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eilidh-eternal · 4 months

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You make a promise

Part of the Metanoia series | Part 1 | Masterlist |

| SingleDad!Johnny x f!reader | 18+ MDNI | CW mentions of SA, stalking, general PTSD warning for reader and Johnny |

It happened again.

You knew it would. Know that part of being a woman in this world means living in near constant hyper-vigilance; with an acute awareness of your surroundings.

Should have known better. Should have been more aware. Should have kicked and screamed. Should have fought back.

It’s disappointment that curls around your mind like a serpent and sinks its fangs in deep, floods you with venomous, paralyzing thoughts.

Paralyzed. That’s a good word for it. Pinned against that bookshelf and presently burrowed beneath the blankets in the dark, body curled in on itself with trembling hands tucked tight to your chest. Small. Meek. Trapped in a body that betrays everything you taught it to do. Disappointed that the months of training you endured in the aftermath proved useless when tested outside of a controlled environment and theoretical scenarios.

It happened again–and you let it.

“Bubby?” Isobel is strapped in her car seat, kicking impatient little feet while Johnny works to unfasten the belt across her lap.

“Yes leannan?”

“Why’re the polis here?”

His hands go still, hovering above the buckle, and he turns his head over his shoulder just enough to glimpse the two lids standing on your front stoop. The air in his lungs rushes out of him, chin falling to his breastbone as the panic winding tight in his chest slowly unfurls.

This is home. Isobel is safe. Everyone is safe. This isn’t that day, he reminds himself, but seeing them on your doorstep strikes flint against steeled nerves. The carefully compartmentalized part of his brain that he reserves for work wrestles itself free from its confines and floods his body with adrenaline. Makes the hair on his nape stand on end and the muscles in his jaw tighten until it aches from the tension.

With Isobel extracted from the car, perched on his hip and her book bag slung over the opposite shoulder, he turns to nudge the car door closed, just in time to see your door crack open. Watches the two men present their badges and a folded bundle of paperwork. Gnashes his teeth when he sees, even from the street, wide and fearful eyes that scan everything behind them. Eyes that note his presence and dart away to catalog the next detail. Trodden snow and parked cars. The woman across the street, walking her dog. Surveying your front yard with the same scrutiny he does an engagement zone.

Isobel squirming in his arms tears his focus away from you, forces him to register the burning sensation at the tip of his nose, the tops of his ears, cold winter air surely biting into her skin just as mercilessly as it does his own.

“I dunno. Let’s get ye inside, aye? Dinnae want to find any missing fingers or toes tonight.”

To anyone else it would look like he’s taking his time with the ice, treading carefully with the little girl in his arms so as not to send them both crashing down into the snow. Anyone else would see lids next door and mind their own damn business.

Johnny’s never been particularly good at that.

Their presence alone is enough to raise his hackles, to pull the pin from his nerves and toy with letting the hammer fall. Just enough to see if they’re as trained up as the SNP says they are. But all that’s likely to do is scare you more, and he can’t have that. He just found you, just started to get to know you. He’ll be damned if he lets another rash decision chase a pretty thing like you away.

The thought of it twists and knots in his stomach, plucks at the out-of-tune strings wound through his heart in a weeping facsimile of something he doesn’t dare put a name to. Can’t name because it gives it too much power. Makes it too real.

It’s slow going, pretending to fumble with the keys in the cold. Feigning indifference as he grapples with “—in custody, for now—” and “—press charges?”

The snow and ice outside is a brilliant, blinding white. Inside, all Johnny can see is red.

Charges? What on earth happened that she needs to press charges for?

“Bubby, too tight,” Isobel grouses, and he loosens his arm around her with a sigh, lowering her to the ground to help with her jacket and boots.

“‘M sorry, Bell. Didnae mean to squeeze ye so tight.” Curls bounce around her face as she teeters on one foot, hands on his shoulders to keep her balance.

“It’s okay.” She shifts to her other foot, pulling free of the fleece-lined boots. “Ye’re makin’ a twisty face again,” she observes, and her brows mirror the pinch of his own.

Too damn observant.

“Ah know,” he admits, and his chest heaves with another sigh, reaching up to smooth the crinkles in her forehead with his thumb. “Dinna worry about me and muh twisty face. How ‘bout some hot cocoa? We’ll warm up and then see about supper, hm?” Her face splits into a toothy grin and he softens at the sight. Lets her latch onto his hand and drag him into the kitchen.

“May we come in?”

No.

“Of course.” You take a step back, pulling the door open just wide enough to let the two officers through. Melting snow pools on polished hardwood under their boots, and you quickly herd them towards the carpeted sitting room before the water can warp your floors. You sit opposite of where they do on your sofa, big fluffy robe pulled tight over flannel pants and a pullover.

“He’ll be released on Thursday morning, unless ye’d like to go ahead with the charges for—”

“—No.” Your fingers curl into your palms. “Just the restraining order. I—” Can’t see his face again. Don’t want to be in the same room with him again. “—just the restraining order. Please.”

The shorter of the two nods and produces a pen from his coat, scribbling something in the margins of the papers he holds before sliding them across the coffee table towards you.

“Tha’s the station an’ phone number,” he says, tapping on the notes he made. “We’ll ring ye when he’s released. An’ we’ll ‘ave the protective order in place by tomorrow. He shouldnae be botherin’ ye anymore.”

All you can manage is a nod and a whispered, “Thank you.” They’re kind enough. Most people are.

Until they’re not.

——

It’s dark outside when you hear a knock at your front door, and your hand immediately reaches for your phone, breath forced out of your lungs by the panic squeezing them inside your chest.

There’s a muffled voice. A giggle, followed by shushing and shuffling feet. “Dinnae want to spoil the surprise,” you hear in a familiar lilt.

Johnny?

You draw a relieved breath and wince when your nails press into the marks on your palms, angry crescent moons, and pull yourself up off the couch to peer through the edge of the curtains.

Johnny and Isobel stand, the former holding the latter, on your stoop, small pan of… something, in Isobels gloveless hands.

Bewildered as you are, you shed the blanket from your shoulders, smoothing a hand over your rumpled jumper, and hurry to the door, fretful over Isobels fingers in the frigid air.

The door cracks open, and with it, so do their smiles.

“Hi, bonnie—”

“—Surprise!” they say at the same time.

You stand dumbfounded in your doorway, hand braced on the wooden frame, and Isobel holds out what might be something of a cake beneath a mountain of whipped cream towards you.

“It’s a trifle,” she proudly announces. You turn a questioning eye to Johnny.

“Didnae have the fixin’s for a proper cake,” he supplies. “Figured it would be a sort of… olive branch.”

Olive branch? Why would he need—?

Clipped memories from several days ago replay in your head. Coming home. Sitting in the car. Johnny calling after you. Practically running away and slamming the door on him. Shutting him out.

And here he stands, thinking he’s done something worth apologizing over.

“You don’t need- you didn’t… oh, come in out of the cold, will you? No sense in freezing out there.” You push the door open wider, beckoning them in.

“Thought ye’d never ask,” he teases with a wink and shuffles inside, following you to the kitchen with Isobel in tow behind him.

“Here, let’s put that on the table.” Isobel gladly relinquishes the pan and you’re relieved when you feel its warmth seeping into your fingers, a little less worried about both of their lack of proper winter attire. “I’ve never served trifle… would bowls be best?”

“Aye, ye’ll probably need spoons too. More of a pudding than a cake,” he says as he settles himself in a chair, Isobel quick to clamber up onto his lap.

You’re surprised by your own lack of nerves. The dishes don’t clatter together when you pull them from the cabinet as they have in recent days, and you don’t feel so uneasy with your back to them. Don’t feel the need to look over your shoulder when Isobel thrums her little fingers on the wooden table, or the deep rumble of Johnny’s voice, speaking to her in hushed tones.

You’re safe here. Safe with them.

Johnny’s right about the dessert too. It’s warm, freshly made, and it’s made for a bit of a runny affair, melted whipped cream seeping into custard and some sort of cake on the bottom.

“It’s good. Thank you for, um… Thank you for sharing.” You spoon another bite into your mouth before you can shove your foot in it. Isobel seems to be in another plane of existence entirely, too absorbed with the confection smeared at the corners of her mouth. The same can’t be said about Johnny. He’s focused wholly on you, dessert in front of him a secondary matter. Tertiary, even, with Isobel perched on his knee and his arm looped around her midsection.

The warmth in his eyes has shifted, burns brighter, in a seeking sort of way. Searching for tinder to catch on. More air to billow and blaze. “Can I ask ye somethin’?”

You settle your silverware in your bowl and fold your hands in your lap, pulling the inside of your cheek between your teeth when your nails slice into your palms again. “Sure.”

The silence isn’t uncomfortable so much as it is heavy, laden with the weight of his unspoken question as he continues his assessment of you. For a moment, you wonder if maybe it’s you who owes him an apology.

“Havnae seen ye for a few days. Yer car’s nae moved and yer curtain’s been closed. And last week, when ye–” He pauses abruptly, mulling over his next words carefully. “Ye looked like a green recruit, fresh off the field.”

Terrified.

Shell shocked.

“That have anythin’ to do with the fellows who dropped by today?”

Your eyes flick between his, the bowl on the table in front of you, and Isobel–still lost in her own little microcosm. Untainted by the dark things lurking just beyond her understanding. You knew he’d seen them. Knew he might ask about them at some point. What you hadn’t expected was a trojan horse in the form of a trifle. Thought you would have more time to think of something to explain the situation away.

This isn’t something he should be burdened with. Not over you. Not when he has Isobel to look out for.

When you finally meet his eyes again they’re no less dim. Still searching for words buried beneath ash on your tongue.

“I… Yes. It did.” You swallow, shove down the knot working it’s way up from your chest. “I was followed, out at the shops,” you lie. “The man, he wouldn’t leave me alone, so… the shopkeeper called for the polis. He left me alone after that, but they still took a statement.” You glance towards Isobel again. To give yourself reprieve from the intensity of his gaze and to ensure she’s not listening too closely to the conversation being had. “Guess it wasn’t the first time he’d done it. They came by today to… to let me know he’s in custody. Wanted to know if I wanted to press charges.”

He’s quiet, unearthly still on the wooden chair, staring hard at the expression you’re doing your best to keep calm.

“This happen before?” he questions, hand curling into a fist on the table.

“No,” you lie–again.

He nods, a near imperceptible tilt of his chin. “Are ye filing?”

You nod in return. No need to go into the specifics.

His shoulders relax a fraction when he looses a long breath. “No wonder ye wouldnae come near me that day,” he muses aloud. “‘M sure my givin’ ye a fright in yer car didnae help much, either.”

“It’s not your fault,” you interject.

“Maybe so, but…” His eyes drift with his words, searching the patterns of the wood grain for something. “Can I ask ye another question?” When he looks up at you again, you nod. “Promise ye’ll tell me, if anythin’ like that happens again? Dinna like the thought of ye dealin’ with it on yer own, lass.”

“Tell ye what?” Isobel queries, bowl of trifle empty in front of her, but his gaze remains firmly on you, and you don’t think he’s willing to take no for an answer.

“Okay. I promise.”

Next>>>

©️Eilidh-Eternal.2024 ~ The intellectual property of Eilidh-Eternal is not permitted for reposting, transcription, translation or use with AI technologies.

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david-talks-sw · 7 months

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When 'Star Wars' dilutes the impact of a "Kurosawa samurai standoff"...

It's no secret that one of the major inspirations for Star Wars was Akira Kurosawa movies. The Hidden Fortress influenced the basic structure of the first film, was a basis for Lucas' character archetypes and his use of narrative POVs.

But, really, all of Kurosawa's films were an influence on the making of Star Wars. Including the duels seen in his and other samurai films from the 60s.

Dunno if you've seen a kendo fight, but they're pretty similar.

The duelists size each other up, and there's a lot of mind games going on before the strike actually happens.

If you hold your sword this way, the other guy adjusts his stance.

You move your foot that way, the adversary responds accordingly.

Cinematically, this process allows you to play with a whole treasure trove of elements to build up the drama and suspense. We see this slow-yet-tense approach to dueling reflected all over the Original Trilogy. And we've seen it again in recent Disney-released content.

The perfect and first real example of this in Star Wars is the fight between Ben Kenobi and Maul, in Rebels.

The tension increases more...

... and more until the two fighters move, the music swells...

... and then it reaches its climax.

Beautifully executed.

Dave Filoni's done his homework, it shows, and while it's an awesome homage, narratively it also holds weight. There's a reason why this fight is so quick:

This time, Obi-Wan isn't fighting to avenge the death of his master, he's not fighting to save his own life... he's fighting to protect Luke's. And that means there's no time to fuck about. He'll end the conflict swiftly and decisively, he won't let it come to a prolonged acrobatic fight. So he lures Maul in by making him think he's taking Qui-Gon's form, and strikes true when Maul, increasingly consumed by his own rage to the point of blindness, falls for it.

Again: a wonderful fight and an excellent homage.

Then we get to Luke's stand-off with Kylo on Crait, in The Last Jedi.

An interesting take on the trope, also with meaningful narrative impact. As Rian Johnson writes in the TLJ screenplay:

"This is not like a saber fight. This like an old-fashioned samurai duel."

Here too, the tension gets built up...

... and every time we're close to getting that climax, Luke dodges.

It leaves a feeling of dissatisfaction, which is exactly what Kylo is feeling as he boils with rage.

Suddenly, we do get the climax...

... and a twist. Luke was never actually there. Boom. Those inserts during the build-up phase? If you look at them again they're clues (Luke doesn't leave a mark on the ground, salt doesn't land on his clothes, etc). Luke wasn't engaging because he wasn't actually there, he was buying time for the Resistance to escape.

Okay. Cool.

Next time we see a "Kurosawa" duel... it's here, in The Mandalorian.

Again, a lot of posing, slow movements and patience, as is expected from the trope.

But we know nothing about the opponent Ahsoka is fighting other than her name is Morgan... so no emotional impact, there.

At some point, Ahsoka loses a lightsaber. The apprentice to the Chosen One is struggling against some rando.

We find out later on that Morgan is a Nightsister from Dathomir, and that's cool... but we already know how Jedi-trained folks fare against the Dathomiri.

If you ask me, it feels like manufactured stakes. But that's beside the point. In fact, y'know what? It's fine.

Though the impact of this duel isn't as great as its predecessors, the whole episode is filled with visual homages to Kurosawa's work.

It makes sense that the duel would be too. Also it's the first time we're seeing Ahsoka in live action, in a lightsaber duel, the hype is real. Let's cut 'em some slack.

So we come to the series Ahsoka... where almost every duel in the the show has the Kurosawa posturing and tip-toeing and... I dunno. I was bored?

Like, the primary purpose of this approach to duels is that it's meant to be suspenseful and intense... and now it's not.

Because we know Ahsoka is gonna beat the crap outta these droids...

... so why even bother faking some semblance of "what's her next move gonna be?" suspense? There's a hole right behind her, gee, I truly wonder.

Oh, you think putting her against an Inquisitor's gonna make us fear for her life, wonder if she's gonna get outta this situation unscathed?

She was wiping the floor with two of them at the same time, a decade prior. At 17, she was killing Inquisitors while disarmed.

Do you really expect your audience to fear for her life in a fight against Marrok?

So we get to the fight with Baylan, and the posturing and studying opponent's next move would be welcome here (two Order 66 survivors, knew Anakin, both well-trained former Jedi)...

... if we hadn't literally seen that same dynamic with Marrok who, again, we knew was gonna die.

No tension was built in either moment, the only thing it achieved was me pressing >> on my keyboard.

It's not captivating anymore, it's just slow and un-dynamic.

Bottom line:

Tributes to Kurosawa are nice. They're part of what makes Star Wars what it is. But c'mon, we get it already.

Lightsaber duelists don't need to tiptoe around each other and change poses at every fight. Because when the actually meaningful duels come up (like the one with Baylan), the impact will be lessened.

The "Kurosawa samurai duel" is artistic and interesting, but it should be used sparingly in order to maintain its charm and not get old and trope-y. AKA too much of a good thing becomes a bad thing.

#ahsoka series #ahsoka tano #baylan skoll #marrok #ahsoka #star wars #meta #sw negativity #long post

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omwife · 8 months

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Sanji Vinsmoke

small series or just falling for sanji/getting with him. part 1!

summary: sanji is gawking to zoro over nami when you surprise him from behind. he figures out that you're another crew mate who was absent for when he initially joined and fawns over you.

notes: bare with me cos im not far (at ALL) into the show and know nothing about how boats work. (do pirates use those wheels? they do right? they use it in this fic anyway.) alsoooo idk french so these r google translations

espèce de sale garçon - you dirty boy

"oh nami's so amazing." sanji said as he leaned his body forward from the barrel he was sat on, and took another long puff of the cigarette he was holding.

"shut up cook." zoro mumbled as he continued his practise of his technique.

"i dunno zoro, he is right." you said as you loomed over sanjis shoulder, who jumped at your voice, while everyone else seemed to perk up at it.

"y/n!!! you're awake!" nami said as she ran towards you and began rambling about what happened while you were asleep.

"y/nnnnnnnnnnnn." luffy called as his arms stretched out from his seat in front of the wheel to your shoulders.

"no- no luffy- no you're going to catapult into me- luffy- let go." you tried as you struggled against his hold before his body flung itself at you, pushing you both to the ground.

"luffy you idiot!" zoro screamed as nami ran over to the wheel to make sure the boat steered in the right direction.

sanji however, had been sat gaping at the way you looked and how he hadn't seen you before. it was a ship? how did he not notice your presence before? had you come aboard from a small ship?

"Y/NNN!!"

"USSOP!!"

"YOU'RE AWAKE!!" ussop yelled as he grabbed onto your forearms, you doing the same to him, and jumped up and down while spinning in a circle.

"I'M AWAKE!!" you yelled back just as loud and matched the large smile on his face as he pulled you into a hug.

"well maddam, how come i've never seen you before?" sanji said as his brain suddenly started working again, no longer being stopped by your beauty.

"i was asleep." you said as if it was normal for you to have been asleep for days on end, the smile not leaving your face as ussop wrapped his arm around your shoulder while smiling at sanji too.

"right.. well you must be hungry, any special requests love?"

"well aren't you a flirt?" you said as you unwrapped your self from ussop to move yourself closer to sanji, while ussop only raised an eyebrow at this with his smile standing brighter, "how about i come and oversee you make the food so we can make up on lost time?" you cooed as you wrapped a hand under the collar of sanjis shirt and fixed it, while he seemingly died inside.

his cheeks heated up at the unexpected flirting from you, while ussop snickered having been watching this in front view.

"oh i'll have something to eat too!" luffy said as he popped up from behind sanji, having listened in as soon as he heard the conversation switch to be about food.

sanji quickly turned and started questioning luffy about what he wanted in an attempt to hide the prominent blush that had creeped its way onto his face after your reply.

"good to have you back y/n." zoro grumbled as he tapped your back with the duller part of his sword as you followed behind sanji, causing you to turn back and throw a wink and a smile over your shoulder to him.

"looks like shes got sanji already." ussop said as he saw the kitchen doors close with you luffy and sanji inside, before luffy was pushed out of the door by two mystery hands.

zoro snorts at this, "guess they've both met their matches."

"so, you were asleep the whole time?"

"yeah. i got knocked up pretty bad in a fight on the island we met ussop at, so it took a while for me to come back to life i guess." you said as you sat at a stool and leaned your chin on your hands as you watched him pull out pots and other equipment.

"i would've forced myself to wake up sooner if i knew someone like you would've been here when i woke up." you said with a sly grin that only grew larger when sanjis movement paused for a moment, shocked, and quickly resumed his work as he decided to do it with his back turned so you didn't see his face.

"how bold you are darling. do you have a preference for sweet or savoury?"

"sweet please."

chills ran down sanjis back, your voice was like music to his ears, it was smooth and sweet and what you said didn't help with calming his already building love for you.

"so, introduce yourself to me." you grinned as he turned, leaving the food to cook on the stove top as he wiped his hands with a cloth.

"i am sanji vinsmoke, your ships cook. however i could be much more for you darling." he purred as he rolled his sleeves further up to his elbows.

"ai! you're dirty." you said as you giggled and only leaned further towards him.

"mon amor i couldn't resist when you look so perfect and pretty." he hummed as he grinned at you before turning his back and continuing his cooking.

"mm espèce de sale garçon."

this only made his smile grow as he plated up your food, making sure to make it as presentable as he could, while he put much less effort in plating luffys plate of barely anything but meat.

"call out to luffy dear?" he asked as you with a smile as he started on cleaning the dishes already.

you got up with a pink hue appearing on your cheeks, "luffy! your foods ready."

his stomps could be heard running towards the kitchen while namis screams about how he can't keep leaving the wheel was heard aswell.

"i hope to have your company more as i cook." sanji whispered into your ear, appearing behind you before he hummed and walked out, pulling his packet of smokes out.

done!

lmk what u think <3

#sanji x reader #one piece #one piece sanji #vinsmoke sanji #op sanji

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albertasunrise · 1 year

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Oops Baby - Juggling Act

Masterlist

Summary: Being best friends with Frankie meant movie nights, drinks with the guys and a shoulder to cry on when you got your hear broken. He is head over heels for you but you don’t feel the same… yet a drunken mistake will tie your lives together forever!

Relationships: Frankie Morales x Reader

Warnings: Like AO3 I choose to give none. Read at own risk. 18+ (So... I know this took a while. Just been so unmotivated lately so been struggling to write. Hopefully with this is worth the wait. I'll be introducing a new plot twist this chapter to look out for that 🙊)

Series Masterlist - Part 1

Two months had passed since you'd told Frankie that you were pregnant. He had been a little slow to forgive what had happened that night. You had hurt him. Taken advantage of his attraction to you and it was something that you'd never forgive yourself for.

The rest of the group had also been slow to forgive your transgressions. You hurt one of them. You hurt all of them. But as the weeks went by, you did your best to prove to all of them how truly sorry you were.

Ben had been your biggest supporter.

"So how are things?" Ben asked as he sipped at his black coffee "You and Frankie getting on better?"

"They're better." You replied as you placed your mug on its saucer "He's been helping me with a few things. Started looking at prams and cribs."

"That's positive." Ben gave you a warm smile as he leaned over to give your hand a friendly squeeze.

"Yeah." You conceded, nodding as you fiddled with the rim of your drink.

"But?" Ben pushed and you looked at him like a deer in headlights.

"But?"

"There's clearly something that you're not telling me." The blonde scoffed and you let out a long sigh as you leaned back in your chair and rubbed your bump.

"He uh… Well, he suggested that he move in with me after the baby was born." You stated, "To help with the baby and stuff."

"So?"

"So… What if his feelings for me start to cause issues?" You questioned "I want to have feelings for him… I mean he's what every woman dreams of but I dunno… Just don't feel the same way he does." You finished with a shrug.

"Frankie's a big boy." Ben chuckled as he downed the last of his coffee and motioned for the waitress to top him up "I'm sure he can handle himself."

"I guess." You replied, sighing as you leaned forward to take another sip of your own beverage "Just don't want to lose him again."

"Then don't fuck him again." Ben snorted and you glared at him as you flipped him off.

"Smart ass."

…

Frankie opened your front door with the key you'd had cut for him as he carefully balanced the takeout. He noted you were nowhere to be seen when he stepped inside so he called out to you whilst placing the takeout down on the table.

"In here." You replied from your office.

Frank placed the last container down before going in search of you. He could hear commotion coming from inside the spare room you had turned into an office a few years back so pushed the door open to you dismantling furniture.

"What the hell are you doing?" Frankie shrieked as he stepped further into the room.

"I wanted to get a head start on the nursery." You replied with a shrug.

"So you thought you would start dismantling heavy furniture on your own?" He growled, grabbing your attention.

"I'm pregnant Frankie… Not disabled."

"You shouldn't be doing this sort of thing on your own." He snapped "What if you hurt fell?"

"Frankie-"

"I'm just… I don't want you to do stuff that will risk the baby."

"Why would I risk the baby?" You scoffed and Frankie practically growled your name out as he replied.

"I get you are used to living alone and being independent but you are four months pregnant with our baby." He continued "If you would just read that book I got, you'd know that you shouldn't be lifting heavy shit like furniture."

You felt a pang of guilt at this statement. You deliberately ignored the book Frank had gifted you. You thought he was just being a know it all but now, seeing how he was pleading for you to listen to him, you realised that he was just trying to help.

"You're right." You sighed as you pushed yourself to your feet "I'm sorry."

"I got us take-out." He stated, changing the subject and you practically growled in delight.

"Thank god… I'm starved." Sprinted to the table, sighing in delight at the smells that greeted you.

"Got you your favourite." He piped up as he pushed the container towards you with some cutlery resting on top.

"Thank you, Frank."

The two of you then sat and ate as you showed each other different ideas for the nursery. You had found an all-in-one crib, the changing station at the end with drawers beneath it and the crib. Frankie showed you a chair he could that he felt would be great for you when you breastfed and a few dials he liked also.

"Helicopters?" You chuckled "What if we have a girl?"

"What… Girls can't like them too?"

You rolled your eyes at his statement but grinned when he stuck his tongue out at you in response. You loved how things were finally starting to ment. That you were starting to get the old Francisco back.

"You thought any more about me moving in here for a bit when the baby's born?" He asked between mouthfuls.

"I have." You replied simply.

"And?"

"And I just had one concern." Frank's brows pulled together in confusion as he looked up at you.

"Which is?"

"You have feelings for me Frankie." He went to say something but you stopped him in his tracks " I just… I don't want things to get weird between us."

"It won't be a problem." Frankie replied as he awkwardly scratched the back of his neck.

"How can you be sure?"

"Because I'm seeing someone." He replied plainly.

"Oh." You replied, a little shocked at his this news affected you.

"Yeah, I uh… Well, I met her a few days after you told us about the baby." He elaborated as a love-sick smile filled his features "I uh… Well, I didn't tell anyone cus it's still new but… Well, things are starting to get a little more serious so-"

"And she's okay with you moving in with the random chick you knocked up?" You scoff.

"She knows the situation and respects the fact I want to be involved… Want to help… Also, you're not some random chick!"

"How heroic." You grumbled, taking Frank by surprise.

"What?"

"Sorry… Nothing, just the hormones." You grumbled, trying to swallow past the lump in your throat.

"Are you jealous?" Frankie scoffed and you snorted.

"No, I'm not." You snapped "Just surprised you started dating when you're expecting a baby is all."

"Well, it's not like anything's ever going to happen between us." He stated as he forked more food into his mouth "I need to move on so that's what I'm doing."

"Right…" You trailed off, feeling tears sting at your eyes as you finished the last of your food in silence.

When the plates were washed and cleared away, you answered Frank's question. You knew you were going to need help when the baby came.

"Yes." You said as you opened the door for him as he went to leave "I would appreciate it if you moved in for a bit after the baby comes."

"Great." Frankie replied as he beamed at you and kissed your cheek "It's gonna be great."

You watched him practically skip to his truck. Your fingers touched where he'd kissed you just moments before. You were so confused by these feelings you were suddenly feeling for a man that four months ago, you'd slept with and rejected. You blamed the hormones.

You couldn't suddenly have developed feelings for him surely?

…

In the month that followed that evening, you and Frankie managed to clear out the office and start to paint it ready for the baby. You had your 20-month scan and after endless arm twisting and puppy-dog eyes from Frank, you agreed to learn the sex.

You were laying on the examination table, staring at the ceiling as the examiner prepped the machine for the procedure. You weren't exactly sure why you were so nervous. The baby had been active all morning, much to your chagrin and everything had been perfect on your last scan. Yet you couldn't help but worry that something might pop up.

"So, we ready to see how baby's getting on?" The doctor asked as she squeezed the gel onto your swollen tummy.

"Definitely!" Frankie replied. He was practically vibrating with excitement.

The doctor got to work looking for your little miracle. Finding them quickly and turning the screen so that you and Frankie could see the life you'd created together.

"Looking good mummy and daddy." Said the doctor sweetly as she grinned at you both "Did we want to learn the sex today?"

"Yes." Frank rushed out and you smirked at him, knowing how desperately he wanted to know.

"Let's have a look then." She said as she started to move the probe around, taking measurements as she went.

"Please be a girl. Please be a girl. Please be a girl." Frankie uttered under his breath, his hands enveloping yours as he stared at the screen awaiting the verdict.

"Well. She's measuring perfectly." The examiner stated and your heads shot up like Meerkats.

"She?" You asked and the doctor nodded.

"It's a girl?" Frankie squeaked and the doctor grinned.

"I can say with 90 per cent certainty that you are having a healthy baby girl."

Frankie choked back the sob that threatened to escape him at the news that he was going to have a daughter. He'd hoped from the moment that you'd told him you were pregnant that it was going to be a girl and his wish had been granted.

"Happy?" You asked, pulling his attention away from the screen and to you.

"Elated."

The doctor printed some pictures for you and sent you on your way with more tips for the last leg of your pregnancy. Frankie couldn't stop staring at the pictures as you left the building and made your way back to his truck, narrowly missing a lampost as he walked.

"Eye's up Morales." You teased as you guided the man to the car.

"I just… Just look at her." He gushed. His eyes were the size of saucers as he studied the pictures in his hands.

You smiled as you walked up beside him, resting your head on his arm as you both admired the pictures together. She was so clear. Her hands waving in front of her and her legs kicking. The first scan had been emotional but this one had just brought it all into focus. In four more months, you were going to be a mum.

"Can't wait to show everyone at the bar tonight." Frank said, pulling you from your thoughts "Ben's going to be stoked."

After a few more moments of wonderous staring, Frank finally helped you clamber into the car before getting in himself. You had loved the fact your appointment had fallen on drinks night so when you had suggested to Frankie that you surprise them with the news that night, he'd leapt at the chance. You had come up with a plan for how you were going to tell them. You just needed to set it up when they were out of earshot.

Frank dropped you home before making his way back to work and so then, with the rest of the afternoon off, you started to put your plan in motion. Come 6 it was time to leave. All three of the boys had offered to pick you up but you had declined. Wasn't like you could drink anyway.

Arriving at the bar, you managed to avoid the Miller brother's gaze as you snuck over to Fish who was standing waiting for you. With a quick hug and a peck on the cheek, you relayed your plan to him, smiling when he then passed that onto the barman whose attention he shortly grabbed. Then, when everything was in place, you walked with Frank as he carried the tray of drinks over.

"Ahhhhhh, that's what we want." Ben cooed as he helped Frank unload the tray before pouring everyone a glass.

"Who's the extra glass for?" Will asked. Something you hadn't noticed until he had pointed it out.

"That would be for me." Piped up an unfamiliar voice and you turned your head to seek it who owned it.

The was a pretty woman. Medium height with dirty blonde waves and striking eyes. She smiled shyly at you all as Frankie stood to throw his arm around her shoulders.

"Everyone, I'd like you to meet Mary." He said proudly "Mary this is everyone." He chuckled "The blonde Labrador over there is Benny… The more reserved blonde there is Ironhead-"

"Will is fine." The older Miller interjected.

"And this lovely lady here is Titch." He finished with a smile.

You gave her a wave, trying your best to hide the turmoil you were feeling with a smile. At first glance, she seemed nice. A little on the shy side but pretty in a girl-next-door kinda way. She wasn't stick thin. On the curvier side but her dress sense did nothing but accentuate her best features in all the right ways.

"So this is mummy to be." She piped up and she held her hand out for you to shake "I'm so happy to meet you. Frankie's told me all about you."

"All good I hope?" You joked and she grinned and nodded.

"Of course."

"Here, sit with me, baby." He purred as he pulled a chair up next to him, smiling sweetly when she popped herself down and leaned in to kiss him.

"So why are we only meeting this lovely lady now?" Ben pushed, his eyes glancing at you and noting how uncomfortable you looked.

"Well, Frank wanted to make sure this was something serious before introducing me to you all." She teased "Y'all obviously very important to him."

"Damn right." Will piped up, grinning at the look he got from Fish.

The table erupted into twenty questions for the next half an hour. Everyone but yourself wanted to know everything there was to know about Mary. Glancing at his watch, Frank noted it was time so coughing to grab your attention, he changed the direction of the conversation.

"Well, I think Mary's had enough interrogating for one evening." He joked, noting that the barman was preparing their surprise "Don't you guys wanna know how the scan went."

"Oooooh!… I do I do I do!" Ben answered as he positively bounced in his chair "How was it? Everything okay?"

"Everything is perfect." You replied with a smile. Glad to be off the subject of Mary for a while.

"We actually have a little surprise for you all." Frank piped up when he spotted the barman walking towards them.

"What is it?" Will asked excitedly.

"Is it twins?"

"No, it's not twins." You chuckled "We would have known that months ago if it was."

"What is it then?"

"Special order for ya." Said the server as he placed three cocktails down on the table.

"There's gotta be a mistake." Ben started "We wouldn't order pink coc…" The younger Miller trailed off as he shared a look with his brother before looking up at you and Frank "Really?" He squeaked and you nodded.

"Someone mind clueing me in here?" Will piped up and you chuckled wetly.

"They're having a girl." Ben replied, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Shit, that's awesome!" Will cheered as he stood up to hug you both "Congratulations."

"This is great news baby." Mary cooed as she kissed Frankie sweetly "I knew that's what you wanted."

For some reason. The fact she knew he wanted a girl before you made you want to scream. This was supposed to be your journey to share with him. Yet you knew you had no right to be jealous of her.

Frank had offered himself to you and you had rejected him.

You didn't even feel like that for him.

"Ugh… This little princess is using my bladder as a trampoline." You pipped up as you pushed yourself to your feet "Back in a few."

With that, you made your momentary escape. Desperate to get away from the happy couple for a while. After relieving yourself, you snuck outside for a moment. Needing another few minutes before rejoining your party. You breathed in the crisp evening air and willed the tears that threatened to spill.

"Titch?"

Frankie's voice made you jump and your hand grasped your chest as you willed your heart to slow.

"Jesus Frank." You grumbled, "Nearly gave me a heart attack."

"Sorry." He replied, "You okay?"

"Mhmm." You nodded, not trusting yourself to speak.

"Titch… What's wrong."

"Nothing I just…" You sniffed as you tried to pull yourself together "I just wasn't expecting you to bring her tonight of all nights."

"Why are you crying?" You growled at his question, not wanting to answer it but knowing he wouldn't drop it if you didn't "Titch?"

"Seeing her with you hurts!" You growled "There! Ya, happy? Seeing you with her has made me sad and I don't understand why."

"Titch-"

"I just hate the idea of you being together… This is supposed to be our journey and then I learn that she knew you wanted a girl before I did and…"

"You had your chance to share this journey with me Titch." He stated plainly and you nodded, knocking the traitorous tears loose.

"I know that." You growled "I just… I don't understand what I'm feeling right now."

"Come inside." You nodded, following him in wordlessly and rejoining the rest of the party.

"Everything okay Titch?" Ben asked when he noticed your eyes were red.

"Yeah… Just these damn baby hormones getting the better of me." You chuckled, leaning into him in a way you hoped would be reassuring.

"Man, those steaks look incredible." Will piped up as he eyes the food that had been delivered to the table across from yours.

"Fuck I miss steak." Frankie grumbled.

"Can't have it at all?" Ben asked, his voice taking on a sympathetic tone.

"Doc said to avoid it. I guess a steak once in a while won't kill me." Fish shrugged "I guess that's what you get for fucking up your heart with drugs." He joked, trying to lighten the tone.

"We all turned to shitty methods to cope man." Will said, remembering his own poor choices after he'd gotten out "Maybe save the steak treat for your birthday though."

"Sounds like a plan!" Mary agreed and she wrapped her arm around his and pulled him close "Your heart may be delicate baby… but you aren't where it counts." She finished with a wink, grinning at the growl this elicited from her boyfriend.

"Gross." Ben groaned, earning himself the finger from the happy couple.

"I should get going." You said suddenly, rubbing your belly and feigning a yawn "Baby is draining me, body and soul."

"Awe." Ben pouted, earning a kiss on the cheek from you.

"Night everyone."

You said your goodbyes and left. Glad to escape. You didn't understand why seeing Frankie and Mary together hurt so much. You should be happy that he found someone. He deserved to be happy and yet you found you couldn't be.

Then it dawned on you as you put your car in park.

"I have feelings for Frank!"

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#frankie morales × reader #frankie morales × you #frankie 'catfish' morales #frankie morales fanfiction #frankie morales triple frontier #francisco morales triple frontier #francisco morales × you #francisco morales fanfiction #francisco morales #francisco morales × reader #triple frontier x you #triple frontier × reader #triple frontier fanfiction #triple frontier #pedro pascal character fanfiction #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal characters #pedro pascal

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hypnoneghoul · 9 months

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hello im the same anon as the eds regressing rain ask and im also interested in maybe little rain having a pots thing happen? i don’t know a lot about pots but maybe they pass out while regressing and freak out a bit, or maybe another ghoul is also regressed and they’re hanging out and rain passes out and that spooks the other ghoul? really go how you will with that idea. again feel free to not do it if youre not interested in it i just think its an interesting idea

sorry it took so long :(

"think 'm hungwy," Rain mumbled, as he put down the block they had in their hands. Phantom nodded at him and hummed around the tip of his tail that ended up on his mouth some time earlier.

There wasn't anyone else with them, it started out with Rain taking care of little Phantom, but his own brain couldn't help joining the quintessence ghoul in his regression. No other ghoul was around so they were on their own.

Before Rain even stood up fully he paused, a quiet "oh" escaping their lips. Phantom perked up at the sound with a curious noise of his own.

"T- tommy-" and they tumbled to the floor.

Phantom panicked, Rain just... he just passed out and Phantom was too little, he didn't know what to do. His friend was hurt and he didn't know what to do.

He whined as he crawled closer to the water ghoul sprawled out on the carpet, tears were already gathering in his eyes.

"Rainyyy," Phantom pawed weakly at their chest letting out a series of distressed noises, subconsciously calling for help, "Rainy, wake up!"

"Phantom? What happened?" he heard someone and they... they sounded angry.

"I- I didn', dunno what- I didn' do 'nything," the quintessence ghoul sobbed, still holding onto Rain and weakly shaking him.

"Shhh, I know you didn't, it's not your fault," it was Dew, he realised as he came closer. His warm hands rested on Phantom's back, rubbing it with an intention to soothe. "It happenes to Rain sometimes, you know that. It's okay, I'll take care of them, okay?"

"Mhmmm, Dewy, pwease, f- fix 'em," he whined, looking up at Dewdrop with wet, red rimmed eyes, pleading. The fire ghoul leaned down to place a kiss on the distressed ghoul's forehead and got up again. "N- no, c'me back, fix 'em!"

"I will, kiddo, don't worry. I gotta get something," Dew assured before disappearing into the kitchen. Phantom sobbed again but the fire ghoul was fast and was back by him and Rain in a flash.

"Okay, take this," he handed Phantom a toy hand fan, the type that works on batteries and all it needs to work is its button pressed down. The quintessence ghoul's brows furrowed as he took the toy. "Turn it on and fan Rain's face, okay? Can you do that?"

A task.

Phantom got a task and it was supposed to help Rain. Of course he would do it. He took a deep breath, and turned the fan on. Its funny buzz made him giggle through the tears still flowing down his cheeks. He was a very emotionally sensitive ghoul, that's all.

"Very good, yeah, like that," Dewdrop praised as Phantom focused to keep his hands steady, to keep the cold air on Rain's face. He bit his bottom lip in concentration.

It took just a moment for Rain to stir. He never passed out for long, anyway, he hardly ever fully lost consciousness, "R- Rainy?"

"Mhmmm," they hummed, blinking slowly.

"Welcome back, fish boy," Dew chuckled, moving a strand of hair from their forehead. "Little, aren't you?"

Rain just whined and pouted, and that told Dew enough.

"Rainy... awe you fine?" Phantom asked, finally sparing a second to wipe the tears from his face with his sleeve. Rain looked over at him and nodded. He then spotted the toy still clutched tightly in one of the quintessence ghoul's hands and smiled before diving in to bury their face in Phantom's belly.

He was too little for words, now, but they understood well enough that Phantom had helped them, and they wanted to thank him. Hugging him tightly and chirping happily turned out to be his best idea at the moment.

And Phantom most definitely got the intention, bending down to wrap his own arms around the ghoul in his lap as he started purring.

"I'll go get some snacks," Dew sighed, smiling at the two.

Just a disclaimer, most folks with POTS don't fully pass out, usually its just ultra dizziness and feeling like you are going to pass out, and even if it is a full black out its not for long, few seconds usually. I made Rain fully loose consciousness for a longer bit to, idk, make the situation more "dramatic" lmao

#hypnone writes #the band ghost #nameless ghouls #rain ghoul #dewdrop ghoul #ficlet #rain ghost #little ghouls #hypnone's disabled ghouls

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inevitably-johnlocked · 6 months

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Loki S2 Pre-E6 Thoughts

So I know that this is totally random content to give to y'all this morning, but I wanted to post up my thoughts about the series before its final episode airs tomorrow. I have, in the past, talked about my thoughts on S1 and how I really did like it until the last 5 minutes of Episode 6 and how out-of-nowhere-forced the Sylvie/Loki kiss felt (I was physically cringing about it).

Given how S1 ended, I was a bit wary about S2, but decided to watch it anyway, and holy hell I think Season Two is KNOCKING it out of the park. I'm loving it as much as I loved Moon Knight, and it's right up there now in my top 5. The episodes are SO cinematically beautiful, well written and flow nicely, the characters are all so charming, and the Mobius/Loki relationship is being built up so much that it COULD lead to more or canonization in the final episode. During the past 5 weeks, I've been lurking on the meta spaces for Loki on Twitter and Tumblr, and wow the nostalgia I feel for it, it SO reminds me of the hey-day of my Johnlock meta-ing before S4.

I think my only gripe right now with this season is that they wasted Sophia DiMartino... her character Sylvie feels like such a... filler character (like they just put her in there because she was in the first season and they didn't know what to do with her this season)? But I think ALSO she's meant to be a counter-mirror to Loki, to show that he ISN'T like her anymore, that he grew and changed for the better with the positive influences in his life, and unlike her he doesn't WANT to be alone and such. And they're REALLY making her so unlikeable this season for me... I'm glad that it's looking like they're pretty much not going the Sylvie/Loki route (and I honestly don't see how people who ship it think it will canonically turn around at this point), but the showrunners are having her have every interaction between her and Loki rather hostile, demoralizing, or toxic. And rather that, they're countering it by showing a more positive alternative for Loki with Mobius as his potential romantic partner. Which is fantastic because I've shipped Lokius since Mobius came on the screen in S1, LOL. I just think they could have done that in S2 without making Sylvie an unlikeable character (like have her be a cheerleader for them instead?) I dunno. It's a shame because I did like her in S1. Don't like her at all in S2. She's so MEAN to EVERYONE. To Mobius especially, like CHILL girl, let a man stress-eat, JEEZ.

And here's the rant I actually wanted to write this post about because I didn't want to clutter up other people's threads with it: So, every week, I usually watch breakdowns and review videos so I can understand the characters and their comic counter parts a bit better, and usually the breakdowns are really good because they show the nods to comic-canon things and such. But OMG these past two weeks, I had to stop watching the reviews because LITERALLY all of them ship Sylvie/Loki and are trying SO hard to prove that it's canon when the past few weeks it's only been more and more likely that it's not happening.

NONE of Big Name Reviewers (NRS and SC specifically, if ya know you know) acknowledged AT ALL the RIDICULOUS amount of romantic tropes and dopey staring that Episodes 4 and 5 had (Loki watches Mobius through a window the first time he finds him, and the second time before going to talk to Mobius again Loki LITERALLY groomed himself and then stutters like a lovesick teenager. It was very rom-com; and they're skirting around the fact that all the empty places in the TVA that Loki kept slipping to were ALL places that Loki tshared time with Mobius in... I CAN GO ON FOREVER HERE, AND AND AND that Loki is constantly panicking if he can't find Mobius). LIKE. NONE OF THE REVIEWERS, who literally break down all the episodes and point out shit like All That for het-ships, just won't acknowledge any of it!! They glossed over both Loki's and Sylvie's bisexuality confirmations in S1, and only briefly mentioned their genderfluidity in the comics and in actual mythology. I usually watch the breakdowns because I'm not familiar with comic lore so I find it interesting to learn about those backstories, as well as little details they find, but they've been dropping the ball ALL season, and EVERY one of them mention EVERY single breakdown that Loki just wants to get back to "his one true love Sylvie!!", like what are you smoking?!?!? I was getting SO FRUSTRATED because they skipped over LARGE chunks of E5, especially, just pointing out the surface level stuff instead. I literally turned it off after all that.

THAT ALL SAID, since episode one it's been clear that Sylvie wants NOTHING to do with Loki – she just wants to live a quiet simple life. Then when shit goes bad, she blames Loki for all the problems SHE caused, shits on Mobius every chance she gets, and then in that bar scene when Loki's bearing his soul to her, telling her that he wants his friends back and DOESN'T want to be alone, she basically is like "tough titties" and leaves him ALONE, showing she's not a friend at all.

But the reviewers literally just gloss over all of this. ANYWAY.

Ugh, sorry about that, that's been eating at me for like 3 weeks and last week's reviews finally just pissed me off so much because even casually watching the show I could see all this shit. I only REALLY started believing Lokius could happen after Episode 4 aired, and then Episode 5 had me reeling.

I am DYING to write meta about every episode as it comes out... I just feel that other people are writing better stuff than I could, and much faster than I have time for, and really it's nice to be on the reader side of things for a change. I just... don't want to add in my own two cents to their posts because I'd feel I'm intruding, is all.

I have lots of hope about where Episode 6 will go... like I'm feeling pretty good about them canonizing Lokius... However... I'm not gonna be disappointed if it doesn't get canonized simply because this is Disney and I am REALLY not thinking they're going to explore Loki's comic-canon genderfluidity and sexuality on a surface level.

Good thing I eat subtext for breakfast LOL. I lived through BBC Sherlock, hahah. BUT... can I get a third ship canonized in one year??? Is it wishful thinking? Oh, for sure. I hope so. I would be so happy if Disney even ACKNOWLEDGED that they love each other But I'm not expecting it. I'll be happy with another hug at least, or a forehead touch or hand holding. I'm a simple gal.

Honestly though, I do inevitably want the last episode to have Loki as the ruler with his friends, because they built up to this for 12 episodes, I DON'T want an unhappy ending for the sake of a twist or whatever. Truly let him be the Loki Who Remains (a callback to Episode One) as the Keeper of Time with Bea, O.B., Casey, and Mobius at his side <3

I LOVE the character development of Loki in this series, too. I legit didn't really care for Loki all that much in the MCU, but this series did the same to him for me that FatWS did to Bucky for me: Make me want to see MORE of them and their adventures with their new friends.

Anyway, thanks for reading and indulging me, I mostly just needed to get that rant out about reviewers and wtf people still think Sy!ki is happening. Feel free to discuss in the notes, I plan on posting a reblog with final thoughts after it airs on Thursday <3

#my ramblings #loki spoilers #loki s2 #not sherlock #my thoughts #marvel #lokius #long post #i love writing meta #just don't think people like reading it anymore #shitposting steph #some negativity in this post too sorry

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desultory-novice · 4 months

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Okay, back where we were left off at the Magoland Branch AU Magolor only had his sight partially restored, but in the crossover between the Apologies AU and the Magoland Branch AU his sight was fully restored. So how did that happen anyways?

Also, how long did it take between the conclusion of the Magoland Branch AU and the crossover between the Apologies AU and the Magoland Branch AU?

(Double question because I want lore.)

(Also, how long will it be till my other ask is done? I'm not rushing it or anything, (Take your time Dess! (^v^)) I'm just curious about how long will it take.)

>How long did it take?

It took... X amount of time! XD ...I dunno! Noir SHOULD have been in hell since almost the beginning, since he was the first or second to die also his life has just been hell since the day his parents died....

Like Noir, who acted as "dead" as possible in the hopes of actually dying, the deceased probably stuck to their own personal purgatories and never really did much positive interacting, outside of people who formed odd connections all on their own, like Joronia and Max, who quickly bonded over their love of rich, fancy things. >w<

Max: "01001101 01110101 01110011 01110100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100011 01101111 01100110 01100110 01100101 01100101 00100000 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 00100000 01100001 01101100 01110111 01100001 01111001 01110011 00100000 01100010 01100101 00100000 01100010 01110101 01110010 01101110 01110100 00111111"

Joronia: "Oooh, do not even get me started on tea in this place!"(1)

("How does Joronia know binary? Why, she's the smartest, strongest, most beautiful queen ever! Of course she knows binary!" - Taranza)

The paradigm changed when Marx found Magolor's tormented soul and convinced the Crown to give Magolor control of his body back. Magolor, trapped in a series of troubled and confusing hallucinations due to how horrific and constant the pain of having a large, wrathful tree feeding off of and growing inside him was, blindly used the crown's limitless power to create an actual theme park.

"Timeline-wise" I'd say once Elfilin and Adeleine started interacting more, Fecty probably said some off-handed remark to "the human girl" (ie: "...your eyes are the exact same color as that boy in hell...") that clued X-over Adeleine into the location/existence of her X-over brother and they had a big, tearful reunion and here we are!

(1) PS: "Hell" here is not full of demons and pitchforks, but it is uncomfortably *bright* (the sun is ever-burning and the sky goes through a cycle of golden hour-orange to fever-dream dark with shades of electric pink at night) and also, there is a larger than average amount of fire. A whole lake made of it, in fact!

>Why does Magolor have both eyes?

That was an accident on my part because I drew him from memory for the first Apologies x-over, forgetting he’s only supposed to have one eye due to still being half rooted to the crown.

I kept up with it after because, eh~ the souls are supposed to be healing slowly after "A Perfect Circle," so maybe his other eye came back on its own to show he’s reclaiming more of himself...?

(Kind wish I hadn’t made that mistake though because I was weirdly attached to one-eyed Mago Soul’s design. But he can’t just go and lose it again now for no reason. ^^)

Speaking of the first crossover and “continuity errors,” Noir wore his scarf more like an actual scarf in that one to dress in the style of the Hell branch (aka, a mix of alive and dead) but he is back to looking like regular Swordsman in “Again.” That was because I purposefully wanted the first image to fool people as to where/when this was happening, and also make it work as a legitimate visual introduction to the script portion of “Again.” Which it does, btw. That first page fairly accurately fits Noir’s experiences in DL3. ^^

I know it's shallow reasoning, but let's just go with it! If I ever return to the x-over plotline, I’ll try to indicate that properly by giving him the wrapped scarf again. ...While I’m being grilled on Hell-Branch Lore, I’m debating whether Max and Joronia are still around. I’m tempted to say “yes” and they are just healed like Magolor. (Mostly because I don’t have that many characters to work with and I think Max would be ALL IN on the “Hell is a Business Hotspot” storyline(?) we’re in.)

#Magoland Branch AU #Apologies AU #cw: angst #cw: mild horror #cw: death #Magolor #Marx Kirby #Noir (human form DMS)#Queen Sectonia #Max Haltmann #Edited to remove my response to the last question because I hate being vulnerable on main ^^;;;;#Long post

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radioactivepeasant · 29 days

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Unscheduled Dark Jak Wednesday!

The little gremlin wanted to cause a little chaos, so behold: the first in a series of crack snippets I wrote for the Demon Baby au!

(Warnings for blood mention, reference to slight body horror, and implied violence. Because this is still Dark Jak)

The dark eco of The Chair was measured carefully. 50% blue, 20% yellow, 30% red. The same ratios, every single time -- Jak thankfully would never know that they'd worked out that ratio after four different subjects melted in their cells after the wrong mixture. And when he'd first transformed, snapping the restraints when for the first time hope arrived in the form of Daxter, Jak had been the embodiment of that recipe. Built for speed and power. And he siphoned every drop of dark eco he could out of that machine as he slid off the Chair, so that they could never use it again.

But outside the lab, dark eco wasn't measured and precise. It was as chaotic in its makeup as it was in its behavior.

In hindsight, Jak wondered if that's why it felt different.

When the KG approached -- oh, how does it feel to be in front of me without bars to protect you? Without me in cuffs? Are you afraid yet? You're going to be--- that toxic cocktail from the injector was still burning painfully in his veins. It was too easy to lose his grip, to be dragged under by that rage even as he felt panic rising in his lungs.

This isn't me-! What's happening to me?! Help me!

Through the hungry, hate-filled thing's eyes, the KG weren't his tormentors. They were nothing but prey. Livestock to be butchered. And butcher them he did. For every beating in the common cells they'd pointed and laughed at, he returned it tenfold.

And then the eco ran out.

Shaking with adrenaline and nausea, Jak stumbled. His boots squelched in a pool of blood, and eco rose out of it and spun into his body. He was breaking down the corpses and- and feeding off their eco.

He wished he could feel horrified by that. He wished he didn't feel like it was justified.

But dark eco made by drawing disparate ecos from decomposition was far more random in its makeup. And when it built up like rising pressure in his chest, even as Jak screamed inside, he changed again.

It was fast, at least. But it hurt, it hurt almost as much as the Chair.

And then-

Why was the world so big? Why did the prey grow larger?

Jak stumbled, tripping on oversized boots. His clothes pooled around him like blankets, and he couldn't even see his hands when he looked down. Why?

Stuck. Don't like that. No! No traps! Get it off getitoffgetitoff!

Snarling, he flailed to get his arms free and something fell over his eyes, blinding him.

"What the ever-loving, snot-flicking, abso-flipping heck?!"

Oh. Friend! Da- D- Dax-ter. Daxter!

Daxter came into view, at eye level.

"Jak? Is...that's still you, right?"

Jak nodded and the things fell off his eyes. Oh. Goggles.

The little boy hiding behind the old man peeked out, and his mouth made a little "o".

"Hi?" he signed.

"Hi??" Jak signed back, or tried to with floppy sleeves.

"Dax help. Eco wrong? Can't...control flow. Not okayokay."

Daxter sucked on his teeth. "H'ohboy. I dunno how to help, pal. But uh...last time you changed back after slicing up a bunch of guards, right? Maybe thats whatcha need to stop being...Demon Baby."

The old man stared down at Jak with eyes so wide he thought they'd fall out altogether.

"That's...interesting," he said faintly, as if in shock, "...that's very interesting."

Jak scowled and wriggled out of the pants. The tunic hung down to his calves now. He needed to be able to move! He shook off the gauntlets and growled. It was high pitched and quiet. He didn't notice.

Fight them fight them not hurt Daxter not hurt friend!

Two guards at the end of the street saw their comrades' empty armor lying in pools of blood. With shouts of alarm, they ran towards them, guns drawn.

"What the hell is that?!" One of them yelled, pointing at Jak.

Jak spread his claws and leaped.

Yes. Hell. Got out of hell. Gonna send you there.

(More chaos to follow later)

#fic prompts #writing prompts #jak and daxter #dadmas #dadsig #jak and daxter au #dark jak #dark jak wednesday #demon baby au #dj is nezuko au #look dark eco turned Dax into an ottsel so I'm making it super unpredictable #jak has a 50% chance of being Regular DJ or Demon Baby on any given day. occasionally Giant DJ too #unscheduled snippet

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anonymityisfunwriter · 8 months

Text

The Twin Flame - Chapter 38: "It's Time To Go"

"That old familiar body ache, the snaps from the same little breaks in your soul, you know when it's time to go…"

Pairing: Sunshine!Reader x Grumpy!Bucky Barnes Part of The Grumpy x Sunshine Series

Cold.

That’s the first sensation you register after it all went dark. You’re cold. Not a shivering cold. It doesn’t hurt. You don’t seek warmth.

You’re just… cold.

Adrift.

There's a peace in the feeling. There's no one in need of saving. No danger lurking around the corner. For the first time in your life, there's no fight. No battle to be won.

You don't have to keep clawing your way to the surface. You're just adrift, floating in a vast, unending void.

There's just nothing.

You can't bring yourself to open your eyes. It's like a sleep you know you won't wake up from.

The second sensation you register is a slight warmth, like a light dancing over your skin, warming you from the inside out.

The warmth laps at you, cascading over you until you’re finally warm again. It doesn’t stop there.

The light burns brighter.

Brighter.

Even when you think it can’t get any brighter, it does.

But it never hurts. It doesn't sting.

You don't feel like an Icarus, flying too close to the Sun.

You feel like you're being pulled back into the sunlight after being lost in the depths of a raging sea.

Your eyelids feel cemented shut. The light seeps through your eyelids until your curiosity gets the best of you.

You creak a bleary eye open, readying yourself for the pain that will inevitably come when you attempt to sit up.

Only, it doesn't.

You feel better than you have in years. The unbearable ache of grief is gone. The searing pain is gone. You gasp for air and it doesn't hurt. Your broken heart almost feels mended.

You sit up to find yourself back in the Compound, the common room, just like it was when it stood tall.

You frantically look around, sitting on the hardwood floor.

A familiar silhouette in your peripheral catches your eye, “Tony?”

Tony slowly turns, his eyes grazing over the common room of the Avengers Compound, hands crossed over his chest and lips pursed in distaste, “Are you kidding me? Out of all the places your conscious could’ve dreamt up, you picked here?”

“Sorry.”

"I'm just saying, you could've been a little more creative." He shakes his head, rolling his eyes before walking over to you. He extends a hand to you, helping you stand up off the floor, “What are you doing here, Pinkie Pie?”

Your eyebrows pull together as you try to recall the events that led you back here.

It all gets blurry after Sam found you bleeding out. It feels hazy. Like little flashes of your life slipping away. Sam scooping you up. Bucky crouching down beside you. A tear streaming down his cheek. Sirens. You remember sirens. Lots of them. Blaring. Screeching in the background. You can't help but wonder what happened afterward.

You slightly shrug your shoulders, your face falling as you realize being here with Tony can't mean anything good. It hits you that you've left Bucky and Sam. They aren't here.

You've left them behind.

That familiar ache slowly creeps its way back to your heart, winding up your arm, through your ribcage, to the place where your heart resides.

You shakily inhale, panic creeping up your spine, “I dunno, I- I lost a fight, I think.”

Tony dismissively waves his hand, “That doesn’t sound like you.”

“I was trying to save a kid, Karli. She’s like me.”

His head lolls slightly, "Now, that sounds like you.”

Your eyes rake over the common room. It's just like you remember it. Before. When things were still okay. “How are we here right now? The Compound was destroyed.”

“I don’t know," Tony admits with a nonchalant shrug of his shoulders, "In fact, you’re the first not dead person that’s come to visit me. What a bunch of assholes.”

“So if you’re…” you trail off, not wanting to offend your friend with insensitivity.

“Dead?” Tony finishes for you.

“Yeah, if you’re dead, why do you still have your arc reactor? And why is it still on?” you point out, looking at the arc reactor still glowing in the center of his chest.

Tony snickers, looking down at the little blue light emanating through his shirt, “I thought it looked cool. This one is purely decorative.”

“Tony?”

He looks up, “Yeah?”

You gulp. “Am I dead?”

“Have you seen any movie ever?" he guffaws, rolling his eyes in the exact way that he used to. Every thing about Tony Stark is just like you remember. The memory tugs at your heart. This was the Tony that was your friend. This was the Tony before the fight. This Tony didn't hate you yet. At least, you hoped this Tony didn't hate you. "No, you’re not dead.”

You frown, “Oh.”

“Just how bad did you lose that fight?” Tony wonders.

Your mouth twists with remorse, “Bad.”

“How bad?”

You look down where the wound was only moments ago, only to find nothing there. No wound. Your lucky shirt untainted. No pain radiating through your body. It's like it never happened. “Like there’s a gaping hole in my stomach bad.”

He dramatically winces, “Ouch.”

“Well, it’s gone now, so I guess that’s good," you halfheartedly joke. "Gotta look at the bright side and everything, you know?”

“Pinkie-“

You ignore the worry building in Tony's expression. You remember that look on his face. You saw it many times and it never led to anything good.

You want to remember Tony like he was before, you don't want the worry to taint the man that stands before you. This Tony was your friend. This Tony would never have shot at you. You just want to keep it that way. You turn away from him, padding around the common room, "Hey, have you seen Steve up here? He came up here too.”

Tony ambles behind you, eyes trailing over every detail of the common room. It's all there. Just like you both remembered it. Steve's journal strewn on the coffee table. Sam's movie collection. Wanda's magazines. Natasha's books. It's your home. It's everything you missed, all pieced back together. You would be content to stay in this space forever. It had everything you knew and loved right here. All you were missing was Sam and Bucky. Two of the most vital pieces of your puzzle.

“Capiscle? He’s been around.”

You look back at him over your shoulder, “Can I see him?”

“It’s your conscious, do what you want.”

"Really?" you hopefully ask, still looking back at Tony.

"Really." Tony juts his chin over your shoulder.

“Hi, Sunshine.” The familiar sound of Steve’s voice is enough to shatter your heart and break any resolve you had to stay calm.

You turn around, and there he is, standing before you. A choked sob catching in your throat at the sight of Steve, standing there as you once knew him. Bright blue eyes, young smile, kind, patient eyes, it’s the friend you so desperately missed. “Steve? Are you- is this real?”

He smiles, that warm signature Steve Rogers smile. Just like you remember. “It’s real, Sunshine.”

Just behind him, Natasha appears.

Her hands fold over her chest, with her signature smirk and a sarcastic glint in her eye, “You know, you’ve got a real knack for showing up in places you’re not supposed to be.”

“Sorry,” you chuckle through tears. “Force of habit. It- It’s good to see you guys.”

“Oh, God, Sunshine,” Steve envelopes you in a warm embrace, he whispers into the hair at the crown of your head, “What are you doing here? You’re too early. It’s too soon for you.”

“I lost tonight, Steve.” You swallow the knot lodged in your throat, “I failed."

Steve immediately pulls away from you, shaking his head again and again, "I don't believe that, not for one second."

"You should.” You pull out of Steve’s embrace, fervently shaking your head over and over again. There’s a part of you that doesn’t want him to know you like this. That doesn’t want him to know the person you became once everything was said and done. You want him to keep believing in you the way you used to believe in yourself. You want to be the person he knew all those years ago. But you're not. And that's the sad truth you have to tell your friend. That girl is gone. She was broken far beyond repair. “You would - you would be so disappointed in me. If you could see me now, I don’t even recognize myself anymore. I'm not anything like the person you knew.”

Steve looks down and sighs at you, "You've always been so hard on yourself."

“No, Steve, I'm not. I ran away - the second things got hard, I couldn’t take it anymore. I ran. And- And I hurt James. I hurt Sam. I just keep hurting them. Everyone. And tonight- tonight - I couldn’t save anyone. I didn’t save anyone. Sharon got away. Karli watched me bleed out. I didn’t - Sam and Bucky, oh God, I promised them, I promised them I would come back. I failed everyone tonight.”

“You changed her mind tonight," Nat pipes in. "You single-handedly changed Karli’s mind. You changed her story's ending.”

Your head twists, unsure if you heard her right, “What?”

“And those hostages," Steve adds. "The ones in the truck.”

“Or the ones that were seconds away from being flattened onto the pavement,” Tony continues.

“How do you guys know about that?”

“You’ve always got someone looking out for you, Sunshine,” Steve promises, a hopeful smile tugging at the corner of his lips. "Always."

“We actually have to take shifts between the three of you, you’re sort of a handful,” Tony sarcastically remarks.

“Tony,” Steve sharply admonishes, shooting a quick glare at him. “You know they're doing their best - but yes, you are a handful.”

Nat guffaws, "Like you two were any better."

"What are you talking about?" Tony scoffs. "We were the epitome of professional. We set the standard for professionalism."

“I’m glad you have them." Nat continues, ignoring Tony entirely. "You make a good team."

"I never got to see you again," you brokenly whisper. Nat sadly smiles, but she doesn't say anything. She just pulls you into the tight embrace that she knows you desperately need. "I miss you, Nat. I miss you so much."

"You're gonna be okay."

You mutter into her shoulder, "Will I?"

"Yeah. You will," she promises.

Steve looks on as you pull away from Natasha, wiping away the stray tears.

He sucks in a breath, shaking his head despondently, "I never meant to hurt you. Never."

You smile at him, "I know."

"But I did, didn't I?"

You don't answer his question. The answer lingers somewhere in the long silence. You don't have to tell him that you were hurt by his absence. You can tell by the look on his face that he knows he did. His little ripple in time caused a typhoon of chaos that almost drowned those left behind. You don't need to tell him that. Instead, you tell him, "We all wanted you to be happy. You deserved that much."

"You deserve that too."

Steve's words strike a chord deep within you. It's always hard to hear. You don't truly believe you do deserve that. You don't know that you'll ever really believe that. You want to, though. You really want to.

"Hey, Nick's not -" You have to swallow the fear that comes along with that question, but you knew there was always a chance that he might just be gone too. Years had gone by without a trace of him. That was the harsh reality of your life. Even if you were angry with him, even if he was really the person that Sharon told you he was, he still was the closest thing to a father that you knew. "He's not here, is he?"

"No. Nick's not here."

You softly breath a sigh of relief, "Oh."

"He cared about you," Steve unexpectedly says. "In his own, Nick Fury way, he really did."

You don't know what to say to that. You don't even really know what that means. You're just glad he's not gone too.

In the beat of silence, a faint noise catches your attention.

An incessant beeping slowly crescendos in the background, barely audible to your ears at first. It creeps up suddenly, then it's impossible to ignore. It's loud, flooding your eardrums. It swells to the point that you can't hear anything else.

And then, just one long monotone beep.

A flatline, you realize.

A chill runs down your spine. That cold feeling finds you again. And you almost swear that the bright, sunny day outside the Compound windows gets just a little too bright.

They're losing you.

The feeling hits you like a ton of bricks. You don't know how you know that, but you do. You feel it. You feel yourself drifting to an unreachable place.

You shake your head, reaching to cover your ears.

That's when you hear it.

A voice faintly shouts, their voice laced with panic, "We can't find a pulse."

"Charging," a different voice calls over the chaos. "Clear!"

“What is that?” you ask, wincing as you hear the sound of the defibrillator charging again.

Steve gently rests his hand on your shoulder. Just like that, the panicked sounds are only background noise again. He softly smiles down at you, “That’s your cue, Sunshine. Sam and Bucky are waiting for you. They need you.”

“What if I’m not ready to go back?” you timidly question.

You feel like a coward asking that. You feel like a coward for not being ready to go back to the world that awaited you. Bucky. Sam. You couldn't leave them. You just didn't see how you could possibly stay anymore.

Tony sidles up to the other side of you. He apologetically shrugs, like he knows that the world you'll be going back to is not the world as they left it. “It’s not your time yet, Pinkie.”

You rest your head against Tony's shoulder, a tear slips from your eyes, “I’m tired, Tony. I’m so tired.”

“So rest," he tells you. "And then you get back up. You get back and you keep going.”

“What if I don’t want to get back up anymore?”

Steve chortles, shrugging his shoulders, “Then we wouldn’t be here, would we?”

You turn back to Tony once more, desperate to get the final goodbye you'd carried for years your off your chest. Finally, you'd get to say goodbye. You'd get to apologize. You could tell him that you never wanted to hurt him. “Tony, I-“

He stops you. He shakes his head, smiling with the fondness you thought was long gone, “I never hated you. I could never hate you.”

You shakily inhale, “You promise?”

“Yeah, Pinkie. I promise.”

You turn to Natasha next. She smiles, jutting her head in the other direction, "Go. Those two wouldn't last five minutes by themselves."

“Get back up, Sunshine," Steve encourages you one last time. "The world isn’t ready to be without you yet.”

You turn back to them one last time. You just want one more glimpse of your friends as they used to be. Another tear slips down your cheek, you wipe it away with a sad smile, “I miss you guys.”

“We’ll be waiting for you when it is your time.”

“Promise?”

Steve smiles at you and encouragingly nods. For the first time in a long time, you feel like you're actually going to be okay. Your past will remain here. Perfectly preserved. A proud relic of a time long gone. You had to leave it behind all over again, say goodbye one more time.

But you've got you. You've got Bucky. You've got Sam. And that meant it was time to go.

“Promise."

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30 notes · View notes

starg1rlie · 2 years

Text

𝐈 𝐇𝐀𝐓𝐄 𝐘𝐎𝐔 !! (FINALE)

pairing: scaramouche x gn! reader

genre: mild angst

xtra !! notes: okay, i didn't notice, but someone pointed out how fem pronouns were used in the first part, and so, i wanted to apologize <(＿　＿)> i will be sure to proof-read my works in the future! also this is probably going to be either too long or too short, dunno yet since this is just the beginning notes...anyways, thank you for reading this mini-series, i hope that you've enjoyed it so far!

❛ tell me more of 𝗬𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗪𝗢𝗥𝗗𝗦 , even if its goodbye , tell me . ❜

───── ghost in a flower ; yorushika

"EVERYONE, CAN I PLEASE HAVE YOUR attention," the teacher called, rapping his ruler lightly against the surface of his desk. everyone's voices quieted down until the room was full of silence.

"as you can see, one of our classmates, y/n, is absent. their parents have reported them to be missing. apparently, they'd run away from home. if you happen to see y/n either on campus or somewhere else, please let us know."

scaramouche dropped his pencil. you were what? ajax flashed a concerned gaze over to lumine, who was trying her best not to burst out in tears. tapping his fingers rapidly against his desk, scaramouche tried to think of a reason why you'd run away. then again, it seemed like the reason was pretty obvious. you were most likely upset after his rejection towards your confession, hiding away in god knows where.

that was the most likely reason. another one would be that something was going on with your family. however, scaramouche didn't have any more time to think about where you could be hiding away at as the teacher pulled out their pop quizzes.

y/n...where are you?

₊˚ ‿︵‿︵‿︵୨୧ · · ♡ · · ୨୧‿︵‿︵‿︵ ˚₊

there was a memory that would forever be engraved in scaramouche's mind. that one summer night, when the fireworks had begun for the festival. he'd skipped out on cram school once again, settling on kicking rocks down the dusty path that wound up to the top of the hill.

he paused, hearing a crack of a twig being snapped behind him. whipping his head around, he turned to find no one there. just as he was about to walk away, he heard it again, and this time, when he turned, he saw a rustling in the bush.

cautiously walking forward, he pushed past the bristly branches of the bush, ignoring the scratches it gave him. there, he found you crouching in your school uniform, sniffling quietly.

"what the hell are you doing out here?" he asked, plopping to the ground, an irritated expression already forming on his face. he hated the sound of someone crying, it pissed him off so much. crying is for the weak, he told himself. and when you're weak, you'll never amount to anything.

"what- what are you doing here?" you managed to say in between quiet sobs, using the back of your hand to wipe away a new trail of tears.

"i asked first. don't avoid the question," scaramouche retorted, rubbing at his cheek. "it's getting late, don't you have parents or something?"

at this, fresh tears started dribbling down your cheeks. scaramouche looked taken aback, his eyes widening slightly. did he say something wrong? what did he say? god, he didn't know how to comfort someone when they were crying, not that he was interested in comforting you in the first place. he just wanted that infernal sound to stop.

"okay, okay, look- i'm sorry for whatever i said wrong, but can you shut up? you're dripping snot all over the place," scaramouche sneered. you quieted down, and after a few quiet moments of hearing your soft gasps, he shoved his hand into his pant's pocket, pulling out a plastic packet of kleenex and handed it to you.

"take it and clean yourself up. you're a complete mess."

at this, you managed a laugh, but it sound a little stuffy. taking one out of the packet, you blew your nose hard, which startled the boy sitting in front of you.

"you sound like a goose, do you know that?' he said, lips curving up into a smile. you paused your blowing, sniffing slightly as your cheeks heated up in embarrassment.

"does not!" you protested, now grabbing another kleenex tissue and wiping your eyes. when you were done, you gathered up all the clumped tissues and stuffed them into your pouch, standing up unsteadily onto your feet. "...thank you."

"what are you thanking me for? i didn't even do anything." scaramouche scoffed, also standing up. now that the two of you were on your guys' feet, you could tell that he was a bit shorter than you. snickering, you patted his head lightly, to a disbelieving scaramouche.

"god, you're so short. practically all of the guys in our class are taller than you," you said in between giggles. he glared at you, swatting your hands away from his head.

"shut up, before i shove all those tissues down your throat," he threatened, heading back up to the dirt path that he'd been walking on.

"only if you can reach my mouth," you teased lightly, laughing quietly as you followed him up.

"whatever. see you tomorrow," the shortie mumbled, stalking up the path, his school bag banging against his legs as he became smaller and smaller in your vision.

just who did you think you were, talking to him like that?

he kicked a stone rather too hard and watched it clatter down the side of hill, eyes narrowed to practically slits as he opened the door of his home and wrenched off his shoes, tossing them onto the floor before walking into the living room.

his father's altar was set up by his mother already, as per usual: incense candles already lit and a plate of his favorite mochi and an opened can of canada dry in front of a framed picture of his smiling face. putting his hands together, he bowed his head slightly to pay his respects. before he left, though, he flipped the photo so that the picture was face down.

"kunikuzushi?" a voice called from upstairs.

shit, scaramouche thought, quickly running up the stairs and into the comfort of his room. before he settled anywhere, he locked the door again and tossed himself onto the bed, thinking about that strange girl that he'd run into earlier. y/n, was it? you seemed interesting, yet infuriating at the same time. he turned onto his side and let his eyes flicker shut, listening to the steady whirring of his ceiling fan.

₊˚ ‿︵‿︵‿︵୨୧ · · ♡ · · ୨୧‿︵‿︵‿︵ ˚₊

when the bell rang and class was dismissed, scaramouche shoved his textbooks into his school bag and waved off ajax before running out the school's building.

there's no way. there's no way that you could be there....right?

scaramouche pushed past the other students that were swarming out past the doors and continued to run all the way to the hill that lead up to his house.

there was a small shed that someone had built there, most likely to go with the house that used to be there, but apparently a few months ago, it was torn down, and construction began just recently.

this was stupid, completely stupid. why should scaramouche care about you? his mind wanted to have nothing to do with you, but his heart was telling him something else.

this is ridiculous,he thought to himself. i can't like them.

but the more he thought about it, the more he understood was his heart was trying to tell him. you were always there; greeting him rather enthusiastically every morning, giving him some of your bento box (even though he protested against eating your pig slop), and always having that bright, smiling attitude. but that day, the day he said he hated you, your whole happy shell broke, and he saw just how fragile you were.

he shook hsi head rapidly, coming to a screeching stop in front of the place where he saw you crying.

pushing past the bushes, he saw the shed and went over to it. scaramouche pressed an ear against the wooden door and knocked gently on it. he could hear a shuffle of someone moving away and then a quiet "go away."

"y/n, it's me, scaramouche."

"what do you want?" you asked, moving a little closer to the door. he could already sense you were twiddling your thumbs nervously, as you always did when talking to him recently.

"why did you run away? was it because of what happened the other day?" he asked, quite tempted to just kick the door down and grab you by your shoulders to yell at you, but held himself back from doing so.

"or was it because of your parents?' this caused you to stop shifting from foot to foot, for which, scaramouche was grateful, but he was pretty close to yelling at you to stop, because he could hear your shoes crunching on the fallen leaves.

"it's none of your business," you mumbled, shuffling back from the door.

"oh, so now you're going to be like this?" scaramouche called. "what happened to being ultra gaga and eccentric? what happened to the person who always greets me in the most stupidest way possible? what happened to that smile you always wear? was it all just for show?"

"you don't understand. at least you still have your mom. my mom left me. she abandoned me. and she has the nerve to tell me to come live with her. well, i don't need her! i don't need anyone! not you, not dad, and not miss aoi either!"

"yeah, well you still have your dad, don't you?"

"that's different. your dad didn't abandon you. your dad died." he could hear your voice shaking more and more. he couldn't pretend that your statement didn't feel like a hard slap to his face, but he wasn't about to let you just run away from your problems, like he used to.

"he died, so what? we move on! we don't stay-" he paused, trying to open the door, but you held onto the handle from the other side, making it even more difficult to rip it open. "-focused on all the bad things in life! i thought you were always looking for the bright side in things? there's always a silver lining, is there not?"

that statement startled you, and your hands slipped from the handle. finally wrenching open the damn door, scaramouche dragged you up by the collar of your dirt-stained uniform shirt and brought you up close to his face. his breaths came out in uneven puffs as he glared at you.

"you need to wake the hell up! if you're going to be moping about your parents all the time, then you're never going to amount to anything!" scaramouche yelled, shaking you in his grasp.

you remained silent, eyes wide at his actions.

"come back already. your dad and step-mom are probably ready to call the police. lumine's blaming herself, you know. you should come back to school. come back home."

"scaramouche, i-"

he let go of your shirt, letting you drop to the ground. you could tell that he was hesitating about something, by the way he paused when he turned to leave.

"get up already,' scaramouche said, holding out a hand for you to take, the tips of his ears pink.

you heaved yourself up and quickly gave him a hug before he could run away. "you know, you can be quite persuading when you're really into it."

"yeah, well, i guess it ticked me off when you ran away like this," scaramouche muttered, hesitantly wrapping a hand around your waist and pulling you closer.

"so...what does this mean?"

"you idiot, were you not paying attention to what i said at all?" scaramouche grumbled but grabbed your chin, yanking you down to be head-level with him. "it means i like you, dummy."

with that, he pressed his lips against yours in a kiss, shutting you up from whatever you were about to say.

you could probably say he was a hypocrite or that he was contradicting himself, but what i think is that, if he learned from his mistakes, then it doesn't really matter. at least the two are finally together.

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a / n !! - holy shit what did i just create?...

taglist (if i added you and you did not want to be tagged for this fic, please let me know, and i will remove you!) : @belovedxiao, @cesarsbeloved, @seungyaolee, @sunoosbestie, @chickynn, @shizunxie, @jameineliebe, @extrabish, @scaralvr, @angryhope, @mobiussdarling

reblogs / likes / comments are vv much appreciated!! thank you for reading this mini-series, and i hope to see you in my other fics!

♡＼(￣▽￣)／♡

#scaramouche genshin impact #scaramouche #genshin impact #genshin #scaramouche x reader #gender-neutral reader #gn! reader #mild angst #slight romance #angst with comfort #( ﾉﾟｰﾟ)ﾉ leeo writes!

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animebw · 21 days

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Okay, three episodes into Nijigasaki, I've pinned down what's going wrong. This is very clearly trying to be a break from what Love Live has been up until now; I guess they figured after two series that were very similar tonally, it was time for a shake-up, with someone other than Juuki Hanada in the writer's chair, even. And since School Idol Project and Sunshine were both bombastic farcical melodramas, they decided to go in the complete opposite direction and see what happens if you make Love Live... subdued? Realistic? Grounded? What if instead of going over the top, we instead went, I dunno, under the bottom, I guess?

Which, honestly? Not a bad idea in concept. Any series as long-running as this should be able to re-invent itself to keep from going stale, and as much as I enjoyed Sunshine, there was a definite feeling of Not Measuring Up to its very similar parent series. If Love Live just kept being that over and over again, it would very quickly lose its charm and become a hollow shell of past glories. So I support this effort to see what happens when you take things in a more naturalistic direction. We know what Love Live looks like when it's going big and operating, with huge emotions spilling across the pavement, but if Nijigasaki could push this franchise's emotional range into something a bit more contemplative and closer to reality, it would forever expand what this series is capable of for years to come.

The problem is, just shaking up your established formula isn't enough if you don't also execute the new formula well.

And hoo boy, is that not the case here.

See, it doesn't feel like the new writer carefully crafted a new kind of naturalism for Love Live to inhabit with Nijigasaki. It feels like he just took away all the bombast and melodrama that used to define it and then... didn't replace it with anything. He stripped this series down to its skeleton and walked off without building new muscles and skin upon the bones he laid bare, and the result is a fucking void of a show. It is painfully, agonizingly basic, in presentation, in dialogue, in pacing, in theming. Everything that used to make this show great is gone, and all that's left is boring conversations that overexplain every emotional beat and go on way too long, limp platitudes preached with all the conviction of a kid forced to go to Sunday school by their strict parents, and the most lifeless direction this franchise has ever had. Like, Jesus, I complained about Sunshine's direction, but that still had life and energy, you know? Not this completely flat pasteboard of boring shots edited together with no thought or passion (genuinely why the fuck did we skip the scene of the old idol club girls meeting Ayumu and Yu) and barely any actual animation outside the performances.

Like... naturalism is not a template, people! It's not the blank slate of writing upon which all other tones and genres are built! It's a complex, fully realized method of storytelling all on its own, and it requires just as much thought and effort as the more outlandish mode that Love Live usually operates in. You can't just take away what's made this series great and think what's left can stand on its own without putting in the effort to build something new on top of it! Especially since the few times it does try to carry over the series' madcap farcical energy, like with Kasumi, the direction is so incapable of living up to that energy that it just devolves into an embarrassing slog of painfully slow body movements set to cringe-inducing "wacky" music that only highlights how little wackiness can be found here. Doesn't help that it also carries on Sunshine's awkward music direction with BGM tracks ill-suited to the scene they're backing, further confusing any sense of tone... Christ.

I don't like not liking Love Live, guys.

#anime #tabw #the anime binge watcher #love live! nijigasaki gakuen school idol doukoukai #love live! nijigasaki high school idol club #love live!#love live #2013 aniwatch

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moral-terpitude · 5 months

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Misadventures - Part 14

cause you don't even know you're an angel • foolish am I for the times I come and go •these stars defy love, so I close my eyes • and sleep inside your worn-in bed outline

[Masterlist] [Series Masterlist]

A/N: I’m not blowing my 10,000 word load at once, y’all might have to wait until tomorrow for Christmas fic. Sorry 😂

Misadvetures taglist: @cillmequick @emotionalcadaver @zablife @raincoffeeandfandoms

Summary: Finally there are answered questions.

Word Count: 6,026

Warnings: sex, umm, I dunno all the usual shit here. If you’ve made it this far I’m sure you know what I mean. (I know that’s a cop out but really nothing bad happens and I don’t feel like reading all thru it again.)

Quinn stood with her hip resting against the fridge, the only light bathing the kitchen coming from its yellowed bulb above the sink, as she looked for a snack.

Hannah was gone for the weekend, some mention of something about Eric (whoever this one was, Quinn wasn’t quite sure) and going to Atlantic City, and Quinn had avoided making dinner out of sheer stubbornness in favor of laying in bed with Mr. Bee and watching a documentary about the Chauvet Cave instead.

It was a better trade. Less mess. She had a lot of rest to catch up on.

She sighed, flipping open the package of peppered salami and retrieving the Ritz crackers, and allowing herself to stand there in the old, and now rather faded, Metallica shirt and her underwear and eat.

There was no sense in dirtying a plate and taking it back to bed when she was already right there.

Two weeks of German food and two weeks of takeaway salads to attempt to balance it out had her famished. She was over it. If it wasn’t so late she would have hauled her ass to Katz’s and gotten—

Her phone vibrating on the counter pulled out of her internal turmoil considering if it was too late to order anything from anywhere at all as her eyes flicked to the screen, the phone threatening to throw itself off of the counter if it rang for too long.

Tommy

She felt her mouth turn down at the corner, lips pressed thin, as she continued to watch it ring, letting it go to voicemail instead of picking up and hearing what he had to say.

In the entire time since she had stormed out of the apartment, he had done as she said, she hadn’t heard a peep from him, and there was something about it that almost pissed her off in a way.

He hadn’t tried to sway her, hadn’t tried to fight for her.

He had done exactly as she asked.

And she hated it.

Maybe, she let her mind entertain the thought, maybe he didn’t actually care. Maybe all she was to him was a consistent way to get laid. What other reason would he have let it go on this long without trying to contact her?

The phone vibrated again, a message, thankfully no voicemail. She wanted to give in, wanted to know what he had to say after all this time, but also felt too stubborn to call him back.

She sighed, laughing to herself, all this time? Really, Quinn? It’s been a month, and returned to staring into the void of the fridge for an unknown period of time until she heard three quick knocks on the door.

Moving from her spot, she swung the door shut behind herself, the wooden floor creaking as she crossed to the door, brow furrowed.

She stood on her tip toes, fingertips quietly finding a home against the door, as she felt her lashes brush against the paint, eye struggling to focus with her lack of glasses for a moment before he finally came to focus in the small glass globe.

Tommy stood looking off to the side with a manilla folder tucked under his arm. He looked rather unbothered at the concept of being stuck waiting in the hall, and the spiteful part of Quinn felt like pretending she wasn’t even there.

She debated making him wait longer, maybe knock again, but her heart got the best of her as she cracked open the door, leaving the security chain across the gap to see Tommy, truly standing there in the flesh, waiting patiently.

“Hi,” Quinn whispered. Her stomach flipped and she felt her ears get warm, finally seeing him again reminding her how much she missed him.

“I don’t suppose I can come in?”

Quinn nodded, closing the door briefly to slide the chain from the lock, before retreating back to the kitchen to toss the crackers back in the cupboard.

By comparison of his attire, she was severely underdressed for whatever the occasion warranted.

“What have you been doing?” His voice was low as he asked, dress shoes clacking the five short steps he took to lean against the counter.

“In what way?” She chuckled, a smile that she didn’t want to give in to beginning to form as she continued, “I mean, I’m standing here in my pajamas eating cold cuts out of the fridge, it’s not like anything crazy is happening here.”

He smiled softly, nodding.

“Shouldn’t be letting you see me like this,” she mumbled, fidgeting with the hem of the shirt as she leant against the counter.

“Why?” His brows furrowed. She noted he had gotten a haircut in the last few weeks, still shaved short on the sides but the top was slightly shorter than usual.

“Ruins the illusion that there’s something you’re missing out on I suppose.”

There was silence, for a brief moment. Quinn wondered what the purpose of the visit was. She would have liked to let him believe that there were throws of men waiting in the shadows, but, that couldn’t have been further from the truth.

The only male presence she had much conversation with lately had been her dad.

Dalton had been in one of his spurts of radio silence.

From the folder she gathered there was something important going on, but the uneasiness of the unknown still lingered in the back of her mind.

“You changed your hair.”

“Oh,” the statement, although simple, caught her off guard. The fact that he noticed the change at all was interesting, “yeah, Johanna’s sister does hair and wanted a tattoo while I was there, so we did a trade.”

Quinn felt like Mika had gotten the short end of the stick, but after installing the new set of extensions and dying everything to match they both had put in close to the same amount of time on eachother, and Mika had been thrilled, so Quinn accepted the fact that a trade was a trade.

It made her feel better being somewhat close to being back to herself again. Less exposed.

“How was your trip?”

“Good. Three steady days jam packed with work and being drug around sight seeing had me wore out. Ate too much food. Joanna and Bronze both like cooking as much as I do but I made them take me to get Doner and Schnitzel, on two separate nights of course, so we had a good time.”

“Johanna is your friend, so you met her through your work. What does he do?”

The pair sat at the table as if the conversation was normal, as if over the last month nothing had happened and they were picking right back up where they left off, as if it was all part of the plan.

“Bronze. They. Bronze uses they/them pronouns, so,” she shook her head, the correction coming out of habit.

“Okay,” Tommy nodded, “what do they do?”

“They are a multimedia and multidisciplinary artist. When I was there, the project they were working on was some kind of welded installation that I really can’t even begin to explain.”

Tommy hummed, nodding, as silence fell between the two of them again. Quinn swallowed hard. There wasn’t much more to make small talk about.

“If you can believe it, I listened to what you said. Took it as a piece of advice.”

Tommy handed the folder over. It was unlabeled, and Quinn’s curiosity was piqued as she flipped it open, biting back the quickly formed retort that wanted to escape, figuring it was for the best to keep her comments about Tommy’s bullheadedness to herself.

She looked down at the sheet, the first one in the stack, some not so fancy printed seal decorating the top, as her eyes wandered down the page.

Tommy rose from the chair, pacing the small amount of floor space in the kitchen, before settling against the counter again, hands crammed deep in his pockets.

“ ‘Before district judge Shorthose, sitting at the Principal Registry of the Family Division, in the Priory Courts, 33 Bull Street, Birmingham’,” Quinn shook her head, trying to not read ahead as her eyes skipped over the gap to the next line.

The document looked rather official and her heart hammered in her chest, throat feeling tight, as she continued.

“ ‘Between Thomas Michael Shelby, Petitioner, Elizabeth Eileen Shelby, Respondent, and Angel Lorenzo Changretta,” Quinn paused, never until that point having a personality to picture as to whoever Lizzie had betrayed Tommy with, not that she could ever picture her at all either, “ ‘Co-Respondent’.”

She swallowed, her eyes glossing over the rest of it, “ ‘Made final and absolute that the said marriage was thereby dissolved August 26, 2022.’ “

She looked up at him, brow furrowed, “That was Friday.”

“That it was.”

Quinn sat at the small kitchen table, flipping through the papers.

“I was surprised to find that she wasn’t purposefully halting the process. The inquiry for the paternity test was filed under ‘curiosity’ instead of ‘legal’ which would have given it a higher precedent. I went there, did some pushing, and they expedited the process considerably.”

Tommy leaned against the counter, not wanting to explain that the pushing was of money into people’s hands, as he fidgeted with the lighter, desperate to use it even though he knew he wasn’t allowed to while he was inside at their residence.

“So, Ruby’s yours?”

She tried to read the nonsense on the page and make sense of it, but her head was honestly swimming at the information and she wouldn’t be deciphering the graphs and decimal points any time soon.

“Yes, she’s mine.”

Quinn smiled a tad and cleared her throat, a strange feeling of relief washing over her. She felt his eyes on her as she closed the folder, leaning back in her chair and crossing her legs.

Tommy took in her form, wearing yet again a shirt far too big for her, the loose wave of her hair tousled from, if he had to guess from her heavy unmade eyes and lack of glasses, what he assumed was a nap.

Too early for her to be considering sleep. It was late but not that late. She was always so stubborn to turn in. Some nights she’d choose to nod off on the couch while he finished a little bit of work instead of turning in alone.

“When did you get back?” She quizzed, stretching her back, arms above her head before letting her hands fall back into her lap.

“About an hour ago.”

“So you came straight here?”

“Yes. I came straight here.”

“Why?”

Tommy paused, the bluntness of the question catching him by surprise.

Quinn knew Tommy. She knew how much he enjoyed being correct in the conversations he had with his brothers that she had overheard, that it was no surprise he was there to prove her wrong about something.

She had left in much of a storm of chaos the last time they had seen each other, and they hadn’t spoken, so she wouldn’t blame him if he came to rub it in.

“I came here because you’re here.”

“Just because you knew where to find me?”

He cleared his throat, a smile creeping onto his features as she continued to use his own tactic of flipping the question back around against him, “Because I miss…” he chuckled, leaning his head back to look at the ceiling, “I miss having to fight for the covers. I miss waking up to short breaths on the back of my neck or your cheek pressed between my shoulders and not being able to move without waking you up.”

She smiled, tucking her hand in her hair at the nape of her neck as she listened.

“I miss the questions you ask to try and understand what I do, even if the answers aren’t always clear, because they can’t be, because sometimes me business is complicated.”

She heard the pitter patter of tiny paws on the floor as Beelzebub wandered sleepily down the hallway, no doubt wondering where his human heater had went off to.

“I miss knowing that you’re there. That if I call you’ll pick up and tell me something about your day. The silence of not wanting to bother you before I had all the answers was beginning to be unbearable.”

Tommy paused, mouth dry, when he saw her watching him intently. She looked more beautiful than he could put into words, the way the light from over the sink cast shadows along her legs, the way she was stretched out without a care in the world in just an old tee shirt.

Chiaroscuro. That was what she had called it, looking through an old textbook on the couch one night for a reference photo for a drawing she had intended to start, one that she knew was in there somewhere but couldn’t quite remember the name. Talking fondly of Baglione and Caravaggio and the way they used light and dark to portray the drama and beauty in their work.

He felt like maybe he understood the way she talked about it all now.

“Should I continue?”

Quinn shook her head, a small shrug accompanying it. “I was just sitting here trying to decide how long I was going to make you grovel for.”

Tommy chuckled, vacating the spot he had been leaned against, and Quinn realized all her brazenness had evaporated from the firmness of her previous statement as she continued.

“I…I was watching a documentary. You can stay. If you want, I mean—“

He shrugged out of the jacket, removing the cap from his head and tucking it in the pocket before draping it over the back of the chair. The way he hung his head, the curvature of his shoulders, the way the light cast its shadows, she had seen things in museums that couldn’t hold a candle to him.

“Your car will get towed, if it’s not in the parking garage. I can make some tea or something while you move it.”

He hummed, closing the space between them before offering a hand to pull her up from the chair, “I had some optimism that you wouldn’t send me away when I got here, so it already is.”

She rolled her eyes, fighting a smile, as she took his hand, pulling him behind her down the hall, soft footfalls following the trot of her tiny companion leading the way.

“You’re just full of yourself tonight, aren’t you?”

She wasn’t prepared for how close he was, arms encircling her waist before whispering the words gently against the side of her neck, voice much lower than it had been when they were simply conversing, “It is a problem at times.”

She shivered as the goose bumps rose across the parts of her skin that weren’t flush.

Beelzebub hopped up on the foot of the bed, nudging at Tommy’s hand as he toed off his shoes.

“Are you going to be nice today? Little bugger.” Tommy skritched him behind the ears hesitantly, at first, before he was allowed to touch the cat under the chin, the loud purr echoing through the room.

Quinn settled herself against the pillows, watching with heavy eyes as he undressed, something familiar and comforting in the way he let himself relax in her space, wandering to the dresser with the clothes all half off, belt undone but still through the loops, shirt unbuttoned but still on, tie laying at the foot of the bed somewhere, and searched for clothes that either were his or would fit.

He ended up in only his cotton undershirt and the Champion shorts he had pilfered from the back of one of the drawers.

Quinn had picked them up at an estate sale back home. From the look of them, they were from the 1998-1999 Detroit Pistons season, the alternate color scheme of teal, red, and black.

She couldn’t blame him. They were comfortable.

She’d never admit it, but she was slightly jealous that somehow his ass looked better in them than hers did.

His weight sank the bed as he settled between her thighs, head resting on her stomach as they both tried to get comfortable, arms wrapping around her waist.

Quinn inferred, anticipating that he wouldn’t say it directly, but from everything else he had said she could gather that he missed her.

There was comfort in the way he held on to her.

“How was your family?” She whispered, the words partly ate up by the darkness of the room, as she ran her fingers through the longest part of his hair.

“Difficult as usual. John and Esme are having another baby, Arthur can’t decide which to worship more, God or a bottle, and Ada’s husband just got put on a new assignment out of the country, so, Polly is going to be staying with her for a few weeks to help get things ready for the baby.”

Quinn felt her heart clench. Two little babies on the way with their tiny toes and fingers and noses.

She swallowed hard before speaking, “You should’ve stayed if they needed you.”

Her eyes were slipping closed as she felt Mr. Bee lay down next to her foot, close enough that she could feel him purring.

Her hands wandered under the collar of Tommy’s undershirt, the familiar planes of his shoulders bringing comfort to her.

He was here, with her, really and truly.

“They get on fine by themselves. I was able to see Charlie. And Ruby. She’s getting tall. Lost another tooth.”

Quinn smiled, the thought of Tommy having to play tooth fairy rather amusing her, “Were they happy to see you?”

He sighed, and Quinn let her eyes slipped closed as he nuzzled at her stomach, something she wasn’t even sure he realized he was doing as he got comfortable, “Charlie is rather indifferent to everything at his age. Ruby still shows it. Woke up with her on the other side of the bed every morning. She isn’t fond of being far away when we’re at the house.”

She hummed, enjoying the heat radiating from him, palms pressed into her skin, and no complaints as she took advantage of being able to put her cold feet on him.

“She sounds really sweet, Tommy.”

She yawned, settling into the pillows. The relief of sleeping in her own bed was something she always looked forward to after traveling.

There was silence, and for a moment she wondered if he’d fallen asleep.

“I’d like for you to meet them.”

“Who?” She was half dozed off when he started to speak again, and she had to take a minute to get her brain back on track with the conversation they had been having.

“Charlie and Ruby.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

She paused before agreeing, heart thundering in her chest at the thought.

“When?”

“I was planning to go back again rather soon. The last horse race of the season is in September. Charlie’s birthday, too. Have to look at the calendar to see how it lines up.”

“Okay.”

“Will you come with me?”

She smoothed her fingers through his hair, trying to find the words under pressure that she was looking for. Did she want to meet them? Yes. She liked kids, but if she met them then that meant something serious. If she said no with no good reason, then that just made her sound like an asshole.

“Can I think on it and decide?”

“Yeah. If that’s what you want.”

Quinn was relieved when Tommy didn’t sound mad or disappointed by the notion of her needing to take some time to think.

As she started to fall asleep once again she tried to find the way to organize the words in her mind to be able to repeat them in the morning, but sleep got the best of her before any coherent thoughts came.

When she woke up, there was no ability for her to roll. Something heavy was on her.

Fucking cat—

Beelzebub wasn’t small, and he had a wonderful habit of curling up on her chest or into her side somewhere to make it impossible to move in the morning.

She took a breath, glancing down to see Tommy’s head on her chest, one leg over one of hers, in a position that surely had his feet hanging off the foot of the bed.

Oh.

She ran her fingers through the shortest part of his hair, stopping somewhere around the crown of his head and just enjoying the weight of him on her.

They hadn’t had sex and he had still stayed. A change of pattern from anything she had considered usual for them.

She let her eyes close, realizing there was immense comfort in the silence.

She slipped her other hand along his back, the shirt apparently having been the straw that broke the camel's back in the night of being too warm, the heat of his bare skin familiar under her fingertips.

She tried not to laugh when he snored, peeking her eyes open, but the way Beelzebub’s ears shot up as he turned to look at Tommy was too comical.

So the snort escaped, rocking his head on her body as she tried to take a deep breath to stop but it was already too late.

He opened one eye, then the other, the confusion of waking in an unfamiliar room apparent on his face until he quickly surveyed where he was, eyes glancing up to meet hers and the suppressed smile she was toying with on her lips finally broke through as he looked severely less disgruntled with his resting place once he realized where he was.

“Hi,” Quinn whispered, realizing she had quite missed mornings like this, where there was no rush, no alarm, nothing to do.

Well, maybe one thing.

“Hi,” he sat up, rubbing sleep from his eyes before leaning against the pillows, legs outstretched.

“So,” she cleared her throat as he pulled her close, her arm wrapping around his waist as she settled in comfortably, “can I be a normal, sane, and rational person and ask you what we’re doing?”

She chanced a glance up at him through her lashes before continuing, “If you want me to do something like meet your children and go to something that involves your business endeavors, I mean, I think I can guess, but, being left to wonder is not something I can do. Clearly.”

He chuckled, “Never would have gathered that.”

Quinn sighed, stomach grumbling as she checked the time on her phone, a little after 7AM.

“You know what I’m saying.”

Tommy nodded, “I do. Yes.”

“I am sorry, for freaking out. I just had people coming at me from every which way with their questions and opinions and it was kind of a lot.”

Tommy gave a small nod, and Quinn continued, “Now,” she squirmed and moved so she could see his face better, something about the heavy lidded look he gave her and their proximity combined with the comfortable lack of clothing stirring a familiar feeling in her stomach, “I am perfectly, happily, content not seeing other people,” she tried to breathe through the anxious fluttering feeling in her chest, knowing it would pass, “if that’s what you want. If it’s not, then I just need to know before we go any further without being on the same page.”

Quinn was relieved when he didn’t miss a beat, one hand cupping her face gently, thumb stroking her cheek, “I asked you to meet my children, I don’t think I could agree more.”

She smiled as he brushed his nose against hers, the thrum of blood rushing in her ears, the warm feeling of adrenaline and anticipation coursing through her body made her feel like she would turn to putty in an instant.

Quinn melted into the way Tommy’s hand found the back of her neck, holding her close enough to bring their lips together, a content sigh passing into his mouth as she welcomed his large hands roaming under her shirt.

She was always surprised how gentle he was with her, not in a demeaning way, not like she was a China doll, but purposeful and deliberate in his movements, laying his hands on her in such specific ways that kept her wanting more.

It didn’t take any convincing for her to find herself in his lap, happily letting him discard her shirt, now wrinkled with sleep as he hooked a finger around the waistband of her ribbed cotton underwear, free hand cradling her face as his eyes drank in every part of her.

She let her eyes close as his mouth met the skin of her neck, working agonizingly slowly across her skin as she pulled impatiently at the string in the waistband of the shorts, knowing damn well it wouldn’t do any good.

The light graze of teeth against her collarbone caught Quinn off guard; she felt goosebumps and a shiver run through her, something new, different, and judging by the aching and desperation for some kind of friction between her thighs, definitely not bad.

“Tommy, please,” she whispered, trying to sound anything but needy, but, it was useless.

“Please what, love?”

She could see the glittering sense of mischief in his eyes, boring a hole into her that sent a shiver straight into her stomach.

She barely spoke, the whispered, “need you,” coming out in a mumble between their lips while he worked on trying to inch the cotton down her legs, despite the position and knowing it wouldn’t work, enough to pull the offending garment to the side, fingers gently parting her, delighted to found how ready she was for him, soaked, wet, impatient and breathless from just the smallest touch.

She drug her nails through his hair, enough to make Tommy look up at her, teeth sunk into her bottom lip, face flush.

“Can’t wait,” she shook her head, fingers tucking into the waistband of the shorts, trying her best to be more than convincing, “need you. Now.”

She hadn’t had a doubt her words would work, he was already rock hard, constrained within fabric but pressing against her thigh, teasing her and taunting her.

Tommy realized, once he found himself buried inside her again, the feeling of no longer being unhole, a strange lonesome worry that sometime plagued his mind, the he regretted the few hours that his brain entertained the thought, late and left alone by the fire in his office after a few too many whiskeys and passing up the offer of dinner from Frances after his late arrival home, that maybe he wouldn’t fight that hard to resolve their situation.

As he was blessed with the sounds of grateful moans and quiet pants and hissed swear words coming from between Quinn’s lips, brows furrowed as he kept the steady rythym that had her toes curling into the sheets and fingers weaving into his hair, the pressure and sensation of everything combined keeping him in a place between reality and some strange sort of oblivion, he accepted, just as he had after sobering up late into the night as he tried to focus on numbers and percentages and charts that he didn’t give a fuck about at that moment, that just because she had been upset and he wasn’t used to not being able to have the final word, didn’t mean that the expression behind it, the root of what was truly upsetting Quinn, was wrong.

He pushed the rest of the thoughts away as best as he could, knowing that now he was able to enjoy what he had feared missing out on, not just the the wonderful way that he could tell just from the way her breath caught in her throat and her hands couldn’t seem to get enough traction on his skin anywhere to satisfy her, but the smell of her hair, and the pillows, and the sheets, and everything that made her endearing and interesting were all things that, once he added them up, he realized he couldn’t live without.

That, and, if he would have missed out on finding out how far they could make it together a second time (arguably the first time they met would have been ill fated and messy if he had managed in any capacity to find her again on purpose) he would have never let himself live it down.

“Tommy,” the sound of his name coming from her lips ripped him back into reality, her soft fingers stroking his cheek, buried to the hilt inside her, the sensation of her cunt clamped around him like a vice, ready to milk every last drop he could give her, had him ready to empty himself out inside her, “is everything okay?”

He took a steadying breath, leaning into her touch, kissing her palm before working his lips down her arm, face nuzzling into her neck, heavy breaths fanning her skin and causing her to shudder, “hmm, yeah, more than just okay, love.”

Quinn was exhausted by the time they finally collapsed beneath the sheets, welcome to the change of Tommy’s arms caged around her from behind as he pulled her close to his chest, making sure she fit just so under his chin before she burrowed them under the blanket.

There was comfortable silence while she felt her heart beat return to normal, fingers idly drawing patterns on his skin while she felt her eyes grow heavy.

“Could I ask you something?”

“Hmm, that depends,” Quinn whispered, “but I feel like you’re going to ask anyway.”

Tommy chuckled, lips pressing gently to her bare shoulder as she wiggled to get closer, if at all possible.

“How many times?”

Quinn paused, eyes rolling in her head as she tried to pinpoint exactly what the question was asking. She thought about it for a moment before shrugging, “How many times, what?”

“You don’t remember?”

“Depends on what you're asking about,” she chuckled, turning in his arms so they could be face to face.

The question could’ve been about anything really.

How many times he had made her finish, how many times she had visited friends out of the country, instances of her sisters being mean to her, how many times Gerard had hurt her—

“The night at the bar, you told Hannah you weren’t sharing,” she started to grin as he spoke, nose creasing, “just trying to figure out how many times you did.”

“Why? Do you want to fuck me and Hannah?”

He shook his head, seriousness cracking with a half smile, “No, just trying to satisfy me own curiosity,” he chuckled before continuing, “maybe to keep an ace up me sleeve in case the little Russian heiress we do business with starts trying to invite me to orgies again.”

Quinn snorted, amused in a way at the thought of him trapped in that situation and attempting to talk his way out of it, “Well, what a life you live, Tommy Shelby.”

He smiled, taking an interest in the way her reaction was slightly less explosive and resentful than what he would have expected in comparison to anyone else.

“You’re not going alone if she does though, nice try.” Quinn yawned through the words, proud of herself for being able to take a joke, as she stretched under the blanket, settling back into a comfortable position as she felt the reminder of part of their escapades begin to leak down her thigh.

“Never said I would.”

“Actually, though, four. The first time was just something that happened and was fun, and by the fourth time we just realized what a lot of work it was to make it happen. I also think Hannah started seeing someone, so that might’ve been it too.”

Her brows drew together while she took in his expression, content with the information she had disposed to him.

“My turn for questions,” Quinn cleared her throat, fingers fiddling with the blankets absentmindedly, trying to hide any little bit of jealousy deep down inside, “was there anyone, while you were back home?”

The words felt silly once she said them, she realized. What did it matter? They were here, now, together. Was something that happened in between enough to make a difference?

He shook his head, placing a gentle kiss to her forehead as a crease formed between his brows, “No,” it came out as a whisper, maybe less convincing that it could have been if it was a tad louder, but it was the truth, “no one.”

Quinn nodded, settling in to the way he held her, something that she thought, maybe, she would never get enough of, hearing the thrum of his heart in her ear as she settled on his chest, the way that his fingertips kneaded into her flesh, slowing as time passed but still lasting until Quinn found her eyes slipping closed.

The silence was cozy as she felt herself dozing back off to sleep, content in the fact that she finally had a real answer to what was happening between them, and relieved at herself for communicating it in a way that didn’t make her sound immature.

When Quinn woke up again, the bed was empty.

She pushed out from under the covers, grabbing blindly for her glasses and a sweater, making a mad dash to the bathroom to clean up as much as she could without making a mess.

Turning on the shower and throwing herself in seemed to be the best bet, doing her best to keep her hair dry before haphazardly toweling off and pulling on the sweater.

She opened the bathroom door, greeted by the smell of something burnt. Not actively burning, not a fire, just burnt.

Tommy was partly dressed, back in the shorts and shirt, standing with his back to her, with a burnt pile of pancakes cooling on a plate next to the stove.

She watched as he flipped another one, swearing when the bottom was charred, and tossing it on the plate with the others with a huff.

“It runs hot,” Quinn spoke, moving to the coffee maker, thankful to see the carafe already full before rummaging around in the cupboard for her favorite mug, one from the DIA with Diego Rivera’s Detroit Industry Mural wrapped around the outside.

“What?”

“The stove runs hot. Something is wrong with the thermostat or something, but we’re just used to it.”

She took a sip of the liquid, heat pooling contently in her stomach, and motioned for him to hand her the spatula.

“You have to watch,” she poured the batter out onto the pan, only enough for one pancake left at that point, “and as soon as the last little bubble evaporates,” she gestured at the edge of the round batter where the last few bubbles came to the surface, before wiggling the spatula carefully underneath the cooked edge, “then you can flip it.”

It landed on the pan with a satisfying thwack and Tommy hummed, pressing a gentle kiss to her hair, a hand slowly drawing circles into her back, “That was the last of your flour, love. So, unless you know something I don’t about where to find more, you should put pants on.”

“For?” Quinn sipped at the coffee, leaning into his side, as she shut off the burner.

“Well, you have two eggs—”

“Those are Hannah’s.” Quinn interjected.

“--and no bread,” Tommy continued, “so, it looks like we’re going to get breakfast.”

“Ooh,” Quinn whistled, continuing on sarcastically as she sipped her coffee, “is that, like, you asking me on a date?”

Tommy chuckled as she wandered off down the hall, swaying her hips in an exaggerated fashion before she reached the door to the bedroom.

“We won’t be going anywhere if you keep that up.”

Quinn hummed, rounding the corner into her room before peeking back to see if he followed at all, “I mean,” she called, pulling off the sweater in her search for presentable clothes, “I can’t say I’d complain!”

Well…that took me far too long to get out! Let me know if you liked it or not, I guess 😂

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