cover of Giant-Size X-Men #1 by Gil Kane and Dave Cockrum, the issue that introduced the version of the team with Wolverine, Storm, Nightcrawler, etc.
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Ken seems to have forgotten that the point of both these covers was to hype up the arrival of a new cast of characters. The new guys are supposed to make a dramatic entrance front and center. That's the focal point. Meanwhile, the cover for Beginnings has the old timeline versions of the cast from Archie Sonic dramatically bursting out of a shattered crystal ball, while their new counterparts look on in mild bemusement - if they're even bothering to look at all, since most of the characters here are just copied and pasted from their profile pages. That's just not how you do this particular homage! The point is supposed to be "out with the old, in with the new." And why are they using a crystal ball to view the past? Hell, why are they even using a crystal ball at all? The original arc was presented as a magical vision of the future courtesy of Tails' uncle Merlin (don't ask), but the new story leans all the way into being futuristic sci-fi.
Of course, there is no real artistic intent at play here. The old versions of the characters are placed front and center in the crystal ball simply because Ken traced over Spaziante's original art of Lara-Su and Julie-Su (the only two characters on the Sonic cover he owns) and threw out the rest, ruining the composition in the process. Look at the awkward empty space where Sonic, Sally, and Rotor once were, and the new drawing of The Character Formerly Known As Knuckles who's no longer properly centered between his wife and daughter. Even if Ken can claim ownership of the cover because he did the original layout, this all just feels scummy and lame.
And, yeah, if it needs to be said, the new characters and Ken's new rendering style look like absolute fucking dogshit. Putting new Lara-Su directly next to old Lara-Su does her no favors. The shattered glass effect looks absolutely atrocious. I could go on, but we'll have plenty of time to talk about the art style when we see how bad the stories inside look.
Changes to "Mobius: 25 Years Later"
Overall, 99% of M25YL is presented identically to its original printing. Sonic, Sally, Knuckles, et al. are still present with no changes to their names and no tweaks to the art. Even the original cover for issue #131 is included only a few pages into this book with its Archie, Sonic, and Sega logos still intact and everything. Again, because of the weird copyright situation described above, these preexisting comics can be released without any changes.
There is exactly one bizarre change to the art, though, where a hand drawn shot of Angel Island is replaced with an unfitting photo background and the ugly Floating Island photobash that Ken has been using as his personal logo for decades. I think he only did this as part of a test for his motion comic app that nobody asked for. I don't know why this had to make it into the print version. It's like the book is firing a warning shot for what's to come if you keep reading.
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The new content begins on the final page of M25YL. In the original wet fart of a cliffhanger ending, Sonic and co. accidentally alter the timeline with an old time machine of Robotnik's and Lara-Su begins to fade away. Then, after everything goes white, we just cut to the present day heroes going "gee, you ever think about the future?" In this new printing, that last bit has been cut, and the rest of the page has been awkwardly shrunk down so that Ken can fit in a new panel. We now see the hands of an off-screen villain, seemingly named "Override," proclaiming that "the Praetorian" (Knuckles) has messed up the timeline again and that they'll finally get their revenge.
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Who is this Override? I have no fucking clue. The new stories in this book make no mention of them. You have to buy the next book to find out.
My confusion over the identity of this villain overlaps with another big problem: name changes. So many names and nouns have been arbitrarily changed in The Lara-Su Chronicles, even ones Ken didn't have to change for copyright reasons, and I only know what half of them are replacing because Ken's been tweeting about this shit for years.
The echidnas are now a totally original alien race called "the Echyd'nya." Even in flashbacks to events from M25YL attempting to mimic the old art style, if it's on a new comic page, they're gonna call themselves "Echyd'nya." Evil echidna faction the Dark Legion is now the "Cyberdark Dominion," hailing from the "Cyberdark Colony." The Brotherhood of Guardians is still the Brotherhood of Guardians, but now the main guardian is called "The Praetorian." Angel Island is still called "The Floating Island," like it was in the older Archie comics, but it's ALSO sometimes called "Avion"? When I read this I wasn't sure if he had randomly renamed Albion, the other echidna city from the Archie comics. But no. Now we have an Albion AND an Avion. Sally is mentioned simply as "Princess Acorn," while Sonic is referenced once as an unnamed "blue-spined Erinaceinae," using the scientific name for hedgehog to make it sound more sci-fi. In an incredibly ballsy move, Ken even mentions Robotnik as "the Insurrectionist Kintobor," retaining his original surname from the Archie comics that's just "Robotnik" backwards. Guess Sega never trademarked that one.
Aside from every name change being a downgrade, this leads to confusion when you're not sure if something is supposed to be new, or if it's just an Archie thing you're supposed to recognize despite having a new name and design. Is "Override" someone I'm supposed to know already? Am I just supposed to have read a fucking tweet from Ken where he said he changed the name of some existing villain to "Override"? The answer is no, but I had to term search his Twitter just to verify this.
Moving on!
New story #1: "The Storm"
If you've been following the WIPs, this is that story about Geoffrey St. John that Ken's been posting previews of for almost a decade. The title page copyright dates it to 2015, and that absurdly long gestation is probably why the art is so inconsistent here. Even the style of speech bubbles and the font change between pages two and three.
This is a problem when there's supposed to be a deliberate and noticeable change in art style here signaling the moment where the time travel stuff alters the timeline, replacing the Archie Sonic world with the Lara-Su Chronicles world. If you don't already know that's what's going on, the idea isn't conveyed clearly at all. It just goes from one hideous art style to a slightly different one with no explanation.
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The main problem here is that Ken has hitched his wagon to a franchise about anthropomorphic animals when he can't draw furries to save his life. (Though a bit later in the book we'll also begin to wonder if he can even still draw humans.) He's shifted away from the cartooniness of the original designs and given them more human proportions and facial features, but this just ends up making them look incredibly uncanny and lumpy and gross. With some designs he's trying to lean into more of a Star Trek alien vibe, but then he still insists upon retaining the giant Sonic eyes on most characters even though he has no idea how to make them emote.
The rendering of these godawful designs doesn't do them any favors, either. Ken's going for more of a painterly look now, but it almost seems as though he's shading everything with Photoshop's burn and dodge tools that are designed to darken and lighten select areas of a photo. The result is a muddy, smudgy look that makes it feel like the color layer has been smeared in vaseline. And it only looks worse after coming off of 14 chapters of M25YL that have way more palatable art.
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The backgrounds, too, are a complete mess, a jumble of low res jpeg photo elements (sometimes with extremely noticeable pixelation), stock textures, and smooth digital gradients. There's no real sense of place here, and it gives everything a surreal, dreamlike quality when you can't really tell where anything is supposed to take place. This first story is seemingly set in a high-tech stronghold below Castle Acorn called "the Bunker," but it could just as easily be confused for the bridge of a spaceship. This whole story features characters speaking to each other over floating video displays and hologram projectors from three different locations, but without a hologram effect and without a clear sense of where the characters are it often feels like they're just in the same room as each other. Characters will be in one location on one photo background, and then the camera angle changes and they're in a completely different place, because Ken just uses mismatched photos off of the internet. It's been like 25 years since he first tried using photo backgrounds in the Archie comics and he hasn't gotten any better at it.
When I had my boyfriend read the book to see if it made literally any sense to him (it didn't), Anthony said this: "This is the kind of shit I'd see linked on a Second Life world that hasn't been touched since 2004." I think he really hit the nail on the head. Now, there's actually a contrarian part of me that thinks that might theoretically almost be kind of cool, in sort of a messy counterculture way. I love weird indie shit. I was a Homestuck reader! But this isn't a scrappy mixed media zine, or experimental outsider art from someone just messing around with Photoshop, or a loving throwback to weird old internet art, or even something intentionally bizarre and offputting like Xavier: Renegade Angel or a PilotRedSun video or whatever where the fact that it's weird and ugly is part of the humor. This is supposed to be a sincere sci-fi epic drawing on Star Trek and Jack Kirby comics, made by a guy who's been drawing comics professionally since the '80s. This is supposed to look good. This is supposed to compete with mainstream comics that are on sale right now. He thinks any day now IDW's gonna go out of business and Sega will come crawling back to him so that he can stamp the Sonic logo on shit like this. It just doesn't work.
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But, okay. It's ugly. We knew it would be ugly. But that ugliness would be much easier to accept if it was in service of an otherwise genuinely good story. So what about the writing? After all this time, how does Ken choose to kick off this new saga? Well, credit where credit's due. "The Storm" feels like a proper continuation of Ken's writing style from M25YL.
Because it's eleven pages of characters standing around and talking while nothing fucking happens.
Here's the synopsis: A dog woman named Brownie, an ensign in the Royal Secret Service fresh out of training and the only character who's almost cute, walks up to Geoffrey to deliver a report. He's immediately suspicious of her, asking who let her in and if she's a spy for Elias (Sally's brother, if you're new here) or Alicia (Sally's mom). The art style suddenly shifts when the timeline is altered, but the scene continues uninterrupted. Geoffrey points a gun at Brownie when she won't say whose spy she is. Geoffrey is distracted by a call and proceeds to have a conversation via a mix of holograms and video screens with Remington (head of Echidnaopolis security), Spectre (Knuckles' great great great great great grandpa, the one with the helmet who always looks evil), and a new scientist character named Dr. Zephyr/Zephur. (The spelling of this character's name changes multiple times throughout the 11-page story, because I guess nine years wasn't enough time to spellcheck this shit.) They say a bunch of made up technobabble nonsense about how it looks like the timeline was just altered and Knuckles and co. seem to be involved. It's complete drivel that I'm not even going to try to make sense of. Everyone decides to investigate further, and the conversation ends. Brownie tells Geoffrey she's his spy, then walks out and implies she's actually Alicia's spy in her inner monologue.
To be continued!!!
Yes, that's it. It's really just a bunch of technobabble where some characters talk about how it seems like the timeline has been fucked with. That's it. The whole time Geoffrey doesn't even get up out of his damn chair, which he's of course sitting in backwards to show how cool he is. It's just 11 pages of Geoffrey sitting in a chair and talking to people and looking uglier than he's ever looked. Nothing happens. Nine years for this.
I'm also struck by how meaningless all of this is to anyone who hasn't read Archie Sonic. The added context from M25YL may help a little, but "The Storm" focuses on characters who weren't in that arc, and the story does very little to introduce who any of them are. Brownie could've been super useful as an inexperienced point of view character who's only meeting the others for the first time here, but instead she's really just a passive observer who's here as part of some kind of 4D chess game between Geoffrey and Alicia, an off-screen character whose motivations in this era of the story are completely unknown to even returning readers. Who are the good guys and bad guys here? What are the conflicts and the stakes of the story moving forward? What do these characters want? Basic questions like this aren't really answered. I can't imagine a new reader being able to make heads or tails of this. Hell, I can't really imagine a returning reader who hasn't been following the last decade's worth of Ken's tweets about this story making heads or tails of it, either.
...Maybe more will happen in the next story?
New story #2: Shattered Tomorrows preview chapter
After another message from Ken, the story of The Lara-Su Chronicles proper begins with the redesigned Lara-Su walking along a jpeg photograph beach at sunset and crying while thinking about how Knuckles - sorry, his name is K'Nox now - is dead.
Yep! Straight into the dad stuff!
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Look, I'm the last person to complain about writers getting super personal and drawing from their own baggage in their writing, but Ken's just no fucking good at it. There's no nuance, nothing interesting to say. He just keeps writing mediocre-to-horrible dads whose misdeeds are always justified by their "good intentions," and then sometimes they die and their kids are like "we may have fought but actually you were the bestest dad ever and I'll miss you forever, I'll never be able to fill your shoes!"
This is the only part of the new material here that feels like it has any heart behind it, because I know how much his complex relationship with his late deadbeat father means to Ken (there's an author's note in this outright saying as much). But the guy died 42 years ago, and it doesn't feel like Ken has had any new thoughts about this part of his life in those four decades. He's just not an introspective or self-aware enough artist to actually mine his personal baggage for anything beyond "father knows best."
Anyway, so then it jumps forward in time(?) and now we're following this human guy who looks like this.
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Previously, Ken got a lot of shit for literally just using the likeness of Anthony Mackie for this guy, based on his IMDB profile photo. Ken has thus redesigned the character... and by that I mean I think he looks more like Ernie Hudson now? Ken's clearly just working off of photo references (if not straight up tracing), given his face is the most detailed and realistic-looking thing on any page where he's present.
But you may be wondering: who is this, and why is he here? Well, for one, he's here to run around in front of some low res space photos while making trite references to things like Planet of the Apes and Star Trek. Haha, he makes a joke about red shirts! Original!! But beyond that, Commander Mykhal Taelor (yes, that's really how he chose to spell it) is a human... from Earth! Archie Sonic readers are probably confused, because in those comics Mobius is Earth in the distant post-apocalyptic future. Well, despite being a Planet of the Apes fan, Ken always hated that particular worldbuilding decision from Karl Bollers, always preferring to think of Mobius as a separate alien planet. And now he gets to make that canon in his own stories and throw out Karl's ideas. So Mobius is basically just, like, a Star Trek planet now, with its own alien creatures that sometimes just so happen to look like anthropomorphic Earth animals.
Also, at one point Taelor wonders if the inhabitants of the dead Mobius might have been human, and the alien ally he's talking to over the radio says it's unlikely. "I don't understand why your kind has a problem understanding you're a minority within a minority." Perhaps poor wording for a line said to the only Black character in the story.
Anyway, Commander Taelor here seems to have discovered the uninhabited husk of Mobius after the vague time-space cataclysm everyone was worried about in M25YL has come to pass, and he finds an audio log from Lara-Su that I presume will explain what happened. I guess those are the titular Lara-Su Chronicles. In theory this flash forward establishes some sense of pressing danger, but when the threat to the planet is so unclear and technobabble-y it just kind of lands with a thud.
It doesn't take long before we get back to Lara-Su being sad about her dad. A good little chunk of the chapter is spent with this new timeline's Lara-Su recalling moments in her life, including echoes of the original Lara-Su's memories from M25YL, which feels redundant coming hot off the heels of a straight reprint of that entire arc. And boy, for anyone who read the later Archie Sonic comics, the protagonist having vague memories of the old version of the series from before a lawsuit-related timeline reboot sure does sound familiar, huh?
The art inconsistency somehow becomes even worse in this story, with Ken flip-flopping on whether or not he wants to use outlines, with the no-outline art managing to look even worse by relying entirely on Ken's awful rendering. By this point in the book, readers are also likely to start noticing how often Ken reuses art from previous panels. This is a shortcut that tons of comic artists use, of course. Invincible famously did a joke about this. It's often understandable. But, again... it sure does stand out in a book that took 13 years to make with only 30 pages of new art. Amusingly, Ken even manages to combine his inconsistency and recycling problems by reusing the same art with and without outlines. And, of course, any time Ken tries to draw the Archie era designs it's just... the worst.
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And, yes, it's in this dreamlike montage sequence of Lara-Su's life that we get...
The uncomfortable family nudity scene, followed by the dual timeline Julie-Su breastfeeding scene.
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Yeah, you might have heard about this one already. If this incredibly eerie presentation of Lara-Su's hazy memories of the two different timelines make it hard to tell what's going on, don't worry. There's another, clearer version later in the book as part of Julie-Su's character profile, because I guess Ken was just so proud of it.
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(I censored these myself because I'm not playing Russian roulette with Tumblr's inconsistent nudity rules and risking getting banned lmao)
Like, okay. Is a mother breastfeeding her child really that shocking of a thing to see in a story? No, not at all. But, like... when it's two characters who you previously created for an officially licensed Sonic the Hedgehog comic for 7-year-olds... and some of those officially licensed Sonic the Hedgehog comics for 7-year-olds are reprinted in the same book... and when it's drawn like this... yeah, it's kind of a shocker.
It just looks so unnatural. Julie-Su is posed very deliberately so that you'll see both of her breasts, and in the new timeline version she's barely even holding Lara-Su so you can really get a good look at her supermodel body, showing zero physical signs that she just gave birth. Most people will immediately jump to this being Ken putting his fetishes in his work (a type of criticism that I'm incredibly tired of - it's 2024, all the cool artists are blatantly putting their fetishes in their work now). And my immediate response is that, no, this is probably just Ken trying to come off as really mature on a surface level, a thing he's been obsessed with since the Archie days. Free from the shackles of writing a licensed children's comic, of course he's going to jump immediately into depicting some nonsexual, artistic nudity to try and prove he's A Real Mature Artist For Grown-Ups who just thinks the human body is beautiful and breastfeeding shouldn't be a taboo etc. etc.
But then, like. You look at some of the other character designs. Like Espio's daughter Salma, who's now this horrifying alien lizard person who's always nude, and her scale pattern puts scales exactly where her nipples should be. Or you look at his comments about the Echyd'nya age of consent. Or you look at how he keeps drawing Lara-Su in this. Like, does the shuttle really need this, like... reverse chaise lounge thing in the cockpit? So that we can keep getting these shots of the 16-year-old Lara-Su lying on her stomach and posing with one of her legs kicked up, her naked ass in plain view?
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The vibe isn't great, is what I'm saying!
I'm not going to try to ascribe authorial intent here. I don't know. I'm not a psychic. Given his very blatant reliance on photo references elsewhere in the book, it's entirely possible he just referenced some figure drawing photos that were maybe just a little too sexy. And also, he's an American comic book artist, and a boomer one at that. Those guys tend to draw women a certain way, even when it's not supposed to be sexual. I don't fucking know. It just sucks. I'm not gonna make some hyperbolic statement about how this makes him a literal pedophile who should be in jail, but it is deeply offputting and objectifying.
But if you already knew about the nursing scenes and were hoping there was some other really shocking stuff in there for me to talk about in this review, sorry to disappoint, but nope. That's the only shockingly weird new thing in here. Once again, not a lot happens in this story, and what does happen is pretty boring.
Once we get past the recap stuff and the human guy, the plot developments boil down to this: The timeline was altered at the end of M25YL... but not as much as you might think. In the new timeline, Knuckles ("K'Nox"), Cobar (now looking significantly younger), and Rotor (now a rhino just called "The Emissary") still traveled via shuttle to go find a time machine in the Badlands and fix the time-space continuum, like in the climax of the original arc. This time, though, Sonic wasn't there, and Lara-Su came along without having to stow away. Lara-Su watches the ship while the grown ups go deal with the time machine, and then after a couple panels Not Rotor comes back with Cobar and is like "Hey, Cobar got hurt, we gotta leave. Dunno what happened to your dad." And then they just, like. Presume that Knuckles must have died. Even though we have no idea what happened to him. And then they just fly away. And then Lara-Su is sad that her dad died.
And that's pretty much it!
This is supposed to be a really emotional sequence - it's literally the scene where Lara-Su learns that Knuckles is dead - but instead it comes off as unintentionally funny because of how poorly it's portrayed. Not showing Knuckles' actual disappearance is a huge misstep, for one, making his uncertain fate more confusing and anticlimactic than dramatic. But also, Ken keeps just using the same two drawings of Rotor for two pages, so he doesn't really seem to be emoting at all, and he's in this spacey hazmat suit that honestly just makes him look like fucking Moltar from Space Ghost. So the whole time I'm just reading his dialogue in Moltar's deadpan voice as he's like "I dunno. We did what we could. Anyway, let's leave."
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After this, we get a two-page spread previewing the rest of the story from Shattered Tomorrows. It's basically like a trailer in comic form. It has one of the most mystifying layouts I've ever seen in a comic book. I have no idea what order I'm supposed to read this in.
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Yeah, I kinda have a feeling this is the full extent of what Ken has drawn for the rest of that book. I'd love to be wrong, but I fear that I'm right.
Bonus material: Data files
These are mostly very dull, recapping a lot of events shared between Ken's Archie run and the new Lara-Su Chronicles timeline. It seems like almost his entire run is still considered canon to the backstory of the new timeline, just with some names changed, and things only really diverge at the climax of M25YL. But I'll share the interesting stuff here.
Lara-Su
The main thing you'll notice in Lara-Su's profile is the massive, unreadable wall of text where Ken felt the need to list the entire Knuckles family tree, split across both pages.
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This is literally so long that Lara-Su's personal history has to awkwardly cut off mid-sentence and be continued on the final page of the book, after the rest of the data files.
Also, please note that this list gives Julie-Su's mom's full name as Mari-Su of the House of Atrades. Incredible on all levels.
There's also a reference to the dark timeline Lara-Su was originally supposed to come from. You know, the one where Julie-Su is the leader of a rebel movement fighting against a Knuckles who had gone mad with power? The timeline that would have been way more interesting than the one in M25YL? Here it seems to have been written off as the result of another "timeline disruption." Lara-Su allegedly has vague memories of this timeline, in the same way that she has vague memories of the M25YL timeline.
Geoffrey
Geoffrey's bio mostly recaps events from the Archie comics, which means the Sonic/Sally/Geoffrey love triangle has to be alluded to. His rivalry with Sonic is described like this:
"He would later resurface when Kintobor was transporting his latest hi-tech weapon, the Dynamac-3000. It was during that mission he discovered a rival for the Princess' affections. Whereas the Princess would be one of a line of conquests where St. John was concerned, the blue-spined Erinaceinae who protested doth a bit too much regarding his affections for the Princess for St. John's taste would prove to be a source of great sport and amusement."
Yes. It's gross. Saying that Geoffrey saw Sally as "one of a line of conquests" is gross. Ken writing this and then still treating Geoffrey as the coolest badass ever is gross. The "Princess Acorn" is also first on the list of Geoffrey's "female relationships" elsewhere in his bio, though I suppose how much of a "relationship" they had is left vague. Honestly, at this point the fact that Ken didn't explicitly confirm that Geoffrey took the underage Sally's virginity in the book comes off as a display of restraint. The bar couldn't be any lower, I know.
Remington
His bio is, frankly, shockingly long for such a minor character, though I guess he does get a large portion of the word salad dialogue in "The Storm." There's a lot of stuff here about how the identities of his biological parents are shrouded in mystery, a plot point that fans have long speculated Ken just straight up forgot about in his time at Archie. (Ian confirmed that Kragok from the Dark Legion was Remington's dad, though, so this isn't really much of a mystery.)
Lien-Da
She gets a bio even though she's not present in the two new stories, just so we get to look at her awful new design and compare it to how Steven Butler drew her earlier in the book:
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Commander Taelor
We get to see two drawings of him with the same exact Ernie Hudson face side by side! That's fun.
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Julie-Su
She gets a list of "known friends," but the only character listed is Knuckles' mom. Poor Julie-Su.
Also, Ken feels the need to reiterate that Knuckles and Julie-Su are still distant cousins. He made a whole new timeline where he can change whatever details he wants, but THAT had to remain canon. Thanks, Ken.
And then after the data files we get the special thanks page, listing everyone who preordered the book and/or bought TLSC merch from Ken.
With my name on the list. Because I had to buy a copy to cover it for the blog.
My name is on the very next page right after the breastfeeding panel in Julie-Su's data file.
Yep. He got me.
Is it at least a well put together book? Like, in terms of manufacturing quality?
Its physical quality is... fine. It's a nice, sturdy hardcover. The print quality seems fine, though mine does have a bit of smudging from some sort of printing error on one page. The pages don't seem like they'll fall out on me. The image quality is crisp. The colors are vibrant. This is a low bar, but this is one of the few places where I'm able to give this book anything resembling praise.
The formatting and graphic design work, on the other hand...
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(I didn't crumple those page corners, it came like that.)
For one, the placement and sizes of the M25YL pages is inconsistent, largely due to the fact that the book doesn't actually match the proportions of a comic. A lot of pages aren't properly centered vertically. Some pages go all the way up to the top edge of the paper, while others leave a visible gap of about half a centimeter. Every page has a 1cm gap to its left and right, which is sometimes filled in with a solid color or gradient that doesn't quite match the page it's surrounding. I have to assume Ken didn't have any sort of source files or original artwork to work off of, as those ideally would've had more generous bleed to account for slight shifts in printing. It kind of seems like he just got the highest resolution versions he could find of the digital releases online and printed those. The colors are a dead ringer for the digital versions, which have always looked slightly more saturated and pastel than they did in print.
I can't say this bodes well for his further plans for Archie Sonic reprints - sorry, Mobian Line reprints. If they ever come out, please, for the love of god, do not buy those. I don't care how much you love Archie Sonic, they aren't going to be good reprints. For comparison, IDW's similarly priced hardcover Sonic collections have none of these formatting problems, because they're made by people who know what they're doing with access to the actual source files.
The book also has its fair share of text-focused pages, split between the data files and messages directly from Ken about the history of his career and this project, and these are formatted in the most amateurish way possible. Just massive walls of Arial text over either plain white backgrounds, simple gradients, or faded photos. I've seen school yearbooks with better graphic design. Even ignoring my subjective feelings about the art and stories within, this book does not feel like it's worth $36 USD.
It's frankly shocking how shabby he let this thing look considering it's supposed to be his baby. And doesn't that really sum it all up?
Closing thoughts
Obviously, I did not expect this to be any good. But I'm still left kind of dumbfounded by it.
I think what really strikes me about it is that Ken had a blank check to do whatever he wanted here. He got an opportunity many writers would kill for when he gained complete ownership of his most famous work. He's free from the limitations of a monthly licensed comic book for children, free to make whatever creative decisions he wants without editors or other writers or Sega to worry about, free to completely reinvent the series to his heart's content and finally tell the story of his dreams. And with that opportunity and 13 years of his time, he made... this. A direct continuation of "Mobius: 25 Years Later" that barely changes anything about the characters or world beyond their awful new designs, even though much of the word count is spent rambling about how the timeline has changed. A story that makes zero concessions for new readers, or even returning readers who don't already have the last decade's worth of Ken's tweets explaining his creative decisions burned into their memory. 30 pages where nothing really happens and the story barely moves forward an inch despite the decades-long wait - but maybe something will happen if you buy the next book!
Who is this for? Maybe this really is a project for no one but Ken. Maybe he just really, really wants to finish the story he started, a story that's personal to him due to the family history it evokes, and the number of people who enjoy it or buy it beyond that is irrelevant. I think that many of the best artists are incredibly self-indulgent ones working with that exact mindset, artists whose enthusiasm for their own work jumps off the page or screen. So, if that's the case, then why the fuck isn't he telling the damn story? What's stopping him? Why is he still spinning his wheels? Where is that passion for his own work? Because it sure as hell isn't there on the page. There's a huge part of me that really wishes I could say "Man, what a weirdo, but you do you, Ken. You tell your weird little story." But there's barely any story here. It's like he loves styling himself as a storyteller, but he's terrified of finally having to actually tell a story after all this time. He's still stuck in the exact same mode of writing he was in almost 30 years ago when he was doing 6-page backup stories about Knuckles, just killing time and stringing readers along until he's eventually able to truly realize his vision. If not now, then when, Ken?
Even the back cover blurb is mostly just a dry recap of the history of this thing. It was a Sonic comic, the original arc was published in these issues, it went unfinished, Ken left Archie, the lawsuits happened, now he's continuing the story. There's nothing about why anyone should give a shit about this as its own story, even though Ken has spent years trying in vain to convince people TLSC is its own beast that shouldn't be judged as a Sonic story. I think deep down he knows that there's no pitch for this beyond the novelty of it originating from Sonic. And that's why, despite declaring that he'd leave the site, he's still on Twitter riling up Sonic fans. It's the only attention he gets at this point.
Maybe this is too harsh when those 30 pages of new comics are just intended as a preview for the "real" book. But the elephant in the room is that we have no idea if that "real" book will ever actually come out, let alone the entire series of seven graphic novels that will supposedly complete this saga.
Ken is undeniably a complete jackass and all around unpleasant, vindictive person who's rightly become an industry pariah. He's a self-proclaimed paragon of progressive values who'll send Comicsgaters after his successors for the crime of not worshiping the ground he walks on, and then turn around and announce he's going to reprint their work without even consulting them. He's a sore winner who already won his copyright battle on a level most comic writers would never dare to dream of, and yet still won't truly be satisfied until he sees an entire major comic publisher go out of business, putting god knows how many people out of work, because he thinks this would get him back the license to a video game franchise he doesn't even like.
But I still have to pity him.
As an artist, the trajectory of his life is my nightmare. I think all of us fear dying before we can tell all the stories we want to tell. There's simply never enough time to do everything. And here's Ken in his 60s, talking about how he's still planning on making his magnum opus all by himself out of stubbornness and pride, despite demonstrably proving he can't handle the workload, and also talking about how if he dies before the project can be finished he'll have to pass the torch on to his kids and get them to finish it for him. It's so grim. Even just typing that sends a shiver down my spine. It took nine years of his limited time on Earth to finish and release an 11-page comic about Geoffrey St. John sitting backwards in a chair.
This is a purgatory of his own creation. And yet... I'm not sure he's ever been prouder. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.
I guess if I want people to take anything away from this review, it's this:
Lesson one: If you're an artist or writer of some kind, or an aspiring creator, don't wait around. No one else is going to tell your story for you. Start writing that novel. Start drawing that webcomic. Start making that game. If Penders can put out this damn book that no one asked for after 13 years of work, then proudly proclaim that he's still going to make six or seven more books and also reprint hundreds of comics he doesn't have all of the rights to, then show up to cons with that foul Lara-Su Chronicles: Shattered Tomorrows banner and sit in front of it beaming with pride, fully aware of his critics but saying "fuck 'em, I know I'm hot shit," then you can do fucking anything. Tell the weird, sincere, cringe story of your dreams. If Ken Penders doesn't have imposter syndrome, then nobody should.
And lesson two: Don't buy Ken's books.
6K notes · View notes
dex0s · 9 months
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—♡DOUMA X MALE READER WARNING: smut, non-con, cannibalism?, douma, reader having a huge chest, thoracic area called boobs/tits, daddy kink, face sitting, breeding kink, semi-public?, incest?, cliffhanger ending (only because I’m lazy), not proof read
A/N— okay I know I was gone for like 2 months but um— yeah
You were a member of his cult and your older sister got sick to the point she had to stay in bed instead of praying to your demon lord. For the past couple days you had been asking your lord to heal your sister. And at first DOUMA was uninterested or just ignored you but then he got a full look at you. (H/c) hair, beautiful bright (e/c) eyes, nice face, well shaped body, and lastly YOUR CHEST. Oh and how he was so in love.
“Oh look a new play thing. Just. For. Me~ and ONLY me~”
After that you notice changes. One, Douma would ONLY look at you if you in the room but the moment you leave his face becomes disinterested (even if he doesn’t have emotions he feels like his life just decrease by a life time). Two, you ALWAYS feel like you’re being watched no matter what you doing or where you are, there are always RAINBOW EYES watching. And three, when you go and pray to your lord you can notice the lust in his eyes like a predator eyeing their next meal.
“I can’t believe I haven’t noticed you sooner… I wonder if that man will let me keep you~ who know maybe I will quit bugging him~”
Knowing damn well that man can hear him
One time you went to douma and asked for his blessing so your sister could get better and by pure coincidence your sister gotten better and could move around better then before. You thanked douma for the blessing but even tho it was a complete coincidence douma wanted more than just a thanks. He gave you his blessing and healed your sister. He wants more and he will get want he wants whether you want it or not .
HaAh~ Oh you tastes Sooo~ good~ Your so good—Fuck! for daddy~
Grinding your hips into the pillow while Douma is thrusting in and out your ass. “Ahh~ you look like dog when you do that~” Douma said, moving his hand up your body and stopping at your chest. “W-wait~AH!” Slamming his cock back in he starts to grope your chest. “Hmm! What a— good boy you are, so good— for daddy” you start to feel yourself about to release and you try to warn your lord but all that came out was babbles. Douma seem to notice this and started to go even harder on you hearing your gummy walls take him in and out and all the noise you were making made him even more hard then white sticky cum came out your dick but that didn’t stop Douma in fact he decided to switch it up a lot bit.
He lifts you over his face, your legs are shaking then slams you down on his face. Taking his long slimy tongue starting with kitty licks, suddenly roughly gripping your thighs and full on eating your ass like there’s no tomorrow. When the door opens (you didn’t even notice at first) it reveals your sister. Your sister was in shock, she didn’t know you had a side like this. Hearing your moans and the licks your sister can feel a wet spot in her undergarment. While your sister was standing there Douma could smell her wetness and started to get upset.
“Why is she here.”
“She needs to leave can’t she see I’m playing with my plaything.”
“It’s her fault he’s in this situation”
“She shouldn’t be so selfish and get sick”
“You know what… It’s show time”
Taking out his tongue from your ass, he moves you to his lap. Picking you up with your legs wrapped around his waist Douma starts to walk to your sister. “You know it’s rude to stare” using one of his free hands and roughly grabbing your sister’s chin forcing her to look at his rainbow eyes. “W-what are you doing to my brother!” Yelled out your sister that was trying to force Douma’s hand off of her and trying to reach for you, when Douma grabs the hand that was reaching for you and pulling it off her body. Finally snapping out the trance you hear a bloody cuddling scream. Turning your head around to see your sister on the ground clutching her shoulder but before you can say anything you were placed on the ground on all fours in front of your sister.
“Why don’t we put a show on for your sister~ hmm dear~”
4K notes · View notes
fastandcarlos · 9 days
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George In Paris : ̗̀➛ George Russell
summary: during summer break your two paths cross, leaving the fans putting their investigative skills to the test
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liked by peforman, its_lucien and 793,723 others
ynusername: the ending of summer break, excited to get back on set in a few days time ☀️
68,361 comments
username1: stfu I’ve been waiting for season 4 for so long 😭😭
username2: you’ve got no idea how happy this post has made me
its_lucien: so excited to see you and have a proper british catch up soon 🍷
username3: forget filming, who tf is that guy in the window 🤔
ashleyparklady: I am gonna need all the gossip asap girlie when you get off that plane!!!
ynusername: @/ashleyparklady good because I am so ready to spill 🥺
username4: glad you’re well rested but SO ready for another season to come our way!!
username5: all I wanna know is who’s the lucky guy that gets to date yn???
emilia_clarke: you can’t just spring something on us like that yn!
username6: I can finally sleep easy at night knowing we’re gonna see the end of this damn cliffhanger ☺️
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liked by lucasnbravo, ashleyparklady and 838,067 others
ynusername: back in my favourite place on earth with some of my favourite people. season 4 is on its way 🇫🇷
72,058 comments
username7: look at them all eurgh this makes me so happy 🤩
philippineleroybeaulieu: even if sylvie isn’t happy to see you, I most definitely am ❤️
username8: my year has officially been made!!
username9: I wonder if window guy went with her to paris too 🤔
username10: @/username9 are we really calling him window guy?? 😂
username11: it makes me smile so much knowing they’re all back together again
lucasnbravo: can’t wait for the dream team to be back together again!!!
username12: those pictures of paris make me want to go so bad 😭
maddenrichard: it’s been a hot shooting with you, enjoy heading back to paris again 💕
ynusername: @/maddenrichard gutted to be going on set again without you there
username13: the countdown is on for season premiere 🎉
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liked by landonorris, lewishamilton and 2,027,436 others
georgerussell63: a dream summer break that I never wanted to end. looking forward to getting back behind the wheel next week 🌊🐬
128,573 comments
username14: you could iron on those abs they’re so flat 🤯
landonorris: well you certainly look like you’ve been enjoying yourself my friend
alex_albon: how many sit ups did you do before posing for that photo??
georgerussell63: @/alex_albon none thank you very much 🖕🏻
username15: we can’t wait to see you back on the grid this weekend!!!
danielricciardo: could you have posted a more subtle photo to let the world know you’ve got an unidentifiable girlfriend!?
username16: wait who tf is that and where has she come from??
username17: so this is how we find out that george isn’t single anymore 😭
charles_leclerc: offended that I didn’t know about her before you posted to the world 💔
username18: reminding myself to smile and be happy for him 😩
lewishamilton: looks like someone’s had plenty of rest 😉
username19: keeping a close eye in the garage this weekend to see if we can spot someone!?
mercedesamgf1: we can’t wait to welcome you back next week george 🩵
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liked by georgerussell63, camillerazat and 782,057 others
ynusername: it feels unfair to call this work when the location looks this good 🔥
73,491 comments
username20: I feel like I’m living my dream through yn these days
brunogouery: it’s never work when you get to work with a legend like me 😂
ynusername: @/brunogouery you’re the main reason I enjoy going into work everyday ofc 😂
username21: this is the sort of my place I fantasise about living in one day!
its_lucien: you need to take me to that macaron place as soon as my plane lands!!
username22: why is george randomly in the likes over here??
philippineleroybeaulieu: paris really does look good on you 🔥
username23: smiling about the fact everyday we’re getting one step closer to season 4 ☺️
peforman: what isn’t photographed is you crashing mine and ash’s date in the first photo
ynusername: @/peforman no idea what you’re talking about 🤷🏻‍♀️
username24: you can see why paris is the city of love ❤️
username25: there’s no way you can ever call that work, it’s like being in a fairytale
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liked by its_lucien, georgerussell63 and 812,084 others
ynusername: always nice to have a little surprise visitor on set 🥰
81,080 comments
username26: a surprise visitor who for some reason doesn’t have a face 🤔
lucasnbravo: who is this person and why have I not met them??
ynusername: @/lucasnbravo they’re coming to the shoot tomorrow and I promise to introduce you ☺️
username27: why is george back in the likes, do these two know each other??
ybffusername: look at you guys, you’re already so good together 😩
username28: whoever this guy is he seems to dress pretty similar to how george does too 🤨
username29: there’s a week off from races this weekend, what if he went there to visit??
ashleyparklady: is this who I think it is?!
ynusername: @/ashleyparklady I can neither confirm nor deny 🥺
username30: there’s no way that it’s george, he could be anywhere in the world right now
username31: if it’s the two of them I think I might cry 🥹
camillerazat: drop whatever you’re doing and come and tell me all about this asap!
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likes by landonorris, danielricciardo and 1,958,492 others
georgerussell63: turns out that it’s quite hard to hide in france too 😂 regardless it’s been the most incredible week seeing my girl in action and exploring a little bit of france too ☕️🇫🇷
139,508 comments
charles_leclerc: how on earth did you manage to bag yourself a world famous actress 🤯
georgerussell63: @/charles_leclerc I can’t help being such a charming man
username32: damn I knew it was george in that window all along!
landonorris: can’t believe you finally asked her out after pining for her for so long 🙏🏻
georgerussell63: @/landonorris shut up before I shut you up myself!
username33: explains why he’s been sneaking into the likes so often recently 😂
carlossainz55: rebecca absolutely loves the series and now she’s freaking out that she might meet yn 😭
georgerussell63: @/carlossainz55: we’ll have to organise something my friend
username34: they look so sweet, so happy for the two of you 💕
ynusername: I loved showing you around this weekend, the best time with you ❤️
username35: am I the only one who had no idea they were together??
alex_albon: mate you gotta come and catch me up cause where tf did this come from?
username36: at last window guy is no more 🙌🏻
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liked by mercedesamgf1, lewishamilton and 903,723 others
ynusername: he finally managed to get me to see his world, who knew f1 was so much fun. thank you so much for hosting me mercedes 🏁
81,043 comments
username37: it’s adorable how supportive they are of each other 🥰
landonorris: even though it was brief, it was a joy to finally meet you!!
danielricciardo: such an honour to meet such a talented actress this weekend 🤩
ynusername: @/danielricciardo you can be as nice as you want I’m still not getting you a cameo 😂
username38: the crossover we’ve been waiting for for so long…
alex_albon: now I understand why george talks about you so much 😂
georgerussell63: @/alex_albon stop exposing me for being a man in love!
username39: yn you look right at home in an f1 garage too!
lewishamilton: it was an honour to finally meet you, hopefully see you again soon 🩵
username40: the way he looks at her is honestly just the sweetest!!
mercedesamgf1: you’re welcome back anytime, we loved having you with us 🩵
username41: idk who introduced these two together but thank you for blessing us with this adorable couple
georgerussell63: so glad you enjoyed it, it means the world that you came and watched the race 🥺
ynusername: @/georgerussell63 there’s nowhere else I’d have rather spent my weekend 🫶🏻
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liked by ashleyparklady, georgerussell63 and 1,039,361 others
ynusername: season 4 is finally here. hope you guys enjoy it as much as we enjoyed making it. au revoir for now paris 💞🇫🇷
92,043 comments
lewishamilton: congratulations on another amazing season yn, can’t wait to watch!!
username42: I’m already three episodes in and feel like I’ve been on an emotional rollercoaster 🎢
georgerussell63: I’m so proud of you, the most talented human I know 💕
ynusername: @/georgerussell63 thank you for always supporting me throughout the season 💞
username43: I’ve been dreaming of this day for so long…I can’t believe it’s finally here ☺️
ashleyparklady: I already miss you so much it’s not fair 😩
username44: I don’t think I’m ready to say goodbye to paris yn just yet…
landonorris: don’t tell anyone but I secretly watched…and I loved it 🙈
georgerussell63: @/landonorris I told you that you’d love it!!
danielricciardo: still waiting on the day for them to call me up to the cast too 😂
ynusername: @/danielricciardo you’ll be waiting for a very long time 😉
username45: it’s scary just how talented you are, every season just gets better and better!!
username46: george won the lottery the moment he met you yn 🥰
charles_leclerc: can’t wait to watch and see you do your thing yn!
iamrebeccad: the proudest best friend being able to see you do what you love 💞
username47: okay but now season 5 when!?!? 🥺
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481 notes · View notes
schrodingerscougar · 7 months
Text
Part two for this one. I'm sorry for the cliffhanger in the first part. The illustration is from the amazing @ave661 .
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--
Four months. That’s how much time it took Simon to get out of that hazy fugue state. He didn’t really remember what he had gone through during that time, his brain switched to autopilot after the breakup. He often wondered why it affected him this much when he didn’t even love you. You were just someone he spent time with, someone he tried to play house with for a short while to feel normal.
Still, now as he lay on his bed, watching the ceiling fan rotate to stir up the hot air in the room, he couldn’t stop thinking about you. He even found himself opening a social media app to search for your name from a fake account he had set up a long time ago, and he was shocked to see the most recent photo of you. It was impossible to miss the unmistakable shape of a baby bump under your shirt, and based on its size, you got pregnant long months ago.
When he was finally allowed to go home for a short while, Simon went to see you. He knew he had hurt you, he knew you were probably still mad at him, but he had to know if it was his child. It only happened one time. One night when he tried to fix things by giving you what you wanted, hoping sex could make him see you in another light. Maybe he would finally want you the way you always wanted him to want you. But it didn’t work, and it was after that night he made the final decision to end things with you.
“What do you want?” you asked him when you opened the door.
Simon nodded as he bit the inside of his cheek. This cold welcome was fair enough, he deserved this kind of treatment. Normally, he would have left you alone. But normally, you would have told him you were pregnant.
So he silently pointed at your belly and waited for you to realize what he wanted. He knew you weren't dumb, the pieces would fall into place in a second. And sure enough, you let out a sigh then opened the door wider to let him in.
“Why didn't you tell me?” he asked you as he stood in the kitchen next to you with his arms crossed.
You were busy making him a cup of tea, but you took the time to silently shrug. When he let out a heavy sigh, you looked over at him and said, “I didn't think you'd care, Si. Simple as that.”
You were right. He didn't care. Even now that he was looking at you, his eyes occasionally moving to the bump that hid his own blood, his mind was somewhere else. He was a soldier, he knew how to take responsibility for his actions. You getting pregnant was his fault too. He couldn't just ignore the problem.
“I’ll pay child support,” he assured you.
“No need.”
Simon reached out to put a hand on the base of your neck, but you quickly pushed his hand away before he could touch your skin. “You don’t have to do this alone.”
You inhaled through your nose and held your breath in for a few seconds before finally exhaling. “So what? You’re gonna be around and help us? Take her to a doctor’s appointment or for a stroll around the block?” When you saw him looking down at his shoes, you couldn’t help but snort. “Thought so,” you said.
“I’ll better get going. If you change your mind, you know where to find me.”
Months flew by, but Simon barely noticed. He was on a mission again far from home, risking his life as usual. You never called and he didn’t force it. He accepted that he would have to live with the guilt of making this happen. Since you didn’t want to accept child support, he opened a bank account where he stored that money, hoping that one day he could give it to you or his daughter when she became old enough.
One day he checked your social media accounts like he had done a few times before, just to see how you were. This is when he saw the post in which you announced the arrival of your baby girl. He didn’t make a big deal out of it at first. She was born and she would probably ask about her father one day. If he was still alive then, he would gladly give her a toned down explanation. If not… Well, he left everything to her in his will.
Eventually he began to save the photos of his daughter and he often found himself looking at them. She was adorable, some of her features resembling his own. Her big brown eyes were definitely his; the color and the shape were both so familiar to him.
No one from the team knew about this part of his life. He had never told anyone, because why would he? They were close, they were his brothers, but you and your daughter were carefully guarded secrets in his life. Simon knew the real reason why he never talked about you; he was afraid of the judgmental looks and words.
Two months later, when he entered his apartment again after another round of deployment, Simon didn't really know what to do with himself. He ended up looking at his daughter's photos more and more often and eventually he made up his mind to give her a visit. It had absolutely nothing to do with you. He was doing this for the little girl.
You weren't welcoming but, once again, he couldn't blame you. “I just want to see my daughter,” he said softly, hoping the two of you could avoid fighting.
For long moments you were cautiously watching him, as if you were trying to decide if he could be trusted or not. But then your eyes fell on the big teddy bear he was holding with one hand and you let out a sigh of defeat.
On the way to the nursery, you didn't talk at all. The silence didn't bother him, but still he would have appreciated some words about the little girl he was about to meet. Was he allowed to pick her up? Did she like to be held? How was she? Did she have stomach ache often? Were she teething?
“Be quick,” you warned him when you stopped by her crib.
Simon let out a sigh. “Come on, don't be like that.”
You just rolled your eyes at him before taking a step back to lean your shoulder against the doorframe, arms folded over your chest, eyes watching his every move like a hawk. He found it a little too much, he hated that you didn't trust him. Sure, he hadn't given you many reasons to trust him, but for the sake of your daughter you should have tried.
With a sigh, he rested an elbow on the side of the crib and reached out to touch the baby as gently as he could with his other hand. His own flesh and blood. It was amazing, really. Without asking for permission, he picked her up and couldn't help but smile when the baby smiled at him.
Now that he was holding her close to his body, placing soft kisses on her head every so often, Simon couldn't deny that he already loved his daughter. There was an invisible string between them, something that brought her closer to him that anyone has ever been.
The baby giggled suddenly and it brought an even wider smile to Simon’s face. He could only hope you would let him see her as often as he could visit, but something told him it wouldn't be easy to convince you.
“She likes you,” you suddenly noted.
He put down the little girl then turned to you. “The feeling's mutual.” A faint smile appeared on your lips. “Can I see her some other time?” You nodded. “Thank you. If I can help with anything, just give me a call or send a message. I'll get back to you as soon as I can,” he offered.
You been to walk out of the room and he quietly followed you, waiting for you to say something. He didn't really know what he was expecting to hear, but he had a feeling you were holding back something. And sure enough, after a few minutes of silence you began to talk, scolding him for not even bothering to send at least a text to ask about her before suddenly showing up.
“I'm sorry. I didn't think you'd read them.”
“I'm mad at you, that's true,” you agreed.
Simon leaned against the doorframe as he watched you pace in the living room like a caged animal. He remembered those nights he had spent thinking about on deployment, the moment he saw that photo of you, and he realized that maybe he was missing you.
But how could he miss someone he didn't even love? Or had he developed feelings for you, feelings he tried to hide even from himself? It was way too confusing for him, and he didn't like to be confused. It was a weakness on the field and in his civilian life.
“I should go. If you need anything–”
You came to a halt, turned to him and nodded. “I know where to find you. But can I ask you something?” Simon motioned you to go on. “Why now? Why did you become interested in her all of a sudden?”
He let out a thoughtful hum as he put his hand on the back of his neck. “I saw the photos, how much she looks like me, and… I don't know.” You took a few steps closer to him, but you still kept a comfortable distance. “I've been saving money for her. I want to give you access to that bank account.”
“I don't need your money,” you were quick to say.
“It's for her. Please, accept it.”
You became mad at him, accusing him of assuming you couldn't take care of your daughter you'd been raising on your own from day one. He knew there was no point in defending himself, you were too lost in the hate you felt for him. So he just waited there in silence, letting you finish your speech.
Then, the moment you seemingly finished, he closed the gap between the two of you. He didn't know what he was doing, he just followed his instinct when he leaned down and kissed you. This was probably the first time he truly enjoyed kissing you, and it helped a lot that you were quick to return it.
Maybe this was why he wanted to come here today. To fix things. To try to get a family he'd been craving ever since he lost his own.
(part three)
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bueckers · 28 days
Text
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UNFINISHED BUSINESS ━━━ paige bueckers ( 2 )
synopsis: putting an end to everything, drea thinks she’s totally and completely done with paige bueckers. that is until the blonde is finally honest with her.
pairing: paige bueckers x fem oc
warnings: angst and smut. they’re so toxic but also like made for each other.. alcohol use, scissoring, fingering, lots of paige’s hands.
notes: another long one so there wasn’t any major cliffhangers, hopefully this makes up for the wait.. :) also a paige & flau’jae feature because i love them sm.
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The morning sunlight filters through the hotel curtains, and she’s sitting at the edge of the bed. I can feel the space next to me where she was lying, still warm but empty now. She’s moving around, getting dressed, and I’m fighting the urge to reach out and pull her back into bed. But I know I shouldn’t.
“You don’t have to go yet,” I say, my voice barely above a whisper. It’s more of a plea than an offer, and I hate how desperate I sound. I can see her hesitate, her back to me as she fiddles with her shirt. For a second, I think she might stay, but then she turns to face me, and I can see the determination in her eyes. Why was it so difficult for me to just say it?
“Except I do. We never actually talked… if you missed that part,” she says, and I try to ignore the slight raise in her voice.
In attempt to busy myself, I grab my shirt from off the ground and pull it over my head. “The whole point of last night was to avoid that, Drea. We ain’ gotta talk about it.” I respond, and I’m only half joking, but I still wince at how much of a dick I sound.
She’s serious, and instead of agreeing or starting an argument, she ignores it. “Look,” she starts, and I can see her struggling to find the right words, her eyes glued to the bedsheets. Not me. I want to tell her she doesn’t have to say anything, that I get it, she deserved an explanation. But I don’t want to make it easy for her. Not when I know this is probably the last time we’re going to be like this.
“Last night.. it shouldn’t have happened.”
I furrow my eyebrows. "You don’t gotta say that. It’s not like we didn’t both want it,” I huff out.
She looks at me a certain way, and I can tell she hasn’t put much thought into what she’s saying. But she’s saying it anyway. "That’s not what I mean," she says quickly, like she’s trying to fix it. "I’m not saying I didn’t want it. I just… I shouldn’t have let things get so deep between us. How things ended.. it’s my fault.”
Her fault? She shouldn’t have let things get so deep? Theres no way she means these things, right? She stands there, biting her lip, and I know she’s waiting for me to say something. My throat feels tight, and my mind is a mess. I’m caught between wanting to shout at her, to tell her how wrong she is, and just shutting down completely.
This is Drea. The one person who’s always known how to get under my skin, in ways both good and bad. And now, while she’s standing right in front of me, telling me she regrets how deep we got, that basically, she thinks I cut her off because she caught feelings, I can’t help but feel like a fool. I spent so much time convincing myself that she didn’t feel the way I did, that I’d imagined the whole thing. Now it turns out she was in it too. And I don’t know what to do with that.
I wanna tell her to stop, to not say anything more. But I can’t let myself be that vulnerable, not when I’ve spent so long trying to protect whatever pieces of myself I have left. This is, like, the biggest joke of my life, and I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
When I finally do speak, my voice comes out quieter than I expect, almost detached. “So, what now? We just pretend none of this ever mattered?”
Drea’s eyes meet mine, and for a moment, I see something flicker in them—regret, maybe, or doubt. It seems like this is the most straightforward conversation we’ve had about the way we actually feel, and everything’s coming to light and an end at the same time. Just as quickly, she pushes it away, her expression hardening, and it makes every dot in my mind connect. “I’m not saying it didn’t matter. It did. That’s why we need to stop.” She’s trying so hard to be the rational one, to be the one who ends this cleanly. But nothing about this is clean.
I nod slowly, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Fine. If that’s what you want.” God, I even sound bitter.
She looks at me like she’s searching for something—maybe a reason to stay, or maybe just confirmation that this is the right choice. But then she sighs, her shoulders sagging with the weight of it all, and I know nothing, at least in this moment, would change her mind about me.
“Please take care of yourself.” She kept me grounded when I couldn’t find my footing, and those words just feel so cruel. It sounded like we’d never be speaking again, and I hated that thought.
I nod, unable to trust my voice, and then she’s gone. And just like that, it’s over. Or at least, it’s supposed to be.
A few days pass in a blur, and my time in Phoenix is slowly coming to an end. It’s safe to say the events of the city had only temporarily kept my mind off of everything, and now I’m sitting in a bar with Flau’jae, trying my best not to let the rain cloud over my head poke out. She’s talking, animated as ever, but I’m only half-listening, my mind drifting back to Drea more often than I’d like to admit.
“You’re not even listening to me, are you?” Her voice cuts through my thoughts, pulling me back to the present.
I blink, forcing out a smile. “Sorry,” I apologize, stretching my arms out in a way to reset. “I’m listening now. Promise.”
Flau’jae narrows her eyes at me, clearly not buying it. “Nah, you’re not,” she says, crossing her arms and leaning back in her chair. “What’s got you so deep in thought? You’ve been acting like you’re here, but not really here, y’know?”
I shrug, trying to play it off. “Just tired, I guess. Been a long week.”
She studies me for a moment, her gaze sharp. “Uh-huh. And this long week wouldn’t have anything to do with a certain someone, would it?”
I bite my lip, trying to stay cool. Flau’jae doesn’t know about Drea and me—no one does, really. We made sure of that. But if anyone’s gonna pick up on something, it’s her. I should’ve known better than to think I could just sit here and pretend everything’s fine.
“Maybe,” I say vaguely, hoping that’s enough to satisfy her curiosity. “I just got a lot on my mind, I’m fine,” I reassure, furrowing my eyebrows as if it was nothing to worry about.
She raises an eyebrow, leaning in like she’s about to uncover some big secret. “Stuff, huh? Girl stuff?”
I roll my eyes, trying to play it off. “You’re too nosy for your own good, you know that?”
She grins, laughing a little. “Paige! Come on, spill. Who is she?”
I hesitate, and for a second, I consider telling her everything. But that’s a slippery slope, and I’m not ready to go there. So instead, I won’t reveal too much. “It’s complicated,” I sigh.
Flau’jae crosses her arms, fully intrigued. “Complicated how?” She could be a detective.
I sigh, raking a hand through my hair. “Just... complicated. Things didn’t end the way they were supposed to. And now I’m stuck trying to figure out what to do next.”
She nods slowly, taking that in. “So, you and this girl… y’all were close?”
“Yeah,” I huff out, nodding as I press my lips together. “Real close.”
Flau’jae gives me a knowing look. “Thats who you was texting last night at the game?”
“Maybe,” I drag out, a shit-eating grin gracing my face. Then I slip up. “I was jus’ too scared to say anything to her face.”
Her eyes widen, and she brings a hand up to cusp her lips. It takes me a bit to realize, and as soon as I do, she cuts me off. Damn it. “Thats why you was hugging her a little too long after the final buzzer.”
“Hey! I ain’ even say a name,” I say quickly and louder than intended, trying to backtrack.
She leans forward, eyes wide with amusement. “You didn’t have to! You gave me everything I needed to know. Paige, what the hell? You and Drea, for real? I didn’t know you had game like that.”
I jerk my head back, scrunching my face up at her. There was no doubt that Drea was one of the prettiest faces in the game, and the fact that she can ball too just really adds to it. “I can show you what these rizz hands can do,” I joked momentarily. “It wasn’t even supposed to be a thing, though. We kept it on the low for a reason.”
Flau’jae shakes her head, holding her lips a little tighter now. “You know what Twitter would do with this? You been out here sneaky-linking and didn’t even give me a heads-up?”
Sneaky-linking? Was that really what it was? “Can we stop talking about this?” I say, half-laughing despite myself.
“And y’all met in high school, too. That’s some next-level soulmatism or something.”
I chuckle, licking my lips as I lift up my drink. The clinking of the ice fills the silence, and I’m able to put a close to the conversation. “It’s over now, anyway. Doesn’t matter.” It’s a lie. We’d clearly went over that it did matter.
Flau’jae studies me for a moment, her eyes narrowing as if she can see right through me. But then she lifts her hands up in surrender, a smirk playing on her lips. “Alright, if it’s really over, how about you find someone tonight? You could use it if I’m being honest,” She retorts, referring to the mood I’ve been in the entire night because of my situation.
“Chill!” I laugh, shaking my head as I lean back in my chair myself. “You make it sound so easy.”
She shrugs, and I hesitate, taking a second to let my eyes wander around the bar. A couple of eyes meet mine, lingering longer than what’s considered normal. I’m not sure if they might know who I am, or just think I’m attractive. Or maybe both.
Flau’jae seems to notice too, shooting me a wild and bright smile. “See? you still got it. Just make a good choice.”
The car hums beneath me, the city lights flashing past as I sink into the leather of the backseat, my head leaning against the window. I can still taste the alcohol on my tongue, and my mind is replaying the past few hours like a hazy, disconnected reel. All I can think about is her.
You’d think after a night out I’d at least be able to get the mass of Drea off my mind, but I think it just made everything worse. No matter how hard I try to push her out, physically and emotionally, she’s always there, right on the edge of my thoughts.
I pull my phone out of my pocket, my thumb hovering over her contact. I know I shouldn’t text her. I know it’s a bad idea. But our last conversation on repeat and the emptiness from earlier are making my judgment untrustworthy, and before I can stop myself, I’m typing out a message.
Yo, you up?
I stare at the screen, the words staring back at me. It’s a weak attempt, but I’m past caring. A part of me almost hopes she won’t respond, that she’ll leave me to deal with the consequences of my choices alone. But then I add another text, like I can’t help myself.
Idc if you’re not
It feels like a challenge. Like I’m daring her to ignore me, to stay out of it. But I know that’s not what I want.
I swallow hard and send one last message, my fingers trembling slightly as I type.
You still in Phoenix, right?
The words hang there, waiting for her response. My heart pounds in my chest, and I can’t tell if it’s from the countless amounts of dirty shirley’s or the anticipation of hearing from her. Or both. I really hope I don’t throw up in this car.
I lean back in the seat in attempt to relax, but I can literally hear my heart beating. I wonder if the driver can, really. I don’t know what I’m hoping for, but I know that if she’s still here, if she answers… I’m not sure I’ll be able to resist whatever comes next.
The minutes stretch out in silence, broken only by the occasional sound of the car’s tires hitting a pothole. I keep my eyes glued to the screen, watching the three little dots appear and disappear. I should put my phone away, maybe even go back to the hotel and sleep this off, but I can’t. I’m too far gone for that.
The Uber turns down another quiet street, and I feel the weight of my decisions pressing down on me. It’s not just about tonight. It’s about all the nights that led up to this, every bad choice that brought me to this moment. The thought of facing it alone is unbearable, and I realize that’s why I texted her. Not because I want her to come over, but because I don’t want to be alone. Or that I do, just with her.
My phone buzzes in my hand, and I almost drop it in my rush to check the screen.
Why?
A single word, blunt and to the point. She’s guarded, as usual. But the fact that she responded at all makes me happy enough.
I just… I hesitate, staring at the blinking cursor. I don’t even know what I’m trying to say, but I settle on honesty.
Just wanna see you. Is that so bad?
I hit send before I can second-guess myself. My fingers hover over the screen again, and then I add another message.
I don’t wanna stop seeing you fr
It’s more than I planned to say, more vulnerable than I planned to be, but it’s the truth. And I’m too tired of pretending otherwise.
The reply comes quickly this time, and I can almost hear her voice in the words.
Are you drunk texting me right now?
And no, you mean you don’t wanna stop fucking me
Her words hit me like a punch in the gut, and for a moment, I just stare at the screen, the bright light from my phone casting harsh shadows in the dark car. I can feel the truth in what she’s saying, but it’s only part of it. Yeah, we’ve been physical, and I’m not denying that’s been a big part of this whole thing, but it’s not just that.
No, Drea. It’s more than that. We both know it always was.
You said it three days ago.
I hesitate before hitting send, but I know I have to. I can’t keep hiding behind the bullshit. She deserves better than that even if she won’t appreciate it.
The reply doesn’t come right away, and the silence feels like it’s pressing in on me from all sides. I shift in my seat. This whole thing—this whole night—feels like I’m balancing on a razor’s edge, and I’m terrified of falling off.
When her response finally comes, it’s short.
It’s 2am.
Ok, it’s not ideal. but I can’t stop thinking about everything you said.
And everything I didn’t say.
There’s another long pause, and I can almost picture her on the other end, trying to figure out what to say. We’ve been dancing around each other for so long, caught up in this push and pull, and now it feels like we’re on the verge of something, but neither of us knows how to take the next step.
Then, her next message comes through, and it’s enough to make my chest tighten. It’s hesitant but willing.
Where are you?
Outside your hotel.
Her reply is instant this time.
Come up.
I shove my phone into my pocket and step out of the Uber, my mind on a million as I make my way to her room. Every step feels heavy as if I’m walking through mud, but there’s a part of me that knows this is where I need to be—where I’ve always needed to be.
When I reach her door, it swings open almost as soon as I knock, and there she is, standing in front of me. Her eyes are guarded, just like her text messages, but I can see something softer underneath. Something that tells me she’s just as scared of this as I am.
“Paige,” she says, her voice a little wistful as she fiddles with the door knob. She looks me up and down, almost as if I’m being examined before I’m allowed in.
I don’t know what to say, so I just step forward, closing the distance between us. “I’m not drunk,” I state, shooting down her concerns from a few moments ago. She wouldn’t proceed if there was a chance I wouldn’t remember anything in the morning.
She looks at me for another long moment, like she’s trying to decide if she believes me. Then, with a sigh, she steps aside, letting me in. The door closes behind me with a soft click, and I lean against it. Suddenly we’re alone in her room, the reality of the situation settling around us.
“I know I shouldn’t have texted. But I did, and I’m glad I’m here.” I ramble, although still stern.
She sighs, and the curls that fall perfectly over her shoulders bounce a bit. Shes in a pair of short pajama shorts and a long, grey Nike tee-shirt that could’ve been mine. Correction, it definitely is mine. “You’re making this so much harder than it has to be.”
“It doesn’t have to be hard. We can make it less complicated.” I try to reason.
She stiffens, her breath catching as she looks at me, her eyes searching mine. “I—“
“I’m serious,” I cut her off, my voice low as I step closer to her. I couldn’t tell you what I was thinking. “I don’t know when I’m gonna see you again. And I can’t… I can’t leave tomorrow without letting you know how much I care.”
I don’t say it out loud, but the words are there, hanging in the air between us. I love you. And I’m sorry. But I can’t bring myself to say it. I don’t know why. Instead, I just hope she can feel it, hoping she knows without me having to spell it out.
“You can’t keep doing this,” she says quietly, her back turned to me as she walks further into the room. “Running to me when you’re feeling lost. It’s not fair.”
“I know,” I admit, taking a step closer. “But I’ont know how to stop. I’ve tried, but… since you’ve been apart of my life it’s been hard to let you go. I don’t wanna lose you—“
“You already did,” she cuts me off, turning to face me, and it scares me how serious she sounds. There’s pain in her eyes, but there’s also something else—something that makes me hope, even if just for a second. “We both did.”
I close the gap between us, and I can tell it catches her by surprise because of the look she gives me. My hands gently cup her face. “Then why am I here? Why did you let me in again?”
She glances down at my lips, and despite being angry, she doesn’t respond with words. Physicality has always been our response for everything involving each other. It’s all we know. She leans into my touch, and it feels like a birthday gift. Her eyes flutter shut before she opens them again, and it’s enough to make me lean in, pressing my lips to hers in a kiss that’s more desperate than anything else.
She kisses me back, her hands finding their way to my shoulders as she pulls me closer, and for a moment, it feels like everything else fades away. It’s just us, tangled up in each other, trying to find something solid to hold onto.
But then she pulls back, breathless, her hands still resting on my shoulders. She’s looking down, like she’s fighting some internal battle. “Oh my God,” she whispers, shaking her head. “You are drunk.”
“I told you I’m not,” I murmur, trying to find her eyes and pull her back to me by the waist, but she resists, her fingers gripping my shoulders tighter. Her resistance is strong, her fingers digging into my shoulders as if she’s trying to push away the intensity of the moment. “Please, Drea.”
She shakes her head, eyes still averted. “I can taste the alcohol!” She brings her thumb up to brush over my lips. “I knew it, why the fuck would you lie?” She’s trying to walk away at this point, but my grip is too tough. I won’t let her go.
“No, listen,” I say, more eager and clear. “What I said, what I meant—none of that has to do with being drunk. I’m here because I need you. Because I want you. This isn’t just about tonight.”
Drea’s resolve falters, her eyes flickering back to mine with her perfectly arched eyebrows crinkling up just a bit. “You’re saying all the right things, but I can’t just ignore—”
I cut her off by pulling her closer, my grip firm but gentle on her hips. My thumbs move beneath her shirt, stroking her skin and feeling the muscle. “I know.” My lips are ghosting over her ear. “But please, just for tonight, let’s not think about it.” I press a kiss right below it. “Just be with me. Let’s just be here.”
“Paige..” she starts again, her voice softer this time, and I love it when she says my name. I lean in, silencing her with a kiss that’s both insistent and tender. She melts into it, her resistance breaking as she wraps her arms around my neck. Shes quick to sneak her tongue in, the movement making me wince, furrowing my brows at how good she tastes.
I guide her backward until her knees hit the edge of the bed, and she falls onto it with a soft thud. I follow her down, my body pressing against hers as our kiss grows more fervent. My hands explore her curves, skimming over the fabric of her shirt as it rides up, and I feel her shiver beneath me.
“Is this mine?” I breathe against her lips, the warmth of her hands on my cheeks making my face flush a vibrant red. Drea nods, her breath hitching as she catches the look in my eyes. Without another word, I grab the hem of her shirt and yank it up over her head, tossing it aside. The shirt hits the floor, and she starts giggling like a school girl, her chest now fully exposed and daunting.
The sound of her laughter makes my stomach flip, and I can’t help but grin, leaning down to capture her mouth in another kiss. This time, there’s no hesitation, no holding back. Our bodies press together, her skin warm and soft against mine, like it was made for me.
My hands begin to wander a bit too much, all the way down to her shorts. Slipping my hand in, I can already feel how wet she is. She lets out a soft gasp as I trace slow, deliberate circles against her clit firmly. “Tell me what you want, baby,” I whisper, my breath fanning over her neck.
Her body has always reacted to every touch, every word. She’s trying to stay composed, but I can tell she’s barely holding on. Her hips instinctively push against my hand, silently begging for more, but I keep my movements steady, torturously slow and sloppy. I want to hear her say it.
“You,” she breathes out, her voice wavering. She’s antsy, I can feel it—the way her muscles tense, the way her breath comes in shallow pants.
“C’mon,” I murmur, nipping at her earlobe. “You can do better than that.”
She whimpers, her hands gripping my shoulders, nails digging into my skin as she tries to find the words. “Please… I need—” She breaks off, a soft moan escaping her lips when I press harder, right where she needs it most.
But then she grabs my wrist, stopping me just before she can fall over the edge. Her eyes lock with mine, and they’re low, dark, and daring. Three words that are very Drea. “Stop,” she says, her voice firmer now, even though I can tell it’s taking all her willpower. “I wanna feel you.”
The way she says it—so raw, so desperate—it’s enough to make me slip into a trance. I pull back, my gaze lingering on her as I strip off the rest of my clothes, watching as she does the same. Every inch of her is so perfect to the point where it should be a crime, and I want to touch every part.
I lay back on the bed, and she climbs on top of me, her movements deliberate and careful as she positions herself right over the bottom half of my body. I let my hands slide down her sides, tracing the curve of her waist before coming to rest on her ass. I tilt my head slightly against the pillows, mouth slightly agape. I can’t resist giving her a gentle squeeze, eliciting a soft noise from her. I smile, and my hands linger there, holding her close as she settles into place. We’ve done this countless amounts of times, and every single time it feels different. Better.
“You’re so fuckin’ sexy, you know that?” I pull her hips down, aligning our bodies perfectly, and the feeling of her heat against mine makes my breath catch, but I’m still focused. “Could stay like this all night.”
Drea licks her lips, her eyes fluttering closed for a moment as she adjusts herself, the friction and jolting of our bodies a whole whirlpool of pleasure. “You better,” she whispers back, a teasing smile tugging at her lips as her hands grip my legs so she can find herself.
Slowly, she starts to move, her hips grinding down against mine in a smooth rhythm. Every slide of her body against me is agonizingly perfect, and I can’t help the groan that escapes as she finds a pace that makes my whole body push up against her.
My eyebrows furrow as I take sight of where we meet, her pussy flat against mine. The squelching of our juices together fills the room, and I lose it. Maybe the alcohol is accentuating the feeling for me, or she’s just this good. “Fuck…” I breathe out, my hands roaming up her back, feeling the muscles flex and move beneath her skin. “You feel so good. Always so good.”
Her response is a soft moan, her head falling forward slightly as she loses herself. I let my hands slide back down to her ass, guiding her movements, making sure every grind, every brush of our bodies, hits just right. I can feel her trembling, her thighs shaking as she picks up the pace, chasing that high.
I can’t resist teasing her a little, my hands kneading her ass as she rides me, my fingers brushing just along the edge of her entrance, close enough to make her squirm but not enough to give her what she really wants. She lets out a frustrated moan, hips moving harder, trying to get more.
“Paige!” she groans, voice full of need and just the right amount of anger, her breath coming out in ragged pants. “Stop playing with me. I can’t take it.”
My grip tightens, and I keep her exactly where I want her, reaching up to tuck a loose curl behind her ear, my fingers lingering as I brush my thumb gently along her cheek. “You can take it, baby,” I whisper. “I know you can.”
She looks at me with those pleading eyes, her breath hitching as she adjusts herself, arching her back more. The movement pushes her even closer to me, our bodies pressing together, and the feeling almost sends me over the edge.
Without warning, I dip two fingers into her entrance, the sight too pretty to resist. It makes her gasp, her body collapsing forward against me. Our skin sticks together, warm too from the sweat, and her chest is pressing against mine as she struggles to catch her breath.
Before she can lose herself entirely, I slide my hand to her lower stomach, pushing her back up, guiding her into place. “Nah, stay up w’me, ma.” My voice is shaky with the effort of holding it together. Out of breath, mouth wide open. “Hold that shit.”
She whines out, her voice high and so pornographic. “Mm—oh, I can’t…” Her words trail off into a desperate moan, her body shuddering as my fingers move in that come-hither motion, curling inside her just right. The feeling of her slick is almost too much to bear, making my head spin.
I push through, keeping her steady even as I feel myself starting to lose control. “You can,” I pant, my breath coming out in ragged bursts. “So close, I know you can do it.”
She’s trembling, her thighs shaking as she tries to follow my command, but I can see the strain on her face, her dilated pupils, the way she’s fighting to keep herself together. My fingers work faster, deeper, and she bites down so hard on her lip I swear it might bleed.
Finally, when I feel her body tighten around me, right on the edge of breaking, I tap her ass lightly with my palm and pull my fingers out just enough to catch everything. “Now, baby. Come for me.”
The moment I say it, she lets go, and we come together, our bodies moving in sync, the room filled with strangled noises. The pleasure is blinding, overwhelming, and I cling to her as we ride it out. She’s finally able to fall on top of me comfortably, hand resting on my chest.
We stay like that for a moment, tangled together, both of us shaking with the aftershocks, until we finally start to come down. I press a soft kiss to her temple, my heart still racing (for more than one reason I’ll admit) as I hold her close.
I can feel her hesitance, scared to move or say anything. But I can also feel her tiredness, the way her body sags against mine like she’s too worn out to keep up any walls.
Gently, I shift, moving my body so I’m laid up next to her, our limbs tangling together naturally. My arm stays draped around her, holding her close as she nestles her head into the crook of my neck, her breath warm against my skin. It feels good—too good—like maybe we could stay like this forever if we didn’t know better.
“I want you to mean what you said. All of it.” 
Her words hang, and I can feel her hesitation, the fear that I’m just saying things because it’s easier than dropping the bomb or just straight losing her. I swallow, pulling her closer.
“You’ont think I did?”
“Paige.”
“Drea, I do.”
She doesn’t respond right away, just presses herself deeper into me, like she’s trying to believe it, trying to let herself see us being more than what we are right now without it turning into shit. I know how hard that is, how many times we’ve proven we aren’t made for each other.
“Then prove it,” she finally murmurs, her voice a little stronger now, like she’s challenging me, daring me to back it up.
I nod against her, not sure if she can even feel it, but I know what she means. It’s not about words anymore—it’s about what comes next, and whether we can make it work. “I will,” I promise, and for once, I really believe it.
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soaps-mohawk · 1 month
Text
I'm going to be honest
I'm having a genuinely hard time making this post. I've been fighting with it for a couple weeks now, but I think it's time I finally make it.
I'm not having fun on this blog anymore.
It sounds bad, but honestly, it kind of is.
I think a lot of it started from the very beginning with the precedence and expectations I put on myself. I've always tried to respond to every comment I get. Even from the beginning. It's just a polite thing to do since those who leave comments took the time to write out what they think of my fic, even if it's just a keysmash. I've always felt the need to thank those who leave comments or reblog my writing or (now that tumblr has it) replied to my fics. It worked fine before because none of my fics were particularly popular. Even my most popular fic (at that time) didn't get as much attention as CRCB has. I've never had a "big blog" before, nor a fic as popular as CRCB has gotten.
It was fine at first, responding to everyone, engaging with everyone. I was riding that high of omg so many people are reading and enjoying my fic! I've never had anything quite like this before.
Now...it just feels more like a chore. I set this precedence on this blog that I respond to everyone and I know a lot of people have said that they're surprised I responded to them and to everyone, and now I'm getting why a lot of writers don't. I'm exhausted. I feel like I've just been robotically saying the same thing over and over trying to respond to people now. I used to love seeing asks in my inbox and reblogs and replies but now? All I feel is dread because I have to respond to all of those.
Turning anon off was a big help. It lessened the sheer volume of asks I was getting a day. And while I do feel bad for all of my anons who prefer to stay anons, with everything that happened (the multiple incidents) with anon that kind of started to suck the joy out of everything. That paired with the obsessive need to constantly have my inbox cleared and make sure everyone gets a response...I can understand now too why big blogs will have 200+ asks in their inbox. It's hard and it's exhausting and I'm burning out.
First it was the fic that was burning me out. Things have gone on far longer than I planned and I just wasn't prepared for this fic to go on and for a while there it was dragging. I'll admit that. If I could go back, I'd speed up a few things, but it's done, it's posted there's no going back. I kind of hoped I would have the mental capacity to upload more than once a week too, but I just couldn't. I still can't.
I've come to dread posting chapters because I know I'm going to have to reply and respond to everyone. The only thing keeping me posting is the fact that we're in the part of the story I've been excited about since the beginning and also because I keep leaving everyone on cliffhangers and I love torturing y'all with all of them.
So that being said, this is in no way to shame anyone for interacting with me, anyone leaving comments or replies or sending asks. Don't feel bad about doing it please. I appreciate all of you that have engaged with me and it really means so much to me. Honestly, earlier this year, if I didn't have this fic and everyone on this blog, I might not have made it to now. It's been a really rough year and it's still going to be into next year. It's just getting to the point where I need a break.
I've needed a break for a long time. I thought taking days off the blog would help, and it did for a couple of weeks, but now even on the days I'm supposed to be on the blog and engaging, I just find myself queueing stuff up and just being offline most of the day still.
I'm tired. That's the best reason I can give. I'm tired and burned out on life and I'm tired and burned out on this blog.
So...I think I need a break. I need to not keep responding to every single reply and reblog every chapter. I need to not force myself to answer every ask right away, no matter how much I want to. I feel bad, but I know everyone would rather have me here and enjoying the blog than forcing myself to interact to the point where I'm dreading it and just robotically repeating myself over and over with every reply and answer and comment.
I won't be pausing the fic, I won't be not uploading. I'll still be posting chapters, I just might not be interacting as much as I have been. It's just putting such a mental strain on me still, even with anon off, even with days off. And with things getting busier for me, it's going to be too much to try and deal with irl stuff and write and try to be super active on the blog. There's going to come a point where I have to sacrifice the writing or the blog and I'd rather sacrifice the blog to keep myself sane, and also to keep trying to finally get this fic done. I love this fic, don't get me wrong, but I'm just burning out.
I'm already burned out in a lot of ways.
I was planning kinktober this year but honestly I'm considering not doing it because I know interaction is going to be insane and it's going to be a lot to keep up on. Plus trying to write that many fics is hard and I'm not sure I have the ability to do it. I have a few done but now I'm just like...is that something I want to do on top of irl stuff and CRCB.
There's just no joy in it anymore. It's not anyone's fault but mine. I put the pressure on myself, I held myself to that standard for this long despite the fact I knew it was draining me. I've tried to push through when I should have prioritized myself. I feel so guilty not responding to everyone. I feel so guilty being a day or two late responding to everyone.
I want to be here and interacting and responding to things but I just can't bring myself to anymore. It's no one's fault, and this is not a drag on anyone, or an attempt to make anyone feel bad or guilty for interacting or sending asks or anything. I'm just airing out the truth and saying what I need to say because I feel like I've been so robotic and lifeless with my responses these last couple weeks and I feel like I need to explain why. It's nothing anyone has done. It's my fault. It's 100% my fault.
Things have just gotten to be too much and it's my fault for forcing myself to be so active. The social battery has dropped into the negatives. I'm not a social person. I can only handle so much interaction and I've pushed so far beyond that, that things have gotten to this point. I want to be here and I want to have fun and I want to use this as an escape but I just don't feel that way about it anymore. It's a chore for me, a job, something I feel like I have to do and it's my fault that I feel that way. It's my own standards and expectations I set on myself, and my expectations on what I think my followers want and deserve and now I feel like I've gone on too long like this that I can't change things without hurting anyone's feelings. I don't want people to think I'm ignoring them in favor of others because I know there's writers out there that do that. They only respond to a certain group and ignore others that comment and reblog. I don't want to make anyone feel like I'm doing that to them and that's now led me to here.
I'm forcing it and I'm tired.
It's been hard these last few weeks. The life has just been draining and draining continuously. The joy and the love I have for this blog and my followers and the interactions and the fic. The last anon bullshit that happened was just kind of the last nail in the coffin so to speak. The straw that broke the camel's back. Things stopped being fun. It made me feel bad (and not in the guilty way, though that was a part of it) and I'm honestly just over it. I'm over the blog, I'm over interacting, I'm over life at this point. August is a hard month for me and every year it seems to get worse and worse. A lot of it is unrelated to anything online and I was going to make a post about it but honestly I just don't want to. Those that know, know. Those that don't...it doesn't matter.
I'm getting annoyed by the blog, I'm getting annoyed every time I look in my notifications and see an ask or a reply or a comment. I'm getting annoyed by some of my followers and that's not fair to you. Everyone always talks about how nice and kind and patient I am when I'm really not. I'm not the person I present myself to be on this blog, the way I mask myself so I can present myself as being a normal, kind human being. The mask is coming off because I'm so tired I can't keep it up anymore. It's happening here and it's happening in real life. I'm tired and I'm frustrated and I'm angry at a lot of things and the last thing I want is to start taking it out on my followers. You don't deserve that, especially when it's not your fault, it's nothing any of you have done. It's all me.
It's not you, it's me.
So for the sake of not burning this whole thing to the ground, I'm going to take a break. I'm not replying to everyone, I'm not responding to every reblog, I won't reply to every ask I get right away, if at all because sometimes I just don't have anything to say in response and I need to learn that's okay. It's nothing against you. It's not aimed at anyone specifically, I'm just trying to put myself first and stop things from escalating. I need a break and I'm going to do something selfish and I'm going to take it.
Don't apologize because it's not your fault. Don't apologize because you think you might have contributed to this because you didn't. It is no one's fault but my own.
I'm the one that needs to apologize to all of you because I've just not been myself because I've been forcing myself to be someone I'm not. I've been very unfair to a lot of people over the last seven months that this blog has been active and I've held a precedent that is not sustainable in the long run and made everyone believe that I was capable of maintaining that kind of interaction when I'm not.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry I've been putting everyone through this. I'm sorry I've been so detached and robotic and ingenuine. I'm sorry I led everyone to believe I'm someone I'm not. I'm sorry I've dragged this on this long that it's gotten to the point that I have to make this post.
I considered just disappearing but that wouldn't be fair to you either. I don't want to put you through that, so I'm pouring all of my thoughts out and making you read through this fucking novel of a post. If you've made it this far, then congrats I guess. Gold metals to you who bothered reading this far.
Anyway, all of that aside, I'll still be posting chapters. I'll have them scheduled and I'll probably come on and add links places to keep things current. I'll respond and reply and answer asks when I feel like it. You don't have to stop sending them, but just don't expect them to be responded to right away anymore. I'll probably still be here reblogging things I want and doing things when I feel like it.
I just need a few weeks to myself. Time I don't have to care about the blog at all and keeping up with it. Anon will remain off for the sake of keeping asshole trolls away, and also so I don't open tumblr and have 200 asks in my inbox after a week. Sorry to my anons but it's just the way it needs to be right now. Maybe once this break is over and I've dealt with irl stuff, I'll consider putting it back on. I just can't after everything I dealt with recently on anon.
It'll be the same on Ao3, for those that follow here and read there. Comments will probably sit for a while. They won't be answered right away anymore unless I get the energy to burn through them. Even then I won't try to answer them all at once like I did this last weekend.
I'll try to reblog something every day so y'all know I'm alright. I don't want y'all to panic and it's not fair to put you through that, especially those that might not see this or bother reading it. Those that follow simply for the fic and nothing else. I'm here, I'm just not...here.
This week's chapter is in the queue to be posted tomorrow as usual. Chapters will still come out as planned since I'm not stopping writing, just taking a break from the blog itself.
Thank you those of you who stuck through to the end here. I appreciate all of you so much. You have no idea. I'm sorry I let things get to this point and I'm sorry to anyone that I've gotten rude or snappy with because I couldn't be selfish and put myself first. I'm sorry to anyone that got a robotic, repeated response to something they were probably excited to share. I'm sorry I've been so unfair to everyone and I hope you can forgive me.
Take care and I'll talk to everyone when I have the energy to.
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cimmanonrowl · 3 months
Text
urs
Your father’s best friend is a man of principles. And as much as you want him to be your very first, Aaron Hotchner couldn’t bring himself to corrupt you.
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Pairing: dbf!aaron hotchner x virgin!reader
Theme: smut mallows
Contents: age gap, gentle first-time sex, unprotected sex, size difference, praise kink, sweet!aaron, angst somewhere, cliffhanger (?)
You barely managed to suppress a squeal of joy as you frantically smoothed your disheveled curls and checked your appearance in the hallway mirror. From where you are standing, you can hear the boisterous laughter of your father mingling with the deep and soothing voice of Aaron Hotchner talking animatedly downstairs.
It only means one thing.
He’s visiting.
And your heart almost exploded at the idea.
With light and careful steps, you bolted down the stairs, quickly trudging towards the spacious living room where your father and his best friend were talking. Your anticipation rose higher with each step, and by the time you reached the staircase landing, your face was flushed with excitement. Eagerly, you rounded the corner, your eyes scanning the room until they landed on a certain man whose sight alone was enough to knock you off your feet.
Aaron Hotchner was standing near the fireplace, absorbed by the conversation he was having with your father, his tall frame and commanding presence impossible to miss.
“Aaron!” You called out, your voice bright and laced with obvious adoration.
Aaron whirled instantly at the sound of your voice, a warm smile spreading across his face. 
“Oh, hey there,” he greeted back, mirroring your wide grin.
You crossed the room in quick strides and flung your arms around him, which he returned with an amused chuckle. His arms wrapped tightly around you in a familiar, comforting embrace. And the first whiff of his scent threw you off-guard. It feels like falling in love with him all over again. The very same way you felt on your 25th birthday when he asked you for a dance and wrapped you in his gentle warmth in the middle of the dance floor.
The closeness now was making you dizzy; the heavy scent of his perfume, the firmness of his body, and the feeling of being held by him after so long.
“It’s so good to see you!” You chirped, your voice muffled against his shoulder. You clung to him a moment longer than necessary, enjoying the contact. “It’s been a while since you dropped by. I thought you forgot about us!”
Aaron chuckled at your whiny voice.
“It's good to see you too,” He pulled back from the hug but kept his hands on your shoulders as he stared back at you. “I’m sorry, work’s been keeping me busy. How have you been?”
You smiled up at him. “Great. You know, same as always. Just busy with work and everything.” 
You tried sounding casual to not appear too excited. You felt his rough hands squeeze your shoulders gently before finally letting go.
“I’m glad to hear that.”
As he released you, a pang of disappointment swirled down your stomach, but you quickly masked it with another bright smile. 
With a tentative step back, you clasped your hands behind you and rocked back and forth in your heels, still staring at him. Aaron chuckled softly at your innocent gesture, a sound that sent a chill through your spine. 
“Aaron’s just in town for a bit, sweetheart. They just finished a case,” Your father chimed in with a smile, watching your usual interaction with his best friend. “Thought he’d drop by and catch up.”
“Well, I’m glad you did,” You mumbled, your gaze never leaving Aaron’s face. 
Aaron replied quietly, smiling at you. “Me too. It’s always nice to be here.”
Your heart hammered against your chest almost painfully. Jesus Christ, this man is aging like a fine wine. You doubt you’ve seen anyone as handsome and attractive as he is. He always looked so good in your eyes. And it seems like he’s getting hotter and hotter every time you get to see him. Is it even possible for someone to look this good? Shouldn’t this be a federal crime?
Before you could even stop yourself, the words slipped out of your lips.
“You really should come by more often, Aaron,” You suggested out of nowhere, a hint of hopefulness in your tone. “I mean… you know… it’s just me and Dad here. It’s not like we have a lot of friends who come over.”
Your heart soared as he continued staring at you. Heat rushed through your face because of that. You started panicking in your head. Was that out of line? Was that too much? Oh God, maybe that’s too much. He must be thinking you’re desperate for company- his company. Or maybe he thinks you’re weird for asking th—
“I’ll try, angel,” his expression remained soft as he nodded. “Promise.”
You let out a soft sigh.
Seems like he didn’t mind too much.
The late afternoon sun casted a warm glow over the backyard of your home. Aaron and your father stood by the grill, occupied in a seemingly humorous conversation, the smell of grilled meat wafting through the open air. Both of them had cold beers in hand, laughing and chatting as they tended to the meat they were grilling.
It was a quiet afternoon. 
By the pool, you decided to lounge on a large swan floater, enjoying the last hours of the day. You were clad in a white bikini adorned with soft pink ribbons that fluttered slightly in the gentle breeze. A pair of oversized sunglasses shielded your eyes from the sun as you sipped on a mango smoothie, humming quietly to yourself.
A thick book lay open in your lap, but your attention was divided. Aaron would often catch you glancing up, watching him and your father with a small smile on your lips. He’d only mirror your smile and go back to their conversation, leaving you to your own thoughts and your fluttering, little heart.
The sight of Aaron, relaxed and at ease, filled you with a sense of relief and contentment. He was wearing a navy blue shirt and denim pants, all casual and handsome from where he was standing. You couldn’t help but admire the way he laughed at your father’s terrible jokes, his eyes crinkling at the very corners. 
The sound of his deep, hearty laughter echoed in your ears.
How you wish you could always have him around.
Despite the book in your hands, you couldn’t focus so much on reading. Your thoughts kept drifting back to Aaron: the way he looked, the sound of his voice, the warmth of his presence. You could barely remember the first time you found him attractive. Maybe somewhere deep down, you’ve always known he’s the most attractive man you have ever met.
You took another sip of your smoothie, savoring the sweet, tangy flavor as you unconsciously let your gaze linger on him… again.
“How’s that book?” Your father called out, glancing over at you with a smile.
You grinned, raising your voice slightly to be heard over the water splashing. “It’s good. But I’m enjoying the sun more.”
Aaron looked over at you, a soft smile playing on his lips. “You look like you’re having a great time,” he said, his eyes briefly wandering on your bare legs before returning to your face.
Crimson red dusted your already flushed cheeks.
“Well, I am...” Your voice trembled a little, your heart fluttering at the attention. “And I’m hungry. That smells good I can’t focus here.”
Your father chuckled, flipping a burger on the grill. “Just wait until you taste these burgers, sweetheart. Aaron here has some secret grilling tips.”
“No, no. I’ll be the judge of that, Dad.”
You laughed, leaning back on the swan floater. And as Aaron’s gaze landed in your direction again, he took a swig of his cold beer.
“We’ll make sure to save you the best one,” he said, his voice warm and teasing. “I bet you’ll forget your own name.”
“Oh, that’s cocky!”
He chuckled at your reaction. “Just a little fact.”
“As I said, I’ll be judge of that." 
You beamed at him, feeling a ribbon of happiness twirling in your stomach. 
The evening eventually settled into a comfortable night. After a delicious dinner Aaron insisted on preparing, the three of you moved to the living room. The television was on and cast a soft glow in the dimmed space as a series played.
Aaron and your father sat on the large couch, sipping on their brandy. While you occupied the solo couch, your legs tucked beneath you as you watched the scenes intently, munching on the red velvet cupcake Aaron brought for you earlier.
“Oh, oh—” You shrieked, covering your eyes quickly as you reached an intense moment between the main characters, the tension was so thick that you felt uncomfortable watching it with your father.
Aaron glanced at you and chuckled, licking the bitter alcohol left in his lower lip.
“You okay?” He asked gently, amused by your reaction.
You shook your head while laughing. “That’s not— that shouldn’t be allowed. They look so good together!”
Aaron laughed in agreement, nodding his head in accord. But it quickly died down when your father joined the conversation.
“You know, it’s inappropriate, isn’t it? An old man with such a young woman,” your father suddenly commented, sipping on his drink before shaking his head.
You felt a slight flush of embarrassment. You found yourself darting your glance at Aaron to see his reaction. On his seat, he remained silent, his eyes focused on the screen, but you noticed the subtle tightening of his jaw.
“Really, Dad, that’s your concern?” You tried sounding playful, clearing your throat a little. “That’s literally her uncle. Doesn’t that freak you out?”
“Silly girl, of course, it does!” You chuckled awkwardly at your father’s dry reply. “It’s already wrong from our moral standpoint. What I’m saying is, that’s a grown man hitting on a young woman. That’s highly inappropriate.”
Aaron took a slow sip of his drink, still not commenting, but you could sense the discomfort radiating from him. You shifted in your seat, feeling a mix of curiosity and unease.
“It definitely makes you think,” your father continued, oblivious to the tension. “I mean, what could they possibly have in common?”
The scenes continued with you and Aaron both silent. After a few more moments, your father turned to Aaron with a more cheerful tone. 
“So... have you been on any dates lately? You never talk about your love life.”
Aaron finally looked away from the TV, a slight smile tugging on his lips. “I’ve been busy with work, you know how it is. Haven’t had much time for dating.”
Your father’s interest was piqued, and so was yours. “Come on, there must be someone. You’re not getting any younger, you know.”
Aaron chuckled, shaking his head. And suddenly, the red velvet cupcake no longer taste appetizing. It turned all bitter and dry against your tongue.
“I’ve had a few dates here and there, but nothing serious.”
“Oh, right. What’s her name again? Beth, right?”
You felt a pang of something you couldn’t quite name. Jealousy, maybe? Aaron dating other women was a topic you actually didn’t like to think about. And who the hell is Beth?
“Maybe you should settle down,” your father suggested, leaning back in his seat. “Find someone who can put up with your crazy work schedule. You know, after Haley divorced you because of that…”
Aaron laughed softly, but there was a hint of resignation in his tone. “Easier said than done.”
Your throat dried up as their conversation continued. It feels like you’ve been eating sand. You fidgeted on the cupcake box perched on your lap as you unconsciously glanced over the kitchen, thinking of getting yourself water. But Aaron’s eyes met yours briefly, and you felt a spark of something electric pass between you.
Which made you look away.
You tried to focus on the television screen, but your thoughts kept returning to Aaron, wondering if he ever thought of you as more than just his best friend’s daughter. Maybe not.
Definitely not.
The tension in the living room had become palpable you had to excuse yourself to the kitchen. As you walked away, you felt Aaron’s gaze lingering on you, sending a trail of shivers down your spine.
You let out a deep breath you didn’t know you were holding as you reached the kitchen. You filled a glass with cold water and took a slow sip, letting the cool liquid soothe your nerves. The silence of the kitchen contrasted with the awkwardness in the living room.
“Hey,” Aaron’s deep voice jolted you out of your thoughts.
You turned around to see him standing in the doorway, his expression unreadable. As always, your heart skipped a beat, wallowing from his very presence.
“Hey,” you said back, trying to sound casual, “you need something?”
“I just wanted to check on you.”
You forced a smile and didn’t say anything. Aaron took a step closer, the space between you shrinking until he was only a foot away. You could feel the warmth radiating from his body, his presence and scent overwhelming your senses.
“I’m good.”
“Are you sure?” His voice was low, almost a whisper.
You swallowed hard, trying to keep your voice steady. “Hmm. Just too much cupcake. Too sweet.”
His eyes softened as he reached out, brushing a strand of hair from your face. The gentle touch made you blush, and you found yourself leaning into his hand, craving for more.
“Aaron,” your voice trembled as you whispered the words, “This... I don’t know what to do with this.”
He sighed, his thumb caressing your cheek. 
The world seemed to have gone quiet. The hum of the refrigerator, the distant sound of the TV in the other room— all of it faded into the background. All you could focus on was Aaron, and the way his attention narrowed down on you. Like you’re the only one that matters in his world.
Almost as if in a trance, you pushed on your tiptoes, leaning in to Aaron’s lips. Blood rushed through your head with your own action. You could feel his breath on your lips, the hint of alcohol intoxicating.
But just as your lips were about to meet, Aaron pulled back abruptly. His jaw clenched when he glanced down at you.
“We can’t do this.”
“Aaron…”
He shook his head, stepping back further. “It’s not right. You know that.”
“I don’t understand. I thought... I thought you felt the same.”
Tears welled up in your eyes.
“This is inappropriate,” He said instead, his voice strained. “I’m sorry.”
You looked away, biting your lip to keep yourself from crying. Aaron sighed as he saw you keeping your tears at bay, his eyes filled with regret.
Silence enveloped you both for a moment, while the weight of his words was crushing your young, hopeful heart.
“It’s okay. It’s not your fault you don’t feel the same…” your smile trembled before you finally walked passed him.
The night had grown late. After finishing the episode, your father called out it was time for bed. You quickly made your way to your room, bidding them both quick goodnight, trying to push aside the pain and disappointment from your earlier encounter with Aaron.
You slipped into your pajamas, a simple tank top, and silk shorts, and climbed into bed. The silence was comforting, allowing your thoughts to slowly drift away. You tried to focus on anything but Aaron, the silence of the night, the coldness of your room, but his face kept appearing in your mind, his words echoing in your ears— and the fact that he’s literally in the guest room next to yours.
Just as you were staring mindlessly at the ceiling, you heard a quiet knock on your door. Your heart leaped as you stood up, your breath caught in your throat.
“Who is it?” you called out softly, not entirely sure if you were dreaming.
The door creaked open, and there Aaron was, standing in the doorway. He looked hesitant as he stepped inside, his expression unreadable in the dim light of your room.
“Can I come in?” he asked cautiously, his voice barely above a whisper.
You nodded in silence, unable to trust your voice. He closed the door gently behind him as he finally stepped inside. The room felt even smaller with him in it, the air thick with tension.
“What are you doing here?” you finally managed to ask.
Aaron took a deep breath, running a hand through his hair. “I couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about... earlier.”
A bitter smile rose on your lips.
“I know I said it’s inappropriate,” his deep voice sounded strained as he went on. “But I can’t stop thinking about you.”
“What are you saying?”
He moved closer, his eyes never leaving yours. “That this is tearing me apart. I know it’s complicated, and I know I said it can’t happen, but... I can’t keep pretending that I don’t feel anything for you.”
The room filled with the quiet sound of your breathing as you both stood there, just staring at each other. You felt tears prick at the corners of your eyes.
“Come here,” you said softly, pulling him closer.
Aaron hesitated for a split second, then stepped forward, wrapping you in a tight hug. You buried your face in his chest, inhaling his comforting scent. Being in his arms felt right. You know that no matter how complicated this is for you both, this is exactly where you want to be.
With him.
In his arms.
You tilted your head back, meeting his eyes again, and for a moment, the world stood still. 
“Take me, Aaron…” you said in a whisper, blood rushing through your cheeks. “I want you to be my first.”
His body stiffened with what he heard. 
“What? No, no. I can’t do that.”
“Why?” You leaned in slowly, testing the waters. 
When he didn’t show any sign of resistance, you carefully closed the distance, capturing his lips in a tender kiss. Which Aaron didn’t respond at first…
Until he did.
It started slow, gentle, tasting Aaron’s hesitance from your insistence.
“I ca—” He broke the kiss, shaking his head. “I can’t do this. Not— no.”
You cupped his cheeks with both your hands. “I want this, Aaron.”
“Do you even know what you’re asking me to do?”
“Yes,” you cut him off by chasing his lips again, staring up at him. “Please, Aaron? I want you to fuck me.”
You stared back at him with the same intensity.
Aaron let out a deep sigh as he closed the distance between you, capturing your lips in a searing kiss. His big hands slid down to your waist, pulling you closer as he guided you to the bed. 
Both of you broke apart for a moment, breathing heavily. And when he looked down at you, a mixture of adoration and concern flickered in his eyes.
“Are you sure about this, baby?” he asked, his voice hoarse.
You nodded quickly, your grip tightening on his arm. “I’ve never been more sure about anything, Aaron.”
Aaron’s lips trailed down your neck, inhaling your scent as he left a soft trail of light kisses. “You smell so good, angel. God, I don’t want to hurt you.”
He was murmuring against your skin. With his hot breath fanning on your neck, you felt like you were on fire. Every touch sent tingles through your already wet core. You tugged at his shirt, eager to feel the warmth of his skin against yours.
“Off, Aaron, please…” you pleaded softly.
And so he obliged, pulling the shirt over his head and tossing it aside. You ran your hands over his chest, marveling at the hard planes of muscle beneath your fingertips. Your cunt clenched at the mere sight of dark hair trailing his stomach down to the fabric of his shorts.
“Tell me if you want to stop, alright?” He murmured breathlessly.
“I’m yours, Aaron. I don’t want to stop.”
“My sweet girl...” He sighed softly, placing a soft kiss on your collarbone. “Promise me.”
You buck your hips to get some friction on your neglected cunt.
“Alright, okay, I promise. Just please do something…”
Aaron’s hands expertly moved to the hem of your tank top, his eyes seeking permission. You nodded again, and he lifted it over your head, revealing your bare skin. His lips found yours in no time, hungrier and so much messier, as he explored your body.
His calloused and rough hands cupped your tits, rubbing your taut nipples with the pad of his palm.
“Aaron,” you whispered, your voice breathless. “I need you. Feel so hot.”
“I know, baby. But we need to slow down.”
He shed the rest of your clothes deftly. His touch was gentle yet insistent, his hands exploring the softness of your skin like a map. And you felt like drowning in him, his kisses, his touch, your desire to be taken.
Your breath hitched as you felt his hand traveling down your thighs.
“Do you touch yourself, angel?” He asked softly.
You let out a shaky breath, nodding. “Yes, yes. Just my fingers.”
“You do?” He seemed interested, perking his eyebrows teasingly. “And what do you think about while doing that?”
You arched your back as you sucked in a breath, feeling his finger rubbing the sensitive nub of your drenched pussy. Fuck, why is he teasing you?
“You, Aaron… wanted you…”
Your jaw almost dropped as Aaron entered two of his fingers in his mouth, wetting them profusely as his eyes lingered on yours. Right after, he settled himself in between your thighs, while you blushed hard and fought the urge to hide your wetness from his hungry eyes.
“It might hurt a little, sweetling,” He said quietly. “Be a good girl and relax for me, alright?”
You nodded quickly, your cunt clenching in anticipation. Just a few moment, you felt Aaron’s middle finger prodding your entrance, his eyes focused on you— searching for any sign of discomfort and that he needs to stop.
Instead, you gave him a nod.
He dipped his head in between your legs, his hot breath directed at your clenching pussy. He gave your cunt a few teasing licks, nibbling on your clit before running the pad of his tongue on your wet entrance. All the while, his finger found a rhythm that felt both new and familiar to you. 
You bite down on your hand, muffling the moans threatening to escape your lips. And once you started getting accustomed to his finger and his tongue assaulting your cunt, he prodded the other finger, while his thumb rubbed gentle circles on your aching clit.
“Aaron… oh god…” You shut your eyes tightly, your legs trembling. “Feels so goo- oh! Oh my god!”
A smile appeared on his lips as he glanced up at you, his voice rough as his fingers continued abusing the spongy spot inside. “Right there, angel? That’s it?”
“Yes, yes, ye– oh my god, Aaron!”
“Shh…” He chuckled quietly, “You’ll wake your father, baby. You have to be quiet for me, alright?”
You nodded frantically even though you didn’t fully understand what he was saying. The lewd sound of your pussy squelching echoed in the silence of your room, accompanied by your quiet whimpers and Aaron’s heavy breathing.
“There you go. Good girl, angel. Good girl…” He whispered encouragingly, diving back again on your pussy. “Come for me, sweet girl. Be good for me.”
The world crumbled as your orgasm racked your body. Your legs trembled, your back arched, your lips hung open into a silent scream. But Aaron didn’t stop, his fingers pummeling in and out of your wet cunt until you whimpered and held his wrist, stopping him fully.
“Good?” He asked hoarsely, making you nod as you catch your breath. “Do you still want to do this?”
“I do, yes. Inside… I want you inside me, Aaron.”
He sighed softly before finally taking off his shorts. Your eyes followed the slow movements of his hands, alternating your gaze from the the plain of his veiny arms to his face.
Once off, he wrapped his big hand around his hard and leaking cock, pumping it slowly, then rubbing his thumb at the tip. You heard him hiss at the contact. He was big; both in girth and length. And for the first time that night, you felt unsure for a moment.
Aaron gave you a reassuring smile.
“Would it fit?”
“I’ll be gentle, sweet girl,” He chuckled hoarsely at your question, taking his place in between your legs again. “Spit on my hand, darling.”
“W-why?” You blushed, confused by the request.
“Alright, I’ll do it then.”
You bit your lip as you felt the tip of his cock on your entrance. Aaron knelt between your legs, and you watched how he spat on your desperate pussy. Just after that, he rubbed the tip up and down your cunt, spreading his saliva messily on your pulsing core.
“It will hurt, baby. I need you to relax.”
You nodded unsurely, your eyebrows tugging to a frown. “I’ll try, Aaron– oh, ouch!”
Aaron held you close, his fingers tracing gentle patterns on your hips. Your room was filled with whispered words and soft moans.
“That’s it, angel… just relax for me… Good girl, look at that.”
“Ouch–” You whimpered quietly, gripping his arm for support. “It… it hurts. Aaron—”
“I know, baby, I know,” he whispered sympathetically, peppering your cheeks with soft kisses. “You’re doing great for me, angel.”
You hummed shakily as you let him bury himself deeper, feeling more of his pulsating cock deep down your cunt. Aaron propped himself above you, scanning your face with obvious worry. His hand was gentle as he caressed your cheek, brushing the strands of hair away from your sweaty face.
“You look so beautiful, baby…” He gave you a sweet smile before placing a featherlight kiss on your forehead, then the tip of your nose, down to your lips.
You keened at his softness. “You can move now, d-daddy. Please... I can take it…”
“Of course you can, sweetling. Daddy just wants to be careful.”
THE ENDING AAAAAAAAAA! This is originally a request but I accidentally deleted the first draft 😅 Hehehehe sorry, Anon! Hope you like this! 🫶🏼
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minkdelovely · 5 months
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love and power
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chapter eight
“i want everything i asked for.”
Alastor x Fem!Reader ; MDNI 18+ ; [y/n] used sparingly ; Alias in Hell is Sylvie
tags/warnings: ‘fuck it, do him scared!’ or whatever the saying is, no plot cuz y’all have had enough of that, pheromones are putting in work cuz you have heart eyes, y’all are touch-starved and pent up, half-transformation demon alastor (i hope that makes sense lol), implied demon alastor, little bit of angst or even hurt/comfort at the end? 🥲 smut: clothes ripping, scratching, oral sex (fem receiving), fingering, slight degradation & praise kink dynamics, blood play & biting, handjob, orgasm denial, cream pie
word count: 6.6k *maniacal laughter*
author’s note: it wouldn’t be right to start this off without a formal apology for the cliffhanger and then, subsequently, the publishing delay 🥲✨ this ended up being more of a labor of love than i had expected; i just seemed to have such bad luck, this week of all weeks. thank you for your patience, and i hope this makes up for it! @hazelfoureyes one of these days i’ll have some more for you, but until then darling, you ever so kindly ‘asked’ me for smut so… 💅🏻💖
prelude ; chapter one ; chapter two ; chapter three ; chapter four ; chapter five ; chapter six ; chapter seven ; chapter eight ; chapter nine ; chapter ten: part one ; chapter ten: part two
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Alastor meant for it to be chaste, really he did. And while he had desperately hoped for acceptance, the ardor with which you returned the kiss was unexpected. The grip of your hands around his wrists was fierce, pulling him in; fingers like sticky fibers against the patch of bare skin nestled between his gloves and the cuff of his shirt. 
So you were hungry, too… He couldn’t help but smile against your mouth at the thought. 
Finally, his luck was turning around.
✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧
When you offered your help to Alastor, a kiss was the last thing you ever expected. 
Actually, you had been fully prepared for him to hurt you somehow, whether it was his intention or not. He had gotten upset so quickly, you assumed it must have been residual animosity from the meeting with Valentino that he could no longer contain. The more you thought about it, you truly understood how degraded he must have been by the whole affair, filling you with a guilt you worried might never go away. He needed a victory.
So offering your help was the least you could do.
But you never could have imagined the way he took your face in his strong hands, holding you with such care despite the intensity roiling off him in his half-formed demonic state. The strain on his face as he struggled to compose himself, his eyes switching back from black with red dials to that familiar searing red. The storming hunger you saw in them, half-lidded, as he closed the gap between you…
Your mind was practically rendered blank, running on instinct; the warm ache throbbing between your hips quickly taking up any remaining space that was left.
His mouth was softer than you expected but his press against you was firm and wickedly practiced. You felt him smile against you and for a moment you forgot to breathe, the resulting gasp being the perfect opportunity for Alastor’s tongue to snake into your mouth. If your eyes hadn’t already been closed, they would have rolled to the back of your head. His tongue was soft and big and hot, his movements steady and filled with purpose; not a drop of wasted effort. You could only hope to keep up…
It was such arduous work keeping your hands at his wrists, floored by the intense desire you had to reach out and touch him. But you didn’t know your limits here. He was still riled up — if anything, you had heard his antlers grow — and you didn’t want to make any wrong moves.
So you put all your longing into the grip of your fingers and mouth, your mind wandering on the feeling of him. Large, elegant hands cupping your face like glass. His body looming over you, offering shelter you were more than willing to accept. His mouth so hot against yours it would leave you feeling cold once it was gone. And he smelled so good this close, smoky and verdant like a bonfire on a crisp autumn night. 
Your thighs rubbed together from the pulse radiating there, and he let out a small groan against your mouth as your nails absently dug into the skin of his wrists. The sound of him simultaneously made your legs weak and fanned the flame between them. His voice had always been nice — he didn’t build a career for himself on the radio for nothing — but you felt a growing fear at the aspect of never hearing something like that again after he was sated; knowing that no matter what it would haunt you for eternity. 
I really am so fucked…
He was pecking now, his breath and teeth and tongue ghosting over your swollen mouth and face as he feverishly placed multiple at a time. You wanted to reciprocate so badly, whether with your lips or hands, but it was clear he needed to ravish you first so you stayed put in a shocking exhibit of will-power. But when you felt the tug of his teeth against the corner of your jaw you couldn’t stop the shaky moan that escaped you, not even noticing how your hips rolled on nothing but air.
That’s all it took. 
Alastor pulled away and gave a quick kiss to your hands before dropping them to take up the torn fabric of your collar. He gave it a sharp pull, tearing your dress straight through to the waist; the sound ringing out in the quiet of your room with the promise of what’s to come. You were too stunned by the suddenness of the action, but the look on your face must have really been something if the expression you were seeing on his was any indication — ravenous and wild. 
Your chest heaved with quickening breath, heartbeat kicking and head empty as you felt all the blood in your body rushing down. Too overwhelmed by the intensity of it all, you dared to bury your face in his chest, grateful to be just tall enough to reach. Mortifying as it was, it was all you could think to do. 
Though safety wasn’t the only thing you found, pressing in so close to him like this, your throat going dry at the feeling of his arousal against you. No amount of time or experience could have prepared you for this, for him. You were beginning to think that there would be nothing left once he was through with you.
Just need a minute…
Mercifully, he let you. Even going so far as to cradle you against him, cupping the back of your head with his left hand. You relaxed into him, a hot puff of air leaving your mouth to soak into the fabric of his clothes. Alastor’s pleased hum in response vibrated against your face, and you brought your hands up to grip the lapels of his coat for fear of crumbling at his feet.
As you steeled yourself, he didn’t desist from his poking and prodding at your exposed back with his free hand. It disappeared briefly, followed by the faint sound of something falling to the carpet before the air was ripped from your lungs at the touch of his hot, bare skin against yours. You whined into his chest as your back arched against his palm, your fingers nearly ripping through his coat with the force of your grip, earning a gruff and sinister chuckle from him. Being able to bask in the feeling of the rumble in his chest against you was a lovely consolation, though. And just under that… his heartbeat. 
His hand against your back regained your attention then, scratching and massaging at its leisure; nails tracing indistinguishable shapes along your skin. Traveling up and down your spine at first, then your shoulders and, finally, the back of your neck where he paused. 
His message read loud and clear: time was up. 
Alastor pulled you away from him with a gentle firmness, managing to handle you delicately despite his clear desire for haste. You could see it burning in his eyes with no intent to extinguish any time soon. He was so mystifying like this, you couldn’t help but drink him in. Stately, powerful… beautiful. It felt impossible now to have ever been afraid of him in this state of half-transformation. He didn’t seem to mind the admiration, soft smile and lust-heavy eyes radiating with ego.
His antlers look so handsome when they’re branched out like this…
“Shouldn’t you have offered to take my coat by now? I’m your guest, aren’t I?” he teased as he swiped your dumbstruck mouth with the pad of his thumb. The filter dipped in and out over his quiet, low tone of voice, sending a fresh wave of heat to your core and cheeks as you fought the urge to nuzzle your face against his bare hand. How had he already reduced you to this? “But I suppose I haven’t been well-mannered myself. Just look at what’s become of your dress.”
His face was smug as he played with the decimated fabric, fingers dancing across your exposed neck and shoulders before pulling down the long sleeves. They had been the glue, apparently, your dress falling past your hips with ease and into a heap on the floor in near silence. Goosebumps pricked your skin as you stood before him in your underwear, already feeling naked as he took you in. You noticed him focus in on your shoulder and neck, the draw of his eyebrows confirming your earlier suspicion that he had left a bruise.
“It’s fine, it didn’t hurt,” you lied self-consciously, unable to keep the nerves out of your voice. It sounded like an apology. He hadn’t meant it and in the grand scheme of things was a bruise really so bad? It would be gone before you knew it.
He didn’t seem convinced, a sound of disapproval coming from behind his closed lips before a smile took its place. “Hmm… if you say so. Perhaps a kiss to make it better?”
Alastor wasted no time leaning down to place his mouth there, and you sighed as the heat of his wide, wet tongue swiped over it before he closed his lips with a small smack. As he nuzzled in — kissing, licking, sucking, nipping — your shaky fingers took to the task of unbuttoning his coat as he had suggested. The action earning you a growl and a bite, not yet enough to break the skin but taking your breath away all the same; the fire in your belly now flickering up into your chest.
Once the coat was loose you ran your hands under it, starting near his waist to travel up his chest until you reached his broad shoulders. Was he the one who was so hot, or was it you? It was impossible to tell. You used the top of your hands to start working the coat off of him, and he paused from his effort at your neck to assist with removing his arms from it before tossing it off to the side — his remaining glove along with it. You caught sight of the saliva glistening around his mouth and chin before he resumed his station and didn’t even try to hold back the soft moan that escaped you.
What was the point?
With a snarl — that was the closest thing you could think to call it — his hands hooked behind your knees and hiked you up, your legs instinctively wrapping around him for purchase as you gasped. Alastor’s mouth found yours again and you held his face to keep steady as you hunched over him, tears forming at the corner of your closed eyes from the relief of being able to touch him this time.
This kiss wasn’t as poised as the first had been. It was hurried and open-mouthed, messy and deep. Not enough, not enough, not enough. You broke away this time, seizing your opportunity to explore his face with your lips as he had yours. His claws bit into the flesh of your ass as your mouth latched onto his neck, sucking at the pulse you found there. The resulting buck of your hips from the action and the moan he let out only pulling another from both of you.
You didn’t even notice that he had been walking until you were suddenly tossed onto the bed, his body immediately caging you in beneath him. You hooked your legs around him as he ground into you, your cry of pleasure from the friction echoing off the walls. He did it again and you whined, squirming, his hands on either side of your head as he leered down; red eyes glowing with satisfaction.
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Alastor took a moment to take in the sight before him, feeling his eyes glitch as he roamed over your flushed face, but made quick work of grabbing it with one hand to pucker your mouth before returning to explore it with his tongue.
It surprised him how much he was enjoying this; kissing you with abandon, somehow never scratching the incessant itch despite his efforts. He captured your bottom lip with his teeth, resiliently managing not to bite straight through it as you moaned into his mouth.
“Alastor…!” 
His name was a song on your breath, scorching down from his ears to his cock, all of which reacted with a twitch.
One string loose. 
How many more would he need to cut before you went slack?
Who had bound you up like this in the first place? It certainly hadn’t been him. On the contrary, he was so eager to see you torn open and bare, stripped of all the little secrets tangled like knots on your tether to him. Always keeping your guard up around him wasn’t only irritating… it was selfish. And there was only one of you here allowed that luxury. 
Still, this was quite the consolation prize, seeing you surrender to him so easily. He had barely gotten started and you were already making such a pretty face for him; a new favorite, even. Your little pout that normally inspired vexation looked sweet like this, swollen with his kisses. It was an image he would soon not forget, being so much better than what he had imagined.
Your scent had truly blossomed now, dizzying him with the potency of its floral, nutty musk; just a hint of sweetness underneath. It complimented his own smoky, green, and bitter scent so well. But Alastor was ready to make his next new discovery, his hips finally lifting away from you as he gave you a final peck on the mouth.
“Hmmm, delicious as your mouth is, there’s another place I’m quite eager to kiss.” He could feel the wickedness on his face as he said it, unable to contain the static that flared around him as you breathed out a curse, body trembling.
Alastor made a slow descent, teasing you with licks and bites and kisses to draw out as many moans and whimpers as he could from you. Such music you made for him. Only for him. It was a good thing he had already resolved to avoid sleep as much as he could in the future; he wouldn’t get much anyway with the sounds you made ringing in his head like church bells.
He could see the damp soaked into your underwear before he even touched them, already intoxicated by the smell and heat wafting off your core. He’d have to be careful here… not an easy task, but he’d manage. The self-advised warning did little to stop him from tearing the garment in half with ease, enjoying the wide-eyed look you gave him as you quickly propped up on your elbows from the sound.
“I’d apologize for frightening you, but I’m afraid I wouldn’t mean it,” he said, holding your gaze as he palmed your bare sex, thrilled by how wet you already were. You were having such a hard time keeping your composure, serving only to egg him on. He hummed and continued, almost surprised by the words that came out of his mouth, “You don’t seem to mind, though… how lewd.”
Your head fell back with a loud whine, arms giving out so that you were flat on your back again; face scarlet as his fingers moved against you, collecting your arousal. His dick throbbed against him at the sight, leaking onto his skin and clothes. He couldn’t help the hiss that spilled from between his teeth when he tested you with his middle finger, tight as you were wet.
“Oh my… it’s been a while for you too, hm? I’m honored,” he cooed, relishing the way you whimpered and clenched at his words. “I do worry how you’ll fare… Contrary to the restraint I’ve shown so far, I must warn you… I don’t have the capacity for gentleness today.”
Your eyes shot open with shock, and with that he removed his finger and brought it up, putting the entirety of it in his mouth to suck you off as you watched. His eyes closed in pleasure, groaning as his tongue lapped up every bit of you, savoring every second. Clean and tart… like a ripe summer cherry. He couldn’t stop the bit of drool that escaped the corner of his mouth, the rush of saliva incensed by your taste coming on too quickly to swallow it all.
Alastor was breathing hard through his nose, a fresh wave of hunger — he wasn’t sure what else to call it — trembling through him with a fierce burning need. His smile and voice were sharp, static fraying as he spoke, “Hmmm… My imagination wasn’t even close. Aiming to please, dear?”
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His fascination with licking you off him would be your second-death. Not only that, but you hadn’t expected him to say any of the obscene things that were spilling from his mouth, let alone the way you were responding to them. You had been subject to dirty talk before and enjoyed it (if done well), but… there was just something about it all coming from Alastor that set your veins on fire.
“Alastor, please, it’s embarrassing,” you pleaded through gasps, watching through half-open eyes as he licked away at his hand. You felt as if you had a fever, your face was so hot, hair already beginning to stick to your forehead with sweat.
As if falling on deaf ears, he merely proceeded to give a sharp tug to his bowtie, removing it in one go before unbuttoning his shirt. Something about the harsh way he pulled his shirt from the belted waist of his pants made you dizzy, but you felt a scream die in your throat watching the way his shoulders and chest moved as he freed his arms, with just the slightest flex of his abdomen; your eyes unable to resist following the trail of hair below his navel that disappeared under his belt.
You had made peace with your budding attraction to him — it was easier that way, considering your near-constant state of proximity — but this felt like being tossed directly into the fire.
Burning at the stake.
As he towered over you, you took in the large, pink scar lacerated across his chest from left shoulder to the right side of his ribcage. There had been mentions of the battle against Adam and his Exorcists within the group; how terrifying it had been, how brave everyone was. The loss of their friend Sir Pentious, who had died trying to help protect them against Adam. That was when the conversation normally tapered off, the grief still too close at his loss, but also because of what led up to it.
From what you understood, Adam had been Alastor’s appointed target to handle. One he was unmatched against, if the scar was any indication. A killing blow he had managed to survive. You hoped the pity you felt wasn’t making its way into your gaze as you looked at him, knowing he’d dislike it. Still… You sat up with hands stretched out, the instinct to touch and comfort him too strong to fight. But he pushed you back down, a shadow coming over his face as he bent over you. 
“Patience, sweetheart. I still owe you a kiss.”
You didn’t have time to process the dismissal before he raked his nails on your skin as he dipped down, your back arching up to meet them as you breathed through the small sting of pain. A splash of sobriety hit you as you felt the heat of his breath hovering over your cunt, your stomach tight as he moved closer, a wanton cry as he finally lapped at you with his tongue; a slow, wide, firm sweep from hole to clit. Sealed with a kiss, as promised.
You shuddered and gripped the duvet as if your life depended on it. The image of him nestled between your legs making your brain short-circuit. His eyes were shrouded with a predation that should have terrified you. So why did it thrill you instead?
 “Oh my god…”
That wicked grin of his…
“Last I checked, Hell is the absence of God. Let’s try again, shall we?” 
He hiked your legs over his shoulders, looped his arms around to grab the top of your thighs, and pulled you to his mouth. You saw white as he didn’t hesitate in setting a voracious pace, his tongue dipped into you — long and thick — as his nose pushed against your clit with every open-and-close of his mouth. His chin providing a pleasant hardness that nearly knocked the wind out of you.
He was incessant. 
Sucking, prodding, licking, and swallowing; a starving man who may never eat or drink again. Your hands found purchase on his antlers, a bit smaller now but still looming, earning a moan of approval into your heat that blossomed in your chest. The room was filled with the sound of wet smacks and a harmony of throaty groans from him; keening, breathy moans from you. Both unabashed.
In between breathing his name, words were tumbling from your mouth that you couldn’t register, too lost in the feeling of him on you. Not just your pussy, but your legs, too. His hands gripping your thighs so fiercely as your hips rolled against his face that you hoped for bruises. A keepsake. It was impossible to know if this would ever happen again.
You hadn’t even realized you were slipping away from yourself until he pulled back with a sharp gasp, finally coming up for air, jerking his antlers from your hands. The lower half of his face shimmered with a blend of your arousal and his spit, the sclera of his eyes gone black, dials taking the shape of his red irises. Again, your arms reached out, shaking from the effort as you tried to catch your breath. 
“Kiss…,” you barely managed to say, dizzied as you were.
Alastor obliged, climbing up to your open hands as you pulled him down to you, unable to find the strength to meet him halfway. He flinched as you ran your tongue over his left cheek, licking up some of the mess there as he wiped at the other side with the back of his hand. The taste of your combined fluids sent a jolt of pleasure through you and you moaned through the sloppy, open-mouthed kiss that followed. The laugh that escaped him was sinister but sent another wave of warmth through you all the same.
He rewarded you with a finger, followed quickly by another. And before you knew it, another. Pumping in and out of you with a delicious stretch and a maddeningly consistent pace before they curled, teasing your spongy core as his thumb circled your clit at the switch; the sudden onset of your orgasm had your body trembling under his touch.
“Ohh… mm, fuck…! Hmmmnn… Ah—! Alasto—ahh!”
“I know, sweetheart, I know.” His voice was rough but soothing. A crackle of static melded into your moans and the wet sounds of your cunt, and he gave his head a violent shake as if to clear it. There was nothing but a growling need when he spoke next. “I’ve got you, don’t fight it. Let me see how pretty that sullen face of yours looks when you cum…!”
It was all too much. Just the intensity of his eyes on yours boxed in between your hands holding his face could have sent you over the edge. But his words again, that pet name… 
The tether snapped so viciously you were fairly certain you passed out for a moment, your vision gone black as you screamed. Only to be brought back to consciousness by Alastor’s fingers slowly riding the wave of your orgasm, no longer stroking with purpose — you were clenched around him so tightly his previous pace would have probably injured you both — but with a languid solace. Graciously accepting every roll of your hips into his hand as you moaned his name and gasped for breath.
✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧ ✧
God, it was so fucking satisfying to see your face twisted up, eyebrows knit and your pouty lips salaciously framing your open mouth as you cried out for him. Another perfectly shattered expectation, much like the rest of this experience had been. He didn’t even mind that your eyes were shut. The consolation being the glimpse he caught of them rolling to the back of your head before they were out of sight. That, and, this would only be your first. He was determined to get at least one more out of you before this was over, truly unsure how much you could handle.
He was surprising even himself, speaking to you in the manner he was. He enjoyed a good tease, but he couldn’t recall going to this extent before. Perhaps it was a result of the pheromones, but he simply couldn’t seem to help it. The reactions it was pulling from you were too exhilarating to deny himself… and by extension, you.
His static was filling the air, buzzing with the energy of a lightning storm as he sucked you off his fingers once more with a snarl; his free hand sloppily undoing his belt before giving it a freeing tug, desperately hard erection weeping slightly at the bit of alleviation. As the realization that he was preparing to enter you sunk in another ripple of goosebumps pinpricked his skin, causing him to bite down on the inside of his lip from the sensation.
The taste of his own blood came with inspiration.
Alastor tucked back some of your damp hair before bringing his face down to meet yours, swiping at your lips with his blood-coated tongue. Testing the waters. Your eyebrows drew together and you stretched underneath him, as if waking from a night’s sleep, before blinking your eyes open. He watched as your tongue responded with a quick prod of what he had left there, and felt his smile grow when you let out a hum of content.
He would never tire of being right.
“I thought you might like that, my little killer… Have some more,” he whispered against you. Giving your lips another rough lick before taking your mouth again, groaning into each other as your tongue soothed his still-bleeding lip.
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Something about this kiss was different.
There was a fierceness this time that hadn’t been there before, no doubt spurred on by the blood pooling in Alastor’s mouth. It had been shocking to taste at first but then… you found that it wasn’t too bad. Diluted with saliva, it was almost sweet, and you relished the way he enjoyed your tasting of it.
Your hands traveled up to the back of his head, gently scratching the prickly velvet of his undercut with one while the other pulled at the hair on his crown. His hiss into your mouth made you moan with another jump of your hips, and you felt him shift over you then; vaguely aware of the sound of him unceremoniously tugging down his pants before he took your hand from his crown and brought it between you.
The gasp that escaped you was sharp, your hand instinctively wrapping around his length as he guided you through stroking him. He was so hard, wet, and heavy, burning to the touch, but distant alarms were ringing about your ability to take him all. It scared you how much you wished to try.
His moan of relief was another keepsake, the sound of it so soft and pleading in your ear that you nearly sobbed from your desire. You couldn’t help but wonder what his face looked like, making a sound like that, and found yourself jealous of the skin of your neck he was hiding in. You stayed like this for a moment, his hand leaving you to work on its own as he cradled the opposite side of your head to lick and kiss your neck between gasps and moans. With a final nip to your skin Alastor pulled back, the mattress dipping as he put all of his weight onto his forearm to the right of your head as he adjusted himself.
“Don’t close your eyes,” was all he said before pressing into you, the tip of his cock already threatening to overwhelm you as it teased your entrance. 
It was not an easy task, your eyebrows drawing together in such a way that it nearly blurred your vision. You whined between closed lips, doing your best to breathe through the sweet stretch of him finally entering you. Despite his direction, he didn’t seem to be doing much better; sweat beading on his forehead over furrowed brows, kiss-swollen mouth open with panting breaths. Flushed cheeks. Even in the state he had reduced you to, you were trying to sear the image of his lust-strained face into your psyche.
He was rocking his hips slowly, allowing you to adjust to him with each little thrust as your arousal coated him, easing his advance; breathy moans collecting between you in puffs of steam, joining the two of you together in all the places you weren’t touching. 
All the while, your eyes were locked on each other. Had anyone else ever seen his the way they were now and found them beautiful instead of horrifying? You moaned as you stared at him; taking in his large, elegant antlers and sweat-damp hair, reminding you of the bedhead you had seen the other morning. His handsome and sinister face. He could easily tear you to shreds — and in a certain way, he was — but you were overwhelmed at the amount of care he had shown you so far, even with his earlier warning. 
His thrusts were building in sharpness, parting you with a tantalizing push-and-pull until he finally bottomed out with a growl. You cried out from the fullness he gave you, already twitching around him despite his stillness as he gave you both a moment to try and catch your breath. 
Alastor peppered your face with kisses and licks as you relaxed into him, testing you with a shallow thrust that had you biting down on your lip. Another. Another. Another. Until your mouth was hanging open, your hands traveling up to hold onto his triceps in your need for stability and to keep him close. Suddenly you felt him leave you completely, not even able to process the emptiness before he slammed back into you with a harsh grunt that made you squeal; writhing as he pressed up into your cervix.
He must have really enjoyed that, because he did it again. And again. And again. Settling into an excruciatingly blissful pace, his hard length massaging knots out of your body you didn’t know where there. Your legs instinctively hooked around him, nails digging into the flesh of his arms as you gasped and whined.
“So — ah..! Good… Alastorrr…!”
“Fuck!” he hissed between gritted teeth as your hips bucked, brows knit tight as he shook his head as if to clear a fog. 
You didn’t know he was actually trying to keep something at bay, the additional inch of growth in his antlers lost on you in your current state.
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Alastor’s hips stuttered for a moment before muscle memory guided him back to rhythm, desperate to regain the ecstasy that was torn from him. It had been a close call, but he managed to keep the switch from happening. Though the monster inside was still there, clawing at him just below the surface. 
He felt as your hands moved from their place on his triceps (which he had quite enjoyed) to settle on his chest, your fingers delicately tracing his scar. The line wasn’t steady though, perforated by the impact of his thrusts, which you were handling with a surprising welcomeness. 
It was almost…
There it was again, lying in wait; that ravenous, goading shadow roiling inside of him.
Take the risk…
Could he, though? Composing himself was practically second-nature, after all…
Say it!
Alastor exhaled, somewhere between a growl and a sigh. “You’re doing so well, sweetheart.” He allowed himself to relish the sound of your cry and the blissed out look on your face, which in turn provided a moment to steel himself before continuing, “I didn’t think you’d be this greedy.”
“Fuuuck…! Alast — oh my god…!”
A fresh wave of your arousal flooded over him as you desperately rolled your hips to meet him, but the intention had been to make you climax — and judging by the way you were spasming around him, you were close. Not drive him to his own at the sight of your glowing eyes, just as they had that day in the alley.
He had miscalculated.
With an agonizing force of will he pulled out of you, harsh breaths straining his lungs as he got off the bed to hastily remove his pants and shoes. He groaned through the ripple of adrenaline that was tearing through him, heartbeat pounding in his ears like a drum, the feeling of it causing his hair to stand on edge. Fuck. He wouldn’t be able to hold it off… not this time.
“What’s wrong?” Despite the question, your voice was still so thick with lust that it made his back hunch over.
It was taking all he had not to wrap his arms around himself in what he knew would be a useless attempt at containment. Even breathing was painful. The air saturated with the smell of sweat and sex and Valentino’s goddamn pheromones!
I really am going to kill that son of a bitch!
“Alastor…?”
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Burning at the stake.
It had been a good way to put it.
He had been burning you alive before dousing you with ice.
What had gotten into him? What had gotten into you? No one had ever said something like that to you before and received anything but a slap in the face. Greedy… The word made your heart stutter, some of the blood from the lower half of your body traveling back up to your face. Was it true? 
Embarrassment was beginning to sober you up. Had you gone too far? It seemed strange that you had, considering the words came from his mouth and not yours. Fuck, all of this had started because of him. How else had he wanted you to react? Or was he ashamed of himself? 
Was he regretting this already? 
“What’s wrong?”
You watched as his back arched up like a spooked cat, the force of his breathing revealing the ribs and notches of spine under the skin. He looked like he was in pain… Maybe the scar on his chest wasn’t as healed as it seemed? You climbed off the bed and made a timid approach.
“Alastor…?” 
He flinched at the touch of your hand with a hiss, the shock of his reaction making you trip over yourself and fall back onto the bed. He kept his back to you when he spoke next, the absence of his filter making you shiver in pleasure and worry.
“You remember what I told you earlier, yes?”
I don’t have the capacity for gentleness today.
How could you not remember that? 
“I do,” you answered, just above a whisper.
He straightened himself then, still turned away from you and managing to look regal despite his trembling. “I need you on all fours… and you must promise not to turn around. Do you understand?”
It was a question that didn’t leave room for any response other than yes. So you just positioned yourself on the bed, facing your headboard and gathered the pillows there underneath you for support. You had just finished settling when you felt his weight dip the mattress behind you, heart in your throat as he ran his nails down your spine before slipping his fingers into you.
You both sighed as he pumped you, filling the room with that familiar lewd sound between breaths. Stoking the embers of your stolen orgasm with every drag, until he removed them completely. You whined at his absence, the tightness in your belly teetering somewhere between pleasure and pain as you heard him shudder through stroking himself. His free hand resting now on your hip.
“Don’t get comfortable. If you cum facing away from me I’ll never touch you again.” His voice was tight with effort, the filter over it harsh and pocketed as he adjusted himself behind you, the grip of his hand on your left hip promising to bruise. 
To your shame, the threat alone almost made you, a graceless moan tumbling out from your chest as you barely managed to nod your head in confirmation; your cunt flexing around the words echoing in your mind. The obscene sight of it drew out a sound from Alastor that could only be described as animalistic, earning the plump skin of your hip a few punctures as he thrust into you, bottoming out.
It was a brutal pace, his cock nearly leaving you with every thrust before plunging back in. He still had one hand on your hip while the other grabbed your shoulder, the slapping sound of your skin meeting quickly overpowering the gasps and moans falling from your mouths.
“Haahhh… nnghh…! …fuck!”
“Alastor…”
You felt him twitch inside of you at the sound of this name before he practically shouted, “Again…!”
The blush burned down from your face into your chest, but you complied and whined his name again. And again. Until it seemed to be the only word you knew.
“Ohhh, fuuuck…,” he hissed, followed quickly by a snarl.
You could’ve sworn you heard fabric tearing before a green glow reflected off the lacquered wood of your headboard. Alastor’s huge silhouette taking shape as it intensified; invoking the image of a nightmarish spider more than the deer demon you knew. You closed your eyes and buried your face in the pillows you had gathered, refusing to turn around despite your instinct to do so. And even through the fear, you still felt your orgasm building, the battle to keep it at bay quickly turning against your favor. 
“Alastor… I… I can’t… I—”
The words were stolen as he suddenly bit into your shoulder, his mouth so wide you felt his teeth sink in from shoulder blade to collarbone. You screamed into the pillows as his hips stuttered, until there was a final thrust so deep it would have pained you if it weren’t for your throbbing shoulder. His seed spilled out hot and thick, fueling the aching fullness inside you as he grunted into your flesh; teeth still latched to you as if making a primal claim.
Hot tears fell down your face as he rode out his orgasm behind you, unsure if they were caused by the savage bite to your bruised shoulder or lament over the deprivation of seeing his face. But you had done as you were told, managing not to turn around or climax. The bite he was now nursing with licks and sucks and kisses providing plenty of distraction.
Almost too much…
As he tried to catch his breath, you could feel him shrinking behind you as he pulled out, his slick torso laying flat against your back as he lapped up the blood dribbling from the bite. And in between his kisses that traveled from your shoulder to your tear-stained face, his hands were petting you with such a tenderness it only wrought more tears. 
His soothing whispers of shhh, I know, I’m sorry, I’ve got you, I’m sorry ringing in your ears as he brought you to lie down, cradling you to him as he caressed your face with his hands that inflicted such pain and comfort… protection.
For what seemed like hours, the two of you laid in silence, looking into each other’s eyes as his thumb stroked your cheek. Until finally you buried your face into his chest, hands over his heart.
And slipped into shadow.
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ps: phew! we fucking made it y’all… i truly hope it was worth the wait. but i do want to announce here that i will be taking a little break. i know this one was already late, but it kinda took a piece of my soul lmao since we only have two more chapters i need to make sure i have all my ducks lined up to wrap this with a pretty little bow. thank you for your patience and love, i really do appreciate you. and i’ll see you on may 5th 💖
tag list: @fairyv-ice, @wat4r, @midorichoco, @raynerrold, @krak-jj, @tremendoushearttaco, @redfoxwritesstuff, @chibistar45, @kaylopolis, @cutiebimbo, @lousypotatoes, @rfox1998, @cosmic-lavender
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Blood Ties Chapter 29
Series Masterlist
Warnings: Slightly graphic depictions of labor and childbirth A/N: Maybe a cliffhanger. Maybe not. You'll have to read to find out! ;) Daryl is definitely ooc in this. I'm sorry, I tried to get as close as I could to how he might react. Also, the saying he uses is one we use in the south that means "how is that relevant?" You'll know it when you read it, lol.
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“About 4cm now. Progressing nicely.” Hershel informed, wiping his hands on a cloth that Carol had provided. 
Rick and T-Dog were out doing yet another night run in the van. It was also low on fuel but the map showed another town close by. Fuel, gloves, and other necessities were on the list. Glenn was on watch with Daryl for backup if anything happened. It wasn’t an ideal situation but it couldn’t be helped.
Thumper was calling the shots at that point. 
Before the men had left, Daryl had confiscated all the blankets except for those that were for Lori and Carl. When Glenn began to complain, one look from the anxiety-driven archer had brought the young man very close to hiding behind Rick. While some blankets were used for your comfort, others were fashioned into a tent-like structure over the bare branches of a decently sized bush. You needed some sense of privacy. 
Carol and Lori had dug through the maternity clothes that hadn’t been lost on the road and found a button up dress. It was comfortable and made things much easier than leggings. 
After your immediate needs had been met, Daryl then perched himself just beside your shoulder and hadn’t moved since. 
“S’the number we’re aimin’ for?” He asked with frustration lacing his tone, making sure the blankets were back over you and tucked tight to keep you warm. He had been muttering to himself how he wished he had made time to read the rest of the books. Daryl was not a man that liked being in the dark on anything. It made him feel helpless, as you had learned over the last several months. 
“She needs to be at 10cm and the baby needs to be in the correct position before she can push.” The old man positioned the ear tubes of the stethoscope before pressing it against several spots on your belly. “Heart beat is strong. Everything is looking good.”
You had remained quiet until that moment. “Do I just—I don’t know—lay here?”
“Walking encourages the cervix to dilate and soften. Once you dilate a little further, the contractions will likely be stronger, whether painful or not.” The calmness that man practiced really made you want to strangle him with that stethoscope. “Make sure you don’t go alone, and—”
“She ain’t.” Daryl snapped. 
Hershel shot him an admonishing look. “As I was saying, take breaks. Sleep when you can. I’ll check you periodically. You’ll need to keep timing the contractions, son.” Daryl nodded. “Sip small amounts of water, no food. Keep me informed of any changes. And as unpleasant as it may sound, if you feel the pressure and urge as if you may need to have a bowel movement, call for me immediately.”
You, as well as Daryl, reared back, lips curling. 
“The fuck that gotta do with the price’a fish?” The archer queried, not so nicely. 
“Settle down. The pressure from the baby’s head moving into the birth canal can feel similar to that.” Shaking his head, Hershel shuffled his way out of your tiny tent. 
Finally alone, you turned onto your side and scooted your upper body toward Daryl. He stretched out his legs so you could rest on his thigh. 
“Get some rest.” His hand wiggled beneath the blanket and rubbed up and down the length of your upper arm, but moved to your belly when another contraction took over. Without prompting, he slid his warm palm around to your lower back and applied the least bit of pressure, rubbing small circles. You buried your face into his thigh to ride it out, but you had to admit the light massaging helped, if only a little. 
“You’re supposed to be—” You were panting when you rolled your head to remind him, but found the watch already lifted to eye level, his gaze shifting from it to your stomach. 
“Sleep if ya can. I got this.” His brow was furrowed in concentration, your heart swelling and warm. Any worry you had entertained of him running when things got real, just gone in an instant. He was there. He was there. 
“I’ll try.” You whispered, the pain finally an afterthought. You felt him slide his hand back to the side of your stomach before you let yourself succumb to exhaustion. 
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“Sorry, Sunshine. Doc says up, so up ya get.”
You let Daryl take your dead weight and pull you up by a grip beneath your arms, making it as difficult as possible so you might get to stay in your warm little nest. You were still at 4cm. Hershel had said you had to start walking to help labor progress. 
“This isn’t fair.” You whined, rubbing your back once you were upright. The pain that accompanied each contraction had lessened but was still ever present. “Can’t you walk and I dilate?”
Daryl snorted. “Don’t think that’s how it works.” He placed a careful hand on the small of your back and kept your pace, slow as it was. 
“Okay, then how about if it gets worse, I kick you in the balls and punch you in the kidneys so you can participate properly?” You were only half joking. 
“If it gets ya through this, I guess.” The archer shrugged. You regarded him with a skeptical brow arched. 
“You’d really let me do that?”
“Hell nah, but s’the thought that counts or some shit like that, right?” He didn’t even try to dodge the smack you aimed at his shoulder. 
“You’re hilarious.” You deadpanned, even as you leaned into him while you strolled in circles around the perimeter. The moonlight caught the watch in his right hand, his finger tapping against the casing. Bless him, he was taking his role of supportive partner very seriously. You gasped when the next contraction came, stopping to bend slightly and breathe through it while Daryl secured an arm around you and flipped open the watch. 
When it was clear you weren’t falling, he slid his hand to the middle of your back and massaged the length of your spine using gentle pressure from the heel of his palm. He never said much—if anything—during the episodes themselves, but kept you informed of the timing of each one. 
“Oh, goddamnit, this one sucks.” You managed through clenched teeth. You swayed slightly when it was over, grasping blindly for the man next to you. 
“Thirteen minutes since the last’un. A minute, twelve.” He was slow and careful when turning you back toward camp. “Let’s getcha back to Hershel.” 
You shook your head. “One last loop, then we can go back.” Daryl didn’t say anything but you felt him tense. “I’m sure. They’re just getting a little more painful in the stomach, less in the back.” 
He still hesitated. “Alright. One more.”
Hershel stepped into your path before you started the second loop, allowing Daryl to fill him in on the last contraction. 
“Do one more. Rest. And then again.” The old man ordered curtly. 
Once he had vanished back toward the small fire, you mocked his words. “Rest and then again.” Daryl shook his head beside you. “I mean seriously, how much help can walking actually be?”
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“Fuuuuuck!” You were digging your fingers into the blankets below you, swatting away Carol’s hand when she tried to dab your face with a piece of cloth. Daryl was sitting beside you, wide-eyed and lost, the watch forgotten by his leg. Hershel was between your knees, sporting his medical gloves that had been brought back by Rick and T-Dog. 
The archer cleared his throat. “She alright?” 
“Do I look alright, Daryl?!” You hissed, making an admirable attempt at breathing the way Carol was instructing. The contraction finally ended and you fell back onto the folded blankets. “I’m sorry.” You found his worried blue eyes easily and fumbled for his hand. 
“S’okay.” He whispered, rubbing your knuckles with his thumb. 
“She’s at 6cm. We can still time the contractions but I think she may need your attention more than that watch does now.” Hershel reached for the item and placed it in his pocket once Daryl handed it over. “Keep moving but stay closer, no more perimeter walks.”
Daryl nodded, you whimpered. 
“I’ll be back soon to check again. If we’re lucky, things will move a little faster now that you’re in active labor.” Hershel left the tent while Carol fixed your dress. 
“I know it hurts, but you two will have little Thumper in your arms in just a matter of hours.” She smoothed your hair and tucked it behind your ears. “You’re doing great.”
“I don’t feel like I’m doing great.” You murmured, ducking your head almost bashfully. “I’m really sorry I snapped at you, Daryl. It just—well, it hurts and it’s hard to think.”
“Ain’t mad.” He tried for a half smile but it was weak. “Better than gettin’ kicked in the balls, I reckon.” You laughed and squeezed his hand. “Guess we oughtta getcha up again.”
“I’ll help.” Carol offered. You could see that a refusal was on the tip of Daryl’s tongue but he never voiced it. With Carol under one arm and Daryl under the other, you were pulled upright. 
Your body already felt wrung out and sore, and the epic finale hadn’t even begun. Still, you allowed Carol to pass you off to Daryl. 
“We movin’ on? Be better to find a house or somethin’.” He looped an arm around your back, following as you shuffled your way around. 
Carol shrugged, not touching you but keeping up with your small strides. “Both vehicles have fuel but Hershel isn’t sure we should move her. He thinks the baby will come soon and she needs to be kept in one place.”
You groaned, letting your head fall back in frustration. “She is right here. And if my opinion matters, I’d rather not—” The contraction came on strong, halting you suddenly with your hand fisting into the lower part of Daryl’s vest. The archer stepped around in front of you, rough but gentle hands grasping your wrists to guide your arms to his shoulders. 
“Try to breathe. Sometimes humming or even moaning helps, like an outlet.” Carol advised while rubbing your back. 
Your head fell forward against Daryl’s chest, a deep but quiet moan muffled against the firm muscle beyond his shirt. His hands had fallen to your hips, his body followed you as you swayed back and forth. The episodes were growing more intense, coming closer together and lasting longer. It wasn’t difficult to surmise that things would be growing more difficult to handle. 
“Ain’t nothin’ we can do for ‘er?” Daryl asked quietly above you, each word blowing his warm breath over the top of your head. Carol must have answered in the negative because his fingers flexed against your hips. 
The skin of your belly was pulled so tightly that you swore it would tear open, the muscles feeling as if they would pulse right out of the gaping hole your torn flesh would leave. 
“Shit.” You whimpered, your voice finding its way back during the last dregs of pain. You almost didn’t register warm hands gliding up and down your sides, a smaller hand on your back. “I don’t want to have the baby here.” You argued weakly. “It’s too open. Things will be too chaotic, too loud.”
“I know, Sunshine, but the doc says—”
“I don’t want to risk Thumper here in the open, Daryl. With—with walkers or people.” With enough strength having returned after the pain, you lifted your head, eyes pleading. “Please.”
The archer was visibly upset. He was just as vulnerable as you were at that moment, torn between what he felt was right and what Hershel said was for the best. His tongue wet his bottom lip before he pulled it in between his teeth, looking to Carol for guidance. 
“Could lay down the seats in the van. Use the back.” He suggested. “Plenty’a room an’ if we need to move fast—”
“I don’t think that’s unreasonable.” Carol agreed, rubbing your back in a few soft strokes before beginning to move away. “I’ll go talk to Hershel. You two keep walking.”
You watched her go, turning your gaze up to Daryl when he shifted back to your side to urge you along. “Gotta keep movin’.” You groaned, dragging your feet with your head falling back in frustration. 
You were in the middle of a contraction, when you heard it. A snarl, a raspy growl much too close. You were already clinging to Daryl and breathing through the pain that was readying your body for Thumper’s arrival, but you’d have to let him go. He had to protect the baby. And to do that, he had to protect you. 
But he didn’t move. He was nearly vibrating, rigid beneath your hands on his shoulders. He was just as scared as you were, even more so. He knew he could take the walker but that would mean letting you go. He needed to protect you but he wanted to support you. He had told you he'd never let you fall and you knew he had meant it.
“Go.” Your hands slid from his shoulders, down his chest before they released him completely to clutch your belly.
His boots disappeared from your view of the ground but you couldn’t focus after that. The pain was growing in intensity, immobilizing you with your lips tightly pressed to withhold the cries that vibrated behind your teeth for release. You couldn’t, you just couldn’t make a sound. You’d attract more, endanger everyone. You’d endanger Thumper. Daryl. 
There were scuffles. More snarls. Tears were threatening your waterline. Pain was coursing through you like a serpent, slithering around each muscle and tendon and pulling them tight. You felt disappointment and guilt over all the agony when your mouth fell open with a guttural moan, your will to cut off the scream that begged to follow barely holding true. 
“D—Daryl.” You cried out. And he was there, hands on your face, your biceps, your belly. 
“M’here. M’here. Gotta move, though.” He swept you up with the slightest strained noise. “Gonna getcha to the van. Gonna find somewhere safe for ya.” The pain was fading. You could focus on the dark blood on his face, the dirt and grime. 
“Herd?” You whispered. 
“Ain’t your fault.” His expression emanated fear and stress. “The hatch.” Someone was with him. The small hands that opened the back of the van and spread out the blankets, those were Carol’s. She sat a pile of smaller blankets and squares of fabric toward the indents on the floor where the seats had been stowed. 
“Get as many in the truck as you can! In the cab and the bed!” Rick was calling out at the same time that Hershel climbed into the van. Daryl was careful when he placed you inside, climbing over you before pulling you further in to make room for Hershel and Carol. 
Through your haze of exhaustion, you saw Rick climb in the driver's seat and Maggie beside him. That meant that five others had to somehow fit into the truck. 
“Is everyone okay?” You asked, eyes pleading with Daryl for an honest answer. 
“Yeah, they’re all good.” He nodded, smoothing a hand over your hair. 
The van was moving, though you didn’t realize when it had started. Hershel was between your knees when another contraction came. It felt like only moments had passed since the last one. In the safety of the van, though you couldn’t be bothered to consider that, you bowed forward with a scream. Daryl gingerly worked your fingers loose from the blanket to take your hand. 
“She’s at 9cm. This baby is coming soon.” Hershel didn’t move this time, he and Carol began sorting things that you couldn’t see. Panting, you leaned to the side, knowing Daryl would be there. His arm wrapped around your shoulders and squeezed. 
“What—” He swallowed audibly. “Tell me what I need to do.” 
“Just be with her.” Carol poured some water from a bottle onto a piece of fabric and passed it across you for Daryl to take. “Wipe her face, put it behind her neck.”
The archer’s hand was trembling fiercely when you felt the blessed cool cloth touch your forehead. The moan that left you was not one of pain but utter relief. “Oh, that’s nice.” You breathed. Your skin was on fire, every cell of your being felt twisted and wrong. But that trembling cloth wiping at your face grounded you, centered you around what your body was preparing to do. 
You were so close to being a mother. 
But that didn’t stop the scream that ripped from your throat when the next contraction tore through you. You sat up, propped on your elbows with your eyes screwed shut. Tears leaked from the corners, the wailing cutting off into wretched sobs when you felt Daryl’s forehead fall against the crown of your head, his mantra of m’sorry m’sorry m’sorry shattering you into a million shards. 
You couldn’t tell him it was okay. You couldn’t remind him why you hurt. You couldn’t reassure him that he was the one you wanted and you were more than happy to do this with him. For him. You didn’t have the breath. 
“Don’t push, Y/N. Not yet.” Hershel’s tone was even but not cruel, his gloved hands on your knees. 
“It fucking burns!” You shrieked, squeezing Daryl’s hand until you were certain you felt the bones shift. The contraction let up, the fiery sensation dulling but ever present. 
“What’s happenin’?” Daryl sounded breathless. Terrified. You were still catching your breath when you looked up at him. His tan skin was white as a sheet, no color in his lips. His blue eyes were brighter than you’d ever seen them. From tears or fear, you couldn’t be sure. 
“The baby’s in the right position. Y/N, it’ll be time to push soon. It’ll be very important for you to listen to everything I say. Can you do that?” Hershel wasn’t looking at you, between moving around things Carol was handing to him and keeping a constant eye on your progress. Distantly, you wondered why it was Carol at his side and not Maggie. Maybe because you were close with Carol? For your comfort? 
“Yeah. Yeah, I can.” You turned your attention back to Daryl when his grip on your hand loosened slightly. He swayed, the pallor of his skin growing more concerning. “Daryl?”
The archer shook his head almost violently. “M’good.”
“Okay, I just—oh, fuck, already!?” You grit your teeth as your stomach tightened, a visible shift beneath the fabric of your dress. 
“Maggie, can you climb back here?” Hershel requested calmly. His eldest said nothing but maneuvered her way into the back and on your opposite side. “I fear we may lose Daryl at any moment and Y/N will need support.”
“Ain’t goin’ nowhere.” Daryl snapped but it was a weak effort. He inhaled deeply and began squeezing your hand to keep you from dislocating his fingers. 
“Here.” Carol passed him an opened bottle of water. “Drink a few sips. You’re white as a ghost.”
You were barely aware of everything happening around you, shaking almost violently to refrain from bearing down until Hershel told you to do so. It was bordering on excruciating. 
“Jesus Christ, it feels like you’re holding a flamethrower to my fucking pussy!” 
Hershel sighed while Maggie and Carol chuckled and Daryl snorted out a quiet nice, Y/N. 
“It’s just the birth canal stretching to make room for the baby.” The veterinarian explained coolly. 
“Just?” You mocked. “Just, he says while it’s my—oh Jesus fuck!” With all the presence of mind you could summon, you managed not to start screaming at Daryl for putting you in that position. You knew that beyond the pain and fear, you wanted Thumper in your arms more than anything in that fucked up world. 
“Okay, Y/N,” Hershel patted your bare knees just at the tail end of the contraction to ensure he had your attention. You had fallen back against Maggie while Daryl held the cool cloth against the back of your neck. His hand was vibrating your skull to the point that you nearly asked him to move away. “You’re ready. On the next contraction, you need to push.”
“God, your calm voice makes me want to kick you in the teeth.” You didn’t mean it—mostly. Hershel must have known that because he chuckled. You could feel the next contraction already building when the van lurched to a stop, throwing everyone in it. 
“We got a herd in front of us!” Rick called from the front. 
“Go ‘round it! Turn ‘round! Just keep ‘em off us!” Daryl yelled as the pain peaked. “Fuck!” He bellowed when your hand began to shake with how hard you squeezed his own. 
“Push!” Hershel shouted over the bumps and jerks of the van doing whatever Rick had deemed best. “Good, good!” He began to countdown from ten while you screamed.
You were being torn open. Thumper was going to rip you in half on their way out. Your throat was raw, surely bleeding from your wails. When the old man reached one, you fell back against Maggie but Daryl’s hand was there too. 
“Maggie, Daryl, hold behind her knees. Help support her legs. It’ll keep her hips open.” Both moved forward, taking you with them to sit you up a little straighter. Daryl had to release your hand to hold you and your leg. The archer hissed with the pressure against his abused palm. “Perfect. Alright, Y/N. A nice, strong push this time.”
You almost snarled. “Last one wasn’t good enough?”
“Easy, Sunshine.” You felt Daryl's lips against your temple and yearned to keep them there. 
“I’m sorry, Hershel.” Once again, the man simply smiled. Lori had told you that childbirth in the movies was often dramatized but so far, you weren’t seeing the truth in that statement. When the contraction reached a crescendo, you leaned forward while Maggie and Daryl held your legs steady. The pain was extraordinary. You almost wished you could see what was happening, but any train of thought was derailed with Hershel’s next words.
“The baby is crowning!” 
Gasping, you swallowed hard, glancing at Daryl—who had a front row seat to what was happening—and then back to Hershel. “Crowning?”
“The head will be out soon.” 
“All this and we don’t even have the head out?!” You screeched, just as your stomach rippled into a rigid mound and you were pushing again. This pain was different. Thumper was definitely ripping you apart. “Fuck, fuck, fuck! It burns!”
“S’that—” Daryl cleared his throat and swallowed, swaying on the spot. “S’that normal?”
“Perfectly normal.” Hershel glanced up at the archer, back down, and then up again. “Carol.” He needn’t say anything else. The other woman was moving to grab the back of your leg and let Daryl fall against her so he didn’t smack his head on the side of the van.
You were completely unaware, your entire focus centered on the inferno between your legs. There was no way any woman would willingly do this unmedicated. Never in your life had you wanted drugs more than you did in that moment. Thumper. Thumper, Thumper. You chanted internally, even as your vocal chords vibrated harshly with your screams. And just as you thought you would lose consciousness from the pain, it lessened. It hadn’t disappeared but comparatively, you would take that over the prior. 
“The head is out!” 
Panting, you smiled but then fell into confusion when you saw Carol beside your leg and Daryl slumped against her. “Daryl? Daryl?!” You shifted but Maggie held you still. “Is he okay?”
“He’s fine.” Hershel chuckled. 
“Who knew a man that could gut a walker without batting an eye couldn’t watch his baby’s head come out?” Carol smiled but began to act, jerking her shoulder to jar the archer. “Daryl. Daryl, wake up. You don’t want to miss this.” He stirred and started to lean back. “Think you can take a look without losing it again?”
“Shuddup.” He shook his head hard, grunting. His hand was the first thing to move, sliding beneath Carol’s to take hold of your leg. Then he was looking at you. “M’sorry. That was—fuck, m’a pussy.” Maggie was moving your hand and pulling you forward as you watched your partner. 
Then your fingers were touching a soft, albeit slimy, head. 
You gasped. “Daryl.”
The man gulped, but then sat up on his knees a little. You watched the fear and apprehension melt away into awe, his jaw loosening, eyebrows rising, and eyes beginning to shine. “S’that—”
“That’s Thumper.” You were able to say before Hershel announced your miniscule break was over. He didn’t need to say a word, your body was already letting you know. Daryl’s hold felt stronger now and he was watching with an awestruck intensity that just made your heart want to explode even as you rode out the waves of agony. You were going to be a little family.
Then, out of the blue, you could feel something was different, wrong.
“Her—Hershel—Ow, fuck—” You fingers clawed at Daryl’s chest, his wet eyes going wide with concern. The contraction ended and you were gasping and swallowing convulsively, feeling nauseous regardless of your lack of food. Daryl’s eyes were darting back and forth between you and the old man. “Daryl, something—something’s wrong.” You could tell the baby had not moved an inch during the pushing, but not only that, it felt like they had actually pulled back toward your opening. 
“I know.” Hershel’s voice had lost the calm and was taking on an emergent edge. “The baby is stuck.”
Panic flashed over Daryl’s face in the form of anger. “The fuck ya mean stuck?!”
Still trying to catch your breath, sweat dripping into your eyes, you thought for certain Daryl was going to jump across your leg and attack the old man. Thankfully, he remained at your side. Trembling and breath stuttering, but he wasn’t moving. 
“Shoulder dystocia. The baby is turned in such a way that the shoulders can’t fit through the pelvis. Carol, I will need your help, please.” You were already on the edge of the next contraction when Hershel nearly barked “Y/N, don’t push.”
“What the fuck’re ya doin’?” Daryl snapped, leaning over your leg to investigate. So many emotions were battling for dominance in his expression that you couldn’t even begin to imagine how he was feeling.
“Daryl, please.” You pleaded, trying your hardest not to sob. For once, you cared nothing about being self-reliant or what the group thought of you and how much you needed Daryl. As you fought through the pain and against your body’s natural insistence to push, you just cried. Daryl kept a hand below your knee, too afraid to move unless Hershel gave the okay, but he leaned as far as he could to hold you without influencing your position.
“S’okay, Sunshine. S’gonna be okay.”
“Y/N, listen to me. I can feel the shoulder.” Now, the veterinarian’s tone was just downright frightening. “Maggie and Daryl are going to pull your legs back on the next contraction. I’m going to apply some pressure above your pubic bone. It’s not going to be pleasant, but if I’m correct, the head should come and then the baby. I need you to push with all you have, do you understand?”
You pressed your cheek further into Daryl’s chest and nodded, hiccuping through ragged, exhausted breaths. When the contraction began to tear through you, Maggie and Daryl reacted immediately, pulling your legs toward your belly while you curled inward with a guttural scream. Hershel pressed into the area just above your pubic bone, the pressure only compounding the whirlwind of pain you were already caught in. And then it was over and you let the two supporters take your weight.
The van rocked again, but was ignored. Hershel looked at Carol gravely and shook his head. 
“S’that ‘bout?” Daryl hissed, trying hard for your sake not to lose his cool.
“It didn’t work.” Before Daryl could speak, the old man continued. “We’re going to try one more time. If it doesn’t work, there are a couple of other things we can try but time is of the essence. The baby isn’t getting the oxygen they need like this.”
“Whatever ya gotta do. Just take care’a both’a ‘em.” 
Hershel nodded. “Alright, same thing, Y/N. A big, big push for me.”
You shook your head, exhausted. “I can’t.” You whispered, your eyelids heavy as hope attempted to flee and you accepted that once again, the world would take from you. It would take from Daryl. “I’m so tired.” You felt movement beneath your left leg and then Daryl’s hand was grasping your chin, firm but gentle. 
“Hey. Cut that shit out.” He wasn’t angry. He was using the same tone you’d heard him use when he had told Thumper to cut you some slack. When he had started communicating with the baby. “Ya’ve gone through hell an’ back for this an’ I ain’t lettin’ ya quit at the goddamn finish line, ya hear me?”
“I’m tired, Daryl.” Your face screwed up in pain as the next contraction began to build.
“Nu uh. Ya ain’t gonna bust into my life an’ fuck up my world six ways from Sunday, make me love ya an’ this kid, an’ then just give up. S’you an’ me an’ Thumper. S’what ya said!”
You blinked at him, slowly starting to sit up.
“I’ve seen ya be a badass before, Sunshine.” Your breaths were coming faster, the contraction nearly on top of you, but you only had eyes for Daryl. “Be a fuckin’ badass now.” His hand left your face and went back to your leg, pulling it toward you at the same time Maggie moved the right one. 
You screamed so loud that you were certain the rocks and bumps of the van were due to your wails alone. Something shifted, you felt it and it hurt. You were on fire and aching at the same time. When the contraction ended, you still felt painfully stretched and bruised and uncomfortable. “Did—did it work?” You panted, grasping desperately for Daryl’s shirt.
“The head is out, the shoulders are turned. One more big push, Y/N. Just one more.”
You breathed harshly through your nose, trying to amp yourself up. Maggie and Carol were throwing encouragement your way, but you didn’t hear them. You only felt Dary’s breath against your ear, his stubbled cheek rubbing against your skin.
He whispered, only for you to hear. “I love ya.” Kissing your temple, he moved back to his spot and when you looked at him, exhausted and crying, the corner of his mouth twitched and he nodded.
You could do this.
When the next contraction ripped through you, the world went silent. It was only you and the pain, white hot and all consuming. You were indeed being torn in half but if it meant Thumper would take that first breath, would open those little eyes to see the world—fucked up or not—then you would gladly be wrenched into pieces. 
The moment the baby slipped free of you, you felt the emptiness. You still hurt, but the worst of the pain was suddenly absent. Sound and sight came back to you in an onslaught that had you sucking in a breath like your lungs had been starved. 
“Is—Hershel, the baby?” You asked, trying to move as Daryl and Maggie lowered your legs. The archer was leaning across your knee. You couldn’t even tell if he was breathing, but his eyes were wide and darting. 
“Doc—”
The ferocious first cries of the distraught newborn echoed throughout the van. Maggie had moved behind you to keep you sitting up while Daryl had staggered backward and fallen on his ass against the interior wall, eyes on the little thing that Hershel was looking over intently. Maggie reached over your shoulder and began unbuttoning your dress, whispering in your ear as she moved.
“The baby needs to nurse, bond with you on your skin and it’ll help when you have to push out the placenta, okay?” You blinked at her, concerned. “It’s okay. It’s nothing like what you just went through. One or two small pushes and it’s out.”’ You nodded robotically, watching Hershel maneuver some sort of tape around a slimy cord.
Thumper was not happy. They were probably cold and that thought made your heart ache. Your baby should never be uncomfortable. Daryl was slowly, clumsily making his way toward you, but wasn’t taking his eyes off the baby. When he was sitting beside you, Hershel finally leaned over you and placed the squirming, slippery baby on your chest.
“Congratulations. You have a daughter.”
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baelabong · 22 days
Text
ᴛʀᴏᴜʙʟᴇ
ꜱᴏᴘʜᴏᴍᴏʀᴇ!ᴡᴏɴʏᴏᴜɴɢ x ꜰʀᴇꜱʜᴍᴀɴ!ꜰᴇᴍʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ
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plot: wonyoung likes you. but you’re off limits
notes: this is a LEGAL age gap yall, wony is around 20 and y/n is around 18,3k words, fluff, lowkey cliffhanger ig??
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You're in your last period of the day, calculus, and the clock seems to be moving slower than usual. Your mind drifts as you solve the problems in front of you, the equations almost too easy at this point. The steady hum of the classroom is interrupted only by the occasional tap of a pencil or the rustling of papers. You’ve always been ahead of the curve—top of your class, already accepted into an elite college. But no one ever lets you forget that you’re still just a high school student.
“Y/N,” a voice snaps you out of your thoughts. You look up to see your teacher giving you a pointed look. “I know this might be easy for you, but try to stay with us until the bell rings, alright?”
A few classmates snicker, but you just nod, giving a polite smile. You’re used to this—the subtle reminders that no matter how mature or capable you are, you’re still the youngest in the room, still the one they all see as a kid.
When the bell finally rings, you pack up your things and head out, ready to go home and unwind. But as you step into the hallway, your phone buzzes in your pocket. It’s a text from Ningning.
Ningning: Hey, I’m dragging you to a college party tonight. No excuses.
You sigh, already imagining the chaos she’s about to pull you into. You:Not really in the mood, Ning. Can’t we just hang out at your place instead?
Ningning:Nope. You need to loosen up before college. You’re always studying. Trust me, this will be fun.
You hesitate, but you know Ningning won’t take no for an answer. Before you know it, you’re agreeing to meet her later, even though you’re not expecting much from the night.
Hours later, you find yourself at the party, surrounded by people you don’t know, in a setting that feels completely foreign. The music’s loud, the lights are dim, and the air is thick with excitement and something else you can’t quite place. You stick close to Ningning, feeling out of place in a sea of unfamiliar faces.
You tug at the hem of your dress—a new one Ningning insisted you wear tonight. It’s slightly more revealing than what you’re used to, the neckline dipping a bit lower, the fabric hugging your curves in a way that feels both thrilling and uncomfortable. You’re not sure if you’re pulling it down to cover more or if you’re trying to stop yourself from fidgeting.
Ningning had assured you that you looked amazing when you reluctantly stepped out of your room earlier, but now, surrounded by college students who seem so at ease in their own skin, you feel more exposed than ever. The house is packed, bodies moving in rhythm to the heavy bass thumping through the speakers. Conversations blend into a constant buzz that you can’t quite tune into, like white noise.
Every laugh, every shout, every cheer feels distant, as if you’re watching it all from behind a glass wall. You’ve been to parties before, but nothing like this. There’s a different energy here—one that makes you feel small and out of place.
Ningning, on the other hand, is in her element. She’s chatting with a group of people, laughing easily, while you hover awkwardly by her side. You try to focus on the conversation, but your mind keeps wandering, your eyes scanning the room, taking in the unfamiliar faces, the unfamiliar space, and the unfamiliar feeling of being completely out of your depth.
Then, across the room, you see her.
She’s standing with a group of friends, effortlessly commanding attention. She’s tall, with long, dark hair that cascades over her shoulders like a waterfall, and a presence that makes it hard to look away. She’s wearing a sleek, black satin dress that clings to her figure in all the right places, the fabric shimmering under the dim lights. The dress has a daringly low neckline, and thin straps that rest delicately on her shoulders, accentuating her collarbones. A slit runs up the side, revealing just a hint of her long, toned leg as she shifts her weight.
She’s paired it with simple yet elegant accessories—a silver necklace that glints whenever she moves, and a pair of diamond-studded earrings that catch the light. Her makeup is flawless, a subtle smoky eye that adds depth to her gaze, and a deep red lipstick that makes her lips look impossibly inviting.
Your breath hitches, and you feel your heart skip a beat. There’s something about her that draws you in, something beyond just her looks. It’s the way she carries herself, the way she’s engaged in conversation, her eyes sharp and focused, yet somehow distant. She seems so much more mature, like she’s already got everything figured out while you’re still trying to find your footing.
“Who’s that?” you ask Ningning, trying to sound casual, but your voice betrays you, trembling slightly as you speak.
Ningning follows your gaze, and a smirk plays on her lips. “That’s Wonyoung. She’s a sophomore here—confident, intelligent, and as you can see, absolutely stunning.”
You swallow hard, suddenly feeling the room closing in around you. “She’s… incredible.”
Ningning chuckles, nudging you playfully. “Good luck with that one. She’s way out of our league, Y/N, and trust me, she’s off-limits.”
But as Wonyoung glances your way, locking eyes with you for just a moment.
As you gather your thoughts and muster the courage to approach her, you notice her laughter subsiding as she scans the room again. Your heart races, and just when you think about turning back, she steps away from her group of friends with an effortless grace, her eyes locked onto yours.
Wonyoung, as you now know her name, walks towards you, her confidence radiating like a beacon. A warm smile dances on her lips, and you can’t help but feel a flutter of excitement mixed with nervousness. Her presence is captivating; every small movement feels deliberate yet natural, drawing you further into her orbit.
“Hey there,” she says, her voice smooth and inviting. The sound wraps around you like a comforting blanket. “I noticed you from across the room. What’s your name?”
Your heart skips a beat at the directness of her approach. “Y/N,” you manage to say, trying to keep your voice steady despite the butterflies swarming in your stomach.
“Y/N,” she repeats, as if savoring the name. “Nice to meet you! I’m Wonyoung.” She takes a small step closer, and the world around you feels like it’s faded away, leaving just the two of you in that moment. “What brings you here tonight?”
atmosphere grows more charged.
“I’m just trying to meet new people and have some fun," you reply softly, feeling a mixture of excitement and shyness under her gaze.
“New people, huh?” Wonyoung tilts her head, a playful smile dancing on her lips. “Well, I’d say you’re doing a great job at standing out. I couldn’t help but notice you. You looked a little lost among all these partygoers.”
You let out a nervous laugh, running a hand through your hair. “Yeah, it’s a bit overwhelming for me.”
Her eyes twinkle with interest. “What do you mean? Is this your first college party? You know, it can be a bit wild. I’ve been there.”
You nod, feeling a little more comfortable. “Yeah, I- t’s a big change. I’m figuring everything out, really.”
Wonyoung leans against a nearby wall, her posture relaxed and inviting. “That’s totally normal! College is a whole new adventure. But I think you’re going to love it—especially if you keep that cute energy of yours.” Her gaze sweep over you, appreciation evident in her eyes.
You can’t help but feel flustered as you notice how she looks you up and down with intention, her eyes lingering just a moment longer on your face, making your heart race. “You really think so?” you ask, trying to fight the shyness creeping back into your voice.
“Absolutely,” she replies, her tone flirtatious. “You’ve got that special vibe, Y/N. It’s captivating.”
Feeling emboldened by her words, you decide to lean into the conversation a bit more. “What about you? You seem to be the life of the party.”
“Well,” she shrugs playfully, “I do try my best. Life’s too short not to enjoy it. Plus, it’s a great way to meet intriguing people like you.” She takes a step closer, her voice lowering. “Tell me, what do you find exciting? I want to know more about you.”
Your mind races with thoughts, but you manage to reply, “I like exploring new places, trying out different foods, and… I guess meeting people?”
“Meeting people? You mean like me?” She winks, and you can’t help but giggle nervously at her daring boldness.
“Yeah, like you,” you reply, feeling a warmth spread across your cheeks.
Wonyoung’s playful demeanor shifts subtly as she moves in a bit closer, bringing an intoxicating scent of vanilla and something floral. “Want to get away from this chaos for a bit? I need some fresh air, and I’d love to get to know you even better.”
The thrill of her attention overwhelms any lingering shyness, and you feel a flutter of excitement surge within you. “Sure, that sounds great.”
“Awesome! Let’s sneak out,” she whispers conspiratorially, grabbing your hand and guiding you through the throng of people. The moment her fingers intertwine with yours, a spark races through you, and you can’t help but steal a glance at her radiant smile.
Once outside, the cool night air hits your skin, refreshing and exhilarating. Wonyoung leads you to a quieter corner of the yard, away from the pulsating music and the din of voices. She retrieves a sleek pack of cigarettes from her bag and offers you one with a playful grin. “Do you smoke, or are you too good for it?” she teases, raising an eyebrow with a flirtatious glint in her eyes.
You shake your head, smiling despite the nervous flutter in your chest. “I don’t, but I’ll join you for the company.”
“Perfect,” Wonyoung says, her voice smooth and inviting. She lights her cigarette with a practiced flick of her lighter, and the small flame briefly illuminates her face. She takes a long, slow drag, her eyes half-closed as she savors the moment. The smoke curls lazily from her lips, drifting upward and mingling with the crisp night air. As she exhales, the smoke creates a hazy halo around her, adding an air of mystery to her already captivating presence.
She turns her gaze back to you, her eyes twinkling with mischief. “So, tell me something interesting about you—something I wouldn’t expect.”
As you share bits about your life and your transition from high school to college, Wonyoung leans in closer, her smile encouraging and flirtatious. She takes another drag, the cigarette glowing brightly against the darkness. The way she looks at you, her expression a mix of curiosity and admiration, makes your heart race.
“You’ve definitely caught my attention,” she says, her voice warm and direct. “I’m intrigued.”
Embarrassment flashes through you, and you glance down, but Wonyoung’s finger gently nudges your chin up. “Hey, don’t hide that away. It’s beautiful.”
Just then, the tension between you seems to shift. Wonyoung moves closer, her breath mingling with yours as you feel the warmth radiating from her. “You know, there’s something about you that makes me want to get even closer,” she murmurs, her voice low and smooth.
Your heart races as the space between you dwindles. “Really?” you breathe, feeling the electricity in the air.
“Really,” she replies, her gaze locking onto yours, and before you can register it, she leans in.
Her free hand settles on your waist, pulling you close. The touch is both gentle and firm, bringing you into the warmth of her embrace. Her fingers rest on your side, grounding you as if to keep you close in this quiet moment.
You look up at her, captivated by the way the moonlight softens her features and the warmth in her eyes. Everything else fades away, leaving just the two of you in this intimate space. You tilt your head up, eager to close the distance between you.
Your hands move to her arms, feeling the smooth fabric and the strength underneath. Your grip tightens slightly, showing your growing boldness, and you lean in closer. The kiss begins softly, her lips brushing against yours with a tenderness that quickens your heartbeat.
Wonyoung’s lips move slowly against yours, each touch deliberate and filled with intimacy. The kiss is a captivating mix of excitement and comfort, with you mirroring her pace, savoring each lingering caress and the warmth that builds between you.
Feeling a surge of confidence, you gently guide Wonyoung’s hand from your waist to your chest, pressing it firmly against your breast. Her hand meets your skin with a thrilling warmth, and her fingers begin to explore, first tentatively and then with increasing assurance. The sensation of her touch is both tender and firm, sending shivers through you.
Wonyoung’s fingers tighten slightly as she gently squeezes your breast. The pressure is a mix of firmness and tenderness, making you catch your breath. A soft, knowing smirk spreads across her lips, and you see the flicker of satisfaction in her eyes. Her gaze meets yours, reflecting a blend of pleasure and appreciation for the intimate shift in your connection.
The kiss deepens, and her hand continues its exploration, her movements growing more confident. You both start to breathe heavily, your breaths blending into a shared rhythm. The taste of her lips carries a faint hint of smoke from the cigarette she had been holding earlier, adding a subtle edge to the sweetness of the kiss. The lingering taste of smoke heightens the intensity of the moment.
A soft moan escapes your lips, mingling with the kiss and intensifying the connection between you. The warmth of your breath merges with hers, and you feel the sensation of your saliva mixing, binding you together in a more profound way. The kiss becomes a passionate exchange, each touch and caress drawing you closer.
Wonyoung’s hand explores further, her fingers pressing and kneading with growing confidence. Her smirk widens slightly as she feels your reaction, the playful, satisfied look in her eyes reflecting her enjoyment of the moment. The squeeze of her hand and the shared heat between you create a cocoon of intimacy, making everything else fade away.
You notice Wonyoung discreetly letting her cigarette fall from her fingers. It drops to the ground, and she steps on it, extinguishing it without breaking the kiss. The quiet act of removing the distraction is her way of signaling that you are her sole focus now.
With the cigarette discarded, Wonyoung takes an even stronger lead.
Her free hand slides from the small of your back to your ass, fingers wrapping around you with a confident, possessive grip.
The touch is firm and deliberate, pulling you closer into her embrace. You feel the heat and strength of her hand, which sends shivers through you as she presses you against her
With a smooth, deliberate movement, Wonyoung guides you backward until your back meets the cool wall. The contrast of the cool surface against her warm body heightens the sensation. Her hand moves from your waist to the back of your neck, fingers gently tangling in your hair as she deepens the kiss.
Her body presses into yours, creating a sense of closeness amidst the cool night air. Time seems to stretch, leaving just the feel of her breath, the way her body fits against yours, and the overwhelming sensation of being so close.
As Wonyoung's hand continues to explore and the kiss deepens, a sudden "Ahem" cuts through the moment. Both you and Wonyoung pull away quickly, faces flushed with surprise. Ningning stands a few feet away, her expression a mix of amusement and mild reproach.
Wonyoung, still leaning against the wall, shifts her head slightly, letting out a small, awkward chuckle. Her earlier playful demeanor fades, and she takes a step back, her gaze becoming more distant and thoughtful.
Ningning's tone is casual but pointed.
"We still need to go to Hanlim tomorrow," she says, referring to the high school you're attending despite Wonyoung and Ningning's enrollment at SNU.
The realization hits Wonyoung hard. Her eyes widen slightly as she absorbs Ningning's words, and she begins to retreat emotionally. "You're still in high school?" she asks softly, her voice carrying a mix of surprise and regret. "I didn't realize."
You nod, teeling a flush of embarrassment as the reality of the situation settles in. Wonyoung's earlier flirtatious demeanor shifts to one of reflection and discomfort. She steps away from you, her hand withdrawing from your ass, and her smile turns into a more apologetic expression.
"Yeah, I guess I got a bit carried away," Wonyoung says, her tone apologetic. "I didn't think about... well, the age difference or the fact that you're still in high school."
Ningning gives a knowing look and turns to leave, giving you both some space.
Wonyoung stands there, her expression now tinged with a mix of realization and regret. She looks at you with a sincere but regretful smile. "I'm really sorry," she says softly. "I didn't mean to overstep. I hope we can get to know each other in a more appropriate way."
Quickly bidding you a goodbye Wonyoung runs a hand through her hair while letting a heavy breath out seeing your retreating figure.
“Shit”
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whateverloomis · 3 months
Text
"Scream" (1996) meets "X" || Billy Loomis x Stu Macher x GN!AFAB reader 🔪🔞
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PART 2
A/N: I got this idea while re-watching "X" last week and I couldn't help but imagine the Scream (1996) characters combined with the movie. I had also been thinking what it would be like for Billy to fuck with Tatum so... Muahaha, here it is hoes. There will definitely be a part 2 for this because it would've been hella long if I had posted all of it. Plus, I like to do cliffhangers ;) Enjoy babes <33
Warnings: Voyeurism, mentions of cheating, making out, p in v, AFAB reader (no use of pronouns,) implied size difference, threatening, lots of teasing, poly!Ghostface, reader has pre-determined interests and outfits, Sidney is not in the story (sorry not sorry,) || Not edited
Word count: 2.8k
"Sidney doesn't know about it and she doesn't have to, simple," Billy told you while you picked some snacks from the gas station. "Besides, you're what's important here. You're the star," Stu continued, grabbing the items from your hands and walking towards the register to pay for everything.
"I mean, it's not like I care bu-" - "Then stop acting like you do," Billy interrupted and hugged you from behind, his hands squeezing your waist. You bit your bottom lip and smiled, feeling him nip at your neck softly. "Plus, after I fuck you in front of that camera you won't even remember your own name," he whispered in your ear and you craned your neck to kiss him, tongue brushing his bottom lip immediately.
"Ah ah ah, save it for the camera, kids," Stu said while walking towards you. He grabbed your face and kissed your cheek before walking out of the mini market. "Let's go babes, we have a long drive ahead of us!"
The car ride was chaotic. Stu and Tatum were making out and moaning in the back of the van while Billy sat across from them, occasionally closing his eyes to drown out the sound of the squeaky back door and his horny friends.
You were completely zoned out, looking outside at the corn field that seemed endless. You couldn't believe you were finally going to film a movie and become a star. Stu promised as much, and all his words of praise and promise excited you more every single time.
Randy was driving while singing along to a tune you didn't recognize and arguing with Tatum from time to time about how she should have some dignity and not suck her boyfriend's face in front of everyone.
He had always wanted his first film to be an artistic porno movie. It was going to be revolutionary, he said. Shown in every theater and be the number one best porn film with an actual good plot. It was everyone's big break.
Billy was in it for the money, not the fame. He didn't care if his face was recognized by any means, but if he got to fuck you and get paid for it?, he wasn't going to say no, and he didn't. You guys have been sneaking around for a while anyways, it was a matter of time before Sidney found out, so he didn't care. Not only that, but Billy supported you. He knew you had potential. He saw it, and this film? This movie was sure to raise you to fame. With those sweet moans of yours and gorgeous body. Those pretty little faces you make when he fucks you stupid. You were it.
"The fuck are you looking at?" Tatum bitched at Billy. He didn't answer her, instead he just kept staring at her, heavy eyes threatening to close once again. He smirked in amusement, Billy got a kick of bothering Tatum while doing the bare minimum.
"Fuck are you bitching at? I'm not looking at anything," he replied, rolling his eyes.
"You were looking at my tits," the blonde answered with an attitude and Billy let out a breathy laugh. "It's not my fault Stu has them out on full display for everyone to look at," he said and Stu laughed along with his friend.
Tatum rolled her eyes and adjusted her dress up her chest. "Awhh, c'mon babe don't be like that-" - "Shut up! I can't believe you want me to fuck him," the girl said and you giggled, looking back at her; "You won't regret it, trust me," you said and Stu stuck his tongue out; "Thaaat's the spirit, see Tate?" - "Ugh, I'm taking a nap," she said before laying down on the carpeted floor, legs over Stu's lap.
After nearly a 6 hour drive you finally arrived at the old ranch where you guys were going to be staying at for a few days.
As you and the group were unloading your belongings from the van, Stu walked up to the house to talk to the owner and announce your arrival.
"I told you we were coming in today pops, relax," you overheard Stu say, nervousness lacing his voice. You looked at Billy to see if he caught on to the situation and saw he was already pulling his gun out from the back of his jeans. You gasped and ran towards him, placing your hand over his to stop him from pulling the weapon all the way out.
"Don't," you whispered and gave him a worried look. He poked the inside of his left cheek with his tongue in annoyance before sliding the gun back down inside his pants and you visibly relaxed.
"You didn't tell me there were gonna be so many people!," the old man said and Stu laughed nervously; "I know I know but listen, I've got some extra," Stu paused his words and pulled out a $100 bill out of his front pocket. "There's more where that came from if y-" - "I don't need your money!," the old man interrupted and pointed a shutgun at Stu's chest. Billy reached for his weapon once again, this time not hesitating; "You better back off or el-" - "Or else what?! You kids are getting yourselves kicked out of my property if you keep-" - "LET'S, all... Calm down, yeah?," Stu said, signaling Billy to put his weapon away and smiling nervously at the old man. "Look, we need this, okay? We drove all the way over here so give us one night at least?," he reasoned, and the owner glared at everyone. "One. Then you're out of here," the old man agreed and walked past Stu, making his way down to the small wooden house all the way across the field.
You closed your eyes and sighed, giving Billy a side eye before picking up your bags and following the owner with the rest of the group.
The small wooden cabin was perfect to accommodate everyone, and had a view of the lake that was not far from it. You sat on the couch in the small living room area with Randy and Tatum. Billy and Stu stayed behind talking to the old man but you couldn't make out a single word.
"That old fuck is gonna kill us, we shouldn't stay here." Randy said, fear lacing his words.
"Randy, you know Stu is not leaving until we film this." Tatum said, defeat and annoyance written on her face. "How the hell are we filming this in one day? That's impossibl-" - "Look, I'm sure Billy and Stu are coming to terms with the owner okay? Relax." You interrupted, but you were talking to yourself more than him.
Billy had little patience for people like the owner of the farm and he was definitely going to pull that trigger without hesitation.
You were nervous. You knew he had fired that weapon before. Billy didn't like to talk about it, but you knew what he was capable of.
"Alright! We negotiated and pops played nice. We're staying the whole week like we originally planned!" Stu announced and everyone cheered except for you and Billy. You had a feeling it wasn't so easy to get the old man to give in so quickly after his aggressive behavior.
-
"Did you threaten him?" You asked. You guys were getting settled in your room and the quietness of Billy was putting you off.
"Threaten who?" Billy asked, turning around from his position in front of the window. He had been keeping an eye on the owners house for God knows how long.
"The owner. Why'd he change his mind all of a sudden?" You continued and Billy looked at you seriously a few seconds before leaning against the edge of the window and smiling softly.
"Don't worry about that old rag, we just negotiated, that's all." Billy replied and you sighed softly. "Hey, c'mon now. Everything's fine. Nothing's gonna happen to you, okay? Not while I'm here." He continued and sat next to you on the bed. You looked at him in doubt and he gave you those puppy dog eyes that drove you crazy. "C'mere" he said while patting his lap. You crawled over the bed and straddled him, the boy placing his hands on your hips instantly. "This is your moment. Your big break, I'm not gonna let that old fuck ruin it for you." He said and kissed you softly. His lips molding against yours perfectly. You relaxed against him and placed your forehead against his. "I trust you." You whispered and Billy kissed you again, this time prolonging it. You moaned softly against his lips and felt him grow hard under you. On instinct, you started to grind against his clothed cock and pull his hair, making him groan.
You gently pushed his chest to lay down on the bed. The kiss getting more heated by the second.
Billy started to run his hands under your tank top and pulled it up, exposing your tits before stopping at the sound of the door opening.
"I knew I heard freaky noises." Stu said, leaning against the door frame.
Billy sat up and placed you on the bed next to him before turning around and glaring at his friend. "Fuck off, will you? Not now." - "Awhh c'mon! Tatum just went to bed."
You couldn't help but chuckle at Stu's clear intentions. Ever since you let him join you and Billy during sex once he's been trying to get another chance, but never succeeded since then.
You grinned at both boys and walked over to Stu. You got up on your tippy toes and placed a single, slow kiss on his lips before running your hand down his chest. "You heard the man, not now." You whispered and Stu sighed in defeat. "Fuck, fine... God, you're so hot." He said and Billy smirked at the sight. He couldn't help but find it incredibly hot when you used that sexy manipulative attitude on others.
Stu walked away and you closed the door quietly, before locking it and turning around to face Billy; "Where were we?"
-
The bright sun woke you up. The sky was almost crystal clear and a beautiful pale blue. Billy was already up since Stu wanted to start filming early, and you definitely didn't want to miss it, so you got out of bed and brushed your teeth, overall freshening up to go into the next room and see if you were lucky to catch them before the camera was rolling.
You didn't bother to change your clothes or cover up. You were comfortable enough to walk around in your black thong and thin white crop top that exposed your pebbled nipples in a rather subtle, nearly classy way.
When you approached the room next door and opened it they hadn't started the filming process and you bit your lip in excitement. You really wanted to see what Billy had in store, plus Tatum is hot as fuck and you knew they'd look incredible together.
"Just in time babe, we're about to start." Stu said and Randy looked at you with a rather unamused face. He wasn't exactly too into the whole idea considering he was filming Billy cheating on his forever crush, Sidney, but he was promised thousands just by standing there with a mic so he wasn't going to say no. Plus, maybe he could get some action himself and finally lose his virginity. Randy took the bait anyways.
"Do we really have to do this?" Tatum asked Stu, rolling her eyes. She was sitting on Billy's lap facing him, wearing a short sundress without panties on. Billy had his legs bent up slightly, cupping her ass and providing steadiness while he took a puff of the joint they had all been sharing.
"Babe c'mon! It'll be quick, trust me!" Stu said, camera in hand.
"The fuck are you saying? That I won't last long like your sorry ass?" Billy said, annoyed at Stu's implication.
"With that pussy? You won't last three seco-" - "I'm literally right here, asshole!" Tatum said and threw a pillow at her boyfriend. Stu laughed and threw the pillow to the side.
"C'mon, don't be pussies and get it over with!" He said and Tatum sighed. "Okay, whatever." The girl rolled her eyes before grabbing the blunt from Billy's hands and taking a drag. She exhaled slowly and started to rub Billy over his jeans. He looked at her hands working on him and couldn't help but grow hard at the sensation.
Tatum unbuttoned his jeans just enough for his cock to spring free and she lifted her dress up slightly, rubbing her cunt over his length to lubricate both of them with her slick.
Billy's breathing picked up at her movements. Even if he didn't want to do this he couldn't deny that she felt good against him.
Grabbing her hips, he positioned her right over the tip of his cock and she sat on his length slowly, swallowing every inch inside her tight pussy. Billy released a hiss at the feeling of her cunt wrapping around him. Stu was right, he wasn't going to last long with how wet and snug her little pussy was.
"Now ride him and do your best show for me baby" Stu whispered and she started to move.
Jumping up and down on Billy's cock she moaned pornographically. "Yes! Fuck yes! Pleaseeee" She said and Billy held her hips tighter, releasing inevitable grunts. He couldn't lie to himself, her tits bouncing right in front of his face looked way too good for him to deny it.
"Fuck" He whispered and started to thrust up, practically using Tatum in order to get off quickly. The blonde moaned loudly, this time it was legit. Billy's cock felt good as he fucked her from below and she could feel him growing bigger inside her, signaling he was going to cum any second.
They both couldn't help but moan in unison. Sex is sex, and it didn't matter to them at that point, they were only focusing on the pleasure.
"Fuck, I'm gonna cum..." Billy said softly and Tatum continued her show for the camera, however she also wanted to rile Billy up just a bit before finishing. She was having fun. "Ahh yes, cum inside me pleaseee" Tatum practically screamed and that did it for him. Billy exploded inside of Tatum and rode his high quickly before pulling out and throwing his head back on the pillow.
Tatum collapsed next to him, cum dripping out of her puffy pussy. Stu pointed the camera between her legs to get a good shot at Billy's seed spilling out of her before stopping.
"Man, that was kinda hot." - "Shut up asshole." Billy said rolling his eyes before taking another drag from the blunt that was on the ashtray next to the bed.
"Oh my Gosh you guys looked so good." You said while looking at the footage in Stu's camera. You could feel yourself growing wet at the sight of Billy and Tatum fucking.
You took a glance at Billy and he was smirking at you. He couldn't wait to get his hands on you next inside the barn and fuck you raw until you came around his thick cock.
You noticed Randy shifting rather uncomfortably and laughed softly. He was hard and having problems hiding it.
"You good, Randy? Looks like you enjoyed the show." You said teasingly and he blushed, excusing himself.
Stu stuck his tongue out and chuckled at his friend getting hard because of the scene that was filmed. "This is gonna be so revolutionary guys, I can already taste the millions."
-
Before getting ready for dinner and discussing your big scene with Billy, you decided to go for a swim in the lake.
The sunset was approaching and the rays of light were glistening over the water. The wind created little ripples that made it look deliciously refreshing.
You decided to skinny dip since the area was alone, but you didn't really care if anyone saw you.
As you were taking your panties off, you noticed the string of slick that connected the fabric to your cunt. You moaned as you felt the cool air brush against your skin and couldn't help but run your fingers between your legs.
"Fuck..." you whispered to yourself, and trailed your hand up your body to spread your wetness over your pebbled nipples.
You thought about how your scene with Billy would be like. The rush of excitement ran over your body and you started to swing your hips while playing with your tits out in the open.
You chuckled to yourself and were spinning slowly until you were met with Billy's gaze. He was standing on the other edge of the small boardwalk, enjoying the view.
"Mind if I join you?" He said teasingly while walking towards you. You bit your lip and looked at his bulge shamelessly.
"Not at all." You answered and he placed his hands over your waist, squeezing the flesh. "You look so fucking good all alone out here. Naked. Vulnerable." Billy whispered and you couldn't help but release a little whimper.
"I'm gonna fuck you so good for the camera tomorrow."
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sugugasm · 1 year
Text
#1 : SLUT CERTIFIED ! — eren yaeger
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꒱ ➛ CHAPTER SYNOPSIS : eren’s first favor.
˚◞♡ who ?? : eren yaeger x black fem! reader
˚◞♡ word count : 8.2K ( i am so sorry )
˚◞♡ chapter warnings : minors DO NOT interact, mentions of female anatomy, fem! reader using she/her pronouns, somewhat bimbo reader ??? mentions of asshole connie, mentions of player! connie ( i’m sorry ), use of profanity, oral penetration, cunninlingus, body worship, fingering, pet names such as [ mama, baby, angel ] slow-paced smut, a little bit of a cliffhanger.
˚◞♡ author’s note : NUMBER ONE — i am so sorry for posting this so late. i ended up re-writing the entire thing many times but i have a good feeling ab this ver. BUT ANYWAY !!!! first chapter !!! yayyy !! i’m very exited to share this with you alllll <3 i appreciate the amount of support you’ve given me before this was released and i love u for it 🫶🏽 anyways, excuse any mistakes or typos !! i hope you enjoy. reblogs n interactions are deeply loved <33
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the typical friday night lights of the city shined brightly through eren’s studio apartment. nothing but the sound of livid drivers behind their steering wheels and the occasional dog barking at whomever may pass by. not to mention you — his best friend ; sitting next to him with a burning blunt plied between your fingers as your eyes intensely gaze at the soothing window view.
although, you didn’t exactly look so soothed.
there was a look of a apprehension pervading your features, almost as if you were deep in thought. eren sets his jaded irises on you and the small smile that once stretched across his lips fades.
“uh, you good?”
your eyes trail over when you take heed to his question, w taking a breath before looking at him with hopeful eyes. usually, you didn’t find yourself having such a challenging time when asking eren anything, but as of right now, the next few sentences you say may or may not tarnish your friendship.
“i’m fine. i um.. i just don’t know how to really ask you this,” you confess. eren then turns his rested head towards you, eyes looking at you with scrutiny as he tries to piece together what exactly that little mind of yours was thinking.
“talk to me, what’s wrong? i do somethin’ again?” you rashly shake your head from side to side, grabbing his hands in yours and squeezing as you nervously laugh —
“you know your friend connie, right?”
the audible groan that leaves eren’s lips is priceless, and so was the look on his face, “you mean the annoying bald motherfucker from high school that won’t leave me alone? hm, the name doesn’t really ring a bell.”
well if that wasn’t obvious enough, yes, they knew each other. they’d been friends for a while now. you can recall first meeting connie during your junior year of high school ; eren introducing you at a house party your devious asses had no business being at. he was cute, and even a little funny, but you’d never really paid attention to him until a few months ago.
him now being in his twenties meant you got to see him grow to cover his body with ink — his arms and legs. and you most definitely couldn’t forget the amount of muscle he’d gained just over a year after graduating high school. point being, he was just your type. and you were his. that’s why it didn’t take very long for you two to begin talking. but of course, after a few dates and many, many occasions of giving him severe blue balls, you figured it was finally time to step it up a notch.
“well you know we’ve been talking for a while now..and we’ve been planning to go out of the city for a little vaycay and i was thinking that maybe it was time he and I could take our relationship to the next — “
“for him to fuck you and break up with you like he did that one girl last year? nah. not lettin’ you do that.” he interrupts you before you could even begin to finish, shaking his head from side to side as he focuses his attention back to the moving city outside the window.
you could say he was being harsh, but at the end of the day, eren knew him better than you did — regardless of being familiar with one another since the early age of fourteen. connie was a heartbreaker. a true player at heart.
that boy couldn’t keep a woman for longer than a month before tossing her to the side as if she was some accessory — many of those women being too good to for him to begin with.
women like you.
the women who were too kind for their own good. the women who never failed to put a smile on a saddened face with just a few simple words. you were the type of woman he’d easily break — and that was just something eren couldn’t bare to swallow. but alas, who was he to judge? he just wanted to see you happy — that was his one and only concern, and if this whole ordeal would succeed that goal, he has no problem doing whatever he can to get you there.
“i wasn’t asking for your permission. i just needed your help, but i guess it’s useless to ask now.” the look of lost hope on your face pulls at eren’s heartstrings, him almost immediately exhaling and rolling at eyes at the sight of your pleading yet condescending gaze.
“jesus, what do you want? advice? intel? a wing man—“
“i want you to teach me how to fuck.”
it took everything in him not to laugh because the more he held your gaze, the more he realized you were genuinely being serious. eren’s eyes nearly pop out of his skull. you stare, waiting for his response as he gives you an intrigued looked rather than a confused one, “i think you need to elaborate. that’s a crazy sentence to say.”
“y’know, like blowjo —“
“i know what sex is, yn.”
you and the word ‘fuck’ had never been been a thought in eren’s mind up until now, so to know he’d be the one seeing you bare for the first time was definitely…mind boggling. seriously, the closest eren has come to even seeing a glimpse of you would have to be when you went scuba diving in miami for your nineteenth birthday — and even then, you were still somewhat clothed.
“i know it’s weird and i completely get it if you aren’t comfortable with —“
“i mean..i don’t really mind teaching you. i’d rather you learn from me rather than a lame ass porno.”
that was a response you weren’t expecting. you’d made sure to prepare yourself for rejection when you came over, but eren had proved you wrong. he didn’t seem to be phased — a resting grin on his face whilst you fully comprehend his answer.
“wait — really?”
he nods, shrugging his broad shoulders, “yeah? it’s not like we like each other or somethin.’ just think of it as my favor to you.” eren motions his fingers for you to pass him the blunt, but you nearly drop it from your fingers as you toss your arms around his neck — embracing him tightly as you whisper a stream of ‘thank yous’ into his neck.
you feel eren’s palms trail up and down your spine, rubbing the small of your back. he laughs at your excitement, “what’s connie gonna’ think about all this, hm?” he questions — validly questions. of course he didn’t like the guy, but he still needed some source of clarity. his days of fucking someone else’s girl were long gone and he’d never step foot into that life ever again. it was too messy.
“he doesn’t know he’d be my first — well, second..besides you. plus, he said it himself : we’re not official! it’s not wrong to see other people,” you casually say this as if you hadn’t just admitted to connie openly voicing that he was playing you, but then again, if you didn’t see an issue, neither did eren.
“yeah, i bet he did say that.”
“oh don’t be like that. you’re such a hater — he is your friend after all,” you poke at his bicep teasingly, amused at the side eye he sends you. you knew eren and connie relationship wasn’t the absolute best — frenemies you’d like to call it. they had their good days, and their bad ones, but you knew, on the outside looking in, it was endless love for one another all around.
“he’s an acquaintance.”
your eyes roll and you huff, “whatever. when do you wanna do this? i leave for the trip in a few weeks. i wanna’ be as ready as possible before then.”
“well, i gotta’ meet up with jean and armin for poker tomorrow night, but after that i’m free if you —“
“great. we’ll start tomorrow. and poker? what are you, old men?”
“oh hush, you like to knit.”
you shove him and you both begin burst out in laughter. the rest of the night was spent doing what you and eren would normally do — watching movies, chatting amongst yourselves and every now and then, casually bickering like an old married couple over the silliest of things.
but these innocent gestures would soon hold a brand new meaning in such a short amount of time. neither of you realized the mistake you were about to make. the days of occasional i love you’s and holding hands out of comfort were long gone now.
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saturday night at armin’s ; a night looked forward to by most —most meaning eren and eren only. there was no better feeling than getting together with his closest friends to trash talk, share a few glasses of rum, and catch up on whatever life had thrown at one another throughout the week.
but what he loved most watching the look of defeat on jean’s face when eren finally placed his last chips. it was a scene he’d pay for.
“you’re a fuckin’ cheater.”
eren laughs, stretching his arms across the table and pulling the pile of neatly stacked chips toward himself. he takes a moment to look over at armin who has his phone out recording jean’s rage all the while chuckling tauntingly under his breath.
“hating the player when you should be hating the game. that’s crazy.”
“fuck you,” jean mumbles. eren steers his attention away from the grown man’s mini tantrum when he hears an angry knock at armin’s door. heads turn in unison, “damn armin. forgot you had a girl comin’ over tonight or something?” the blonde rises from his seat, walking over to take a look at the peephole to reveal a standing connie in front of the door, “it’s just con, guys.” the door is pulled open, and at the sound of connie’s name eren could already feel himself tuning everyone out.
the sound of connie’s voice alone was enough to make eren want to gather his keys and satchel to make a run for it, but it was nowhere near the time to meet with you.
“its about time y’all answer the fuckin’ door. i’ve been knocking and waiting for like thirty minutes now,” this was a lie. poker always started at seven, and it was now thirty past nine.
“you’re late,” eren huffs. connie gives him the finger, scoffing as he makes his way over to the table, “where were you?” eren sounded like a stern parent scolding their child, but at the end of the day, there was something off about connie in this moment that was shifting his mood from solemn to easily irritable.
“damn, am i not allowed to oversleep every once in a while?” oversleep eren’s ass. the purple and blueish colored bruises beginning to taint connie’s neck said otherwise. he’d obviously been acting on that ‘seeing other people’ bullshit he fed you — and if eren was being honest, the lack of coverage showed just how little he respected you.
eren conjures a smug laugh, “oversleeping huh?” jean does the same, vividly noticing the markings as his eyes peer over to the exact spot as eren’s, “more like fucking. i see you and yn are becoming pretty close, huh ?” he asks.
“y-yeah, yeah. she’s great, man.”
“just great? you’ve been talking for like four or five months now,” armin chimes in, and thank the heavens above that he did. it was evident that the group as a collective were well aware of connie’s shitty behavior.
“i mean…it’s nothin’ too serious. she’s cute, for real. we’re just taking it slow.” nothing too serious? for christ’s sake, he was planning a getaway with you in a few weeks. it’s like all of this was just a little game of cat and mouse to him. you’d think connie being aware of how tightly knit you and eren were would give him some sort of change at heart, but nope — that was just connie for you.
eren could practically feel the blood pumping through his veins. he rolls his tongue around the inside of his cheek, tapping lightly onto the wooden table with a deep mug twisting his chiseled features.
“i think ima’ call it a night,” eren voices, rising from his reclined position slowly while avoiding eye contact, “i have some shit to do.” shit to do meaning heading towards your place earlier than he should be. he couldn’t stand to be around connie and his ignorance. it was depriving and overall time consuming.
“the fuck? i just got here, eren,” connie scoffs, but eren doesn’t stick around long enough to hear the bass in his voice rise to a T. the door slams behind him, eren now making his way out of the door and down the hall to head for his black mustang parked out front. the skin of his cheeks and the tips of his ears flushed pink with a crack of discomfort bubbling inside of him.
the moment he unlocked his car doors and hopped in, he didn’t know if the adrenaline was getting to him or just the sheer fact that he liked the taste of making connie angry, but that whole interaction just made him all more enthused to see you.
no matter how much you liked connie or how much you cared about a potential relationship with him, he couldn’t beat the fact that eren would easily treat and fuck you way better than he ever could — hypothetically speaking, of course.
and that’s why, the only thought on his mind was to make tonight a moment you’ll never forget.
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with a day consisted of excruciatingly long lectures and excessive amounts of homework given by your professors, you could finally find yourself prancing down your apartment hallway, eager to enter your home to prepare for what the night had in store.
you fumble with the keys on your baby-pink lanyard, specially made for you and given to you by eren for your birthday one year. the sound of your living room television could be faintly heard resonating through the wood as you started to unlock your door. you furrow your brows since you know for a fact that you made sure to turn it off before you departed earlier this morning.
your hand twists at the nob, the fingers of your opposite hand clutching tightly onto your pepper spray, but to your surprise — you quickly feel a sense of relief travel through your body as you see none other than eren. his legs spread, arms behind his head as he lounges on your white couch which a bowl of half eaten ice cream resting on the coffee table before him.
to say he startled you would be an understatement, but the sound of your keys jangling did just about the same to him : his head almost immediately turning toward the door to face you.
“what are you doing here, ren? and how the fuck did you even get—“
“you gave me a key, remember?” he asks, pointing to his neatly hung set of keys on the coat hook beside the front door. as soon as you turn to look in that way, his lifeless lips start to smile and he begins to giggle at your confusion, “damn, about to pepper spray me and everything, huh?” he quips.
you simply plop down next to him, sinking into the warmth of the sofa as his arm gently moves to rest behind your head, “you’re the one who can’t send a damn text. it would’ve been nice to have a heads up, ren,” he smiles at your tone ; sounding just like his mother, carla, when she used to yell at him for being a sneak.
ah, what a time.
“i thought it was poker night. i didn’t think i’d see you until ten,” your inquiry was enough to make eren riled up all over again, but for your sake, he chooses to leave out the part where he nearly wanted to slap your potential partner across his face.
“i kept winning, so i left. it got boring.”
eren’s blatant lie didn’t seem to phase you. in fact, you seemed to have easily glossed over his sorry excuse of a response, and instead choosing to gush over the possibility of him seeing connie.
“was con there? did he say anything about me?” you giddily ask, a smile complimenting your dilated pupils with just the mention of his name. eren only sheepishly grins, “yeah, he was there alright. called you cute too.”
eren barely cracks a smile at this, seeing how effortlessly your face lit up at the sound of the bare minimum. poor, sweet, innocent yn — too blinded to realize the boy you spoke so highly of only used a simple sentence when speaking of you. it was sad almost, seeing you be so naïve. but then again, telling you wouldn’t make a difference — it would only start an argument.
“he’s so sweet. i think he gets nervous in front of you guys…y’know, when he talks about me.”
“…right.” eren decides to navigate the conversation elsewhere, “so..did you wanna’ get some food or something before we start or..”
“don’t be so awkward, eren,” you laugh. you squeeze his bicep consolingly, “i’m gonna’ go freshen up a bit and then we can get going. it’s been a long day.” you tread off toward your room, shutting the door behind you and leaving eren alone on your living room couch.
for some odd reason, eren found himself to be more nervous than he was when he first entered. he didn’t know if it was the mystery of it all or the simple fact that he would be seeing you naked for the first time, but his heart was damn near beating out of his chest.
the scuffling sounds coming from your bedroom only induces his anxious heart, eyes directing their attention toward howl’s moving castle playing quietly on the tv.
“eren! can you come in here for a minute?” he hears your soft voice call out from behind the door. eren blinks a few times, confused on why you hadn’t just come out yet, but the moment he opens the door to your room — he knows.
there you were, standing in the connected bathroom in front of the mirror, adjusting and shifting your waist length faux locs from one side to the other. your body was decorated in a pink, two piece lingerie set. he’s stunned to say the least, eyes tracing the outline of your figure — picking and observing the small tattoos sitting just above your ass and right below your left thigh.
“eren? you with me?” your question snaps him out of your forbidden trance. eren clears his throat, running a hand down his chest in a self-comforting manner. it takes everything in him to control the arousal forming in his pants. there was no denying it — you were fucking gorgeous, but this wasn’t a regular hookup and you weren’t just a regular girl.
you were his best friend and right now, the hard cock in his pants is thinking otherwise.
“y-yeah, i’m with you. i’m right here.” you don’t see the way his eyes look you up and down, nor do you see him sucking on his bottom lip while doing so. instead, your focus is on the inner thoughts in your head, pondering about if your choice of attire was overdone.
“is it too much? i saw it at the mall earlier today after class and i thought it would be fitting —“ he cuts you off before you could even dare finish that sentence.
“nah, you..,” he takes a moment, looking at you in awe as if he’d just seen an angel, “you look beautiful.” you don’t perceive the smoothness of his voice but it’s there. it’s so obviously there, and you’re so obviously breathtaking.
face bare, lips coated in a thin layer of lipgloss and smelling as if you’d just showered in roses — like said, breathtaking.
“i-im sorry. i can take it off if it makes you uncomfortable —“
“no.” that slips out faster than he intended, but he didn’t care. it got his point across simple enough. you laugh, turning to your left to finally come face to face with him, only to dig eren in a deeper hole than he was already in.
“well..i’m ready when you are,” you announce. seeming to be all around enthused about this, you take a few steps closer, inching forward to the point where you’re arms length away. eren still stands there, quiet with gentle eyes as he grips the top ledge of the doorframe. you hear his breathing become unsteady, almost as if he’d lost that smooth talking, serenading attitude he once carried.
he felt like the virgin here.
“are you nervous?” you ask, studying the way his eyes pierce while he stares at your lips, “we can stop before it starts.”
with he way he was feeling, a wise man would’ve called it all off, but eren…eren needed needed you. he needed to touch you, to feel you, to please you in some way — beyond the act of just giving you guidance.
he answers your question with a question, “are you?” you shake your head, rocking back and forth on the heels of your feet as you wait for his next statement.
but his next move surprises you.
without hesitation, you watch as eren towers over you, taking his thumb and index to lift your chin — letting you naturally meet his alluring gaze, “can i kiss you, yn?” the moment you begin to nod is the same exact moment when his lips brush against your own. the contact almost shocking the both of you as a small gasp leaves your mouth, and his stuttered hand grasps the side of your neck.
eren was kissing you. he was kissing you as if you’d easily break under his touch. the butterflies in your stomach begin to flip. by default, you close your eyes and fall into it — moving along and following his soft yet hungry pace.
it was funny. it was like you were kissing each other as if you’d been waiting to do so your entire lives. considering you’d always deemed eren as attractive and an overall somewhat decent man, the thought of him giving you butterflies had never occurred.
if anything, those same butterflies were present while you spent time with connie, but never ever have they fluttered like this. maybe it was the heat of the moment, or maybe it was just an effort to set the mood, but this felt like an eternity you’d never wish to end.
his hand was incredibly light against your neck, giving you a distinct chill as the one creeping down your waist sends an unfamiliar shiver elsewhere. as the kiss gradually intensifies, over the course of a few seconds, reaching its peak, he then sucks on your bottom lip. pulling and yanking on it like he was in dire need of more — which he was.
he’s groaning, he’s hard, and most importantly, he’s infatuated. your lips felt like heaven against his, so plush and so comforting. eren was so lost in you that he couldn’t even begin to fathom the consequences that may come.
“y-you can touch me some more,” you mumble in between breaths — and that was all he needed.
“where…tell me where, baby.”
baby — a word you thought you never hear coming out of eren’s mouth when referring to you. it didn’t make you contemplate much though, it was hard to think about anything at all once you felt his hands grip and mush at your backside. he fondles it in his palms, letting your skin mold into his hands.
“i more, ren. more please…”
he hears you, he hears you so clearly — and he wants more of you too, “what, hm? want me to touch you here?” you feel his hand sneak around toward your inner thigh, fingers tips grazing the area near your pussy. you let out an unexpected sigh of pleasure.
“an important part of intimacy is what makes you feel good. so tell me, what feels good to you, yn?” eren appeared to look and sound more confident than he felt.
“h-here. here feels good.” you gesture toward your pretty pink underwear that had been fighting to be taken off for the last five minutes. eren was just as ready as you were, waiting for the moment you were comfortable enough to allow him to please you like he was itching to.
“yeah, you like touching yourself there don’t you?”
“y-yes,”
“you want me to touch you there?”
there should be a world record for how quickly you whimper ‘yes’ under your breath. the same goes for how quickly eren scoops you from the floor, cupping his hands underneath the back of your thighs as he carries you in his arms toward your bed. eren lays you on your back, your spine hitting the fluffed sheets of your mattress. as much as he wanted you right then and there, the thought of your innocence comes back to mind.
this was your first time.
“we’ll take it slow, alright?” he asks, and when he doesn’t hear a response from you he becomes worried. the energy shifts from hot and hasty to nerve wracking and what the fuck am i doing, and it’s evident, “do you wanna’ stop? we can forget that shit in the bathroom ever happened, okay? i don’t mind—“
“no! no, it’s..it’s okay, ren. really, i’m just a bit nervous that’s all.”
you weren’t lying. you were more than comfortable with him being the one to do this. in truth, you were more turned on than you’ve ever been, but then again this was all so surreal. the boy you’ve called best friend your entire life was about to be the first to see you in such a personal way.
there were so many what ifs — too many to count on your own two hands. what if there was a possibility he gets uninterested mid-way through? what if he was judgmental of the way you looked? what if he lies about your anatomy just to spare you the embarrassment?
these were all the things you’d thought of, but these were also all of the things that eren would never in a million fucking years do.
“nervous? of me?”
“it’s just, you’re the only one who’s ever…seen down there and i don’t know if —“
“look at me.” his hands travel up and down your thighs, comforting and soothing your jitters as you fight the intense amount of eye contact he was throwing your way, “can you look at me, please?” eren’s treasuring voice allows you to relax a bit, your eyes meeting his.
“you’re an angel — an absolute angel. you have nothing to be ashamed of. especially in front of me, okay?” you nod, breath remaining steady after hearing his words of encouragement. you shoot him that sweet, signature smile, allowing him to wipe away the small tear that’d fallen down your cheek.
“you’re too pretty to be cryin’ like that. worrying over nothing. lemme’ make you feel better..”
you let your back fall back onto your bed once again, watching as eren lowers down onto his knees while coming face to face with your cunt, “spread your legs for me,” he kindly orders. eren has no problem helping you do so, lifting your squished thighs onto his shoulders while your ass hangs off of the bed.
he takes the hair tie around his wrist and gathers his hair back, pulling his strands into a low, loose bun to the back of his head. there were a few more pieces of small hairs that scattered across his hairline, making him look all the more handsome than he already did.
“ready?”
you nod.
“if there’s ever a time where you want me to stop, don’t hesitate to tell me.”
you wished you could’ve captured the look on his face on camera, cause it was definitely a sight to remember. you hadn’t seen his cheeks this red since he peed himself in front of his crush in the second grade.
“can i take these off?” these referring to your underwear. the same pair underwear that reveal a damp patch in the middle now that eren was really looking at them. once you voice a simple yes, he takes a second to admire you. running his fingers along the waistband, eyes roaming all over with no clue what they should look at first. you were too pretty — too lovely for him to even begin comprehending.
eren hears you lightly groan, and he begins to pry your underwear off, but he does this slowly — so slowly that it’s almost unbearable for you. he was moving as if you were a brittle creature in danger of being easily corrupted ; which you were, and that’s when he felt the need to pinch himself. seeing your hips lurch around in an effort to get him to move faster was one of the cutest things eren’s ever laid his eyes on.
there was no way he was in this position right now. kneeled in front of you with your bare cunt staring back at him, your folds sleek with your own liquid bliss dripping from them like honey on a comb. to put it short, you looked good enough to eat — and that’s exactly what eren was going to do : devour you like you were the last meal he’d ever be able to taste.
he kisses your inner thighs, the intention of leaving marks becoming prevalent as he makes his way down toward your pussy, “you ever play with yourself?” eren was so close — close enough for you to be able to feel his breath on your clit, tickling you.
“s-sometimes,” you couldn’t look at him. not when he’s on his knees and touching you like this. he hadn’t even begun the action and you were already losing hope in the idea of you being able to keep your composure.
“ever had someone do it for you?”
with unsteady breaths leaving your lips, you choose to answer honestly, “no.” he chuckles, taking his thumb and unexpectedly grazing it over your clit. you nearly jolt at the feeling. given you’ve been the only one with the access down there, it felt much different feeling someone else’s hand.
“i can tell. look at how responsive you are, mama.” he sounded fascinated, flicking you gently just to get you used to the sensation. you felt so sensitive, so fragile — and that wouldn’t even be the be the end of it, “and this pussy’s so fuckin’ wet..”
“erenn… wanna — i wanna’ feel more!”
“what, hm? more what?” he keeps at the slow pace of his thumb, not stopping or increasing until he hears your next few words fill his ears and shoot straight to his pants.
“your mouth..wanna’ feel your mouth, ren. please?” you say this as if he didn’t look like he was sitting on the edge of his seat just waiting for you to grant him the access. it doesn’t take any further words for eren to latch his mouth onto your pussy slowly. he makes an introduction with small pecks to your visibly puffy clit, making sure to pay attention to the way your body reacted to the simple touch.
he watches your belly rise up and down from the snag in your pattern of breath. once he sees you begin to grow comfortable, he makes the jump to lay his tongue flat against your pussy, licking a long stripe against your core and letting the sticky salvia from his mouth lubricate you.
“ooh – fuck!” you whimper, quickly covering your mouth once realizing what’d slipped out. eren sees this, reaching his hand out for you to grab before taking his mouth off of you for a split second.
“don’t do that shit. i wanna’ hear you.”
he resumes, pressing the bridge of his nose against your clit and licking your folds to create a sort of double penetration. you feel the texture of his tongue tickling your labia, applying minimum pressure to ensure a pleasurable stream of delight traveling through your belly, “feels s-so good. you’re so fucking good at tha – nnn!” when eren starts to feel himself losing his breath, he comes up for air, just to see you now resting on your elbows and looking down at him with quizzical eyes. he’d never seen you look so happy.
there was sweat beaming from your forehead and a bit of it forming on your upper lip, the lips that which eren was fighting the urge to kiss. your bra strap had slipped down a bit, now resting on your upper arm and exposing a bit of your nipple that slipped from the cup.
“w-why’d you stop?” you ask, hyperventilating. eren rests his head against the inner flesh of your thigh, looking as dazed as ever.
“i-im sorry, you just look…so pretty.”
this wasn’t out of the norm. eren always made it a goal to uplift you whenever he could, but there was something about the deliverance of that sentence that sent your mind into a never-ending frenzy. it was hard to believe that this was anything more than just a simple gesture to really get himself into character with the heart shaped desire he carried in his eyes.
“you look pretty too,” the echo in your head must’ve been deceiving you. you’d hoped to keep that one to yourself but the look on his face told you that he’d definitely heard you say that out loud.
“yeah? bet you wonder what else i look pretty doin’ don’t you?”
a smug grin appears on his lips, but the teasing remark did no justice for how he truly felt. instead, he just decides to show you ; placing his mouth back into your pussy with little to no remorse with his tongue this time. your hands magically find their way to his hair, running your nails through his scalp as you balance your upper body with one elbow. eren groans into you, the sound reverberating through your core and shaking you a bit.
at one point, his fingers brush past your hole, earning a loud unexpected moan from you. this shocks him, almost as much as it shocks you. you didn’t know why, but there was a sense of urgency pumping through your veins. you wanted more — more than what he was already giving you after you’d asked the first time.
“oh? you want a finger, don’t you?”
“mmfuck – yes! yes, just, do something eren, please!” you beg. your back arches from the sheets, fists bawling with anticipation. eren stands onto his feet and finds a seat on the bed. his back now rests against the headboard, eren’s chest heaving as he motions his index and middle finger in a ‘come here’ motion.
you hesitate at first, not sure exactly where he wants you until he’s pulling you into the space between his thighs. you instantly feel the warmth as you collide with his tank top covered chest. he was so much larger than you — and well, that’s the benefit of having a best friend that stood tall at a whopping 6’3.
“lemme’ see that pussy,” eren orders and you oblige quickly, parting your thighs for him once again while his chin sits in the crook of your neck, “isn’t she pretty, look at her..” you feel his hand grasping on your jaw softly, directing your focus to the soppy, wet cunt between your legs.
you were still so wet. wet enough to feel your essence dripping down your crack and onto your bed. you were messy but you wanted to be messier — you wanted to feel messier.
and he reads your thoughts before you even have to say a damn thing.
“you want me to play with you, hm? teach you how to take fingers before takin’ dick, is that right?”
“ren, just do something –“
“answer me, baby. don’t be shy. this is about you and what you want. so why don’t you just tell me what it is you want from me?” the room felt hot, and the air felt thick. the only contact between you both being your back against eren’s chest and his hand casually caressing your tummy, “p-put them in. god – just put them the fuck in,” you whine. eren’s chest fumbled with a laugh and he gives the side of your forehead a quick kiss.
“there she is.”
goosebumps pattern your chestnut skin when you finally feel his hand inching toward your pussy. you carefully watch, mouth held agape and your eyes batting shut the moment his fingers move in a counterclockwise motion against your agitated clit.
“gotta’ prep you some more, okay? i don’t wanna’ hurt you.” oh, right, pain. you’d been so blindsided by the pleasure that you’d forgotten that this in fact was not the simplest of processes.
eren keeps rubbing your clit, his eyes piercing into the side of your skull as he does this. you take a second to observe the veins that decorated his forearms. blue and greenish lines hiking from his wrist to his inner elbow. you’d always thought he had the prettiest hands. so neatly manicured and topped with a thick coat of clear polish — a pink color if you’d volunteer to paint them for him.
you don’t know why, but all of this made you crave him — badly. you turn your head, wandering eyes finding his. you stare at him, then his lips, then him again. he looked so kissable.
you just had to do it.
leaning in, you take in his musky scent and it lures you in closer. so close to where you’re practically poking your lips out to get him to kiss you back — and he does. for the second time tonight, your heart bursts with excitement feeling his lips on yours. you place your hands on his thighs, grinding along with his fingers, “i think i’m wet enough,” you mumble. he looks down, seeing that — you were indeed wet enough. your slick covered the majority of his fingers and your pulsing pussy felt like it was just about ready to give up on its orgasm.
“i think so too,” he pauses the motion, hovering his middle finger over your hole, and begins to softly lubricate the area with your own mess, “it’ll be uncomfortable at first. body isn’t used to being stretched, y’know?” eren pauses, lips coming close to your ear as he whispers, “but i’ll break you in…and i’ll do it so good…and you’re gonna’ tell me just how good it feels, okay?”
that sentence alone got you wetter, and eren feels this — literally. he kisses your temple over and over as he slowly begins to push his finger inside of you, “don’t look away, you’ll miss how good you’re doing..” you clench onto his opposite arm ; the one that wasn’t busy giving you a bit of discomfort, and you bite down on your bottom lip.
it was one finger, and you’d been used to that. you’d done it to yourself maybe once or twice, but you’ve never gotten any sort of pleasure out of doing so. but now, it felt so different — the slow in and out, in and out, pace. his finger pushing and gliding along your snugged walls while he licks and nips at your neck and ear. it felt amazing.
“f-fuck eren, so…so good,” your breathless chest rises and falls, nipples as hard as they’ve ever been — needing to be touched. your hand slowly creeps up to touch one of your needy tits, gripping and mounding it in your hand slowly while pulling your nipples between your fingers.
he’s watching you — studying you, actually. this wasn’t just a learning experience for you, but for him as well. eren was learning exactly how to navigate your body. he knew which itches to scratch and what barriers you’d overcome. he got to see you in your purest form — carefree and exhilarated.
“y’know…the human body is a temple, yn,” eren begins, resting his head on your shoulder as he wraps his other arm across your chest, pulling you in tightly, “only the worthiest of men should be able to touch you like this.” you didn’t know where he was going with this, and you didn’t know why it was giving you the feeling it was, but you wouldn’t stop it even if you had the option to. his finger felt too good. you wanted — no, you needed another.
“so, what makes me so worthy, baby?”
“b-because i trust you.”
you feel the pressure of another finger slowly making its move to inch it’s way in — eren holding back until you give him the green light to even try, “yeah? you trust me to do this too?” he asks, pushing the second finger past your barricade as gently as he could. he didn’t lie, the stinging discomfort was nothing to mess with — but you wanted it.
“sh-shit eren!
you wanted to feel him stuff you full.
you clench your eyes shut, face scrunching up as you whine a bit at the temporary pain, “you’re doing good, yn. you’re bein’ such a good girl..”
that opened you up more. able to get better access to you, eren’s fingers moving together as one eventually became pleasurable. the uncomfortable feeling had subsided and somehow turned into an eye rolling, spine twisting pressure against your core. his fingers were slowly, but surely, jabbing into your pussy, a small creamy noise following behind his movements as the wetness of you makes it easier for him to get around.
“o-ooh! fuuuck, eren…right there –” you could barely maintain pulling a full sentence from your brain, but luckily for you, you didn’t need to say a word. eren could feel every little thought or emotion through your pussy. the way your walls naturally open up for him, giving him the opportunity to find that perfect spot ; it was like you were made for this — made for him.
“she’s so needy – thinkin’ maybe i should move a little faster, don't you? all i wanna’ do is make you cum, mama.” he says this as if it’s a promise — and to be honest, he was pretty close to achieving that promise. the sound of your whines and the squirms of your hips were enough to tell him to pick up speed.
so that's exactly what he does.
eren plunges his fingers in and out of you, poking at what he was certain was your g-spot — every time he’d hit it with his fingertips, there was another whimper leaving your mouth, “i feel that pussy tightin’ up, you wanna’ cum, don’t you?” tauntingly, he asks this as if you weren’t already on the brink of tears, “don’t fight yourself. let it go.”
now eren’s hand is moving rapidly, automatically making your legs spread further open. now, he was really there — and so were you. the knot in your stomach that's been there this whole time was starting to unravel. you rest your head firmly against his shoulder, “rennn – feels so fuckin’ good! don’t stop, please don’t stop!”
“i won’t, baby. i’m right here – i feel you, just let me have it.” his encouragement works and he reels you in. you feel your stomach contracting as your heart starts to race. eren sits you up straight, keeping your weakened body from falling over while he keeps working your pussy.
“eren, eren, eren! f-fuuck yess!” you shout and his fingers curl upwards creating a distinct squelching sound and you claw onto whatever you could find — that being the same arm between your legs.
“cum for me. cum for me, come on,” out of nowhere, you release — and all over his hand, at that. your eyes are wandering, seeing blank spots trickling the ceiling as you cum on both eren’s fingers and your mattress, “atta’ fuckin’ girl..”
he pumps you some more before slowly pulling his fingers out, leaving a stringed trail of your cum to follow them. there was enough on him for both he, and you to get a little taste — but he needed to know you were okay first.
you were reclined against his chest still, eyes closed with your exhales being rather hoarse. eren wraps both arms around you, hugging you from behind as he kisses the top of your scalp repeatedly, “m’ so proud of you, yn. you did great – so, fuckin’ great.”
your head is still in a slight daze, and although your vision had come back, you hadn’t yet gained the full consciousness to realize what the hell just happened.
eren just fingered you.
eren just made you cum.
eren just mind fucked you.
there were so many things to think about, so many moments to cherish, but most importantly — there were so many doubts running through your mind. you walked into your apartment today under the impression that this would just be a piece of cake : he comes in, he teaches you, he leaves — that’s it. so why did you want to remain snuggled into his arms? why did you want him to kiss you to sleep after coming down from that life changing orgasm?
why did you want…eren?
“you okay? i wasn’t too rough was i? anything hurt?” he must’ve sensed your uncertainty. you quickly rise a bit, turning over your shoulder only to see him with worried eyes.
“no, no. you were perfect,” you go to lift your hand up to side of his face but you stop before completing that thought, “but, i think we need to make some rules.” his already flattened expression got even flatter. eren could feel his heart dropping to his stomach at the thought of even making you uncomfortable in the slightest bit. that was the last thing he’d ever want to do.
“r-rules?”
you nod, now feeling the need to sit directly in front of him, still in between his legs. you hold his hands in yours, looking at him with sympathy, “you did nothing wrong, ren. i just think we should set some boundaries?”
“oh. so..uh, what’d you have in mind?”
you sit there for a moment, reminiscing back to a few moments ago when you were shaking in his comforting grasp, “well, maybe we should hold off on the kissing? i just…i’m with connie and i don’t think it’s appropriate to kiss you while —“
“got it.”
you’re left silent. eren had a habit of cutting you off, but as of right now, he seemed rather passive than talkative. the guy couldn’t even make eye contact with you. he only sits, eyes fixed on any other object in sight but you.
“eren —“
“it’s okay, really. i understand. no kissing, anything else you can think of that you might wanna’ add?” eren held a forced grin. there was no need to elucidate. he’d already caught on to what you were throwing down. you wanted him to forget about it. you wanted him to pretend like the brief moment of his lips on yours didn’t mean anything. he knows you’re confused, and so was he, but to deny the spark between you both in that moment would be ludicrous.
“well i…i haven’t really thought about anything else yet, but i’ll let you know when i do,” you stare into eren’s empty eyes for a few more seconds before he abruptly gets up and heads toward your bathroom. you watch as he snags a towel from your linen cabinet and runs it under the warm sink water.
he wrings it out, now bringing the towel over toward you ; who still sits up straight while watching him do all of this. he sits next to you, adjusting the towel in his palm, “open your legs, please.”
you were ineffable. completely silent, but slowly parting your thighs to allow him to gently wipe away the mess that streamed between them. you don’t say anything, and neither does he, but you both secretly cherish the feeling of his hands roaming your body.
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a bit of time passes, and you fall asleep. you didn’t know how, but you’d ended up on the couch in eren’s arms — snuggled in close with your kuromi plushie between your arms as you dreamt of anything besides the events that took place tonight.
you drifted off easily, eren on the other hand, couldn’t spare to shut his eyes. there were too many questions without answers running through his mind for him to even think about sleeping at all.
in all of his years of knowing you, he’d never thought about you as anything more than a companion, a partner in crime, a best friend — but tonight revealed that narrative to be false. eren liked the feeling of your body against his. he liked to be able to navigate which spots made you weak in the knees.
he liked that he would be your firsts.
but to openly say those words aloud is forbidden. you were right, you were somewhat with connie. it wasn’t eren’s place to feel any type of way about how you felt.
you asked him to help you out, not fall for you.
so that’s exactly what he’d do. he’d give you what you want. he’d play the role until his help is unwanted, and although it’d ache him, that ache would be nothing compared to the ache of losing you as a whole.
eren takes a moment to look at your somnolent face, finding himself with the same tingly feeling he’d had when he kissed you earlier. his eyes bat as he finds himself in a daze, reaching his hand up to touch the side of your face, eren’s cracked voice conjuring up one last sentence before returning his focus to the tv.
“you’re gonna’ be the death of me, yn..”
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tags : @sully-stick-together @lalalucidity
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