#But it's so much worse to go through alone
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when in vegas ~ lando norris
instagram au
synopsis: anything can happen when lando and y/n are left alone while in vegas.
a/n: for the sake of the story, we'll pretend Lando's crash never happened. thank youuuu
my masterlist
♡♡♡♡♡
liked by yourusername, alex_albon and 3,291,574 others
landonorris Vegas baby
tagged: yourusername
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yourusername i love traveling with you <3
landonorris i love you 🫶🏻
mclaren Let's go!🧡
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mclaren also, please, BEHAVE - PR team
landonorris we'll try
yourusername i'll keep him under control
landonorris you'll be too busy to think about that 😈😈😈😈
mclaren LANDO
alex_albon please be good
landonorris not making any promises
yourusername sorry alex 🫣
oscarpiastri ...my room is next to yours...
yourusername 🫣🫣🫣
landonorris i suggest earplugs 🤭
oscarpiastri ...
charles_leclerc someone should watch over you two
yourusername not you, that's for sure
charles_leclerc why not?
landonorris you're worse than we are
charles_leclerc ...true
adam_norris_pure_electric good luck, my boy!!
landonorris thanks dad ❤️
ciscanorris take care of him yourusername
yourusername i will!!! ❤️
user1 you just know they are going to be WILD
user2 I cannot wait for the content abut these two
user3 THE COMMENTS
user4 they’re spending his birthday in Vegas together i’m not well 😭😭😭
user3 my man is getting LUCKY
maxfewtrell you seem to have lost my invite. again
landonorris nah, i just didn't want you here
yourusername babe, be nice please
maxfewtrell this is him being nice.. some friend you are
landonorris ;)
user5 max and lando bickering like siblings will forever be my favorite thing in the world
user6 NOT MCLAREN LITERALLY SCOLDING HIM HAHAHA
liked by mclaren, oscarpiastri and 2,974,186 others
yourusername being by your side and watching you do what you love the most has been my greatest accomplishment. i am so proud of everything that you do and i'm forever thankful that you chose me to be a part of your journey. happy 24th birthday baby, i love you so much and i cannot wait to see what the future holds for us ❤️
tagged: landonorris
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landonorris i wouldn't even think about doing life with anybody else. i love you so much 😩❤️
yourusername ❤️❤️
landonorris can’t wait to party with you tonight 😈
yourusername BEHAVE
landonorris 😈no
mclaren Happy birthday, Lando! We are proud of everything you do and we hope to continue being your family for many more years to come. Cheers! 🧡🧡
landonorris thank you 🧡
oscarpiastri happy birthday, mate. take it easy tonight
landonorris never 😈
oscarpiastri 🥲
yourusername i’ll keep him under control, don’t worry
landonorris you’ll be too busy to do that 😈😈
oscarpiastri THERE ARE CHILDREN ON THIS APP
georgerussell63 happy birthday, mate! 🥳 can’t wait to crush you on the track
landonorris thanks mate. you wish you had my pace
georgerussell63 your ego is through the roof
yourusername so is yours
user1 HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO OUR FAVORITE DRIVER 🧡🧡🧡🧡 WE LOVE YOU SO MUCH
user2 he’s all grown up 🥹🥹
user3 i remember when he was just a little guy starting out in F1 and now look at him 😭😭😭😭
user4 he’s so fine and talented and just UGH SO PERFECT 😩😩😩 happy birthday king 🥳🥳
user5 i love their relationship so much ❤️❤️ she keeps him grounded and he’s so much happier now
maxverstappen1 happy birthday 🎉 can’t wait to get drunk tonight
landonorris 😈😈😈😈
yourusername oh Jesus
kellypiquet we’re in for a very long night
charles_leclerc i heard there’s a party?
landonorris you’re not invited
charles_leclerc :(
yourusername don’t listen to him, you’re invited and we’d love it if you came 😊
landonorris we would?
yourusername shut up
charles_leclerc yay!! 🥳🥳
mclaren if someone could please keep an eye on them, we would really appreciate it - PR team
carlossainz55 consider it done
landonorris we’re not children, you know
mclaren you certainly act like children
yourusername they’re kinda right, you know…
landonorris shh
maxfewtrell happy birthday mate. looks like you made it another year
landonorris thanks. you know you can't get rid of me
maxfewtrell no matter how hard i try
liked by f1wags, yoursister and 28,473 others
formula1gossip MARRIAGE ALERT⁉️⁉️ Reports are saying that Lando Norris and long-time girlfriend Y/N Y/L/N have tied the knot last night during his birthday bash in Las Vegas? What do you guys think? 👀
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user1 tbh i hope it's true, they're amazing together😩
user2 i saw yoursister in the likes 👀👀👀👀
user3 yoursister GIRL WHAT DO YOU KNOW🫣
yoursister i know nothing
user3 SUCH A LIAR HAHAHA I LOVE IT🥲
mclaren sigh...🥲
user5 BAHAHAHAHAHAHA THIS IS AMAZING
user6 this is basically the confirmation we needed
user7 i suddenly understand why everyone keeps saying they are the biggest PR nightmare 😭😭
user8 this is the most Lando thing ever
user5 for real, like this seems the kind of wedding Lando would have
user4 i can just imagine the earful Cisca is probably giving the both of them for doing this 😭😭😭
user2 she is so gonna tear them a new one hahahaha
liked by georgerussell63, ciscanorris and 4,291,857 others
yourusername & landonorris we got married last night. we don't remember much, but it was the best decision we have ever made. grateful to be starting this journey together ❤️
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mclaren Congratulations!!🧡
landonorris thanks admin 😊
yourusername also, we're sorry for the nightmare we've caused the PR department 🫢
mclaren you're cute, we'll let this one slide - PR team
georgerussell63 wild night, but happy for you guys ❤️
liked by yourusername and landonorris
maxverstappen1 i don't even remember this happening
yourusername you were drunker than everyone, you couldn't even remember your name 😂
maxverstappen1 that's not true 😠
kellypiquet you danced naked in front of the wedding venue singing "Viva Las Vegas"
alex_albon for 20 minutes straight
landonorris not the sight I wanted to remember from that night
georgerussell63 me too
alex_albon me 3
charles_leclerc me 4
carlossainz55 me 5
maxverstappen1 OK I GET IT
ciscanorris my children ❤️ you're lucky i love you
yourusername we're sorry ❤️❤️ we promise to have a proper wedding when we get back
landonorris anything for the Mrs.
yourusername 🤭OH
oscarpiastri congrats guys, thanks for taking it easy on me last night with the noise 🥳
landonorris we were too drunk
yourusername you got off easy, pastry
oscarpiastri a win is still a win
user not both of them bullying poor oscar 😭😭
alex_albon never thought you would be the first one of us to get married
yourusername we didn’t either
landonorris what can i say, i love surprising people
maxfewtrell you guys getting married was definitely not on my bucket list for the year
yourusername but you loved it nonetheless
maxfewtrell i'm just grateful you got him to settle down
landonorris she is something else
yourusername 🤭
user1 YAYAYAYAYAAY 😩😩😩
user2 MY FAVORITE COUPLE GOT MARRIED 😭😭
user3 they are so precious 😭😭😭❤️❤️❤️❤️
user4 CONGRATS ❤️❤️❤️
user5 our favorite WAG is officially HERE TO STAY ❤️❤️
yoursister mom is mad you got married without us
yourusername i’m sorry :((
landonorris kinda my fault, but don’t worry. we’ll have a proper wedding soon!!
yourmother you better.
yourusername MOM, be nice to your son-in-law
yourmother don’t push it, young lady
landonorris yes ma’am 🫡🫡
francisca.cgomes a truly wonderful night 🥳 CONGRATULATIONS DARLINGS!!!❤️❤️❤️
yourusername we love you !!! ❤️
lilymhe i’m sorry i couldn’t be there, but i’m really happy for you guys !! ❤️
yourusername don’t worry, you’ll come to our other wedding ❤️
user6 imagine saying OTHER WEDDING 😩😩
user7 i cannot wait to see their wedding 😭😭❤️
liked by yourusername, landonorris and 381,573 others
mclaren Mr. and Mrs. Norris everyone! Even though their wedding came as a surprise to us as well, we could never be mad at these two! 🧡
tagged: yourusername and landonorris
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yourusername we love you guys !! 🧡🧡
landonorris thanks for the papaya post-wedding cake
mclaren was it delicious?
yourusername it was 🤩
user1 not McLaren posting them 😭😭
user2 they are just one big happy family🥹🥹
user3 MY PARENTS😩❤️❤️
charles_leclerc you're so milking this wedding
landonorris fame is fame
yourusername excuse me? 😠
charles_leclerc great job making her mad from day 2
landonorris you know i didn't mean it like that babe !!
yourusername you're treading on thin ice, mister
georgerussell63 how did y/n, the down-to-earth one, agree to this?
yourusername vodka might have been involved in my decision making process 🤐
landonorris and my good looks also played a part
georgerussell63 good to know that's all it takes
carmenmmundt don't get any ideas
maxfewtrell where is my slice of cake?
landonorris lost in the mail
maxfewtrell ...
yourusername don't worry max, i saved you a slice
landonorris i thought that was extra for me :((
maxfewtrell get your head out of your arse for once, mate
mclaren we'll get you another cake landonorris
user4 the way he has the McLaren staff wrapped around his little finger amazes me 🫣
user5 I LOVE THEM SO MUCH YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND😭😭😭😭😭
liked by pietrapilao, mclaren and 8,392,817 others
yourusername & landonorris due to popular demand, we present to you, again, Mr. and Mrs. Norris
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mclaren Congratulations guys!🧡🧡
liked by yourusername and landonorris
ciscanorris beautiful wedding, we love you so much❤️❤️❤️
yourusername we love you guys too !!!! thank you for making our day special🫶🏻🫶🏻
maxfewtrell great wedding, glad to see i was invited to this one at least
landonorris don’t be condescending
yourusername sorry maxie :)) you know we love you
charles_leclerc beautiful wedding, well done y/n 👏
yourusername thank you charles <3
landonorris i helped too...
charles_leclerc sure you did
carlossainz55 very beautiful ceremony, i loved the cake particularly 🫣
landonorris you thought bringing a Ferrari-themed wedding cake to my wedding was a good idea?
yourusername i thought it was delicious
carlossainz55 i rest my case
user1 SHE WAS SO BEAUTIFUL I’M SOBBING 😭😭😭😭🥹😭🥹🥹🥹
user2 seeing him so happy makes me want to cry 😭❤️❤️❤️
zbrownceo Congratulations to my boy Lando, I hope you and Y/N have a wonderful life together!🧡
landonorris thank you zak 🧡🧡
yourusername we appreciate everything you’ve done for us Zak!!🧡
zbrownceo Thank you for taking care of our boy 🧡
user3 ZAK CALLING LANDO “HIS BOY” 😭😭
user4 YOUR HONOR, you don’t understand how in love i am with them 🥹🥹🥹
maxverstappen1 thankfully i remember this wedding
yourusername thank you for making an effort max
landonorris surprising on all fronts
francisca.cgomes OMG YOU LOOKED SO GOOD 😭😭😭 so grateful to have been by your side on your special day ❤️❤️
yourusername OH MY LOVE ❤️❤️❤️ thank you for everything you did for me ❤️❤️❤️
lilymhe truly such a magical night ❤️❤️ so happy for you guys
yourusername thank you lils ❤️❤️
alex_albon i still can't believe you're married
landonorris bro, we've had 2 weddings, you better start believing
yourusername stop living in denial, alex
yoursister ❤️❤️❤️ if he hurts you, i will fight him
yourusername he won't. if he does, i'll fight him myself
landonorris ...so much violence...
user5 i can now die happy❤️
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𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒕𝒔 𝒎𝒚 𝒈𝒊𝒓𝒍.
𝐉𝐞𝐚𝐥𝐨𝐮𝐬!𝐁𝐒𝐅! 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬 𝐱 𝐂𝐥𝐮𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬!𝐏𝐎𝐂 𝐛𝐬𝐟
prompt by this request: "chris getting jealous bc his bsf seems flirty with matt so he confesses his feelings and it ends with smuttttt”
contains: HELLA SMUTTT, Chris confessing his feelings, mad jealous Chris, dom!chris, suggestive, “flirting” w Matt??, Chris and yours first kiss, choking, spanking, degrading names (slut, whore yktv), MUCH dumification, use of pet names (mama, baby, sweetheart, good girl, pretty girl, sweet girl ), stomach bulge!, flashbacks of Chris fantasizing about you, overstimulation, cream pie, squirting, Chris having a massive cock obviously, missionary, slight m!oral, aftercare as always!! Heavy ( bath tg, praising, concerned!chris reassurance
a/n- this has been sitting in my drafts for a while so here it is
For years, since we were kids. I’ve always had a huge crush on my bestfriend.
I couldn’t get over her no matter how hard I tried and it grew more and more especially since she lives in LA now and we see her almost everyday.
It got worse. So bad. I needed her
I remember seeing her in an orange bikini complimenting her gorgeous features. The way the bottoms hugged her curves making her ass pop out was enough to make me finish in my pants.
She was gorgeous, I wanted to have her badly but it was Nearly impossible fo get her alone.
Especially with Matt around. It pissed me off when I’d see them laughing together or making tiktoks.
That’s my girl
I remember sitting in my room scrolling on instagram when I got the notification she posted on her story
Fuck she looked so good.
the way the grey shorts hugged her ass just how I liked, she looked so gorgeous too.
I, unintentionally started palming myself through my sweats.
I couldn’t help it she had such an affect on me.
I pulled my sweats down revealing my boxers with a wet spot where my tip was.
“Shit”. I groan pulling them down fully as my dick slapped against my stomach begging to be touched, wishing it was her hand and not mine.
I began to stroke myself with shaky hands imagining it was her lips wrapped around me and I throw my head back against the pillows as my mind wandered
She was irresistible, I had to have her.
We always had a flirty thing going on and I didn’t think it would get this far.
Until…
Today was on of those days where I was in the kitchen leaning on the counter drinking a Pepsi pretending to watch TV as I listen to her faint giggles as her and my fucking brother watched TV.
I felt my hand tighten around the can as I saw how close they were, knowing he didn’t like her but I didn’t care. I wanted her all too myself.
I sighed throwing my can out coming up with an idea to figure out a way to get her for me.
Matt and nick going to get food.
“hey Matt, wanna go get some food? Y/n likes this Chinese place it’s about an hour away, nick prob wants to go”. I say smiling with a cocky grin and he rolls his eyes.
“Okay fine I’ll be back in like 4 fucking hours nick let’s go!”. Matt tells and Nick comes downstairs.
“Y/n, you’re so lucky we love you”. Nick says sarcastically and they walk out the house but fuck something about the way Matt looked at her before he left just made me more pissed off.
“Chris?”. I stand up adjusting my shorts as the grey material rolled up my ass and my tank top hugged around my tits the watching Chris’s eyes wander.
“What the fuck are you trying to do to me”. Chris mutters into my ear, his hand wrapping around my neck and my breath hitches.
“W-what are you talking about?”. I shudder as his blue eyes pour into mine with an unhappy expression giving me a pity laugh.
“Flirting with my brother in front of me? Seriously?! Is it not obvious how much I want you?”. Chris confessed his nose touching mine making me gulp, my thighs closing together accidentally.
There was no doubt Chris was attractive but hell if I knew he liked me shit I’d probably let him fuck me or something.
“You? Want me?” I said slightly confused and utterly shocked and he takes a deep breath.
“you have no fucking idea how much I want you, and I have no problem showing him that your my girl”. Chris gave me a sly smile picking me up by my ass carrying me downstairs to his room.
“C-Chris wait-“. I was cut off by him kissing me and I melt into his touch. His hands grip my ass tighter making me gasp, his tongue massaging mine as I moan into the kiss.
“Strip”. He demands standing me up and I tilt my head. And he gives me those eyes and immediately comply beginning to peal of my clothes leaving me in a matching set of orange. Chris’s favourite colour.
“Fuck ma you look so pretty..all for me right?” He asks his hands playing with my bra strap making my panties dampen.
“Yes Chris- all for you”. I match his gaze and he smirked pushing me on the bed as I scooted back leaving him room to climb above me.
“You have no idea how long I’ve been wanting to fuck you”. Chris leaves a soft kiss to my cheek practically ripping my panties off me and I squirm.
“Chris! I liked those!”. I whine and he rolls his eyes pulling down his sweatpants and boxers in one movement and his thick, and painfully hard cock springs out hitting his stomach and my heart beat picks up
how the fuck was that supposed to fit inside me?
Chris took in my nervous expression and let out a soft laugh placing his hands on my thighs
“Spread ur legs for me”. He taps my legs and I spread them apart revealing my wet pussy, the arousal glistening on my inner thighs.
he runs a finger along my slit and I jolt slightly at the sudden sensation.
“shit- ur so wet, did i make you like this? Or was it my brother”. Chris asked tilting his head, his jawn clenched ans my breath hitched as he continued moving his finger.
“No answer? Guess I’ll fuck the answer out of you”. Chris pressed my legs against my chest before slamming his cock deep inside me, stretching me out painfully I almost couldn’t take it.
“f-fuck Chris! T-too much!”. I stutter trying to push his hand away but he quickly slaps it away, using my legs as leverage to begin pounding my inside me.
Chris didn’t give me time to adjust to his large size, tears already forming on my eyes from the pleasure.
“shit- your pussy feels so good, better than I’ve imagined”. He let out a deep groan watching how my pussy sucked him in, Chris’s hips driving into mine as I squint my eyes shut.
“Already becoming a mess on my cock? Should’ve kept matt here so he could see how much of slut you are for me”. Chris grips my neck angling his hips to thrust deeper and I squeal, my eyes meeting with his blues, an electric feeling shooting through me.
He wouldn’t let up his pace, his cock plunging into my tight hole as the pain turned to pleasure thankfully as my cunt morphed to fit his dick.
And Chris was fucking right, I was a slut for him and I has tried to hide it this whole time by being innocent and flirtatious with his brother but the second I was underneath him, I was begging for him to touch me
“Oh shitt- d-don’t stop- fuck”. I throw my head back on the soft pillows, moaning curses breathlessly, my tits bouncing with his quick and hard movements, bound to leave bruises between my thighs burning with sensation.
“mmph fuck- wasn’t planning on it pretty girl”. He moaned, completely infatuated with how I wrapped around him perfectly, like I was made for him. And shit- was he made for me.
She felt so good, almost as if her pussy and every thing about her was made for me.
I couldn’t get enough of her, the Moans and squeaks of my name leaving her swollen lips could’ve made me cum on the spot.
the way she could barley form a sentence as I fucked her, and I wasn’t even close to being done with her yet.
I was going to make sure she knew that she was mine, my fucking girl.
“Chris-you feel so good”. She moaned my name again, turning me on much more than it should’ve, the way her eyes barely opened, and how she’d bite her and stare at me grasping her breasts.
“yeah? you like when I fuck you dumb like this? Can’t even get a word out?”. I taunt, I gripped her neck tighter, her legs finding their way up on my shoulders crying out my name like it’s the only one she knew.
I couldn’t even answer, the things he were asking me required my full attention and shit- I was so far gone.
“I suggest you answer me ma because your about to to cum”. Chris presses his chest on mine, our noses touching as he breathed heavily into my mouth while I reciprocated the same action.
“mm-m I-fuck I-i love it”. I shudder on each word, praying he heard me because I really could not talk right now. I squeezed my eyes shut and he chuckled seeing how speechless he fucked.
“God I could listen to you like this all day”. Chris grunted into my ear as I felt the stomach coil I had began to burst unexpectedly from the overwhelming pleasure.
Chris made me squirt
“S-shit! I’m sorry I-“. I shook as the fluids made a mess over his lower stomach but gasping as he didn’t slow down.
“Never apologize that was hot as fuck- got one more in you?”. He pants resting his head on my shoulder quickening his pace and I whimper gripping his back.
“Oh god Chris- I-I can’t”. My nails run down his back making marks and he bites his bottom lip as I pulled him closer.
His hips pushing into mine, as my juices had coated his cock, leaking out of me creating a wet sensation of our sex.
“You can take it baby, being such a good girl, fuck just one more”. He let out a shaky moan throwing a my leg around his waist and I let out a loud moan at the angle Chris’s cock hit, brushing my g-spot.
“C-Chris ur so deep-“. I let out pornographic sounds and he gave me a deep kiss before pressing his hand where his dick was poking through.
his hand pressed down on the bulge in my stomach and I felt the tears run down my face from the overwhelming pleasure.
“that’s all me baby- fuck I love ur pussy so much-“. He stutters throwing his head as hair sticks to his forehead, the sight was more than appealing.
His slightly parted lips producing whimpers, curses and moans of my name. The way he squeezed my hips making sure I could feel every thick inch of him and the sweat coating over his body.
Her lips parted releasing pants and moans of my name and the occasional “fuck”, her hair now sweated out with hickeys along her neck and tits reminding her that she was mine now. The way her nails would grip my back drawing marks that showed how much she enjoyed it.
“Oh shit- ma- can I cum inside you? M’need you so bad-“. He moans into my neck and I shiver and chant yes’s.
Chris released his seed inside me triggering a second hard orgasm for me, creaming his dick as my body shook.
I turned my head to lay on the pillow before he could catch a glimpse of me, slowly sliding his cock out of me.
He took one look at me and his eyes immediately shifted to one of concern
“wait wait shit- did I hurt you?”. Chris started, seeing how my legs shook from the orgasm I just had.
“please talk to me”. He cupped my cheeks and I gave him a soft smile.
“I’m fine Chris that was- shit- the best sex I’ve ever had”. I let out a quiet sigh and a smirk tugged at his lips as he pulled me into a bridal style hold.
“Well come on let’s get you cleaned up, I wanna spend time with my girl”. He giggled like a child and I rolled my eyes as he carried me into the bathroom running a warm bath for both of us
“No seriously tho your okay?”. He said softly rubbing my shoulders as we soaked in the warm tub.
“Chris the way you put that dick on me I’m more than ok”. I kissed his cheek and his cheeks flushed a bit as he leaned back against the tub whilst I’m in his arms.
She’s really my girl.
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Imagine going through relationship issues with Spencer and a scare at works sets you both back on the right path
This had been the eighth night in a row you'd slept alone. Opting to sleep in the spare bedroom of the place you and Spencer had bought together. Waking up hurt and sad with your partner was an exhausting way to live, and it was getting to you. The team had been back at the main office for the same amount of time. Having a big bust up on the aftermath of a case meant the journey back on the jet was awkward for everyone involved.
When he hadn't agreed with the way you dealt with the unsub, on top of you both disagreeing on when to start trying for a family. Had left you feeling put down and attacked both in work and in your personal life. Feeling like you couldn't do anything right, and that you were holding him back.
It was made worse by his lack of enthusiasm when you attempted to make amends. Wanting to talk about the issue, but finding it difficult when your boyfriend was a stubborn lump. Shrugging his shoulders and seeming totally disinterested.
After the fourth day of you trying to get through to him. You gave in. Telling yourself that if he wanted to make amends he would. Or he'd realise once it was too late.
Today though, you had a meeting with Garcia, she was going to show you an easier way of accessing some files. The way she does it. Getting yourself up and ready. The house sounded eerily quiet. Spencer did have a habit of impersonating the invisible man when he was home. But still, it was cold and felt empty.
Making your way downstairs, you called out for him, but got no answer.
Realising he wasn't even home. You felt another pang in your chest. Maybe he was done? The thought made your eyes sting. But on checking the time, you would be late to meet Garcia. You grabbed your breakfast out the fridge and grabbed your bag and keys.
Once in the office, you passed the bullring to see Spencer at his desk. Nose deep in some files.
"Hey, what time did you come in? We could have come together." You asked, approaching his desk.
"Early. Didn't want to wake you."
Nodding, you still wanted to push for you both to make up, "did you want to grab lunch somewhere? Would be nice to spend some time with you."
"I'm busy."
"Well I didn't mean right now. Later. When you're free? I'm in Garcias office if you-"
"Y/N, you're here!" Garcia squeaked, "for a moment I thought you were standing me up."
Realising he still wasn't ready to have a decent conversation with you. You gave up, again.
"Never." You smiled at her, before giving Spencer a sad look as he continued to read his papers.
You sat down in Garcias office and fully immersed yourself in the training. Pushing Spencer to the back of your mind.
Around lunchtime you saw Spencer walk past the room and you felt another wave of sadness wash over you.
"So, what's up with you and Sir Smarts-a-lot?" Garcia asked you while you were taking a break.
"There's not really much to tell. We fell out over some serious and not so serious things. I've tried to patch things up. He doesn't want to know. Been trying for like 4 days now."
"I'm sorry. He does seem particularly cranky since you came back from that last case."
"Yeah. Happened while we were out there. I don't even-"
You were interrupted by the sound of shouting from out in the main office. Both you and Garcia looked at each other and wondered who the hell fell out with each other so bad they had to have a screaming match.
Both getting up and wandering down the hall. You just about turned the corner first. But froze in your tracks seeing two people, one with a gun, the other with a briefcase. The woman, with the gun, had the few people that were in the bullring huddled together.
"Shit Garcia go back to your office and lock the door. Call Spence and tell him to stay away. Now!" You whisper shout at her.
"Hey! Put your hands on your head. Get in here Miss now." one of them shouted at you. Not having noticed Garcia as she backed away to her office.
When you didn't move. The seemingly unarmed intruder marched towards you and attempted to grab onto you. As you went to defend yourself. He pulled out a knife and threatened you with it.
"Think very carefully about what you do next." He said lowly.
"What do you guys want. I can help you."
"No you won't. You'll just try and talk me down and I won't let them down again. Get in here or I'm going to make you. And it will hurt."
"What's your name? I'm Y/N. Why are you here? There's no weapons or money stored here. Are you looking for someone?"
"Shut up!" He yelled, you let out a gasp at the sharp pain in your side.
Looking down the blade he was holding embedded in your side. Crumpling down to the floor, you watched as the deep red soaked into your blouse. Spreading across your side.
"What the fuck Darren. You weren't supposed to hurt anyone." A woman came up to the guy and yanked him by his shoulder. "We need to set these charges now and go. Now!"
Charges, that meant explosives.
The pair rushed off and left you bleeding on the floor. Giving you the opportunity to make an escape.
Making it back to Garcias office. You burst through the door, scaring the life out of her.
"Y/N! Oh my god why is there blood. There's a knife hanging out of you."
"Did you speak to Spence?" You asked locking the door behind you.
"Yeah he's in the armory now. They-"
"Call him back! Tell them to abort. Do not come up here!"
"OK, what-why?" She spluttered while calling him back.
"Garcia? Is everything okay. We're just planning how we're going to do this." He answered. You could hear the sound of kevlar being secured. You managed to stumble your way across the room to Garcias desk before your legs gave out.
"Spence, where are you? Do not come up here. And keep people out of the lifts. Do not use them." You panted.
"Y/N are you okay? We haven't left yet. What's going on?"
"I'm fine. I just met the intruders. They're setting charges. Evacuate the rest of the building."
"What? They're going to blow up the building?" Garcia asked, her face paling.
"How big are the explosives?"
"I didn't see. I just managed to get away from them. I did see it was only a small briefcase though."
"That could still be enough to wipe out the whole floor. You need to leave now. Use the far stairwell."
"Garcia, you should go."
"What? I'm not leaving you."
"Both of you go. Now!" Spencer raised his voice.
You shared a look with Garcia, knowing you weren't moving anywhere fast enough.
"We should be okay here," Garcia nodded, "I'll stay with her."
"You're hurt aren't you." Spencer spoke quietly.
"A little bit yeah. Spence, I love you."
"Don't do that. I'm coming to get you."
"No do-" and then the call rang off.
Garcia came and sat next to you. You rested your head on her shoulder.
"I don't get what they were talking about. They said about setting charges. But when the woman saw I'd been stabbed she said they weren't supposed to hurt anyone. How does that make sense." You mutter, starting to feel woozy from the blood loss.
"Unless what they're trying to destroy is paperwork not people," Garcia mused.
"Hotchs office, he keeps loads of important documents in there." You guessed.
"That makes sense. He always takes Sunday's off. So he wouldn't be in there to get hurt."
"Garcia you really should go. Maybe you can get some help." You said quietly. Feeling very lightheaded.
Garcias phone started ringing, answering it she put it on loudspeaker.
"Go ahead. We're just sitting here awaiting our handsome prince's to rescue us."
"Garcia." Spencer answered, "how badly is she hurt? They won't let us get in yet. Not if there's a bomb threat. The whole buildings on lock down. They aren't holding hostages. The other guys from the office have run out already. Are they still there?"
"Woah, woah, woah. One question at a time. Y/N isn't doing great. I don't know what to do Reid. I'm not a doctor. But she's still bleeding."
"What? What happened."
"She got stabbed by one of them. It's still in there but it's-"
"We have to get in there Y/Ns been stabbed. Please. I volunteer to go in. Come on Hotch." He sounded desperate, it made you smile slightly. The irony that it took a near death situation to get him to act like he cared again.
A deafening boom shook the office, jolting you awake.
"Shit was that the-?" You asked.
"I think so." Garcia nodded. "We're okay. Spencer can you hear me?"
You slumped down against Garcias shoulder a bit more. Fighting the urge to fall asleep.
"We saw it. Blown the windows out of Hotch's office as well."
"Tell him..." You trailed off falling into unconsciousness.
Garcia looked at you, panic washing over her. "Y/N? Spencer she's passed out. I don't know what to do- I know I shouldn't take the knife out."
"Is she sat up or laying down?"
"She's sat up, do I lie her down?"
"Yes, don't knock the knife though- I need EMTs with me right now- Garcia, I need you to check if she's breathing." Spencer sounded out of breath, "I'm coming to you as fast as I can."
"Okay, she's laying down. And yes she's breathing."
"You're doing well Garcia. We're seconds away now."
Garcia still let out a scream when the paramedics burst through the door. Stumbling away from your figure, she bumped shoulders with Spencer as the experts dealt with you.
"Do you think she's going to be okay?" Garcia asked him.
"I don't know. But I feel like a prized jackass now. What if she's not? She will have died thinking I was mad at her."
"I don't know what to say Reid. She was trying. She thought you'd stopped trying."
"The argument was stupid. I was more annoyed us arguing had ruined some plans I had."
"Plans? What do you-ohhh." Garcia cut herself off as she clocked onto what Spencer meant.
He quickly pocketed the small jewellery box as the EMT turned to the pair of them.
#spencer reid x reader#spencer reid#spencer reid imagine#criminal minds imagine#criminal minds#criminal minds spencer reid
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The Bet
Male OC x Tzuyu
Tags: 1k, smut
The story is not ours; we simply alter the original story to our preferred settings.
Tzuyu was sitting in the deserted communal lounge, her face buried in a book. She wasn’t, technically, hiding. That would have gone against the rules.
She was just getting some alone time without all those hands running aimlessly over her body, fingertips trailing her figure and peering beneath her garments, lips and teeth caressing and nibbling every inch of her skin...
Her cheeks flushed, and she felt scorching hot in the oversized sweatshirt she was wearing. She bit her lip and sighed.
The words on the page she had been reading and re-reading for the last ten minutes without really understanding the meaning blurred, as she became engrossed in her thoughts once more, still puzzled as to how she had gotten up in that situation.
A shy, prudish, inexperienced freshman like her was playing with fire. Or worse, with the rampaging hormones of a bunch of college boys.
She made a lighthearted, drunken mistake, but she was paying its price with her body and no end in sight.
Betting with her buddies while inebriated sounded innocuous, and she was confident it wasn’t anything they were going to follow up on anyhow.
But she was wrong - dreadfully wrong.
It was all a game in her eyes. And she was pretty sure she was going to win at the time. But she lost, and the guys eagerly demanded their prize.
She had turned into a real-life sex doll for them: she had to let them touch her body, grab, and grope her as they liked, and offer herself whenever they wanted.
This was her retribution for being so irresponsible and stupid. Worst of all, she was beginning to like it, even though she would never say it out loud.
She had been feeling so dirty and depraved. Tzuyu had only had one previous boyfriend, her high school beau, and she’d never experienced sex or pleasure.
And now, whenever a hand reached for her, a small bolt of electricity would rip through her body, giving her shivers and stealing her breath. Being forcefully exposed in front of others was humiliating, but it gave her sensations she had never expected to feel.
Even though the guilt and shame were eating at her, her body was sending her new signals and feelings that she had never experienced before.
She was drawn sharply back to reality when she was pulled back by her hair.
Electricity coursed through her as she saw two dark eyes upside down, mischievously staring at her.
“Did you plan on staying hidden for much longer? We were worried by your sudden disappearance...” Hyeon inquired, keeping her head tilted and caressing her throat.
His fingertips were ice cold, but her skin felt like it was burning under his touch.
“I had to study. You know, exams...” she mumbled, while he played with the sweatshirt zip, loosening it. His hand crept under, reaching for the bra.
Hyeon cupped his hand around her breast and began massaging it. He let her hair go and did the same with the other hand.
“I see,” he said quietly, “then go ahead and read. I’ll help myself.”
Her vision blurred when he gently pinched and twisted her nipples. She was embarrassed by who she had become, but she couldn’t bring herself to stop it. She wasn’t even sure if she wanted to put a stop to it.
Tzuyu sighed as she felt a twitch in her womb. She closed her eyes and leaned against Hyeon’s body, allowing him easier access to her. Against her neck, she could feel already the bulge in his pants.
She blushed again, both from her thoughts and from his gentle touch on her skin. She could feel she was getting wet.
Hyeon drew his hands away from her sweatshirt after what seemed like an eternity. As he leaned over her, he reached for her skirt. He unceremoniously lifted it, revealing her underwear. He slid the fabric to the side, A light touch on her labia made her moan.
“You’re such a slut Tzuyu, you’re already wet...” he chuckled as he gently stroked her.
He pushed two fingers into her warmth, provoking her another moan. She held her breath and widened her eyes as she grabbed his wrist with both hands.
Jisung and Suho were sitting on the desk on both her sides; she hadn’t noticed their presence. They were stroking their erections through their shorts while enjoying the little show.
They laughed as she violently blushed and tried to cover herself. Jisung smiled, bending over to grab her cheeks and kiss her, pushing his tongue into her mouth and sucking her lips.
“Come on baby, stand up,” Hyeon said, pulling his fingers out of her and grabbing her arms.
He pushed her against the desk, ignoring her weak protests and whining. Her hair covered her face completely, blocking her view. She could hear the other two guys unzipping their shorts and the light clank of their belts hitting the ground.
Several hands caressed her skin and lifted her clothes to reveal her body. Someone took her wrists and pressed them against her back.
As fingers grabbed the hem of her undies and pulled them off, she bit her lower lip and held her breath.
A hand caressed and squeezed her buttocks, followed by a slap. As she tried to wiggle out from underneath the guy who was blocking her, she was hit with a harder slap that took her breath away.
“Stop squirming or you’ll hurt yourself,” Jisung said, pulling her head up by her hair. Her gaze met his as she groaned beneath his hands. He kissed her once more, firmly holding her head. While Jisung’s tongue was playing with hers, someone gently rubbed his sex on hers. He pushed his way through her soaked labia and inside. Her moans got lost in Jisung’s mouth, which was still devouring her lips.
The third person let go of her wrists and grabbed one of her hands, pressing it against his erection.
Tzuyu noticed it was Suho masturbating with her hand. She gave in to his grip, wrapping her fingers around his hardness and letting him guide her. Jisung let her mouth and head go, and Hyeon grabbed her by the hair, pushing his length deep into her.
Jisung then kneeled on the desk and presented her with his member, stroking it on her cheek, and lips. She disclosed them and welcomed him, clasping her semi-closed eyes in his as he entered her warm mouth slowly. Hyeon’s tight grip on her head guided her rhythm as her tongue twisted around his girth.
It was the first time they pulled something like that on her, she had never been taken by more than one person at the same time.
Tzuyu thoughts were clouded by pleasure.
With each thrust in her mouth or sex, electricity scurried through her entire body. Her desperate, rising moans were suffocated in her mouth.
Hyeon let go of her hair, which was replaced by Jisung’s grip, and groaning sank his fingers into the soft skin of her hips.
She tilted her head, her senses dulled and inebriated, as they both went faster and deeper. Shivers ran down her spine, and a tingling warmth propagated through her like wild, uncontrollable waves.
Hyeon came into her depths and collapsed on her back. His skin was warm and sweaty, his breathing heavy.
Then it was Jisung’s turn, who came into her mouth, pressing her head against his groin while his throbs slowed and he softened, slipping off her lips.
Suho let go of her hand and rushed for her.
He rolled her over, moved her to the edge of the desk, and positioned himself directly above her head.
Then bent over her and plunged his erection into her mouth.
Tzuyu grasped his thighs, overwhelmed, her mind empty of all but bliss.
One of the guys parted her legs and buried his face in her, holding on to her knees.
Two hands completely unzipped her sweatshirt and reached for her breasts, squeezing and pinching her nipples.
She was totally helpless, which really just heightened her arousal. Her body was stiffening and twitching as tension built up within her.
The guy eating her, bit her labia, ascending to the clit, then circled it with his tongue, first gently caressing it, then with frantic strokes that left her screaming and squirming under his mouth. He firmly gripped her thighs, lapping and sucking her and pushing her over the edge.
When she thought she couldn’t bear it any longer, he slid two fingers into her, moving them slowly.
Her orgasm burst violently, her back arched, and every inch of her body shivered, pervaded by a tickling ecstasy that released her tension.
Suho came soon after, filling her mouth once again.
She stopped shaking after a good minute or two. She could feel her heart rate lowering, but she kept her eyes closed.
She was feeling warm and fuzzy. She didn’t want to face yet the actuality of what had just occurred.
The three guys were busy pulling up their pants and composing themselves.
to meet the three pleased stares. Tzuyu quickly shut her legs and tried to put back her hoodie, embarrassed.
Jisung seized her hands and held her back.
“Don’t bother covering, cutie; no one else is here. Even if that were the case, anyone would have adored the show.” He reached for her mouth and kissed her.
“When is this prize thing going to end?” she sighed, as she sat on the desk.
“Oh, you don’t like it?” Suho joked as he buckled his belt. “ You seemed to be having a good time two minutes ago.”
She blushed again, looking away.
“It will end when we unanimously decide that the payback for the lost bet is adequate, obviously. And I’m sure tonight at least a couple of gentlemen will be interested in discussing with you what just happened, so don’t go and hide again,” Hyeon added.
He gave her a wry grin and a nonchalant nod before heading out of the room, followed by Jisung and Suho.
Tzuyu was alone again.
The sun had begun to set, and the communal lounge was getting darker.
She retrieved her underwear and put it on.
Her mind was a whirlwind of feelings and thoughts. She was heated and out of breath. She couldn’t understand why she would enjoy the whole bet and prize thing; it was so wicked and dirty. It wasn’t like her, to do things like this, but she couldn’t bring herself to end it.
Tzuyu knew she could demand they stop at any point, and if they refused, she could simply go talk to the student representative. They’d be in big trouble.
But perhaps she just didn’t want it to stop.
She sat at the desk, her head buried in the soft sleeves, until it was completely dark, with just the streetlamps from outside shedding some light on the walls through the large windows.
She took a deep breath and smiled, wondering who would be the first to take her that evening.
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As Luck Would Have It [1/2]
Pairing: Matt Murdock x Fem!Reader Word Count: 3.5k [Part Two]
Warnings/tags: Humor, fluff, and a charming, teasing Matty
Summary: Stressed out while working on a dead-end case at Nelson, Murdock, and Page, Matt isn't too thrilled when Foggy interrupts and asks him for a favor. Despite his annoyance at another task being added to his list of things to do, Matt is shocked when the potential client Foggy asks him to call turns out to be a wrong number. What's even more surprising is how much Matt enjoys chatting with the woman on the other end of the line.
a/n: This is going to be a short, two part piece. It's light and fluffy so I hope y'all enjoy it! Feedback/reblogs are always appreciated!
Matt Murdock One Shot Tag List: @pazii @shouldbestudying41 @kmc1989 @ebathory997 @yeonalie @shiorimakibawrites @xxdrixx @wkndwllf @leikelle @pinkratts @lazyxsquirrel @1988-fiend @marvelcinematiquniverse @carstairswife @stilldreaming666 @kiwwia-wiwwia @willwork4dilfs @will-delete-this-later-probably @mattmurdocks6thscaleapartment @theetherealbloom @yarrystyleeza @dramaholic18 @ladywholikesreading @sleepysleepymom @tartbeanpuzzles @harleycao @sunflower-tia @gamingfeline @juskonutoh @kezibear @ninacotte @withyoutilltheendoftheline @justanerd1
Matt’s fingers slid across his braille reader, his brows furrowed together in deep concentration as he focused on reading the digital document displayed on his laptop. This entire case had been draining him lately, only managing to aggravate him as he continually hit legal wall after legal wall trying to figure out how to help their client. What made things worse was that he knew what was really happening behind the scenes in this case that he, Foggy, and Karen had been working on, but he also knew that Matt Murdock wasn't supposed to know about any of that.
With a vexed grunt he raised a hand from off his braille reader, running it through his hair in agitation as he blew out a frustrated breath. Tired of reading the same thing over and over with no new way forward, Matt pushed his chair back from the desk in annoyance. The desk lurched a few inches across the floor at the force as Matt grit his teeth together.
He wished he could use the information he'd uncovered last night as Daredevil. That would have solved all of his problems and easily saved their client. But of course, none of that evidence was remotely admissible in court. So while he knew where the truth lay in this entire case, he was still currently helpless to use the law in his fight for justice. Though he was certainly determined to keep picking through detail after detail in search of something he could use to his client’s benefit.
The sound of footsteps approaching his office door caught Matt’s attention and his head shifted to the side. Matt pushed all thoughts of his frustrating case out of his mind as he focused on the noise. Barely a second later the sound of Foggy’s unmistakable heartbeat registered in his ears just before two knocks sounded against his door.
“What do you need, Fog?” Matt called out.
He heard the door handle twist, the door to his office opening as Foggy stepped inside. Matt didn’t have to exert much effort studying him to notice how stressed Foggy currently was. His blood pressure was quite clearly elevated this morning along with his cortisol levels–he could practically smell the stress in the faint bit of sweat on Foggy’s forehead. So apparently Matt wasn't the only one having a shitty day at the firm today. At least he wasn't alone in that.
“Hey, Matt,” Foggy began hesitantly, stopping just inside his office before shifting his weight back and forth along his feet almost nervously. “I know you're busy running yourself into the ground for the Richmond case, and I know how frustrating it's been to keep hitting a deadend. But…” he trailed off for a moment, Matt catching the faint waver in his tone. “I was actually hoping to ask you for a favor this morning.”
Matt’s head tilted curiously to the side, his eyes narrowing behind his glasses at Foggy. Leaning back in his desk chair, he lowered his hands down onto his lap and attempted to keep the annoyed fidgeting of his fingers hidden from his friend. The last thing Matt wanted right now was another task added to his agenda for the day. All he wanted was to make headway on this case before it drove him insane.
“What kind of favor?” he asked, trying to keep the edge from his tone.
Matt heard Foggy take a few more steps forward into his office, stopping just in front of his desk. The sound of something like a small slip of paper faintly rustled between Foggy’s fingers as he stood there.
“Elliott got a call a bit ago from someone by the name of Edgar Philips who was potentially interested in hiring us,” Foggy began to explain, setting the paper down onto Matt's desk before sliding it across the surface towards him. “And the case sounded… interesting to say the least. But the thing is, Karen is out today dealing with the Rodriguez building permit thing, and I'm about to head over to the courthouse. So I was…sort of hoping you could call them back and handle the consultation? Somehow fit them in today?”
Matt could hear the way the muscles in Foggy’s face had contracted, sounding like he'd almost grimaced when he had asked for the favor. His heart rate had accelerated just a bit, meaning Fog was clearly anxious that Matt would decline to help take on even more work today. Truthfully he wanted to decline calling this possible client because he was already swamped with the Richmond case, but maybe taking a few minutes to focus on something else would benefit him. Maybe stepping away for a bit before coming back to things with a fresh mind would help him see things a little differently. Clearly he wasn’t making any progress this morning doing what he had been doing.
With an exasperated sigh, Matt slid his hand across his desk to where he’d heard Foggy set the slip of paper. His fingers felt around the wooden surface for a second before he found it.
“Yeah, I'll make the call,” Matt told him, pulling the paper towards himself.
Foggy let out a relieved breath, the sound of his entire body relaxing impossible for Matt's ears to miss. At least he could make Fog's day a little better.
“Great, seriously! Thank you, buddy,” Foggy said in a rush. “You have no idea how helpful that is right now. I've already got so much to do today, I really didn't know how I was going to fit that call in. And you know how bad the reception can be at the courthouse.” Foggy laughed good-naturedly, his mood already lifting. “But hey, before I go, did you need me to read that phone number off for you? Or dial it even?”
Matt's fingers ran over the indentation of Elliott's pen marks on the paper. Despite how scatterbrained their new secretary often tended to be, he at least appreciated that the man had a heavy hand when he took notes from the calls he answered. It at least made things easier for Matt to read without too much extra assistance–something he loathed having to ask for if he didn’t need to.
“No,” he answered with a shake of his head. “I can make the numbers out just fine. Don't worry about me, Fog. Just go take care of what you need to. I'll deal with this Edgar Philips.”
Foggy’s hands clapped loudly together, Matt picking up on the sounds of his feet as he already began to back out of his office.
“Thank you, Matt, you're a life saver!” he exclaimed. “You know, more than you usually are.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Matt said with a grin. “Can you just shut the door again on your way out, though?”
“Can do!” Foggy replied.
Matt swore he heard the air shift as Foggy sent him a salute. Chuckling lightly at his best friend's ability to lighten the mood, he heard the sound of his office door closing before he heard the muffled sound of Foggy’s footsteps as he began making his exit from the office.
For a minute Matt sat in his chair, listening as Foggy said a brief goodbye to Elliott before leaving. Then the usual ‘silence’ of their office returned. Though it was never truly quiet to Matt because he could still hear the hum of the lights in the building, the almost constant tapping of Elliott's fingers on his keyboard in the room over, and even the incessant buzzing of a fly that had been trapped in the office since yesterday afternoon.
Foul mood slowly returning, Matt's fingers ran over the pen marks on the slip of paper still in his hands. Glancing down towards it, he wondered what the interesting case that Foggy had mentioned was actually supposed to be about. To Matt, interesting just translated to complicated, which was the last thing he needed right now. Though whatever it was, he figured getting the call out of the way would be the best course of action for now. Afterwards he’d be free to continue working on the Richmond case for the rest of the day, hopefully without any further interruptions or distractions.
Shifting in his chair, he slipped his cell phone from out of his dress pants pocket, the electronic hum of it louder now that it wasn’t muffled by fabric. He raised it to his mouth before speaking a few voice commands into it, then he took a second to recite the number he’d been given from off the paper. Sitting back in his chair, Matt listened to the familiar dial tone as he held the phone to his ear, but surprisingly it only managed to ring twice before someone had quickly answered.
“Seriously, Lindsey, I said I’d call afterwards,” a distinctly annoyed and hushed female voice came over the line. “There’s nothing of interest for me to report yet and now you’re just making me even more nervous. At this point my armpits are going to be as sweaty as my hands.”
Sitting forward in his chair, Matt rested his elbows along the top of his desk. A small grin slipped onto his mouth as he tossed the little slip of paper somewhere among the mess of papers before himself. He hadn’t expected that to be the response to his call, but now the person on the other end of the line had captured his undivided attention.
“Maybe you should try using more deodorant then,” Matt cheekily suggested.
A surprised gasp met his ear, the sound making his smile widen further. Clearly whoever he'd gotten ahold of had just now realized they were in fact not speaking with Lindsey.
“Oh, shit,” came your clearly embarrassed and still hushed voice as the realization that you were speaking to someone else settled in. “I'm sorry, I totally thought you were my friend calling back. I didn't check the caller ID because I didn't want my ringtone to make any more of a nuisance than it already had been making because it's so loud. I swear I don't ever hear it if I don't have the volume up so high. But now I am incredibly regretting the decision to not just have taken the two seconds to look and check the number first.”
There was a pause where you loudly cleared your throat over the line. Matt found himself still grinning at the word vomit that seemed to keep coming from you with no end in sight, his irritation at having to make this call quickly vanishing. His left hand began to absently fiddle with a pen from his desk as he listened to you ramble on further.
“Clearly you're not Lindsey and now I'm absolutely mortified,” you continued in a rush. “But for the record, I am wearing deodorant. A lot of it actually. I'm just nervous and it makes me extra sweaty, alright? I don't like job interviews. They terrify me.” Your voice dropped to an even quieter tone as you continued on, Matt not remotely interested in stopping you because you had easily become the most fascinating part of his day. “And I dislike when you have to sit and wait in those stiff plastic chairs while the secretary keeps shooting you random smiles from their desk like you're not about to vomit all over the floor from nerves. I swear they make you sit outside the office for at least ten minutes like it's some sort of extra secret test before the actual interview takes place. Are they supposed to be judging how I sit and do nothing? Or how I handle intentionally being asked to show up at a certain time but am purposely made to sit and wait? I swear, it’s done on purpose.”
“So what I'm gathering from all of that,” Matt finally began when you had paused to take a breath, still grinning as he spoke, “is that you are not the Edgar Philips I am looking for, nor were you the one who most likely tried contacting the law firm of Nelson, Murdock, and Page earlier this morning on his behalf. Am I correct in that assumption?”
There was a very long pause on your end of the line after he'd spoken. Matt waited patiently for you to respond though, his left hand still leisurely flipping the pen back and forth between his fingers.
“Did you say…law firm?” you hesitantly asked.
“Yes, I did,” Matt replied.
“So you're a…?”
“Lawyer, yes. One of the partners, actually,” he answered easily. “And one who must have somehow gotten the wrong number it appears, judging by your response.”
“Yeah, I uh–” you cleared your throat again, “–I definitely didn't call your office today. And I am certainly not Edgar Philips.”
“Ahh well, my apologies,” Matt said, setting his pen back down on his desk before sitting back in his chair. “I'm sorry to have interrupted your day, especially at such an inconvenient time as right before a job interview. I suppose I shouldn’t further distract you.”
There was a small part of Matt that almost felt reluctant to end the call already, dreading having to ask Elliott for help with the clearly incorrect phone number so he could get in touch with the actual Mr. Philips before going back to that irritating Richmond case. You'd been an amusing distraction this morning at least.
“Actually you've somehow managed to calm my nerves,” you replied. “Apparently embarrassing myself with a stranger has now made me feel less like vomiting.”
“Any less sweaty?” Matt teased, unable to help himself.
You laughed lightly over the line, the sound a pleasant one that seemed to ease the tension from Matt’s own body. Something about your voice and your way of immediately speaking to him as if you'd known him for longer than two minutes had drawn him in.
“Maybe a fraction less, thank you for that,” you answered. “You uh, you have a calming voice, whichever part of Nelson, Murdock, and Page you are.”
Matt's brows quickly shot up onto his forehead in surprise. No one had told him that before.
“I do?” he asked.
“Mhmm,” you hummed back. “You know, if you ever need money, you'd be great at calling people and talking to them until they relax before they have to do something they're nervous about–like going to a job interview. Or maybe even attending events with them to keep them calm or something. You know what I’m saying?”
Matt couldn't resist the laugh that slipped out of his mouth, his head tilting to the side. “Is that an actual thing that exists? Because it almost sounds like you're just describing a male escort,” he pointed out.
“ No !” your harsh whisper came over the line, the embarrassment in it causing Matt to chuckle again. “Oh no, that's not–no I didn't mean it like that! I swear! Is that even legal in New York City? Though I suppose maybe you don't live here since this is a wrong number and all... But no! That’s not what I meant!”
Matt relaxed further back in his chair, finding that he'd been enjoying this unexpected conversation with you this morning far more than he could’ve thought. He truly didn't want to end the call even though he knew he would need to soon. Though he found himself wishing for an excuse to talk to you again already.
“I do live in New York City actually,” he answered. “And male escorts aren't supposed to be getting paid for their time in the way that you're currently thinking about, so yes, they are actually quite legal.”
“I imagine as a lawyer that owns your own law firm, though,” you began, “you don't exactly need a side hustle as a male escort. And that–that’s a joke, by the way,” you quickly clarified. “You know what? Just forget I said that, I'm just nervous for this interview. I'm rambling.”
“You are, but I'm enjoying it,” he told you. “But our law firm tends to take on lots of cases pro bono, so truthfully, I could probably use a side hustle. I'll keep your vote of confidence as a male escort in mind if I ever struggle to continue paying my bills.”
The bark of laughter followed by your soft curse under your breath had Matt’s cheeks hurting from how wide his smile had grown.
“Despite how entertaining this call has been, I should really go,” you said. “I imagine they should be calling me back soon and I probably shouldn’t be sitting here looking like I’m having so much fun on the phone judging by the frown the secretary just gave me. I’ve never had one frown at me before and I’d really not like to mess up my chances here. I kind of really want this job so I can actually do something with my degree.”
“Well, I’m sure you’ll do just fine, but either way, I wish you luck,” Matt replied. “I should probably get back to work myself, but I’ll admit that you’ve been a pleasant distraction from a case I’ve been struggling with myself, so thank you.”
“Then I wish you luck as well, stranger,” you replied. “I hope you make some progress on your case.”
“I suppose if I don’t, there’s always other viable career options for me that I’ve recently had my eyes opened to,” Matt teased.
He enjoyed the sound of your laugh over the line one last time before you told him goodbye. Almost reluctantly Matt ended the call, lowering his phone down onto his desk. His smile faltered as he once more overheard the sound of Elliott’s fingers typing on his computer. With a defeated sigh he pushed his chair back, rising up to his feet and accepting the fact that he’d need to ask Elliott for help dialing Mr. Philips correctly.
“Matt, this is–” Foggy began but quickly stopped himself.
Matt sat back in his chair, a triumphant smile spread wide across his mouth as he continued to listen to both Karen and Foggy rifling through the documents he’d had printed out early this morning. The three of them were currently sitting in the conference room while Matt proudly sat back, enjoying the sound of the pair of them getting excited over what he’d discovered yesterday afternoon. Apparently taking a step away from the case for a little bit had been just the thing he needed to do to come back at it with a different angle.
“Dude, this is exactly what we needed for that Richmond case!” Foggy finally exclaimed, his head darting up towards Matt. “You’re brilliant!”
“Ahh, well,” Matt said with a smug smile and a shrug of his shoulders. “Just doing my job, Fog.”
“This must have taken a lot of creative thinking,” Karen muttered, still flipping through the papers. “Hell, Matt, I think you just saved this whole case.”
Matt had been about to respond, tempted to make another cocky comment, but the sound of his phone receiving a text cut him off. Brows furrowing together slightly, he slipped his hand into his pants pocket and pulled his phone out. Holding it up to his ear and muttering out a command, he slid back his chair from the conference table before rising up to his feet and walking a few steps away from Foggy and Karen.
He frowned slightly at the number the automated voice began to read off in his ear almost immediately. It wasn’t one he had recognized. Why would a strange number be texting him? Though when he heard that same automated voice begin to read out the text message he’d received, a small smile easily slipped onto his face.
“Just wanted to let you know that I was offered the job already this morning,” the automated voice read into Matt’s ear. “Apparently you’re my good luck charm, stranger. So thanks for the chat. Hope you made some progress on your case, too.”
For a moment Matt just stood there in shock, holding the phone to his ear and grinning like a fool. He hadn’t expected to ever hear from you again, and he certainly hadn't anticipated the burst of pride at your news. And apparently you’d also been his good luck charm because after he'd dealt with the real Edgar Philips, he finally made a break on the case that had stumped him for weeks.
Without a second thought, Matt turned around to face both Karen and Foggy, lowering his phone to his side. “Hey, I’ve got to respond to this message,” he told them. “Do you mind if I handle this back in my office now?”
“No, no,” Foggy answered distractedly, the air shifting as he clearly waved Matt off. “Go do your thing, buddy. We've got plenty to focus on at the moment.”
Trying to fight back the growing smile on his mouth as he maneuvered his way back over towards where he'd been sitting, Matt picked up his cane that had been resting against the table. As he navigated his way out of the conference room and back to the privacy of his office, he already began thinking up a response to your message. And he also wondered how strange it would be if he called instead of texted you back.
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“Do It For Us.” Pt.2
Summery: A quirkless girl tired, sick and tired of being helpless, tired of being weak. Bullied all her life along side her best friend and longer term crush, Izuku Midoriya. Happy she isn’t alone…but he gets in to UA? Leaving her behind…what’s left for her? Seems a blonde takes pity on her.
M. Izuku x AFAB! Reader x B. Katsuki
Pt.1
The morning with katsuki Bakugou was, weird to say the least. He wakes you up bright and early, his face a bit pink, you were confused into why. You two waited for each other to change, you two brushed your teeth together. It felt weirdly domestic.
Breakfast was wonderful, Mrs. Bakugou made some special Omurice for you and Bakugou and it was delicious! And surprisingly Bakugou barley spoke this morning just the few remarks here and there. Guess he’s not a morning person.
Walking to school with Bakugou was even weirder, it was awkwardly silent. You never tried to start any conversation, except you just wanted to thank him. And ask why the sudden change of heart? Why help you after putting you through so much? Did something happen?
“Hey, I just wanted to say-“ of course the timing couldn’t be worse, his lackies and more boys bombarded him, pushing you out the way. You simply shrug, glancing at the blonde boy before making your way into the school to wait for Izuku. Realizing that Izuku is probably wondering where you were.
“Where were you Y/n!? I was worried sick!” Izuku ran to your desk, worry in his face. You were currently staring into the distance for what seemed like ever.
“I was…not home..so I walked to school in a different path.” You smile, grabbing Izuku’s hand to try and soothe his worry. “Oh…why? Why weren’t you home!” He proceeded to grab your hands with both his.
“Uh…just some personal stuff, nothing too serious !” You laugh, giving him a soft look. You loved whenever he worried for you, it made your heart soar and your serotonin levels went off the charts.
“Oh…well if you have more trouble. Please, come to me…I would hate for you to get hurt. Again.” He looked at your hand dejectedly, “oh! I have something great to tell…” as soon as his smile was up it faded as soon as it came. It’s like he realized something.
“I’m going to get into UA…I will. I have a chance now!” He gave you the most determined look, a look you haven’t seen since you were young. One where you knew you couldn’t argue against.
“Good luck Izu…work hard! Do it for…do it for us! We quirkless people need a rep too!” You let go of his hands as the rest of the class came flooding in. You couldn’t help but think. What if he really got in? Am I a bad friend for not believing in him? Is it bad to hope?
What if he leaves me behind?
Questions and thoughts raced through your mind, not even noticing you were staring at the back of Izuku’s head.
Don’t go…
Don’t leave me alone…
Being so stuck in your head, you never even noticed the day ending. Until you finally heard Izuku calling out your name.
“Y/n! Are you okay? I’ve been calling out your name for ages!” You turn to Izuku, noticing the almost empty classroom. “Oh! Sorry just lost in thought!” You laugh sheepishly, scratching the nape of your neck. Izuku shook his head chuckling.
“Oi! Y/n…hurry yer’ ass up.” The familiar hot head was standing at the classroom door way, you quickly get up to gather your things. Izuku was clearly confused by this. What did Bakugou mean? Are you two hanging out? How and why?
“Wh-what? Why would she-“ he stops, seeing the smile on your face when you look at Bakugou, the same smile you always give him. That friendly and loving smile.
“See ya Izu! I gotta go but we’ll talk later!” You giggle waving him goodbye as you make it to Katsuki’s side. The two of you making your way out of the classroom leaving the green-haired boy with so many questions.
When did you two become friends…?
It had been a few months since you’ve been staying in the Bakugou family households. You’ve never been happier, you felt as if they were your own family! They helped you with everything, you almost forgot about your old family. Almost.
That is until you were walking to the school with Katsuki one day, talking about breakfast and how katsuki wakes you up way too early.
“No! Katsu-…you really wake me up way too early I always have an hour left of free time!” You protest to the boy, playfully shoving his shoulder.
“Yeah yeah whatever, you wouldn’t wake up at all without me!” He argued, he grabbed your bag throwing it over his shoulder. Katsuki had made it a habit to carry your bag. How sweat. You thought. Everything finally felt right, the bullying almost stopped, you had a nice family! You’re ere finally happy!
“Y/n?” The voice made you freeze, like a dear in headlights you stopped in your tracks to see your father standing at the school gates.
“Y/n! Oh my gosh we’ve been worried sick!” Your father reached out for you only for Bakugou to slap his hand away, putting himself in between you and your dad. Giving you a chance to compose your self, something strange happened, katsuki grabbed your hand. And tightly at that.
“What do you want old man!?” Katsuki shouted anger my glaring at your father. “Y/n!? You’ve been running off with some boy while your mother suffers!?” This caught your attention. What? What happened to your mother?
“What…? What’s wrong with mom…?” You peek from behind Katsuki, righting your grip on his hand. “She’s sick! In the hospital all because you’ve gone missing! I can’t believe it!” You could tell he was getting angry, really angry. Your heart started racing, continuing to cower behind katsuki never letting go of his hand.
“Don believe him…it’s a trick. They all always use the same excuse. Cmon Y/n.” Katsuki pulls you along with him making sure to keep distance between you and your father.
“You’ll regret this Y/n! What if your mother dies huh!?” This made you stop katsuki from walking, turning to your father. You didn’t know what to do, you didn’t know what to say.
Shall you return to save your mother?
Or stay where it’s safe.
You look back up at Katsuki, the boy who’s given you so much.
“If your mom cared about you wouldn’t she go searching? They don’t love you Y/n. I know you love your mom…but she doesn’t love you anymore. And if she did she’d want you to stay where it’s safe…” he fully turned around to steady you. Cupping your face in his hand, you could tell he was worried. You trusted him.
Your father couldn’t be trusted, katsuki who had changed so much for you. You’ll believe him. “S…sorry dad…but you are no longer my father! I’ve been happy! Tell mom…I love her and hope she finds happiness herself!” You scream, quickly pulling Katsuki along with you as you run away. Run like your life depended on it.
Katsuki let out a sigh of relief.
At school you and katsuki always parted ways. But he left you alone for the most part! Especially not wanting to be around Izuku.
“It’s the last day…and the exams are in 3 more months…” Izuku mumbled to himself. “Really? I’d didn’t even notice that…” you’ve been having such a good time lately you didn’t notice it was your last day of jounior high.
“Hey…Izu…what if you do get in? Where…where would I go?” You finally said it looking into Izuku’s eyes, looking for a sign, anything for him to stay with you.
“I…I don’t know…but I’m doing this for us!” He gave you his signature big smile, the smile that you loved. But you knew that loving him will give you nothing, it’ll only hurt you.
You knew you could never keep up with him.
You were his past. Not his future.
You knew you had to push these feelings down, you had to look to your own future. You just didn’t know what. It’s always been with Izuku. It’s always been him. You felt your words get stuck in your throat as you try not to cry.
“Yeah…do it…I’ll cheer you on from the sidelines. Just don’t forget about me when you become number 1 Izu.” You give him a big smile, tears streaming down your face, Izuku embraced you, you breath in his scent for one last time.
Goodbye, Izuku Midoriya, my first love.
My everything.
As you hugged him you noticed something different, he was a lot musclier than normal.
“H-have you been working out?” You sniffle, leaning away from him. He lets out a long laugh at your sudden statement.
“Uh…yeah! Yknow heros, they can’t just be smart.” You two share on last laugh together.
AN: Part 2 is a little shorter! I might drag this out for 3-4 more parts! Because I love this little story <3 I hope you all enjoy! Get ready for part 3! What will the reader be? How does she live without Izuku by her side anymore!?
#mha x reader#bakugou x reader#mha bakugou#mha fanfiction#mha writing#bakugo katsuki#katsuki bakugo x reader#mha angst#deku x reader#deku angst#mha deku#midoriya x reader#izuku midoriya#izuku angst#mha izuku#izuku x reader#izuku midoria x reader#izuku midoryia x you#deku x you
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Cult Part 5!
Here's One, Two, Three, and Four if ya missed 'em.
“Whatever he’s up to,“ Dipper leans forward in his seat, glaring. “It’s not what you think it is.”
His warning goes unheeded. His glare, unnoticed. The man not only keeps talking to Bill, he does it in the stupidest way possible.
“I don’t believe you, vile tempter,” says the dark-haired man, folding his arms, turning away in a huff. His hips tilt in a way that makes those tiny shorts look ten times stupider than they already were. “Your infinite cunning and dire convincing cannot sway a human pure of heart!”
“Oh, how pure it is.” ‘Bill’ says slowly, capturing the man around the shoulders. “But think about it, mortal - What’s the worst that could happen?”
Some of the pouty defiance fades from the human’s face. His slow, dramatic turn towards Bill is focused in a close shot, so their faces are both in frame.
“Alright,” He says softly, “You bastard.”
Ugh, of course he’d give in easily. Even though it’s a terrible idea.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” Dipper mutters, and stuffs another handful of popcorn in his mouth.
He’s seen his fair share of bad television - more so in the last week than ever before - but this bullshit really takes the cake.
Dipper stumbled on this drama while flipping through the billion options of Bill’s TV. Somewhere in the middle of random shows and channels, a brief clip caught his eye. Mostly because he thought the main guy looked like Bill, and it paused his thumb for a second.
Turns out it is Bill. Or rather, an actor playing him. The looks don’t quite match, and they’re using a different name - but the likeness is unmistakable, right down to the triangle motif.
For the first five minutes, Dipper had to just boggle at the very concept. Only the most devoted followers know the Truth. The clever plans and private nature of Bill Cipher are solely for those who are initiated in the deepest secrets. Ones that the ignorant masses could never comprehend.
A hundred-some odd episode tv series blows that theory out of the water. He guesses that’s more bullshit he learned from a bunch of ignorant, sheltered jerks.
Honestly, meeting Bill should have clued Dipper in earlier. A guy who talks about himself that much isn’t going to keep a low profile. Seeing it on Bill’s own TV was also weird until he remembered, right. Multidimensional sight. That’d show him things from all over. And pulling all the episodes on a dedicated channel in his living room? That’s an egomaniac’s move.
So of course Dipper would run into this. There was no better place.
The next episode starts. The opening credits roll for the dozenth time. Dipper doesn’t move from his position on the couch, but he does roll his eyes at the stupid smile actor Bill gives at the camera. Completely off-base, it’d be way more smug.
He should really stop watching. The first episode alone nearly had him grimacing at how idolatrous it was, and Dipper lived in a cult. Problem is, the worse it gets, the more compelling it becomes.
Then the theme song ends, and Dipper looks again down at the tiny text at the bottom. The one that reads, ‘based on real events!!!’.
Sure, it’s the most highly dramatized bullshit he’s ever had the misfortune of watching. Including the soap operas his cult classmate smuggled in all the time. And yes, it’ll be difficult to tell how much is true when it’s less reliable than an overheard rumor.
But it might give him some leads to go on, and Dipper can’t pass that up.
Suffering through shitty dialogue is a small price to pay, when it comes to unraveling the tangled thread that is Bill Cipher. Especially because his subject keeps trying to wrap up into a whole friggin’ gordian knot whenever he’s not looking.
Besides, Dipper’s already on episode twenty-seven. He might as well see how this season ends.
The plot picks up on the same convoluted scheme. Judging by last season, it’ll end in some climactic battle for no particular reason. The characters on screen continue their bickering, an intense-back and forth. One that ignores the very insightful commentary from anyone watching.
Halfway through, ‘Bill’ double- or perhaps triple-crosses his human rival/friend, and Dipper spends a few seconds to feel very I-told-you so about it. The plot thread isn’t resolved though, so there’s no way to know how that turns out without watching another episode.
And Dipper’s bowl of popcorn is empty.
He contemplates the dish first, then the TV. Whether to get up and refresh snacks, or stick around to see how ‘Bill’ ruins that guy’s day for the seventh time. A tough decision.
He’s just about decided to raid the kitchen for snacks, when the front door ominously creaks open.
Bill Cipher, Lord of Dreams, King of the Nightmare Realm, storms into the room with irritation in his terrible gaze, and furious purpose in his stride. He wears a scowl on his face that would make even the most apostate follower cower in terror, a demeanor that speaks of his infinite violence. The thrum of magic in the room builds, intense as it always is in his so-called glorious presence.
As that single golden eye alights on Dipper, he waves and says, “Hi.”
All the tension slides off Bill like a particularly messy sloughing of skin. “Hey yourself, sapling!” He waves back with more enthusiasm. “Been one heck of a day, lemme tell ya that.”
It sounds lighthearted. A pretty decent act. Tough luck for Bill, though; Dipper can read him pretty well by now. A check of Bill’s body language gives him all the info he needs.
Huh. There haven’t been many bad days since he’s met this ‘god’. But by the look of it, this one was more than most.
“That bad?” Dipper asks. Then, since he’s not doing much anyway - “Wanna complain about it?”
A blasphemous question. No follower should delve too deep, for that is the purview of divine revelation. The wisdom of Cipher - his most terrible secrets - are only revealed at his discretion. Not something to be pried at by the greedy and curious.
Dipper still marvels at how wrong they got all of it. Total misses on absolutely everything. Bill’s got secrets, sure. ‘Wisdom’ is questionable.
And when it comes to learning about his life, prying is unnecessary.
Stopping him from talking is the hard part.
“Don’t even get me started!” Bill says, clearly delighted.. He spreads his arms wide. “But you did! Too late to take it back now.”
“Mmh,” Dipper agrees. He’s got another episode queued up. That’ll be a nice distraction. Bill’s rambling can be interesting, but his complaints are longwinded. When you think about it, he’s really doing this ‘god’ a service by listening to all the bullshit.
He really doesn’t know what his old cult was talking about. Clearly they’d never met the guy. When this is how Bill talks to some random human, it’s amazing he has any secrets at all.
He waits for the oncoming onslaught as the show keeps playing on. The theme song finishes and the scene opens. There’s a new location, too - god, this better not be another timeskip. Demons might keep track of that stuff easily, but Dipper’s had to start taking notes.
It takes a second before he notices Bill’s… actually not talking.
A quick glance over - yep, just like he thought. Staring like a creep again. One of Bill’s favorite pastimes. This time paired with a pleased smile, and his hands on his hips.
“What’s up?” Dipper asks. There’s no rhyme or reason to the creeping so far - but he’ll figure out the pattern one day.
“Hm.” Bill gives him a slow onceover. The corner of his mouth quirks up another fraction. “Nice outfit.”
A quick check reveals… Nothing particularly interesting. His clothes are identical to, like, the same three outfits he always wears. Jeans and a t-shirt - though today he ditched the flannel for this big hoodie he found in his laundry. It’s remarkably soft. “Uh. Thanks?”
Bill says nothing. The smirk grows even wider.
Very suspicious. Dipper narrows his eyes. “Are you making fun of me?”
“Who knows?” Bill says, teeth showing in his smile. “Interesting outer layer you got going on there.”
Dipper checks the hoodie. No, he doesn’t sense any magic. If there were pins he would have felt them, and a curse would have kicked in by now. It’s just a random hoodie that’s admittedly too broad in the shoulders, but very comfortable. It even smells good.
He waits a few seconds - Bill keeps staring, oddly smug - but with no information forthcoming, Dipper decides to chalk it up as another ‘weird demon thing’. There’s a lot of weird demon things. Most aren’t as innocuous as random fashion critique, so he might as well let this slide.
“Cute as that look is, you did ask for the rundown, sapling.” Bill loosens his bowtie, letting the ends drape over his shirt. “You know what my least favorite part of today was?”
“Dealing with idiots.” Dipper replies. It’s always idiots. He rifles through popcorn kernels to find any remaining puffs.
“Sure, sure. Most times!” Bill strides over, sighing dramatically. “But today it was dealing with sycophants.”
Dipper runs that through his mental dictionary - then frowns. “They weren’t flattering enough?”
“Close!” With a grin, Bill leans on the arm of the couch. “More like praise comes in a lotta different flavors, and this one -” He stops mid-sentence, with a sudden frown.
Pausing? That’s unusual. Dipper rips his attention away from the show, glancing up. “This one was…?”
“Hm? Oh, y’know.” Oddly enough, it seems like Bill genuinely wasn’t deflecting. Simply thinking, his head slightly tilted. He snaps his fingers twice. “Like, suckups are one thing. Currying favor’s the most common grift in the universe! It’s the… That kinda saccharine crap that’s a hair too sincere. Like…” He wags his hand in the air, fingers wiggling as he tries to grasp for an invisible word. Grimacing when he doesn’t find it. “Ugh. English doesn’t have the right vocab.”
A multilingual master of the mind probably does feel limited by speech. And every day, Dipper learns something new.
Demons have a different culture. Human customs don’t apply. Learning it has been a whole process, more arduous than he’d expected - because it’s got an entirely new language, with a million new words.
Apparently said language has a lot of terms for ‘suckup’.
Dipper rummages around for an English word that might fit. “So it was… Creepy?”
“Close!” Bill agrees, looking pleased. “Little bit obsessive. A touch like they’re up to something.” He makes a face. “Or worse, they’re not! Even when every non-braindead being should know I’m not on the market.”
“The market for…?”
“Most everything,” Bill says, with his usual amount of detail.
“I would have thought you get that a lot.” Dipper frowns. Power, money, fame - Bill’s got it all. As the biggest shark around, he should be used to remoras.
“Totally! Everybody wants what I got, sapling. Power especially.” The couch barely bounces when Bill plops himself beside Dipper. “But just ‘cause I have it in spades doesn’t mean I’m handing it out like eyeballs at a wedding.”
“Um.” Except he kind of is. Because. If he wasn’t, then why has Dipper’s magic been so strong recently. There’s no way that’s a coincidence -
Bill leans in closer, meeting his gaze directly. One eyebrow slowly lifts.
Dipper ducks his head, scooting an inch away. Bill hasn’t said anything. He didn’t need to.
Special.
Suddenly it’s very important that Dipper fiddle with the unpopped kernels in the bottom of his popcorn bowl. He was going to get more snacks. Right. Kitchen’s not far from here.
Before he can rise, Bill snaps his fingers and the bowl refills. Overflows, even, scattering kernels everywhere. Then he shoves his hand in up to the wrist, sending more of it flying.
“So that’s the losers I gotta deal with. Every day with these idiots! And I’m supposed to meet up with a few of ‘em later. If we weren’t talking an old favor, I’d pass,” Bill says. He slumps back, with an uncharacteristic sigh. Then shrugs, kicking his feet up onto a previously nonexistent ottoman. “But hey! There’s always time for a vicious betrayal!”
Dipper makes a soft sound of commiseration. That’s an interesting fact, too. Favors, deals. Those are demonic things, He wonders what those involve, and how -
“Ha! Now this is a classic,” Bill says, interrupting before the question can form. He’s watching the TV now, grinning wide. “How’ve you been liking the show? Looks like the main character’s a real handsome guy!”
“It’s terrible,” Dipper says, flat. It gets a chuckle, but no argument.
“Sure, I’ve seen better,” Bill says, nose wrinkling up at a particularly dramatic line from the actor on screen. He flips the TV off, then shrugs. “But eh,” Hand waggling, an ‘iffy’ gesture. “When you got a billion-eye view of the multiverse, you see way dumber crap than this.”
Fair point. Dipper shrugs, but doesn’t comment. Something to think about, there. That Bill’s seen this before, for one, but also-
“How much of this is true?” He asks.
If this demonically produced drama is even slightly accurate, Bill will have a strong opinion. Once he starts talking, everything will reveal itself.
“Great question! I’d say…” Bill pauses to stroke his chin. Aiming for ‘solemn’, but mostly reminding Dipper that the jerk never needs to shave. “What does it matter if a narrative is factual or fictional? Everyone’s got their own version of how things go down! Truth’s a sucker’s game when you really think about-”
An elbow to the ribs doesn’t quite shut Bill up. Just gives him enough pause to let Dipper interject.
“Philosophy doesn’t suit you.” He nudges him again before he can derail the topic. Bill sticks out his tongue, and for a second Dipper’s tempted to poke it in revenge for before. “I’ll settle for which parts actually happened.”
“Spoilsport,” Bill says, sounding oddly warm. “Eh, they took a lot of artistic license in this series. And that’s coming from me.” Shrugging, he makes a so-so- sort of gesture, weighing it in his palms. “Call it less than you’d like, but more than you’d think.”
Dipper glances at the screen.
The battle at the end of the episode is a poorly-cut fight. Bill, human-formed, faces off against seven gorgons. Which is bullshit, they’re territorial - and the shoggoth at sunset brings it almost to the level of parody. The human of this episode has fainted in a way that leaves him leaning against Bill without somehow falling on his ass.
Yeah. That about tracks. Demon to human translation: ‘Artistic license’ means ‘total bullshit’.
Almost on cue, Dipper feels fingers brushing against his hoodie. There’s a shift as Bill adjusts his seat, his arm unsubtly snaking over behind Dipper’s head.
Any minute now that ominous limb will drop onto his shoulders. Just like the last half dozen times. God forbid Bill not take up all the room he can; he thinks everything is his. Even gorgons aren’t this territorial.
Dipper can live with it. Hell, if the worst thing Bill ever does to him is invade his personal space and talk over an already bad TV show, he’s basically set for life.
And truthfully, it’s not that bad. Less irritating than it should be. Having someone close, even if they are an obnoxious evil demon god, feels nice.
One day he’s going to know why he’s being bothered by Bill in the first place. What made him stand out among the rest. What he’s for. The question doesn’t upset him like it used to, but he can’t help but pick at it like a still-healing scab.
It feels like he has a decent amount of facts already. Between the journal in the guest room, watching the highly dramatized version of Bill’s life, and talking to the demon himself…
Dipper glances over at Bill - still focused on the show, crunching popcorn - then down at the long line of his wrist.
Even Bill’s providing clues, in his own, unique way. When he arguably shouldn’t.
It would be so, so easy for him to cut it all off. Burn the books, break the TV, cage Dipper up and beat the curiosity out of him. Taking every step the cult did and more, in his ‘wrath’ and ‘infinite cruelty’.
But he’s not. He wouldn’t, not to Dipper.
In fact, Bill’s been - in a weird, exclusively Bill-ish way - kind of helpful. Hell, he’s having a great time.
He clearly delights in watching Dipper scramble around, trying to follow a breadcrumb trail of hints. Even more fun is occasionally dropping a bunch of clues down the wrong track, then hiding behind a tree to giggle. He especially likes to dangle something just close enough to grab, then teasing Dipper as he tries to make the leap.
So much of his time is spent making stuff annoying, teasing and taunting and tricking - but Bill’s not actually stopping him. As hobbies go, it’s both incredibly dickish, and totally benign. It’s almost like…
Dipper gets the sense that Bill expects him to figure it all out. Bill just also thinks he should make the journey very… ‘interesting’.
Joke’s on him, though. He’s left more hints than he intended. He may not even realize how far Dipper’s come.
The show plays on. The actor ‘Bill’ argues with the latest, nearly-identical human guy. They change actors a lot; usually whenever there’s a timeskip. They always have exactly the same role, too - ‘guy who argues with the demon in charge’. Probably because demons consider all humans interchangeable.
There’s some interaction between the various planes. Everyone knows that. Demons are pretty rare on the list, but lower-level entities occasionally get summoned, or break in through some magical mishap.
Back in the cult, Dipper learned that Bill Cipher has bothered and convinced and manipulated mortals for eons. His unearthly machinations twist the strings of his human puppets, all the time. Slowly building to the inevitable goal - the world, under Bill’s eternal thumb. He never interacts directly; the physical plane is not yet his to roam.
But in the drama, Bill is on the physical plane. Not acting through haunting prophetic dreams, or divine revelations. Just bitching and prodding and poking in person.
And while the setting’s fictionalized version of the place, it’s definitely not under any demonic reign.
The implications took a while to sink in, but Dipper thinks he gets it now. Parts have clicked together; facts he didn’t know were connected until just now.
Bill probably doesn’t realize it, but he’s helped there too. Filling in the gaps. Adding extra detail.
He’s even doing it right now.
The unasked for commentary track continues as Bill talks. Going on about how he hasn’t been to that country in millenia, or how the seasons are wrong for this encounter. Elaborating on details, mocking others, going on about the stupid plotline and dialogue -
Totally bragging about his earthly knowledge. About the physical world. Because he’s been there.
Dipper sits up a little straighter. It bumps the hand trailing through his hair away, and he settles back to let Bill’s idiot fingers continue their idle path.
He can’t be totally certain without proof, though. And Bill has always liked it when he’s picked up the clues…
Dipper speaks up.
“I think more of this is real than you’d admit, Bill. You’ve…” Didn’t laud himself over them, no divine visitation- “Hung out with humans.”
“Hard not to! What with billions of you dreaming all over the place.” Bill says, deftly avoiding the question. Staring at the screen now, focused forward in a way that makes it hard to catch his eye. “You’re everywhere on that scummy pebble you call a habitable planet.”
No confirmation, but no denial. Which means Dipper’s on the right track.
“I mean you’ve been on Earth. In the, uh, flesh,“ Dipper insists. No triangles were visible, maybe that form can’t be sustained in reality - but this is no time to get derailed. He seizes the thread of logic, yanking on it with all he’s got. “Was-”
“Pfft, who hasn’t!” Bill interrupts. He flicks the question away, snorting in amusement. “Pretty permeable place you got there.”
“That’s at least two hundred years of human interaction,” Dipper insists. He jabs his index finger at the screen, then into Bill’s ribs. “And I can’t help but notice none of it is in your realm. It’s on Earth. Which you haven’t conquered-” Before Bill’s mouth can open, he holds up a hand. The lie is so dumb he doesn’t wanna hear it. “Nice try, I was just there.”
“Yeah, yeah, make a mountain out of a molehill.” Bill buffs his nails on his shirt, chin lifting. “I’ve just been busy! I’ll get around to it!”
“Sure you will,” Dipper says. He narrows his eyes. “I’ve figured you out, Cipher. I know what’s going on.”
Plausible deniability went out the window ages ago, thrown with such force that glass shattered everywhere. Leaving Bill standing in the middle, wondering aloud what happened, with a perfectly innocent look on his face..
It’s about humans. About earth, and Bill, and Dipper himself. Why Bill never showed up before, in all those years - decades - of cult summons, the ones he never ever answered, even though they really tried. Not just that he didn’t see them, or didn’t care to.
It’s because Bill Cipher can’t do everything.
Bill’s been evasive, per his usual. He’s not quite meeting Dipper’s gaze, and keeping up a dismissive tone.
But he can’t deny that he’s interested, even though he tries to keep his expression aloof. It’s not working so great. His mouth keeps twitching as the grin starts to leak out around the edges.
“Oh?” Bill’s voice has a strange tone. He leans in until their thighs touch, sides together; he must be really interested in something. “Go on, sapling. Enlighten me!”
That’s the core of a line of truth, leading somewhere important - if Dipper dares to follow. He’s getting close, he can feel it. It’s dangerous, but-
Getting the words out is harder than he thought. Challenging Cipher is - he starts talking before he can talk himself out of it.
“You can’t take over reality.” He keeps his voice level, daring Bill to interrupt. “You don’t have all your powers there.”
A pause; Bill’s oddly silent. His face is blank.
Before he can get angry, Dipper rambles out the rest. “Or at least not yet. You’d have taken over already if you did. I mean, it’s not like you didn’t have time. You can’t get the world because…” Here it goes - “Something’s stopping you."
He watches, tense, as Bill’s expression sours. Looking askance at Dipper, he folds his arms in a huff. Muttering something under his breath about ‘stubborn’ and ‘annoying’.
But Bill doesn’t deny it.
God, and even the look on his face. The one that’s both annoyed but also, maybe, resigned? Like it’s an old, old roadblock that he’s both huffy about, and very used to, it’s…
Holy shit. Dipper’s right.
His heart is racing. Merely guessing that Bill can’t accomplish his main driving purpose is a far cry from him saying it, or even not arguing with it. The very thought makes his head swim.
But he can’t stop now, not while he’s ahead.
“So there’s some obstacle even you can’t get rid of,” Dipper says. Looking at Bill out of the corner of his eye, he pitches his voice in a tone of reverent, religious awe. “I can’t even imagine how powerful that is. How incredibly-”
“Hey! Don’t get so full of yourself, Pine Tree, it’s just not the right time yet!” Bill sits up straight, indignant. He bares his teeth in a sneer. “Maybe there’s something I still want from that miserable little rock, you ever think of that?”
Another admission. An unforced error. Bill winces very slightly as he hears his own misstep, and Dipper swells with pride.
Bill thinks he’s all high and mighty and oh-so-secretive. A master of mysteries. If only he didn’t talk way too much. He didn’t think Dipper was clever enough to trick him and he gave everything away.
“That’s it. That’s why- why everything.” Dipper beams as he waves over, well, everything. “You keep going back there, and you keep picking a human, wandering around with some random guy - because you can’t get what you want without one.”
Not a cult, building power. Not a massive ritual spell. Nothing grand and showy; Bill would have done that if it was effective. That’s way more his style, and far more magically powerful.
There’s been none of that. Not in the show, not in real life. He hasn’t used the cult, he doesn’t have a base of power. Bill doesn’t peddle with groups, both in the real-life cult and the cannon fodder in the show.
He’s only focused on one person.
Out of billions of people he could bother, Bill latches onto a single, unfortunate guy and throws their life into total chaos. It’s a curse, an annoyance, a bolt of bullshit out of nowhere - and would also ensure you don’t bleed out until he’s had his ‘fun’.
Being picked out from the crowd like that. Having the full brunt of Bill Cipher himself foisted upon you, laser-focused. Going from a nobody to someone who has all his attention -
Wouldn’t that make someone kind of special?
No response, again. Bill has retreated to his last, mocking resort. Flapping his hand like a puppet as Dipper talks, and making faces.
Yes. Finally, Dipper got him. He followed the breadcrumbs, avoided the trap, set up one of his own - and Bill walked right into it.
Dipper gives him the smuggest, most annoying smile he can. He’s got plenty of examples to draw from.
Bill glares, and flips him off. “Sure, sure, live it up,” He says, rolling his eye dramatically. Waving off the loss like it’s no big deal, even though it clearly is. “You don’t have a clue what’s really going on.”
A blatant lie. Hardly his best one, either.
Dipper lets himself enjoy this win for a full minute. Rare chances like this should be savored. He has to hold onto the couch so he doesn’t grab Bill’s dumb handsome face and shake it, for being so very, very stupid. He’s never going to let him live this down
“So. Why do you need a mortal?” Dipper asks after a while. Bill isn’t volunteering any more information, and there’s one more part he hasn’t quite figured out. “The thing you’re after. Why can’t you just,” He grasps at the air in demonstration. “Take it?”
Bill’s eye twitches, once. He doesn’t say anything.
“I mean-” Dipper hesitates. “That’s a ton of work. Heading to a different realm, picking a new mortal every time - that’s decades - no, centuries of effort. The human has to do something, right? You wouldn’t do all that just for fun.”
“Excuse you, it’s plenty fun!” Lifting a finger, Bill wags it chidingly. “You think I’m above messing with some mortal just for kicks?”
Shit, he’s not. Ruining a random person’s life for the hell of it is so very, very Bill.
“Alright, maybe.” Dipper admits. This could be because Bill’s a capricious dick. “But I’ll bet there’s more to it.”
“Never have one motive when you could have six,” Bill agrees. The grin widens, he wiggles his eyebrows - and he starts cackling.
So yes, there’s more. And no, he’s not telling.
Dipper racks his brain for ideas. For clues. Whatever Bill’s after must be extremely important if a literal demon god keeps chasing after it, over and over again. Nothing comes to mind, though.
Eventually he sighs, waiting for Bill to be done with his stupid smug laughter. It doesn’t cover up his mistake.
“So I guess that makes me your latest human… companion thing.” He prompts, once Bill’s finally done with his smug, jerk laughter.
One of the first things he noticed - that room in Bill’s penthouse. The one meant for a specific type of person, as clear as a fingerprint. How many of Bill’s mortals stayed in that room? How many of them-
Those notes in the journal. Dipper has to go back and check them. Now that he knows it was someone in exactly the same position, there might be more to learn.
“Congrats, kid! Ya got parts of it! Well played! But I gotta ask one thing.” Bill cocks his head to one side. A brief, amused smirk. “There are plenty of magical guys around! A lot of ‘em begging for demonic contracts!” The smirk widens, sharp teeth showing. “Why do you think I picked you?”
Dipper opens his mouth. After a beat, he shuts it.
He was so busy thinking about the mechanics of his presence that he didn’t think about the motive.
Obviously Bill grabs a human for practical purposes, so he can get that thing he wants on Earth. If it’s an entertaining person, that’s a bonus in his eye. This time it ended up being Dipper, because…
Not because he’s devoted. Or the most knowledgeable guy around. He’s smart, but too aware of the experience he lacks. Weeks ago he would have said it was the ritual knowledge from the cult, but since that’s less than worthless… Something else, then.
“Because…” Dipper starts, then hesitates. Mind racing, trying to pin the strings between the bits of knowledge he has before Bill throws a wrench into it. “Uh.”
Shit. Shit, he’s so close, there’s a piece missing. A final step. He struggles to find it but there’s little time to think; Bill’s expectant expression demands an answer.
“Convenience?” Dipper hazards. He was right there, in the middle of a powerful ritual, directed at Bill, so-
Instantly he knows it was the wrong guess. By the way Bill’s face fell, it was off by several hundred miles.
“Ooh, nice try.” Bill tugs Dipper closer, hand dragging through his hair - Dipper ducks out of the way before he can start a ‘companionable’ noogie. “You really missed the mark there!”
“Any chance you’ll tell me what that is?” Dipper says, with no small amount of bitterness.
Damn it. He was so close he could almost taste it.
“Nope!”
“You- hmph.” With a grunt, Dipper scoots away and out of his grip. He’s used to all the deliberate frustration, but right now it just sucks.
“Aw, don’t make that face!” Bill scoots after him, trying to get his arm around him again. Dipper swats it away. “Tell ya what - here’s a hint! You’re something a guy doesn’t see every day, sapling.” He winks. “Pretty unique.”
How very specific. Totally not opaque. How does Bill manage to give more facts and make things more mysterious in the process? It’s a really annoying talent.
Dipper sulks then, for a bit. When Bill tries petting his air again, he smacks his arm away, muttering unflattering things under his breath. It makes Bill laugh again, cackling in delight.
“What’s the matter?” Bill nudges him, a teasing laugh. “Ease up, kid. Given enough time, you’ll figure out some real secrets.”
“May Cipher hear your words,” Dipper says, the old phrase springing up before he can stop himself. He sucks in a breath through his teeth, cringing away from his own voice.
Thankfully, the slip gets Bill laughing. Dipper’s turn to not live something down; they’re one for one today.
“Okay, some of the affectations are adorable,” Bill says, nearly pinching Dipper’s cheek before he elbows him in the side. “Hardly worth all the other crap, but still!!”
“It really wasn’t,” Dipper says. He rubs at his left wrist. ‘All the other crap’ barely covers it.
“Don’t worry, sapling.” Bill says, voice low and satisfied. He squeezes Dipper’s knee, grip tightening. “Once we got everything in order - we’re gonna wreak some havoc on those idiots! All the fun stuff and more!”
‘Fun stuff’.
Spending time with Bill, even in Dipper’s position of relative safety, teaches you a lot about what he thinks is ‘fun’.
He’s not sure why he didn’t see this coming.
“Is that… so.”
“It is! Getting back at those who wronged you, tormenting the tormentors. Punishment returned with neat ironic twists!” Bill waits for a beat, then grins, jostling Dipper with a gentle shake. “Come on, you gotta have ideas!”
“A few, yeah.” A lot, actually.
Being favored by a ‘god’. Chosen, in a way. Having Bill’s favor means having his full permission to enact vengeance.
He’d be lying if he said he never thought about… what he’d do, if he could. Fleeting ideas from too many nights lying in bed. Staring at the ceiling, feeling the burn in the back of his mouth, or the pain in his knees or the stripes on his back. Frustration and anger and hurt, bubbling up into red-hot thoughts that tasted like blood even with a missing tongue.
Dipper swallows. He rubs at his throat.
“Ooh, I bet you’ve got a lot.” Bill purrs, wrapping his arm around Dipper’s waist. He walks his fingers up Dipper’s knee, trailing up his thigh. “Whatcha got in mind? Turning them inside out? Bone dissolving? Rearranging their legs where their ears should be and making them try to do a cartwheel?”
“Uh,” Dipper says, then, “Well.”
Bill is way more creative than Dipper is. Half the ideas he’s mentioned Dipper couldn’t pull off, and even if he could it’d be… Messier than he’s comfortable with. In those moments of pain and rage, he would have - even then, it’d be a stretch.
Though maybe Dipper wouldn’t mind when it came to the priest. Too bad he’s already dead.
What will he do? When he goes back?
He can see their faces in his mind’s eye. All the people he knows. The only people he ever knew, in that life that feels so far away.They’ll show up again in the room of ceremony, once they get wind of their god’s return. Except this time, he’ll be standing proud at the altar, with everyone in front of him, staring in…
He knows how they stared at Bill, at least. That mix of wonder and terror, their eyes wide. They’ve always believed so much. Hopeful in a way that Dipper never was -
Or. Was, rather. Only when he wasn’t so stupid.
And isn’t it just - so pathetic, and sad. Thinking things might turn out well. That something good might happen, when someone better knows it won’t. Those idiot, expectant moments before you know there’s a punishment coming, that leave you without a chance of defending yourself.
Dipper can feel the burn of Bill staring at him. Waiting to hear his most horrible, gory ideas, and bring them into terrifying technicolor.
“I’m not telling.” He states finally, sounding more prim than he would like. “Nice try. It’s, um. Going to be a surprise.”
“And I can’t wait to see it!” Bill beams, nearly bouncing in place. His enthusiasm is so powerful it’s almost catching. “Mark my words, kid - it’s gonna be a real party.”
“A super fun one,” Dipper says. “Totally.” He offers a smile back, waits for Bill to start cackling - then quickly looks away before his face gives up the game.
For such a consummate liar, Bill’s hit rate on detecting them is only 50/50.
Though. It isn't a lie, really. Dipper does have a lot of ideas. And what he ends up doing to the cult will be a surprise.
In that he’s not sure what he’ll do until he gets there.
“Take your time, sapling! Whatever you come up with is gonna be great, I’m sure.” Bill rubs his hands together, a glint of sinister anticipation in his eye. “I can’t wait to see it.”
Dipper lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “I hope you’ll like it.”
Of course it wasn’t going to happen today. That’d be a quick turnaround by anyone’s standards. Even Bill himself needs longer than a few days to cook up a… what did he call it that one time? A ‘showy little number with a twist at the end’. Anything else would be disappointing.
Anyway, it’s too early to make definitive plans. Bill said he should take his time, and Dipper believes him. Shoving his human back into the world half-cocked would ruin the entertainment.
And when you think about it, there are so many options that it could take a lot of time to narrow them down. There could be setbacks, and stutters. It could take weeks, maybe months, to get everything just right. A punishment ironic yet powerful, subtle yet dramatic.
Who knows how long it’ll take until Dipper’s ready to head back? Certainly it won’t feel very long, to a guy who’s billions of years old. And as long as he’s making some progress, nothing needs to happen just yet.
“Ooh, this one,” Bill says suddenly. He sits up straighter as something catches his attention. “I remember when - ah, but that’d be spoilers!”
Dipper looks up. Spoilers for-?
Oh. A new episode started when he wasn’t paying attention.
“It’s still a bad show,” He mutters. He could turn it off out of spite, just to bother Bill - but he did kinda want to see what happened with the twelve-ring summon the ‘bad’ guys were planning.
Another episode would actually be kind of great, thinking about it. He could use the distraction.
Bad TV, Dipper’s learning, is nice. One of the few times where he can almost let his brain turn off.
And having someone else who thinks the show is dumb somehow enhances it.
The climactic battle has the worst dialogue, and terrible graphics. Dipper can barely look at the monsters, they’re so poorly rendered. Bill agrees that they needed a better illusionist; half of the explosions look like they were drawn.
Chatting about something so trivial makes everything so easy. Dipper lets out a laugh when Bill mocks his own actor’s performance, then swats at him when Bill teases him for being a dork.
Some idle comment sparks a bit of bickering. One of them throws popcorn at the other. Dipper doesn’t remember who started it - only that by the end, the bowl is empty again, and he’s smiling for what feels like the first time in hours.
Actor Bill hisses,“Oh, you are a vindictive, terrible mortal.” His suit has mostly melted off from the acid, leaving shreds of it hanging off his arms and chest. The shreds slide off his skin as he storms forward. “A pitiful being like you should never exist!”
“Yet I do!” Protests the human, standing with fists on his hips and a truly defiant look. One only partly ruined by his totally shirtless form.
“You never stood a chance against me,” Actor Bill purrs, slamming a hand into the bark of a tree, pinning his captive in place. “There’s no escape, kid! There never will be!”
“Oh yeah?” The man’s chin juts upward, a sneer of sheer contempt - totally unrealistic, nobody would get away with that - as he flips Bill off. “Then I’ll be your own personal curse, demon. You’ll never escape me either.”
The music surges, a broad orchestra that’s… honestly a jarring clash to the argument that breaks out. You can barely hear what they’re talking about over the grand music.
“Just shut up will you?” The man yells.
With a broad sneer, Actor Bill leans in, smug grin surprisingly close to the real version. “Make me.”
The human fumes, eyes narrowed. His fists clench as if he’s about to throw a punch. But when he extends his arm it’s too slow for that, and his hand is open. It seizes ‘Bill’ by the back of the neck, yanking him in, then -
Dipper nearly leaps out of his seat, eyes wide. Only the pressure of Bill’s arm over him keeps him from standing.
“Three stars for timing, zero for technique.” Bill gives the TV a thumbs down. “That’s way too much tongue! This ain’t slug wrestling for crying out loud.”
Dipper’s shoulders rise nearly to his ears. He doesn’t dare glance at the screen. Only once the wet noises stop, and the credits music rolls, does he try darting one in Bill’s direction.
Who seems entirely, implausibly bored. He cups a hand over his mouth as he yawns, loosely splayed over the couch.
“You’re, uh. Okay with that?” Dipper asks. He tucks his hands between his knees, leaning forward. “It just seems, uh.”
“Seems ‘uh’, what?”
“Like,” Dipper gestures vaguely at the screen, even though it’s faded to black. The credits roll, a series of ominously glowing symbols scrolling up the screen. “That was…” He searches for a word, and fails.
“Terrible writing,” Bill says, bored. He shakes his head, lips drawn into a line. “You’d think someone would come up with a better plot for this kinda crap. It’s not like there isn’t material to go on.”
“But he kissed you,” Dipper says, before he can stop himself.
It’s one thing to blaspheme a little, Dipper himself is no stranger to forbidden acts, but this one takes the cake. The whole bakery, even. To do that at all is bad enough, but to Bill or - or an actor playing him, obviously it’s not the same thing, but still-
“Yeah, yeah, smooching, whatever.” The concept hasn’t phased Bill in the slightest. He snorts, grin widening. “Contrary to your idiot idolatry, I have been known to practice a liplock once in a while!”
“You-” Dipper starts, then stops. “I-” He shuts his eyes, then blinks rapidly. “Yeah, okay.”
So. Bill isn’t surprised, because this is - he sees everything, it’s not like he didn’t know about that kind of stuff.
It’s just that. As far as he’s concerned, there’s nothing to get worked up about. Because nothing that happened there was wrong.
Dipper presses the heels of his hands into his eyes to rub them, then draws them down slowly over his face.
Every time he thinks he’s found the bottom of the pit of bullshit he learned back in the cult, he finds another goddamn level beneath it. There may never be an end to all the lies.
Another one he can strike off the ‘sin’ list. There’s basically nothing left now, with Bill indulging in everything from gluttony to sloth to… that.
Every whim Bill has, he indulges. Often to excess, and always with aplomb. Dipper never had the opportunity or ability to do even a tenth of what Bill has, and - god, he wonders what that’s like.
“Do you…” How to phrase this. Dipper wipes sweating palms on his jeans. “Have you… kissed a lot of people?”
The words come out in a bit of a rush. Bill snorts in amusement, which is a relief; that wasn’t the worst question to ask.
“Depends! What’s ‘a lot’? I’m pretty particular about my partners.” Bill’s smile widens, and he wiggles his eyebrows. A quick squeeze Dipper’s shoulder, just above the bicep. “But sure! I’ve known a guy or two worth putting a peck on.”
“Okay,” Dipper says. Then, because that feels inadequate. “Cool.”
Because of course he has. Bill’s put his mouth on. Thoughts are spinning in his head now, rapid and light.
“Come to think of it, it’s been a while since I’ve dabbled in the dating scene!” Bill continues, with an odd tone in his voice. “Pretty tough to find the right guy these days, when you’re holding out for something special.” A nudge, as his eyebrows go double-time.
God, and he would have options- Didn’t Bill say it earlier? People pursue him. For power, sure, but that’s only what he mentioned. Kind of weird, though, Dipper’s only heard of men chasing after -
Wait. Wait, no, how did he never consider this before? Maybe because his stupid upbringing blinded him; Bill’s not human. The shape he’s wearing doesn’t mean anything, metaphysically, doesn’t speak to what he really is, and he just said that at some point he’s kissed a man.
“Are you a girl?” Dipper blurts. Staring wide-eyed at that angular face, at the arms and then a little longer at his chest.
The look of sheer incredulity Bill levels on him makes Dipper sink down into his seat.
“What?” Bill asks, and - oh god. That’s the first genuinely bewildered look Dipper’s ever seen on him.
“I thought - I was wrong.” Dipper’s face burns, he wants to cringe himself into a ball and then fall between the couch cushions. “Sorry.”
Great. Dumb guess, shitty concept. Now he looks like an idiot. His very first assumption was the right one. More fool him for overcorrecting.
“Whatever, kid. And don’t say ‘sorry’,” Bill flicks his fingers. Awkwardness slides off his back like water on a duck, he’s grinning again. “None of your human crap applies, y’know?” He brings his hands together, index fingers and thumbs forming a familiar, three-sided symbol. “I’m the shape you see on caution signs, not bathroom doors.”
“Right.” Dipper perks up. So he wasn’t totally wrong, just... not at all right. Still embarrassing, he should change the subject. “Um. So-”
“But I do have a dick, if that’s what you’re asking.” Bill adds, grinning way too wide.
“I wasn’t.” Dipper claps hands over his ears. It fails to cover up the delighted chortle beside him.
Guess he’s learning all kinds of things about Bill today. Just not ones he wanted.
Not helped by the way Bill leans in very closer, tickling him on the side in a way that makes him jump again. He’s about to scramble off the couch or do something inadvisable like shove someone else off the dang thing - when Bill’s ringtone goes off.
“Ugh, are you- Blegh.” Bill says, moderately annoyed. He leans on Dipper for a moment as he fishes around in his pocket, a smothering weight. How is a simple human shape so heavy.
Whatever he sees on his phone screen has him sticking his tongue out. “Ugh,” He repeats, frowning at. Lifting his arm off of Dipper, and holding up a finger. “Be right back! I gotta take this.”
Dipper hopes the jerk gets lost on the way and falls down a hole. Not really, just - it would be something to say when he’s at a loss for anything else. He just rolls his eyes instead, watching Bill depart with a pointed stride and a grumpy mutter.
Finally, some space to breathe. To think. The mind magic of Bill’s presence always has Dipper scrambling for something to think about that isn’t his too-powerful aura.
He taps the edge of the bowl, an idle beat. Feeling the chill on his side where Bill’s body kept it warm.
Yep. Just Dipper, and the tv, and any remaining popcorn, all to himself. Nothing wrong with that.
He brushes around the bowl without any particular intent. Kernels rustle against his fingers, and he spends a minute swishing them around, even though his hand gets greasy.
The remote lies inches away. Easy to pick up if he wanted to distract himself. Finishing the season is an option, but feels wrong to keep watching when Bill’s not here to see it.
Actually, Dipper could watch something better. Finding a show that doesn’t suck, or have bizarre, blasphemous content. Just some real, semi-wholesome entertainment that doesn’t raise more questions than answers.
Distantly, he hears Bill still on the phone. Sounds like the conversation’s going to take a while.
Dipper taps his fingers on the couch, creeping towards the remote.
Said remote also has, like, a million buttons, so it takes a while to figure out which ones to press. One goes back to the previous episode. This one skips forward, another pauses. This one goes back in fifteen second intervals.
Dipper leans over, checking - Bill, still well out of sight - then taps the volume button down until it’s nearly zero before hitting play again.
“Make me,” Bill’s actor hisses again, before getting grabbed and - stuff.
Dipper sits forward in his seat, elbows on his thighs. Living with Bill means exposing himself to new ideas. Since he didn’t look before, now’s as good a time as any.
Though - Wow, Bill really wasn’t kidding. That is a lot of tongue. Even with the volume lowered it’s all wet and - it makes him feel odd, even though he knows it’s not sinful.
Maybe he should replay it to check.
The fourth time around, he pauses his research to inspect it closer. Aha -That’s what was bothering him, those aren’t real abs. They’re enhanced with makeup. The lighting covers it a bit but when you really look, it’s totally obvious. The actor playing Bill has the worst version; the other guy just has a blotch near his -
“Son of a bitch.” Dipper says, standing up so fast the popcorn bowl dumps its contents on the floor.
The image burns itself into his brain. Dots and lines, laid out on skin. A pattern Dipper could never forget if he wanted to.
Oh, Bill got lucky earlier. Real lucky. The only reason he got away with it is Dipper had his eyes covered. If he’d seen it, he would have had that evil demon bastard as pinned as that human in the show.
Before he knows it he’s charging for the entryway.
He can hear the jerk still talking on his phone, muted voice growing louder as Dipper storms in his direction. Unaware of how he’s been found out.
Dipper doesn’t have a plan in mind, which is the first thing that’s probably going to go wrong - but he’s got to do it, right now, before Bill can run off on some errand or head to some party, evading and avoiding questions like he always does.
And before Dipper can lose the courage to confront him. A little confrontation might intrigue the guy - excite him, even - but the questions racing through Dipper’s mind aren’t going to be fun.
Too bad. Bill’s not going to wiggle his way out of this one.
He catches sight of Bill’s back, turned towards the door and totally not paying attention. Dipper storms up behind him, intending to catch him by the shoulder and whirl him around. See how Bill likes it when he-
The door swings open. Dipper skids to a halt, rocking back on his heels.
That is. Many demons. Eyeballs peeking over the shoulder of something with spikes, another with wings too large to see around. A crowd clustered around the doorway.
Bill stuffs his phone back in his pocket, glaring at them all.
“You call five minutes notice a ‘heads up’? Then show your asses up here?” Contempt rings in Bill’s voice, low and furious. “You got a lot of nerve, and that’s no compliment.”
“It was urgent,” a voice burbles. Something soft and squidgy - oh, that’s where the eyes were, on stalks - it bubbles literally as it speaks. “The mistress-”
“Yeah yeah, blah blah, I’ve heard it all before. Cram it.” Bill stalks forward, leveling a look at the group that has them all scooting away. “Maybe your ‘mistress’ should think ahead next time. Or think at all before calling in a last-minute favor from me.”
Slowly, inch by inch, Dipper backs away. If he keeps really quiet he won’t catch anyone’s attention, they’re all too focused on Bill to mind one small human in the room. Hopefully.
“You got the thing?” Bill snaps his fingers impatiently. There’s some confusion - demons tangling up and shuffling each other around until they manage to wrangle something out of the group. “Alright, hand it over.”
A briefcase is shoved into Bill’s eager grasp. He spends a moment examining it, then unlatches the clasps. Opening it the very, very slightest fraction of an inch - then rolling his eye, and slamming it shut again.
There’s some brief conversation - partially demonic, and partially too inhuman for Dipper to parse. The slimiest demon tries slipping past Bill, into the penthouse - only to get caught by the eyestalk. Green smoke rises, hissing and squealing as Bill’s grasp heats to a burning flame.
“Ah ah ah! Nice try,” Bill chides. With a snap of his fingers, another door appears. Dipper recognizes this one; it leads to a sitting room. “We’ll have our little discussion elsewhere.”
With minor threats and moderate violence, the demon crowd is forced through the open doorway. A miniature parade of odd shapes and sizes, skittering around under Bill’s impatient gaze. He snaps his fingers and they all hurry up.
Dipper guesses he’s going to be preoccupied for a while. He wishes he’d asked more details about this meeting earlier, but neither of them thought it would happen today.
As the last of the demons flutters into the sitting room, Bill turns around. Raising an eyebrow, looking amused.
Dipper makes a belated attempt to duck back around the corner, even though he’s well and truly caught. Curiosity got the better of him, damn it.
“No worries, sapling, you take it easy out here! I won’t be long,” Bill says, voice bright. He waggles his fingers in Dipper’s direction. “Coupla hours at most to milk these suckers for every penny they got.”
Dipper nods, once. He stays silent. Bill’s beckoning him over, but no way is he getting close. He knows that look. As soon as he gets within arm’s reach, he’ll have his cheeks pinched or pulled into a noogie or something.
Bill makes a disappointed face as his nefarious plan is thwarted, then shrugs. The easy grin returns. “Fine, be that way.” He gives Dipper a sharp wave and a wink. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t! Or do! I’m not a cop!”
The door shuts behind him with an ominous ‘click’. Dipper watches it for a while. No motion, no sound. No Bill popping back out, declaring that he’s already done and they can finish the drama.
Guess they’re well and truly settled in for some weird, demonic business deal. For several hours. Or more.
God, that’s frustrating. As much as Dipper wants answers, he can’t just barge into a room full of strangers and start demanding them. Especially when those questions might be kind of… personal. Bill probably wouldn’t be furious if it was just Dipper asking - but airing his dirty laundry in front of a crowd is a terrible idea on multiple fronts.
Damn it. And Dipper was this close to having him right where he wanted him, too.
He kicks the carpet a couple times. Then the baseboards. When the meeting hasn’t resolved two minutes later, Dipper stuffs his hands in his pockets, and slinks back over to the couch.
It’s empty, with scattered cushions and a throw blanket disordered from their popcorn fight. He stares at the discarded bowl, and the cooled fabric.
Settling back down isn’t nearly as appealing as it was five minutes ago. He’s not sure he can.
Dipper feels his hands clench into fists, then forces them to relax. He tucks them behind his back instead.
Every time. Every freaking time. Just when he thinks he’s close to understanding, another curveball gets in his way.
Pacing back and forth helps a little. There’s plenty of space in the living room to work out this restless energy.
Whatever this - this thing is, it’s been going on for a while. Centuries of Bill picking up mortals, putting them through their paces, trying vainly to reach the object of his desire. A pivotal point of his unknown plan.
And since he’s still going after it, every human before Dipper must have failed.
Maybe Bill got distracted by dicking around. Maybe it really is too powerful to overcome. Or maybe his humans didn’t even know what it was, since they were in the company of a cagey, manipulative asshole.
Dipper could go back and dig through the books in the guest room - but if they didn’t know either, then that’ll be a wash. There’s the show, but it’s so full of bullshit that he doesn’t dare make too many guesses.
Even at the best of times Bill’s wrigglier than an eel, and a total stickler for details. If Dipper doesn’t check off all the boxes on the list, finding everything he was supposed to - then Bill’s going to tut and wag his finger instead of handing over the prize
Too many questions. Zero idea what it’s about. Only one person knows anything useful, and he’s a total dick about parceling out the facts.
Waiting for him to get back won’t take long. It’s barely any time at all, even on a human timescale. Dipper can manage.
It’s just…
The idea of sitting around meekly, waiting for Bill to return. Hoping he’ll come bearing information because Dipper needs his stupid hand held through the mystery just feels - pathetic.
Everybody keeps making decisions for Dipper that change his whole life. Nobody gives him a heads up on what they’re going to do. People taking charge, over and over and - he’s just so tired of letting things happen to him.
If he just had one more thing. Something to prove that he’s right, not hearsay or guesses but physical evidence, that he could shove right in Bill’s dumb face -
Dipper pauses in his rapid pacing. His head slowly turns.
There is one place that he hasn’t fully mapped.
Technically he’s been in there before. Even more technically, Bill’s said he’s allowed to enter. Dipper just hasn’t gone back since that first time since. Well. It’s a little too personal. It felt weird to poke around.
But if there was a place to find the deepest, most powerful secrets of Bill Cipher - it would be in there.
The doorknob to Bill’s master bedroom is oddly warm for something metal. Like it has its own radiating heat, just like the demon who commands it.
Dipper takes a calming breath, then lets it out as he turns the knob.
The unlocked door opens easily, gliding without a sound. Funny, he almost thought it would have an ominous creak.
The carpet’s soft. It muffles his steps. Not that there’s anyone to hear him; Bill’s busy with his meeting several rooms and an unknown amount of actual space away.
Still, Dipper feels a semi-giddy thrill run through him as he walks back in - intentionally, not fleeing - into the most private sanctum of his ‘god’.
Centuries worth of humans. That could be dozens, even hundreds of people, depending on how fast Bill churns through them. And he loves his little trophies and knickknacks, having something to wave around while he brags.
If there is any proof, Bill will have kept it around.
Last time Dipper was here, it was during a panicked rush. He didn’t really look at the room, or check for anything that might explode or devour him - and then Bill was there, and it was. A lot.
This time, he can really take in the place. Get a real sense of what might be going on.
Speaking of - Dipper reaches out with his magical senses -
Then winces. He eases back until the flare of magic is no longer blinding.
Everything in the bedroom is soaked in Bill-essence. Not surprising, really. All of it has marinated in god-demon magic for hell knows how many years, so thick it feels like it could be wiped up with a finger.
For all that, it’s remarkably unthreatening. The sensation’s not welcoming, that word would be too strong - More like it could be dangerous, and deliberately choosing not to be.
“Right,” Dipper says aloud - checks over his shoulder on a paranoid impulse - and sighs when nothing happens. He claps his hands together. “This should be good.”
Time’s limited. Bill claimed it’d be a couple hours, but his company wasn’t invited. Depending on how annoyed he gets, that meeting could be over in seconds.
Better get to work.
Circling the room, Dipper trails his palm over the wall, checking for cracks that would indicate a door or a safe. He brushes fingers over a shelf for secret switches, then rubs them together. Not even a hint of dust.
There’s got to be somewhere he would hide a private journal, or… or a list of human-selecting criteria. Or like, an elaborate carving of every human he’s ever had, with all the information about their lives and when and why he grabbed them. Details.
Sure, there’s plenty of magic around. Tons of it. It’s in the absurd amount of Bill-shaped knicknacks, and the variety of miscellaneous thingamajigs. It’s in the paintings, in the tapestries. The little statues and trinkets and amulets displayed on the mantle. An extravagant collection if you’re generous, clutter if you’re not.
Another person would consider this quite the find. Dipper’s stumbled over a dozen artifacts pulsing with power just lying around like cast-off socks. Finding what Bill likes the most or considers the best is nearly impossible to parse.
Dipper figures it out in about two minutes.
The only thing to glean from this horde? Is that Bill picks up too many souvenirs.
He scowls at one particularly annoying statuette, towering over a field of presumably conquered human-things. A crowd of bowing figures, prostrating before the much-larger Bill in a series of miniature lines. He checks over his shoulder, then flicks the statue’s golden hat off.
On the one hand, it’s careless as hell. Leaving an amulet that rips off all your skin, lying half-under a chain that summons a horde of flying eyeballs, is a recipe for disaster.
On the other hand, it’s… maybe a little clever. A type of misdirection.
Sure, some artifacts have elaborate puzzle elements, and half of them likely contain mystical secrets - but Bill’s decorative habits are so busy, it covers up the fact that none of them are important.
No, Bill’s real secrets aren’t so easily found. They’re held much, much closer to his chest.
Putting them behind a puzzle wouldn’t work. Someone could solve that. Hiding them in plain sight is an option, but not particularly Bill’s style. Guarding them with a series of traps… Probably not in his bedroom, where he could accidentally set them off and ruin his suit.
But then, that would be what people expect, wouldn’t it? That Bill would have a bookshelf that swings out into a secret room, or a seal protecting a hidden vault. A big scary door, with mystical, nearly impenetrable lock.
…It’s all about misdirection.
Dipper drops the edge of the painting he was toying with, and heads to the dresser instead.
Part of him can feel the weight of the all-seeing eyes. The portraits of his ‘god’, omnipresent and watching. Unblinking, unmoving. Always watching.
Dipper shuts that idea out of his mind. That’s not true and he knows it, for a fact. Bill doesn’t pay attention to even half his eyes on a good day. Most times it’s like a single digit percentage.
Odds are he won’t find out. Besides, he’s too busy at the moment to care. What Bill doesn’t know can’t bother him, so it’s totally fine if Dipper rifles around in his underwear drawer.
Dipper holds up a pair of boxers, frowning at the pattern. Tiny blue pine trees against the most garish yellow ever. Truly hideous.
This is both worse than the triangle ones, and more inexplicable than ones with the heart pattern. Hardly what he’d pictured underneath the suit.
Not that he’s ever pictured it. That would be weird. But if he had, it would have been way cooler than this.
This search comes up with nothing, other than confusion at Bill’s fashion sense. Just clothes in the drawers, along with several unsheathed knives, a Bill-shaped keychain, and three glass eyeballs. Dipper does find a drawer with a lock set in the bottom, but he doesn’t have the key. Even then, opening it would just swing the bottom open and let all the pants fall out, so. No dice.
The closet is a walk-in. Dipper stands in the entrance for a minute, staring at the lines of suits and shirts and clothes and cloth and -
He shut the door again. Nope. That went back way too far. Diving in there might get him lost in the bespoke suit dimension.
Checking under the bed reveals… exactly the same stuff as last time.
More dustbunnies than anything useful. There’s a magical ring that’s bent with the gem fallen out, weakly emitting a tiny skull-shaped cloud. One actual sock lies discarded under there, half-balled up from its removal. It has little blood-soaked knives on it.
Dipper rubs at his eyes, staring up at the bedsprings. He sneezes, then wipes his nose on his sleeve.
So far, so… nothing. Disappointing, and weird.
He crawls back out from under the bed. Brushing off the dust, he gets up and sets fists on his hips.
Most of the obvious hiding places contain exactly what one would expect. Worst of all, it’s weird stuff. Just weird enough that he’s certain he’s not in a fake, illusory version of Bill’s bedroom, but the actual real place. It’s just less exciting than he’d thought it’d be.
Is there… actually nothing here?
Not that the evidence doesn’t exist. It has to be somewhere. The idea of Bill not having any secrets is impossible. Like a duck not swimming, or most mammals not breathing; a necessary part of their nature.
So it might actually be a different, hidden room. Figures. Getting to Bill’s secrets wouldn’t be as easy as opening his bedroom door.
And if that’s the case - Dipper’s out of luck. Finding an access point would be hard enough with his limited experience. Bill’s secret horde would have a set of quantum puzzles and a spike trap, at minimum.
He sits down on the bed, sighing heavily - then blinks.
Wow. The bed is incredibly nice. Just touching the sheets is a smooth, luxurious experience; Dipper presses his palm into those soft covers, stroking along the edge. Bouncing slightly on the mattress, just to test.
Not too firm. Not too soft. Just right. He could lie down for a moment if he wanted - and. And Bill said he could be in the bed, right? That was a while ago, but the invitation wasn’t taken back.
As he swings his legs up, one of them knocks into the bedside table.
Hold on - he hasn’t checked that yet.
Dipper hops, reluctantly, off that comfortable bed. One that has to be magical in its own right; he was nearly tempted to take a freakin’ nap. He’s lucky to have pulled himself out of it.
The bedside table doesn’t have such dangers, thankfully. Its drawer opens easily, unlocked and smooth on its slides.
Sadly, there’s not much to look at.
Dipper frowns at the contents. Some breath mints, a big bottle of clear liquid. A strange metal thing that’s bulbous on one end and tapered on the other. Picking it up shows it’s heavy and cool - but no apparent purpose, and zero magic. Maybe a weapon? Except it’s nowhere near big enough to be an efficient one.
He has to pull the drawer out more to get the metal object out. It easily slides open another foot, which is - weird? And actually…
Another tug, and a few more inches confirms - this goes back further than physically possible.
With a shrug, Dipper chucks the metal thing over his shoulder and onto the bed. By the time the drawer is out all of the way, it’s almost longer than he is tall.
Pushing things around to check, he finds snack wrappers - gross - and pieces of bone. A tiny skull, some weird statuette. A pair of handcuffs and a sleep mask, a tangle of metal wires and an elaborate candle, a weird ribbon-tied bundle of brown hair that he nervously scoots away with the back of his hand. With all the crap in here he’s half-worried he’ll feel something go ‘squish’ or skitter up his arm.
This is, more than anything, a junk drawer. Damn it. This was the last place he was going to check, and he came up empty-handed-
Then his knuckles bump against something, at the very far back. Shadowed by the overhang of the table above it, so far back it’s almost impossible to get a grip. His fingers slip twice before he gets a nail around one of the corners. A little wriggling. Then - Ha!
Dipper pulls the object out with more force than he needed. The move jolts the drawer open at an awkward angle, off its track. Whatever, he’ll fix it later.
In his hands, there’s a picture frame.
Now this could be something. A personal photo, so close to the bed. Something that should be resting out in the open, until it was stashed away nearly out of reach. He turns it over in his hands.
A picture of Bill. What a surprise.
Nothing remarkable here. Just Bill himself, giving the camera a thumbs up with stupid sunglasses over his eyepatch, lounging on some white-sanded beach on a towel of his own image.
Vacation photo. Great. Totally relevant. Totally not annoying, to get so close and yet so far.
“Jackass,” Dipper mutters, and pokes the stupid demon ‘god’ right in his stupid eye. The back of the photo frame presses against his fingers.
Wait. Then - It’s not flush with the frame. There’s a gap, or -
Dipper flips it over again. The only thing keeping the picture in is a tab, holding the backing in place. If he twists it, it comes off easily.
And there is another photograph, hidden behind the first. Oldest trick in the book.
Whatever Bill’s got to hide here, he sure as hell didn’t make it easy to find. Stuffed away in an innocuous place, not a hint of magic around it, right in his personal sanctum - this has to be something good.
A quick flick retrieves it; Dipper flips the photo around, and -
Blinks, twice. He nearly does a double take. An illusion? No, it’s - he just checked for magic, and there isn’t any here.
It’s just a picture of… Dipper.
And it has to be him, because- because it looks like him, and he’s in Bill’s home, wearing one of his favorite shirts as he lounges on the couch. In the photograph, he’s mid-yawn, arms drawn up as he stretches, loose sleeves falling down.
For a moment he wonders if this was one of Bill’s other humans - it’d be one hell of a resemblance if so - but the jagged pink scar running down the left wrist is absolutely unmistakable.
Dipper stares for a while. He’s not sure what to make of this.
Why is this stashed away? It’d help if it was like, a weird picture, one with some clear and sinister intent. The weirdest thing about this is the fact that it exists. And that quiet fluttering noise that started a few seconds ago.
Something taps on one of Dipper’s shoes, and he glances down.
There wasn’t just one picture.
With the backing removed, with the way he’s holding it - dozens of photos pour out of the picture frame, fanning out in their fall; an impossible number of them, there’s no way they all could have fit- Goddamn it, it’s extradimensional.
“Shit,” Dipper says, and tries to clap the backing back on. He gets a papercut for his troubles and swears, sticking his finger in his mouth.
Some fumbling later, he slaps the frame onto the sheets face down. The flood ceases, though a few more puff out as a final insult and scatter on the sheets.
Dipper backs up cautiously, just in case there’s another surprise in store - and nearly slips as a picture glides across the carpet. A second trips him up as he tries to get his balance, he grabs the blankets to steady himself.
How many fell out of the frame? Where have they all gone? It can’t be…
Dipper wheels around and stares in horror at the room.
Photos have tumbled everywhere. Across the floor and onto the table and under the bed, some halfway across the freaking room like an extra-inconvenient game of 52 pickup.
“Shit,” Dipper repeats. He nearly sits down on the sleep-enchanted bed again, then thinks better of it.
So much for being careful and subtle in his quest. Evidence of his spying has splattered across the entire goddamn room. He scoops up an armful, cursing as half of them flutter away like annoying butterflies. Another grab lets half the ones he gathered tumble back out of his grip.
Okay, this - this isn’t a disaster yet. This is solvable. Bill doesn’t need to know, it’ll be fine. He’ll never notice. As long as Dipper gathers these and gets them back into the frame. That shouldn’t be too hard to figure out. Depending on how long that meeting runs, he might even have time to-
A sound. Was that a footstep? Or just paranoia.
Clenching his teeth against another curse, Dipper snags another armful, then a second. For lack of anywhere else to put them, he dumps them on the bed. Put everything in one place first, then worry about -
No, there was a sound. He hears another one now. The doorknob rattles, clicking as it turns.
Shit.
Dipper swipes his hands over the blankets, snagging what few photos he can reach and shoving them into the opened drawer. Then ramming the drawer shut with an all-too-loud thunk, clamping loose pictures in the gap, before belatedly realizing he left the metal thing out, too. He grabs it as the door starts opening, and now there’s no time left, he’s got to hide.
Suits rustle as he makes his dive into the closet. The door, pulled behind him as he made his rush to hide, clicks against the frame but doesn’t latch.
No more noise from the main room. Too quiet, almost, the sound of his own quiet panting muffled by surrounding cloth.
That. Did not go well. Dipper grits his teeth, silently running a prayer against discovery in his mind - wait, no, calling out for the guy he’s trying to hide from is a terrible idea.
Through the inch of open space, he can hear the faintest, lightest footstep. Not the thud of Bill’s shoes - but he might be still in the doorway. It’s hesitant because he’s looking across the mess, wondering what the hell just happened.
And what the hell was Dipper thinking? Permission to be in Bill’s room is nowhere near the same as permission to get his grubby fingers on every inch of Bill’s junk. Even that intrusion pales in comparison to putting a gallery’s worth of photos - ones Bill had deliberately hidden - practically on display like an impromptu art exhibition.
Dipper takes slow, measured breaths. In, and out.
All he can do now is wait. Stay quiet. Small, and hidden. Out of sight equals out of mind for most beings.
It’s too much to hope that Bill will let this slide. But maybe he can come up with an excuse? Lying in a cool enough way might amuse Bill enough not to go full-on nuclear.
The closet doesn’t judge him. The closet is where nobody will yell at him, since suits can’t talk. He’s even ninety-percent sure Bill doesn’t have any that could; it’d take away from his own rambling time.
Dipper shuffles into the rack, pressing his face against the lapels of a jacket. It’s a little cool on his cheeks, smelling faintly of Bill’s aftershave. He sighs against the jacket, feeling the press of the other suits on his back, and almost, sort of, feels a bit calmer.
After a while, he remembers he’s clutching the metal thing tight, in both hands. It’s warmed remarkably fast against his flesh, and now he’s not sure what to do with it. Stick it in a suit pocket, maybe? It doesn’t fit in any of them, or his own for that matter. The damn thing’s too long and weirdly shaped to go in anywhere.
Another footstep. Soft, but close. Despite the danger, Dipper pokes his head out of the suit rack to get a better listen.
The pacing is very soft and very rapid. Like multiple little feet instead of the standard two, tapping on the floor. Then on the bed, then - on the wall?
Okay, it’d be one thing if Bill decided to tiptoe in on his hands and knees. Weird, but not that weird, considering. The erratic movement, also plausible. Who knows what the hell he gets up to when Dipper’s not watching him.
It’s just… too quiet. Too furtive, really, like it’s trying hard not to make too much noise. Dipper’s all too familiar with the process.
And faintly, he can hear a strange, gentle buzzing. A quick, two-second burst that he almost mistakes for static. Only there’s no TV in here, and the pitch is off..
Dipper scoots a little closer to the door, ready to press his ear against it. The sound hits a deep, unpleasant memory, throwing him back to some of the more unsavory cult duties. Sacrifice cleanup. The messes always had a bunch of - but he’s never even seen a spider in Bill’s rooms. Much less some sort of giant fly.
He turns to peek through the opened crack, just as the door gets thrown open wide.
The demon - and it must be a demon, because no fly is five feet tall and has that huge a spike on its face - lets out a horrible, high-pitched shriek. Dipper’s own scream doesn’t match its pitch, but it’s a hell of a lot louder.
Compound eyes reflect his face back at him like mirrors. A thin tonguelike proboscis runs along the sharp spike on its face, four arm-leg things reaching out towards him with odd spiked pads -
Dipper screams again, and hits it with the metal thing.
The demon wobbles, looking dazed - before it can grab at him again, he whacks it a second time. Wings buzz fast, a high ear-splitting pitch, limbs grasping at his shirt and his face. They whip acros his arms and sting. Shoving it away feels so- gross, it is like a big bug, all shell and hair and ew.
Another grab; the pad lands on his collar and it almost digs into his flesh One of the spindly limbs cuts across his shirt with a tearing noise and he hits it harder, feeling something crunch unpleasantly under the blow.
At some point the metal object in his hand started buzzing too; something in the sound has the demon reeling away in fear or disgust. And that is a chance to land another blow. A solid one, right in the eye. As it reels back Dipper follows the blow another, and a third, and again and again and again until stuff stops slashing at him and poking, and all that’s left is empty space in front of him.
Dipper realizes he's breathing hard. A quick patdown to check shows he’s sweating, and there’s some - ugh- goop on his hand. His shirt’s ripped, but there’s no blood. Everything’s intact.
Well. He’s intact.
A thoroughly swatted demon lies on the carpet, carapace fractured in multiple places. One leg jerks up and twitches rapidly before going still.
Nausea roils in Dipper’s stomach. It’s not human gore, or even mammalian, but. God, that was gross. And it smells really, really bad.
Something slams open a few feet away, and Dipper nearly jumps out of his skin. He looks up at the noise and -
At Bill.
A newly-manifested doorway has popped into existence, right in the middle of the room. Bill stands in the frame, teeth bared in a snarl, his arms braced he’s about to leap out. His eye lands right on Dipper, lit from inside with fire.
Then he blinks.
Bill looks Dipper over, then down at the twitching bug demon. His eye glances over the room, then back to Dipper. Then down again, to the metal thing in his hand, still buzzing away. Dipper lets it drop from nerveless fingers, where it vibrates in a slow little circle on the floor.
Several seconds pass without a snappy comment. Dipper can’t read the expression on Bill’s face. It flickered through several before settling on blank..
“Well, well, well, well, well,” Bill says, clapping his hands together. An unsurprisingly swift recovery. Behind him in the sitting room, Dipper can see the other demons clustering around to catch a peek. “I can’t believe what you’ve been up to!”
Dipper’s heart plummets into his stomach. He clutches at his torn shirt. That smile looks delighted, but it always masks something else.
He’s been caught. Caught right in the middle of things, red-handed. Guilty as hell in the eye of his god.
What the fuck was he thinking. Digging where he shouldn’t, pushing when it’s wrong. Being allowed to be here has been more than Dipper could ever ask for, and what does he give in return? Blasphemy. Violation. He’s ruined everything because he wanted to know things he was never meant to, just like he always does.
“Look, I can explain,” He babbles, backing up a step. Bill’s quicker by far, catching up before he can do more than hold up his arms. “Wait, I-”
A firm hand catches his shoulder; the other takes him by the cheek. Bill’s face is inches away, approaching fast, and he can’t help but see those sharp, sharp teeth in his open mouth, things that could bite and tear.
At the very last moment, his head is twisted to the side. Something soft and damp smacks him on the temple.
“Mmmmwah!” Bill draws back with an exaggerated sound, cupping Dipper’s face in both hands. “Boy, you really walloped that guy! Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.”
“Whuh,” Dipper says, intelligently.
Bill drops his grip and turns towards the demon on the floor, giving it a contemplative, almost professional look. He taps his foot for a moment, then nods, like an expert evaluating a journeyman’s craft.
Dipper touches his temple with two careful fingers. It’s a little damp. A warm, tingling feeling spreads out from where Bill- Where it happened.
“Now, as for you-” Bill eyes the demon a little longer, then sets his hand on his hips. His smile changes to the sharp, unpleasant version. “Creeping around the place. Digging through my stuff. I don’t take kindly to peeping eyes that aren’t mine.” One sharply polished shoe lands a heavy kick in the vague area of the thing’s groin; it lets out a tinny scream. “And you made a huge goddamn mess while you were at it!”
Dipper glances over the scattered photos, open drawers, and the scattered knicknacks. Yes, someone certainly did.
Another kick lands on the demon with a crunch, and he winces.
“Gee, I wonder how you snuck your way in.” Bill says, immensely dry. He turns slightly towards that still-open doorway. The demons leaning in to watch start backing up fast. “Who coulda possibly helped with that! It’s a real friggin mystery for the ages!”
A mystery that Dipper had been wondering about, somewhere beneath the panic. The solution’s clear now that it’s gone.
Getting through Bill’s front door was all they needed. With such a big crowd of ‘small-timers’, as Bill would call them, he’d barely bother to track every one of them. The fly demon could have easily hitched a ride in a shrunken state; too small to be noticed until the time came to start snooping. With Bill busy elsewhere, it would have been a perfect opportunity - if Dipper hadn’t had the same idea.
That it is a spy is a relief. Dipper had been a little worried. If this was the kind of bug that comes crawling in after cracking open a window, he’d have second thoughts about his living arrangements.
Bill makes an odd pointing gesture. The room tremble as it shifts - and a spike impales the demon in front of him, dangling its slender body in midair.
“I’ll handle those losers in a second,” He says, gesturing at the doorway. He taps a foot, humming briefly in thought. “But as for you…”
Dipper backs up further. He keeps Bill between him and the fly-creature while still trying to keep an eye on the action.
Watching Bill about to enact his vengeance is … Sure, it was spying. It didn’t do what was right, or even smart. But he already beat it up, and it’s looking really rough. Whatever Bill’s going to do is -
The insect-like demon flails on the spike, limbs writhing. A loud buzz starts up again, along with some odd clicking noises.
“Hm?” Bill cocks his head to one side. Then he glances back at Dipper. “Yeah, what about him?”
On second thought, Bill should finish this guy off quickly and violently. For spying, and for ruining Dipper’s shirt, and being a goddamn snitch.
“Oh, I see!” With a grin, Bill stalks closer. “You know what, you’re right! If I caught two spies in my place, they’d totally get the same treatment!”
Dipper’s heart leaps into his throat.
No, wait, that - he was so certain, this isn’t -
“But there’s a real big problem with your dumb little assumption.” Bill tuts, holding up one finger in a chiding wag. With a vicious grin, he seizes it by the spike on its face. “There’s only one of those around!”
Dipper’s heart restarts, though it’s pounding fast. He braces himself on one knee, starting to breathe again.
“See, you’re here uninvited.” Bill says, very calmly, even as he twists the head at an unnatural angle, a sound both crunchy and wet. The wings buzz so fast a breeze starts picking up. “And HE freakin’ LIVES HERE.”
Oh.
There’s a thud as the severed head drops; Bill stomps on it with one perfect black shoe. Fragments of chitin flying, goo splatters in a comically yellow splat, making more of a mess than Dipper ever could.
Then Bill scowls at the ruined carpet, his hands on his hips. Like he’d walked in on a pile of undone dishes instead of making the disaster himself.
And Dipper’s still standing there. Untouched.
“There,” Bill says, with deep satisfaction. He wipes his hands off on his suit jacket - then frowns and takes the whole thing off, toweling bits of innards off his face. “What a moronic thing to try. Though it has been a grip since anyone made an attempt!.” Shrugging, he tosses the jacket away. “Guess they’re forgetting what happened to the last batch.”
Dipper nods, waiting for a moment. Then another.
And he’s still there, untouched. Unharmed. Because - because he’s not a spy, or an interloper, or even an unwanted or unattended guest. Bill doesn’t see him that way. He thinks that -
“So, I’m…” Dipper starts. Pauses, briefly, as Bill looks over his shoulder, then summons up the scraps of his courage. “I’m… not in trouble?”
“Sapling, you’re fine! Better than fine!” Bill says, dismissing the suggestion with a wave. “Hell, you could go through my freakin’ underwear drawer and I wouldn’t give a crap.” He pauses - then turns towards Dipper with a huge, knowing grin. “See anything you liked?”
“I’m-” Dipper freezes. All his muscles tense, and his face is hot. He touches his temple again; the tingling has started running down his neck. “Uh.”
Bill’s still staring at him. His smile widens another degree for every second it lasts.
“I’m gonna go take a shower.” Dipper blurts, and starts backing up again.
That’s a good excuse. Reasonable. He’s got goop on him, he’s sweaty, and he would really rather avoid talking about anything right now.
“Suit yourself!” Bill laces his fingers together, pushing his arms out in front of himself until the knuckles crack. He faces the door again, storming towards the meeting he’d recently abandoned. “I got some business to take care of.”
Dipper nods, once. He leaves the bedroom at a walk instead of a run, and hears the door shut behind him.
He’s…
All his breath comes out in a rush. The wall is steady under his back as he leans on it, palm over his eyes.
Holy crap, he’s fine. He really is. It’s okay.
This wasn’t a mistake. Everything was fine, he did make the right guess, and thank fuck for that. He is allowed in the bedroom. He could go anywhere he wants, and it’d be fine. More than fine.
He also wasn’t lying about the shower. Not only does it buy him some space, this fly-blood stuff really stinks.
Getting into the shower, he sets his face in the hot, pounding stream and tries to scrub off the goo. Water pressure. Hot water, and as much of it as he likes. Dipper can turn his back to the steady stream and feel it beating out the tension.
He lets out a low groan, letting water run through his hair. For all that it’s bizarre and confusing, the sheer luxury of Bill’s home is downright amazing.
Though. It’s not just Bill’s home, is it.
Dipper tilts his head out of the water. He watches droplets trickle down the shower walls.
Like. Obviously Bill’s the owner, he’s the ruler of his own domain. He controls the very fabric of space, changing the interior on a whim -
But there’s another person around. One who’s not a guest, or merely staying over for business reasons. Not a sentient pet or a tool or one of his knicknacks, kept carefully for display.
Dipper is a whole entire person who gets to be here, in Bill’s home, because he lives here too.
Not all that long ago, he was worried he wouldn’t leave this place alive. Then he wondered whether he could leave at all. For a while he wondered if Bill would make him go, after he was done doing… whatever he wanted to do with Dipper. Yet another part was convinced that when they went back to the cult, that’d be it. Back to earth, out of the dreamscape and out of Bill’s hair.
The last two no longer hold up. Because Dipper lives here, Bill said it himself, and by the nonchalant way he said it it’s been a done deal for a while.
Bill didn’t even try to hide it. He didn’t think it was a surprise.
The concept’s so big that Dipper doesn’t know where to start.
Living here. With Bill.
Dipper’s been places, though not many. Lived in places, if only a grand total of two. Early on, he thought that this one would be the same as the last. A man in charge, setting strict rules that must be followed. Forbidden from ever leaving. Punishment for not doing as he was told, or even thinking about not toeing the line.
All his experience told him that was how things go. It was all he knew. An assumption that everywhere was going to be the same tune, played on a different instrument.
His assumptions have never been right.
Bill’s home is a different beast entirely.
Bill could be in charge, but he doesn’t care to be. Not with Dipper. He hasn’t heard an order leave his mouth in ages. He’s free to leave the apartment if he wants, nothing’s going to stop him - though that’s a bad idea for other reasons, and Bill didn’t create them just keep Dipper in line. The worst punishment he’s gone through is a pinched cheek and some teasing, which is so minor that it almost goes into the negative. And he doesn’t have to worry about the breaking rules, because Bill doesn’t have any.
DIpper almost wishes he could blame it on, well. Demon realm. Strange culture. That things are topsy-turvy because everything else conspired to make it that way, rather than just.
Like, he already knew the cult was shitty when he was still in it. Knowing how shitty it really was leaves him wondering what a normal life could have been like. A strange, what-if ache.
Dipper had made plans to leave that awful place, knowing it meant he could never return. Even if there was anything he wanted to go back for, it wouldn’t be safe; Once he got out, that was going to be it. The whole world, or the conclave. One or the other.
If he wants to step outside Bill’s home, he doesn’t need to abandon it.
They’ll make a visit to Earth, for one. Bill wants to go to the cult for revenge, and Earth seems to intrigue him. He’ll take Dipper along with him, not lock him away in his room, because he wouldn’t let him miss the ‘fun’.
And - and if the show was right. Later, Dipper might get to visit Earth by himself, while Bill waits back at the Fearamid.
It’s an idea that feels more dreamlike than anything else in this realm of sleep. That maybe, this could be a place he can leave and come back to. Somewhere he doesn’t have to choose. Going and seeing things he’s always wanted, then returning again, with someone happy to see him at the door. Maybe that’s what a home’s supposed to be.
Dipper lets his head thunk into the side of the shower, out of the stream.
It’s weird to think a deadly demon realm ruled by an all-powerful madman is the safest Dipper’s felt in… forever, maybe. Which is another question entirely.
How the hell is he getting away with all of this?
It’s not just the snooping from earlier; he didn’t find much worth mentioning. Punching Bill in the goddamn face, though, that should have sent him into the lowest, most horrible dungeons. Not to mention the increasing amount of backtalk he’s giving a ‘god’. Complaining and questioning, even arguing, all excused. The defiance even delights Bill, because he’s a huge goddamn weirdo.
Nobody else - nothing in the universe - could get away with all of that without retribution. Yet Dipper remains singularly, remarkably unharmed. The worst Bill’s ever done is scare him a little, and even that’s odd considering the whole ‘nightmare king’ deal he has going; Dipper should have had at least two heart attacks by now.
The birthmark. It must be that.
The one human in the show had it, and Dipper has it too. The other human companions… He didn’t see it on them, but it might have been in a different place? At minimum though, that’s two humans who Bill hung out with, wearing the same star-ridden shape.
But ow would Bill have known Dipper had it? He wasn’t watching him before they met - and by the time they did, the mark had been missing for ages.
It could be magical. Maybe. Dipper’s never heard of ‘special birthmarks’ actually being a thing outside of bad fantasy novels. Then again, if it was, the magic could show up in his blood - exactly what was used in Bill’s summon. Which would…. Do a thing. He thinks.
Dipper rubs his face with the washcloth, willing his brain to start working better.
Everything feels muddled and weird. Partly from exhaustion, partly from too much information with not enough connections.
Still, one thing is certain. Bill wasn’t lying, no matter what Dipper thought at the time. He is special.
It’s… what, special… privilege? A secret power? Some strange field of influence, so specifically targeted it’s ridiculous, with no logical reason to exist? It’s…
Dipper gets out of the shower, and stares at himself in the mirror. He sticks his tongue out. The birthmark remains, brightly outlined on pink flesh.
Having more pieces to the puzzle helps. Sadly, he still doesn’t know the picture on the front of the box.
Confronting Bill without having his thoughts in order would be worse than useless. He’ll dodge every guess, unless Dipper throws something really solid at him. He needs a strong offense to pry the secrets from between Bill’s stubborn, oddly soft lips.
Screw it. There’s too much to go through, and he’s so, very tired. He can sort it out tomorrow.
There’s no rush, anyway. Bill’s not going to kick him out. Dipper lives here.
Preparing for bed is the same ritual as always. Brush teeth, get changed. He can turn the lights on and off whenever he wants, not wait for someone else to do it at a mandated time, and now he keeps them dimmed. The bed’s already made in the guest room-
No, His room. Where he lives.
An emotion fills his chest, welling up until it feels like he could - Dipper grabs mini-Bill and holds it tight.
Squishing the plush in his arms helps, though he has to hold it very hard. And this is his, too. Bill hasn’t tried to take it from him beyond starting to glare at it on occasion. He has so much that’s his.
The quilts settle cozily around him, comforting in their weight. The pillow soft,sinking under his head. Comfort, too; he has this now, and he’s never, ever going to take it for granted.
Problem being, when he shuts his eyes, there’s flashes of translucent wings. A high buzzing, from both the thing in his hand and the thing making crunching noises -
Dipper sits up again with a groan. Rubbing at his face, he kicks his legs over the edge of the bed.
He knows what kind of night he’s in for. They’re infrequent enough lately that it doesn’t bother him. Nightmares in the nightmare realm, who could have guessed. Another round isn’t going to kill him.
Yet somehow, the idea of lying down and watching that scene repeat in extra-gory detail, with the cult and god knows what else thrown in, feels like an extra shitty thing to go through right now.
He could get up and read for a while, try to get it out of his mind. Or get a glass of water, or journal down all the things he’s learned today. Hell, he could even bother Bill, who doesn’t ever seem to sleep and certainly wouldn’t mind the company. He’s almost always up for whatever Dipper suggests, no matter what it…
Huh. Now that’s an interesting thought.
It might work, too. Being ‘special’ gives him some extra leverage. Stuff that Bill wouldn’t normally allow, he lets Dipper get away with handily.
He could use that.
Dipper gets up, heading for the doorway. Still clutching mini-Bill, since he doesn’t expect to be up for long. He’ll consider this a test run. A little favor shouldn’t bother Bill much; it’ll barely take him a second.
The door to his bedroom creaks as it opens. The living room’s still lit up, though dimmer than usual. Typical for the ‘evening’, or dream realm equivalent. He pushes it open further, stepping out into the light.
And there’s Bill. Sitting in the high-backed chair, facing the fireplace.
He must have wrapped up his ‘business’ to his satisfaction, looking pleased with himself. He swirls a drink in his fingers that shifts color with every turn. The light from the fireplace illuminates the angles of his face, and the curve of his satisfied smirk.
Dipper hesitantly clears his throat. Instantly Bill perks up, head swiveling in his direction like a compass needle to the north.
“Hey there, sapling! What’s up?” Bill asks. He crosses one leg over the other, offering a quick wave. “Thought you were in for the evening.”
“No, not yet.” Dipper says. Already he’s awkward; asking for things and actually getting them still feels weird. “Soon, maybe. But I, uh. Wanted to ask you something first.”
Bill tilts his head back, finishing his drink in one long swig before tossing the glass aside. He gives Dipper a wink, and double finger guns. “Sure, go for it.”
Okay, now. How to phrase this. Hopefully it’s not some kind of offensive ask, and - well, he’s pretty sure Bill’s not doing this on purpose. More like it’s an aura around him, or a knee-jerk reflex. Not always activated, but powerful when it is.
Bill’s still watching him curiously. Waiting for Dipper to speak, in an eerily patient silence.
Here goes nothing. Dipper takes a deep breath.
“I don’t want to have bad dreams, so, uh,” He admits, though it comes out a little rough. He tugs his pajama shirt to straighten it. “Could you…um. Not? For tonight?”
A beat of pause. Bill blinks several times, then says, “That’s not me, kid.”
Oh for - Dipper levels a deeply unimpressed look. Usually Bill’s lies are better. “You’re the lord of nightmares.”
“Yeah, ‘cause I’m great at designing them, not the source of all of ‘em. You think I got time to get to every being in the multiverse?” Bill says. He catches sight of Dipper’s glare and frowns, lifting his hands to show his own empty palms. “Look, I’m not poking around in your subconscious. Whatdya want, a pinky swear?”
Dipper’s mouth moves, his tongue flicks. The words come out without permission. “Or maybe you’re just not that great.”
He shuts his mouth with a click, almost catching his tongue in the process.
He shouldn’t have said that. Shit, even if he is a little annoyed, he keeps crossing that damned line. Questioning Bill’s power. His capability, his very essence. Surely Bill won’t just ignore it again.
Except Bill does. If anything he looks more amused, starting to snicker as he rises from his seat.
And he does inflict a ‘punishment’. By getting super close and ruffling Dipper’s hair in a super annoying way. Dipper shakes it off, pulling back with a huff. Annoyed, but also - god, he really does have a lot of leeway. It’s insane.
“Hey! I’m definitely the best.” Bill chides, wagging a finger at him. “You just got your perspective wrong! Elements exist on their own! Some guys are just great at manipulating ‘em. You’re not texting the king of fire every time you light a match, y’know?”
“Well,” Dipper says, then stops. When Bill puts it that way -
Not omnipotent. Not omnipresent. Not literally the fabric of the mind itself, either; he should have thought of it before, except he keeps making dumb assumptions.
“Look. You want a custom, hand-delivered nightmare? One that’ll make someone scream their lungs up and claw their own eyes out? Then I’m the best in the biz!” Bill puffs out his chest, smiling wide - then shrugs, looking a little wry. “But any dreamer can have something nasty crawl outta their subconscious. That’s just nature.”
Dipper nods, once. Letting out a sigh, and rubbing at his eyes.
Not the answer he was looking for - but an answer nonetheless.
He’d guessed that Bill wasn’t inflicting them on purpose, sure. Infrequent and random fit ‘accidental’, there wasn’t any pattern he could find. Learning they’re not Bill’s fault at all is surprising - but nice.
…That also means every terrible dream Dipper has had came from his own stupid brain. Going around concocting terrible scenarios and waking him up in a sweat, purely au naturale. Super great.
Simple solutions rarely exist, he guesses.
“Sorry. Or- yeah.” He squirms out from under Bill’s pursuing hand, turning back towards the door. Another bad night isn’t the worst, he’ll live. “I’ll just-”
“Hey, hey! Don’t sweat it, sapling. When it comes to nightmares, you came to the right guy!” Bill interrupts before Dipper can make it more than a foot. He takes him by the shoulder, squeezing it firmly. “I got just the solution for ya. Sweet dreams only, one hundred percent guaranteed.”
Or maybe… Dipper glances back. But Bill just said he wasn’t doing this, so-
“Really. One hundred percent.” That’s an exaggeration if he’s ever heard one. Dipper folds his arms, giving Bill an arch look. “If you’re not making the nightmares, then that means you’re playing defense. You’re telling me you get every single one?”
“Always so cynical! Ninety-nine point nine repeating is mathematically identical.” Bill says primly, already steering Dipper around, pushing him in another direction. “And better odds than you’ll get anywhere else.”
Fine, that’s true enough. Dipper doesn’t have better options. Or any other ones. He might as well see where this leads.
Bill hums behind him, bizarrely delighted by the weird request. Maybe because it’s weird. Maybe because he enjoys the process, somehow? Either way, he seems confident in his ability to pull this off - but when doesn’t he?
Dipper gets maneuvered through the living room, over the carpet, and - into Bill’s master bedroom again. He glances over his shoulder briefly, just before the door shuts behind them.
Wait, what are they doing here?
The room’s just as clean as the first time he entered. There’s no demon corpse, no puddle of ichor or new freestanding door. No photos to be seen. At some point Bill must have tidied up -
Dipper closes his eyes against the mental image. Bill, seeing through all the evidence he left. Knowing it was Dipper who did it. He hasn’t said a word about it, but the guilt lingers.
He almost wishes Bill was mad about it. Or complaining about the mess, or making some wry comment to tease him about his shitty show of espionage. At least then he'd know what Bill is thinking.
Dwelling on his own guilt is interrupted by Bill pushing him forward, then halts suddenly. Leaving Dipper standing at the side of that immense, luxurious bed.
Bill gives his shoulders another pat, then lifts up one edge of the sheets. “Hop on in, kid!” With a little flourishing bow, he flaps the covers. “Get yourself cozy.”
“Uh. Sure.” Dipper hesitates, but. Bill’s nudging him along, so he eventually pulls himself up into the bed and under the opened sheets. They drop on top of him before he’s even fully in the thing, while Bill perkily walks off to another part of the room.
Just as he suspected. It is a great bed.
As Dipper settles back, the mattress is firm but yielding. The pillows mold around his head. The blankets are cooler than the quilts in his own room, almost chilly - but not hard to get used to.
It’s not hard to settle down, waiting for Bill. For a ritual that involves dreams, a bed as the setting makes sense. Though part of him thought Bill would just, like. Snap his fingers, or something. Demon powers, or whatever.
Even without any magic, Dipper’s tired enough to fall asleep right now. But that might mess with whatever Bill’s doing, so. He’ll just. Shut his eyes for a moment.
“Hold tight for a sec! I’ll be with ya in a jiffy,” Bill says, vastly more upbeat than the situation calls for. “Lemme just slip into something more comfortable.”
Dipper’s eyes shoot open. He blinks up at the ceiling for a moment before sitting up. “What do yo-”
His words die before the sentence fully forms. He shuts his mouth slowly. Swallowing with a mouth that’s gone suddenly dry.
Bill’s shirt lies in a silent pile on the floor by his feet. In the firelight, broad shoulders roll as he stretches, casting interesting lines of shadow on the planes of his back.
Dipper drops back down, clutching the blankets like a lifeline.
Okay, wait, maybe he has the wrong idea. Bill’s not, like.
There's a clinking sound. A belt being undone, moving as it slides from its loops - then another as it falls. Followed by a zip, and more soft shuffling of cloth.
Dipper dares a glance. Then instantly grabs one of the other pillows, pulling it over his face.
Okay. Okay, this is - fine and, normal maybe, he doesn’t know how this ritual’s supposed to work. It’s not unheard of to be… unadorned when doing powerful magic, since any enchanted clothing could interfere. Bill’s just getting rid of them before he casts the spell. Everything’s going exactly as it should, and Dipper can throw out that newly-acquired mental picture as totally irrelevant and definitely rude.
The pillow helps. He’s not tempted to look at all, but if he was, it completely blocks his view and most of the sound.
He should be patient, and quiet, and wait for the spell. If it’s strong enough that Bill has to undress to cast it, this will take a while. Dipper has plenty of time to calm back down.
A motion in the covers, as something pulls them up. A deep, pleased sigh, much closer than before - then a large weight sinks the mattress slightly, scooting close with familiar, incorrigible confidence.
Or, the thought appears in Dipper’s mind. There’s no spell. It’s a ward. Which would require the warder’s presence, right. Totally reasonable.
So yes, of course. Bill joined Dipper in bed, just like he said he would like, less than two minutes ago. How that little fact got glossed over was - he stopped thinking straight for a while, that’s all.
The cult didn’t leave Dipper with a huge range of experience, he knows that. Hates it, most days.
But even in that limited scope, he knows some people sleep undressed. He’s seen his share of unfortunate cultists get woken up for morning sermon, only to see them entirely unprepared. That Bill shares that particular proclivity is… honestly not that big a surprise.
“Ah, now that’s nice.” Bill says, voice slightly muffled. There’s a thump near Dipper’s head - probably Bill lying back himself. “You don’t look all that cozy, though. What gives?”
Dipper tells him he’s fine, but he doesn’t know how much of it gets through the down covering.
There’s a pause, then a snort. The blankets shift as Bill adjusts them, drawing them further up.
It really is fine. He’s doing great, he’s comfy, Bill’s going to help him with something and it didn’t seem like any kind of trick. All he has to do is deal with a perfectly normal sleeping habit from a not-at-all normal guy, who’s lying so close Dipper can feel him breathing. Inches away, with his bare skin warming the too-cool blankets.
He can’t hold the pillow this tight forever, though. It’s getting hard to breathe.
Then a thump, just near Dipper’s head; Bill slammed a palm into the mattress. Leaning over him no doubt, with his body covering Dipper’s own. The picture is clear in his mind; he can almost feel the body looming over him. Something gently tugs the pillow, urging it away, and - and Dipper shouldn’t resist, should he? Bill is after something, he’s demanding and forceful, he’ll do anything to get what he wants.
The pillow leaves Dipper’s loose grip, pulled away by a firmer, stronger hand. He lets his arms drop to either side of his head. His breathing picks up.
And Bill is looming over him. Held up by one strong arm, looking amused. His eye bright and half-lidded, his smile sharp and dangerous on his face. Wearing a soft, loose t-shirt, reading ‘Hungry Zixlor’s Burger Joint’.
Dipper reads the shirt, then tilts his head up for another angle. Below that, Bill’s put on the pine tree boxers.
“See? Way more comfy when you can actually aspirate.” Bill says, wiggling his eyebrows.
“Yeah, sure. Whatever.” Dipper rolls onto his side, feeling a rush of annoyance. The hell, he was going to put the stupid pillow down. Bill didn’t have to get all over him just for that.
He feels the bounce as Bill drops back down into bed, cackling to himself at another successful human-annoyance. Dipper’s half-tempted to smack him with the damn pillow, but who knows what that would lead to.
Mini-Bill got lost in the covers somewhere along the line, so Dipper fishes around until he finds it and hugs it to his chest. He lets out a huff, squishing it tight.
Without warning, an arm slips under Dipper’s neck. Another drapes over his waist. If asked later, Dipper will claim he didn’t make a single sound, much less anything undignified.
Instead, he holds very, very still. The arms around him are firm and strong. With the body behind him warming up everything, the blankets suddenly make sense. Bill’s practically a furnace. Anything more insulation and they'd combust.
“Good night, sleep tight,” Bill says, low and close. Dipper shivers, though he isn’t cold. “Don’t let the demons take too big a bite.” Teeth click sharply right next to his ear, and Dipper shivers.
God, of course he wouldn’t just- just let this be calm and nice, he’s Bill friggin’ Cipher. “Jerk,” Dipper mutters, and feels Bill’s chest shake with silent laughter.
The arm around his waist squeezes him tighter, pressing his back fully against Bill’s chest. He can feel it move as he breathes, and the steady pulse of his heart. Between real Bill and mini-bill, they’re practically a set of nesting dolls.
After that… nothing. Bill doesn't taunt anymore, and a few minutes later, Dipper hears him start to snore. Another annoying bit of Bill, and not annoying enough to distract him from everything else. He wishes it would.
Even in sleep, Bill has the nerve to keep breathing and moving, instead of being a warm statue Dipper could ignore. His fingers trail in a mindless, unconscious pattern over Dipper’s stomach, making him bury his face in the pillow. Running through every chant he can remember silently, over and over, especially the ones that are mind-numbingly boring.
None of these ideas are sinful. Bill himself has done more, and worse, than just having two or three concepts flicker through his brain, and Dipper knows it’s not wrong. He does, really.
…Just because it’s not sinful doesn’t mean it’s not awkward.
Dipper keeps his eyes shut. Trying to ignore the pounding of his own heart. There’s a bright, tingling energy in his body, spreading through every part of him, head to toe. It's... inconvenient.
Bill wasn’t lying about preventing nightmares. He’s terribly effective.
Dipper can’t have bad dreams if he doesn’t get any sleep.
#One day I will relearn how to write short things#Today was not that day and tomorrow's not looking good either#By the end of this miniseries I'll have basically written a dang novel#RIP my writing hands#I will now have some chocolate as a reward#Fun Fact: I know I'm finished editing when I reach what I call the 'fuck it phase'#Which is when I'm sick of looking at the dang thing#So here it is!!#This is why it's hard to leave tumblr - not a lot of other sites let you drop huge blocks of text like this
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This is going to come up in "Some Unknown Corner", but I don't know how explicitly it'll come up, like, terminology-wise, so... saying it more explicitly here if you want to try and look out for this detail in coming chapters. Minor spoilers for a character issue that will become a later plot point.
I'm going to try to explore Yue Qingyuan having claustrophobia, specifically a fear of being shut in underground spaces in particular. This man has wild amounts of willpower and will generally refuse to be vulnerable, so he does NOT let on to this fact in obvious ways, even when forced to be underground temporarily, but he HATES the experience. On the edge of a panic attack, feeling like he's dying, still smiling pleasantly somehow.
Yue Qi goes back into the Ling Xi Caves with Shen Jiu as disciples in one of the Qijiu extras. In this case, I think he was a little fearful (not irrationally, honestly) of something bad happening to Shen Jiu, so he forced himself to be there despite the fact that he hated being there the entire time. (My general headcanon is that Yue Qi genuinely doesn't remember huge chunks of his confinement due to the trauma of it all.) By the time he's the sect leader, over ten years later, he's calmed down enough to let Shen Yuan go in there alone to cultivate. (Maybe Shen Qingqiu threw him out another time later down the line as disciples.)
In SVSSS, Yue Qingyuan goes into the Ling Xi Caves again, I believe, in order to get stronger and potentially get Shen Qingqiu's body back from Luo Binghe. When Luo Binghe invades Cang Qiong, Yue Qingyuan has apparently hastily had to exit seclusion at a delicate time. Was he trying to heal the Xuan Su sword issue as much as possible? Are visits to the Ling Xi Caves a regular medical treatment for him? Why didn't he go into the Ling Xi Caves to get stronger / potentially heal his broken relationship with his sword any earlier? I'm imagining Yue Qingyuan honestly having to force himself to go cultivate alone through a fairly serious phobia, and Mu Qingfang being generally against it, because it seems more like Yue Qingyuan might accidentally work himself up into a terrified, traumatized episode of some kind and die due to another qi deviation.
Being at Mai Gu Ridge sucked for many reasons. It sucked for everyone, really.
Yes, Yue Qi having claustrophobia does make his being blinded in "Some Unknown Corner" worse. (He's holding steady (barely) based on being able hear other people around him + smells + Shen Jiu's touch.) He's really not having a fun time! He's a practical guy and he really doesn't like panicking, so he is SHOVING IT OUT OF MIND, which is not great. I already view Yue Qi as disabled in SVSSS canon due to the Xuan Su sword issue, and the story keeps putting him in positions (sect leader) where he cannot "afford" to be disabled (he has to try to save everyone else), and it is continuously fucking him up. He needs some real rest so, SO badly.
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Seeing Me in You - #1 Delivery
Masterlist
Wrote this on a whim :3 pretty short but who caresssss… might write more??? Might also delete later
cw: pet whump, threat of recapture, box boy universe/bbu adjacent, institutionalized slavery
——————
He shouldn’t have opened the door. Checked the peephole at the very least, as if that would have done him any good.
He could never have escaped them.
August stared ahead into the corridor of his apartment building, jaw falling slack as his mouth went wide and eyes stuck agape. A lump formed quick in his throat, tightly wound with sick acid burning a hole through his neck. His organs flipped and churned over one another, brain filling with flooding nausea.
WRU employees. At his house. August was going to be sick.
Were they speaking? Their voices reduced to a muffle inside his mind, hearing going blank. An itching sensation flared over his arm, just the spot where his tattoo was carefully shielded by his sweater. He lifted a hand to scratch at his throat, the place where a cheap collar had once sat and rubbed around his neck. The memories stung, yet not worse than the sight of such specific uniforms.
No, this was much worse.
His pulse was quickening my the second, heart beating in and out of his chest. He couldn’t breath. Warm, thick bile was slithering it’s way up from his stomach, twisting his insides in contorted knots.
They found him. After so long of comfort and faux personhood, they had found him. Come for him even, to take him back as their property. To refurbish him. To sell him and beat him back into shape, and to train him yet again-
Before August could so much as collect his scattered, bleeding thoughts of past horrors and tortures, one of the employee’s lips parted. “Would you like us to bring it inside? Or leave it here?” He muttered, so casual August almost couldn’t digest his words.
August, body filling ever so carefully with disbelief and panic, trailed his vision down to his feet where his eyes stopped. A large, nearly-fit-for-a-human sized box sat at the workers’ feet. He knew that box well. Very well. He’d been inside that box.
They weren’t here for him.
August could have jumped and squealed from a mixture of terror and joy that he was still safe, never to be recaptured and refurbished. At least, not yet, anyway. But there was a boxie in the process of a delivery at his apartment doorstep.
How could that be? How? What disgustingly cruel, rich asshole’s boxie was sitting inches away from him? Just waiting to be claimed as his own? And why?
His mouth moved swift beyond his own accord, mind gradually catching up with his quivering lips. “You… um, you can leave them there.” August croaked out, voice meek and continuing to waver no matter how hard he tried to hide it.
“‘Kay.” He shrugged, and that was that.
They didn’t suspect a thing. No idea they dropped the order to the wrong person, let alone a former boxie. How impossibly lucky for the poor thing. August could barely believe it himself.
He watched with intense focus as the two employees calmly and quickly left, keeping an intense eye on them just until they finally turned the corner. As if at the last moment they would realize their mistake, and either take the boy back, or end up taking him as well.
Careful and terrified, as soon as he heard the pitter patter of their steps dissipate, he turned to the box.
August, still standing rigid in the doorway, with intense fascination trailed his vision over each and every little ridge of wood and nails, eager yet terrified to open it. He swallowed, thick and juicy saliva that rolled it’s way down his throat.
What just happened?
—————
Masterlist
Taglist- @softvampirewhump
If anyone wants to be removed or added to the taglist, please let me know! :)
#Writing#my writing#whump writing#whump story#Bbu#box boy universe#box boy whump#bbu adjacent#Pet whump#pet whumpee#institutionalized slavery#Whump#whumpblr
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Never Again
Gang member Mingi x reader
Word Count: 1335
Summary: you and Mingi fight, and when you run away an opposing gang member catches you in the alley way on your way out and tries to force drugs down your throat. Mingi, on his way to get you back, sees and loses his shit but calms only once you say his name.
Notes: MDNI, cursing, angst, fluff, drugs forced, attempted kidnapping, gang violence, gang related topics
“That’s it!” He yells throwing his phone down to the couch beside him trying to release some anger without breaking anything. A habit I helped him break.
“Oh that’s it? Alright fine.” In the heat of the moment I gather just my phone jacket and keys and start to walk out the door hoping he might say anything to stop me.
“Fine.” He says with the anger shaking his voice. If I were anyone else he would have said more and if this were a drug deal he would have either beat them to a pulp or used that brand new gun I got him and ended it before it got worse.
Instead of saying anything more I leave our apartment, his apartment and head straight for the elevator. In my fit of anger I can’t even comprehend the time. It’s dark out that’s all I know, and being in a relationship with a gang member I should know to never go out alone at night, but my clouded judgement does nothing but push me further out the glass doors.
The empty streets do nothing to clear my mind, and the damp air does little to help my breathing calm. “So fucking stupid!” I curse under my breath kicking a pebble with my heeled foot. “All of this over a damn drug deal that they don’t have enough information on! That’s it! God forbid I fucking care. My bad I didn’t know I shouldn’t fucking worry that the love of my life could die. Oops. Fucking ridiculous.”
My whispers to myself add to the silence of the night around me. That is until I get pulled into an alley way not far from the apartment, “what the fuck!?”
“Shut up!” A gruff voice says from behind me pulling me in close to their chest and holding me so tight my lungs struggle. He slams me against the brick wall and pins me against it. His face is covered by a mask but his eyes I can see. This black that makes my skin crawl.
“Who the fu-“
“Shut the fuck up!” He says again with so much anger that I think he’s the one who just had a break up argument. Instead of covering my mouth he grabs something from his pocket and through my hazy vision I can just make out that it’s small and held between his fingers. He raises it to my mouth and tries to shove it in but I do that best I can and bite his fingers hard.
He curses and drops the pill to look at his fingers to see blood. “You bitch.” I go to say something but in a second he is thrown off of me and air is brought back into my lungs. My vision is so blurry from tears and anxiety that I can’t see what is going on and I’m so afraid that my hearing has gone silent.
I slide down the wall and just let sob wreck through my body. I let out all my anger and fear and say the one name I wish could save me now “Mingi.” I continue sobbing into my hands whispering his name and saying my apologies for walking away.
Someone tries to pull my hands away and I freak out thinking the man won and came back to drug me again. “Baby I’m here. I’m here. It’s me baby. I’m here for you. Come here.” His strong arms pull me into him and instantly know who it is. He waists no time in picking me up and carrying me away to what I hope is back him.
He continues to whisper sweet nothings to me and hold me close occasionally rubbing my back while his other arm holds me up by my thigh. I cling on to him as if my life depends on it and refuse to open my eyes and face reality.
“We’re home baby.” He whispers and slightly let’s go to see if I will drop from his hold but I hold on tighter. “I’ve got you baby.” He holds on tight again and carries me to what I assume is our bedroom until I hear the sound of the shower. “Come on let’s get these off.”
I finally let him set me down on the counter but I keep my eyes closed shut, I don’t want to open them and find out all of this was just a drug induced dream. As soon as my clothes are off he picks me back up and I feel that he is still fully clothed. Under the water I realize this is reality and open my eyes to see the shower wall and let out a sigh of relief. “I got you baby. I won’t let you go.”
“Your clothes.” I say and notice my voice is weak from all the emotional distress.
“It’s okay. I’m going to set you down okay?”
“Okay.” He sets me down and turns me to face away from him. Mingi washes me hair with care and makes sure to massage my head just the way I like that calms me down. He takes some time to place kisses on my head and shoulders telling me he loves me and that he’s here.
“Mingi?”
“Yes baby?” He asks finishing washing out the conditioner from my hair.
“I’m so sorry.” I say and turn around the hug him tightly around his waist. He doesn’t hug back at first from the shock of my words.
“What?” He pulls me away to look in my eyes and push any stray hairs away from my face. “Baby you have nothing, absolutely nothing to be sorry about.”
“But I-“
“No. I don’t care what you think in that beautiful head of yours, you did nothing to be sorry about. That motherfucker took advantage of you and tried to fucking drug you. And I was so worried about my pride and ego that I was pushing you away and it led to this. If anything I’m sorry, but he should be the most sorry. He should rot in hell. He would be there if you didn’t say my name. I was seeing red.” He pulls me back into him and hugs me tightly. “I’m so sorry baby. Let’s get you dried off and in bed, okay?”
I let my tears fall as I nod and let him pull me out of the shower to wrap a towel around me. He sets me down on the counter again and leaves for a few minutes to change his clothes and grab some for me. He comes back in a large black t-shirt and sweat pants and dresses me in my favorite hoodie of his along with underwear. He brushes my hair just the way I like and wipes my face clean with my products. After he’s down he moves us to the bed and cuddles me close.
“It’s not your fault.” I say into the darkness still clinging on to him and nuzzling into his chest.
“Yes it is. If I did-“
“No Mingi. It’s not anyone’s fault. Couples fight, we fought. But neither of us knew what would happen so it’s not our fault. Please don’t blame yourself. Please.” I beg and sit up to face him. In the darkness I can just make him out and can see that he is looking at my every move.
“Fine but never again. We won’t fight again, we won’t walk away again, and this won’t happen ever again. No one will ever touch my baby ever again. I will protect you with my life at all costs, okay?”
“Me too baby.” I say and stick out my pinky finger, “promise?”
“Pinky promise.” We lock fingers and then he pulls me into a kiss, on that has my using his chest to hold my self up and his hand in my damp hair holding me close.
“I love you Mingi.”
“I love you more than you will ever know.”
#Mingi#Ateez Mingi#Mingi ateez#Ateez#Mingi x reader#Gang member#Song mingi#Song mingi fic#Mingi fic#Mingi imagine#Ateez Song Mingi#ateez fanfic#ateez fic
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Wail of the Silent 9/?
Prev | Next
WARNING: SUICIDE ATTEMPT AS WELL AS A NON-GRAPHIC SEX SCENE! PROCEED WITH CAUTION
Jason didn’t think, he shot. Finally, he was able to get to the bitch that had made his life a living hell the past few days—who had made life even worse for the citizens of Gotham.
At the moment, she had Batman in her clutches.
The mass of shadows that vaguely resembled a woman screamed in pain when the shot hit true and let Batman go. Batman fell on the floor with a thud; he was breathing hard.
“Show yourself, bitch,” he said with his mechanized voice.
Jason blinked as red eyes got in front of him.
“If it isn’t my favorite snack,” she raised her claws to scratch Jason, but before they hit him, a green forcefield appeared in front of him.
“That’s enough, Spectra.”
“Ghost boy,” the specter sneered, “I would say it’s a pleasure to see you, but you’re a pain to have in my afterlife.”
“Right back at you. Now, are we doing this the easy way or the hard way?”
The bitch didn’t answer. She screeched and, with claws out, lunged at Danny. Jason shot.
The ray gun let out beams of green energy; it hit its mark. Spectra shrieked in pain. She turned her sights toward Jason and jumped toward him. Batman tried to grab her, but his hands went through her. Jason stopped her with no issues.
He didn’t have time to be surprised. Instead, he put her in a half-nelson and wrestled her to the ground before pinning her.
Jason didn’t know what it was but felt a change in the air. He knew she was trying to use her ghost powers.
Spectra smirked. She knew being held back by a mere human would do nothing to her, so she became invisible and intangible.
Jason held on to the ghost even though he knew it would be useless.
After a few seconds, Spectra yelled out in frustration.
“What are you? How can you negate my ghost powers?”
Jason had no idea how he was holding on to a ghost, but he didn’t have time to feel surprised. He felt a burning pain in his arm. Claws sank through his armor to make him loosen his hold. He tightened it instead.
“Bring her up, Hood,” Danny said while bringing up the thermos. It started glowing and whirring.
Jason felt a sense of despair so strong that he let go of Spectra. He went to his knees, breathing hard. Something in him broke. Jason felt himself being torn apart. It was too much. Hot tears fell down his cheeks, making breathing even harder. He wanted it to stop.
Without much thought, he brought up his gun and pointed it at his forehead.
“No!”
Something green hit his gun before Jason was able to pull the trigger.
He could hear cackling as it faded away.
Fuck, fuck! FUCK!
Danny knew he shouldn’t have brought Jason. Now, the man had crumpled to the floor like a marionette having its strings cut. And Spectra had gotten away.
Danny ignored a groaning Batman and picked up Jason in a bridal hold.
Batman decided to come to as Danny gently cradled Jason’s body to his. Danny let his core softly hum, hoping it would help Jason.
“No, Ja—Jason. Let go of my son!”
Batman threw a dark weapon toward Danny’s head just as he turned intangible and invisible. He floated up and then flew toward Jason’s apartment. Danny had not stopped humming and chirping the whole time.
He could hunt down Spectra after Jason woke up.
Danny put Jason on the bed and removed Jason’s helmet by turning it intangible. He had no idea if the thing was boob trapped or not, but he wasn’t going to take any chances.
Jason’s eyes weren’t closed, but they were glazed. His eyes were red and misty. Dried tears marred his cheeks. His mouth was slightly gaped as if he was screaming.
“Oh, Jason, I’m so sorry. This is my fault. I shouldn’t have brought you with me. I took you straight to her clutches.”
Danny sat by Jason on the bed and held the other man’s hand. His core hummed louder, hoping it would reach Jason.
You’re not alone, his core chirped. I’m here with you.
____
Bruce knew despair; he and misery were practically friends.
Bruce was very intimate with suffering since that dark night in that alley. He never thought he would feel more wretched than that night.
Then Jason had died.
Losing a child was a million times worse than losing his parents had ever been.
Tonight, those feelings had come back a hundred-fold. The anguish he had felt had him breathless; it had him wishing for death.
Then he came back to find his son holding a gun to his forehead. Bruce still hadn’t been able to move, to yell out in fear.
To put the bad things to worse, his son had been kidnapped right in front of him by a strange being.
He had no idea what was happening, but he would find out.
Batman limped toward the Batmobile and let himself slump into the seat.
“Nightwing, I need your help. It’s Hood; he’s in trouble.”
There was a moment of silence.
“What do you need me to do, B? I’m ready.”
Whoever hurt his child would wish Batman didn’t have a no-killing rule. After all, there were worse things out there than death.
____
Jason came back to consciousness slowly.
He felt more than heard soft humming under his ear.
That’s when he noticed his head was on top of something solid and cool. He looked up and saw blue eyes looking at him with concern.
Jason could still feel the echoes of misery.
Jason let a dejected chirp.
She got away. She got away! My FAULT!
Not your fault, Danny chirped back.
Jason felt an overwhelming calm settle over him, like a warm blanket on a cold night.
Not your fault.
Jason felt tired. He had been so alone for so long. He hadn’t felt another’s sincere, loving touch in a long time.
Suddenly, that was all he wanted. He wanted to feel loved and chase away the last bit of cold misery.
Would Danny…?
Jason raised his lips to Danny, hesitating to make sure Danny would want to, too.
The taller man cradled Jason’s face and kissed Jason gently.
Jason started taking off his shirt when Danny suddenly stopped him. He chirped out in indignation.
Don’t want me? Jason chirped out. Changed your mind?
Jason felt disappointment even as he understood. Who would want something broken?
“No, it’s not that. Are you sure? We’re going a bit fast. I want to make sure this is what you want.”
Jason tried to put every bit of emotion and want in the middle of his chest, where he felt the warm humming and let it out in a loud chirp.
Want this. Want you. Now! Please! Want to be held. He kissed Danny again, Want the misery gone.
Danny nodded. Soon, clothes flew off bodies, and heavy breathing pierced the room's silence. Their bodies were soon intertwined. Danny cradled Jason’s body as he slowly entered him. Jason hung on to the taller man.
The humming coming from both their chest intensified as the pleasure rose. The two cores sang out as both men reached the climax of pleasure at the same time.
For the first time in a long time, Jason felt wanted. He felt whole.
Yeah, sorry for the long wait for such a mediocre chapter. Anyway, I hope it came out kind of good.
Also, I think I love torturing Jason a bit too much...
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Chaeri as the 8th and youngest member of BTS.
CHAERI'S MASTERLIST
The relationship between Chaeri and her mother
No one will know the violence it took to become this gentle
❒ warnings: Dysfunctional family, food deprivation, bullying
7 years old Chaeri
"It hurts!" Chaeri whined.
She hated that time of that day, in those classes where your whole body is stretched to its limits and then pulled back tight. The pain always made her feel sick before she came home.
Her teacher kept her knee between her thighs and held both of them pressed flat to the floor. She had said that flexibility training were necessary, but the pressure was terrible.
"It will get better" her teacher insisted "You have to push through the pain, otherwise you'll never get good at this"
Chaeri gritted her teeth, trying not to cry. She hated how her tears always made the pain worse.
"I don't want to be good at this"
──────
9 years old Chaeri
"What happened?!"
Kim Eun's eyes were wide with anger as she looked at her daughter. Chaeri knew that look, she had seen it a million times before. It was the look of disappointment and anger and resentment, all rolled into one.
"I'm sorry" Chaeri cried "It just...slipped"
She tried her hardest, she had practiced over and over the choreography for weeks before going on that stage, to compete with other girls from all parts of France.
She worked hard in the hopes of winning, putting in long hours, catching every nuance of what she wanted to accentuate with her body language alone. But who would have expected a mishap like that?
The hat needed for the continuation of the choreography had slipped off the stage.
Chaeri had been trying to grab it, but she was too late. It had fallen to the ground and she had tripped over it.
"I didn't deserve such an untalented daughter"
──────
10 years old Chaeri
Chaeri was in her room. Her face was still adorned with the sparkling glitter she had used in the competition earlier that evening.
She had prepared so much for this contest, to the point of exhaustion.
Months of rehearsing the same choreography over and over again, perfecting every move, every expression, every breath.
She had come home with a beautiful, shiny silver trophy, just big enough to sit proudly on the shelf above her desk.
The walls were painted a light purple, and the trophy she had just received stood out in its bright tones.
“What did the first-place winner do that you did not?” Chaeri, who had not heard the woman's footsteps stopping at the door frame to her room, jumped in fright at Eun's low, stiff voice.
The look on her face was one of disappointment, but not surprise.
There was a minute of silence before the girl found the right words. She knew that it would only lead to more unpleasant consequences if she gave an answer that the woman would find stupid.
“She… she was perfect,” Chaeri admitted, the admittance a shard of glass in her throat.
“Perfection is what we strive for” her mother stated “Anything less is simply rehearsal.”
Chaeri’s fingers curled into the fabric of her skirt, the trophy’s shine now seemed to have suddenly become dulled, taking the form of a pale witness to failing. “I thought you would be proud…just a little maybe”
“To be proud, Chaeri, one must first be satisfied” Kim Eun said, holding back a bitter laugh. She could not believe what she was hearing. “And satisfaction is earned, not given for mediocrity. Second place is just the first loser.”
“I’ll do better next time.”
“Do better?” Kim Eun scoffed, stepping into the room, her presence overwhelming. “Doing better is not enough. You must be the best. Anything less is a waste of my investment in you.”
Chaeri’s hands clenched into fists, her nails digging into her palms. “Your investment” she echoed. Feeling more than ever like an object and not a daughter.
"Yes, my investment,” she affirmed, disgusted to have to repeat herself. Ashamed to have received such a response “I’ve given you everything— the best teachers, the best opportunities. And yet, you consistently fall short.”
The room felt smaller, the air thicker. Chaeri’s breaths came in short gasps, as if the very act of breathing was a challenge. She wanted to scream, to lash out, to tell her mother that she was more than an investment, more than a project to be perfected.
She opened her mouth to speak. Her eyes burned with anger and rebellion, not at her mother, but at her tormentor. For all of her life.
But she had no time to do so, as the woman turned and told her “I expect you to practice until you can’t stand,” she said, her voice devoid of warmth. “Maybe then, you’ll have a chance at being worthy of this family”
──────
11 years old Chaeri
"Mom!"
Still in her bun and the warm baby pink jumpsuit, Chaeri wandered through the many rooms of her huge mansion looking for her mother.
It was almost sunset, and by that time, Chaeri was usually never home.
The ballet classes she took would occupy her entire day, giving her free time only after dinner and on weekends.
Hence, hearing the young girl's voice around the house disturbed her mom.
"What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be in class?"
Chaeri followed her mother's voice that led her to the woman's bedroom.
She was rarely allowed to enter that room. As her mother said, a woman's bedroom is a sanctuary that must not be violated.
Bullshit, Chaeri thought. Her mother thought she was stupid enough to believe that shit just because she was only 11 years old, but she knew perfectly well the real reason: Her mother was sleeping with her dance teacher and didn't want her children to see the evidence of it.
But she honestly didn't care. Her mother's private life was none of her business.
Kim Eun, who never seemed to have a hair out of place and always looked like she just stepped off the pages of a magazine, was there. Even though her makeup was usually so subtle that it did not even seem real, today, without wearing any makeup at all, she was more beautiful than a normal woman could ever hope to be. Her skin looked as if the sun had kissed her whole face, giving her smooth cheeks and an ivory complexion.
"I'm home" Chaeri greeted her softly, remembering all the times her mother had scolded her for being too loud and clumsy
"I can tell you're home, I asked you why" Her mother crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow, a sure sign she was already annoyed by the conversation, but Chaeri ignored it, she knew that what she was going to say would change her mood.
"I got the role of Columbine in the Nutcracker!"
"Well, I'm not surprised" Kim Eun said and Chaeri's face lit up, thinking she was about to receive congratulations from her mother "You have an innate talent for earning good-for-nothing roles"
"But this is the role I've been waiting for" Chaeri protested "All my classmates wanted to be 'Clara'. I think Columbine is a much more fun character and then, the duet with Harlequin is very difficult, just because I dance less doesn't mean I'm-"
"Stop it" In a sudden outburst, her mother's voice was louder than usual and Chaeri stopped midsentence.
The usually graceful Kim Eun, who towered over her daughter with her imposing height, looked like a mad woman. She only revealed this side of herself within the walls of her home
"Stop talking nonsense" she hissed "Did you even try to get the role of 'Clara'?"
Dropping her head, Chaeri turned to look at the tips of her shoes. They were beautiful; shiny white so bright you could see yourself reflected in them. There was no occasion when her mother did not remind her how all those 'beautiful' things she got them because of her and no one else.
"I tried, even though it wasn't the role I wanted"
"And you couldn't get it"
"No"
"Obviously, you tried not hard enough," she snapped back "You are a disappointment. Why can't you be as good as your brother? You will bring shame upon my reputation"
"No matter what you expected of me, I wanted the role of Columbine anyway" Chaeri said, trying to keep the hurt out of her voice "So I'm not interested in what you have to say"
"You little- " Before her mother could finish, Chaeri turned around and ran out of the room, not wanting to be hit by her.
──────
12 years old Chaeri
The kitchen was quiet, the only sound was the soft ticking of the clock on the wall. Chaeri sat at the table, staring at the plate in front of her. It was almost empty, just a few slices of apple and a handful of almonds. This was her dinner, the same as it had been for the past few weeks.
Her mother believed that a ballerina’s figure was paramount, that it was the key to grace and beauty on stage. “You must be light as a feather, my dear” she would say, her voice as cold as the untouched food on Chaeri’s plate. “No one wants to see a heavy dancer.”
Chaeri knew better than to argue. The last time she had asked for more food, her mother had looked at her as if she had asked for the moon. “You want to be a dancer, don’t you?” she had said, her tone implying that hunger was a small price to pay for success.
But Chaeri was tired. Tired of being hungry, tired of the constant ache in her stomach that no amount of water could quell. She missed the warmth of a full meal, the satisfaction of eating something meaty.
All because she'd been found to be one pound over her classmates during the monthly body check at dance school. That damned pound, her teacher had pointed out, was too much for a dancer whose job is to be lifted into the air by others. "Don't be selfish" the teacher had told her, "you'll make anyone who does a pas de deux with you lose their breath at that weight."
Never before had she felt so humiliated, never before had she been so ashamed of the chocolate chip cookies in her backpack that she had brought with her as a snack.
She pushed the plate away, frustrated with that dinner that could not be called 'dinner'.
Her mother smiled at her when she saw that she got up from the table without touching a single almond. Her stomach turned and she felt nauseous.
How perverse was it that she had to treat her body unnaturally in order to gain the approval of the woman who had given her life?
She caught a glimpse of herself in the reflection of the window. The moonlight cast a pale glow on her face, highlighting the sharpness of her cheekbones, the hollowness of her eyes. She was the picture of a perfect ballerina, and yet, she had never felt more imperfect.
She turned away from the window, from the ghostly reflection that seemed to mock her. She would go to bed hungry again tonight, but in her dreams, she would feast like a queen.
taglist: @alixnsuperstxr | @bts-dream | @enchantingbrowneyedgirl | @ycuvi | @cosmicwintr
#bts 8th member#bts female addition#bts drabble#bts female member#kpop female oc#kpop female addition#bts imagines#bts x reader#kpop female member#bts addition#bts eighth member#bts
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JWCT Countdown Day #1: Favorite Character - Yaz
This is a snippet from my Isla Sorna AU (read more here) about Yaz having a nightmare like she had in season 4. Sorry girly <3
One moment she’s staring at the corrugated ceiling of the ACU van, and the next she’s looking up through a web of sunlight piercing the overhead foliage. She instinctively raises her hand to block the light, but the movement is sluggish, weighed down by the kind of exhaustion she only feels after a particularly grueling track meet.
Or, she realizes with a sinking feeling in her gut, after she’s been running for her life.
A surge of panic spurs her to her feet but she only manages to stumble a few inches forward. The impossibly thick carpet of intertwined roots and thickets clutch at her feet, shackling her in place. And oh God this is not the place she wants to be.
The jungle looms and sways all around her, rippling thickly in the wind. As she struggles to move, the sound of it folding in on itself gets louder and more violent, eventually turning to a deafening crash of leaves on leaves and whatever else has the misfortune of getting trapped in the maelstrom.
Despite the warm rush of wind against her cheeks, she shivers.
She falls back with a gasp and frantically glances around, narrowing her focus to the dark tunnels formed by the gaps between tree trunks and the flat arms of ferns, the ends of which could conceal any number of dangers.
A small voice in the back of her head reminds her that this isn’t Isla Nublar and that she’s survived much worse than whatever a remote island in the Pacific boonies can throw her way. But that voice only grows smaller as she hears the distinctive crunching of leaves followed by rhythmic tremors beneath her fingertips in the dirt.
She shuts her eyes and immediately curls in on herself, trembling with the knowledge that she’s trapped, frozen in place as the roar of the wind gives way to the shuffle of heavy limbs and the strained breathing of an animal unaccustomed to the sun-soaked air.
She keeps her eyes screwed shut as she’s enveloped in a wash of hot air that smells like the dead meat she’s surely about to become. The light drains from her eyelids and teeth as big as her hands burst through the supple flesh of her arms.
She wakes up with a scream, but still, she wakes up.
The sensation of teeth puncturing her skin fades as the carcass of the ACU van materializes around her, a dark cylinder lit only by the thin threads of moonlight filtering through old, boltless holes in the roof.
“Yaz?”
She nearly jumps out of her skin before realizing that she’s not alone. In fact, she’s about as not alone as possible, being one of six kids stuffed into the back of a van already crowded with the alien tentacles of vines and the spindly tips of weeds growing up through the wheel wells.
Kenji, apparently having fallen from his perch on the wheel hood, lays sprawled across her legs, looking up at her in bewilderment. Sammy is at her back, rubbing soothing circles against her shoulders, and Brooklyn is in front of her, looking at her with the half-confident eyes of someone accustomed to failing to make others feel better.
Yaz resists the urge to extract herself from the mess of bodies, including her own. She wants to crawl out of her skin and into the grass, away from the friction of the group’s proximity in the van, and away away away from this nightmare she can’t seem to wake from.
But even if it is a nightmare, her friends are here, trying to calm her down to the best of their abilities. She focuses on the weight of Sammy’s arms around her waist, the feel of Kenji’s chest pressed to her thighs, and the assuring lilt of Brooklyn’s voice that she just now begins to hear.
“It’s okay Yaz,” Brooklyn says. “Just breathe.”
She does breathe, and she keeps breathing, one breath after another, until her heart stops wrestling with her ribs, and the tears she’s fought so hard to suppress spring to her eyes.
“I want to go home,” she whimpers.
She doesn’t need to look up to know that the others feel the same.
#i really shoulda written something nice and fluffy for yaz buuuut#this was in my drafts already >.< so sorry my girl#jwctcountdown#jwcc#yasmina fadoula#light yasammy#kenji kon#brooklyn#jurassic world camp cretaceous#isla sorna au#sorry this is a day late!! so excited for the coming prompts tho :>
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I was just reading back through the notes and thoughts I had as I was reading volume 6 and the situations that happen with Mu Qing, Feng Xin, and Xie Lian's parents are still what sticks out to me the most from this book and not the 100 stabbings.
I understand where Mu Qing is coming from. He wanted to do what he thought was going to help everyone the most, and let's be honest it was probably the best option they had. Did he go about doing it the wrong way? Yes. Can I fault him for it? No.
The situation with the heavenly officials in the cultivation cave was also a fucked situation from the get go. Should Xie Lian just be the bigger person and leave? Yeah probably, but I don't blame him for not leaving. Mu Qing leaving isn't what made me cry, it was Mu Qing staying silent and then running after Xie Lian that made me cry. My heart was broken for XL. In his eyes, not only did one of his oldest friends leave him when he was at his worst, the friend then comes back with new friends and sides with them.
Then on the flip side, we've got Feng Xin who I'm 100% sure would have done absolutely ANYTHING Xie Lian would ask of him (I mean obviously, he left when XL ordered him to). Loyal to a fault Feng Xin. He was essentially trying to do the same exact thing as Mu Qing, just in a different way.
It's so glaringly obvious how much those two care about Xie Lian and how they are just trying to do everything in their power to help him and his parents.
To be honest, I really need to reread Feng Xin being told to leave and then the queen and kings deaths. I was crying so badly, I could barely read some parts.
The queen and king hit me like a fucking truck. I know that they both felt so horribly guilty for the way things ended up and for Xie Lian being banished. I can unfortunately relate to this. I was at my lowest and homeless with my child and for a while I really did think that he would be better off if I wasn't around.
The fact that it happens within such a short amount of time after Feng Xin leaves is what makes it even worse. They knew Xie Lian, their only child, would be completely alone afterwards. Maybe they thought Feng Xin was going to come back? Who knows.
The most heart breaking part of this book to me though was that Hua Cheng is literally the only person that never left Xie Lian willingly. Every time he left, he was made to do so forcefully.
All 3 of them were in their early 20s when they went through all this trauma. None of them knew how to cope so they all did what they thought would be best.
Anyways this series is one of my absolute favorites now. I am always down to talk about this series so please comment or message me.
#tgcf spoilers#tgcf seven seas#heaven official's blessing#tgcf volume 6#xianle trio#xie lian#mu qing#feng xin#xianle#someone please talk about thebdamn books with me#fuck jun wu#if you cant tell from my emoji usage i was crying a whole lot durring this read
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Imagine being in the past, you’re a heavily pregnant woman, 41 weeks, twins and you already started to feel contractions. You don’t know anything of this, your mom died when you were young, so she never told you anything about pregnancy and birth
You’re totally alone in this, the rest of your tribe are men and this is your first baby in your task of bringing more women to keep the tribe.
You were 4’9, dark curly hair, big brown eyes and very thick in result of all of the exercise hunting, climbing and running. Now you can’t do anything of that, since 7 months ago the whole tribe have been keeping you safe and helping you to grow your little one bringing extra food and building a big house for you.
It’s now the end of that, you’re in active labour but you don’t even know, anyone in the tribe knows anything about birth or even pregnancy because that’s a “woman’s thing”, in your culture any men can be during the childbirth, so they just don’t need to know anything. You’ve been feeling cramps and a lot of pressure in your back, but you’ve been feeling that since your belly dropped a few weeks ago, so it’s impossible for you to know the difference.
The male that impregnated you is who comes every day at 8am, 1pm and 8pm to bring you food and check if you need something. It’s 9pm right now and you just had dinner, a big cramp hits your big belly and you moan so loud that someone that was near comes to your door running and asks if its everything alright, you just answer "Yes, i think its just another cramp. Thanks"- he walks away, you start feeling a lot of pressure in your back and a sharp pain hits you making you fall on your knees moaning in pain.
You start to breathe heavily, now you start thinking about how does the babies come out, if theyre already inside your body, they have to come out after a few time of being inside no?. You start thinking how your baby got in there, maybe how babies get in, they get out no? Its simple, but ... the only thing you can have in mind now its "size" how much does a baby heights? how much a baby weights? is it going to fit...down there?
Last time you saw your little opening was months ago, you lost the capability to see it several months ago, with your big bump its imposible since almost the beggining. You remember its not as big as a baby human, thats obvious.
Another sharp paind hits you in your lower bump, you start breathing through the pain as you used to do when you get hurt during activities in the tribe, but this is starting to be the worst pain youve ever experienced.
Now youre pretty sure that youre about to pop, your baby is about to come out from your vagina, maybe its going to slide out of you without any effort, but the worst pain you have ever felt in your whole life makes you fall now in your back and a lot of water gushes out of you, with this its very obvious that your baby its not coming out in a very beautiful way.
Youre on your back on a huge carpet that your tribe made for you, breathing heavily with no one that could help you. The pains are getting worse and you can just breathe trough them moaning and screaming very loud.
Its been hours, youve been changing positions the whole time, you tried squatting, by your side, by your other side, squatting again, standing, on your back again, until you tought, "if the baby comes out as it comes in, i should get how they got the baby inside me".
As fast as you can, heavily you turn your self into hands and knees position, as sooon as you got in position you started to feel the worst pressure ever, you feel like you have to poop, like you have to get something out of you RIGHT NOW, you feel the urge to push.
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I remember a post where someone said that Batman isn’t adopting orphans to turn them from children into vigilantes so they’ll end up like him (a hero), but that he’s adopting orphans to turn them from vigilantes into children so they’ll end up like him (not a villain). I think the point was that most of the Batkids were already on a path that could potentially lead to crime and villainy by the time Bruce got to them, so taking them under his wing and mentoring them kept them from losing their way. Can’t find the post again, but I feel like reprocessing it by rephrasing it for myself.
You can’t make choices for people, but people have to have the choice in the first place. If you don’t have the resources and the support to harness your pain and suffering and channel it into something productive and honorable, it has the potential to become something much worse. If you don’t have the means to heal, then healing isn’t going to happen. In the case of Gotham, ‘something much worse’ appears to happen on a semi-regular basis and results in a new member joining Gotham’s Rogue gallery.
I’m a firm believer that once Bruce realized the best way to keep crime down was to intercept the would-be-Rogues before they arrived at the point of violence, Wayne Enterprises started pouring as much into Gotham’s welfare and societal infrastructure as waynely possible. The existing Rogue gallery is kept at bay through cooperation with Gotham PD, trying and failing to make Arkham Asylum effective, and being the Batman. They will die, not by Batman’s hand but one way or another, eventually. What if Bruce could starve out the violence and the crime? What if those who made their choice and refuse to change their ways bear the consequences of their actions, grow old, and no one picks up the slack behind them? What if people see that, BECAUSE Batman refuses to kill and forces the villains to face the music rather than escape through a quick death, villainy isn’t the answer and doesn’t fix anything? All villainy earns you is a punch in the face and a trip to jail or an understaffed asylum. If you want your life to get better, you have to find another way because crime clearly won’t work. Sure, this would never deter everyone, but it might bring the numbers down just enough to make a difference.
And then Bruce finds these kids. Kids who are alone or hurt or stubborn or scared and for one reason or another, Al even at their young age, they’re already at risk of choosing the route of villainy. They have the reasons, they have the motivation, they have the skill. Bruce looks around and sees that no one else is stepping up to intervene.
So he redirects them. He establishes himself as their primary authority figure (just as Alfred did for him, whether he had the same mentality as Bruce or not) and lays the no-killing rule on thick. He trains them and makes them better than the villains that already are and the villains that will be and the villains they might have become without him. He gives them a place to call home, if they so choose. He lets them be kids, he lets them be HIS kids, and slowly the family builds over time. He gives them a choice to reject villainy and he makes it enticing. He makes heroism look a little more fun, he makes it seem a little bit easier, and he makes them a little bit braver.
They make their own choices. Not all of them adhere to the no-killing rule the way Bruce does. Not all of them stay home and dwell in Wayne Manor full time. Not all of them even stay in Gotham.
But they don’t become villains. With very few exceptions, the Batman rarely stands against his kids. Whatever they are, it’s miles away from what they might have been without Bruce. It made a difference. The danger Bruce saw when he met each kid did not come to pass.
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