#wrote this because i still feel like a ten year old kid waiting for someone to notice somethings wrong with me

[milkyspine]

— accidental prayer

[callsignmercy]

The voicemail - Jake ‘Hangman’ Seresin.

Prompt: Jake calls you to tell you he still loves you after ten years.

Words: ~2.5k

Warning: slight mention of death but nothing serious.

Note: I’m sick and I feel like shit so I wrote a shitty piece. I don’t like this and probably will edit it later but anyway here it is. Please don’t copy of repost my work. English is not my first language so apologies for the easy vocabulary and bad grammar.

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The voicemail went like this: “Hi it’s me. Uh it’s uh- it’s Jake. Seresin. I don’t know why I’m calling really… I think I just wanted to hear your voice. It’s been so long since I’ve heard it… I’m sorry we broke up. Truth is, I should never have done it. I should have known that I would never stop loving you even after all these years. But you might have moved on since then, and if you’ve found someone else I’m happy for you really. Forget I ever called, it was a mistake. We’re going on a top secret and insanely difficult mission for Top Gun in a few hours and truth be told I’m terrified. I wish we could’ve had more time together but those few high school years were worth it because you were there with me. I should have never made that stupid decision of leaving you when I got into aviation and I’m sorry. I hope you can forgive me. Anyway I don’t have much time and I’ve been drinking a little so, forget I ever called. Another thing I shouldn’t have done. Anyway, bye.”

Jake Seresin, whom you haven’t talked to in about ten years after he broke up with you when he joined the navy just called you to tell you he shouldn’t have left you? What the hell is happening?

You were trying to understand what came through his mind to gather up the courage to call and confess to you after so many years, and just hours before probably dying.

No but how dare he? Seriously! You were fuming. Admitting his love for you after a decade like it was nothing while casually telling you he might never come back?

But who were you kidding really? Of course you loved him back, you never stopped thinking about him actually. Even after ten years he was still in the back of your mind. But anyhow, how dare he break your heart like that? You contemplated calling him back but decided against it. You didn’t want to ruin his mission which he said could potentially be fatal. Oh God. You couldn’t dare think about the love of your life potentially dying.

Suddenly you jumped on your feet, packed a few clothes and took your car keys and drove away. After all Miramar was only two hours away…

When you woke up in the late morning and listened to his voicemail you knew he had already left as he had called the night before but you decided to go anyway. Wait for him. Wherever.

You arrived at Miramar in the late afternoon and stopped at a navy bar to get something to drink.

“Hi, what can I get you hun?” The bartender said. “A coke please.” You replied. “I’m Penny by the way. Did you come for the holidays?” “Nice to meet you, I’m Y/N. Actually it’s a spontaneous and maybe incredibly stupid decision that I took about two hours ago for someone that will probably never show up here.”

Penny seemed confused. “What do you mean?” She asked. “An old boyfriend of mine, like ten years old boyfriend called yesterday to tell me he regrets breaking up with me and also casually said that he was going on a mission that he could probably never come back from. He’s a pilot for the navy by the way. And so I don't know why I decided to come here to see him even though I know they’ve already left.” “Yes they left this morning.” She replied and your head shot up to look at her. She had a sad smile on her face. “I rekindled with an old boyfriend of mine too that flies for Top Gun and so he told me he might not come back. They left this morning.” She explains.

“And how do you manage something like that? What do you do?” You ask. “The best thing is hope. You know Top Gun pilots are the best in the world, you just have to trust that they’ll succeed and come back to you.” “And what if he doesn’t? What if he never knows that I came here for him, that I still love him?” Tears were slowly making their way up but you fought them, not wanting to appear vulnerable in front of a total stranger. “Who is it you’re waiting for?” “Jake Seresin. You know him?” She smiles. “Yeah I know him, he’s cocky but he’s a nice guy and I’m sure he’ll come back, especially if he didn’t get an answer back from you, I swear he’ll come back to get it.” You laugh at her answer. “Do you know how long they’ll be gone?” “No idea, Pete didn’t tell me. But I’m sure they’ll come here as soon as they come back stateside.” “Can you recommend a place to stay while waiting for them?” “You’re going to stay in Miramar?”

“Well I can’t possibly go back home and come back here every single day.” “You’re right. Well, there’s a motel not far from here if you want, or if you’d like you could help me here a few hours a day and in exchange you could sleep on my couch. Your pick.” “Well, It would sure occupy my days to work a little, rather than hoping and stressing all day.” “Then it’s settled, you’ll start tomorrow.” She smiles and you smile back.

“So tell me about you and Hangman.” Penny asks the next day as you were working together. “Hangman?” You replied. “Jake. Hangman is his callsign, they get one when they become pilots.” “Why Hangman?” “I don’t know, you’ll have to ask him I guess.” “Sure. Well Jake and I used to date in high school, we met when we were both freshman and dated until after we graduated but he broke up with me when he signed up for the navy.” “Why?” “He said he was leaving for a long time, that he didn’t think a long distance relationship would work. I cried for days.” “I can understand. Pete and I were just hooking up from time to time back then but when he came back a couple of weeks ago I felt things I hadn’t felt in a long time. It took a while for me to let him back in but now we’re happy and I can’t wait for him to come back.” “ I’m genuinely happy for you Penny.” “Don’t worry, Jake will be really happy to see you too I’m sure.” “I can only hope so.”

After a few days, Penny decided that she wanted to go on a little holiday with her daughter Amelia and left you in charge of the bar. The night wasn’t really busy so you handled things well, serving up patrons and cleaning up tables, hoping yet again to see a certain man come through the doors of the bar.

“So you’re telling me that you left your high school sweetheart a voicemail saying that you still love her and you should never have broken up with her and in the same sentence telling her she can forget about you ‘cause you’ll certainly die?” “Yes Phoenix, for the hundredth time, I did it and I don’t know why I did it.” That voice sounded rather familiar to you and you froze on the spot, not believing your ears. “Well Hangman, let me tell you yet again how stupid you are.” “Thank you Phoenix I think I’ve heard it enough. I’ll probably never see her again anyway so you can stop talking about it now.” Jake sighs and they all head for the pool table. You watch as Jake walks, talking with the woman named Phoenix, still not believing that it was really him in front of you after so many years.

“I’ll get the first round.” Phoenix says. “Hi, what can I get you?” You ask her. “I’ll get seven beers please. Are you new? I’ve never seen you here before.” “Yeah, I started working here a few days ago. I’m Y/N by the way.” “Natasha, pleasure to meet you Y/N.” You smiled and handed her the beer and started a tab for her.

“Well Jake, if you want to forget all about your stupidity and the high school sweetheart you’ll never see again, there’s a new cute bartender, I’m sure your southern charms will work wonders on her.” “No thanks Phoenix. I’m still going to wait for an answer from Y/N and if she doesn’t I’m going to call her while being drunk again and demand that she answer me.” He replies ironically. Phoenix tilted her head when she heard you name come out of Jake’s mouth. “Well the girl at the bar said her name was Y/N so you might want to check if that’s your Y/N first.” Jake frowned and looked at the bar only to see you, serving drinks to the men on the other side of the bar. His face dropped and his heart skipped a beat at the sight of you after so many years, looking more beautiful than ever.

Phoenix bit her lip in excitement seeing Jake’s face and understanding what it meant. “Oh I love seeing love happen.” She whispers to her wizzo next to her.

Jake didn’t know how to react to seeing you after so long. He might have frozen for a few minutes before Rooster gave him a slight push to force him to go to the bar and talk to you.

He gave the pool stick to Rooster before walking awkwardly toward you. He gets to the bar as you turn around and you stop right then and there.

“You came.” Jake said matter-of-factly. You shrug. “You called.” You replied.

“What are you doing working here? Where’s Penny?” He asks, still not looking away from your eyes. “It’s a long story. How did you avoid death?” You ask. “It’s a long story.” He replies.

“Did you really come here for me?” He asked, hopeful. “I’m waiting for an actual explanation. For why you called me after ten long years to tell me you should never have broken up with me and why you scared the shit out of me by telling me you were probably going to die.” “I’m sorry I did. I just realised that it was the right thing to do, to tell you how I felt and hopefully you’ll feel the same.” “After ten years?” “Yeah well, I never stopped loving you, never stopped thinking about you, never stopped hoping we’ll meet again and nothing happened so I decided to take the matter into my own hands and call you to tell you everything.”

You looked at Jake for a few seconds before being called up at the other end of the bar to serve some people. You think about what Jake just said to you while doing your job. After a few minutes you wipe the bartop and sigh before turning back toward Jake, still a hopeful look on his face looking at you.

“Look I think about you all the time, I’ve got a photo of us constantly in my flight suit and in my cockpit. I constantly think of you when I’m up there. I don’t want to leave this world without knowing what you really feel. That's what keeps me from dying and helps me come back every time. I’ve never stopped loving you and if you want to take me back I swear I’ll spend the rest of my life showing you how much I love you.” “I’ve waited ten years for you to come back, Jake. I’m not going to let you go again.” You say with tears in your eyes. “God I love you so much baby. I’ll do this right I promise. I’ll take you on dates and tell you how much I love you for the rest of our lives and I’ll marry you baby. Right here and there.” You chuckled. “Just shut up and kiss me Seresin.” He smiles from ear to ear and leans in to kiss you tenderly.

The voicemail went like this: “Hi baby. Today is the day and I can’t wait to marry you. I’m so thankful you came back into my life and I’m so thankful you put up with my shit for so long. I love you so much and I’m sure there’s still so many things waiting for us. I love you forever baby.”

You smiled while listening to your fiance/soon-to-be-husband’s voicemail.

Jake had made a habit to leave you voicemails for key moments in your life for you to save and still hear his voice whenever he left for a mission.

“Thanks for our first date. I really had fun with you tonight. Thank you for agreeing to take me back, thank you for still loving me even though I was a total dick with you ten years ago. I can’t wait for all the things we’ll do together.”

“Hi babe. Today you agreed to be my girlfriend again after all these years and I thank God everyday for you. I swear I never thought I’d see you again and even less that you’ll agree to take me back. Anyway, I love you. That’s all I wanted to say.”

“Today we moved into our first house together. Our very own home. Everywhere you are is home for me anyway but being able to wake up next to you every morning will be heaven on earth for me. I can’t wait to decorate it all with you. I love you baby.”

“Jake why are you calling me? Just leave it baby I’m leaving you a voicemail. Oh it’s already on, okay. Hi baby. I’m whispering because you’re in the other room and I don’t want to spoil the surprise for you. I’m about to ask you to marry me. After all, we've been together a while. Plus four years if you add our high school years together. Anyway, I love you so much I hope you’ll say yes. And then we’ll have a beach front wedding like you’ve always dreamed of. I love you so much I could marry you with paper rings but for you I gave it all and I hope you’ll like the diamond better. I can’t wait to put it on your finger. I love you baby.”

You were about to marry the love of your life. In about an hour you were going to call him your husband. And the truth is, you couldn’t wait. But you had one more thing to do before saying yes.

“Hi Jake. For the first time I’ll be the one leaving you a voicemail. You leave me voicemails for me to listen to whenever you’re away from me and I thought I should do it too because a photo of us in your cockpit doesn’t really do the job does it? Well here I am. And I’ve got something to tell you. Soon, I won’t be the only one you’re going to call baby. I checked this morning and I’m pregnant, Jake. You’re going to be a dad. I hope it’ll make you happy. I love you Jake. Forever. I can’t wait to say yes and spend my life with you baby.”

[leasstories]

Lea’s advent calendar day 12 – Not so Unrequited Feelings

@writerthreads writing prompt for Christmas (2022), prompt 23:

["Will you be my New Years kiss?"]

Eddie x gn!reader

TW: Recreational drug use

WC: ≈ 1K

December 31st, 1986

You and Eddie have been best friends forever, literally forever. Your moms were childhood best friends and you both always lived at Hawkins’ trailer park. You were born a few months apart, Eddie being the oldest. He loves bragging about it. For a long while, before Eddie met his friends and bandmates from the Hellfire club, it was the two of you against the world. You and Eddie are both 20 years old. You graduated in 1985, you had to repeat your senior year once. But opposite to Eddie, on your second attempt, you got your shit together and ended graduating. Now, you’re working at the Hideout four nights a week, as a bartender. You always manage to work on Tuesdays to see Corroded Coffin’s performances and cheer on your boyfriend. Eddie and you know everything about each other. Well, almost everything. You’ve been keeping a really huge secret from him since the two of you were 15. That’s when you developed a crush on Eddie. You know Eddie only sees you as a friend, his best friend even and you know telling him would ruin everything between the two of you. Eddie and you have been through thick and thin, and it would be a shame to ruin everything because of a stupid crush. You’ve always been one of the guys for Eddie. You’ve never, even drunk, or high, spilled the gut on your feelings for him.

This year, Eddie and you decided to spend Christmas just the two of you. You’re currently preparing all the snacks for your New Year Evening together. You put Cheetos on a bowl for Eddie and put your friendship mixtape on the record player. Once everything is settled, you sit on the porch of your trailer and wait for your best friend. Eddie arrives, ten minutes late. He smiles at you before kissing your forehead as a greeting. Every time he does that, your face heat up. You can’t help but imagine what it would feel like to kiss his plush lips, what it would feel like to be his. While you’re in your own little headspace, Eddie makes himself at home. He sits on the couch and smiles at the sight of his favorite Cheetos, as well as some of his favorite candies. It always warms Eddie’s heart how caring you are. You join Eddie on the trailer’s living room and sit crisscross on the couch.

“Wanna smoke a J lovey?” Eddie asks. Eddie’s been calling you lovey since you were little kids.

“Can you roll it for me please?” you ask.

Eddie nods, he is used to roll it for you, he’s never seen someone struggling to roll a joint as much as you do.

“Wanna share?” he asks.

You nod. Every time Eddie and you share a joint, you blush hard. Every time Eddie makes you notice that you’re blushing, you put the blame on the weed, but in fact, you love the fact his plush rosy lips and yours wrapped around the same joint.

When Eddie sees that you’re zoned out he calls your name.

“Where’d you go?” Eddie asks, chuckling.

“Sorry, I was just thinking.” You tell him while getting up. “Want a beer? I bought two six packs for tonight.”

“’course, thanks lovey.” Eddie says while rolling the joint.

You take two beers out of the fridge and hand one to Eddie.

Eddie puts the joint to his lips and starts inhaling deeply. You stare the whole time; he doesn’t notice and pass you the blunt. You both stay silent for a little while, only enjoying each other’s company, smoking, and drinking beer. Then Eddie and you tells you all about his future DnD campaign and you tell him all about the new songs you wrote for Corroded Coffin. You talk like that for a little while, relaxed when Eddie asks, out of the blue.

“Are you still a virgin?”

You start blushing hard. “Eddie if I wasn’t you’d know it” you tell him, embarrassed, hiding your face with your hands.

Eddie pulls on your hands to see your face and intensely looks at you. “Don’t be embarrassed lovey, I just asked because I was curious. You and Eddie starts getting high as a kite, that’s probably why he asked this question. After a few beats of silence, you confess.

“Never kissed anyone either.”

“Why that?” Eddie curiously asks.

“Because…” you sigh. “It’s complicated… I love someone who will never love me I want them too.”

“I know the feeling lovey, it’s the same here.” Eddie confesses.

“But I don’t wanna die stupid Eddie and as midnight approaches, will you be my New Years Kiss?” you ask him.

“Lovey… It’s the weed talking…” Eddie says.

“No, I want it.” You say, not caring to keep your secret anymore, you’re to high and drunk for that, and midnight is approaching?

“’kay.” Eddie breathes out. “If that’s what you want.” He says, still wondering if his feelings are requited and getting high made you spill the gut or if he is imagining things. You both patiently wait 11:59pm. Eddie leans in towards you and the two of you share a passionate, long-wanted kiss.

“Happy new year Eds” You tell him.

“Happy new year lovey” He answers.

A few minutes later, you both fall asleep on the couch and in each other’s arms.

When you wake up the next morning and remember what happened, you start to panic. But as soon as you try to untangle your limbs from Eddie’s he rouses.

He pushes you closer to your body and mumbles “need to talk.”

“No, we don’t.” You answer ashamed about yesterday.

“I’ve wanted to do that for a long time.” Eddie admits.

You freeze. “You don’t regret it?” you ask.

“Do you?” Eddie asks.

You shake your head no.

“Lovey, now that I know that my feelings are requited, would you do me the honor of going on a date with me?” Eddie asks.

You hug Eddie tight, nodding your head. What you thought was the biggest mistake of your life, turned out to be the biggest blessing of your life.

[inky-eclipse]

a response to jreg's loneliness video

note: wrote this ten thousand years ago, but figured i'd put it here since it's one of the few posts on my old blog.

when i initially watched the video, i sat there waiting for the “gotcha” moment where he’d turn around and be like “just kidding” or something. as i continued watching the video though, it slowly became apparent that moment was not coming.

i’ve never really thought about writing this type of response to a video, but i think how the video reflected some parts of what i felt in the past year is what pushed me to write.

he discussed that what pushed him to ditch his introversion was the posts he’d seen on the Ottawa reddit about how some people (jokingly i hope) wished COVID would go on forever so that they wouldn’t have to interact with people again. he figured if this is what introversion entails, he didn’t want a part in it anymore. girlbossing yourself into extroversion is a really post-COVID response. i’m somewhat introverted, but after COVID, i’ve noticed that i want to be around people a lot more frequently. i think the effects of severe isolation to humans is at least what partially drives this urge even if i know logically that i can’t accidentally isolate myself to that severe extent. i also related his adoption of extroversion. i usually get intp on Myers-Briggs, but once i started college, i tell people i’m entp. who’s going to stop me? the Myers-Briggs police? besides, i feel like i genuinely enjoy being around people for long periods of time when i like them. i guess i don’t want to tell people that i’m introverted and then have them assume i want to be alone all the time or that i would combust at a party.

when he started discussing the sediment around the soul or the unnatural distance he had experienced when trying to deeply connect with people, it didn’t ring any bells in my experience. then again, i don’t think i’ve given a shit in recent years about a person to the extent that he described so that probably has a lot to do with why the bells are stationary. the only thing that it somewhat reminded me of was how i usually tried to host study groups with folks, but usually nobody or one person would show up. it could be that nobody showed up cause it’s lame, but that repeated experience made me resonate with jreg’s frustration of constantly putting in legwork for nothing.

i continue to diverge from his experiences because while he laments about how he wishes he could just not have the need for genuine connections with others, i’m fine either way. however, it really hurt for a moment when it occurred to me that maintaining deeper, platonic connections is either out of my scope or might not be a thing a lot of people are looking for. since i grew up with solitary activities for the most part, i don’t, consciously at least, have this consistent need for a lot of close relationships. if i were to continue to have my acquaintance group, i think i’d be content. i wouldn’t have people i could talk to deeply when i’m upset, but i resist opening up to that extent to begin with.

that’s just me though. i didn’t appreciate his accurate comment on about how “if you see someone reading about happiness, it’s over for them”. i definitely didn’t read The Power of Fun and still have my detailed annotations.

[crystalninjaphoenix]

Assessing the Situation

A JSE Fanfic

Septics Inverted AU

First IRIS Chapter | Previous

(It’s back again! Time for part six! And with only two months since the last part XD We pick up with Chase where we left off, still stuck with IRIS. And then we check on what Anti has been up to. He’s found someone he hasn’t seen in a while. And meanwhile, Jackie has found out something as well. Happy reading :D)

A day must have passed. Chase had slept through most of it—or tried to, at least. It was difficult to sleep in this room when they wouldn’t turn the lights off. He managed to drift off eventually, only to be awakened by the loud CLUNK! of the door lock. He immediately sat up. The woman in the white coat from yesterday was back. Another man in a black uniform had come with her—not the same one from yesterday, but it was hard to figure out details beyond that. The woman sat down at the table. “Hello again, Mr. Brody,” she said with a smile.

Chase didn’t say anything. He glanced towards the door. Sure enough, it had already been closed and locked again. Damn it. He slowly stood up. “So... are you going to actually fucking explain things now?”

“First, we have to get through this assessment,” the woman said. Behind her, the man was resetting the camera, putting it back on the tripod after Chase had thrown it around yesterday. “This will all be better if you cooperate.”

“You say that, but I don’t know if I believe you,” Chase mumbled under his breath. Even so, he didn’t want to push IRIS’s limits. He still didn’t really know what they had planned for him. While the woman wrote something down on her clipboard, he walked over and sat at the other chair.

The woman glanced at the cameras in the room. No doubt double-checking if they were on and functional. “The date is August 14th, 2019, and we are interviewing Chase Brody again. Use of the Dr. Hopkins Assessment has been approved. Good morning, Mr. Brody.”

Chase rolled his eyes. “Is it?” He folded his arms.

“We are going to ask a series of questions to determine your state of mind,” the woman continued. “Now, keep in mind, we can detect if you’re lying, so please try to be truthful.”

Wait, they could? Did they know he’d been lying like a dog all through the ‘interview’ yesterday? He tried not to squirm self-consciously. Or, wait. Maybe they were lying about that? After all, he couldn’t see anything that could possibly be a lie detector in the room.

The woman looked up at him and smiled again. “Are you okay with this, Mr. Brody?”

Chase sighed. “Do I have a choice?”

She didn’t answer, just looked back down at the clipboard. “Is your name Chase Brody?”

Oh, they were starting now? Chase glanced around the room. “Wait, shouldn’t I be hooked up to some wires or something?” he asked, trying to gauge her reaction. Maybe he was calling their bluff on the lie detector.

“Don’t worry, our technology is quite capable,” the woman said in what was supposed to be a reassuring tone. “That won’t be necessary. Now, I will repeat the question. Is your name Chase Brody?”

Chase sighed. Might as well get this over with. “Yeah.”

“Are you 30 years old?”

“Yes.” He didn’t question how they knew that; they probably got his records somehow.

“Are you taking the Dr. Hopkins Assessment right now?” the woman asked.

“Yeah, I guess.”

“On a scale of one to ten, one being the lowest and ten being the highest, how would you describe your current mental state?”

Chase laughed dryly. “Thought you didn’t care about that.”

“Please just answer the questions, Mr. Brody.” The smiles and pleasant facade from earlier conversations were now gone. She was all business.

“I don’t know,” Chase said. “A... three.” He lowballed it a little on purpose.

“Have you ever felt an attack of fear or anxiety?” the woman asked.

“Yes, of course.” Didn’t everyone, at some point in time?

“Do you feel safe?”

Chase laughed again. “Right now? You fucking kidding me? No. I don’t know what you people want or why you illegally moved me here, because you definitely didn’t get any sort of government approval for—”

“Do you regret your decisions?” the woman interrupted.

He blinked. “...what?” His voice had gone quiet.

“Do you regret your decisions?” she repeated, eyes locked onto him.

He leaned back in the chair, metal creaking with the movement. Even though he wanted to say something about how this was a stupid question and it should be more specific... he couldn’t deny the answer he knew he had. “Yes,” he whispered.

The woman nodded once. “Do you know where you are?”

A few seconds passed while Chase collected himself. “I-I don’t know. Somewhere in IRIS.”

“Do you know why you’re here?”

“No, I keep telling you guys, I have no idea.” Chase shook his head. “I... you said something about helping people like me, but I don’t know what that means.” Especially with the way he’d been treated so far.

“Have you ever heard of ALTR 114209?” she asked.

“I heard of it yesterday, when you mentioned it,” Chase said. “Other than that? No.”

“When was the first time you came into contact with 114209?”

“Are you even listening?” Annoyance was now overriding any other feelings Chase had. “How many times do I have to tell you I don’t know what the fuck that is? You said you would explain!”

“Alright, moving on, Mr. Brody,” the woman said, ignoring the noise of frustration Chase made. “How many pictures have been shown to you so far?”

“Pictures?” Chase glanced around the room, confused. “None.”

“How many sounds have been played for you?”

Again, he looked around the room. “None.” Was there supposed to be some sort of subliminal messaging going on?

“Are you easily startled?” the woman asked.

“No. I mean... maybe?” Chase answered distractedly, now keeping an eye and ear out for strange pictures or sounds. “Depends on the situation.”

“What’s the worst pain you’ve ever felt?”

“I don’t know, I can’t remember.” Maybe the one time Marvin went crazy and blasted him with that weird Void magic? He wasn’t really thinking too hard, still watching for anything suspicious.

“Do you believe in God?”

That snapped Chase’s attention back to the interview. “Bit of a loaded question, don’t you think?”

“Please just answer the question, Mr. Brody.” The woman sounded a bit tired.

“Well, uh... no.” He used to, but that was a long time ago. That belief came from a different person entirely.

“Do you believe in life after death?”

“Okay, no.” Chase shook his head. He shifted a little, ready to stand up at any moment. “This is ridiculous, I’m not doing this.”

“Ridiculous or not, Mr. Brody, please just try to answer the question truthfully,” the woman said firmly. “Do you believe in life after death?”

Chase sighed. He leaned forward onto the table and glared at the woman. “No.”

She was unintimidated, moving on. “Have you ever experienced a terrible occurrence that has impacted you significantly?”

“No,” he lied.

“Have you ever lost someone close to you?”

He stiffened, a visible reaction. “Lost in... what way? Like, death or just...” He trailed off. “Actually, you know what? No. We’re done here.”

“We are not done here, Mr. Brody,” the woman said firmly. “The assessment is not complete. Have you ever lost someone close to you?”

“I don’t care if we’re done or not, I’m not fucking answering any more questions without knowing why I’m here or what you people want!” Chase started to stand up. The black-uniformed man in the corner took a step forward. He stopped.

“Just answer the question, Mr. Brody,” the woman pressed. “Have you ever lost someone close t—”

Chase slammed his hands down on the table. “If I say yes will you stop fucking asking?!” he shouted. “Or does it not count if they’re dead?! Does it not count if they’re right?!” 

The woman stared at him. Chase stared back, breathing heavily. After a few seconds, without looking down, she wrote something on the clipboard. Then she smiled. “Thank you, Mr. Brody, this concludes our assessment.”

The sudden whiplash was enough to shock Chase out of the spiral the question had sent him into. “Wait, that's it?” 

The woman stood up, adjusted her coat, and walked towards the doorway.

“What was the point of all that?” Chase demanded. He stood up fully now. “When do I get some damn answers?!”

She didn’t look back, just opened the door—which had somehow been unlocked without Chase noticing. He started running after her, but just like yesterday, the man in the black uniform grabbed him and yanked him backwards. It was a bit rougher this time, and Chase staggered. By the time he regained his balance, they were both gone, leaving him alone again.

“You—you—fuck you!” he shouted at the closed door. He kicked the chair leg with enough force to send the whole chair spinning. It crashed against the concrete floor with a deafeningly loud clatter. Chase winced.

The silence after the sound was equally deafening. Chase turned his attention to the camera on the tripod. He was really tempted to throw it around again. His hand was already reaching out before his mind caught up and reminded him that this was probably not a good idea. He hesitated for a moment, then settled for picking the tripod up and turning it around so it was facing the wall. But there was nothing he could do about the camera in the ceiling,

He stared at it, dangling in the corner. “Is this fun for you?” he asked. “I don’t think you’re the type of people to have fun. But is it? I don’t know why else you would promise to explain, and then not tell me a damn thing. What sort of—of sick, twisted, fucking game are you playing?”

The camera didn’t react at all. Its red light continued to blink.

“I used to hang out with some terrible, terrible people,” Chase said. “And I can see them doing something like this. That’s how you know you’ve done something wrong. But then again, I guess you wouldn’t care, would you? They definitely wouldn’t have.”

Blink. Blink. Blink.

Chase stared at the camera for a moment more. Then sighed and walked back over to the bed. He climbed in and buried his face in the pillow. He needed some rest. If something happened, he didn’t want to go into it while exhausted. And he couldn’t shake the feeling that something would happen sooner or later.

- - - - - - - - - -

“No, I can’t say I’ve ever heard of them before this.”

The House was unchanged since Anti had last been to visit. He paced back and forth across the entrance hall, occasionally glancing at the broken mirror. Dark leaned against the wall by the staircase, looking thoughtful. “Really?” Anti asked. “They’re a large organization. And they were founded in America, in this same state.”

“That doesn’t narrow it down as much as you think,” Dark said, slightly inclining their head. “California is a big state. It could qualify for its own country. Do you know where, exactly, this IRIS corporation came from?”

Anti’s form flickered slightly. “Their website lists a town called Kronolle.”

Dark shook their head. “I’ve never heard of it. At the very least, it’s not in the forbidden zone around Los Angeles. Perhaps it’s up north somewhere.”

“How old are you again?”

Dark smiled. “Old enough.”

“Very fucking helpful,” Anti grumbled.

“I know what you’re thinking. You think that, being around as long as I have, I should have at least heard of this IRIS. But I have not. If you want, I can ask G or his new friends to search the Internet.”

“Nah, that’s fine. Guy freaks me out.”

“Really?” Dark raised an eyebrow. “The great Antisepticeye? Freaked out by something?”

“Oh shut up.”

Dark’s lighthearted expression fell. “You’re even grumpier than usual. I haven’t seen you in months, and you come back twitching erratically and snapping at everything? What happened? Is this IRIS situation that worrying?”

Anti stopped pacing. He sighed. “I could deal with it,” he said quietly. “I’ve dealt with it before. But they’re bringing Jack and Sam into their bullshit, and I don’t like that.”

“Ah.” Dark nodded. “You’re scared something will happen to them.”

“Of course I fucking am! I hacked into their network. The files I saw—” Anti shuddered. “It’s been a while since I saw widespread horror on an organized level like that. If... if Jack was... subjected to that, I... I don’t know what I’d do. Nothing good.”

Dark stood up straight, now fully serious. “Is there anything we can do to help?”

“I need more information on them,” Anti said. “Even their own network is vague on their origins and purpose. Maybe you could find something out, since you’re on their home turf.”

“Yes. Of course.” Dark nodded. “I can’t promise anything. We’re having problems ourselves. Which reminds me. Have you seen an elaborate box with a blue crystal on it anywhere? Or maybe just the crystal?”

“No. I can keep an eye out for it, if you want. What’s it do?”

“Well, that’s a bit compli—”

Thud. “Ow!”

Anti’s head immediately snapped towards the noise. It came from behind a door beneath the staircase. The door was labeled “Coat Hanger” but Anti knew that meant nothing with the strange, shifting layout of the House. He glitched over to the door and threw it open, revealing that there was, indeed, a hallway beyond that. And more importantly, revealing— “You!” he gasped. “What the fuck are you doing here?!”

Henrik von Schneeplestein stared back at him. It had been a long while since Anti had last seen him—about eight months or so. In some ways, he was the same. Bright blue eyes peering through rectangular glasses, slightly unkempt brown hair and beard, and the gray sweater he wore was something he would have worn before. But in other ways, he was different. There was more color in his face, his clothes had no stains, and he looked far more... alert than he ever had before. There was also a bruise forming on his forehead—the result of the thud a few seconds ago. Schneep blinked, then folded his arms. “I live here now,” he said defensively.

“Really?” Anti glanced back at Dark, who nodded and walked over to join the conversation. “Well, in that case, what the fuck are you doing right here while we’re talking? Listening?”

Schneep hesitated. “No.”

“Mm-hmm.” Anti glared at him suspiciously.

“Alright, perhaps I was, but I did not mean to come here!” Schneep protested. “You have been here before! You know about the twisty turny hallways and how nothing connects as it should!”

“In that case, the question is clearly why the House wanted you to be here.” Anti now directed his glare at the broken mirror. A vague shape moved in the reflection. It almost looked like a person shrugging. “He’s the last person I wanted here.” Anti huffed, and looked back at Schneep. “How much did you hear?”

Again, Schneep hesitated, clearly contemplating if he should tell the truth. “You were saying something about a TV store...”

“Oh for fuck’s—” Anti threw his hands in the air. He was glad Schneep hadn’t heard him telling Dark his personal experiences with IRIS. But that meant he’d heard his explanation of what IRIS was and him asking Dark for help.  “So you were just standing here eavesdropping for two minutes?”

“Henrik.” Dark folded his hands on top of his cane, looking disappointed.

“I—You—There—Was I just supposed to leave?!” Schneep stammered. “I hear Anti’s voice, I get curious! I wonder if this will involve me, because it seems like it always fucking does with him.”

“No, it doesn’t involve you,” Anti says firmly. “Or any of your friends. Are they here too?”

Schneep rolled his eyes. “You know what happened to Marvin and Jameson and Chase. And Jackie is still in England.”

“So why are you here?”

“I...” Schneep cleared his throat. “...thought it would be... good for me. They have... services here. Without judgment.”

Anti gave him a once-over. “You mean psychiatrists and stuff.”

“I—shut up.” Schneep looked away from him.

Dark put a hand on Anti’s shoulder, silently asking him to back down. Anti glanced back at him, then sighed. “Fine. It’s not my business.” Schneep did look much more... put-together. So that was good. Anti still didn’t trust him, though. Not everything Schneep did could be blamed on mental health issues. “Look, like I said, it doesn’t involve you. It won’t involve you. This is an entirely separate issue than everything between us. So just forget it.” He turned and started walking away.

“Is Jack going to be okay?” Schneep asked quietly.

Anti stopped. He turned back around. “He is. This is a problem, but I’ll take care of it.”

“It sounded like a very serious problem,” Schneep pointed out.

“Nothing I can’t handle.” The last thing Anti wanted was for Schneep to get involved with IRIS. A whole organization of advanced technology and questionable practices? He would probably jump at the chance to join them. And Anti knew he would do great in there. After all, Schneep had been the one to figure out magic combined with an EMP would briefly incapacitate Anti. He hated to think what he could do with more resources.

Schneep nodded. “Okay. Fine, then.”

Dark cleared his throat. “Are you alright, Henrik? I heard you shout a minute ago.”

“Is nothing. Embarrassing, really. I had my head up to the door and then I turned too fast and hit this.” Schneep patted the door frame. “Right on the corner. I am fine. But... thank you.”

“Alright. You can let Edward know if you need anything.”

Schneep rolled his eyes. “Right. I will definitely talk to him, definitely.” Clearly, he wasn’t getting along with Edward, the House’s resident doctor. Some things would never change.

Anti gave a little laugh. “I’m going to head out. Do some searching around, see if there’s any sign of anything... strange.” Double-check if IRIS really wasn’t in the area.

Dark nodded. “I’ll be sure to keep an eye out as well.”

“Thanks. I’ll be back later, just to... finish our conversation.” Anti gave Schneep one last glance. Then he dissolved into particles and disappeared.

- - - - - - - - - -

The car pulled into a spot near the visitors’ entrance. Jackie leaned forward, staring out the window, while Frederick parked. “This won’t take too long, will it?” he asked.

“Probably not,” Jackie said. “I just want to check in on things. If it takes too long I’ll just tell him where I’m going and that I’ll be back later.”

“Jackie,” Frederick said tiredly. “You’re not going to tell him about the IRIS situation, are you?”

“I mean, if he asks where I’ve been.”

Frederick leaned forward over the steering wheel, bonking his head on its rim. “Do you know how it’ll sound if I have to explain we were late because you had a sudden impulse to check on your friend in prison, and you just happened to tell him everything about this secret operation?”

“It’s not any more secret than the rest of the magician stuff, right?” Jackie insisted. “Chase already knows all about magic.”

“I know. But think of the context. We’re already a bit delayed. Nick and Briony are going to freak out if the wards are down for a minute longer than necessary, they won’t... react well to you if you say we were delayed because you wanted to visit a friend in jail.”

“Well maybe they shouldn’t be so judgemental about people in jail,” Jackie pointed out.

Frederick laughed. “I’d agree, but not in Chase’s case.”

Jackie slumped lower in his seat. Frederick had told him that morning that his magician group was willing to let Jackie into their safe house to look at the IRIS technology they had, but only if it happened today at noon. That proved a problem, because Jackie realized it had been a while since he’d seen Chase and wanted to visit him. Today. When visiting hours were from 10 to 12. And the prison was in the complete opposite direction of the safe house. There had been a brief argument before Frederick agreed they could stop by before the meeting if Jackie made sure to keep it brief. “You... Have you told these guys about... me?” he asked.

Frederick straightened up. “In what way?”

“I’m just saying, you’re really concerned about what they’d think of Chase if we told them about him. You must be extra-worried about what they’d think of me.” Jackie didn’t look directly at Frederick. “I was much worse.”

A moment passed in silence. “I thought I’d...” Frederick started, then trailed off. He shook his head. “You’re right. I’m being unfair to you and to Chase. I’m just... nervous.”

“Is being on time really that big a deal?”

“Maybe not in the grand scheme of things. But the whole situation has me on edge, so...” Again, he trailed off. “I haven’t told them about your... checkered past, by the way. Yvonne already knows, obviously, but the rest only know that you’re my boyfriend, because that’s all that matters to me.” Jackie gave a small smile at that. Frederick smiled back, and continued. “Of course, the past is a big thing. They might have to know. Hard to keep that a secret. But I’ll leave it up to you.”

Jackie thought about it. “I don’t really see myself getting to know these guys that well, y’know? I, uh... We’ll shelve that whole thing for now. If I see them more and more, I’ll... bring it up myself. But I’m not throwing Chase under the bus. If we’re late—which we won’t be, cause I’m keeping it short—we’ll just say I wanted to visit him and not mention where.”

Frederick nodded. “Sounds good.”

“Great.” Jackie opened the car door. “I don’t know how long the processing will take, but if I’m not back in thirty minutes, call me.”

“Thirty minutes?!” Frederick repeated, nervously glancing at the car’s dashboard clock.

“I don’t want it to take that long, but who knows? Red tape and shit.” Jackie shrugged. “We’ll still be able to make it on time. Don’t worry.”

“I’ll try.” Frederick sighed. “Good luck. Have fun.”

Jackie smiled. “I’ll try.” Then he stepped out of the car and walked up to the entrance.

Every time he walked in here, he couldn’t help but clutch the amulet around his neck. It was made to disguise his appearance from anyone he didn’t want to recognize him, including on recordings. Even though he knew it was an effective disguise, he still felt exposed strolling right into a police building like he wasn’t a wanted criminal. Just because it had been about a year since the Mirygale police had last seen him didn’t mean they weren’t still searching.

But, as it had been the last few times, there was no immediate reaction from anyone in the front hall. Jackie walked up to check-in—a booth protected by thick glass—and cleared his throat.

“Hello, how can I help you?” asked the woman behind the glass.

“I’m here to visit Chase Brody,” he said.

“Reason?”

“Social.” Jackie knew how this went. He’d done it dozens of times before.

“Right.” The woman swiveled over to a computer and began typing into it. Normally, this would only take a minute or two, and then the receptionist would say to sit down and wait. And five to twenty minutes later, a prison guard would appear and say he could come on back. But this time, the woman frowned. She turned back to look at him. “I’m sorry, he’s been transferred to a different facility.”

Jackie blinked. “What? Why?”

She glanced at the computer monitor. The screen was reflected in her glasses, and Jackie tried to read what she was reading. “It seems it was for security reasons.”

“What reasons?”

“I’m sorry, I’m not at liberty to divulge prisoner information to a civilian.”

“Okay...” Jackie said slowly. “Can I at least know where he is now?”

“Hmm.” The woman paused. “North Point Prison. However, sir, it says here that they don’t allow visitors.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“I’m sorry, I’m not familiar with their system. You’ll have to contact them for any future questions.”

“...Right.” Jackie nodded slowly. “Ah... thanks anyway.” And with that, he turned and left.

This didn’t make any sense. He’d never heard of North Point Prison before, and Jackie used to be very careful about knowing all the nearby prisons—as well as courthouses and police stations. And why didn’t it allow visitors? If Chase had been transferred somewhere else “for security reasons,” Jackie would have assumed his security was being downgraded for good behavior. But a place with no visitors allowed implied a higher security level.

He was quiet as he got back into the car. Frederick looked at him, concerned. “You’re back quick. Is everything alright?”

“They transferred Chase somewhere else,” Jackie said.

“What? Why? Where?”

“Said it was ‘for security reasons,’ but I don’t know if that adds up,” Jackie says. “Chase has been nothing but cooperative since the arrest. He admitted to everything and doesn’t cause trouble. Why would they move him somewhere with higher security?”

Frederick shook his head. “I don’t know. Are you sure it was a place with higher security?”

“That’s what was implied when the receptionist lady said the place didn’t allow visitors.” Jackie frowned. He reached into his pocket and took out his phone. “I’m looking it up. Hey, by any chance, have you ever heard of North Point Prison?”

He didn’t expect a reaction, but Frederick gasped and went pale.

“What?” Jackie looked at him. “Is it... bad?” he asked worriedly.

“I think... i-if this is all correct, then it’s really bad,” Frederick said.

“Why?!”

“North Point is the old prison that IRIS converted to their headquarters.”

[lighthouseborna]

HATER & ANGST ANTHEMS—3 songs that portray your muse’s negative side of life! Bitter, negative, sad, bad vibes. What songs portray the darker sides of your muse?

Helpless / Bloodlines pt. II — Sir Sly

It's not that I'm lost, I know exactly where I am / I'm in the middle of a mess that I don't understand / Why does it feel like the world's stealing every single thing that I have? / I only got the air in my chest and even that won't last What do I do here? / What do I do here? / What do I do here? / What'll I do if I lose you? / What do I do here? / What do I do here? / What'll I do? / I feel helpless

This is just like. Someone wrote a song about him, like condensed his greatest fears into song form I don't know how this is so about him like this but I have been floored since I found it. I have to keep it in a separate playlist because otherwise it just completely nukes his presence for threads. All confidence absolutely gone. The Bloodlines part also makes me want to cry:

Everything I know is finally gone / The things I had, the ones I love / Again, again / All the words that I had once believed / I'm not sure we'll ever meet / Again, again Waiting on your bloodlines / Waiting on your bloodlines again / How could you make me wait?

This song is really just very much... if you attacked Henry in exactly the way that scares him most. And he gets very uncertain and very little. The little that he has, that 19-years-old quality, he is not just a boy but that boy, that ten year old, is still in there and in some ways is still the one in charge. And this is how he sounds when he is scared.

Rubik's Cube — Athlete

The world is too heavy / Too big for my shoulders / Come take the weight off me now / Thousands of answers / To one simple question / Come take the weight off me now Oh I'm like a kid who just won't let it go / Twisting and turning the colors in rows / I'm so intent to find out what it is / This is my Rubik's Cube / I know I can figure it out

Speaking of him still kind of being driven by his younger self: Rubik's Cube. Man what the hell with Rubik's Cube. Its biggest thing though is actually that it dips into the obsessive side of his nature. Which is something I honestly don't always treat like a fault so much, because I think there's a lot about it that's admirable. He doesn't give up. But also for fuck's sake he doesn't give up. He just won't let go and it's like. I don't know, I feel like it's astonishing it hasn't gotten him killed?? Or driven him mad. It's a flaw and also a large chuck of his charm and did you know: he knows he can figure it out. He knows! he can! figure! it! out!

And I really really want one day to have a song for his like. His can-go-too-far side, his capacity for retaliation and aggression. Sadly I do not really have a song for that right now but what I do have is

Leviathan — Leathermouth

which I think is more effective listened to than read as lyrics so I simply will not put lyrics but I think that's what being possessed is like. It's fine :)

[jumbothy-blog]

The Stars Dance When We Watch Them

A short creative writing piece I wrote about human imagination and purpose. Felt inspired by a scene in Don Hertzfeldt’s THE MEANING OF LIFE and wanted to write about the stars dancing. Enjoy!

“There’s no light pollution out here. You can really see the Milky Way at its most beautiful.”

“Hm.” She didn’t really feel like glorifying that with a response.

Both their eyes stared up at the sky. Everything was still in that moment. Each word seemed to fade quicker than usual, with nothing for the sounds to bounce off of, only an unobstructed journey into the atmosphere, where they would dissipate into nothing.

“You don’t think this is incredible?” he asked disappointedly.

She shrugged a bit. “It’s fine.”

“Those little specks of light, the stars, are huge. You get that right? They’re larger than life. Thousands of times larger than the planet we’re on right now. Think about the scale of it. This hill we’re lying on? It’s tiny compared to the cityscape down there. The city is a grain of sand compared to the whole country. Our country is a small fraction of the Earth. Take a chunk out of that star right there,“ he pinched his fingers together, “and there’s virtually no difference. And these giant balls of pure energy are as old as time. Doesn’t that fill you with wonder?

”She sighed. “Not particularly.”

He briefly turned his head to the side to face her. “The night sky has painted us a beautiful mosaic, a moving composition with depth and grace with the entire universe as its canvas, and you don’t feel anything?”

She folded her arms. This was starting to get annoying. “What, do you want me to lie? No, I don’t see what you see. You can give me the whole elevator pitch ten times over, you could even fly me up there and give me front row seats, and my level of enthusiasm won’t budge.”

He let out a dry chuckle. “I doubt that. I would take us up there if I could. Then you’d understand.”

She didn’t say anything for a few seconds. She was waiting for him to fill the silence with something, like more insisting that there’s a missing piece that she could find. But he didn’t. He just sat there with a stupid grin on his face. A good kind of stupid. She found it oddly endearing. Then she looked back up at the Milky Way. It was a streak of color across the deep blue expanse. It was hard to tell what colors, since they blended together in a strange, subtle way. Some parts were an understated violet, others were a stark bright orange.

She took a second to think before speaking again. “When I was a kid, I would look up at the night sky and dream of floating around, flying by all the giant planets, stars, and galaxies. You know that one nebula, the pillars of creation?”

She waited for a response. He simply kept listening, like a silent invitation to continue.“

That one was my favorite. I always thought it looked like a big hand, reaching out to grab something. Like some cosmic entity, a gentle giant rearranging her heavenly garden. She was a mother of the sky, and she would smile down on every galaxy, and every planet in that galaxy, and every grain of sand on that planet. She was never scary to me, never had ill intent, was just an observer who would reach out with a delicate touch from time to time. And with her delicate touch, space glittered and it was full of light, and everything would do an intricate dance. Maybe it was to perform for someone, or there was some rhythm I couldn’t feel. Maybe because even in the void of space, dance is nature.”

She shook her head. “But that’s not what’s out there, that’s not the real universe. It’s cold. Dead. Empty. The sky only looks so bright and full of stars when you’re here on the ground. You could be reaching out for millions of years, just for the stars to stay as far away as they were when you started.”

Neither of them met each other’s eyes.

She continued. “There is no hand. The pillars of creation are just dust. There is no dance. It’s just gravity and angular momentum. So, I stopped looking up. I stopped dreaming of the stars that would dance for me.”

She sat up. Maybe it was time to go. “Sorry. I just don’t see it.”

He didn’t budge. “I’m going to keep lying down for a while. You’re welcome to leave. But it would be better if you stayed.”

She decided it wouldn’t hurt to linger for a bit longer. She lied back down.

“Everything has meaning because we’re the ones that give it meaning. I’m sorry you lost sight of that. Searching for any sort of inherent meaning will only end in disappointment.”

She’d heard this before. “That’s cliché.”

“Let me finish. The important part is that everything that we give meaning is better off for it in the end. The schools we build would be covered in cobwebs, and their walls would be barren if it weren’t for the children covering the walls with their finger paintings. The stuffed toy you had as a kid is covered in stitches because you gave it so much love it started to tear, and then took the time to treat that tear. The stars are just burning balls of gas until you sit and watch them dance. Think of everything as vessels. Without the meaning you give these vessels, it’s like you said: they’re cold, they’re dead, they’re empty. Then you fill up those schools, hug your toy, go stargazing, and they’re brought to life. In a way, the hand you saw? It’s your hand. You know what I mean?”

She did. “When those stars dance, they dance for you.”

He grinned that good stupid grin from ear to ear. “Took the words right out of my mouth.”

As the stars looked down at their audience on the ground, they performed the most elegant dance they had ever danced before. They didn’t disappoint their audience.

[sardonic-the-writer]

Simpbur x Reader

━"My Darling"

━Simpbur

━Tw: Smut with an AFAB reader, but GN pronouns

━Notes: Wrote this for a horny friend and got permission to post it on Tumblr and only Tumblr. So here ya go

━Song: "Very Smart" By Wilbur Music

(Y/n) hated school.

It was such a pointless and tedious task to go to college in their eyes. The four year path wasn't the silver bullet that it used to be in society. If anything, the place only brought them more troubles to attend to. Slipping grades, frustration, falling outs with friends, and more.

So when they heard their English professor announce in front of the entire class that their final project was due on the following Monday, they nearly screamed.

“Are you shitting me!?” (Y/n) mused to themself loudly while walking the cobblestone path back to their apartment building. The streets were relatively empty for a Friday night around their campus’s borders. At this point normally it'd be teeming with drunk students and horny teens that they'd have to navigate around just to get back to their house. But (Y/n) will admit, it was a nice change in pace.

After a few more minutes of walking through the now rapidly darkening side-walks of their cities “finest” universities (I say finest in quotation marks considering the place was on its last limb), (Y/n) arrived at their rickety little flat.

It was a fairly simple little building squished in between larger and more brash buildings. But it was cheap, and that's the only thing that mattered. (Y/n) didn't care if the bricks were crumbling or trash cans overflowing. Hell, they'd even turn a blind eye if they saw any rats meandering around in the lobby. Just one more year of this god-forsaken place and they could never see it again.

Walking up the stone steps, (Y/n) spotted a figure wrapped in rags that normally hung out in the lobby. I suppose it was because the place had good air conditioning and the workers didn't really give two shits if someone slept in the lobby. As long as they weren't there when the health inspector came to visit that is.

“Hey Billy.” (Y/n) said absentmindedly as they stepped into the front doors of the building. The homeless man inside the foyer that they had been waving at looked up and smiled at them with his few mossy stumps of teeth that were left.

“‘Ello (Y/n). Good day at that school of yours?” He croaked out with laughter that sounded more like a dry heave. Scratching his decade old scruff, Billy waited for an answer as (Y/n) stood under the air conditioner for a second

“Eh. I feel like murdering the school system. So about the same as always.” They grumbled, still not looking at him and instead reveling in the feeling of cool air whisking around their figure.

“Well you’ll have that, kid.” Billy waved it off. (Y/n) nodded with a bitter smile and finally stepped out from underneath the cooling device. With a silent wave once more, they headed over to the border up elevators that looked like they had been plucked straight out of a horror movie. If they hadn't ridden them a million times before, (Y/n) wouldn't go near those hunks of scrap with a ten-foot pole.

“Hey, before you leave, that roommate of yours came home early today. And by early, I mean early. That means a lot for someone who's been livin in the street for thirty years. At least, I think it was our roommate. No one really sees ‘em enough to know.” He said with a bit of seemingly innocent curiosity in his tone.

(Y/n) paused with their finger hovering over the elevator button. A small dusting of blush coated their lower face as they awkwardly laughed at the mention of their roommate.

They knew it was wrong to find their roommate attractive. Months ago they had been nothing but strangers and they already thought about him daily? (Y/n) tried to suppress the thoughts that would randomly intrude their mind during their waking (sometimes even sleeping) hours, but nothing seemed to work. At this point they were just hoping he didn't notice how soft and embarrassed they would get around him.

After all, a tall, soft spoken brunette with just the right amount of build was right up their alley.

“Yep, That's Wilbur for you. Ever the recluse.” They warbled a laugh that they hoped was enough to cover up the sound of their rapidly beating heart. Billy lowered his eyebrows into a face that screamed disbelief and tisked.

“Whatever kiddo. Just be careful around that guy. He doesn't give off the right vibes.”

“Whatever you say Billy.” (Y/n) scoffed, not letting him see that they were a complete tomato by now.

—

It was dark.

So dark.

Wilbur drained his fourth monster can of the day. With a tick in his right eye that had only been increasing as the hours drew on and on, he crushed it into a small metal disk against the ever dented wood of his old desk.

It was night-time outside now. Not that Wilbur could tell you that. His room was dark all the time. With blackout curtains and two different types of blinds obscuring any sort of daylight, his room was constantly bathed in an inky soup. It was a miracle that he wasn't as pale as a sheet of paper by now with how much sunlight he saw (or rather didn't see) on the daily.

A screen radiating flickering blue light sat in front of his eyes. It blared against his watered down iris’s, practically feeling like they were attacking them with a metal baseball bat. But it didn't matter to him.

Wilbur felt the blood in his head pound from the amount of caffeine and sugar coursing through his veins. The feeling was only increased by the sight of them.

Them.

His beloved (Y/n).

Wilbur nearly started giddily spinning in his chair when he saw his dear walk into the lobby. The camera up in the corner caught their frame perfectly, allowing him to see them talking to someone in the lobby.

How he got access to that camera footage wasn't important.

But Wilbur scowled once he saw who (Y/n) was speaking with. Billy. He never really liked Billy. The man was always stealing (Y/n)'s attention, trying to tell them to get a different roommate…

The thought of them getting any sort of roommate but him made Wilbur want to scream and punch a hole through the wall. Instead he took a deep breath so that way he wouldn't have to tack up yet another poster to hide a fist sized hole in the fragile dry-wall. After all, he didn't want (Y/n) figuring out about his little episodes that ended in bruised knuckles.

“Yup, that’s Wilbur for you.” He heard (Y/n)’s vice speak up, causing his ears to perk up and a grin to spread across his cherry flavor stained lips. The sound of his name falling from those plump lips made him want to rush down there and snatch them up for him and him only.

“Ever the recluse.” They continued to awkwardly laugh.

Was it just his imagination, or was their face red?

Wilbur slumped back into his chair with a dreamy sigh at the thought of (Y/n) feeling the same way he does. He could imagine it now. The way their heart would leap into their throat at the sight of him, how they would wring their hands with a red face behind closed doors, how their hands would delve in between their thighs at the thought of his tounge circling their-

The sound of a door opening broke Wilbur out of his, ah, rather interesting trance. With a pink face, he frantically clicked the large red x on the corner his tabs before shutting his computer with a violent slam. Had they really gotten up with the elevator that fast? Guess he lost track of time.

Scrambling out of his comfortable, yet millennia old, gaming chair and across the pigsty called his room, Wilbur opened his door to peak out.

There (Y/n) was, setting down their back pack on the kitchen table with a huff, hair obscuring their face as they bent down to take off their beat up tennis shoes.

“Hey (Y/n).” Wilbur slid out of his room quietly, closing the door behind him without even looking. At the sound of their name, (Y/n) looked up at their tall roommate to see him standing there and adjusting the navy blue beanie on his curls.

“Hey Wil.” They murmured with a genuine smile after seeing him clumsily walk up to them. “How was your day?”

“O-oh it was alright. Not much happened at work.” He scratched the back of his neck, trying not to let his stomach do a backflip.

Actually, work had been horrible today. He had spent the first half of the morning getting yelled at by his boss for not cleaning the bathrooms well enough. And then, later in the day when he was taking his lunch break, when he went to check (Y/n)’s school cams to see how they were doing he couldn't find them.

After frantically flipping through cam after cam, he eventually found out that they had been useing the bathroom. But still, the thought of his beloved not being where they were supposed to be made bile rise in his throat.

He wasn't about to tell them that though. In his experience it was best to just keep that to himself.

“Well I'm glad for that.” (Y/n) huffed with a furrowed brow, having some difficulty undoing one of their shoelaces. Wilbur stiffly stood there for a moment or two more before speaking up.

“Do, do you need some help with that?” He asked slowly. (Y/n) choked on their spit and cleared their throat quickly.

“U-uh, sure.” They coughed.

Okay, Wilbur definitely wasn't imagining things now. Their face was red.

Carefully and slowly, as if he'd break them if he got too close, Wilbr bent down on one knee (in the process trying not to imagine a ring in his hands) and reached his slender fingers down to the knot on (Y/n)'s shoe.

The young adult stood there with a flaming face as they felt Wilbur's hands skillfully undo the knot with ease. The feeling of his long fingers slipping through the lace made a small tingle of static form at the bottom of their spine.

When he was done, the man stood up with a grin. Part of it felt innocent, but the other half ignited something within (Y/n).

“Thanks Wilbur.” (Y/n) stuttered, slipping their shoe off and clutching it tightly in their fingers like it was a priceless artifact. He noticed their white knuckles and death grip, but did nothing but exhale air from his nose with a small smile.

“No problem doll.”

There was that feeling again. As if electricity was traveling straight through their belly and to the bottom of their spine. It collided with the previously stated static feeling until it was a mass of nerves that made (Y/n) involuntary shudder. Teeth chattered and eyes shut tightly like that would make the feeling go away.

As if they wanted anything but it to stop…

Wilbur felt the blood rush to his cock at the sight of (Y/n) shivering beneath him. He worked his tongue around his mouth in an attempt to swallow the saliva that had swelled into his mouth.

Oh boy.

—

Wilbur moaned out as (Y/n)'s hips slammed against theirs, as they had been for the past hour or so.

He had no idea how he got in this situation; being fucked brainless on his darling's bed as the smell of sex and sweat filled the air. He couldn't believe after all these months of mindlessly pining after them they had practically become putty in his hands.

“Such a good boy.” (Y/n) cooed with a smile of ecstasy, ignoring how Wilbur whined at their words needily. “All splayed out under me like this. Bet you’ve been thinking about a moment like this ever since I've walked through that door haven't you.”

With another roll of their hips, (Y/n) sunk Wilbur's cock even deeper down into their needy hole. The man underneath her shook with delight, relishing in the feeling of their walls fluttering around him akin to the feeling of the soft velvet of a butterfly's wings.

“So pretty.” (Y/n) traced a finger slowly down Wilbur's chest with a sharp nail, drawing just the slightest amount of blood from underneath his skin. He moaned with a star eyed smile, flipping them under him in a sudden move that rendered (Y/n) shocked.

He immediately got to work with a sly grin that barely disguised an earth shattering groan, pulling out of (Y/n) only to slam back in.

“You have no idea how long I've wanted to do this.” Was the only thing (Y/n) heard before they came

Boom. There you go

This isnt the Simpbur chapter I was promising you since this was an unexpected project (I got this done in two hours lol) but still

1236 words

-WayToSarcastic

[pennylanewrites]

Hey I saw your post and read your rules. I too am having a bad day and would like to change my mind hehe. Two sides of the same coin. Please take care of yourself and be kind to yourself too :)

Could I please request an AOT headcanon for Eren, Levi, Armin, Bertholdt and Reiner with an s/o from the modern world who is really peaceful and couldn't hurt a fly? Thanks and again, take care :))

Hey love, I’m sorry you’re having a bad day, I hope everything turns out well! I’ll work on your other ask soon too, I loved the idea! Let me know what you think of this! <3

~~~~~~~~♡~~~~~~~~~~♡~~~~~~~~~~♡~~~~~~~~

Modern AU s/o who is really peaceful and easygoing with: Eren, Levi, Armin, Bertholdt and Reiner.

Eren

→ Eren and you met in high school when you broke off a fight between him and your friend, Jean

→ after that he pays more attention to you and wonders if it’s all an act

→ actually asks you straight up if you’re acting sweet bc there’s no way you’re this nice

→ he asked you out by throwing a basketball that wrote ‘date?’ on your face

→ you didn’t even consider getting mad at him for the bloody nose

→ you’ve been dating for a while and he still hasn’t got a reaction from you

→ constantly screams at you about how you need to get mad at people who steal your wallet or rip your essays bc ‘no, they’re not having a bad day!’

→ you calm him down a lot since he basically has no self-control at all and will punch a wall at the slightest obstacle

→ if he’s ever mad at you, he can’t even have a fight because you refuse to have one

Levi

→ even though you’ve been dating a while, Levi claims it’s annoying how you’re always so nice to everyone

→ the only time you raised your voice at him was when the bleach with which he cleaned the floors burned your eyes

→ you apologized to him a thousand times and started crying

→ he had to cuddle you for an hour and assure you he didn’t mind if you yelled, that it’s only normal

→ he actually loves how nice you are, just not when someone’s flirting with you and you just can’t find a way to reject them nicely

→ he yells at Hange and Erwin a lot bc they annoy him

→ you go up to them when he leaves and explain to them that he didn’t mean it and he’s just tired

→ Hange will tease him about you two being a literal angel and the devil reincarnated

Armin

→ boyfriend who’s scared of bugs but wants to kill them and partner who’s also scared of bugs but chases them around the house to put them in a jar

→ ‘throw your slipper at it!’ ‘armin no, what if it’s mom is waiting for it at home?’

→ armin is also very easygoing usually so you two get along extremely well

→ you’d do anything he said and eren would tell him to use it for his advantage, but armin just loves you too much to do something that feels like using you

→ you literally wouldn’t mind though

→ you both want to make each other feel great so your days probably go like

→ ‘here’s some flowers babe I had to visit ten different stores to find them!’ ‘thanks armin, I made you your favorite cake from scratch even though I have a pile of assignments and I ended up missing two classes!’

Bertholdt

→ you two are the same person no kidding

→ he might get mad at Reiner sometimes but that’s about it

→ worships you for how sweet and calm you are

→ words of affirmation and praises are both of your’s favorite thing

→ ‘darling you handled that so well’ ‘you did so good on the exam!’ ‘im so proud of you’

→ he might shed a tear or two as he sees you helping a little kid at the park tie his shoes and then find his mum

→ you just didn’t have the heart to shoo a sweet, innocent kid away from your one year anniversary date

Reiner

→ gets very frustrated at the way you act sometimes

→ ‘why are you whispering?’ ‘Reiner, I’m not whispering, this is my normal voice’ ‘but it’s so quiet’

→ screams at the tv during a soccer game and then turns to you but you haven’t batted an eye

→ god knows this man needs a s/o who’s calm bc he’s not been calm since he was two years old

→ you help him with the papers he takes home from work even though you have one hundred more things to do

→ reiner loves waking up to see you humming a song and making breakfast, you just look like an angel under the sunlight

→ has a theory about how you’re Snow White reincarnated bc animals LOVE you

→ you’re just so calm, how can wild animals not come up to you on a walk through the forest?

→ ‘reiner it won’t bite you’ ‘honey, its a literal wolf’ ‘but it isn’t even teething yet!’

~~~~~~~~♡~~~~~~~~~~♡~~~~~~~~~~♡~~~~~~~~

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

Canary, Part 1

It was a good day. Why did stuff always have to go wrong on ‘good days’, Marinette thought bitterly as she rushed through the city, the rough edges of her phone digging into her palm. The message she’d been sent was burned into her eyelids.

She pushed the spiraling thoughts from her mind as she stared at the street sign nearest her. Only a minute and she’d be there and her fears would be either confirmed or denied.

She leaned against the wall to gather her thoughts. If she had messed up it had to have been today because, otherwise, he would have done something earlier. Did she mess up? She allowed her eyes to flutter closed as she thought back.

~

She’d woken up on an uncomfortable mattress on the floor and rolled off of it, the sheets sticking to her sweaty skin. It had been a particularly hot day for Gotham and she had been too concentrated on typing up a report for work to turn up the AC before her impromptu nap (translation: she’d passed out).

She rubbed her eyes until she managed to get her brown contacts out and set them in the weird not-quite-water that she had never bothered to learn the name for so her eyes could rest while she took a quick shower and changed.

Then, she’d waited. She sat in the window, eyes barely poking over the sill as she watched the building across the street. She didn’t feel like moving for a long while but, alas, the meeting was supposed to be that day and she was running out of time for that thing with Calendar Man and… yeah. Unfortunately, Marinette had to be productive that day unless she wanted more enemies.

She saw movement and her face lit up. She might get everything done soon, at least, and then she could pass out for a hundred years like she oh-so-desperately wanted to.

She checked that her gloves were firmly in place, pulled on the plague doctor (gas) mask that had accidentally become her trademark, and toed on her boots.

Then, she made her way up to the alleyway next to the building she had been watching. She’d been lucky enough to have a job right next to one of her safe houses and she kinda wished that it would happen again. It was nice to not have to travel a half-hour or more just to listen in on one boring conversation.

She pulled out her knives and, after testing to make sure they were still strong enough to hold her weight, began picking her way up to the roof.

She set everything up for the thing with Calendar Man. It took approximately five seconds. Yay her.

Alright, next thing: listening in on a boring conversation that, if she was lucky, would end in someone getting shot so it wouldn’t last too long. It was going to be even hotter inside the vent and she did not want to end up cooked. That would be embarrassing.

She crawled into the vents and dutifully wrote down everything they said on a notepad. They were negotiating a drug deal and her client wanted to intercept it to try and get both the money and the (… Big D? What the fuck is Big D?) drugs. From the sounds of it, it wasn’t possible but, hey, her job wasn’t anything more than gathering intel. If her clients wanted to die stupidly that was on them.

… maybe she’d kill her client herself, she thought angrily as she readjusted in the vent in hopes of not getting stuck to the metal. It was easy money but wow was it awful.

Or, at least, it was awful until a hand grabbed her by the hood of her leather jacket and started dragging her out. She tipped her head back, grin on her face in seconds.

“Signal. Hi.”

He sighed and pulled her the rest of the way out. She let herself hang from his grip like a reprimanded cat.

“So, what’s up?” She asked brightly, as if hadn’t just caught her listening in on a private conversation.

“Great, thanks for asking,” he said. “Even better now that I’m taking the famed Canary to Arkham.”

“We both know that’s not going to happen.”

He leveled her with a cold look for a few more seconds before splitting into a grin. “Yeah. Probably not. Got a backup plan?”

“Of course.”

“Is it even worth trying?”

“Probably not. But who knows? You could get lucky.”

She waited for a minute as he mulled over the idea in his head before he sighed. “I gotta ask: what’s with the egg?”

She swatted at his hand until he let her down and then led him over to her science experiment. “Know how there’s that expression that says ‘it’s so hot out you could make eggs on the sidewalk’ or something?”

“Yeah…?”

“Well, the pavement physically can’t get hot enough to do that and also we’re up north so: aluminum foil to try and get the process to work a little better.”

He stared at her for a while before snickering. “Need a magnifying glass? We can ‘kid with an anthill’ this.”

“Sure.”

He reached into his tool belt and started looking for his spare. Unfortunately for him, it seemed to be gone.

She could feel his sharp gaze turn on her even if she couldn’t see his eyes behind his helmet. He wasn’t stupid and magnifying glasses don’t usually just disappear into thin air unless they’re Plastic Man in disguise. She held up her hands for a quick search but, when he couldn’t find it on her, he just sighed and looked down at the science experiment. It didn’t seem to be going well. The egg was still distinctly not cooked.

Eventually, he groaned and sat down. The light around him flickered and started to move at his will. Marinette watched intently.

Ten minutes later, they had a cooked egg. They high-fived, delighted. They weren’t going to taste it, obviously, it had been out for a while without supervision and who knows what could have happened to it… but it was an egg! Yay them!

“My old science teacher would be so proud of me,” Marinette joked.

“My current science teacher would be proud of me.”

“Oooooh, going back to school?”

He smiled. “Yep! Robin is finally in college and Red Hood convinced me to go with him. You should, too, it’s actually not that bad.”

“Please. If I was going to do that I’d go back to my home country. American school is expensive and not all of us are sponsored by billionaires.”

“... aren’t you a millionaire?”

She grinned. “Of course. But why would I want to spend that much of my own money?”

He hummed his understanding. Then, she pushed herself up with a groan. “Right, we both have jobs. See you later.”

He hesitated and then held a hand out for her notepad. “Is it bad?”

She held it out of reach with ease. “Nah, just drugs. Unless someone got shot while I was gone but I doubt it. They’d been almost as bored as me last I heard.”

“If it’s nothing then let me see.”

“Ugh, do you really want to fight? It’s too hot for that,” Marinette complained. He started to square up and she, after a second’s thought, added a little something to convince him: “Also, there’s going to be a breakout today so you should really save your energy.”

“... really think I’m going to fall for that?”

There was an explosion in the distance.

“Yeah. I’d hurry. I’m pretty sure it’s Joker’s turn to get out.”

She waved him off with a smile… only for her smile to drop when she remembered her other job. She groaned again and stretched out while she still could.

Tikki floated over the side of the building, a magnifying glass as big as her head in her tiny paws.

Marinette rubbed the kwami’s head. “You’re the best.”

Her kwami sighed. “That I am,” she said.

Marinette grinned and sent the film of Signal using his powers to her computer so she could give it to Calendar Man when it was due.

People were always so predictable in Gotham.

~

She supposed she really had been tempting fate when she’d thought that. Still, that didn’t mean she liked it that Fate had called her bluff.

But, actually, it seemed that Fate was the one that was bluffing. That had been her entire day. She had finished up her work and then went to one of her more stocked safehouses for a nap. She’d woken up to the buzzing of her phone when she’d gotten the message. She didn’t think she had messed up anywhere…

Her shoulders relaxed. She was probably fine. Which meant it was just Oswald Cobblepot being annoying. As usual.

Marinette flung the doors to the Iceberg Lounge open. Every eye in the room fell on her, but she only cared about the eyes of one person.

She stalked through the lounge, pulling one of her twin karambits from its sheath and pointing the curved blade towards him.

“What the fuck do you want? You really think that, after almost seven whole years of rejecting your wrinkly ass, I’m suddenly going to say ‘oh, yeah, I guess I’ll work for him now’? Leave me alone!”

Cobblepot wasn’t concerned even as her knife came to rest under his chin.

“Canary,” he greeted, regarding her cooly through his monocle.

Guards surrounded them. Marinette somehow managed to look unimpressed without anyone being able to see her face.

Everyone present held their breath… except for the two with weapons pointed at themselves. They knew that they would never follow through with it, especially not in a place as public as this. It was little more than a warning, a reminder, that either of them could kill each other at any given moment and chose not to.

For now, at least.

Cobblepot dismissed the guards with a wave of a gloved hand and she, after a few seconds, lowered her knife.

“What do you want?”

“Currently? For you to get off my table,” said Cobblepot.

She snorted but hopped down with ease. “I meant: why did you call me here?”

“... we should go somewhere else to discuss this. I assume you don’t do all of your business meetings in public?”

“Only if I know ahead of time that I’m going to say no,” she said.

He motioned for her to walk with him to a private room and, reluctantly, she followed. He had to think he had something on her, otherwise he wouldn’t have tried calling her there. She was curious.

They came to a room with a metal door and she cringed a little. Fun.

She dropped eight knives down into a tray and Cobblepot put down a gun, a knife, and his umbrella. She let a female goon pat her down and then checked Cobblepot over herself. Nothing she could find, but she was sure he had found some way to hide one somewhere.

They stepped inside as a pair and each took a seat on opposing ends of the wooden table stationed awkwardly in the middle of the room. She leaned back in her chair and propped her feet up.

“So, what’s the job?”

“I’m surprised you’re even going to hear it.”

She shrugged. “I’m curious.”

He nodded slowly before leaning forward to rest his elbows on the table, steepling his fingers in front of his face.

“Power poses don’t actually work, you know, that’s just lies so companies don’t actually have to deal with all the discrimination.”

“Is that true?” He asked.

She shrugged again. “Probably. I’ve never worked for anyone, so…”

He chuckled. She didn’t like that.

But he didn’t say anything on that subject. Instead, he just smiled a smile that looked weird on his face and gave her her mission briefing: “I want you to figure out the bats’ identities for me.”

Marinette stared at him for a minute before breaking out into laughter. She couldn’t seem to stop. She stood up to leave, still giggling. Really? Did he really think that would work? People had asked many times, of course, and the bats’ identities weren’t common knowledge so she had to have said no. Why would she suddenly do it for him? She didn’t even like him.

She rested her hand on the knob but held off on leaving for just a second. She flashed a grin at Cobblepot. “Interesting offer. Bold. But no. Couldn’t pay me enough to do that.”

“Good thing I have no intentions of paying you, Marinette.”

~~~

And behold a new section I call ‘Marinette is a menace to society why would anyone let her on twitter’

(… the name may need a little work)

OliverQueenOfficial: Why does that one Gotham villain go by Canary? Black Canary already exists.

TheBetterCanary: if youre gonna vague tweet maybe dont put my name in it

TheBetterCanary: but anyways someone else named me that and it stuck before i could think of something to change it to

ScareCrane:… @/RiddleMeThis she’s dissing you

RiddleMeThis: LISTEN UP. IT WAS THEMATIC. DON’T ANY OF YOU KNOW ANYTHING OF DRAMA? EVER HEAR ABOUT CANARIES IN COAL MINES? FUCK ALL OF YOU AND YOUR UNCULTURED, UNEDUCATED ASSES. NOT TO MENTION IT WAS MAKING FUN OF THE BIRD THEME ALL THE VIGILANTES HER AGE SEEM TO HAVE. (1/14)

TheBetterCanary: @/ScareCrane why would you do that you knew he was going to do this

ScareCrane: Joker just broke out so Arkham is boring… needed to entertain myself somehow

TheBetterCanary: fuck you im not visiting this weekend

OliverQueenOfficial: Wow do I regret asking. I didn’t need all this family drama in my comments.

~~~~~

Next

Perma taglist: @nathleigh @peachmuses

[lwt28brave]

LT2 masterpost

If it was up to me, we would get an autumn or winter EP. Since it’s not up to me at all, here, enjoy this post with everything we know so far of LT2, which is to say, not much at all. Everything here is hypothetical. I’ll be updating every time I see something relevant. A little disclaimer that while this is a masterpost (kinda), it could be read as discourse (duh, it’s also a theory), AND it’s also by me, and you shouldn’t expect me to be serious at this point.

Due to me restraining myself, there’s no reference to any of the times he’s mentioned his guitar skills and him improving but I hope you know I cried every single time.

I’m also linking my old pinned here. It was written before AFHF and around the free merch thing that didn’t lead to much, but I still think I made some good points.

Possible tracks:

Copy of a Copy of a Copy

Change

Faith in the future??

369??

Possible names:

369

Faith in the future

When is the album coming out?

Your guess is as good as mine

Friday 28th of January 2022. Almost two years after Walls. It’s a Friday. It’s a 28th. What else can I say?

Here you can find @want-to-be-loved timelines for every month.

Here you can find @berlinini’s timeline of what Louis has been up to this year (2021).

The rest is under the cut. And here you can find a PDF version where Tumblr can't tell me how many pictures I can add.

2020

He said back on May 2th 2020 he wasn’t writing anything new yet.

(x)(x)(x)

Interestingly enough, he’s said many times after that that the album’s not ready cause he has no new experiences to drawn from. I won’t call him out because he does it himself.

May 4th. He liked a tweet from DMA’s Johnny Took saying they had to go write together again. Louis has been credited as an influence for them and (kind of) participated in their previous record, so I’m assuming he meant for their music and not his, but you never know.

Nothing(literally nothing??? how did we survive) until 11th of July. We all know what happened that day. We all celebrated it. Nonetheless, that’s not what I’m talking about here.

(x) So, by the beginning of July 2020 he was working on concepts and ideas for the new album. That was fifteen months ago. I know perfection takes time but…

Brief summary of important things that happened from then until the next mention of new music:

Louis left Syco!!!! 10 days later he rescheduled the tour for the first time. He followed Matt Vines on Twitter, probably so we could publicly shame him into doing something. Also, the 10thanniversary. He followed more people I wish he hadn’t.

Then more nothing until September. Not even a single tweet. The first merch drop was on the 28th of August but he just RT’ed the tweet. He first mentioned Free my Meal on the 25th of September. Then on October 1st Walls hit #1 on a lot of countries and Louis was incredibly happy and excited about it ^^

And then, that same day, October 1st, 2020, he dropped this bomb:

(x)

He also said it was too soon to be sharing new lyrics with us (x)

And, obviously, this tweet which is actually what made me start this whole post. I would hope you know mate.

(x)

He also told us he was cooking "banger after banger" and that he was incorporating more social themes into his music (x)(x) (I believe any social issue is a political issue but that’s not the point rn).

COPY OF A COPY OF A COPY?!?!

These next paragraphs are brought to you by my mind not remembering things and me not having any links. I’m assuming COACOAC came from those writing sessions that supposedly happened in October. Or in LA but I have no idea if he actually was in LA at any point other than a Daily Mail article putting him there on December which would have been too late, but I do remember that someone said he was in the studio in LA last autumn???? A rumor. Maybe. IDK. Did I mention already all of this is very hypothetical?? Well, this is it. I can’t even remember if this was October or November or what. So, take this with a grain of salt.

I’m also… taking the liberty to assume, if you must, that Copy wasn’t meant to be a Walls reject because it sounds more mature and darker and it has a vastly different tone that Walls songs. I know he’s said that song probably isn’t getting into the album, but I want to have faith (in the future) that I’m getting a studio version. (But also, Louis, if you’re reading this, first of all GET OUT OF MY BLOG second of all, please don’t ever feel pressured again to add a song to the album because we have already heard it before. It’s your art and it should always be under your own terms).

So yeah, I believe that Copy is either one of those four songs (then imagine the other three??!!) or was written around the 1st of October date.

---End of the Intermission---

Then not much important (other than sharing more about Marcus Rashford fight against food poverty and the 2nd merch drop) until he announced the livestream on the 24th of November. (x)

It wasn’t until a few days before the livestream date we even thought again about new music (jk, I know we’re always thinking about new Louis’ music). So, December 9th/10th, 2020. Nine months ago. We got our first taste of new music!

He made sure we knew Copy of a Copy of a Copy isn't a cover! (x) (x)

(x)

Ok, so that’s it for 2020. (I feel like I’m missing something from September 17th because tweet was deleted but maybe he was still talking about cucumbers. We might never know. Unless I understand how Tumblr tags work). Expected, cause Walls was released in 2020. We needed to let it sit for a while.

2021

Another Summary: Louis third tweet of the year was telling the UK government off. So was the fifth. What a good beginning. On the 26th of January, he said he prefers pancakes over waffles. I hope he meant pancakes other than his own. More importantly, he tweeted the infamous “you lot read into things too much”. Don’t get me started, Tomlinson. Don’t. Then the 31st came around and Walls was one. He tweeted this. How wise. And Project Defenceless happened!!

15th of February!! Who cares about Valentine Day when the next day we got this? ♥

(x)

(x)

So…AN EP?? AN EP?? PLEASE RELEASE AN EP.

“I’m sure I will have something out this year but unlikely that will be the album”. Unlikely but not impossible. Also. A single would be good. This is the second time he mentions releasing something in 2021 and he sounds surer about it than the first time around.

He also said that he isn’t sure we will get a studio version of Copy. And that the best bridges from Walls to LT2 are Walls, OTB, KMM and Copy. Can’t wait!

Then we jump to March 6th when he announced he was going to create his own management company. “Sometimes action is needed first to encourage the motivation and belief”. As we can tell he was already manifesting some stuff which will lead us to the numerology stuff/Tesla… kidding. Or not. We might never know.

On the 22nd of March he answered some questions:

He told us music was still his main focus ♥ mwha. (x) I included this tweet to guilt-trip him into giving us music in case he’s reading this even after I told him to leave. ILY.

(x) I’d love to get a visual EP this autumn. Just saying. It sounds like a lovely concept.

(x)

…next (I will get into it, I promise. I’m just mad).

On the 25th he left for Mexico until April 10th. You could assume it was just for the documentary where we got ten seconds of footage or admit the obvious: LT2 its a Mexican baby!!

On the 26th (so, not so far apart from that first 369) we got the first Faith in the Future mention: (x)

Back then we were innocent people who had no idea what was coming upon us. We still have no idea because what the fuck does he mean with these. Please explain. I have one braincell and I don’t use it enough for this. I’m linking some theories.

On the 30th of March he confirmed he was already working on the documentary. So AFHF was already on the works. Will it take this long for us to get the Veeps numbers? We also got this tweet: "Got a decent chorus idea down" (x).

Same person that got the “something out this year” exclusive. If you know something share with the class. Also. Is this Change? I feel like this could be Change but I also assume he wrote Change after hanging out with his friends or being in Doncaster. But who knows.

(x) And the second mention to 369.

(x) 15th of April. The second "Faith in the future".

On the 19th of April he announced that he had something BIG for us later on the year which turned out to be the Away From Home Festival ♥♥ (x) I love him so much.

Then on the 28th he announced the 369 merch drop (which it’s probably the Walls drop? Except that the TOU and KMM ones were “drop 1 and drop 2” and this was drop 369 which, again, makes no sense) but we still don’t know what 369 means.

Into May’ 21 we go.

He rescheduled tour again. And dropped another bomb (x).

He announced he has signed with BMG as an independent artist by RTing this tweet on May 10th. The article also says that he’s already working on writing and recording LT2. The timing… we don’t know. What this deal involves… we don’t know either. Bear with me here because I have a lot to say about this.

I think the deal is only a distribution one, but that BMG are interested in Louis and what he (us) could bring to the table. They were either present at the festival or watching it, but officially they had no involvement at all with it (everything is credited either to Louis own company, 78 Productions, or Charlie Lightening’s company). That’s the case for both giveaways too; the vinyl one and the tickets for the festival.

I think it would be an unbelievably bad move not to test the waters with BMG now or soon-ish. At least a single, to see how it performs. Due to the circumstances, it’s obvious there’re certain limitations on place but I want to see how they push it, whether the radio play exist this time around and if the song is playlisted and promoted and all that… I would also love to know, since it says he signed with BMG UK, but it also states it’s a global deal, how things are going to go on the US and other countries.

Yes, yes. I know those are all questions and no answers. But I know the same as you, sadly. If any of you know more than you’re letting on… again, share with the class.

Where was I? Yes, on the 25th of May Louis had a great day writing (x). Since the first time he had mentioned he was officially writing to this date there’s almost eight months. And I believe he was writing before October’ 20.

He followed Robert Harvey that day and, on the 28th of May (why is it always the 28th???) he was spotted at the studio for the first time.

June was an interesting month for the fandom ♥. Lots of LHL content which I will love and cherish for the rest of times. On June 4th, June 9th, and June 10th he was spotted at the studio, but I believe he was there more days.

(x)

This was posted on June 6th and captioned Studio. Charlie also shared it with “Mega tunes being put down, can’t wait for this @louist91 #louistomlinson #LT2” as the caption. This gives me 2019 (Elton-Joint) vibes. I like it. Feels like we’re getting closer to something.

He added the Milano date on the 9th too which I’m mentioning because I’m going alone. Anyone wanna go with me please? I’m nice and I never eat anything before a concert so you can have my food. On other news. It didn’t come home.

During July he was at the studio at least three days too. Probably more. Feels like more with all the fan pictures we got. Or was that June? Anyway, July 1st and 9th we got some videos from Robert Harvey and wearesuperhi, which is who Louis has been working with the most, that we know of. I don’t know for sure they’re from that day. And on July 5th we got an article and lots of pictures of Louis looking really good outside the studio.

On the 12th of July the first fans started getting the free, 369 bucket hat and print. We still don’t know what the purpose was other than to thanks fans. Maybe that was it. I want answers and I still think it relates to a future project (see theories above), but it could also just be a bridge with the Walls breaking.

He didn’t tweet about anything interesting for a while, mostly because he lost his phone (he either throwed it in the air or smashed it who knows). Then on the 29th of July he announced the festival!

I’m glossing over it because there’s already been a lot of talk about it (rightfully) and while it was a wonderful thing, it doesn’t have much to do with LT2.

Let’s talk Change!

On August 3rd he tweeted this about the setlist.

(x)

And this (x) on the 28th! I can’t stand him.

We didn’t get it, obviously. Because who was going to get that. But we read too much into things. Alright.

On the 16thof August Dave Gibson shared this post tagged #LT2 with the eyes emojis 👀👀👀. I believe this has to do both with Change but also with whatever else came out of that Mexico trip.

(x) Last relevant tweet related to LT2 is this one.

So, on the 30th of August we got Change and we cried, and we know that Change is going in the new album. He said it. With those exact words. He also said he was “getting a feeling for it”. This has to meant he already has a general idea of the vibe of the new album and what’s going in it!!!!!! (Right? RIGHT?).

Anyway, let’s go back a few weeks because some other things happened on August. He was at the studio a few more times. Or it was suggested that he was there. On the 17th and the 18th. (Why was it so time-pressing to be at the studio instead of rehearsing for the festival? There was no studio at all on the documentary. Which makes sense, but again, then why?).

On the day of the festival we got another mention of Faith in The Future that made me feel part of a cult ngl. The words were flashing on the screen for less than a second. Okay.

And then he tweeted those words again after watching the livestream/documentary on the 4th of September (x). This is what makes me suspect it's either the name of the album or of the single.

On the same day, we got some interesting quotes about LT2 on the documentary.

“Soon I’ll have to think about me second album, which in my head I’ll get the tour out of the way and then I’ll address that. So, I hadn’t really given it much thought, to be honest”.

“When every day is the same is hard to feel creative and it’s hard to have any kind of proper inspiration”.

“As season started to come back, I started writing again and it was great and some of these songs turned out alright”.

And I think this is it. I might be overlooking some important details but that’s what we know and what we don’t know.

So. Conclusions. That’s what you missed on Glee. I do believe the album is, if not mostly done, partially there. And yes, this post is pointless and never-ending but it’s all in here if you need to tell Louis “Hey, you said this, mate”.

[lovee-infected]

Husband!Leona x Housewife!Reader: Birthday surprise

As you have your birthday today, Leona has a plan to prepare a party for his one and only beloved wife; however, uncle Ruggie and your babies almost burn the house down to ashes when you're out...

Happy birthday @jessamine-rose !♡ Now suffer-

Warning(s): None, just a review on Leona's chaotic father experiment trying to babysit his neko babies.

Note: This work is the continuation of a personal au I wrote for @jessamine-rose s/o and Leona have 3 adorable kittens (babies) in this au; The elder two are twins , a girl named Kaede and a son named Haruki while the baby gremlin is a sweet but chaotic cinnamon roll girl named Lucy (Lulu).

At last, it's here: The big day. Not only Leona seems have been expecting this day to arrive for months, or perhaps, he's been waiting ever since you had your previous birthday last year.

Not that you thought previous birthday celebrations with them lacked anything specific or was incomplete in a recognizable way; but it didn't change the fact that you didn't seem to have enjoyed them either.

Leona is the prince of the afterglow Savannah, after all. As her wife your birthday was nothing less than a national holdiday and he always tented to prepare royal celebrations ever since you married him.

But for some reason, that formal and majestic aura seemed to bother you in a way; perhaps because you preferred to be actually spending time with Leona and your family instead of having to stay in the same spot for hours with your back straightened as you greet thousands of strangers and the rest of the royal family.

Not that you ever spoke of how uncomfortabe and annoying all of those birthday ceremonies were, but you almost let out a relived sigh when Leona tells he isn't going to put out another of those extravagant celebrations.

The night before your birthday, Leona comes to you and mentions hoe it's been a while since the last time you had some time for your own, and he's right: From the day you gave birth to lulu you've been awfully busy with housework and caressing your babies; not that your life could be any sweeter than it is now but you had to admit- You somehow missed the old days when you had more time to spend on your own...

Leona recommends you take a day off, as a birthday treat! You're free to go shopping, take a short vacation to the beach or simply go to your favorite cafe and enjoy your favorite drinks and beverages in peace, meanwhile Leona would take care of the house and kittens so you can have today for your own and all~

Of course you accept his offer, you give him a small kiss on cheek and thank him, the two of you head to your bedroom and you are given the opportunity to sleep on Leona's warm chest for the rest of the night.

Thus you leave the house the next morning after, and now it's time for Leona's secret plan. He's already prepared anything, your favorite flowers, your favorite desserts and food, a very expensive perfume you had liked before, color-matching costumes for both him and the kittens, tiny cute accessories to decorate the house with and at last, tens of gifts from different things he sure knows that you'll love.

Ruggie is charge of cooking, so he gets to preparing muffins and cupcakes while Leona takes care of decorations: Designing the entire house with flower petals, baloons and colorful ribbons would've taken him hours if he were to do that by hand, but using his extraordinary magic skills, the whole house is perfectly decorated and prepared in a second *Chef's kiss.*

Just as Leona is about to let out a proud smirk and return to kitchen to see how Ruggie is doing with he cooking, he hears a sound. He turns his head to find no one but baby Lulu, chewing the decorations.

He runs to her and takes the ribbons out of her mouth, opening her mouth a second time and carefully look through it to see if she's eaten any of them or not. Oh God, he promised that he'd take care of everything when you're out, he just can't let you return home and find out that your baby has swallowed paper, what will you even think of him? Irresponsible partner? Unworthy father? No, he must make sure that baby lulu would be all same and sound until you return home.

He hugs Lulu and puts her on a corner with several baloons to play with, far from anything dangerous she could chew but then baby Lulu discovers a new hobby: popping balloons.

Her tiny fangs have just popped out and her gums often hurt, so she just wants to get her fangies on anything she could chew or bite and wow, this baby is not only totally unaffected by the loud sound of balloons popping right into her face but also finds it quite amusing. Baby begins to laugh loudly and chase after more balloons to chew as she has discovered a new hobby, and before Leona could've stopped her, she pops 5 more balloons with just one bite-

Leona picks her up immediately because if Lulu continued to chew balloons like this nothing of them would be left until you get home-

- But all of a sudden, he smells something rotten, followed by a trail of smoke coming from kitchen. He immediately puts Lulu down and runs back to the kitchen to see what in the great seven's name is happening there-

Leona jumps into the kitchen- just to find Kaede and Haruki screaming and crying as Ruggie's trying to take the black-rotten cupcakes out of the oven. Leona asks what the hell has happened and Ruggie explains he was too busy separating the twins because they couldn't stop arguing whether their mama would like caramel syrup as the topping or sprinkles, so Ruggie totally forgets about the overcooked muffins and cupcakes in the middle of their arguments.

Leona tells him to pull himself and start over- But Ruggie aruges that he won't be able to concentrate on both babysitting and cooking if that's how it's going to be. Leona growls and tell Ruggie to stop being such a wacky hyena and just get back to work without messing up again- And Ruggie explodes.

He starts shouting, Ruggie legit starts shouting in a rare, angry tune which terrified everyone even Leona. He roars that he won't be doing shit until Leona actually pays him for once, and the two start arguing. Just as the chaos is burning the kitchen down, Lulu decides uncle Ruggie's leg looks quite delicious to bite, and in a matter of second Ruggie is screaming as the baby lion's fangs literally pierced into his flesh.

The whole house is filled with smoke, Lulu has taken the entire decorations down and Leona's trying to seprate baby Lulu's fangs from Ruggie's leg. Twins are terrified, so the silently sneak out of the kitchen to call the right person to come for help...

It's past 10 pm when you're done with your day off. You've been giggling over how a day off was just what you needed after a long time, you had told Leona to call if anything went wrong, and thankfully, you didn't receive any calls from him while you were out. Leona really seems to have toughed it out as a father, huh?

You knock at the door, waiting for someone to open it. After a 3 minute delay you take a small look through the house and realize the lights are off. You just get in using your keys and suddenly, a loud "SURPRISE!" makes you jump back and the lights are back on, revealing Farena, Cheka, your kittens and very, very very tired-looking Leona and Ruggie standing in front of you. Leona gives you a weak smile as your confused gaze meets him, at last, they managed to clean the mess up before you got home.

Twins welcome you with a warm hug as they lock their tiny arms around your waist, digging their faces into soft fabrics of your clothes as if they hadn't met you in days, and of course, 12 hours of chaos without mama at home is enough to make them want to never be left alone in the house with uncle Ruggie and dad again-

Ruggie is trying his best not to be rude but he quickly approaches you, wishes you a very happy birthday and excuses himself saying he really needs to be home by this hour. You question the bandages wrapped around his leg, asking if he's alright? Ruggie just- Gulps nervously before turning his head back and stare at Leona who is holding Lulu... Ruggie nods quickly and leaves your house asap, poor boy... maybe you should call him sometime later and asking if he's doing fine?

Back to the party, Farena chuckles as he tells you how his younger brother has been DESPERATELY making plans for his beloved wife's birthday for nearly two months-! Farena explains that Leona even refused to accept Farena's help when he was firstly coming up with the plans, but Leona insisted that he wanted to manage everything on his own.

Aaaaaw Leona's face is a must-see now, his ears dropped down in mild embarrassment and frustration, feeling like a silly child in front of you. Damn- If it was on him he wouldn't have asked for Farena's help once in a thousand years even if if Ruggie and him had ended up burning the entire house; but he must admit, he's glad that twins asked for his help because- It would've been impossible to manange to do all the work on time without his help.

Aaah at least your birthday party didn't turn out to be a horrible mess, but at what cost? Great seven, he was supposed to be your one and only man tonight but right now he's nothing but a fuzzy cat wanting to pass put on his bed.

Yet he still manages to keep his eyes open, at least until you're done with the birthday party and Farena and Cheka are finally out; leaving him alone with you. Gosh, he looks so- you can't even find tje right adjective to describe this but all you can say for now is that you've never seen him this tired before.

You gently take Lulu, who has already fallen asleep in his arms and take her to her bed, asking Leona if babysitting her was difficult by any means. Leona tiredly shakes his head in a no, saying how much of a wonderful girl she was when you were away, and you can tell how much of an awful liar he is.

When the kids are asleep, you come to sit next to a lifeless Leona on couch, damn, just what happened to this household when you weren't around?

Leona's too tired to explain, he just sighs and apologizes for your birthday not being even *close to the best it could be, just to meet your laughter.

Oh lord, he is being quite desperate at the moment ha? Leona was always the dominative and demanding one, to have him serve ypu on your birthday... Oh dear, isn't that already the best birthday gift possible?

You excitedly start to tell him how this birthday was just the best you could've ever asked for: Freedom, A golden time to be spent for your own desires and not anyone else, and aside all of these, you return home just to face a secret party waiting for you!

But most importantly: He had gone through all of these... for you, to make you happy.

You tightly hug him, wrapping your arms around his neck and bringing his face closer to yours. Aaaa he looks so cute like this, just like a tired pouty can wanting you to spoil him and to be honest, he's going to need you spoil him for a week at least for him to recovers from that 12 hours of chaos.

It's been a long day, for both you and him. So he just kisses your forehead and bridal carries you to your bedroom afterwards; wrapping his strong arms and thighs around you and jailing you in his embrace. You gasp at the warmth, truth be told having your face burried in Leona's firm chest like this was something you never got used to even after being married to him for years. Damn lion knew how to leave a flushed mess out of you, huh? You chuckle as you struggle to release yourself but hell, the jerk simply pretends that he's already fallen asleep.

Just as Leona's arms are jailing you into his embrace he wonders, today probably didn't turn out to be as good as he'd planmed but well... at least you're happy. That's what he wanted when he whet out of his way planning for today, after all. But he can tell the experiment made him come to appreciate you even more, thinking that you've been caressing all three of your babies for years all on your own while Leona wouldn't have even made it for half a day if Farena hadn't saved him...

[morizoras-cave]

Sleepover (Collab with @lozzypoz321)

Sebastian Stan x f!teen!co-star!reader, MCU Cast x f!teen!co-star!reader

Genre: fluff, crack honestly

Description: You and the MCU cast have a secret sleepover on set.

Warnings: language!!

A/N by morizoras-cave: this was even more fun than the last fic, loz is so so funny and so so talented and i just feel so comfortable writing with her :) also so many… bad things… happened while we wrote this. I mean it was chaotic.. I hope you enjoy its LONG

A/N by @lozzypoz321​: this was so much fun to write and I loved it!! Honestly you do not want to know what happened behind th scenes because that was a m e s s. Vic is suck and amazing writer and deserves so much love! Hope you enjoy!!

“Kid, open the door!” your head snapped to the door of your hotel room. You recognised Sebastian’s voice coming from outside. “Open up!”

“I’m coming” you yelled, padding over to the door and opening up. Sebastian and Anthony stood out there. They looked oddly child-like as they stood there with their sleeping bags and dressed in pjs. You snorted. “Well, hello to you too!” 

“Don’t laugh, N/n, this is serious.” Anthony said as you walked out, you also dressed in your marvel pjs and with a sleeping bag in hand. Although, you thought, it was hard to take him seriously when he was dressed in Winnie The Pooh slippers. 

“Whatever you say, man.”

The entirety of the marvel cast had planned a sleepover on set. It was very secret, apparently. You didn’t know the full story, but they had seemingly asked the directors if they could have an onset sleepover and they’d refused, so someone had to steal a key. It was a whole process, but nonetheless you found yourself on the way to set at around 10:30. 

“Is anyone bringing snacks?” you asked. You, Seb and Anthony were walking down the street. You could see the set already. “Damn, I hope so” Anthony mumbled and you all continued walking. 

When you got there Elizabeth was standing outside, holding the door open with what you assumed was the stolen key. She ushered you inside. “You’re late and for some reason I’m not surprised.”

Inside all the others were already waiting, the entirety of the cast. Notably, you could see that Robert, Scarlett and Mark had created a pillow fort, and were hiding out in the coziness with a bag of popcorn. 

“Welcome, late-comers!” Robert greeted you dramatically, standing up in his Iron Man onesie. “You’ve missed the pizzas. You know, because you’re late!” 

“It’s fine, we already ate. Which is why we’re late,” Sebastian pointed nodded to Anthony. You nodded along.

Everyone sat down on a large stretch of couches, blankets and pillows, where Elizabeth had placed a projector pointed to an empty wall of the set. You sat down with Tom (Hiddleston), Sebastian and Mark. It was a rather weird thing to see so many grown men and women (that you had previously had respect for) in their most colourful pjs, but you supposed it was on you to expect any differently from this cast of people. 

Chris (Evans) had picked a movie and, unsurprisingly, he picked Iron Man 1. Robert protested for about two seconds, before he let everyone shower him in compliments because that movie was so damn good. “Okay okay, I guess we can watch it if we really have to”

Scarlett lightly laughed and pressed a button on the projector to start the movie after placing the disk inside that Chris (Evans) had brought from his collection at his house. “Where’s the snacks?” You heard Chris (Hemsworth) loudly whisper to Scarlett who sat next to him. 

“Ooh do we have popcorn?” You quietly asked Sebastian who nodded and reached across Anthony who was laid next to him to retrieve the salted popcorn that Mark had gotten just for you as he was in charge of the snack committee. Chris (Evans) silently got up, after making sure nobody noticed him (except from you), and crawled across the room in his rapunzel pjs on his hands and knees to reach Robert who was now on the verge of unconsciousness with dribble falling from the side of his mouth. Trying to be discreet, he raised his hands scarily behind him, gaining everybody’s attention in the room except Robert, and suddenly pounced on him in a playful manner. 

The man leapt up without warning with wide eyes the size of dinner plates and held his hands up as if he was doing karate in a mode of self defence. Everybody in the room burst out laughing at his reaction, Chris (Evans) reaching for his left pec as he leant back on his knees in a full on belly laugh. “You looked like you were a 6 year old girl” Scarlett laughed out and shook her head towards the man, who was now grumbling as he sat back down on his spot with an abundance of blankets by his side. 

“All the snacks are gone” Anthony exclaimed to the cast, making Tom (Hiddleston) look up from the screen and ponder “well we could do something that doesn’t require food” he suggested, making everyone look at him to continue. 

“I mean, we could play hide and seek?”

“Oh!” You exclaimed excitedly, one of your first inputs of the night “I’d love to play hide and seek! My dad used to do it with me all the time!”

Your happy demeanour made them all smile as you began explaining how he would hide next to you while your brother tried to find both of you. “Well it’s settled then, we’re playing hide and seek!” Chris (Hemsworth) announced in his Australian accent, before you could be told twice, you jumped up and grabbed Sebastian's hand before racing out of the room, not even giving anybody a second glance. 

“Woah, where are we going?” Sebastian chuckled, following your rapid footsteps. “Don’t worry about this, Seb, I’ve the perfect hiding spot!” It was a little bit embarrassing to admit, but every time you entered a new place, you thought about the best hiding spots (in case of an unwarranted game of hide and seek). 

You pulled Sebastian into the costume room and shuffled awkwardly into the back. There, you found your masterful hiding place. It was a vent, but not a small one. It was big. Sebastian looked at you in surprise. “Not bad, Y/n.” 

You popped the cover right off, catching Sebastian off guard. “I unscrewed it back in February,” you explained and jumped inside. Sebastian seemed to want to question you further, but instead just shrugged to himself and followed you inside, closing the vent cover behind him.

“This really is the perfect place,” he mumbled, voice echoing slightly in the vents. It was pretty cold, but stable. “And hey, didn’t you say that your dad used to hide with you?” He asked while looking around the airy place. “Oh, um, yeah” you said sheepishly, just now remembering the moment in the other room. 

“Um- I-I mean, not that you’re my- Like, my dad-” you stammered, blushing at the awkward moment, “Like- My dad is my dad- You’re just- I’m sorry- I didn’t mean to make this awkward, I just-”

“Shut up!” Sebastian hissed suddenly. You looked at him, taken aback. He was staring out the vent covers, and then looked back at you with a grin. He pointed to it silently. Your brows furrowed, and you looked out. You saw Chris in the room, hand holding a flashlight while aiming it around the room, trying to find a sign of anybody. You held your breath. 

“I know you’re in here! I can smell your fear!” he yelled trying to act scary. Meanwhile, he just looked kind of goofy in his Disney princess pjs. You saw Sebastian beside you, trying not to laugh. His face was contorted into a forced frown, but a smile still crept up the corners of his mouth. Seeing his face, you started feeling the urge to laugh too. 

You both laughed silently, trying so hard to not give away your position to Chris. You were failing miserably. 

“I will find you!” Chris said again, and this time Sebastian let out a laugh, immediately clamping a hand over his mouth. His eyes widened and so did yours. Chris stopped moving, snapping his head around furiously. “Who was that? Where are you?” 

You saw the moment Sebastian decided to give up on hiding, as he just suddenly started laughing like a maniac. You did too, both of you clutching your stomachs. Chris scoffed and tore the vent cover off, revealing the two of you laughing uncontrollably. 

“Come on, guys, it wasn’t that funny!” Chris sighed, but he was wrong, it was definitely that funny. You guys went back to the movie room. Robert, Tom, Scarlett and Anthony had all already been found.

“Welcome to the losers!” Tom grumbled. You both sat down with him and chatted while waiting for the others to turn up. The next was Mark, who had been hiding under a table, and then Elizabeth who wasn’t even trying, but was somehow second last anyway. 

Then came the waiting game. Hemsworth, the biggest of you all, the goofiest, and seemingly the easiest to spot, was still at large. Chris was hopelessly searching, but came back every ten minutes with a more and more depressed look on his attractive face.

“I can’t find him!” he admitted finally. There was a collective sigh, and then everyone started searching together, simultaneously calling out “Chris! The aussie one!” Eventually you did find him, crammed behind a couch uncomfortably. 

When you finally did, Anthony (as well as several others) seemed to have only grown hungrier, and the need for snacks was larger than ever. “I swear to god if we don’t find food right now I may just quit the job” Anthony swore and huffed as he crossed both his arms over his chest. “That seems a bit dramatic but okay” Scarlett laughed as the ten of you rounded a corner in the building to only come face to face with an abundance of vending machines that everyone used at break and you all had seemingly forgotten about. “Woah” Tom said, impressed at the arrangement. 

“Food galore,” Elizabeth expressed and was the first one to walk towards, closer to the arrangement, leaving the rest of you by the wall with your jaws dropped. “If I’m sick, don’t blame it on me” you quietly expressed, making Mark laugh from his spot next to you. 

Trying not to seem too excited, Anthony ran forward, eyes following each and every item of edible food and drink. “I think you better hurry up” Tom commented from his spot the furthest from you, noticing the way Anthony and Chris were now eyeing your favourite type of chips. 

“Umm yeah, that sounds like a good idea”

You, Robert and Sebastian immediately went over to the vending machine that was holding doritos, lays, and other classic chips. “Um, about earlier,” you mumbled to the Romanian man as Robert began to shake the machine with force, hoping something would fall down “I didn’t mean it like that” your cheeks flooded with embarrassment as the memory came flashing back to you.

But before you could start apologising even more, he stopped you and sent a reassuring smile your way “don’t worry about it Y/N, I know what you meant.” He gave your shoulder a small squeeze, before going back to watching Robert yelling at the Doritos to “fall out, you big pussy!”

Before Chris (Evans) and Tom could come over to your side of the room to be responsible adults and make a rational decision, Chris (Hemsworth) had already come bounding over to you and kicked the glass where the chips were held behind. He put full force behind the kick, so it shattered and fell loudly with a crash to the ground. 

“Erm. Good idea?”

For no reason at all the situation was just funny to you, so while everyone in the room was stood still shocked (apart from Hemsworth who rocked back and forth on his feet sheepishly) you began to laugh. “What’s funny? You could literally cut your feet if you move!” Tom exclaimed with wide eyes, “you can’t get hurt we need to return you to your mom the same as we got you!”

Without warning Chris (Evans) ran over to you, making sure to carefully avoid the glass panes. “I’m not getting sued for this shit” he muttered as he picked you up and brought you over to a corner, which was a safe distance away from the wreckage.

“Alright, this has gotten out of hand,” Mark ran a hand through his hair, as he surveyed the broken glass on the floor in distress. Elizabeth nodded. You made eye contact with Scarlett and Anthony, who very clearly didn’t share the same concern that Mark and Elizabeth did. You all giggled quietly. 

“But uh, let’s take advantage of the situation, eh?” Chris (Hemsworth) pulled a couple bags of doritos out of the broken vending machine, “Free doritos?” He shook the bags playfully. There was a moment where people seemed to question whether they prioritized their dignity of the free doritos, and it’s fair to say that a large number of them chose the doritos. 

You all went back to the movie room, collapsing on your mattresses and blankets, with your snacks. But before any of you could begin to focus on the movie once again, a sudden gasp broke out from across the room. “He has the last bag of Doritos!”

“No I don’t” Hemsworth was quick to deny Elizabeth’s claim but everyone could see the full bag that he had attempted to stuff under his blanket. All of a sudden, Scarlett leapt out of her sleeping bag, trying to reach the chips before he did, but unfortunately all the gym workouts he had been going to (or yoga lessons you weren’t really sure) were paying off, as he held the woman at bay so he could grab the snack and hold it far out of her reach.

“Give it” she grunted and tried to reach past his grip and take the chips for herself, but before she had a chance, Chris (Evans) jumped up from his spot over by Tom and snatched the bag from him, holding a victorious grin on his face. Chris (Hemsworth) pouted angrily at his costar, not bothering to fight back as he knew it would be a losing battle (he was captain America for Christ’s sake). But you had a trick up your sleeve, you wanted those chips and you were going to get them whether it was the last thing you did.

Picking up the pillow beside you, you held it up as a shield as ran forward as fast as you could, taking in the confused expression Chris held in his face before you smashed into his stomach, knocking the air out of your lungs but unfortunately, not his.

He chuckled deeply as you smashed back into the wooden floors groaning as the pain surged through you. “I don’t think that worked as well as you thought it would” Mark commented from his comfortable spot on his mattress. 

“No, it really didn’t”

The movie ended, and slowly but surely people started going to bed. There were yawns and stretches around you all bundled together on the floor. You too found yourself growing tired, stuffing yourself into your sleeping bag and getting comfortable. 

“Goodnight!” you murmured and those who were awake mumbled it back drowsily. You distinctly heard Sebastian mutter back to you from his sleeping bag “shut up, I’m tired”. You chuckled for the last time that night, as soon sleep overcame you. 

Then, at the the buttcrack of dawn, a scream came from the nearest entrance: “WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK-” 

And that was the inspiring story of how body searches became a daily routine on set, so the Russos could make sure no one had gotten their grubby hands on an extra key.

___________________________

Tag List:

@hera-the-writer @marvel-madness @40srogcrs @whatthefuckimbisexual @snarky–starky @garbage-potato @lozzypoz321 @allthecreativeonesaretaken @missamericana713 @rororo06 @shady80smusicsingercolor @ireadfanficforfun @deephideoutmilkshake @rae-is-typing @sophs-library @herecomesthewriterwitch @alicedanganh @eviemarvel @idk123906 @tamayakii​

[sanchosammy]

Wrong Calls

Description: In a desperate attempt to find information about Pablo, you suggest your boyfriend Javier to see an old informant... Will you regret that decision? 

Warnings: Some cursing and a blink of sadness, and probably badly translated Spanish . that’s about it.

Number Count: 2,717

The fight with Pablo Escobar had been on pause. The DEA was stopped with a block in the road. That was hypothetically speaking, of course. Pablo had been quiet. Too quiet to say the least. He cashed out most people’s silence and it was clearly working out well for him so. No one could get information on him and nearly three weeks had passed.

As you can imagine, Murphy, Peña, and yourself had become restless from the free time.

This was too long without a move being made on the DEA’s part. Too much time wasted on waiting for an informant to finally come forward. You were like sitting ducks as you waited for someone to drop any information at this point.

Today you couldn’t take it anymore. You didn’t want to waste your time in the office looking over the same material you have studied for weeks. None of it would help you. It was all useless paperwork by this point. The sounds from the office had become more like mockery the longer you listened. You had never spent this much time in the building and it started to feel like your own personal hell.

That’s why you went home early. The boys could see it on your face when you practically stormed out without a word. That was an unusual move on your part, but they knew what was going on with you. You were beyond committed to this case. Javier and you had plenty of late night conversations about it. The both of you were in agreement, you and him were all in no matter the cost. You just wanted Pablo Escobar caught.

In the first year of working together, it was something you bonded over. You were hesitant in the beginning considering what you knew about Javier’s past, but he looked at you with such adoration that somebody would be a fool to deny that man was in love with you.

You had stolen his heart and he didn’t want it back by this point. As Murphy put it, Javi was whipped.

All three of you lived in the same apartment building. However, you found yourself in Javier’s apartment a lot more lately. You liked to clean it for him while he stayed late at work sometimes. It was something to distract you from the stress of work, and he made sure to reward you for your thoughtfulness later at night. You couldn’t complain about that.

You were in the process of cleaning the coffee table when the telephone rang. A part of you was hopeful it was Javier with something new at the office, life had been too quiet. You were grateful for some time to rest but your mind could never find ease with Pablo on the loose not paying for a single damn crime he committed.

You picked up the phone and fell backwards into the couch with a huff,  “Hello?”

A woman’s voice replied, clearly confused from the sound of her tone. “Hola, ¿es el teléfono de Peña?” (Hello, is this Peña's phone?)

When you heard the Spanish, you found yourself sitting up a little straighter in instinct. You knew Spanish somewhat. It wasn’t perfect by any means, but you had spent enough time in the country to have some of it down. Not to mention Javier constantly helped you practice in case you ever needed it.

“Sí, ¿puedo tomar un mensaje?” (Yes, may I take a message?)

She paused on the other end. From the silence you could tell she was weighing her options on what she wanted to do. She seemed uncomfortable with your presence on the phone.

“¿quién es?” (Who is this?) She asked.

Now it was your turn to weigh the options. This woman had to be someone outside of personal contacts. This wasn’t an old friend at all. Her hesitation and concern to put forth personal information was speaking volumes to you. She had to be an informant… Javier had a past with those before the two of you started dating.

You bit your lip and internally shamed yourself for what you were about to do. How could you even consider playing into the possibility of letting him see an old informant… and yet, you found yourself speaking the words without fully thinking it through.

“Soy la criada del señor Peña. ¿Puedo llevarle un mensaje?” (I'm Mr. Peña's maid. Can I take a message for him?) You asked in an almost customer service tone, playing into the stupid role you put yourself in. This was quite frankly embarrassing.

"¿Podrías hacer que me llame, decirle que es Tina." (Could you have him call me back, tell him it’s Tina.) You hummed in response and wrote down the name on the notepad.

“Sí, se lo haré saber de inmediato.” (Yes, I’ll let him know right away.)

She said her thanks before hanging up. You rubbed your faces in your hands, wanting the world to swallow you whole. You couldn’t believe what you were about to suggest.

*

You walked into the office and leaned against Javier’s desk. Tossing the paper in front of him silently, gaining the attention of not only Javier but Steve as well. Both had confusion spread across their faces.

“So, Tina called.” You commented and looked ahead at the wall. Murphy’s eyebrows shot up as he let out a low whistle. A polite way of saying ‘you’re in for it now, buddy.’

“What?” Was all Javier could ask as he looked at the paper then back at you.

“Yeah, she called when I was at the apartment. I think she has information about something, but you weren’t the one to answer the phone so…” You shrugged before looking at him. It was almost a little humorous how taken aback he seemed.

He hadn’t seen any of those informant’s in months. He had remained completely loyal since day one of the relationship, and you knew that without a doubt. That’s why he looked so dumbfounded to hear one of the girls contacted him after nearly six months of silence on his end.

“What did you say to her?” He asked like an animal who just saw the light of day for the first time.

“Well…” You weren’t proud of this, and you had to swallow some pride to say it. “I told her I was the maid, truthfully.”

Murphy was the first one to react, his laughter filled the room. You looked over and gave him a lopsided grin in response. It was such a joke of how far this had gone, but you couldn’t ignore the humor of it all. Javier’s girlfriend pretending to be a maid to his old prostitute, now that was a story to tell in the future.

“No kidding, you are something else (Y/N).” Steve was shaking his head before enjoying his coffee.

“Why the hell would you do that?” Javier asked, baffled as he failed to light his cigarette. The lighter not working with him.

“Look, Javi, we need something. We are sitting here wasting our fucking time while Pablo is out there continuing his bullshit. We need something, we need our in.”

Javier leaned back in his seat with his arms crossed. You noticed Murphy from the corner of your eye watching the scene intensely interested where this was heading.

“Tina isn’t going to provide any information unless I sleep with her, you know that. I’m not going to get anything out of her,”

You nodded silently before mumbling you knew that already. When you looked up, his face said it all for him. He couldn’t believe you’d actually hint at him sleeping with someone. His eyebrows scrunched together and his voice was low “Are you seriously asking me to fuck Tina?”

“Well, I mean… I’m not asking necessarily, all I’m trying to say is we have limited options Javi.”

“No.” He immediately responds. Almost sounding a little angry with you.

“It’ll be a one time thing, Javi. You’ve done it before, what’s the big deal now?” You huff with your arms crossed now, looking at him with frustration.

“I wasn’t in a relationship back then, and now I am. That’s the difference. I’m not sleeping around to catch fucking Escobar.”

By this point Murphy at least had the decency to pretend to mind his business, but you knew he was still fully in the conversation as much as the two of you were. You were all close. Partners. Not to mention you lived in the same building, and would have double-dates regularly.

“You remember what you asked me? You asked if I was all in? Well, I am. I don’t want you to sleep with some street whore, trust me. But I know that I have to sacrifice my own happiness for the sake of catching this bastard.” You sighed and pulled yourself away from this desk. You returned to your seat and the silence seemed to consume the room.

No one talked for at least five minutes. Javier hadn’t moved in his chair, he remained leaning back in silence. The most noise was Murphy pretending there was something interesting about the file on his desk, but everyone in the room knew that Murphy read through all of that already. He was just trying to pretend like he wasn’t involved for the sake of privacy.

Javier cursed under his breath as he picked up the phone, Steve and you looking over at him waiting to see who he was calling. You had a suspicion but you needed a confirmation.

He was stressed out, you knew because he would take longer drags of his cigarette when he was unhappy. The smoke left his mouth as he replied in Spanish into the phone.

“¿Tina? Soy yo, Javier. ¿Qué tal las diez esta noche?” (Tina? It's me, Javier. How's ten tonight?)

Murphy looked at you in awe. He couldn’t believe you had convinced Javi to do this. His eyebrows were raised and he forced his mouth to remain shut before he could say something stupid.

Javier put the phone back on the hook before looking at you. “Ten tonight.” He said emotionless. He stood up from his chair and walked out of the room.

“You’re a crazy bitch, you know that?” Steve asked, looking at you. It wasn’t judgmental when he said it. He understood completely why you did this, he felt just as strongly about Pablo as you. However, he would’ve never asked his wife to sleep with someone for intel. You had taken this desire to a different level and he wasn’t sure if that was the most positive thing.

*

You were in Murphy’s apartment by now, a request made by Javier. He didn’t want you to be alone as this happened tonight, but you almost found yourself wishing you were. You sat on the couch uncomfortable with the thoughts looming in your mind

You recalled the conversation you had with Javi before you had left. He asked if you were sure about this several times, and you continuously said it was for the better good. You needed information and if that meant going behind the government’s back and working some magic, you considered it done. Javier was uneasy though. And that made you sit down to reflect on it all.

Had you taken this too far? Your boyfriend was downstairs fucking a woman named Tina… and you were the one who made it happen. He had done all of this before, when the two of you were simply coworkers you knew he fucked them for information. Why did it feel so much worse now though?

What if this changed your relationship? What if this reminded Javier why he didn’t want to be in a relationship in the past? What if she was better than you?

It all started to pile in. You felt a little queasy from the sudden rush of concern hitting you. You hardly noticed when the couch sunk next to you, it was Steve holding out a drink for you.

“I thought you could use this.” He commented and you noticed the beer in his hand. You mumbled a thanks before downing half of it. His hand patted your knee and you looked over at him.

“Do you think I made the wrong call?” You asked quietly. Worry starting to reveal itself in your eyes.

He looked at you and sighed, putting an arm around your shoulder and pulling you in. Steve was what you needed in a friend. He knew what you needed, when you needed it. He sorted out the few fights that happened between you and Peña. He was just an all around good guy.

“It wasn’t a call I would’ve made to be honest with you, (Y/N).” He sipped his beer and remained his stare ahead. You noticed Connie wasn’t around anymore, she must’ve gone off to bed early. You don’t even know why Steve stayed up to sit with you. Maybe he could see your self pity coming from a mile away before you did.

“Would it be horrible if I stormed down there right now?” You asked. He looked down at you and then finished his beer.

“Yeah, I’d say it’s probably already happening. Might as well just get the information at this point.”

You hummed in acknowledgment. You pondered it all for a minute. Do you just continue to let it all happen, or do you cut it off early? You sighed before downing the rest of the beer and handing the bottle to Steve.

“Another one?” You asked with a small smile. He nodded and understood, you’d need it tonight. He pulled himself from the couch and headed towards the fridge, what he didn’t know was you’d rush past him and out the apartment door the moment his back was turned against you.

You practically flew down the stairway, Steve close behind as he called your name frantically trying to get you to stop. You shoved the key into Javier’s doorway before nearly slamming the doorknob into the wall, screaming your head off as Steve came up behind you holding you from going in any further.

You were screaming something, it had all blanked out the moment Javier came from around the corner fully dressed and alone. “Hey, hey!” He yelled out grabbing your attention.

“Where is she?” You tried to catch your breath, Murphy still holding onto your arms not willing to let go in case you found the poor woman somewhere.

“She left. I couldn’t… nothing happened.” He commented quietly. He nodded to Steve to let go. “Goodnight Murphy,” Javier commented, walking him to the door before shutting it.

“Nothing happened?” You asked, confused. Javier was exactly as you left him. His hair still in the same position as before, his clothes not wrinkled in the slightest. He shook his head and pulled you by the arm to the couch.

“I couldn’t do it. I kissed her, and I just couldn’t do it.” He looked at you. His eyes were troubled and concerned, with a touch of disappointment. You found yourself relieved. How could you almost risk your relationship for fucking Pablo, hasn’t he ruined enough?

“I’m sorry, I just freaked out.” You whisper placing your face in your hands. He pulled you into his embrace instead, holding onto you as if you would keep him grounded into reality. He placed a kiss against your neck. A habit he started to do whenever work emotionally exhausted you.

“I’m never asking something like this from you again, I swear. I can’t imagine you with another woman.”

“Good because I can’t imagine myself with another woman either.” He chuckled but there was seriousness behind his words. He pulled you to face him before a quick kiss.

“I love you.”

The words were sweet to your ears. He had only said those words once when you were hurt during a chase, but it was something he was incredibly reserved to say.

“I love you too.” You smiled at him, your hands finding their way to hold his face. He was such a rough man. Hardened by his job, but something about you softened him. You let out a small laugh “Murphy’s right… you’re whipped.”

“Cállate, Cariño.” (Shut up, darling) He mumbled against your lips.

[dreamescapeswriting]

The Late Night Café ~ JJK [M] [Request]

↬↬↬Word Count: 4.9K

↬↬↬Genre: Prince!AU, Non!IDOL, SMUT, Fluffy

↬↬↬Pairing: Prince Jungkook x Fem!Reader

↬↬↬Warnings: Sex without contraception (wrap it before you tap It), cunnilingus,

"I don't think you understand the sincerity behind this Jungkook!" His mother slammed her hand down against the throne as her son treated this as though it was a joke to him but to him it was.

"What's the big deal? You're only going to set me up with someone I do not wish to be with so just get on with it." It was no secret that the Prince wasn't happy with the idea of an arranged marriage but if he wanted to take the throne and become King he had to marry before he turned 24 years old which was less then six months away. No time for him to find someone to fall in love with but plenty of time for his parents to force a marriage onto him where he would not be happy.

"Please Jungkook-"

"No. I don't want to talk about it anymore." He walked out of the throne room and away from his mother who was still calling out for him to stop but he didn't want to hear it. He didn't want to hear another speech about how it was for the good of the Country and if he didn't do it there could be serious consequences, it was always the same lecture.

"Jungkook are you going to sneak out again tonight?" Taehyung - his personal guard asked him as they walked side by side through the stone castle, Jungkook chuckled at how scared Taehyung was about it but it was something Jungkook had mastered over the years. He was always sneaking out of the castle late at night, he'd dress up in normal clothes instead of the suit he always had to wear and then he'd walk around the streets acting like anyone else his age would.

"I am."

"Is there anything I can say or do to stop you?" Taehyung knew it was useless since there was nothing he could possibly do,

"Is there ever?" Jungkook teased as he reached his chambers within the castle, Taehyung sighed bowing and walking away from the doors.

Inside was a huge King sized bed with curtains around it, all draped down to cover the red silk sheets that were on the bed. The rest of the room was quite boring, books were along the walls but nothing that interested Jungkook, all of them were about his training, and royal history, he wasn't allowed anything exciting as it could distract him from his Royal duties as the Prince. Everyone thought that this life was perfect and easy but they were wrong being a prince was far from easy and far from perfect.

A rapid knocking sounded on his door and he ground lifting himself from the bed and going over to the door,

"Yes, Namjoon?" He asked the tutor that had been teaching him for the last 7 years,

"Assignments," He handed Jungkook a folder full of papers and smiled at him,

"I'll see them on my desk next week?" He nodded at the request knowing it was no good to say no to Namjoon, he took the folder into his room and threw it down onto his own desk flipping through the pages. He had no classes that afternoon so he saw no harm in starting to do some of the work he had ahead of him, it was all about the history of the palace, how his family had come into the power and then sections about the royal guards. Boring drabble that made him want to throw the folder out of the window.

Four knocks on his door meant that the guards were changing over, midnight he let out a breath of relief. Jimin - the second personal guard - would be taking over the night shift which meant he would be able to slip out easily and have Jimin cover for him while he wandered around outside of the palace walls for a while. He slipped into some jeans and a hoodie before heading out of the door to his room,

"You have ten minutes, run." Jimin handed him some cash and chuckled as Jungkook lifted up the hoodie hood and began sprinting in the direction of the guard exit within the palace, he had about ten minutes before the next one would come out of the door and see him.

Being in the town was a total bust there was nothing happening, it was a Monday night so everything was practically closed. The bars were empty and Jungkook was wondering about bored but even this was better than going back to the palace. He was about to give out on finding somewhere to sit when he saw a cafe with its lights still on, he walked up to the window to see you sitting on the counter reading from a book with a hot chocolate in your hand eyes glued onto the page you were reading from. He chuckled watching you as your eyebrows furrowed together clearly reading something you didn't like, the way you smiled as you turned over the page made Jungkook feel warm inside and before he knew it he was heading inside of the empty cafe.

The bell above the door made you jump up and look around your eyes landed on Jungkook and you almost slopped off the countertop.

"Are you open?" Even his voice sounded angelic to you but you were so lost by staring at him you hadn't been able to form a sentence yet, Jungkook felt his pulse quicken as you stared at him. For a second he thought you knew who he was - everyone did but whenever he came into down dressed down with his hair down no one seemed to be able to tell he was Prince Jungkook.

"Erm, open? Yes! Sorry!" You jumped down from the counter and left your book on the side so you could serve him without being distracted,

"Sorry, we don't get anyone at night," You laughed nervously taking out a notepad and pen,

"What can I get your sir?" He smiled walking closer to the counter, he pressed his palms against the marble and looked through the menu.

"What do you recommend?"

"My famous hot chocolate, it's not on the menu though."

"Famous?" He laughed looking at while raising his eyebrows, you nodded at him and smiled.

"I make it whenever there's no one here, it's an old recipe because between you and me..." You leant across the counter to whisper to him despite there being no one you both,

"The new machines scare me, I burnt myself once and then they put me on the night shift so I've not had to use one since." You laughed softly and Jungkook couldn't help but smile at how adorable you sounded, the way your throat made a wheezing sound as you sucked in some more air - it was too cute.

"Then I shall take a famous hot chocolate created by the amazing...Y/n." He read off your name tag and you smiled,

"My famous hot chocolate coming right up for?" He smiled at you,

"Jungkook-"

"Ah like the Prince, cute." You wrote down his order and went off to make it while making your self a fresh one at the same time. He looked down at the book you'd been reading and smiled, it was the same book his mother used to read to him as a kid,

"The little prince," He whispered picking it up and flicking through your copy of it, along the margins was small notes you'd made in pen and he read through them all. Analysing your handwriting as he went, it made him laugh that whenever you were angry about something happening inside of the book your penmanship would get a little rougher.

"You like the book too?" You asked while you waited for the milk to warm up, he jumped dropping the book down onto counter as you made him jump up in surprise.

"Sorry, I'm quiet and sneaky." You laughed it off and he chuckled along with you,

"I used to love it as a child."

"Do you read now?" You questioned going back over to the steamer and checking on the milk,

"Not as much as I'd like, I'm in a slump." He lied going over to a table in cafe and sitting himself down.

"Ah, I can give you some titles if you like?" He heard the familiar sound of whipped cream being sprayed from a can and he smiled,

"Please, if you don't mind."

"Of course," He glanced up hearing you closer to him this time and watched as you placed down a giant mug of hot chocolate in front of him, on top was a pile of whipped cream, marshmallows and a flake for a little extra taste.

"Enjoy," You went to walk away but he called out your name to stop you, he was intrigued by you and wanted to know more instead of letting you go back to your book just yet.

"Those books you recommend?" He questioned doing anything to make you stay there with him just for a few more minutes, being with you made him feel normal and not like the prince at all. It was refreshing to him to be around someone like you, someone he didn't have to worry about freaking out on him because he was the Prince.

After a week with you, Jungkook began to realise that the reason you didn't know he was the Prince was that you didn't pay close enough attention to it all, you never watched anything on the news to do with it because you would much rather be reading, doing some of your hobbies or sleeping. Over the last week, you'd lent Jungkook a lot of books - he'd explained that the job he worked he wasn't available to go out during the day so spent most of his nights awake.

"What did you think?" You asked as you slid him a hot chocolate, it had become customary every night for him to come by with the book you'd given him to read and talk to you about it.

"I don't like it, why would she fall for him? He's all types of bad for her." You'd given him twilight of all books. He'd mentioned never reading anything that wasn't factual books and you wanted to give him something on the plainer side as well as a little romance,

"Trust me, in midnight sun it all makes sense." You laughed sipping on your hot chocolate,

"Did you get around to any of the movies I suggested?" He glanced up and you and shook his head, he'd been dying to watch the movies you'd given to him but he never had the time during the day, with reading he could sneak it in between study sessions, practice and while he waited to sneak out but movies were harder.

"Not yet," You sighed scooping up some of the whipped cream from his cup on your finger and placed it into your mouth, he watched in awe the whole time. It would be a huge lie if he said he was attracted to you because he was, very attracted to you in a strong way.

"You'll have to come over one day and we can watch a series together, there's this horror...one I've been dying to show someone." He frowned as you trailed off and stared out of the window, he followed your gaze to see Jimin and Taehyung standing around they were dressed in regular clothes but he knew they were there for him but he continued to ignore them and act as though he had no idea who they were.

"Friends of yours?" You laughed looking at them as they stared at Jungkook and you together,

"Something like that." He mumbled looking down at the hot chocolate, it would be a shame to waste it now so he just held up his hand to them, signalling that he'd be two minutes.

"They don't look happy they have to wait," You whispered feeling slightly disheartened that he was going to leave again, he sighed looking at you.

"I'm not happy that I have to leave, we all have to make sacrifices sometimes." He tied to laugh it off but he was really upset about all of this he could already feel himself falling for you which was bad since he would have to be away from you very soon.

"I'll be back tomorrow, we can talk all about those movies you want to watch with me." He smiled at you taking your hand in his, you felt a jolt in your body as he touched you. Before you knew it he was leaning across the table and leaving a small and gentle kiss on your lips.

"See you tomorrow," He whispered running his thumb along your bottom lip and leaving you alone with the book he'd borrowed and the half drank hot chocolate in front of you.

The Queen tapped her foot as she looked at her son,

"You were spotted kissing her, so who is she?" Jungkook rolled his eyes, Jimin and Taehyung hadn't been there when the kiss had happened so it was evident that she'd had someone else following him for the last week.

"Assuming I'm correct you'd had us followed for a week so why don't you tell me who she is mother," His tone was coming out like a bratty teenager who was being caught in a lie and was being told off but he didn't care. He knew what his mother was about to do and he wasn't happy about it,

"You won't be seeing her anymore, I'm stepping up your security so no more sneaking out." She straightened up and watched as Jungkook scoffed her before leaving the great hall, slamming the doors behind him as he left her alone there.

"Was I too harsh?" She asked Yoongi who was standing beside her, he looked down at the floor.

"No your highness, he needs to learn the rules are there to be followed." But she couldn't help but feel bad for him, she knew what it was like to be in love with someone you could never have and she swore never to let her own child go through that and yet here she was doing the same thing her father did to her.

"Follow him, make sure he's in his chambers." She mumbled to Seokjin and Hoseok who was standing by the doors, they nodded and walked out without another word to the Queen.

Three nights in a row and Jungkook was a no show, you were starting to think he regretted kissing you and that was why he hadn't come back.

"Another night another disappointment." You whispered to yourself as you waited for the next waitress to come and take over,

"There's some dude outside for you, said he's ready for the movie marathon?" Your heart raced hearing those words,

"I cleaned, I've done everything, see you tonight!" You threw down your apron and rushed outside to the street to see Jungkook leaning against the alleyway wall, his head was hanging low as he pulled the hoodie up over his head.

"Movies?" You laughed walking up to him, he looked up at you to make sure you were you before he took your hand in his.

"Lead the way. I'm sorry I haven't been here...I was caught up at work." He lied trying to ignore the pounding in his chest as he held your hand for the first time in three days, being away from you was hurting him a lot. The idea of never seeing you again pained him so he'd slipped Seokjin and Hoseok a sleeping pill each before leaving out of his balcony door and climbing down the drainpipe.

"It's fine, I'm glad you're back." You smiled walking towards your apartment building still holding onto Jungkook's hand as you walked together, he was casually swinging your arms back and forth.

"Are they scary horror films then?" He questioned as you unlocked the front door to the apartment building, you giggled at how nervous he sounded about it.

"No Kookie, they're just a little Gorey," You promised him though that if he got scared he could hold onto you through them,

"Can I hold onto you through them anyway?" He whispered as you reached your front door, your back was against the wooden door but you nodded while staring into his eyes.

"Y-Yes."

You phoned into work that night taking a sick day so you could continue your time with Jungkook, he faked a phone call to his work and came back to you.

"So which film is next?" He questioned sitting down next to you and wrapping his arm around your shoulders, over the day you'd grown more and more comfortable around one another, stealing kisses and glances whenever you could and now it was as if you'd known him forever.

"I'm going to get you into the lord of the rings movies, you're going to love them," He chuckled watching as you got excited over the idea of him loving a movie with you, he stared at the side of your face as you flicked through the channels with the remote in your hand.

"What?" You laughed feeling his hand brush the hair out of your face,

"I just wanted to see your beautiful face again." He laughed leaning across and kissing your cheek softly, you put the remote down after clicking play and turned to look at him.

"Do it again," You whispered turning your head so he would kiss your cheek but at the last second, you turned your head connecting your lips. The same sparks you'd felt the first time came rushing out of you, your heart began to pound as he kissed you lovingly. His hands moving to cup either side of your face as you struggled to get into a comfortable position on the sofa.

"Come here," He chuckled lifting you up and sitting you down onto his lap so he could kiss you better, you giggled bending down to connecting your lips once again, whining out when he ran his hands down your spine.

The makeout session began to grow in heat and he pulled off his shirt revealing his toned body, you bit down on your lip running your finger down his abs as he took off your shirt next as you went to hide your body he shook his head at you.

"You're gorgeous, don't hide from me." He gently kissed you again standing up, you screamed into the kiss wrapping your legs around his waist as he began walking towards the bedroom laying you down against the sheets.

"Are you sure you want this?" You questioned when you watched him slowly begin to undo your pants,

"I've never been so sure about something in my life, are you?" You nodded your head desperately not caring about how desperate you looked. Anyone would be a fool to resist Jungkook right now.

"Need you." You whispered pulling him down into a kiss while your hands massaged his already hard member through the fabric of his jeans, he let out a low grunt as you finally came into contact with him and you smirked hearing him. You couldn't wait to hear more.

Sinking to his knees in front of you he began to kiss up to your thigh, letting his fingers run between your folds as he teased you a little wanting to get you riled up before he'd even entered you.

"J-Jungkook," You begged for him to do something, anything except this constant teasing and he chuckled blowing air onto your clit and smirking as you wiggled under his breath.

"So cute when you're needy Y/n." He slowly pushed two of his fingers into you knuckles deep holding them in place so you could feel him just below your g-spot, you began rocking yourself on his fingers but he pinned your hips down to the bed.

"No baby, let me do the work." The nickname sent shivers down your spine, he hadn't called you anything except for your name yet and that nickname made you needier for him.

"Then do the work," You hissed at him, frantic for him to move his fingers in and out of you. Once he did your head rolled back against the mattress making you cry out his name feeling him spreading his fingers a little each time he thrust them into you, curling them whenever he heard you moan in a way he liked.

"So sensitive," He whispered kissing your clit slowly sending your brain into a fog,

"I wonder-" He cut himself off by licking stripes up and down your clit as he continued to thrust his fingers in and out of you, increasing your moans as if you were an instrument he was playing.

"F-Fuck!" You whimpered hands going out to either side of you on the bed and clutching onto the sheets around you, you clenched around his fingers as he began to suck on your clit, occasionally removing his fingers from your core and dipping his tongue into you.

"S-Shit! Jungkook please!" You begged for him to keep going, your eyes rolling back as you could feel your orgasm beginning to build the more he ate you out like that on the bed.

"You wanna cum Princess? You wanna cum on my fingers?" You nodded frantically and he chuckled returning his mouth to your over-sensitive clit and hummed on you edging you all the more.

"Cum." He ordered darkly continuing the rough movement of his fingers, your eyes screwed shut as you cried out his name loud enough for the neighbours to hear you coming down from your first high of the night.

As you went to sink down onto your knees he brought you back up, kissing you softly,

"No baby, if you suck me off I'll blow right here, j-just lay down okay?" You nodded at him and kissed him again, kissing down his jawline and sucking on the exposed skin and he groaned laying you down against the bed and lining himself up at your entrance.

"P-Please," You whimpered looking him in the eyes, he smiled taking your hand in his as he slowly eased himself into you groaning out at how tight you were around him. He stayed still for a moment, letting you both adjust to the new feeling, if he were to move now he wouldn't last long at all.

"S-Shit you're so fucking tight." He mumbled against your lips kissing you as he slowly began to move in and out of you,

"S-So big." You mumbled back to him making him chuckle as you wrapped your legs around his waist begging him to move faster which he gladly accepted, moving your left leg around his shoulder and angling himself deeper into you.

Heavy grunting and loud moaning filled the room as he pushed in and out of you at a ruthless pace looking into your eyes as you cried out his name,

"Don't stop!" You begged, holding onto his face as you kissed him roughly begging for him not to stop. He was filling you up in ways you'd never felt before and you didn't ever want it to finish,

"I won't baby I won't." He chuckled moving his hand down between you and rubbing your clit, you throbbed around his length making him groan as you got tighter around him. You were letting out loud whines and whimpers that were bringing him closer to his release, he'd imagined you like this beneath him all week, imagining the way you would sound when you called out his name and moaned it loudly for everyone to hear.

"Jungkook!" You ran your fingernails down his back as he pushed himself deeper into you, it was as if something took over him then. He began to get rougher with his hip movements, snapping into you relentlessly as he felt his high drawing closer to him.

"C-Close." You whimpered to him looking into his eyes,

"M-Me too," He added glad that you were close, he didn't want to be the guy to cum without making you cum first, he let out a shaky breath as he pushed you further onto the bed and put your leg around his waist again.

"F-Fuck...Squeeze me-ugh- like that again babe." He begged you as you wrapped your legs around him pulling him deeper into you, he groaned loudly feeling you do that whenever he thrust into you.

"Jungkook I-I can't hold it a-anymore." You whispered to him and he chuckled leaning down to kiss you, kissing from your lips up to your ears.

"Cum around me baby, cum all over me like a good girl." At the mention of you being a good girl you lost control, your hips bucked up and your legs shook as white took over your vision. Sending you over the edge as you cried out his name, a warmth spreading through you as you came around him.

"S-Shit! J-Jungkook I love you!" You cried out loudly hips bucking wildly as you felt him twitch inside of you pulling out and spilling onto your stomach with a few pumps of his hand,

"I love you too." He whispered looking into your eyes as you both laid there panting heavily to one another.

You screamed as the door to your bedroom was kicked open and guns were aimed at you, Jungkook wrapped his arms around you covering you with the sheets. You were panicked while he looked calm about all of this happening around him,

"Mother," You stared at Jungkook as he watched the Queen walking into your room, you knew she was the Queen because of the crown she had on her head and the way she carried herself as she walked into the room.

"M-Mother?!" Your voice cracked as you asked him that, your eyes danced around to each of the guards who were now putting their guns away and standing to attention. Two of them were the boys who had been outside the cafe the last night Jungkook had come to see you.

"At ease, Jimin and Tae stay, the rest of you out." She ordered and all of them left without questioning it, Jungkook was still holding you close to keep you clothed.

"Can you give us a moment?" He questioned looking from his mother to you, you hadn't spoken a word yet and you wouldn't meet his gaze, you just stared at the bed waiting for them to leave you both alone.

"You have five minutes."

When you both emerged from the bedroom the Queen was sitting on your sofa, Jungkook had tried talking to you but you couldn't reply back to him. You hadn't been able to think of a single thing to say to him yet,

"Would you like some tea?" You asked the Queen, bowing a little as she made eye contact with you.

"No thank you, I heard you make a nice hot chocolate but it is neither the time nor the place for that." She stated, looking at you up and down trying to determine if you were good for her son or not but she could already tell that you were, you stopped bowing and stared at the floor.

"I wanted to come and see who was making my son so happy, over the last week he's smiled a lot, it's the first time I've seen him like this since his father died so it's rather refreshing." You looked at Jungkook who was nervously staring at you already, he was trying to figure out if you were okay with everything happening around you.

"I didn't know he was a Prince, your highness-"

"That's okay, he should have told you." She raised herself from the sofa and walked closer to Jungkook.

"I expect to see you home tonight and at dinner, bring her along." She told him looking over at you and smiling brightly,

"We'll figure out a way around the arrangement, I'll speak to Yoongi and the council." She meant the Royal council that had been the ones to decide he needed to marry royalty before becoming King, seeing the way he was with you really made her change her mind on this. Deciding that he needed to be happy,

"I see that you would give it up for her...I'll see what I can do." He thanked her and bowed as she left your apartment.

"Prince Huh?" You asked nervously and he laughed softly at your reaction, he was nervous that now you knew the truth you would start to treat him differently but you seemed okay.

"Do I have to call you your highness now?" You whispered as you walked over to him wrapping your arms around the back of his neck, Taehyung and Jimin were still in the apartment with you watching your every move.

"Only in the bedroom," He winked bending down to kiss you but you groaned pushing him away and looking at his personal guards.

"Do you want hot chocolate?" Jungkook acted offended as you offered them the famous hot chocolate that he'd come to you for.

"That's my hot chocolate," He mumbled watching as you walked into your kitchen getting ready to make everyone a cup he was just thrilled your feelings towards him didn't change when you found out he was the Prince. 

Tagline: 

@writingdreamsnottragedies​ @snowy-meowl​ @jooniesdarlingdimples​ @lyoongx​ @mitzwinchester​ @fan-ati--c​ @callingmyangel​ @rjsmochii​ @kneel-begyourpardon​ @taestannie​

[rhysismydaddy]

Unholy Matrimony Pt. 1 (Nessian)

Nesta’s part of the Damnation Series.

OOF this took so long sorry. I rewrote it, changed it, then deleted it entirely about 9 times. I literally started writing the version before you, from scratch, on Sunday. All parts are linked below, so I’m only tagging people on this version! To go to the next chapter, there is also a link at the bottom <3

ALSO, an important caviat: Nesta is an only child in this one! I originally wrote it for her to be adopted and not know it, but it wasn’t really relevant to the story, so... idk. Just ignore that plot hole I guess.

Parts 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 -- pls like each part I’m insecure

______________________________________________

~Cassian~

“You’re getting married.”

The glass of bourbon halfway to my mouth pauses, because despite being known for being rash and unpredictable, even I’m surprised by the sudden change in conversation.

My eyebrows raise as I look over at Rhysand, my best friend and Capo, trying to figure out if this bastard is serious. His tone says he is, but that doesn’t make sense, because before a few seconds ago, the word “marriage” was in neither of our vocabularies.

He’s been single for as long as I have, although I’m starting to suspect he’s got a bird in the city. He’s too damn happy these days, and the other day I saw him laugh at something on his phone.

Which is weird, because we both know long-term commitments don’t really do well with our lifestyle.

We were raised to not give a shit about anything except the job. We kill without remorse, live in the shadows, and whatever other shitty euphemism you want to use. Settling down in some suburban, picket-fence prison has absolutely no appeal to Made Men.

Don’t get me wrong, most of us get married at some point. But never for love.

Some men choose a bride that’s pretty and sweet. Someone who will donate to charity and help clean up their image. Governors’ daughters, women from old-money families, and social princesses make up this category.

Some men marry to advance their station in the Family. Second sons who will never inherit the business marry daughters of Underbosses to get a nice boost to their status.

And then there’s the ones who are forced to marry by their capo--ie. me-- so they choose whatever attractive woman that’s in the Family and available. Those are always the happiest.

But regardless of the reasoning, marriage in the mafia is heartless, political, and for me, unnecessary.

I know I’ll have to pick someone eventually, but there aren’t a whole lot of desirable options at the moment. Not many of the other Underbosses have daughters that are over the age of fifteen right now, and I have no interest in doing the child-bride thing.

Plus, there’s no way I’d marry someone outside of the family. At my rank, it isn’t an option.

That leaves... a widow?

The only one I know is Ianthe, and considering I highly suspect she killed her last husband and the fact that she’s crazy, there’s no way in hell I’d legally bind myself to her for life.

So he must be joking.

I take a pull from my cigar and look over at Rhys with narrowed eyes. “Uh huh. Sure. To who, exactly?”

“Volchonok.”

The Wolf Cub.

The cigar snaps in my fingers.

“You’re fucking kidding,” I say, honestly hoping that’s the case. He’s either that or insane, and I’d hate to lock someone who’s like a brother to me in a padded room.

Rhysand’s unflinching gaze doesn’t change, but his tone morphs from that of my friend to my boss. “You will marry her, Cassian.”

“She’s a fucking Russian,” I spit, not understanding. That should be reason enough for him to be joking.

In our world, being Russian is a crime similar to stabbing the Pope.

We’ve been at war over New York with them ever since they decided to try and get a stronghold on the east coast, and I’ve killed more of them than I can fucking count. Now I’m marrying one?

“Yes, she is, and so is her father, Alexei Olov.” Aka the Bratva Boss responsible for blowing up half of St. Petersburg last year when the local police refused to buy his weapons. “You will marry her, move to New York full time, and run the city with her by your side.”

“Why? Two or three more years, and we’ll have the city anyway.” Every day the Russians get weaker, and I’ve been responsible for pushing them out of my city block by block.

So there has to be a reason we’re suddenly okay with the enemy.

Rhysand sighs. “It was his idea, not mine. Orlov has agreed to sell our coke in Moscow and Seattle instead of his usual dealer and will supply us all the weapons we need for five years. There will also be no more midnight raids, bullshit arrests on bullshit charges, or missing shipments. He’s offering you a dowry, too.”

I don’t need his money, but the old fashioned term makes me laugh.

“Yeah? And how much does he think his wolf cub is worth?”

His lips twitch. “Ten million.”

“She must be a real pain in the ass, then, if he’s going to pay me that much to take her,” I chuckle.

Not that ten million dollars is anything but pocket change for the man. Orlov may be losing the fight in New York, but the bastard is richer than sin. 

Selling arms to half of the entire world will do that to a person.

“I hear she’s beautiful,” he says, trying to tempt me to not fight him.

“Then you marry her,” I shoot back, not ready to give up the argument.

“I don’t feel like it.” Fucking typical. Rhysand sighs. “You and I both know we can work this deal to our advantage, so what will make you say yes?”

He could order to me to say yes and I’d have to, but he hates enforcing that kind of authority with me.

So I think it over, make a show of lighting a new cigar. “I want Sera.”

It’s a burlesque club in New York I’ve always been a little envious of, owned by Orlov and operated by his men. I’d tried to buy it a few years back but hadn’t had enough leverage on the Russian to strongarm him into selling.

Now I do.

Rhysand--the only one who knows about my failed attempt to buy the place--nods and tells me he’ll make it happen.

“When’s all this happening, anyway?”

He looks like he might laugh. “Wedding is in a month, but she’s flying in tomorrow night.”

A quick laugh forces its way out of me. Also typical of him to give me absolutely no time to change my mind.

Well, I have a month. That’s already longer than any relationship I’ve ever had. 

Sighing, I stand and shake his hand, cementing the deal before I can even lament the loss of my bachelorhood.

~Nesta~

“Chto sluchilos?”

I slide my gaze to my father, because seriously, that’s the stupidest fucking question I’ve ever heard. 

What’s wrong? What’s wrong? Everything.

“Nichego,” I lie, assuring him for what feels like the tenth time as I look out the window. The plane picks up speed and lifts off, taking me towards an uncertain future, an uncertain place.

I might have told him nothing’s wrong, but inside, I’m screaming.

Three days ago, I woke up to find a marriage contract on the pillow beside me. There was a blank space where my name had been typed and a pen waiting for me to remedy that.

I still haven’t.

I’m not signing anything until I meet this... Cassian. 

God, what an Italian name.

An image springs to mind, one of a slumped-over, hairy-chest beast with slicked back hair and a gold chain. 

I know it’s stereotypical and hopefully incorrect, but I’ve never been to Italy and Alexei strictly forbids me watching movies that portray Italians as anything except revolting. 

But looks aside, there’s one thing I don’t need to guess to know. 

My future husband will be like all the other men in my life: controlling.

Men in the world I live in take what they want, don’t ask for permission, and feel like they’re entitled to anything and everything. I’ve dealt with it my entire life, so it’s more amusing than anything at this point.

I guess I’m a bit non-traditional in that sense, considering most of the women around me have no problems taking orders from their fathers or husbands. But Alexei and I figured out pretty early in life that wasn’t going to work for me.

As he frequently likes to tell me, I started telling him to fuck off when I was five.

What did he expect? All the kids I hung out with were the opposite sex and at least five years older than me, so my vocabulary and mannerisms became pretty... colorful early on.

Regardless, I’m just not looking forward to having to deal with yet another man who thinks he can control me.

“Ty vresh',” Alexei accuses, lips twitching. You’re lying. 

“Konechno.” Of course. 

Of course I’m upset, but I understand what’s happening. I might have found out about it three days ago, but I’ve known it was coming for far longer.

As the only child of the great Alexei Orlov, Wolf of Moscow and Pakhan of the Russian Bratva, I’ve been told my entire life that I will one day be used as a pawn to gain more power.

It would--should--piss me off, but I’ve also been told I’m to one day take my father’s place and run his company.

So by gaining more power for him, I’m also doing the same for myself.

Not that I really give a shit about that kind of thing. I started officially working for Alexei years ago, and I already have enough money saved to never have to work again. 

But in the Bratva, there’s no getting out. I was put in this world by birth, and the only thing that will take me out is death. 

In case it isn’t obvious, I’m not a typical business woman. 

My father is an arms-dealer. 

A less than legal one, if you believe the heinous lies the media spreads about him.

He sells weapons to governments, private armies, and whoever the fuck else has the money to buy. 

He’s also built himself a shipping empire to haul said weapons around the globe, runs the drugs and prostitute rings in Moscow, and has enough real estate to rival most small countries.

It probably sounds like I don’t care, and that’s because I don’t. 

I like what I do in the sense that I have a mind for business. I went to business school and graduated at the top of my class, and I enjoy running the clubs and hotels I have. Trained by Alexei himself, I’m ruthless in negotiations, enough so that people started calling me the Wolf Cub by the time I was twenty. 

But despite being good at it, I’m not particularly fond of the aspect most people think of when they picture my career in the Bratva. I detest drugs, have never hired a prostitute, and don’t really enjoy selling arms to bad people. 

The alleyway meetups, the broken bones and bullet holes, and the blown up houses are all a little tiring to me.

Sure, it sounds exciting. And for a while, it was. I used to lose myself in the chaos, used to enjoy coming home with busted knuckles. But I honestly just got tired of it.

Right now, I don’t have to deal with it as much because Alexei’s still alive. But when he dies and I officially take over the family business, I’ll have to be more involved. Even if the thought makes me want to sigh.

I pull out my laptop and look over the financial report for Sera, my newest club in New York. As predicted, everything’s running smoothly. 

I turn the laptop around to show my father, grinning when he pulls out his reading glasses and leans closer. 

“Starik,” I tease. Old man. 

He flicks my forehead, then reads the report and nods. Then he turns to his phone, probably playing Angry Birds or some shit, and leaves me to work.

The plane ride goes by quickly, and by the time we’ve landed in Chicago, I’ve gotten ahead on my schedule for next week, slept, and changed into what I’ve chosen as the “meeting my future husband” dress.

It’s simple and sleek, the black material clinging to my curves without being obscene. It’s long enough to hide the holster on my thigh, not that I feel in any danger with four personal guards stationed near me at all times.

My heels click as I make my way down the plane stairs and across the tarmac to the waiting sedan, and once my luggage and belongings are unloaded, we head to the Italian Capo’s house.

We’re meeting here, finalizing the contract, and then Cassian and I are flying to New York. 

My new home.

“Try to look happy,” Alexei tells me, his heavily accented English almost ridiculous to hear. He speaks English only when he’s in the states, and considering he hasn’t come here since I graduated B school two years ago, he’s a little out of practice.

“I’m ecstatic,” I say, intentionally using a word I know he doesn’t understand.

His eyes narrow, because it isn’t the first time I’ve used this trick, but he doesn’t call me out on it. We continue to ride in ecstatic silence, eventually pulling up in front of the Capo’s... house.

It’s almost obscene to call it that, considering it’s fucking huge. Like obnoxiously huge.

I heave a sigh, step out of the car, and take in my surroundings. The neighborhood’s quiet, likely filled with friends of the Cosa Nostra too scared to make any noise. 

A butler--seriously, a butler--opens the door and welcomes us inside, and as soon as I step in, I have to repress the urge to roll my eyes.

The amount of dirty money in the air is suffocating. It drips off the vaulted ceilings, down the artwork on the walls, across the marble floors. It’s in the little details of the crystal chandeliers and the mahogany staircase. 

Ridiculous.

One look at Alexei’s disgusted face says he’s thinking the same thing.

Don’t get me wrong, we’re rich. Grossly so. Alexei could have ten houses just like this, if he wanted them.

But he doesn’t. He owns property all over the world, but most of it is commercial or apartment complexes--property that makes him money, in other words. This, however, is a massive waste of capital. 

The butler leads us further through the house and into an office where four men wait. 

One is immediately identifiable as their lawyer, his over-priced cologne making me have to resist the urge to sneeze. The humongous man in the corner is hired muscle, if the boxy shape of the guns under his jacket is any indication.

The man behind the desk is obviously in charge, so I’m guessing he’s the Capo. Rhysand or Rhyland or something weird like that. He takes me in silently, bright eyes not seeming to miss any details. 

That leaves the man leaning against the desk to be Cassian Azara.

My fiancé. 

Our eyes meet, his golden gaze beautiful and wild, and I have to remember to keep my expression bored. 

Because the stereotype, the horrible image I’d conjured up in my mind, couldn’t be further from the truth.

For one, he isn’t hunched-over. He stands tall, leaning a hip against his Capo’s desk with obvious confidence. But I see more than just self-assuredness in his eyes. He seems a little too rough around the edges, wild gaze almost like he’s daring someone to swing at him. 

If the confidence didn’t already make him attractive, his looks sure as hell get the job done.

His hairs long and dark and curly, half of it pulled up in a rouge manner that clashes with the suit he’s filling. He has a few days’ stubble, too, like standing still long enough to shave just isn’t an option. 

His shoulders are impossibly wide, narrowing down to trim hips and legs long enough to make him tower over everyone in the room. 

His knuckles are tattooed and split open, and there’s a cut above his eyebrow that tells me I was correct to assume he’s a fighter by nature. 

Usually, that would be a deterrent for me, but there’s something about the way he’s dressed in a dark suit jacket and crisp white shirt while also looking so untamed that has me cocking my head to study him some more. 

He studies me, too, beautiful eyes taking in the long blonde hair and bright blue eyes offset by pale skin. He looks at the dress like he can see everything underneath, and I have the strangest urge to blush. Jesus, he’s toxic.

He’s attractive, is what I’m getting at.

Which is not what I had planned on, considering I’d been trying to think of a plan on how to not sleep with him, but suddenly that’s all my mind can focus on.

His lips twitch like he knows what I’m thinking, and I realize we’ve just been standing here staring at each other for a bit too long.

So I turn back to Alexei and shrug like I’ve seen what my future husband has to offer and aren’t impressed in the slightest. 

I toss the marriage contract on the desk, grab the Capo’s fancy little fountain pen out of his hand, and sign my name on the blank above my name. 

Cassian watches, but I ignore him entirely until the ink has dried. Then I look up at him through my lashes and wink, turn on my heel, and leave the room.

~Cassian~

I think I’m in love.

Fuck.

She hasn’t said a single goddamn word, but the way she looked at me has me feeling itchy all over, anticipation and nerves rolling through me. I feel like I feel before I fight or something exciting happens.

Like I’m primed and ready and need it to happen now. 

Nesta Orlov, my bride to be, is nothing like I expected. 

I was fully braced for some meek little woman, similar to most of my friends’ wives, to come in and smile and say hello. 

But nope. Nesta didn’t smile; she came in like she was walking onto a battlefield. 

And she didn’t smile. She looked me over, clinical blue gaze noticing too much, and left me feeling winded. God, she’s beautiful. Just looking at her made me hot.

She also didn’t say hello. 

Just signed the contract and left, like this was nothing more to her than a boring business deal. I mean, that’s what it is, but... I don’t know, I expected more of a reaction. 

I’ve heard from some Underbosses that their wives cried or raged when they were forced to sign, but shit if that were the case with Nesta. She honest to God looked like she didn’t care.

Alexei, on the other hand, does look a little pissed about the situation, but I couldn’t care less of the old man’s opinion. He’s signed the contract, so to me, he’s irrelevant. Regardless, he and Rhys proceed to iron out some of the details about the wedding and other shit I’m not paying attention to.

Then they shake hands, and the Russian warlord turns to leave. 

He reaches the door and looks over his shoulder at me, and there’s amusement in his cold gaze as he mutters, “Udachi.” Good luck. 

As soon as he’s gone, Roman and the lawyer follow, leaving me alone with Rhys. 

He slides the contract to me, and I sign my name next to hers, making this shit official. 

“This should be interesting,” he comments, vague as usual. 

I sigh, because I have a feeling interesting isn’t going to cover it. 

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NEXT CHAPTER

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