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yourmomxx · 11 months

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Father of Mine

father of mine masterlist

summary: All Dean Winchester ever wanted was to protect the people he loved. Sometimes, in order to do that, he had to make hard decisions, Lisa and Ben were the prime example. Years after making another one of those hard decisions, he has to come back to the place where he had left a piece of his heart - only to be constantly reminded of what he had to sacrifice in order to keep his family safe.

warnings: canon violence, child abandonment, swear words, angst, daddy issues, character death, throwing up, this is written like an episode of Supernatural

word count: 8,2k

a/n: I’ve been writing this story for … a year now? I think? And I’ve gotta admit, I am so happy that it is finally out. Everything that I write means incredibly much to me, but this story just holds such a special place in my heart and I am very happy to share it now with you guys. I do hope you like it, and, as always, reblogs are very much appreciated because that way the story gets spread to more people! Now, enjoy!

flashbacks are written in italics

pt1 pt2 pt3

Cleveland, Ohio 2002

The bar was crowded with people.

Gruffed men wearing leather jackets and intoxicated women in crop-tops were all sprawled out around an alcohol booth in the middle.

In another corner, currently bathed in purple and orange spotlight, a guy with an unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt and a bucket-hat was giving a lousy cover of ‘God save the Queen’ by Sex Pistols.

♫ ♪ “Don't be told what you want. Don't be told what you need. There's no future, no future, no future for you!” ♫ ♪

On one of the way too small bar chairs, sipping a burning mix of whiskey and ginger ale, was sitting Dean Winchester, and he was pissed.

Pissed at his stupid father, who was acting like Dean was a 15-year-old with no common sense whatsoever, pissed at the goddamn ghost that had found an incredible pleasure in almost ripping his fingers off his hands, and pissed at stupid Sam for just getting up one day and leaving him - didn’t matter if that had been months ago.

And with every drink that Dean downed, he started feeling more like “Dad can kiss my ass” instead of “Dad has been doing this much longer than you and just knows better”. Meaning, he should probably slow down.

But whatever.

His Dad could kiss his ass.

♫ ♪ “Oh when there's no future, how can there be sin? We're the flowers in the dustbin!” ♫ ♪

“Why, hello,” he suddenly heard a sweet voice next to him say.

Dean turned his head and was met face to face with friendly, glimmering eyes.

Those, just as the voice that had spoken to him, belonged to a young woman who seemed to have just appeared next to him.

He moved his gaze up and down her body.

Apart from her eyes, she had smooth skin, that was covered with glowing sweatpearls, most likely because of the stuffy air around them.

Or maybe, just like Dean, she had had a couple drinks too many.

A few, fine strands of her shoulder-length hair were tousled, likely from combing her hands through it.

He licked his lips. “Well, hello you. With whom do I have the pleasure?”

He was laying on thick and he knew that, but it’s not like he could care about it.

“Gloria. Richards.” She was speaking in a soft, honey voice, and Dean urged himself to focus on her face, and not the way her neck and chest were lightly gleaming from the thin layer of sweat covering them.

“What’s yours?”

Dean Winchester.

But no, that wasn’t his name. Not today at least. If he could just remember what was. And the drinks didn’t exactly make thinking easier.

“Dean Hansley.”

Gloria smiled again.

What a nice smile she had.

"Dean Hansley." She tasted the words, let them burn on her tongue. "That's a nice name."

And then she sat down at the stool next to him, without waiting for him to invite her, and she started talking.

And he talked back with her.

And time went by, and she kept finishing and ordering drinks, that Dean all offered to pay, and she never refused.

By now, the guy in the Hawaiian shirt had been thrown off the karaoke stage, after heavily throwing up into one of the other guest's handbags, halfway through a tedious ballad about life, and love, and its misery.

The only source of music was coming from the colorful jukebox next to the pool board.

A couple drunk-off-their-asses idiots, trying to play billiards, were loudly roaring along to AC/DC’s ‘You shook me all night long’.

♫ ♪ “She was a fast machine, she kept her motor clean, she was the best damn woman that I ever seen!” ♫ ♪

Gloria was still sitting next to him, although a bit closer, and she was sipping at her third drink he had bought her tonight.

And damn, that girl had high tolerance.

Dean thought she was amazing.

“That thing with your family sucks, really.” She scrunched up her nose in slight discomfort.

Dean let out a humorless laugh and took a sip of the whiskey he was still stuck with. “Yeah, tell me about it.”

Yes, he had told her about his - family issues. But so what?

It felt nice having someone listening to him for a change. Someone who wasn’t his family, didn’t even know them, and wouldn’t try to disregard his frustration by telling him to ‘put himself in his father’s shoes for once’.

Gloria finished her drink and used the palm of her hand to wipe the sweat off her forehead.

Dean tried his best to not think too much about her knee touching his, her being so close him.

“The air in here is terrible,” she said, heavily emphasizing the last word.

Dean’s attention was turned to her again. He knew she had said something before that, but he hadn’t been able to catch it, too lost in his own mind.

He kind of felt bad for not listening to her.

Dean threw a look around.

“Yeah, it’s getting pretty hot in here,” he agreed, feeling pearls of sweat rolling off the little hairs on his neck.

Gloria looked directly into his eyes, then up his body, down his body, before settling on his eyes again.

She bit the inside of her cheek. Then her lip.

“I mean,” she slowly spoke, “we could continue this conversation somewhere else if you want. Where there’s not so many people and the air doesn’t taste like salt.”

♫ ♪ “You really took me and you shook me all night long! Ooh, you shook me all night long!” ♫ ♪

Hell yeah.

A boyish grin started forming on his face.

“An offer like that - how could I say no?”

༺ ｡ ° ୨❀୧ ° ｡ ༻

Now

“Read it again for me.”

Dean was staring straight ahead onto the road, his gaze hard and jaw clenched.

Sam sighed and opened the newspaper again, for what had to be the seventh time now since they had first found it.

They were both sitting in the Impala, Castiel in the backseat. The angel could have just flipped his wings and flown to the destination they were headed, but he had insisted to take the drive with them, claiming he had “nothing better to do anyway”.

“St. George, Louisiana,” Sam started to read.

“In the night of Wednesday to Thursday, a young man was found dead in his room in Saint George’s Children’s Home. The 17-year-old Roy Kendall hadn’t come out of his room the first half of the day, and when a woman of the working personnel - whose name has been withheld - came to check on him, she discovered his mutilated body draped out on the bed. According to the police, the young man’s rib cage had been compressed with such force that his ribs were broken and had managed to pierce through the young man’s internal organs, which resulted in him slowly bleeding out internally. Authorities are still in the dark about the exact details of the tragedy and the questions of “Why” and, particularly, “How” something like this could even be possible. The head of the Children’s Care Institution …, blah blah blah.”

Sam purposefully drifted off and ended his reading session therefore. He folded the newspaper back together and stuffed it into the Impala’s globe compartment.

“And that’s it, I am not reading this again. Next thing you know, I’m going to dream about squished organs and ribcages.”

He shuddered.

“I just don’t get it, man,” Dean said, ignoring his brother’s complaints, but he didn’t seem to address anyone in particular.

“I mean, I checked everything, Sammy. No demonic omens, no strategic killings, no recent disappearances. That place was all white picket fences and summer barbecues when we- ”

He was quick to cut himself off.

Sam threw his brother a side glance, but decided to not address his slip-up.

“Well, Dean, sometimes monsters just … turn up, you know.” This time Sam turned his head to get a proper look at his older brother.

“Maybe it’s just passing through, or simply moved there from somewhere else. They aren’t exactly tied to a specific place.”

Dean ran his hand over his face and through his hair in distress. “Out of all places, why there?” He muttered in a low tone.

And again, he was more talking to himself than anyone else.

“I don’t understand.” Cas was suddenly talking from the back seat. “What is in this Children’s Home that is of so much importance to you both?”

Dean was quick to answer a “Nothing,” but Castiel didn’t quite believe him.

Sam turned in his seat to face the angel.

“We were working a case near there a while back,” he simply explained.

Cas frowned, still not quite convinced, but he decided to let the topic rest. For now, at least.

“I understand,” he said. “Then it would probably be of benefit for you to stick with your past aliases. Just in case anyone there should recognize you.”

“Yeah. Maybe,” Dean vaguely answered, but he seemed trapped deep in his own thoughts.

༺ ｡ ° ୨❀୧ ° ｡ ༻

Black Hawk, Colorado 2002

“To listen to this voicemail, call-”

A dial tone sounded. The message was a few months old.

“Hey, Dean, it’s uh … it’s Gloria. You know, Gloria Richards, from a few nights ago?” A humorless chuckle was heard on the other end of the line.

“Though, guys like you don’t usually remember their casual one-night hookups. So I’ll cut straight to the chase.” One heavy inhale.

“I’m pregnant. And I know the chances of you wanting anything to do with me are zero to negative six, but I just wanted to-”

“To delete this voicemail, press 2.”

A tone.

“Voicemail deleted.”

“To listen to this voicema-”

The woman on the other end sounded more outraged this time, even though occasional cracks or hiccups in her voice gave away that she had been heavily crying moments before. Maybe still was.

“Hello Dean, it’s me again. You know, I didn’t expect you to jump up high at the news, but ignoring me?” She scoffed. “That’s a different type of low.”

She sniffled. “I’m just calling to tell you I’ve decided to keep the baby. So you can still change your mind, if you-”

“To delete this voicemail, press-” “Voicemail deleted.”

“To listen to th-”

“Hello, Dean. It’s Gloria. Again.”

This time, she seemed calmer, which could be reasoned with the tiredness her voice was radiating.

“I suppose I’m still kind of hoping that you will call me back. Or even pick up.” She sighed.

“I wanted to tell you that she’s perfectly healthy and growing. That’s right. She. Our baby is going to be a-”

“To delete this-” ”Voicemail deleted.”

John Winchester stared at the small phone in his hand and pressed a button.

“You have no more voicemails.”

That moment, Dean came bursting into the motel room, looking around the empty shelves and patting up and down his jacket- and jeans-pockets.

“Hey Dad, do you know where my phone is? I heard it ringing,” Dean asked.

“Yes, just some spam-callers,” John neatly lied. “I took care of it, but I’m gonna put it out of service, just in case.”

Dean looked at him and for a moment, John thought his son would grow suspicious, but he just nodded. “Alright. Thanks, Dad.”

John nodded and Dean left the room with his bag in hand. When he was certain Dean wouldn’t come back, John took the phone apart and crashed the SIM Card on the nightstand with the lamp.

Then he put the pieces in the bin, took his duffel bag and followed his son to the car.

༺ ｡ ° ୨❀୧ ° ｡ ༻

Now

The St. George’s Children’s Home was somewhat of a small castle, kept in a renaissance style.

Around a large courtyard, archways connected four round-towers, which were slightly higher than the rest of the castle. The walls were painted a pale yellow.

Trees grew in the gardens around the castle, flowers in planted beds, and as far as Dean could remember, there was a hedge maze behind the walls, not visible from the gateway.

They had parked the Impala in one of the parking spaces next to the tall, elegant terrain fence.

Sam and Dean were wearing black suits and their fake badges, Castiel - as always - stuck with the trench coat.

Dean was eyeing the building suspiciously.

In fact, he had been doing so for the last three minutes, in which they had all sat in the Impala in complete silence.

Sam threw a quick, concerned glance at his brother before clearing his throat.

“You really wanna do this?”, he asked quietly.

“No,” Dean answered and opened the car door, “But it’s not like we have a choice, right?”

Sam sighed and did the same, not before exchanging a quick, apprehensive look with Castiel, who still didn’t quite know what was going on.

The castle’s inside was considerably more modern than its outside.

With brightly-colored walls and furniture, and minimalistic decorations all over.

It seemed cozy.

They were headed for the office of the youth center’s director, Maria Whitlock. Dean remembered exactly where that was. Down the hall, left. Past a few closed bedroom doors. Last door at the end of the corridor.

Dean cleared his throat and knocked on the door, Sam right behind him. Castiel had left before they had entered the castle, claiming to look for a suitable Motel nearby, and telling them to contact him if they needed his help.

There was a beat of silence before they heard a woman’s voice reply “Yes?” and entered the office.

Maria Whitlock was an elderly woman, with dark red hair that she kept in a low bun. She was around a head smaller than Dean, and wearing a grey blouse combined with a wine red jacket and a black pencil skirt.

When she heard them enter the room, she looked up from a few papers she was filing, and her face immediately fell.

“Hello, Maria.” Sam greeted her.

“Dean and Sam Winchester,” she breathed out, startled.

“I never thought I would see you two again.”

Dean felt a sting in his chest.

“Yeah, well,” Sam said and tried a clumsy smile. A heavy silence followed, and Dean shifted uncomfortably.

Maria frowned. “Not to seem impolite, but what are the two of you doing here?” She asked.

Sam cleared his throat awkwardly.

“We, uhm, we heard about Roy and we thought that, maybe, we should just check if everything was alright and, of course, speak our condolences. You know, for old time’s sake.”

She nodded and closed the pen. “Yes, right. Roy. I completely forgot that they put that in the paper.”

A look of dark grief fell over her face and her gaze drifted into nothingness. She suddenly looked much older than she was.

Dean cleared his throat. “I gave you my number, Maria,” he spoke. “If you would’ve called, we could’ve been here sooner.”

She blinked rapidly, pulling herself out of her thoughts and looked at him for a second before she replied.

“I know, I know, but to be honest - it slipped my mind, in between all of this … chaos and tragedy.”

While she was talking, she got up from her chair and walked around the table, getting a clearer view at Sam and Dean.

“Of course,” Sam hastily said. “No worries. We are very sorry for your loss.”

She gave him a sad smile. “Thank you. That means a lot.”

Dean was glad that it had been Sam who had spoken up. He wasn’t very good at that sort of things. Nor did he aspire to be.

“You said you were here because of Roy’s …. passing,” Maria continued, and the brothers nodded.

“But that would mean that this was some sort of - unnatural incident.”

Sam swallowed hard.

“Well,” he started, trying to find the right words that would not trigger a breakdown for the woman, “we saw the article in the newspaper and thought that we would just have a look at it. The circumstances of Roy’s passing aren’t exactly common for a person his age, after all.”

Or for any person, really.

She nodded lazily. “Yes. I suppose you are right.”

Dean could swear that another minute of awkward silence between them would probably kill him, so he took it upon himself to prevent it before it started.

“I get that this is hard, Maria,” he said, “But if we could maybe ask you some questions? Maybe speak to the person that found him?”

She sniffled.

Oh dear God.

“Yes, yes, of course.” Her voice was a bit higher than before, and her hands grabbed for a handkerchief lying on the table.

“Uhm, the woman who found him was one of my responsible supervisors, Betty Langston. She should be present in the building today, but the last time I spoke to her, she was still pretty shaken up. I mean, who can blame her? I can’t even imagine what it must have been like, seeing that poor boy lying on his bed, just- ”

She broke off and a sob escaped her lips, before she buried her face in the kerchief.

“I’m sorry,” she cried, “I’m sorry, it’s just - he was such a kind boy. He had his whole life ahead of him. And the way that he had to go…”

She raised her head and shook it, eyes reddened and filled with tears.

“I wouldn’t wish that upon anyone.”

“We understand, Maria,” Sam spoke in a comforting, low voice.

And Dean added, “And I promise we will find whatever did this and make sure this happens to no one ever again.”

She forced herself to a smile.

“Thank you, boys. May the angels be with you.”

Dean forbid himself a snort.

“Thank you for your time, Maria. We will let you know when we know more,” Sam said and left the office.

He wouldn’t risk making her cry again by bothering her with questions about her dead fosterling.

Dean smiled at Maria and turned to follow his brother, but she stopped him.

“Dean.”

He turned to face her.

“You do know that it won’t be possible for you to investigate here, without … encountering a certain someone.”

Dean straightened his shoulders.

“Yes, I know.”

“Have you thought about it? What you will say to her?”

“Gotta admit, I haven’t.”

She hummed and nodded. Dean noticed that she had resumed her usual upright position, and if he hadn’t just witnessed it, he probably would not know that she had been crying.

“I should warn you,” she said gently, “It probably won’t be easy.”

“I honestly didn’t expect it to be.”

She smiled a gentle smile at him and he returned it, before finally leaving the room and joining his brother in the hallway.

༺ ｡ ° ୨❀୧ ° ｡ ༻

Lewiston, Michigan 2004

The first time he had read it, John Winchester had been drunk. He had spared a quick glance at it after coming home from a bar, before throwing himself onto the motel bed and passing out.

The second time he had read it, he had been sober, but suffering from a skull-splitting headache.

The third time he read it, it was simply to make sure his hungover mind wasn’t making any of this up. But no, the words on the newspaper stayed the same, grinning up at him with a sickening smirk that made his stomach turn.

In the small corner of the left page, where the lesser important news were usually placed, throned the bold-printed, black words:

24-year-old woman dies in tragic car accident, leaves 1-year-old daughter behind

No. God, no.

He read it again. Read the headline, read the article, the name that had been shortened but to him unmistakable: Gloria R.

R. Just like Richards. Gloria Richards.

There was a picture placed right next to the text, held in color, of a young woman that was clearly putting on a smile for the camera.

John slammed the newspaper on the round table.

“Damn it!” He yelled.

And in that moment, John was grateful that Dean had offered to go on a coffee run.

—

He was ‘going on a quick hunt’. That’s what he told Dean.

He was ‘going on a quick hunt and if anyone needed anything, they should contact Dean’. That’s what he told Bobby. And everyone that reached his voicemail.

Cleveland, Ohio. That’s where he was going. He had some business to attend to.

—

Central Nebraska

To say that Ellen Harvelle wasn’t delighted about John Winchester showing up inside the Roadhouse would be quite an understatement.

She was furious.

John paid attention to enter the wooden cabin carefully. He didn’t expect Ellen to be pleased by his sudden presence, especially considering their last encounter with each other.

It was a random Wednesday afternoon, and there wasn’t anyone seated in the Roadhouse, except for Ellen herself, who was busy cleaning the bar with a half-wet kitchen towel.

The brunette woman looked up for a quick second, as a form of formality, before she dedicated her attention back onto the dirty surface.

“I’ll be with you in a secon-” Then she realized. Stopped. Did a double take.

“Winchester.” The word was dripping from her lips with loathing.

“Hello, Ellen,” he started, but she cut him off.

“What do you want?” Her question was blunt and her tone cold and unwelcoming.

John cleared his throat and stepped from one foot to the other. He had to sell his story good, if Ellen wouldn’t get on board with his proposition, he had nobody else to go to.

“Look, Ellen. I get that you’re mad- ”

“Mad?” She let out a short, sour laugh.

“Mad doesn’t even begin to describe what I am feeling towards you, Winchester. Try hatred. Pure disgust.” She scoffed again.

“You must have a death wish, because I couldn’t think of any other possible reason why you would drag your dumbass out here again. ”

John swallowed hard. She was right. Who was he to just show up here again? After what happened?

But there was no turning back now, he had to go through with this.

“You’re right.” He spoke in a low tone to try and seem less intimidating and also attempt to soothe her temper towards him.

“I am sorry about what happened, Ellen. If I could go back and do it any different, then I would.”

A lie. She knew that. He knew that she knew that. Still - she didn’t interrupt, just kept glaring at him, so he decided to continue.

“But unfortunately, I can’t. And I know you have every right and reason to hate me now.”

Agreeing and empathizing with her.

“But there is something extremely important that I need to ask of you.”

Again, he didn’t have much time to talk, before Ellen raised her voice.

“You damned son of a bitch!”, she yelled, tossing the kitchen towel onto the counter with such force, the leftover water splashed around.

“You ain’t got no right walking in here, after what you pulled, and ask a goddamned favor of me!”

Her voice was loud in the silence of the Roadhouse and John lifted his hands up in defense.

“Ellen, please! Listen to me!”, he pleaded. Ellen wasn’t yelling at him anymore, but her jaw was still clenched and her entire body tense.

“I wouldn’t be here if I had any other options. Like you said, I must have a Deathwish to show up here. And I understand that. But you are the only person that I can trust with this. You can toss me out all you want after. You can yell, and scream, and punch me, and shoot at me. Just please, hear me out first. ”

There was silence, where John just stood there, his hands still raised in the air in front of him, and Ellen grinding her teeth as she thought about what to do now.

Because by God, did she hate him. And a part of her wanted to take a rifle and first shoot a bullet into his feet and then his di-

But on the other hand, she could not recall a time that John Winchester had ever gotten himself into a position to beg.

No, he was too proud for that. So whatever he wanted must be goddamn important for him, really.

“Tell me what you need, Winchester,” Ellen said eventually, “And let me decide afterwards.”

Her body language didn’t show one sign of hospitality still, but John interpreted her words as somewhat of a good sign.

Hopefully.

༺ ｡ ° ୨❀୧ ° ｡ ༻

Now

After their talk with Maria, Sam and Dean settled on questioning Betty Langston.

In the middle of the wall in the entrance hall, a big frame with the pictures, names and duties of the working staff was hung up.

Above the name ‘Betty Langston’ was a picture of a friendly looking woman in her mid-twenties, with a pointed nose and blonde strands of hair framing her face.

Underneath, the duties “Social Worker” and “Deputy Manager” were listed.

When they knocked on the door which was labeled “staff”, a young man opened and told them that Betty Langston was currently positioned on the second floor.

Dean wanted to take the elevator, but Sam dragged him up the stairs.

“It will be faster,” he guaranteed, and Dean just rolled his eyes with a groan.

The hallways on the second floor were surprisingly wide, with doors placed across each other in a zig zag pattern.

Here and there were a few paintings on the walls, old and new, and green neon signs pointing toward the emergency exit.

They met Betty after they turned around the first corner. She stood in front of a pinboard and was currently hanging up new posters.

Her hair was different from the picture, slightly longer now ending halfway down her back, and copper colored with only a few blonde highlights.

The brothers made their way over to her and flashed their fake FBI-badges when she let off her work and shifted her attention to them.

“Hello, my name is David Shields, my partner’s name is Jarvis Stark,” introduced Dean. “Are you Betty Langston?”

The young woman gaped at them, slightly caught off guard. “Uhm yes, that’s me,” she eventually got out and lowered her arms. “What can I do for you?”

Dean caught a glimpse of the writing on the poster. It was a few phone numbers, and in dark blue, a text above read: ‘DON’T HESITATE TO ASK FOR HELP!’

“We’re here to ask you about Roy Kendall,” Sam carefully approached, “We understand that you are the one who found him.”

Dean couldn’t help but notice how Betty Langston’s eyes shifted to the floor and she nervously trailed her fingers up and down the paper in her hand.

“Um yes, I … I found him.” Her voice got small and she swallowed hard.

“But what does the FBI want with that? I thought it was a wild animal.”

“Given the unusual occurrence of Roy’s death, we thought it necessary to at least have a look at this case and find out what we can,” Sam said.

“That doesn’t have to mean anything, though,” Dean quickly tried to soothe her when he noticed the tears springing in the woman’s eyes. “Exactly,” Sam hastily agreed. “Only a few questions, just in case.”

Betty nodded and blinked away her tears. “Okay,” she quietly said. Sam reached into the inner pocket of his jacket and pulled out his notebook and a pen.

“Did Roy mention something … I don’t know, unusual before he died?” Sam asked, clicking the pen and bringing his notepad in position. The young woman hesitated.

“Well, not that I know of,” she eventually said, “But, you see, kids at that age … they don’t talk to us adults much anymore. If you want to know something about Roy, you better ask his friends.”

Dean furrowed his eyebrows. “His friends?” He repeated. She nodded. “Mhm.”

“And, uh - who are his friends, if I may ask?” Sam tuned in again. Betty thought for a second and then clicked her tongue. “Well, there’s Cassandra, Cassandra Claire,” she said and started counting the listed names on her fingers. “And, uhm, Finnegan Beckett.” Sam repeated the children’s names under his breath as he quickly wrote them down.

“And Y/N Winchester,” Betty finished.

Sam abruptly stopped writing at the ‘n’ and looked up. He felt Dean visibly tense and shift next to him.

The younger brother just put on a smile and folded the small notepad back into the inner pocket of his jacket. But not before completely writing out the last name on the list.

“Thank you so much, Miss Langston, you helped us a lot. We will let you know if there are any more questions. And, our condolences,” he added.

She shyly smiled back at him and slowly continued gathering thumbtacks to hang up her posters, and the brothers left.

Sam waited until they were out of hearing range, then turned to Dean. “So…that was something,” he carefully started.

“What do you mean?”

Sam threw him a look. “You know what I mean. The witness list. Roy’s friends. That last name…”

Dean sighed heavily. Sam waited for him to say something. And when he didn’t, Sam just shook his head but decided to not stress it any further.

“So, where to now?” He asked instead.

Dean took a look at his watch. “The morgue, I’d say. As far as I know they’re closing soon, and a dead body is not exactly the first thing I need to see in the morning, so-”

Sam nodded in agreement. “Yeah, alright. Sounds good.”

They made their way out of the castle.

“You want to take Castiel?” Sam questioned when he rounded the car.

“No,” Dean decided firmly and opened the driver’s door. “Remember what happened last time? Exactly. I don’t need Cas smelling some dead guy again.”

Sam grinned at the memory. With a creak, the Impala gave in to their weight as they sat down, and the gravel gnashed under her tires when they drove off.

༺ ｡ ° ୨❀୧ ° ｡ ༻

Central Nebraska 2006

Roughly, the dark minivan tuckered over the bumpy earth of the pathetic excuse of a road, and Dean’s insides flinched with every squeak the old car made.

When they finally came to a stop, he tossed the keys somewhere and maybe slammed the door with a bit more force than necessary. A lot more.

“This is humiliating,” he grumbled, as he took in the atrocious excuse of a vehicle they just stepped out of. He missed his Baby.

Sam ignored him, and stepped forward, towards the old wooden – house? Shack? – the mysterious phone number on their dad’s cell had led them to.

The huge letters ROADHOUSE flaunted above them, and Dean thought that these were probably made to light up when the sun disappeared.

The rest of the house looked abandoned, frankly, from the outside, and that, in combination with the four-month-old voicemail, made Dean not like his odds very much. The chances that this Ellen chick was still alive, knowing what his father had needed her for, were slim in his mind.

Or hell, maybe she just called from here, got the phone from some rando, and got on her merry way when she realized John wasn’t calling back. It’s probably what he would’ve done.

Safe to say, Dean didn’t like their odds. Even less so when they entered the eerie quiet of the bar, and spotted a man lying unconscious, probably dead, on the pool table.

Dean felt his shoulders stiffen. He didn’t like this one bit, and every second he spent here made the alarm in his head shrill even louder than before.

Dean only just turned to take a closer look at one of the shelves, when he felt something hard dig into his lower back, and heard an all too familiar clicking sound.

Dean closed his eyes. “Please tell me that is a gun.”

“No, I’m just very happy to see you,” came the fast answer from a very snarking - and female? - voice.

In one swift motion, Dean whirled around, grabbed the barrel, ripped it out of his attacker’s hand, and uncocked it. The bullet fell to the ground with an echoing clatter.

Dean almost smirked triumphantly at the blonde girl in front of him, when he felt a sudden, blinding pain in his face.

And if Dean had thought pulling up in a 30-year-old, barely functional van, of all things was humiliating, he didn’t calculate how it would feel to be absolutely sucker punched by a girl, not even as old as him.

Aside from the obvious nosebleed, his ego took a severe bruise.

“Sam! Little help here!” He called, hand still holding his hurting face.

The door swung open, and Sam walked out, hands raised to his head, a sheepish look on his face. “Sorry Dean,” he said, “I’m a little tied up right now.”

Dean’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline, as he watched another woman with dark brown hair follow his brother close behind, a revolver held to his head in fair warning.

He would be impressed, if his vision wasn’t swimming right now.

The older woman behind Sam furrowed her brows. “Wait, Sam? Dean?” She asked, exchanging looks with kick-ass Blondie in front of him. “Winchester?”

There was a beat, before the brothers pressed out a unison “Yeah?”

“Son of a bitch.”

“Mom, you know these guys?” Dean’s head hurt with how much he was swinging it around to keep up.

“Yeah, I think these are John Winchester’s boys.” And that made Dean perk up.

The woman let out a laugh as she lowered her weapon.

—

A few minutes later, Dean was served with an iced cloth for his nose, and he and Sam seated themselves on a few of the bystanding bar chairs.

The brunette woman, who had threatened Sam, turned out to be the mysterious Ellen, whose voicemail on their dad’s phone they followed here. Jo, her daughter, and also the kick-ass blonde that had held the rifle to Dean’s back, looked about as unknowing about the whole situation as the brothers did.

Turns out Ellen had contacted John about the demon he was hunting. Said she could help him with it. Why John had never mentioned her, or her daughter, she didn’t say. Told them to ask him themselves. Dean didn’t say anything to that.

“So why exactly do we need your help?”, Dean asked, repositioning the cloth on his face.

Ellen scoffed. “Hey, don’t do me any favors. If you don’t want my help, fine.” There was a snarking edge to her voice, and Dean started to realize why his father would associate with her.

“Don’t let the door smack your ass on the way out,” she continued. “But John wouldn’t have sent you, if–“

There it was.

Ellen stood straighter. A haunted look crossed her eyes. “He didn’t send you.” It wasn’t a question.

Dean looked away.

“He’s alright, isn’t he?” Dean hadn’t known Ellen Harvelle for very long, but even he could sense the way her voice wavered. And know that she was a smart enough woman to not truly believe what she was asking.

“No.” Sam cleared his throat, and the simple word echoed through the deafening silence. “No, he’s not. We think the demon did it. Got to him before he got to it.” The thankful feeling of not being the one to have to tell her what happened felt like a sin in Dean’s gut. Then again, what’s one more on his plate.

“I’m sorry,” Ellen said. It’s what everyone said.

“It’s alright. We’re good.”

Ellen didn’t believe him, he saw it in her eyes. But she didn’t bother him more about it, either.

“So, look, if you can help us,” Sam said, and Dean threw him a look that showed just how much he wanted to smack his little brother across the face, “we’d be real happy about all the help we can get.”

Ellen’s lips twisted. “We can’t help you.”

Is this lady for real-

“But he can.”

And then the dead man stood up from the pool table.

—

Ash was a tech freak, with a haircut like Billy Ray Cyrus and the mouth of a southern cowboy. Jo called him a genius. Dean didn’t know what to think of that.

Still, he had passed him their dad’s journal, told him to go nuts, and Ash had drooled over John Winchester’s handiwork like a child over a lollipop.

Ash had left with the journal and the promise of new information in the time of fifty-one hours.

Dean thought that was long enough time to take a drink.

Jo Harvelle was a pretty woman. When she wasn’t threatening him with a rifle or punching him in the face, that was. Her soft, blonde curls fell long over her shoulders, and those jeans did wonders to her curves.

Dean started conversing with her. While he had moved to one of the tables, Sam had stayed with Ellen at the bar. He found out that her father died, a long time ago. In the back of his mind, a mean voice cackled at the irony. He paid his sympathies.

Then, suddenly, one of the doors to the backrooms flew open, and a small whirlwind of colorful fabric and y/h/c hair came dashing into the room.

“Aunty Ellen, Aunty Ellen! Look what I made!”

Dean’s head whipped around at the sound of the high-pitched voice and he spotted a small girl, not older than five years probably, squeezing herself behind the bar table. When he noticed Ellen bowing her head, he figured that the little girl had probably reached her destined spot next to her.

Dean, though he would never admit it, was an easily curious person, so he followed Jo on her way to the bar and leaned slightly over the tablewood to catch a glimpse at the small intruder.

Little Lady was tugging at Ellen’s pantleg, and expectantly holding up a colored paper for her to look at.

“Look at what I drew, Auntie Ellen!” she repeated, in that same excited tone as before, when she had stormed into the room.

Dean watched as Ellen abandoned her washcloth somewhere behind her and crouched down to meet with the little girl eye-to-eye, as she inspected her drawing.

“That’s so amazing, baby, is that us?” The girl nodded, her pigtails wiggling up and down as she bopped her head enthusiastically.

“Yes, that is you, and that is Jo, and that is me. And look, I made my own fingerprint!” She dashed her finger into a spot on the paper, and then proudly held up the red-colored tip to shove it in Ellen’s face.

The woman had a wide, genuine smile on her face. “I can see that, baby, well done, it looks so nice!” She praised. “How about we hang it up there next to the menu?”

The girl nodded her head again, and let Ellen scoop her up gently. Only then, when Little Lady was at height with them, she seemed to notice the strangers standing in the room.

In the matter of a second, Dean saw her whole demeanor shift from bubbly and open, to a more closed off version, sinking further into Ellen’s embrace and clutching the fabrics of her shirt. Something about it made Dean’s heart sting.

“Auntie Ellen?” The girl tried to whisper, but Dean had learned soon that children were terrible whisperers, “Who is that?”

Ellen looked first to Sam, then Dean, and back at the little girl in her arms. “Those are friends of Jo and me, sweetheart. Their names are Sam-“ Dean’s little brother gave a wave and a smile when Ellen introduced him. “-and Dean.”

Dean grinned and carefully stretched his hand out. “Very nice to meet you, Little Lady. Who am I speaking to, may I ask?” He laid a formal accent on his voice, one that he knew had always made Sam laugh when he was a child. It was an olive branch, but something in him hoped she would grab it.

The small giggle that Little Lady let out made Dean’s heart bloom with a warmth he didn’t know he was able to feel.

“My name’s Y/N,” she said. With a pointed look at Dean’s still outstretched hand, Ellen murmured in her ear, “And what do we do when someone gives us their hand to shake?”

Y/N nuzzled her face into the crook of Ellen’s neck, and Dean almost drew his hand back again, when a small warmth settled into his palm and closed around it.

He smiled at the girl and shook her hand. As they both pulled back, Dean twisted his hand around and huffed. “Ouff, someone has got a firm grip! Your Auntie Ellen teach you that?” Y/N grinned proudly at him and nodded her head. Then she held up her hand and showed him four fingers. “I’m already this old!”

Dean gasped. “Really? Well, that is a great age, no wonder you are so strong!”

Y/N was beaming now.

She didn’t hide in Ellen’s neck again.

“So, what about that picture now?” Ellen bounced the girl on her hip once, and it seemed like she was snapped out of a trance. Determinedly, she pointed at a space next to a hung-up blackboard. Dean figured Ellen usually wrote her daily specials on that.

The woman made a few steps over where Y/N had led her and gestured toward an already hung drawing of blue water and grey – fish? – above it, that was already taped to the wall.

“But we already put a picture there. We would have to remove that one if you want your new drawing to hang here.” The girl shrugged, and already reached for a roll of clean tape on the shelf.

“That’s okay, I don’t like dolphins all that much anymore anyway,” she explained nonchalantly. “I will just put it in my drawing box.”

Dean watched as Ellen carefully picked the old drawing from the wall to make space for the new one. He was so caught up in the scenery, he almost didn’t notice how Sam was scooting closer to him.

“You know who she is?” Sam asked. Dean turned his attention to his brother.

“Well, her name’s Y/N,” Dean answered simply. Sam didn’t roll his eyes at him, but it was a close call.

Dean just shrugged. “Guess she isn’t Ellen’s. Otherwise, she wouldn’t call her Auntie.” He pitched the last word high, to mimic the child’s voice.

Sam furrowed his brows as they watched Ellen and the small girl.

“Makes you wonder,” he said, “What she’s doing here.”

Dean just hummed. He made brief eye contact with Y/N, as she stole a look in his direction, but she averted her eyes quickly, as if she had been caught.

Dean found himself slightly smiling.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Sam looking at him. His brother was grinning.

“You love that kid.” It was a statement.

Dean scoffed. “Oh, shut up, I don’t even know her. Also, I love kids, plural.” He added.

Sam nodded, that smile still on his lips. Dean ignored him.

“Come on, ask him. Don’t be shy.” Ellen and Y/N had finished putting up her drawing and were now standing closer to them again. Ellen was still carrying the girl on her hip and had bent down to whisper to her.

Y/N had buried her face in Ellen’s shirt again, clearly shy to say something.

“He ain’t gonna bite you,” Ellen said, nudging her. “Go on.”

Y/N lifted her head, and shyly looked at Dean. Her eyes were flickering all over him, but never exactly to his face.

“Doyouwantodrawwithme?” She spluttered. Dean’s eyebrows shot up.

“Don’t think he understood that. Try a bit slower. You can do this, come on,” Ellen encouraged her.

Y/N clutched her shirt.

“Do you want to draw with me?” She asked, head lowered and looking at her fingers. Her voice was quiet, but to Dean it felt as if she had shouted that sentence.

He felt warm inside. “Of course I want to.”

Y/N’s head shot up, and Dean Winchester had seen many beautiful things in his lifetime, but the gleaming eyes of that small child before him had to be at the top of the list. He never wanted to look at anything else.

Ellen set her down and pointed at a table in the corner of the room.

“Her colors and paper are already set up. Every day, before we officially open,” she explained with a look at Dean, and he nodded. While Sam got comfortable on one of the bar chairs, he made his way over to where Y/N had already set up her coloring tools and begun drawing on a piece of yellow paper.

Her tongue was sticking out of the corner of her mouth in concentration. Dean pulled out a chair and sat down next to her.

“What are you drawing?” He asked, stretching his neck to take a closer look. Y/N leaned back and showed him her creation. Lines of red and yellow. Maybe a tomato? An apple? He turned his head. From that perspective maybe?

“It’s Lighting McQueen!” Y/N told him triumphantly. “I saw cars with Jo.”

Dean nodded. So no apple. He also wasn’t going to point out the girl’s grammar. She was only four after all. And who was he to talk.

“How did you get that?” Y/N suddenly asked, and pointed her small finger at Dean’s forehead, right where a big scar stretched over his skin, consequences of the fatal car accident.

Dean tried his best not to wince. He didn’t need to expose his lingering trauma to this pure soul.

“I was … in an accident,” he said instead. “But I’m okay and it’s almost healed now.”

The girl nodded. Dean was almost astounded at how easy it was with her.

“Whenever I hurt myself, my Auntie Ellen takes me to the Doctor. Or Jo. Or Ash.” Her face scrunches up as she thinks hard. Dean thinks it’s adorable. He finds himself smiling again.

“They always give me colorful plasters! I always get the dinos.” She leans in closer to him when she says the last bit, almost like it’s a secret she only wants him to hear. Dean’s heart warms at the thought, and he doesn’t even know why.

“Really? I’m jealous. I think dinosaurs are amazing.” He used the same hushed tone she had before. Y/N’s eyes widened. “You don’t get dino plasters?” She asked. If Dean hadn’t known better, he would’ve said she was outraged at his confession.

He shook his head. “Nope,” he said, “only boring beige ones.”

Y/N’s eyes widened even more, and her mouth fell open. Then, her lips curved into a beaming smile. “I can give you some of mine! Jo bought me so many the last time she went shopping!”

Before he could even give it a thought, Dean felt her small hand take his, and he was yanked from his seat. Geez, how did a four-year-old kid have so much strength?

His enthusiasm was short-lived, as Sam shouted from the other side of the room.

“Dean, Ellen got us a case!” His little brother was waving around a beige folder, a few newspaper pages hanging out at the sides.

He looked at his brother, then at the girl still clinging her small hand around his fingers.

“Does that mean you have to leave?” Dean’s heart clenched at the quiet, disappointed voice. He crouched down and looked Y/N in the eye.

“Yes,” he said, honestly. “ I have to go to work.”

She tilted her head. “To save people?” She asked. Dean nodded. He didn’t know how she knew, but maybe Ellen told her.

“Yes, exactly. But I will be back soon, and then you can show me your plasters, alright?”

Y/N seemed to think about it, and then nodded her head. Her pigtails were still wiggling up and down. “You promise?” She asked.

Dean nodded. “In fact,” he said, shifted his weight, and held out his pinky finger in front of her. “I pinky promise.”

Y/N grinned up at him. Dean grinned back. She linked her small finger with his.

“Can’t break a pinky promise,” Dean said as he stood up.

She shook her head violently. “Never!”

Dean laughed and waved her Goodbye.

“Let’s go,” he said to Sam as he passed him, and grabbed his jacket.

“Bye, Ellen, Jo.” Sam lowered his voice seriously. “Y/N.”

“Bye, Sam! Bye, Dean!” Y/N waved her hand after them.

“Good luck,” Ellen said. Then they closed the door behind them. The light of the sun was a heavy contrast to the dusky air inside the Roadhouse, and Dean’s eyes needed a while to adjust to the change.

He made his way over to the abomination car, Sam close next to him. His brother bumped his shoulder.

“Plural, huh?” Sam asked, smirking.

And if Dean sped the van up a bit faster, just to give his little brother a good scare now and then, well, that was between him and the Lord above.

780 notes · View notes

finitevoid · 1 year

Text

A Study in an Utter Lack of Regard for Personal Safety, featuring Mal Bertha and Carlos De Vil

“I don’t know why I agreed to this,” Mal says.

“Yes, you do,” Carlos replies, hefting the duffel bag over his shoulder. It clinks dangerously as he moves, and she eyes it with suspicion.

And, okay, he has a point. Mal may be the leader of this gang, but if Carlos said ‘jump’, Mal would say, ‘how high?’. It’s a side effect of all the gang activity; you learn to trust each other with things that normal people have never even thought to trust another person with.

“Okay, revise: I don’t know what we’re doing here.”

Carlos meets her eye, gaze as sharp as she’s ever seen it. He smirks like an Isle boy, wide and wicked, and says, “Science.”

“Science?”

“Just trust me.”

Without anymore preamble whatsoever, Carlos begins traipsing through the woods. With single-minded purpose, he stomps over the weeds and roots, directly into the belly of the beast. Mal swears, rushing to follow.

“I just don’t understand what kind of science,” she smacks at a branch before she can run right into it, “we’re going to be doing in the Enchanted Forest.”

“The magical kind,” Carlos says, not pausing in his trek. “That’s why I brought you.”

“Isn’t that a contradiction?”

He abruptly stops. She nearly runs into him from behind. He whirls around on his heel and says, “No, it’s not. There’s actually an entire field of scientific study here in Auradon dedicated to the way magic interacts with things like biology and chemistry. And cosmology, but that’s more philosophical… Anyway, you,” he sticks an accusatory finger into her face. “didn’t tell me that there’s a special magic lake that washes away curses!”

She blinks at him. His phrasing is very interesting, given that all she’d said was that it washed away the love spell they casted on Ben, all that time ago. “It doesn’t just wash away curses.”

He rolls his eyes. “Spells, then.” He huffs theatrically. “The point is, you’ve been holding out on me!”

“Okay, wait,” she holds a hand up. “You dragged me all the way out here so you can do some freaky science experiment—“

“It’s not freaky.”

“—on the Enchanted Lake?”

“Yeah,” he says, easily. “Are you coming?”

“Obviously.” She scoffs. “I’m just wondering what all the secrecy was about.”

“Revenge, obviously. For holding out on me. Now, can you just show me where the damn thing is?”

“You don’t know? Then why were you leading?” She groans. “Is this part of your ‘revenge’?”

He rolls his eyes. “I thought I heard water.”

“Well, you’re shit out of luck, because Ben made me close my eyes when he showed it to me.”

Carlos stares at her, genuinely scandalized. “And you did?”

“Ben is like if a kitten were a person. I wasn’t worried about it.”

He frowns. “Whatever you say, killer.” And, it’s like, yeah, on the Isle closing her eyes just because someone had asked would’ve been a fast way to get a switchblade buried in her gut, but she’d been playing the part of sweet-girl-with-a-crush, just the way Evie had taught her, so closing her eyes had just made the most sense.

“You gonna tell FG about those ‘Isle instincts’ you got going on right now?”

He smiles at her, all kinds of smug. “FG loves me. I don’t got any ‘Isle instincts’, didn’t you know?” He bats his eyes at her, expression suddenly the picture of shattered, wide-eyed innocence. “My mommy hurt me and kept me inside all the time. Gang violence? Oh, evil, I wouldn’t have been caught dead doing anything like that!”

“You know, puppy,” she laughs, reaching forward to ruffle his curls. “sometimes you scare me.” He ducks from the affection, shooting her a tilted grin.

It takes them the better part of an hour to find it. By the time they do, Mal is sweaty, dehydrated, and adorned with at least two scratches from thorny plants. They had run into a total of three (three) weird, fucky-looking creatures that Mal didn’t know forests in Auradon could have. Weird, lithe, rodent-like things with sharp teeth and too many eyes... She’d had to do some creative magic to avoid them. Overall, she’s not pleased with the experience.

Finally, though, they find it.

Just how she remembers it: granite arch on a silver dais. Ivy crawling up the sides, flowers dotting the bank. It’s... deeply picturesque. The sun hanging high in the sky above it, framed by mountains. Even the breeze smells like flowers, like this is some sort of fucking romance novel.

The fact that Auradon has places like these, just, sitting around, and nobody even bothers to visit them half the time drives her slightly insane. It makes her want to grip Ben by the back of his skinny neck and shove his face in the wild, freezing, rocky surf of the Isle. But that isn’t very ‘good’ of her, so she pretends the feeling isn’t there.

Carlos drops the duffel bag onto the dais, just by the edge of the water. He seems completely unaffected by the beauty around him, and truly, that’s half the fun of doing anything with Carlos; he’s dressed in Isle clothes like he doesn’t give a shit, an old ratty pair of studded combat boots, a shirt covered in patches and pins, hair haphazardly dyed. He breaks up the serenity of the fairytale image of this place, a smudge amidst all the pastels.

The inside of the duffel appears to be, almost entirely, small glass vials. He pulls out a thermos and dunks it into the water, twisting the cap shut.

“Is that legal?” She asks, plopping down beside him. He’s crouched over the lip, hands braced on his knees as he stares impassively down at the crystalline water. It’s reflecting the sunlight, and somehow the glittery light is shining off of it in hues of pink.

“Definitely not,” he replies, gently setting his thermos of contraband back into his duffel. “Technically, we aren’t even supposed to be here.”

“Wait, seriously?” She watches as he pulls vials of various liquids from the bag. “But Ben brought me here?”

“Special privileges. Those of royal blood are permitted to enter public property that would otherwise be restricted, providing it has substantial religious significance. And by ‘religious’, they just mean—“

“—fairytale-relevant.” She finishes. “I can’t believe you memorized that whole damn book.”

“‘S not a book.”

“I can’t believe you memorized the entire Constitution of the United Kingdoms of Auradon,” she drawls. “Still, it’s weird. Somehow I can’t imagine Ben doing something like that. He just, hates breaking the rules.”

Carlos finishes laying out his perfectly even line of glass vials, before selecting one carefully. “It’s easy to hate breaking the rules when the rules for you are so lax.”

“Preach,”

He hands her the vial. “Put a spell on this.”

She takes it, raising her eyebrow at it critically. It’s clear, sloshing around in the sealed vial as she eyes it. “I don’t have any love spell cookies on hand.”

He rolls his eyes. “I already know it works on the love spell. Put another spell on it.”

“This seems like a very lax way to conduct an experiment,” she says. “Any requests?”

“I’m just satisfying my curiosity, not writing for a scientific journal. And, I don’t know. Make it sweet or something. It’s just water.” He pulls out a notebook and a pencil, opening it to a fresh page with confident, practiced motions. With ease, he makes a table with five columns. On one side, he writes, substance. Then, spell. Then, time submerged. Then, observations. Then, effects.

“Does anyone know we’re out here?”

“You think I would tell people we’re going to go flagrantly ignore Auradon’s laws regarding private religious property?”

“Fair enough,” she mutters. “Evie and Jay?”

“Yeah, I mentioned it.” He gestures with the eraser of his pencil. “Now hurry up.”

She rolls her eyes, but acquiesces. She doesn’t need her spellbook to do magic anymore, which is nice, because FG’s been way sweeter on them since they put the spellbook and the mirror in the museum. No, magic isn’t about some arbitrary collections of poems in a book; it’s about intention, power, the sleek possibilities of the meaning they’ve given to the things they say.

Power gathering in her clavicle and leaking hotly from her eyes, she says, “Sweet like candy, sweet like cake, make this water so sugary it aches.”

Words and rhyme schemes was how she learned magic, and so it is what her magic associates with power. The legends of fae and contracts and names speak for themselves, after all. Magic itself does not require words, but for her, half-faery she is, there is nothing more powerful.

“Did it work?”

“You doubting me, De Vil?”

He rolls his eyes. “It’s science. I have to be sure.” And then he yanks the vial from her fingers. He sets it down, twisting open the cork. He pulls an eyedropper from the bag and gently sets it inside, sucking up some of the water. Then, he sticks his tongue out, and drops a glob of it onto his tongue.

“Well?”

He smacks his lips. Holds up the eyedropper. Rolling her eyes, she sticks her tongue out for him. He lets another drop fall, and saccharine sweetness explodes on her tongue. It tastes like funfetti cake, which is exactly what she’d been picturing when she spelled it.

He takes it back and hands her a stopwatch. He holds his hand over the lake and says, “On three.”

He inhales, eyeing the lake with eyes that sparkle. With a wild, manic sort of excitement. In another life, she’s absolutely sure he would’ve been some kind of mad scientist. Maybe he’s already on his way there. “One,”

The water laps gently at the lip of the dais, perfect and undisturbed. It looks like an oil painting; the kind she’d see in Ben’s castle, ten feet tall and set into a gold frame. Pure opulence. “Two,”

It’s funny, she thinks, how all he had to do to get her to come with him was ask. He’d even made her drive. Yanked her phone from her back pocket and set the address into the GPS. And she’d done it, because she knows he hates driving. “Three,”

He dunks his hand underneath the surface. She clicks the stopwatch on.

“We’re going to do ten seconds to start. Then twenty. Then thirty.”

She groans. “When you said ‘science’, I thought we were gonna do something fun.”

“This is what you get for holding out on me—“

“Time.”

He pulls it from the surf. He goes through the motions of testing it again, before announcing, “I fucking knew it.”

“What?”

“It’s still sweet,” he shakes the vial gently. “The glass protected it.”

He makes her spell another vial, and this time, he pulls a dropper full of water from the lake. Then, he drops it into the vial. When he tests it that time, it’s not sweet anymore.

“Is it safe for us to be testing it like this?”

“Oh, it’s a flagrant violation of every lab safety rule ever made.” He’s not even looking at her, scribbling notes down.

Her eyes fall onto the water. Perfect. Clear. Gentle and glittering pink in the sunlight. Auradon. “What d’you think would happen if I drank it?”

He looks up from his notebook to deadpan, “What?”

“Like, if you drank it, it would probably just taste like water. But I’m a magical creature.”

He opens his mouth. Doesn’t say anything. Narrows his eyes in thought. Sets his pencil down with finality. Closes his mouth. Opens it again.

“Maybe it would make you, like, not able to do magic?”

“Like the barrier.”

He presses his lips into a thin line. “Yeah, like the barrier.”

“Or maybe it’d be like poison.”

“Didn’t you say you swam in it, when you were with Ben?”

‘Swam’ is a charitable word for it. She’s not going to argue, though. “Yeah, but I didn’t swallow any of it.”

He pauses for a moment, seemingly contemplating this. Then, he goes digging through his duffel, arms shoulder deep. He emerges with two empty vials. “You wanna find out?”

“Hell yeah,” she swipes one. Together, they fill their vials with the liquid. And together, they shoot them back like it’s booze.

It tastes like the way sunlight feels on her face, like the way the vines look where they climb up the granite. She hates it.

Gently, Carlos takes the vial back when she offers it, their fingertips brushing. He pulls his notebook into his lap, eye glittering as he pierces her with his gaze. “How do you feel?”

“Normal.” She says. “Well, I can sort of feel the water.”

“Feel it?”

“Like the way you can feel booze. Except it’s cool, not warm. It’s in my stomach.”

He hands her a vial. “Spell it.”

She does. It’s not sweet. She could tell as soon she said the words, though; the power didn’t gather in her, didn’t leak from her eyes like hot steam. He could tell, too. But that’s because the magic didn’t turn her eyes green, because there wasn’t any magic.

He scribbles furiously. She says, “You know, you should dunk the Anti-Magic Machine in here.”

The ‘Anti-Magic Machine’ being their awful, pre-teen colloquialism for the machine Carlos had once been developing to try and tear an exit in the barrier. He’d only just gotten it to work— put a teeny tiny hole in the sky, letting in a strange dot of unfiltered sunlight— when they were brought to Auradon. The excitement had been electric, she remembers. She’d really thought he was going to break them out.

He mumbles, “Possible effects: mind wandering,” and she snaps, hey! But then he digs around in his duffle again and emerges with a black box about a foot long and half a foot wide. It’s got ANTI-MAGIC MACHINE V3 written haphazardly one the side in metallic, silver sharpie. “I brought it to use as a control, but,” and then his eyes land on the water.

He drops it in.

It, predictably, explodes.

A fountain of water and sparks shoots upward into the air. Mal grabs Carlos by the shoulder, shoving him as hard as she can away from the explosion, jumping after him, shielding him with her body. The shockwave bursts past her, rippling through every inch and plane of her body. She gasps, heart hammering, body screaming in pain.

Then, all is quiet. Her ears pop painfully. They are laying on the riverbank, Carlos pressed into the dirt by Mal’s weight. Her arms are braced on the soil beside his temples, framing him. She attempts to catch her breath.

Carlos blinks up at her, expression only mildly put-out. The ends of his hair are smoking, and she pats them out with a shaking hand. It smears ash over his forehead. He says, very calmly, “Interesting.”

It explodes again. They’re far enough away that the shockwave is only kind of painful, and they turn to watch it. Fire sprays into the sky, surrounded on all sides by a cacophonous shower of water.

It explodes a third time, this time less intensely. The shockwave still makes her ears pop and her eyes water, but it’s nothing she isn’t used to. She pulls herself from on top of Carlos, standing. She gives him a hand up, brushing dirt and grass from his clothes.

Together, they creep over to the dais. They peer over the edge at the water. Carlos drops to his knees and sticks his arm in the water, searching blindly; eventually, he pulls the Anti-Magic Machine from the surface.

As soon as it touches the air, it catches fire.

He yelps, throwing it to the dais like it’s a roach he caught crawling on him. He hops back, hissing in pain, waving his hand back and forth. She grips his wrist, pulling the wound to her face.

It’s a third-degree, but it’s on his fingers, which sucks. She says as much.

His eyes are on the AMM. “It’s soaking wet. Why the fuck did it catch fire?”

“Beats me.” She nearly casts a healing spell on the wound; she belatedly realizes that she’s still under the Lake’s effects.

His eyes are glittering with that manic excitement again. His staring at the fire with violent passion in his face, licking his lips like a predator sizing up its prey.

On the Isle, Carlos had always been hungry for knowledge. Starving, even. He had gripped whatever he could learn in greedy hands and put it all to use as soon as he could. But on the Isle, it’d been about survival. It was about keeping their enemies off their backs, finding creative ways to save food, making a machine to escape the island.

But as soon as he came to Auradon? It stopped being for survival and started being for sport. For fun. A game he plays. Hours spent in the library, late nights in the school’s lab, doing experiments he’s not supposed to be doing with materials he’s not supposed to have. She was wrong, earlier; he already is a bit of a mad scientist.

She kicks the AMM away with her boot.

He opens his mouth to argue.

She says, “Next weekend. You make a new AMM, I bring the spellbook.”

A smile breaks across his lips. Stretches wide over his face, crinkles his eyes at the corners, bells his cheeks, warps his freckles; his hair is singed and there’s that smudge of ash on his forehead in the shape of her thumb. They’re gonna have to dress that burn, but goddamn. He’s never looked so beautiful.

He may smirk like an Isle boy, but his smile is all his own. He says, “You’re on.”

“Am I forgiven for holding out on you?”

She cradles his burned hand. He says, “Killer, I was never mad.”

She knew that already. Still, though. For that smile? She’d do anything. Not that she’d ever tell him. His head would get too big.

#I’m going back to my ROOTS #descendants #mal bertha #carlos de vil #marlos #my writing*#alternatively titled: auradons newest mad scientist and gods worst little enabler

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deadcactuswalking · 17 days

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REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 13/04/2024 (J. Cole's Might Delete Later, David Guetta/OneRepublic)

Hozier’s “Take Me to Church” peaked at #2 for four weeks. The first week, “Uptown Funk!” blocked it, but for the most part, it was halted by Ellie Goulding’s “Love Me Like You Do”. This week, just under a decade later, Hozier can finally claim his UK #1 as “Too Sweet” lands its first week at the top, skipping straight up from #4 last week. I’m personally not complaining as it’s a great song, but I will be complaining because under it, we have J. Cole. Welcome back to REVIEWING THE CHARTS!

Rundown

As always, we start with our notable dropouts, those being songs exiting the UK Top 75 (which is what I cover!) after five weeks in the region or a peak in the top 40. This week, we bid farewell to: “exes” by Tate McRae, “I Remember Everything” by Zach Bryan featuring Kacey Musgraves, “vampire” by Olivia Rodrigo, “Flowers” by Miley Cyrus and some long-term bottom-feeders like “Someone You Loved” and “Everywhere” by Fleetwood Mac. Like much of everything else this week, it’s a bit of a mixed bag.

We only have one returning entry, but it’s pretty interesting and surprisingly high: Thanks to the specific surge of TikTok traction to a Summer Walker remix, “Hell n Back” by Bakar, which peaked at #20 just last year, is back for another run at #26, already nearing its peak position that I honestly expect it to surpass soon enough. As for the gains, we see healthy boosts for “We Ain’t Here for Long” by Nathan Dawe at #49, “Worth It.” by RAYE at #46, “Jump” by Tyla, Gunna and Skillibeng at #43, “if u think i’m pretty” by Artemas at #39, “Saturn” by SZA at #30, “Happier” by The Blessed Madonna and Clementine Douglas at #21, “Back on 74” by Jungle at #19 - really glad this is still at it - “Belong Together” by Mark Ambor at #14 and finally, of all hits, “Austin” by Dasha finds its place in the top 10 at #8. Maybe this is a fluke, or maybe Dasha is a pop star in the making. I guess time will tell.

As for our top five, we start with… Artemas, joy, and “i like the way you kiss me” at #5, then the usual suspects: “Lose Control” by Teddy Swims at #4, “TEXAS HOLD ‘EM” by Beyoncé back to down to #3, Bentley Boonemobile with “Beautiful Things” at #2 and of course, Hozier at the very top. Now for whatever debuted on the rest of this chart this week… trust me, it’s mostly not very good.

New Entries

#67 - “Cry” - Benson Boone

Produced by Malay

Bento Box’s debut album with a name stupider than the nicknames I give him on this show debuted surprisingly low at #16 - that’s lower than Feeder, man. And I like Feeder. Regardless, I did like those two singles, I have yet to hear the record, but I’m sure there’s some good on it, and I’m happy to say that this would be included in that. Now why is pretty simple, it starts with a melancholy ballad produced by Frank Ocean’s go-to, Malay, but that doesn’t last long as it’s scrapped for a more propelling pop rock chug. The lyrics go from woe-is-me to bitter and toxic bitching about his ex, in icky falsetto deliveries only accentuated by an ugly, distorted vocal chop that does not fit at all. There’s an obvious vocal glitch that was kept in and doesn’t sound intentional in the first verse, but it adds to the genuinely infuriating song full of straining and one-note riffing, as well as a second fake-out with him briefly trying to see her perspective. The song’s ugly, it doesn’t flow and it makes me hate the guy singing it, but that seems to be the intention, with which it completely succeeds. Three-for-three, Ben 10, keep it up. I wish you were comfortable with swearing though, it would hit a little better… I know, that’s rich coming from me.

#64 - “Good Luck, Babe!” - Chappell Roan

Produced by Dan Nigro

With Olivia Rodrigo’s producer and some sleeper traction for her debut album from last year, Missouri singer Chappell Roan seems primed for a big 2024 breakout, especially since she’s on tour with O-Rod. Her last album was a bit of a queer concept record and this seems to be following in similar footsteps, being about compulsory heterosexuality, feeling like you are conformed into heteronormative behaviours despite being queer. It details a secret relationship wherein love cannot be fully reciprocated due to that circumstance, and it’s treated tastefully with enough drama for most of the song for it to feel both worthwhile and not mundane, as well as not making some grander statement. The bridge irks me a tad, not allowing for the nuance of gay women marrying men and framing it in a way that seems more bitter and honestly self-serving to her narrative. Even if it’s from a different perspective, it seems a bit tasteless and awkward tonally with the rest of the song, especially given this is a classic synthpop track in the vein not of the retro pastiche or indie revival but standing damn near to Wham!’s “Last Christmas” and struggling to tell the difference kind of synthpop. That makes it slightly unique but in terms of the vocal melodies Ms. Roan lays on top of that sound, it fails to capture me all too much, and I’m also really struggling not to hear a mashup on the verses with “I Just Called to Say I Love You” by Stevie Wonder. The lyrics sharing soime similarities aren’t helping either. This is far from bad but both sonically and lyrically, it trips over, in a way that seems like it might be on purpose, and I do want to give this song credit for tackling an interesting, niche topic and having a morally grey depiction of it. That’s impressive for the pop charts, I just don’t really enjoy the final product. Sorry.

#59 - “Feel It” (From the Original Series Invincible) - d4vd

Produced by Gray Toomey, Noah Ehler and Sam Homaee

For some brief background, Invincible is an Amazon animated series based on the comic books starring Omni-Man, and the second part of its second season has just concluded, with the crew recruiting d4vd of… “Romantic Homicide” fame, because, of course, for a soundtrack single. Now for the song and okay, this is quite similar to the Benson Boone song from before. Firstly, it vaguely aligns itself with alternative R&B and indie pop in its groove, guitar tones and delivery and secondly, on a lyrical and vocal level, I’m pretty sure I’m also supposed to find d4vd a bit overwhelming and annoying, given how this girl thinks he’s crazy and he’s being inescapable to her. There are a key differences: A) this is not a rock song, it’s a synthpop haze with too much reverb, echo and overdubs - probably enough studio manufacturing to kill a small elephant. B) d4vd is neither funny nor really aggressive, he is simply being a nuisance towards the woman in the name of love, and has some creepy undertones regarding how she treats the woman in this story being uncomfortable with his advances, even if this relating to a fictional character in the series, it fails to translate beyond that. C) there is not much space left in this mix for any real emotional resonance, because he’s half-rapping and the song is filled to the brim with effects. It’s difficult to even focus on the narrative given the sheer amount of layers. Finally, D) this is a pick-up, not a rejection, so the annoyance feels like encroaching on territory rather than having any solid catharsis. All this is to say that the song just fails on all of its levels, but fails honestly. I can absolutely see someone liking this even having over-analysed it like I have, and its crime is not translating well to an audience it didn’t really intend to have, considering I’m not a d4vd fan and I’ve never seen this show. I can envision this getting pretty big and whilst I do not like the song one bit, it’s hard to complain about, really. It’s just refreshing, especially in a J. Cole week, to have a song that I don’t like for storied but largely impersonal and constructive reasons. To put it simply, I just don’t feel it.

#53 - “Crocodile Tearz” - J. Cole

Produced by T-Minus

I wrote a pretty extensive and scathing review of J. Cole’s latest mixtape, Might Delete Later. It’s #7 on the albums chart this week, and debuted three songs here this week. I am going to keep these entries brief as can be, because that review is there for you to read on my RateYourMusic 2024 listening log, the account’s exclusivelytopostown. Most of that log is in a scattered first-impressions style but that review is very thought-out, reflective and in-depth, so I’m quite proud of it. I’m tempted to format it and upload it separately as a review to this blog, though I don’t want to flood my page with such negativity. To cut it short, I think this mixtape is frankly embarrassing, as even moving away from stagnant and dire trap-adjacent production mostly headed by a clearly tired T-Minus, Cole is so unconvincing and insecure in his flexing that it becomes difficult to listen to, especially when he has all the technical lyrical skill and little personality to back up those flows, so they end up soggy and awkward. When he in any way attempts to be conscious, introspective or even commenting on his “place in the rap game”, he becomes downright insufferable and really just shows his ass rather than his pen. This song in particular has some of the dullest production Cole has ever rapped over though there are not many particularly corny lines here, other than how his dogs only shed tears in emojis and how he’s so much better than those girls on Instagram, right? Cole’s insistence on claiming himself superior to entire groups of people based on an intellect or higher spirituality he shows no proof of existing never gets old.

#38 - “7 Minute Drill” - J. Cole

Produced by T-Minus, Conductor Williams, Al Hug and Elyas

Okay, genuine question: how do I ethically tackle a song that has been rescinded by its artist, that days after release, has been disowned by the person who wrote and performed it, expressing live on stage that he regrets it and wishes it to be removed? Surely giving harsh criticism to a song that already makes him feel bad is just kicking a man when he’s down. Firstly, if you consider Cole’s position to be “down”, then you and me both are in the trenches and secondly, whilst I understand that the industry demands quick responses and can make the bureaucracy of releasing a track based on heated emotions quite frustrating, there is the option of just leaving it alone and not releasing anything, especially because “7 Minute Drill”, referring to the song process used to make it, not its runtime or genre, is framed more as a warning shot than a full-on diss. He didn’t even send the angry message before deleting it and walking it back with apologies. If anything, this song, like really the whole album, proves Cole’s insecurities about his self-instated “middleman” promo package and media representation. Cole just doesn’t have either the heart, or lack thereof, to make an actual diss track and also has nothing but good things to say about Kendrick - even in this diss track, he praises his musical output and fabricates outright lies about the albums’ reception to make it appear disrespectful. If you want any sonic criticism, the T-Minus beat is a practically unlistenable parody of “Like That” but Conductor Williams, as he always does, pulls a smooth piano jam in the back half that sadly cannot save the pathetic bars placed upon it. Next.

#37 - “I Don’t Wanna Wait” - David Guetta and OneRepublic

Produced by David Guetta, Brent Kutzle, T.I Jakke, Tyler Spry and Timofey Reznikov

Sigh… I quietly predicted this to myself. Once I’d seen EDM do-overs of “Gangsta’s Paradise”, “Better Off Alone” and “I’m Blue” hit the charts, a sinking feeling inside of me knew that O-Zone were not safe, and by God’s, Guetta has gone and done it. And he bought the hacks at OneRepublic with them, so no, let’s talk about that original song, because I think it’s genuinely great. Those synths glitch and buzz out more than you remember, having some pretty cool interplay with the deeper-voiced verses, and whilst yes, there is a nonsense hook, and the rest is in the band’s native Moldovan dialect of Romanian, you don’t need to know the language to find yourself humming the refrains in your head. The flip-phone beep after he says “beep”, the call-and-response “Alo! Salut!” and obviously both the “maiya-hee, maiya-hoo, maiya-ha” and “numa-numa-ey” choruses, they are so embedded into my brain, and that can’t just be by memetic coincidence, it’s a brilliantly written song and well executed. And obviously it was a hit - in the UK, their only hit, peaking at #3 in 2004 whilst Mario Winans’ “I Don’t Wanna Know”, also a classic, was #1. What’s most frustrating about this Guetta rendition is that “Dragostea din tei” was already milked dry for sampling, long before his 20-year anniversary last year. Most famously, it was sampled in a Newgrounds meme, but other than that, T.I. took it to #1 in the US with Rihanna on 2008’s “Live Your Life”, which was already a comical attempt at making it serious (consider it starting with T.I. shouting out the troops in Iraq), but you know what Tip and Rihanna DIDN’T do? Remove the nonsense lyrics - Rihanna does re-sing real lyrics in the nonsense melody, but they start and end the song with the original sample, there’s no hiding where it came from. They work because they’re nonsense, we do NOT need a Ryan Tedder rewrite! “Live Your Life” peaked at #2 here, but it was blocked by a single from The X Factor so it’s basically an honourable #1, I don’t like it much but it has a heart and charm that Guetta and Tedder could not successfully pull off even in their “prime”… which coincides pretty comfortably with when T.I. released that song. Have fun chasing the past, boys, maybe you’ll find your talent and creativity hidden back there.

#29 - “H.Y.B.” - J. Cole and Bas featuring Central Cee

Produced by DZL, T-Minus, Cedric Brown, AzizTheShake and FNZ

I quite like Bas. He doesn’t exactly a consistent brand of sound, instead shifting through a pretty eclectic array of pop-rap styles, though often maintaining both trap and Afrobeats influences, and therefore, his work tends to be a bit hit-or-miss when you consider the full-length projects. Regardless, he has genuine pop perfection on those albums - what ties his albums together is Bas, a lighthearted but experienced presence who is full of hooks and catchy flows, as well as often genuine heart that makes the variety of styles feel connected via that vocal throughline. This is his first top 40 hit in the UK, and it really bothers me that Cole do not push Bas further, as this could have easily been at least his second given he released a Jersey club-inspired single with AJ Tracey last year that could have absolutely smashed over here. It was one of my favourite songs of 2023, and still gets me really excited - if there’s anything Bas is great at, it’s just letting you loose and allowing for a dropping of the same pretence that has defined J. Cole’s every move. Cole puts Bas on his albums as a gesture but is seemingly unwilling to promote the man’s solo music. This may be because of how obvious it is that Bas, whilst maybe not as technically lyrical, has the pop edge over Cole, and could honestly be way bigger if given a chance to a mass audience or even bigger features like Cench over here, who is completely fine in his verse. This is just a sample-drill track wherein Cench does fine, Bas is cool but is only granted the hook - telling - and Cole embarrasses himself by reciting the alphabet without the letter L because he doesn’t take those. You got outcharted this week by two Benson Boone songs, Teddy Goddamn Swims and the song that dissed you in the first place still at #11. Please, stop lying to yourself, it’s not healthy.

Conclusion

Guess Best of the Week Boone strikes again with “Cry”. Jesus, I thought I was better than that. It’s even the only song I actually like out of our debuts, which is fantastic, so there won’t be an Honourable Mention. Instead, we can throw out a Dishonourable Mention for J. Cole’s “Crocodile Tearz”, whilst he ties for the worst. Both “7 Minute Drill” and David Guetta’s “I Don’t Wanna Wait” with OneRepublic feel like very cynical and regretful songs, made not for response but reaction and no, in art, those aren’t necessarily the same thing. Hopefully, we’ll have a more pleasant week on the horizon, there are pop girls by the dozen with Dua Lipa, Perrie of Little Mix, Sabrina Carpenter, Mimi Webb and perhaps most importantly, Future and Metro dropped the sequel. For now, thank you for reading, long live Cola Boyy, and I’ll see you next week!

#uk singles chart #pop music #song review #j. cole #might delete later #bas #central cee #d4vd #chappell roan #benson boone #onerepublic #david guetta

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bladewarde · 2 years

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from Alasdair: ‘ I never wish to be parted from you from this day on. ’ / @has-opinions

He had begged her with a softness in his voice; where a deep yearning he kept only to himself came through in the gentleness in which he held her by the arms. For a moment, Laera could only stare, taken by the affections of the man she had fallen so deeply in love with, and left all the same. He looked so frail. A towering man in stature, and strong as a bear -- that was the Alasdair she knew, and loved -- yet he looked small in the clothes he wore. Exhaustion was carved deep into his handsome face, and his hair dulled, faded from its rich brown colour.

Her tenderness, though, shifted, as she twisted from his grip in protest. Her anger briefly surfaced, unable to hide the insult she felt: ❝ I didn't ask you to find me! And... And I told you -- the both of you -- I couldn't stay! No matter 'ow much you whinge and beg, I'm not leaving with you! ❞ She screamed at him, the blood pooling in her face, as Alasdair, unwavering and motionless, took it all.

There had been plenty to think about while she was gone, and in the moments she spent polishing silverware, or preparing the food, the desperation to belong, to feel whole, turned her bitter. She vowed to make this life in England work, in spite of what Alasdair or Eilodh believed. Shamefully, though, she hated them for being unburdened with the responsibility of a normal life, where they could live on forever; a freedom of a different sort. It was a luxury she could never have, and her pride would never allow her to be dependent on either of them, yet mixed with her bitterness was longing. A homesickness.

' Please come 'ome, ' He then whispered to her, persistent as the snows that passed over Ben Lomond, and she faltered, then. ' Come 'ome to Eilodh; she misses ye awful. ' And he paused; a long, drawn out silence, as he seemed to stare through her, his thoughts cast elsewhere. Laera watched, expecting more than the calm he gave her. She thought he would have matched her in her fury, but Alasdair was talented at soothing even the wildest of them. She simmered, and when he spoke to her again, she could feel herself softening to his words. ' I miss ye, Laera. I miss ye more than I could ever tell ye, but I want -- I need -- ye 'ome. I need ye 'ome with me, an' can only 'ope ye listen. ' If there had been any fight left in Laera, it wholly left her in that instant; she crumbled, and she could do nothing to stop the tears that poured down her reddened cheeks.

In the days since the MacDonalds' arrived, and the weeks it took for them return, Laera had much time to think. Maybe she was a fool for being convinced so easily, to give up so readily on the plan she had carefully laid out, but in truth, Laera didn't want to be without. It would be worse, she thought -- even with no coin to her name, or work of her own -- to be without the two people who showed her the beauty that her life could be. They had become her family; and only when she was returned to the comfort and familiarity of her simple life, pressed against Alasdair's side, her head on his chest as she listened to the beating of his heart, did she truly feel at peace. It's the sort of peace that comes with knowing this is where she is meant to be.

❝ I shouldn't 'ave said those 'orrible things to you, ❞ Laera mumbles, her mouth pressed into his skin, afraid of admitting the cruelty behind the words she screamed at him. It's all she can say to make it better. ❝ 'M sorry, Alasdair, ❞ She raises her head, staring into his soft gaze, and without expectation of forgiveness; she doesn't deserve it. ❝ 'M sorry, ❞ Her apology is soft, guilty.

He returns her stare, as if attempting to memorise the details of her face should they never see each other again. He holds her a little tighter, and when he speaks, he speaks firmly. ‘ I never wish to be parted from ye from this day on. I cannae bear it, Laera. Never again. Please... ’

She swears he to him he has nothing to fear, and through her holding back tears, Laera kisses him sweetly.

She is meant to be home.

#hasopinions #❛ fad beatha. / i trod with a wild ecstasy; the bright fringe of the living sea.#i have no words!!!!!! other than!!!#i love them ur honour :pensive:#❛ 𝒊𝒄. / ic answers.

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meryamthebadassbitch · 2 years

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𝐑𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐊𝐢𝐧𝐠 {𝐂𝐚𝐬𝐩𝐢𝐚𝐧 𝐱 𝐅𝐞𝐦𝐚𝐥𝐞!𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫}

Warning: Angst, Fluff, swear words...

A/N: I'm in love with Ben Barnes, that's it, he is so fucking beautiful so I wrote this, between listen to this song for better experience:

Chase Atlantic- Friends

words: 2579

"Edmund the painting!" spoke Lucy while staring at the moving image, water immediately started pouring down as Y/N held Eustace back before he could do something to it, the water instantly started covering the whole room, her lungs started burning as she hurriedly swam back to the surface to get a little oxygen, breathing heavily Y/N looked around in search of her siblings checking if they were okay but stopped upon her eyes landed on the huge ship in front of them, "swim!" shouting at them the H/C haired girl swam faster than she ever had, making sure to keep an eye on her siblings including Eustace, stopping brutally at the sudden arm sneaking around her waist her E/C eyes widened before turning around to punch whoever the hell this is but this person was quicker yet stronger than her as he blocked her with a charming smile, "Caspian!" she exclaimed loudly while holding Caspian's hand as tightly as she could for dears life, sparkles grew in her E/C eyes as she stared at him with joy.

"Oh I'm so sorry your majesty!" she said bowing down as soon as they were aboard the ship but Caspian already hurled himself into her arms, nearly knocking her over given how taller he was than her, blushing a deep tint of red she wrapped her arms around his neck pulling him possibly closer, Caspian tightened his grip around her waist hugging her with one step higher, "I missed you" whispered the king to her ear sending a shiver down her spine "I missed you more, King Caspian"

Eustace for the whole time kept talking nonsense about how he will contact the British council (as if they were gonna believe him) and have them all arrested for kidnapping, "kidnapping is it?" spoke Caspian from behind while bumping his shoulder with her favorite smile on his face before continuing his words "That's funny, I thought we saved your life?" "You held me against my will!" "did I?" both Reepicheep and Lucy snickered at his words while Y/N and Edmund rolled their eyes, "Listen, Eustace, you better respect him, for now, you're in Narnia and he's your king, don't make me say it twice or i'm telling your mother about every single thing you said to us, you know, she likes me?" her tone was serious as she warned him to respect Caspian who smiled at her proudly.

Y/N thought he looked more beautiful with the beard, he always was the most beautiful guy to her, and him with a beard, and wearing those outfits that look like pirate ones made her fall for him deeper than she already was, every time one of her siblings would look at her she is either talking to him or staring lovingly at him, she loved how his voice would vibrate through her ears whenever he's talking, there she was standing at the end of the ship staring into nothing but at the water thinking about him, Reepicheep seemed to notice the sudden mood changing before making his way toward her, "Hello your majesty" looking away from the ocean she smiled at him kindly "hey Reep, call me Y/N only" she was the queen and her telling him to call her by her name was probably one of the best things, "yes, of course, may I ask you a question your majesty- I mean Y/N?" he asked kindly.

"depends on the answer, but go on?" "Are you in love with King Caspian?" that was sudden, standing there in silence Y/N blinked and stood in silence thinking of his question, noticing the sudden silence the talking mouse immediately started apologizing while bowing down, "Hey calm down, I won't cut your head off! the answer to your question is yes" 'damn Y/N, that was quick' she thought disappointment written on her face as she tried so hard to fight the urge of screaming and jumping off the boat, laughing awkwardly she turned her attention back to the waving mermaids, nodding her head at their direction she turned back her attention to the mouse who seemed to be in shock of her words, "well, you both will make an amazing couple" her face lit up at his words "you think so?" "oh yes I do, I have seen the way you look at him, Caspian couldn't stop talking about you for about three years anyways" The fire of passion flamed in Y/N's face.

"So? have you found you a queen in those three years?" asked Lucy on the other side of the table while brushing a strand of hair behind her air, Caspian smiled at her before responding "No, so how are Peter and Susan?" this time it was him who asked the question in hope to change the subject, "Peter and Susan are alright, thanks for asking, Susan said Y/N talked about you ever since we met you and her house is full of letters of her talking about how handsome and brilliant you are, I, as her younger sister never seen happier than now, well, until she talks about you, of course!" Lucy seemed to notice him trying to change the subject, he was speechless, there is no way Y/N loves him more than he did, he thought she didn't love him at all and Lucy telling him how she always talks about him, made his day- no, his life a hundred times better.

"Hello" Y/N's voice startled him as he brutally turned around pointing his sword inches away from her neck he sighed heavily making her chuckle, it was late at night and here she was holding two cups of orange juice she made herself, handing him a cup she sat beside him with a smile, "I'm sorry Y/N I didn't mean to point-" Caspian immediately started panicking before turning his head to her with worry in his beautiful eyes, putting her hand on top of his she gave him a reassuring smile "hey, it's alright, I should apologize for scaring you" her thumb rubbed his soft skin trying to ease his panicking down, Caspian melted as soon as her hands touched his making her smile. "You have changed, cause the last time you were just a prince who attacked Peter not knowing who he was, and now here you are a king, you deserve it, I'm sure the crown would look amazing on you and with that Spanish accent" a chuckle escaped his lips as he remembered the first time he met them, he could still remember Y/N wearing a dark blue dress beside Susan and smiling at him softly, Both of them seemed to not notice their hands intertwined as they both laughed and drank their juice.

"I like it" "What?" "the beard, you look handsome, really handsome" "oh so you think I wasn't handsome before?" now it was her turn to panic as she snapped her head toward him while shaking her head, "No! you were always handsome Caspian!" laughter escaped him as he tried to hold himself from bursting out of laughter and waking everyone, frowning she punched his shoulder feeling embarrassed, covering her face in her knees she listened to his laughter, it was beautiful, it was— music to her ears as she read in some books.

"W-we should probably head inside it's getting cold besides we should rest, we have a long day tomorrow?" she said getting up while holding her hand out, helping him stand on his feet she held the two cups in her hand before placing them on the small table, "Good night" as she was about to walk away "Stop Y/N...wait!" Caspian grabbed hold of her arm and stopped any further movement, "I'm so sorry, darling, for everything" he whispered soothingly as he pulled her toward his chest, her breath hitched in her throat as she tried to believe what is going on, slowly wrapping her arm around his waist she hugged him back listening to his heartbeat questioning what it would be like to cuddle him, trying to keep herself from blushing a huge grin was on her face as Caspian's finger brushed her hair, his lips were suddenly on her forehead, brushing it lightly— that soft touch sent shivers down her whole body. "Good night, Y/N" with that he was off.

For the past days, it was full of adventure, Eustace becoming a dragon, fighting a sea serpent after following a blue star, who was a beautiful woman named Lilliandil who seemed to know about her crush on the lovely king and convinced her to confess before it's too late. Too late, what does she mean by that, of course, we are going to come back here? she thought at first, but when Aslan told them they grew and can't come back here, her hands started shaking, "This is our last time here, isn't it?" "Yes, you have grown up, my dear one, just like Peter and Susan" spoke Aslan calmly as he made her way toward her with soft eyes, her words broke up and all she could say were stuttering sounds as hot tears streamed down her face, squeezing her eyelids shut in the hope the tears would stop, "you were the closest thing I had to family, and that includes you Eustace" spoke Caspian behind her she could tell he was about to cry also, looking down she let the tears fall to the sand, turning around she ran to Caspian before wrapping her arms around his neck tightly

Sobbing she pulled away before smashing her lips into his, she kissed him like he wanted to be kissed, "I can't leave you, I can't live without you Caspian please I need you in my life!" staring deep into his eyes she let the tears continue to fall, Caspian couldn't help but pull her into a kiss a rough one full of emotions, as she wrapped her arm once again behind his neck, Her hands went from the sides of his head and down to his neck, "I'm sorry, I love you, my love" "I love you so much Caspian and I'm so sorry I didn't say it before" her forehead was against his as she cried, slowly pulling away he grabbed her cheek wiping the tears that fell down her ravishing eyes "promise me, you will get married and live happily, have kids, but don't forget me" "I can't promise that, I love you and I'm not getting married unless it isn't you!" she was stubborn.

Kneeling in front of Aslan she looked down while begging the lion for his help "Please Aslan, you know I can't live without him, can't you create another Caspian who rules the kingdom and he can live with me, please, I am begging you Aslan, and that is the only thing I ask from you?" she asked in the hope he will do something but only put his paw on top of her knee making her look up at him, her eyes were bloodshot as she stared at him straight into his eyes, giving her a small nod he spoke "I'll see what I can do about it, my dear, you should go now" nodding she sniffled before wiping her cheeks with the back of her sleeve getting up she pulled Aslan into a hug, he became a part of her life ever since they came to Narnia, she could feel him resting his head on her shoulder.

Planting a kiss on Caspian's cheek one last time she grabbed his face, both her hands on his cheek felt wonderful as he examined her in front of him taking in every single inch of her body in his memory, "I love you so much Caspian" "and so do I" leaning against her hand he softly placed his on top of hers keeping the eye contact looking at her deeply, brushing her lips against his one lost time, she pecked his lips before walking away, his cheek felt cold as soon as her hand left his cheek and there she was standing beside her family who gave her a guilty smile while rubbing her back. The eye contact Caspian made with her hadn't been broken just yet.

It has been 3 months since they came back from Narnia, she wasn't feeling well, she wasn't the cheerful girl she was, she became quiet very quiet and her eyes rarely showed a hint of joy but only tiredness, exhausted after another tiring day, Y/N held the picture in front of her along with the letter, tears immediately started covering her eyes at the sight of Caspian's handwriting, it was beautiful very beautiful, letting out a chuckle she pressed the picture against her chest before fluttering her eyes shut with a smile still on her face, her eyes flickered into darkness due to exhaustion.

'I miss you my love' she thought before drifting into a deep slumber

Jolting on her bed at the sound of something falling from her closet she grabbed the closet thing, a book, slowly getting up she made her way toward the closet holding the book tightly in her hand while cocking her head to the side, someone was breathing in her fucking closet, slamming the door open she was about to swing her book into that person's head but stopped after realizing who it was.

There he was standing, the love of her life, King Caspian, in her closet staring directly at her.

The book fell from her hand with a loud thud as she stared at him with wide eyes, "Hello, did I interrupt your sleep darling?" His voice rang through her ear as she stared at him, she couldn't believe it, the love of her life was in front of her in the closet when he is supposed to be in Narnia doing his job as a king, tears covered her E/C eyes as she threw herself around him, her arms wrapped around his neck pulling him closer to her, she missed him, she missed how his hand would linger down her back stopping at her waist pulling her toward his chest, she missed how he would whisper sweet nothings into her ear while hugging, especially when his lips were pressed against hers into a soft lovely kiss.

"Oh Caspian, I missed you so much, how-" before she could finish her words Caspian pulled her into a rough kiss straight into the mouth without warning, Y/N on the other hand gladly accepted her hand playing with his hair stroking his scalp gently which drove Caspian crazy, pulling away he cupped her cheeks while pressing kisses around her whole face making her giggle, "but what about your kingdom-" "Aslan said he will handle it and sent me here!" The feeling of him holding her caused more goosebumps to arise all over her.

The door to her room suddenly slammed open and there stood Edmund and Lucy ready to attack whoever this is, "What the fuck- Caspian!" both her siblings pulled the king into a hug while asking plenty of questions before pulling him down the stairs to meet their mother, who happily added him to the family and wanted both of them to get married as soon as possible, "Thank you Aslan" she whispered before closing the door to her room while making her way down the stairs listening to her mother talking about her and how handsome he is.

#Ben barnes #ben barnes x female!reader #ben barnes fanart #fluff #angst #fanfic #xreader #ben barnes fluff #prince caspian x reader #prince caspian #chronicles of narnia #narnia x reader #ben barnes x reader #edmund pevensie #lucy pevensie #peter pevensie #susan pevensie

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caitimetravels · 3 years

Text

she’s insignificant

chapter 3: the dangers inside

the umbrella academy x reader

disclaimer: i do not own the plot/storyline of the netflix tv series and i do not own the umbrella academy characters.

warnings: swearing, mentions of death

masterlist

y/n stared at the blue energy in the courtyard before deciding to join her siblings as they rushed to see what it was. as she ran down the stairs she caught sight of klaus holding a fire extinguisher.

"what are you doing?" she caught up with him.

"something" he shrugged, bursting out the door first. "out of the way!"

"thats not going to- klaus what the hell?" y/n went to stop him only to watch as he tried to extinguish the mass of energy. she shook her head in disbelief, stepping beside vanya.

klaus chucked the extinguisher when he realised it wouldn't work.

"what is that gonna do?" allison shouted over the loud noise. klaus threw his hands up.

"i don't know. do you have a better idea?" he stepped back in surprise as another flash came from the portal. luther pulled klaus back.

"everyone get behind me!" and in true sibling rivalry diego nodded, shielding vanya and y/n.

"yeah, get behind us!"

they watched, brows furrowing at the familiar figure that dropped to the ground. as they stepped closer the vortex disappeared.

"is that-?" y/n looked up at vanya, peeking around diego to see.

there, in a too large sized suit, stood their missing brother. he pushed himself to his feet taking in their appearance.

"does anyone else see little number five is that just me?" klaus questioned as they walked closer. the said boy stared down at himself in confusion before looking back at them.

"shit" he cursed.

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they all moved back into the kitchen, letting five do as he pleased while he explained what he needed to.

he placed a chopping board and knife on the table while the others stood at the other end. y/n stood off to the corner, not entirely comfortable with them after being accused of murder. "what's the date? the exact date"

five walked around, grabbing bread to make himself a sandwich. vanya answered, "the 24th"

"of what?" five pushed walking back over.

"march"

"good" he pulled out two pieces of bread, laying them on the chopping board.

"so, are we going to talk about what just happened?" luther raised an eyebrow, expectantly but five stayed silent. "its been 17 years!" luther stood, frustrated but five wasn't taking any of his bullshit.

"it's been a lot longer than that" the shorter boy walked towards him before blinking behind him to grab the marshmallows. luther sighed,

"i haven't missed that"

"where'd you go?" diego piped up, unfazed.

"the future" five sighed, "and it's shit by the way" he opened up the bag of marshmallows.

"called it!" klaus raised his finger.

"do you want one?" five looked up at y/n, referring to the sandwich, a soft gleam in his eyes. the others shared a look, of course he had only missed her. she gently shook her head with a small smile. "i should have listened to the old man" five walked to the fridge, pulling out a jar. "he knew. travelling through space is one thing, travelling through time is a toss of the dice"

he paused as he opened the peanut butter, looking up at them again before noticing klaus' attire. "nice dress"

"oh, danke" klaus twirled loose material around. allison rolled her eyes.

"how did you get back?"

"in the end i had to project my consciousness forward into a suspended quantum state version of myself that exists across every possible instance of time" he continued making his sandwich like he hadn't just shocked them.

"that makes no sense" diego scoffed,

"well, it would if you were smarter" five shrugged, ignoring the way diego stood up to fight him. luther held him back.

"did you put a decimal point in the wrong spot?" y/n asked, surprising the others. she crossed her arms, thinking "it was probably a miscalculation in your proof of the existence of a bound for the number of limit cycles of planar polynomial vector fields of fixed degree."

five paused, thinking it over before realising she was right. "it should have been 0.57" he mumbled.

"how long were you there?" luther changed the subject, obviously confused.

"45 years" five went back to his sandwich making. "give or take"

everyone sat back down in shock.

"so what are you saying? that you're 58?!" luther narrowed his eyes in disbelief. there was no way.

"no" five looked up, speaking through gritted teeth. "my consciousness is 58. apparently my body is now 16 again"

"how does that even work?" vanya croaked out, still shocked at the situation.

"delores kept saying the equations were off" five shrugged, stepping away and looking off into the distance as he took a bite of his sandwich. "bet she's laughing now"

"delores?" vanya asked. y/n froze, he had kept her? at the girl's movement, or lack thereof, allison looked over at her, raising her eyebrows.

y/n shook her head, waving it off.

five picked up the newspaper on the table, staring at the picture of their father.

"hm.. guess i missed the funeral"

"how'd you know about that?" luther questioned, defensive.

"what part of the future do you not understand?" five narrowed his eyes, slightly amused by his brothers incompetence. "heart failure, huh?"

"yeah-" diego started only to be cut off by luther.

"no" there was silence for a moment before a kitchen knife stabbed into the table beside luther's hand.

"if i had murderous intent, luther, you'd be the first on my list" y/n scoffed, walking out.

they all stared after her in shock.

"nice to see nothing's changed" five sighed before following her out.

"thats it?" allison asked, turning towards him as he walked. "thats all you have to say?"

"what else is there to say? circle of life" he called back.

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vanya walked up to five in the parlour where he stood staring at his painting.

"nice to know dad didn't forget me" five turned to her, "read your book by the way.. found it in the library that was still standing"

he started to walk around, noticing y/n sitting on the balcony above. she had her legs dangling through the bars, calmly reading a book. he turned back to vanya.

"thought it was pretty good, all things considered" he stared her down, "definitely ballsy, giving up the family secrets. sure that went over well"

"they hate me" vanya frowned,

"well there are worse things that can happen" five was obviously trying to cheer her up, in his own way.

"you mean like what happened to ben?" there was a pause, both thinking it over.

"was it bad?" five asked softly, he knew y/n was still listening. he heard the faint sound of a book shutting. he looked away as vanya nodded.

"y/n had a hard time dealing with it.. the worst of all of us. dad forbid her from going on missions after her reaction.."

"her reaction?" five turned back, eyebrows furrowing, this wasn't in vanya's book.

"she nearly tore our souls out.. she was devastated and couldn't control her emotions. dad said it helped her though, something about a new ability. he trained her alone from then, forcing her to find you" vanya shrugged, sighing, going silent.

"find me?" five pushed, "what do you mean find me?"

"she said she did.. did she not?" vanya looked surprised now.

"no, no she did.. just didn't stay long is all" five shook his head, frowning.

"yeah well, they stopped trying when she lied to dad"

"she lied?" five looked back up at where she was previously sitting but now she was gone, the only thing left behind was her book and a wisp of smoke.

--------------------------------------------------

"ben.. i'm- i'm scared" eight sat cross legged in front of his statue. "my powers are getting stronger and i'm scared to hurt the others. i wish you were still here" she refused to cry no matter how much she wanted to. she couldn't let the same thing happen.

"i'm scared ben. what if i can't control it? what if hurt somebody? you're not here to help me and i-.. it hurts sometimes. dad doesn't understand, he never did but it hurts to suppress my emotions like he wants me to. we try so hard and he still never thinks we're enough.." she paused, pulling her knees up to her chest. "what if i am weak? what if he's right?"

unbeknownst to her ben's ghost sat beside her. "you're not weak" he shook his head, moving to look at her face. "you'll never be weak, you're so strong. please keep being strong for me" he pleaded with her as she continued to blame herself. he hated this. he hated not being there for her. he just wanted her to be okay.

--------------------------------------------------

y/n walked beside five, standing under his umbrella with him. they didn't speak as they walked back out into the courtyard. the siblings all stood in line with luther in front of them, carrying their dad's ashes.

"did something happen?" grace looked at them all, smiling despite the occasion. they all looked up at her.

"dad died.." allison answered, confused. "remember?"

"oh, yes of course" grace nodded, expression turning more somber.

"is mom okay?" allison asked, now worried about how grace was acting.

"yeah, yeah she's fine" diego quickly defended, "she just needs to rest, you know, recharge" allison looked incredulous but dropped it nonetheless.

pogo stepped forwards, looking up at luther. "whenever you're ready, dear boy"

luther breathed out, opening the lid and dropping the ashes in a pitiful pile. they all frowned.

"probably would have been better with some wind" luther griped,

"does anyone wish to speak?" pogo ignored it, looking at the rest of them. everyone stayed silent, looking away. "very well.. in all regards, sir reginald hargreeves made me what i am today, for that alone i shall forever be in his debt. he was my master and my friend and i shall miss him very much.." he paused, "he leaves behind a complicated legacy-"

"he was a monster" diego cut off, still staring down at the ashes. klaus laughed. "he was bad person and a worse father. the world's better off without him-"

"diego" allison scolded, glaring at him in surprise.

"my name is number two. you know why?" he looked over at her. "because our father couldn't be bothered to give us actual names, he had mom do it"

"would anyone like something to eat?" grace asked, smiling again, unaware of what was happening.

"no, its okay mom" vanya denied, albeit confused.

"oh, okay"

"look, you wanna pay your respects" diego stepped out in front of them, "go head, but at least be honest about the kind of man he was" he looked at pogo now.

"you should stop talking now" luther warned, anger growing. diego glared at him for a moment before fully turning to face him.

"you know, you of all people should be on my side here, number one"

"i am warning you-" diego ignored him,

"after everything he did to you" y/n sighed, crossing her arms to her chest, fighting wasn't going to fix any of them. klaus and five shared a look. "he had to ship you a million miles away"

"diego stop talking-" luther tried again. diego was definitely hitting a nerve. he jabbed a finger into luther's chest.

"that's how much he couldn't stand the sight of you!" luther grabbed his arm and swung at his head. diego ducked. they begun fighting while everyone else backed away.

"boys! stop this at once!" pogo attempted to stop them, moving back despite this.

klaus held an arm out to shield five and y/n. the former slapped it away. they continued to fight, diego egging him on and landing several punches. klaus began to chant while vanya yelled at them to stop.

"klaus" y/n warned, gaining both his and five's attention. her eyes were turning black, she was struggling.

"y/n? are you okay?" five hadn't been there, he didn't know what she would do if she lost control. pogo walked away, not wanting to stay. klaus nervously watched y/n while the others watched luther and diego fight.

"i don't have time for this" five sighed, beginning to walk away, leaving y/n with klaus under his small pink umbrella.

that was when it happened. y/n froze as they knocked ben's statue.

"aw" klaus complained while allison glared at them.

"and there goes ben's statue"

"klaus?" y/n's voice scared them all. she sounded weak. she gripped his jacket, tightly. "klaus"

"what's wrong?" he looked down at her, watching as she fought her emotions. her eyes were turning black but she kept fighting it.

diego pulled out his knife and vanya's shouting at him to stop made it harder for y/n to calm herself. he threw it at luther, cutting his arm.

"klaus" she called again and he held her arm unsure of what to do. "i-i can't.. i can't-" she let out a pained whine as her eyes darkened, she was letting go. suddenly diego and luther let out shouts of pain.

"what's going on?!" allison watched them, confused and distraught. vanya quickly left their mother's side, pulling y/n into her.

"its okay, you're okay" vanya whispered to her, trying to calm her. "it can be fixed, you're okay, just relax. try to relax" listening to vanya's heartbeat she slowly calmed down, the blackness of her eyes seeping away and diego and luther straightened, no longer in pain.

y/n stared at them in shock and guilt before shaking her head and running inside. she locked herself in her room again. she was truly a demon.

--------------------------------------------------

one by one the siblings left, y/n watched sadly as they all abandoned her again. she was always left alone, the family problems only got bigger when they got together. she sighed, maybe she was better off alone.

--------------------------------------------------

y/n looked up from her book as she heard frantic footsteps around the mansion. peeking out her door she noticed vanya slowing down in front of five's room.

"oh thank god" she disappeared through his doorway but y/n could still hear her voice. "i was worried sick about you"

five had talked to vanya? why hadn't he come to her?

"sorry i left without saying goodbye" five's voice answered softly. what had he been doing? y/n quietly left her room to hear better. she wanted to be apart of her brother's plans too. she didn't want to be left out anymore.

"no, i'm the one that should be sorry. i was dismissive and i guess i didn't know how to process what you were saying.." vanya paused, "i still can't to be honest"

"maybe you were right to be dismissive" five huffed, that didn't sound like him at all? what was he really doing? "maybe it wasn't real after all.. it felt real. but well, like you said the old man did say time travel could contaminate the mind"

well vanya referred him to a therapist y/n tried to sense the room. something else was going on. carefully using her power she felt another person.. klaus. when vanya walked out y/n quickly turned to smoke, gliding along the floor, past five who watched vanya leave. klaus pulled himself out of the closet.

"that's so touching, all that stuff about family and dad and time"

"will you shut up? she'll hear you" five warned him, walking back over.

"you're lying to vanya?" y/n appeared next to klaus, crossing her arms and raising an eyebrow.

"it's nothing you should worry about" five dismissed before looking klaus over again. "i thought i told you to put on something professional"

"what? this my nicest outfit" klaus gestured to it. y/n snorted when five scoffed.

"we'll raid the old man's closet"

"whatever, as long as i get paid" klaus shrugged, beginning to walk behind five.

"when the job is done" they stopped just above the stairs.

"so, where are we going?" she followed along, smiling innocently at five who raised an eyebrow at her.

"not we, just klaus and i" five shook his head, shoving his hands in his pockets.

"five" she frowned,

"y/n" he mocked.

"just let me come, please don't leave me in the dark. i just want to help you" she pleaded, she had missed him.

he thought it over before sighing, "fine" he turned to walk again but klaus stopped him.

"but just so we're clear on the finer details" he waved his hand around, talking over the plan. "i just got to go into this place and pretend to be your dear old dad, correct?"

"yeah, something like that" five agreed, exasperated.

"what's our cover story?" klaus continued, ignoring five's look of annoyance.

"what? what are you talking about?" five shared a confused look with y/n who shrugged.

"i mean was i young when i had you, like 16.. like young and terribly misguided" five agreed just to get him to stop but he didn't. "your mother, that slut, whoever she was, we met at.. the disco and you can be his sister"

"i am his sister?" y/n raised an eyebrow, but klaus only smiled, clicking his fingers.

"okay, remember that. oh my god the sex was amazing"

y/n scoffed, walking away first, five following. "what a disturbing glimpse into that thing you call a brain"

"don't make me put you in time out" klaus waved a finger at him.

as they walked out the door onto the street y/n paused.

"what's wrong, baby sis?" klaus asked, wrapping his arm around her shoulders. "you're not backing out already?"

"no!" she quickly denied, looking up at him as she snapped out of her starstruck daze. "it's just.. i haven't left the house in 16 years.."

klaus and five shared a sorrowful look. what had happened to her?

tags: @rxses-and-reverie

#tua #the umbrella academy #tua x reader #the umbrella academy x reader #tua x sibling reader #the umbrella academy x sibling reader #five hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #allison hargreeves #diego hargreeves #vanya hargreeves #luther hargreeves #five hargreeves x reader #klaus hargreeves x reader #allison hargreeves x reader #diego hargreeves x reader #vanya hargreeves x reader #luther hargreeves x reader

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phoenixyfriend · 3 years

Text

Anakin, Shmi, and the Jedi Babies

(Plus Jango)

A scene from the Anakin and the Jedi Babies

Warnings for: canon-typical discussion of slavery.

Shmi is eleven years old when the stranger comes.

He’s tall, and covered in the kind of dark clothes that are hell in the desert. He’s got some armor, too, but not as much as the Mandalorians she sees walking around sometimes. His expression is mean, even though he’s smiling, and she thinks the trader is scared of him.

He’s buying her.

“Now I just need a name for the ownership paperwork,” the trader says. She thinks he’s sweating.

“The sale is already completed, yes?” the stranger says. He tilts his head and purses his lips, still smirking. “No sudden fees coming my way?”

“Of course not, honored customer,” the trader simpers.

“Anakin Skywalker.”

Shmi’s heart stops. That’s her family name.

The trader gets a little paler, as he realizes why this man is here. Shmi watches the calculations fly, wondering if he can maybe squeeze out a few extra wupiupi on this sale. Former slaves freeing family, even family they don’t know, always fetches the highest price.

The stranger—Anakin—leans across the counter and looms over the trader, smiling in the most threatening way Shmi’s ever seen. “No sudden fees, right?”

“Well, there will be the code transfer f—”

“I’m the most dangerous person in this city,” the man says, smile dropping away like flies from a bantha. “Don’t make me prove it, friend.”

The sale is secured, the codes handed over, the detonator passing hands.

Shmi falls into step next to Anakin, hurrying to keep up with his longer strides. He takes her a few blocks away without a word, and then into a shallow spot in an alleyway, right where foot traffic won’t be a bother.

“Hey,” he says, dropping to one knee and placing himself where, even when she sets her gaze low, he’ll be there. He smiles at her, hesitant but far, far kinder than what she saw in the shop. “Do you want me to deactivate your chip now, or once we’re on my ship? I can’t remove it until we’re out of here; I’m no surgeon.”

“…now, please,” she whispers, and watches him punch in the numbers and codes to neutralize the bomb she’s carried inside herself since she was three. It’s done in less than two minutes.

“Do you want me to break this?” he asks, voice soft.

She nods, and watches in fascination as he crushes it in his fist with seemingly no effort.

He smiles at her, tosses the shards into the nearest compactor, and then offers her the hand that isn’t in a glove. She takes it, like she used to take her mom’s before they were separated, and follows him through Mos Pelgo. He’s family. He’s cleanly, clearly freed her. She should be able to trust him.

“Where are we going?” she manages to work up the courage to ask.

His stride stutters a bit, his hand squeezing hers, but his voice is even when he speaks. “Well, I would like you to stay with me, but if you have… have any family to return to, that you know how to find…”

“I don’t know where my mom is,” she says. “She got sold when I was four.”

He squeezes her hand again, and she dares to look at his face. His eyes are squinted, angry, and focused on the horizon. She’d call it stormy, if she’d ever been to a planet of water, but she was a child of the desert. She could feel his anger, and it wasn’t hot and sharp and blinding enough to be a storm of sand.

(She felt that it could be, in the intuition that had kept her alive these past years.)

“I see,” he says. “I’m… okay, then. I’d try to find her if I could, but I don’t know how to do that.”

Shmi shrugs. “She was sent to Jabba’s. I don’t think she’s… um. She’s probably dead, now.”

He’s silent in response to that.

“How did you find me?” she asks, because her intuition says to trust this man to keep her alive, even if she thinks she may not trust his temper.

He thinks about that for a second, and then lets go of her hand for a moment to brush aside a layer of his tunic.

A lightsaber.

Her eyes dart up to his, wide and maybe a little awed. He grins, a little more carefree than before.

“Jeedai?”

“A full Jedi knight, believe it or not,” he confirms. “The Force led me to find you. I don’t think I’d have been able to do locate you without it.”

“Wizard,” she whispers, and then he pulls her into his side and out of the way of a large, too-fast-for-these-streets speeder.

He swears under his breath in a language she doesn’t recognize.

“So, I’m going with you,” she says. “Um, where… where do Jedi live?”

“The Temple is on Coruscant,” he tells her. “But I’ve got business in Mandalorian space, so that’s where I’m based out of right now.”

“Okay,” she says. Mandalore… maybe that’s why he’s got armor like one of them. “I… I heard that Jedi are all called Master, so—”

“No,” Anakin snaps, turning around and getting to one knee in front of her again, hands on both her shoulders, stopping her in a fraction of a second with a look so intense that it scares her. “No, you are never to call me that. You are never going to bow your head to a master again, okay? You are free, and you are family.”

She stares at him for a long second, and then nods. She thinks her head jerks a bit too sharply, but he’s scary. He cares so much that it frightens her. He must be able to tell, because he closes his eyes and visibly forces himself to calm down.

“I was freed when I was nine,” he tells her. “By a Jedi Master. And I know… I know how uncomfortable it is to live like that, where the word means something different to you than it does to everyone else. I became a Jedi, so I learned to make it mean what it was supposed to, respect for teachers and—and elders. But you, you’re not a Jedi, you’re just a girl, and you matter, and—don’t make yourself say it. Please.”

“Okay,” she says. “Do I just… do I just call you Anakin, then?”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s fine,” he says, and his hands twitch on her shoulders. She thinks he wants to pull her into a hug, but is forcing himself to stop. “Or Ani, if you want, my—my mom used to call me that. Seems like something to keep for family.”

“Okay,” she says again. She can do that.

“Or, um,” he hesitates, and then barrels on. “We’ll be in Mandalore. They say ori’vod to mean older sibling. So, er, you can call me that. If you want. You don’t have to.”

She’ll have to practice. It looks like it means a lot to him. “I’ll think about it.”

“Great,” he says, and dithers for a moment before he stands up and turns around, black robes flaring. “Come on, let’s get out of the sun.”

He leads her to just outside the city limits, where there’s a small ship waiting, enough for a half-dozen people on longer trips, maybe. She doesn’t know much about ships, but this one’s covered in scratches and pits, like it’s been in fights and come out the other side.

They open the door, and are met with wailing.

Anakin rushes past her, shouting, “Ben!”

Shmi doesn’t follow immediately, but he’s been pretty insistent that she’s family, not property. She’s allowed inside.

She finds Anakin in the main room, holding a baby and bouncing it in his arms as he hisses a demand to a boy only a few years older than Shmi herself.

“—my kids, Jango!”

“I’m here to babysit the ship, not the baby!” the teenager argues back.

Anakin scoffs and turns his attention to the baby in his arms. Shmi isn’t entirely sure, but she thinks the baby is definitely less than a year old. It quiets in his arms, tiny hands fisting in the fabric she knows is still too hot from the sun outside.

“Shmi, you can sit down,” he tells her, distracted. “I’d love to talk more but I think I need to make a bottle for Ben. I’ll be back in a few.”

She looks around, sees a bench, and sits down. She presses her hands together in her lap, keeps her eyes on the japor charm her mother left with her years ago, hanging around her wrist. She can wait. She’s patient. She’ll figure out how freedom works eventually.

“Mmmmmmbook!”

Shmi jolts in her seat as a very small body collides with her leg, blue and white and giggling. The head of that small body turns up to stare at her with massive eyes, and she sees the child’s face is orange. Togruta, she thinks, and very young.

The little one pushes a flimsi book onto Shmi’s lap and pats at it, grinning up at Shmi with tiny, pearly teeth.

“Ad’ika, she just got here,” the-teenager-that-is-probably-named-Jango sighs, dropping into the seat next to Shmi. “Let her rest.”

“Sto-wee!” the baby Togruta insists, patting at Shmi’s leg. The little one tries to climb up onto the bench, and Shmi reaches out to help after she realizes the toddler is about to slip. She receives, in thanks, a delighted grin and a montral to the ribs as the child hugs her.

“’m Soka!” the little one introduces.

“She’s one of Skywalker’s,” probably-Jango says. “He showed up with those two a few months ago in the middle of a chaak’la snowstorm.”

“No!” Soka insists, slapping her little hand on the book a few times. “No ‘ssip! Book!”

Jango lets his head fall against the metal wall behind them. “Fine. No gossip.”

Shmi looks at the little girl, and then back at the book. She’s… well, she can read. Mostly. She can read better than most slaves her age, but this is Basic, not Huttese.

She cracks it open to the first page, finds herself relieved that it really is a children’s story with small words and big letters, and starts reading it out loud. She goes slow. The story is about an eopie trying to find its way home after getting lost, asking other farm animals for help. There are plenty of pictures, and sometimes Soka pats at the book and shouts the name of an animal. It’s very cute, overall.

About two-thirds of the way through, she stumbles. It’s a word she hasn’t seen before, long and with repeating letters that she can’t quite figure out how to say. She pauses, long enough that she’s sure little Soka is confused about why she’s stopped.

“Happabore,” Jango mutters.

Shmi lifts her head, but he’s not looking at her. She looks down at the book again, mouths the letters to herself, and thinks that yes, that probably fits. She keeps reading aloud, letting little Soka tell her about her favorite animals, and when she finishes and looks up, it’s to find Anakin standing across from them.

He’s leaning against a doorframe, bottle-feeding the baby named Ben, and watching them with an expression Shmi thinks might be ‘wistful.’

“Skyguy!” Little Soka cheers, sliding off the bench so she can toddle over to the man as fast as her little legs can carry her. “Skyguy, gots a fweind!”

He smiles indulgently and lets her hug his leg. “I can see that, Snips. You guys have fun?”

“Uh-huh!” the little one tells him. She raises her hands at him. “Up!”

“Sorry, hun, no can do,” Anakin apologizes. “I’m feeding Ben, and I need both hands for that.”

She pouts, and he jerks his chin at Shmi and Jango. “Go back to the bench and you can help me feed him, okay?”

Soka races back.

“Fett, go get the ship powered up,” Anakin says as he ambles over, voice the kind of casually commanding that gives Shmi goosebumps. It’s not familiar, not the way an owner is, but it’s… it’s a voice that’s very used to having authority. “I want us out of here as soon as possible.”

“You’re not the boss of me.”

“I am the commanding officer according to Jaster,” Anakin says, and Shmi watches him raise an eyebrow. “I know it’s not much of a mission, but I am in charge until we’re back on Concord Dawn. You want me to tell him you’re playing at insubordination?”

Jango makes a face, sticking out his tongue. Anakin waits.

Jango goes to start the ship.

“Teenagers,” Anakin mutters, shaking his head. “I want to say I was never that bad, but I’d be lying.”

Soka giggles, bouncing in her seat as Anakin carefully lowers himself down next to her. “Okay, okay, settle down. He’s cranky, kiddo.”

“Wanna help,” Soka stresses, reaching for the bottle. Anakin shifts away from her, keeping it out of her reach. “Skyguy!”

“Slow down, Snips,” he chides. “Climb on my lap and we can hold him together, okay?”

Shmi fiddles with her japor snippet, but she can’t help her fascination with the dynamic presented. Anakin obviously isn’t related to Soka by blood, but he’s adopted her as his own. They haven’t said as much, but it’s obvious. He can’t stop smiling as he talks the girl through holding the bottle for her baby brother, even though it’s obvious from the outside that he’s the one actually holding it, and her, and the baby.

The ship hums to life around them. Anakin tilts his head, as if listening to something, and then goes back to the baby.

It’s another minute before Anakin says, “Okay, that’s enough. I need to burp him. Go on, scoot.”

Soka grimaces as well as a two-year-old can, and slides off of Anakin’s lap onto the bench. He stands and presses the baby up to his shoulder, patting it on the back. There’s a towel there already, something Shmi hadn’t noticed earlier.

“I’m going to go check on Jango,” he tells them. “Shmi, can you get Soka in her seat? I’ll tell you how to buckle her in, but I promised Jango he could fly us back and I want to sit up there to make sure he gets us into hyperspace without, say, exploding.”

It’s only a minute or two to get both of them sat down and buckled in, and Soka spends the entire time until lift-off telling Shmi about how much she likes eopies. This continues well until they end up in hyperspace, the jolt of it making the little one squeal in excitement, even if Shmi feels her stomach drop out. Shortly after, the boys wander back in.

“We’re good for a couple hours,” Anakin says. “Nav computer’s got it until we jump back out. Anyone want a snack?”

“Me!” Soka screeches, bouncing in her seat. “Jan-Jan, snacktime!”

Anakin’s eyebrows climb up towards his hairline. “Well, seems like you’ve got a fan, Fett.”

“Shut up,” Jango grumbles, but he does go over and pick Soka out of her child seat, setting her on his hip and going in the direction of what Shmi assumes is the galley.

“You doin’ okay?” Anakin asks, carefully taking the seat next to her. He sits Ben up on his lap, but the baby has trouble staying in that position. Anakin takes his hands, letting tiny fists curl around his thumbs, to help him stay up.

“It’s a lot,” she says. “But I am happy to be free.”

He grins at her. “Glad to hear it. It’s a lot to adjust to, I know, but… I’m happy to have you with us.”

She nods, eyes on the baby that’s swaying from side to side as Anakin moves his hands, like a very, very small speeder pilot.

“Is he, um, yours?” Shmi asks. “Or did you adopt, like Soka?”

Anakin’s smile, so full of love, drops off. He presses his lips into a thin line, and for a moment, Shmi wonders if she’s made a horrible misstep.

“What… what do you know about Jedi relationships?” Anakin asks, voice quiet.

“Nothing,” she admits, but she’s not ashamed of that. Nobody knows much about the Jedi.

“Okay,” he says, more to himself than to her. “Okay, so… okay. There are a couple ranks in the Order. Younglings go in the crèche, communally raised in groups, and then when they’re five or so, they get to become Initiates. A few years later, usually between ten and fourteen, they can enter an apprenticeship to a Jedi Knight or Master, and the apprentice rank is Padawan. When the apprenticeship is done, they become Knights, basically journeymen, and at some point after that, Masters. There are positions that technically rank higher, councils and heads of divisions, and there’s stuff outside the apprenticeship system, like the service corps, but that’s not super relevant. It’s complicated but we’re only focusing on the apprenticeship path for knights.”

He hesitates, and then continues. “One of the ways to become a Master in the Order is to successfully raise a Padawan to knighthood. I was never an Initiate, because I came to the Order so much later than most. I immediately became a Padawan, and my master was freshly knighted. The relationship between master and padawan is… it’s family. Some of the more orthodox of the Order don’t like to put it in those words, but it really is.

“If I ever talk about my Master, just know I’m not talking about any of the owners I had before I was freed. I’m talking about the man who raised me, the man I saw as a father. He may not have seen me as a son, more a brother, but he was only sixteen years older than me, and… anyway. Jedi lineages are family. Your Master is a parent, or an older sibling, and your Padawan is a child to bring up as your own,” he finishes this off with the kind of deep, heavy breath that she thinks precedes grief. She can’t tell.

“My master is… well, he’s not in a position to teach anyone anything anymore. Ben here is all I have left of him.”

Oh.

Anakin doesn’t look at her, just stares down at the baby that’s gotten cranky again, and rearranges Ben to lie sideways in his arms. He smiles down as the baby burbles up at him, and tickles at the baby’s stomach. Ben grabs at Anakin’s fingers and kicks at the air, laughing in the manner of all children that small.

The man hums, and Shmi is more shocked than she should be to hear one of the lullabies she’s heard in slave quarters all her life.

“He’s your son now,” she says, more firmly than she feels. “He is yours to raise and care for, and I can tell you love him as much as any parent.”

Anakin lifts his head, staring at her like he can’t quite believe she’s there, and tears collect at the edges of his eyes.

“Thank you, Shmi Skywalker,” he says, and she feels like there’s more weight in those words than there should be. He licks his lips, eyes darting away for a second, and then asks, “do you want to hold him?”

She steels herself, and nods.

This is her family now.

Hers.

#Shmi Skywalker #Anakin Skywalker #Obi Wan Kenobi #Ahsoka Tano #Jango Fett #star wars #time travel #de aging #parenting #childcare #baby characters #phoenix posts #Anakin and the Jedi Babies #outside pov

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daisydaisybilly · 3 years

Text

stars in my eyes | part one | n.r

pairing: Natasha Romanoff x Actress!Reader

summary: you meet Natasha at an boring old Stark party... things don't go as planned when Natasha finds out you have a boyfriend.

warning: swearing, angst, mention of smut, mentions of cheating (but not really), fluff and a happy ending i promise

word count: 1.9k (plus 1 Instagram post that fit in with the story)

a/n: this whole idea came to me before sleeping and i knew right away it would be fun to write! I hope you enjoy it! first part cause this is getting bigger than i thought, wanna get some out now to see if this is actually something people like . edited but some mistake will remain

MAIN MASTERLIST | REQUEST OPEN

You still weren’t used to the whole posting every moment for your life online for everyone to see. Most of the time you left it to your agents team and tried to have fun. Now you felt out of your depth, you knew Tony when he was a simple playboy and you were just a background actress, now he was iron man and you were playing main roles.

“Think an actress would be more fun at parties” Tony smirked holding you two drinks.

Rolling your eyes at him you took the drink from his hand, “been on set all day and you want me to be fun”.

“What you playing this time?” Tony asked.

You grinned, “The villain in a fantasy series” you shrugged. “No really impressive with actual superheroes and supervillains in the world”.

He threw his arm over your shoulder, “Well you for sure get paid better than they do”.

You laughed batting him off you. Stopping when you spotted someone cross the room. Natasha Romanoff, since the avengers had become public heroes, you had been harbouring a crush. She was wearing a plum-coloured dress her hair in soft curls down her back.

You were spaced out watching her. Tony had to call your name multiple times before you heard him.

“Huh” you asked snapping back to attention.

He shook his head a smile forming on his lips, “I was asking where Ben was but looks like you have someone else on your mind”.

“Very funny” you fake laughed. “You and I both know my relationship is a fake as those diamond earrings you gave your ex-girlfriend in 2010”.

He put his hand to his heart, “You wound me”.

You rolled your eyes again sipping your drink, “Sue me if I actually see someone I like”.

“I could put a good word in with Romanoff” he winked.

Before you could turn him down, he was dragging you across the room where Natasha stood. “Romanoff have you met my friend? She’s been in a few films but I’ll let you two talk” he waved walking off.

“I’m going to kill you Stark” you hissed after him.

Smiling he turned around briefly, “Join the club”.

Staring after him with your jaw set. He was still the same playboy deep down.

“You were in that retelling of the little mermaid right?” Natasha asked.

You turned back around smiling shocked. “Yeah, I was for like 5 minutes but you might see me on the 11 o’clock news when I kill Tony” you laughed.

She laughed along, “Don’t worry I’ll help you clean up”.

The drinks kept coming even when the party started to die down. Closed off in a corner together you felt relaxed, you don’t know when it happened or who made the move to end up with her legs cross your lap. Absentmindedly you soaked her leg with your hand. going from the top of her knee down to the calves.

“Have you always wanted to be an actress?” She asked you.

You thought about it, “No actually. I wanted to be a doctor when I was younger but my grades weren’t good enough”.

She looked at you with her head tilted, “So why an actress then?”.

“It was 100% by chance, I saw they were looking for someone who could play the piano for a small scene and I thought why not put all those hours of practicing to use”.

“So you got the dream that millions go to Hollywood for?”.

You laughed, “What can I say? It’s all thanks to my great ass”.

She nodded, “I agree you do have a great ass”.

You could remember the last time you had actually enjoy talking to someone, being in the same place as someone. So you did something you didn’t plan on doing, you lent over and kissed her. You felt her hesitate feeling guilty you started to pull away.

She grumbled something then pulled you back. Humming your smiled.

Even with the awkward position you were both in, she still managed to be pinned you down on the sofa. You moved away feeling breathless you looked up to her, “Maybe we should take this somewhere private?” you asked.

She kissed you again lingering, “if you insist” she grinned.

-x-

Your phone buzzing on the floor woke you up, groggily you sat up in bed using the sheet to cover yourself. “Jesus…what’s that sound” Natasha mumbled from your side. You blinked at her clearing your mind.

“My phone” you said softly , slowly you climbed out of the bed and started to look for your phone. When you found it, you sat on the floor and started to type away.

Natasha sat up and watched you, “Whose calling you this early anyway” she yawned.

You didn’t look up, “Just my boyfriend. We have a meeting with my agent later” you only looked up when Natasha made an odd sound. “You, okay?”.

Her mouth was open wide, “you have a boyfriend and you didn’t think to mention it?!” she asked looking confused.

Her attitude did phase you, “I thought everyone knew I was dating film star Benedict Hopper” you laughed rolling your eyes.

Natasha stammered something else looking like she was going into shocked. worried you hurried back over to her. You grab hold of her face, “hey hey, look at me” she did as you asked. “It isn’t real between me and Benny… it’s just a RP thing. I promised”.

She looked at you doubtingly.

“Ask Tony if you don’t believe me!” you said trying to calm her down.

She chewed her bottom lip not looking at you, “if you promise not to mess me around”.

You smiled wide, “If I ever do you can fight me, I might even ask you too” you teased her winking.

She scoffed pushing you away, “You can’t be serious can you” she laughed as she straddle you. You kept your eyes on her as your hands made their way up her bare thighs.

“I can be very serious” you joked, “I’m an actress, I can be anything you want”.

She shook her head lowering herself. “there’s the problem I don’t want you to be anything but you”.

“I think I can manged that” you said softly.

You kissed her again running your hands through her hair, deepening the kiss.

“Jesus” you sighed. “You’re making it really hard to leave”.

She pouted, “You really have to go?”.

You wanted to say no and spend the whole day wrapped up in her. “My agent will kill me” you smiled sadly.

She scoffed laughing, “Well it’s probably a good idea I might need to save the world you now…it’s my job”.

You kissed her cheek before getting up. After fully dressing you lagged by the door, “When you’re done saving the world call me” you winked on your way out.

-x-

You thought about Natasha none stop all that morning. Someone had pulled you out of your daydream multiple times. Benny and Angie, your Agent were less than impress when you weren’t playing attention at the meeting.

“Hungover huh?” Benny asked his English accent strong.

You rubbed your face with both hands, “I am not hungover I just don’t see why we have to be here” you sighed.

Angie rolled her eyes, “I swear you two are exhausting” you and Benny turned to look at her. “We are here to talk about the next steps in your relationship”.

You pulled a face, “Why can’t it stay the same? Think things are going well” you shrugged.

Angie put her face in her hands and grumbled. Lifting her face she sat up straight. “With the DSW awards coming up we need to bring attention to you both” she explain. “Nearly everyone nominated is seeing someone what we need is an announcement”.

You felt uneasy. “What kind of announcement?” you asked.

Benny who had been quiet spoke, “Think she means an engagement, love”.

You went cold all over.

Angie gave you a look of pity, “You knew this was going to be an opinion one day and that’s now” she pulled some papers from her bag spreading them out so you and Benny could see. “It would be exactly like the relationship you have now, no commitments just RP reason”.

You chewed your thumb, “It’s just a lot to take in”.

Benny took your hand and held it in friendly manner. “We could just say yes now and wait to use it, like Angie said it will be good for getting you your first big award”.

It made a little sense and you knew it, you shook your head sighing again. “It feels wrong getting people to vote me just because of who I’m seeing and not because I’m actually good”.

Benny rubbed your knuckles with his thumb, “they’ll vote for you because you amazing. Just think of me as some eye candy”.

You try to smile trying to put on a brave face. “okay” you nodded looking at both Angie and Benny in turn. “Just give me sometime”.

-x-

You were too impatient to wait for Natasha to get in contact, after sitting through a phone call with a smug Tony to get Natasha’s number. You then had to build up the nerve to actually text her, it took a while longer before you come up with something to next altogether.

You nearly dropped your phone when she picked up.

You listened to the noise from the other end of the phone, waiting for Natasha to speak.

“Hello?” she asked, you could tell she was slightly out of breath.

“Yeah...Hi” you said a little too loud, “In my own world sorry”.

“It’s all good” she said. You felt your heart soften knowing she was smiling.

You swallowed. “I had to go through Tony to get your number” you laughed.

You heard he take a sharp inhale, “He came walking in the kitchen this afternoon all proud of himself like a damn matchmaker” she started off laughing it fell flat at the end.

This would be the perfect time to tell her you could be engaged soon, that you were completely against it and she was the reason. But just because you had like her from a distance for so long didn’t mean she did too.

Instead you pushed your worry away, “He’s the same old playboy he’s always been. Only difference is now he has a fancy suit”.

She gave you a light laughed, her breathing was finally level. “Truer words were never spoken”.

An idea rose up and before you could think any better you said it, “How would you feel about joining me on set tomorrow?”.

The line went silence the idea had caught her off guard, this is what you were afraid of, wanting to much too fast, you were going to scare her away.

“You know what forget it, it was a dumb idea” you tried to push the idea away and move on from the strange hard feeling in your chest.

“No” she cut through, “I just thought you wouldn’t want to be seen in public”.

“Why would you-“ you said frowning.

“Like you said forget it” she said her voice was light again. “Send me the info and I’ll see you there. Well that’s if I’m not busy saving the world” she joked.

You sighed dramatic over the top playing along, “You know I’m getting very jealous of this world”.

“Just how I like it” she said sounding like herself again.

part two

#natasha romanoff fanfiction #natasha romanoff x you #natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanaoff x yn #nat x you #natasha x you #natasha romanoff fanfic #natasha x reader #natasha romonova masterlist #natasha romanoff #natasha x y/n #natasha romanoff imagine #natasha romonova x reader #marvel imagine #marvel fanfiction #marvel fanfic #marvel social media au

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ofnifflersandkings · 3 years

Text

Endgame Strategy

Character: Benny Watts

A/n: I said I’d write for the hot chess people so I did. The timeline for this is kinda confusing but the desperation I had to write this made me simply not care.

•

“(Y/n)!”

A familiar voice pulled you from your current task of getting Benny’s two ton apartment door shut. You barely got yourself inside before a pair of arms promptly wrapped around you.

You staggered backwards by the sudden weight, a noise between a wheeze and a laugh escaping you as you registered who it was.

“If it isn’t my favorite drama queen!” You pulled back to get a good luck at Beth, a big grin busting out on both of your faces.

“Come in,” She ushered you in, helping you take off your coat and asking you little questions as she lead you over to the sink.

You were a pretty established photographer for some big fashion companies, so you had been traveling with Cleo around Europe for the better half of a year. You’d telephoned Benny as soon as all of your campaigns wrapped up and he instantly insisted you come to New York to make up for lost time.

You had just started to get a word in when you felt someone come up behind you and squeeze you abruptly, practically toppling you over. “Look what the cat dragged in!”

You looked over to see Benny already looking down at you with a grin before promptly ruffling up your hair. “Hey stranger,” He grinned. You pushed him off and turned to give him a proper hug.

You noticed Arthur and Hilton lingering behind him and you pulled yourself from his hold to greet them as well.

“You came at the perfect time,” Benny said, slinging an arm over your shoulder. “We were just about to start.”

“What do you say, (Y/n)?” Hilton asked. “Finally gonna indulge us and play a game?”

You shoved his hands off of you and sent him a smile. “You don’t need some newbie slowing down your thunder,” You noticed Benny giving you the pleading look he always sent your way when you turned down playing chess. You swear you thought he knew how to deflate his eyes on purpose so he looked like a kicked puppy. “No, I don’t need your patronizing when I barely make it past five moves.”

Benny was an old childhood friend of yours, so you had known Arthur and Hilton for almost as long as he had. And they made it their personal life mission to rope into playing against one of them. But you were renowned for your patience and they’d yet to wear you down.

Beth sent a small pout your way and handed you a glass of water. “Oh please, now who’s the drama queen. You were doing great when I was teaching you last time we saw each other.”

Benny’s gaze shot up. “What?”

You scoffed at her, completely forget about your last encounter. “Now that’s not fair, we were hardly playing. You had to show me where to move every five minutes.”

“When did you see each other?” Benny pushed.

You sighed, smoothing down your sweater. “When I was in Paris with Cleo, we only saw each other the one night and I was just bored and tipsy enough to let her show me.”

She grinned at you, shoving her arm into you as she leant into your side. “I think you have lots of potential. I could make a grandmaster out of you, I know it.”

Benny’s eyes followed you as you moved from your standing position to sit next to him on the sofa.

“You never let me teach you how to play,” He murmured to you with a huff, causing a small tuft of his hair to fly upwards.

Benny had made several attempts to get you into the game he loved so dearly. And as one of the few constant people in his life he wanted you to be part of his world. But each time was met with a firm refusal on your part, insisting you wouldn’t get it. He’d try to pull every trick in the book, every charming smile and all the pretty words he knew to try and convince you to let him show you, but you were always indifferent to his charisma.

It annoyed the shit out of him.

Truth was you didn’t want to risk embarrassing yourself in front of him. You’d seen him play at almost every match he was ever in and it was almost scary how good he was. You could play a casual game and maybe boast a win or two, but playing against him wasn’t something you think you’ll ever do. Besides, give him the satisfaction of having your inevitable defeat over your head? Not in this lifetime.

You let out a light laugh, smiling at Beth as she moved to grab the other boards from Benny’s alarming collection he kept stuffed in the closet. “You’re too intimidating when you play, I’d be distracted.”

Benny rolled his eyes, thinking of the stern look that permanently sets on Beth’s face. The woman who looks like she’s three seconds away from going for your neck during her games but he was too intimidating.

You took a sip from your glass of water and lightly knocking over one of the knight pieces on the board in front of you. “I don’t see why it matters, I’ll be beat regardless of who’s playing.”

He frowned, he’d always wanted to play you. Not because he cared about winning but he just wanted you to see his skill firsthand. You didn’t bat an eyelash at winnings anymore, and you never stuck around for his in-depth lectures about game theory with the other players. But he also knew you liked knowing the way things worked. And since chess was his bailiwick, Beth being the only other American player who could beat him, he knew you’d be impressed. At first he just thought you weren’t interested, so knowing you were being taught by someone else stung twice-over.

You knew something was wrong when he didn’t send a clever remark back your way. Benny liked to think he was this cool and collected character, but really he could be quite the prima donna. Knowing him for as long as you did made him an open book, you could almost always know what he was thinking.

“Don’t be such a baby, Bens.” You grinned, leaning over to tap the end of his nose, something you always did to irritate him. “She crushed me anyways.”

“You’d win if you let me teach you.” He argued, looking at you pointedly.

“I don’t need to win, that’s your job,” You leaned into him, trying to stroke his ego to get him to drop the subject.

Benny’s ears perked up and he was about to go into of his grand self-assured lectures when Beth interrupted him, promptly placing the boxes of chess boards on the table in front of him.

“I dunno, (Y/n),” Beth gloated, passing a box to Hilton. “I think he’s losing his touch, last time we played I damn near emptied his wallet.”

That got your attention, and you sat up with a laugh. “You’re kidding? In speed chess?” Your cackles only grew when she gave a proud nod. “I can’t believe I missed it!”

Benny scoffed, pushing away from you to help set up the boards. “You hardly missed anything-“

“She kicked his ass, ,” Arthur chuckled, loosening the cap on his beer bottle. “Said she’d kick him the crotch too when he tried to argue with her.”

You raised your glass to Beth in commencement. “I knew there was a reason I liked you so much.”

“Another simultaneous?” Beth asked, noticing they were moving the boards onto the floor, she turned back to you. “Have you ever seen once of these?”

You shook your head dramatically, moving from your place on the sofa to the floor so you could sit right next to the action. “Nope! I mean I know what they are, but I’ve never actually seen one.”

She smirked, placing the clock at every board while the boys situated the pieces. “Well, you’re in for a treat, these are my specialty.”

You leaned forward, placing your elbows on your knees so could you watch every move. The speed of the game was something you had long gotten used to, but it never was any less impressive. You don’t know how anyone’s brain could go that fast, but watching the pieces fly around the board completely fascinated you.

Beth really was everything the chess magazines said she was and maybe even more amazing in person. You found it hard to pull your gaze away from her hand, watching as she completely tore through the three boys pieces. Hilton and Arthur were the first to lose, knocking over there kings.

You got ready to settle in while she took on Benny, but not even a few moments later you watched him grimace and reluctantly fish his wallet from his pockets.

“Wow,” You breathed out, looking over at Beth with a gaze that could only be described as positively starstruck. “I mean I knew you were good, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like that.”

Beth felt her face get a little warm, not used to such straight-forward praise. At least not since she was a child prodigy. She reached her hand up to brush her hair out of her eyes, and pulled her gaze away from you.

“I can do it again.”

Benny felt his eyebrow twitch, he was used to your praise being directed at him for the most part. You had grown up with him constantly talking about and challenging others to play chess. And when he started to make a name for himself he’d taken you along with him. Before your work took off, you had more time to see his games in person. But, even when you couldn’t physically be there, you always called when you saw the results in Chess Review or tuned in to one of the broadcasted matches.

He was the best in the States for a long time, so you had become especially hard to impress. He knew Beth was better him than by miles, but to finally have his title of best chess player you knew taken away made him feel scratchy.

But he scoffed, straightening his back to try and get his focus back. “Not if I have anything to say about it, Harmon.”

And so for about three more games, she absolutely crushed the three boys. You got closer to the boards each time, admiring Beth’s superhuman skill. It made you feel a little sting of pride, the girl was showing up three of most arrogant and skilled players you knew.

“God,” You leaned back onto your elbows, sniffling a giggle when. “I would’ve given any amount of money to be here to see the faces on these boys when you did this the first time.”

Beth smirked, rounding up the pieces to put them away in their cases. “Me too, we could’ve gotten it all on camera.”

You groaned. “Such a missed opportunity.”

You lolled your head over and saw Benny staring intently at the board, a deep frown on his face. You smiled, scooting over so you could lean all your weight against him. “Don’t look so sad, Bens. I’m sure you would’ve gotten her eventually.”

He laughed, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “That’s what you used to tell all the sorry losers I used to beat.”

You closed your eyes, settling into his side and sighing at his warmth. “You’re not a sorry loser. You’re the best chess player I know.”

“Still?”

“Hey now, I didn’t drag my ass to every one of your matches for decades for you to question my loyalty,” You teased, you opened your eyes and saw something on his wall. Nestled snug inside a frame was the first time he was on the cover of Chess Review.

“You remember when I took that?” You nodded towards it.

Benny smiled properly, his eyes getting a familiar shimmer. “Yes ma’am, I told them I wouldn’t be on the cover unless you got to take my photos,” He wrapped an arm around you. “Course if I had known it’d make you a hot shot photographer who had to go away all the time I might’ve kept my mouth shut.”

You smiled, reaching up to flick his forehead. “I’ve taken all your photos for decades” You made a sweeping notion with your hands to all the various magazines scattered around his apartment. “Even when we were kids, I think I earned my little adventures abroad”

Benny gave you a look, one you couldn’t quite place, but he kept your gaze for awhile. A small smile snuck up in the corner of his mouth before he looked down, strawberry blonde strands hiding him from your view.

“Well don’t stay away so long next time, yeah? I missed you.”

#the way this has bi disaster just written all over it #benny watts imagine #benny watts x reader #benny watts imagines #the queen’s gambit #the queen’s gambit imagine #queen’s gambit imagine

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fandom-blackhole · 3 years

Text

I'll See You in my Dreams- Soulmate AU

AN: First off, sorry I didn't have this up earlier, I went through so tough writer's block that is kicking my ass and my school year has begun so I had to focus on that for a bit. Second, I wanted to say, the next thing I write is probably going to be the next part for Merman!Din because I hit 100 kudos on the fic over on Ao3. Third, starting probably towards the end of this week, maybe Thursday or Friday, I am going to start character takeovers. I will make a post about who it will be and how long it will be around during the morning and reblog it throughout the day along with any disclaimers/rules. I am thinking this is something I can do during the weekends when I don't have classes and Im not writing. Love you all and I hope you enjoy this fic!

Masterlist

Pairing: Paz Vizsla x Reader

Words: 1K (sorry its short....)

Summary: What if you, someone from Earth, miraculously were soulmates to someone in a galaxy far, far away?

Warnings: descriptions of pains, sadness, yearning, soft love confessions and promises, unedited bc I am tired and just wanted to post this

The dreams, oh, the dreams….

They come and they never stop, always leaving wondering and wanting, aching.

You do not understand them, what they meant, if anything other than a manifestation of desires, but when he appears you feel like you are in another world, another galaxy all your own, made for you and him alone. He tells you you are his one, his only, and your heart soars with every small touch and smile. His whisper of your name, and promises sworn in a language so foreign, yet familiar after years of their whispered softness, cause you to feel like you're floating, like you are where you are meant to be, in this loving man's arms.

Only...each day as you wake, you come crashing down into the same disappointing reality, reminding yourself that he is not there, and he is only a cruel trick your mind plays upon you heart and soul each night, laughing as you wake to the same cold loneliness of day, ripped from the warmth of his arms that hold you each night. It had been like this since you could remember, even as you were a child he would appear in your dreams and ask if you wanted to play with him. He told you stories that his family, his culture taught him, the things that were even at that age obviously very important to him.nYou parents would praise you for your creativity when you repeated the stories to them. They never understood.

Your parents didn't understand why you never let go of this imaginary figure in your dreams. They couldn't comprehend why even after you grew away from the imaginary friend stage you still talked about the boy that simply did not exist to them.

The older you got, the more you realized that you wanted no one else but him. No one else could make you smile or laugh the way he could. No one else made you feel safe the way he did. No one could come close to making you feel cherished or content the way he did. No one could touch just how loved you felt each night when he gave you that shining smile, followed by an endearment in his sacred language- he had attempted to teach you a few basics at one point, but he only kept chuckling and teasing you softly as you tripped over the words he said so effortlessly.

It wasn’t until you were graduating high school and looking into colleges when it dawned on you how much you loved the man in your dreams. How you would never be happy with another, not knowing he was there, even if he was not real. You would never find anyone better than the boy you had watched grow into a man, than the person who listened to you talk endlessly about your life, the one you told all your secrets to never holding any information back because you knew he would never judge you. But this, this realization you kept to yourself, not wanting to share and find heartbreak from the one person you knew you would never be able to recover from.

So you pulled back slowly, never fully distancing yourself how could you, but you tried to never come too close, fearing the pain that would follow if you did. And you hated every second of it.

As you progressed through college, you both lamented your stresses to the other seeking comfort in just venting or just listening to the other’s voice. You were busy with school, stressing over finals and papers, while he was worried about his people, his covert who he was now lead and teach, he worried about the future generations as his people’s numbers kept diminishing.

Life and stresses seemed to take over and pass in rhythms. Soon you both found yourselves in a comfortable dance, but one that had each side aching for more but unable to ask for it.

By the time you graduated from school, on track already to work your dream job, you found yourself suddenly feeling hollow. A feeling that started showing up in dreams, a feeling that was only suppressed when you brushed against his hand, or he reached out and hugged you before you both woke. But it did not take long for the feeling to spread into your waking hours. Life became numb at best, painful at most. The feeling only getting worse as you were with him. Some nights it felt like your entire body was screaming for the man you could not have.

But it changed one night suddenly. You had not even got to say hello or hi to him before he pulled you into his embrace, whispering words of defeat, whispering how he could no longer hold back, being apart from you for so long hurt him. He said that his very soul was hurting and he just needed to hold you for the night. And you caved. You caved and held him as tightly as he held you, hot tears slipping down your cheeks as you hiccupped the words you never wanted to tell him. You stuttered through devotions and dozens and dozens of ‘i love yous’, and you were overjoyed, bursting at the seams when he returned each with his own love confession, with his own devotions for you. And you only cried harder, finding yourself slowly being soothed by his rumbling voice in his chest and his calm words.

You both stayed like that. The night ticking by but moving slower than normal, or it could just be the quiet nothing of the world as you held tight to each other. Maybe it was just wishful thinking, hopes to freeze in time and never wake again if it meant staying here wrapped in the other’s soft love and body.

But….like each night come to pass, you found yourself being lulled and pulled away from the man you loved so forcefully. He could feel it too, you knew he could by the way his arms tightened, and as his final words were whispered into your ear before you were ripped apart.

“Mesh’la, my fierce love, I swear on the name of my ancestors, that I, Paz Viszla, will find away to reach you in daylight. I will come for you, cyare, I promise with all my being I will come to you.”

700 Fic Taglist: @shellyc9 @ben-is-a-hoe @mrs-ghuleh @moodsare @mysticalgalaxysalad @eri16 @elinedjarin @reverielibrary @bunny-fair @justnat15 @ollovaemisc @indycaelumskywalker @just-someone11 @peach-child @remmyswritings @gotham-city-uber-driver @mindidjarin @kirinpl @katie-sheep-111 @lovecatsnotpeople @3braincells @bunny-fair @phoenixhalliwell @skellylady @kikiinden @lothiriel9 @misguidedandbeguiled

Permanent Tags: @mysticalgalaxysalad @phoenixhalliwell @moodsare @perpetual-fangirl900 @night-snows00 @dumbass-simp-for-fredweasley @stargazingthenightaway @meabravo @just-here-for-the-moment

Paz Tags: @bunny-fair @elinedjarin @shellyc9 @blackmarketmummy @djarin-junk

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#700 followers fic #700 followers #soulmate au #paz vizsla x reader #paz x reader

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oh-for-fic-sake · 3 years

Text

Fearfull Proposal

Summary: henry plans a romantic proposal... and instead of coming clean about your secret fear of heights and ruining his romantic plan, you put on a brave face... well until your nearing the top of the london eye.

Warnings: fear, fluff, swearing, typos.

You quivered as you rose higher and higher over londons skyline.

Fuck why? Why the fuck had you got in this dangling glass death trap. A faulty few bolts and you'd be plummeting into the fucking thames!

Henry was standing by the window looking out at the glittering lights in awe.

You were standing with your back turned to the houses of Parliament hands clutching the rail eitherside of you knuckles white. Knees knocking.

God this was the stupidest thing you'd ever fucking done! And it was your own fault.

"Babe, look! God big ben looks soo small never been on this at night"

You hummed nodding but continued looking to the floor.

Henry paused when you didnt correct him with the whole 'big ben is the bell' you usually countered

He turned looking back to you and his stomach dropped.

"Babe? Whoa are you okay there love?" He asked frowning as he saw your eyes clenched shut almost as if you were in pain.

You were trembling and pale to the point he fearded youd pass out.

"Here come sit down and relax, i packed some snacks-" he said placing the specially packed bag of snacks and screw top mini wine bottles.

"No! No I'm fine... I will just stay here... By the saftey bar" you said giggling nervously sparing him a glance and patting the metal you were holding onto for dear life..

Henry faltered and really took in your apperance unsure what to do. It wasn't like he could get you off, you had to ride the ride.

"Babe? Are you scared of heights?"

"Nooo dont be sillyeee- OH MY GOD IM GONNA FUCKING DIE!" you began laughing him off then screamed as the ride stopped.

Instantly you ducked crouching whilst wrapping your arms around the silver bar shouting bloody murder.

It didn't help you were bathed in purple light so couldn't see shit.

Henry got up and rushed to you standing over you arms rounding you holding you securly.

"No, no its fine love... shh its fine baby, they said it could stop to let people on poppet remember?" He said quickly rubbing your sides as you cowered trying to fend off the temptation to look at the thames below.

"Y-yeah fuck hen- im sorry i just..." you mewled turning towards him tucking your head to his chest.

"Scared of heights huh? Why didnt you tell me?" He sighed pressing kisses to your head as you whimpered adn the ride began moving once again.

"Because you went to all this trouble, you planned this surprise and i didnt want to ruin it, you were soo excited" you sniffled blinking at him.

"Hey shh you silly girl, you should have told me. You wouldnt have ruined anything you silly sausage" he cooed winding himself around you tighter.

He was actually annoyed at himself, how the fuck had he not known his girlfriend of a year and a half was scared of heights?

He'd suspected a fear of heights when you both went on holiday for your birthday, but youd managed to convince him it was a fear of flying and planes... not heights.

And come to think of it you didnt even like the glass lifts in shopping centers, you ran to the corner and held on eyes locked onto the doors the entire time.

So this was the worst surprize he could of planned for tonight. Things weren't going to plan. Fuck.

"Babe im sorry" he apologised feeling like an asshole.

"No no dont be, this was extremly sweet bear" you said quickly not wantin to make him feel bad fpr your own short commings.

"Theres noting sweet about terrifying you"

"Do... do you want to sit down? Ill hold you the entire time" he offered peaking to the central bench where both your bags sat.

"I.. yes okay i think sitting will be better" you said then yipped as he prompty scooped you up and placed you in his lap securly.

"Im so sorry love, I just wanted to make this special and romantic" he muttered holding you as close as he could letting you know that you were safe and sound.

"It is! It is love really im just a baby" you said quickly grasping his face pulling him closer before peppering his face with kisses.

"Your not a babe we all have our fears" he said quietly pressing his forehead to yours.

"You dont" you sighed closing your eyes trying to ignore the snails pace of the pod that still rose over london.

You could barely feel it, but your fear amplified it.

"Oh but i do~" he replied peering at you, as yur eyes fluttered open.

"Like what?" The questionnescaped before you could think.

"No" he said eyes now becoming worried, anxiety clouding them.

"No?"

"Yes, at the moment thats my biggest fear" he said releasing a shakey breath as you frowned at him not following but didnt dwell as your ees darted to the side seeing the houses

"You see, i was trying to be all romantic and wait untill we got tp the top, but i think you'll be too terrified"

"Henry?" You said leaning back unsure about the serious tone he seemed to take.

"I brought us here, to the spot we met two years ago today..." he said drawing deeper breaths as the reality of what was about to happen hit him.

"Was it really?" You asked surprized he'd remember something like that. Anniversary? Definitely. But the day you first met? And asked for a selfie with a series of embarrassing squeaks? No you didnt think he'd remember.

"Yep. I remember doing a promo and shoot on this thing, then got off and was sat next to you in wagamama"

"And i squeaked for a selfie" you groaned with a small giggle.

"Im glad you did, i scanned instagram for days after- scouring my hashtag trying to find you... i kicked myself for not getting your number~"

"I still cant belive you did that... but im gld you did henry"

"Who'd have thought the nervous little thing trying not to even breath in my direction would be my girlfriend six months down the line"

"Or that we'd last this long?" You quipped at him trying to reme,ber to breath.

"And.. hopefully a lifetime? Despite me dragging you intoyour actual living nightmare- which i promise to never do again! Not even lifts"

You scowled and tilted your head to him not sure if you heard him correctly.

Untill he pulled the small velvet box from his pocket.

"Henry?! What? You cant be serious?"

"Oh but i am love, as much as i want to do this right and drop to one knee i doubt you'll thank me for releasing you?"

"Dont you dare let me go!"

"I think you'll find im trying to do the opposite~" he chuckled opening the box revealing the simple elegant ring three tiny diamonds.

"Im trying to marry you..."

You gasped eyes glazing over as you locked on to the dainty ring pinched between his fingers.

"I love you y/n, and i want to know if you'd become my wife and share your life with me. Will you marry me?"

"Oh god yes of course its a yes henry i love you bear!" You cried throwing your arms around him making him grunt and quickly clench his fist arohnd the ring before he dropped it.

He groaned into you rocking from side to side littering your head with kisses before peeling you away to sit the ring on your finger.

You looked at the glittering stones on your finger weeping. You may have been cursing yourself for getting into this godforsaken glass bauble in the sky.

But now you were he happiest woman alive.

"I love you bear"

"I love you too"

"Would you like some wine? I brough the little cute bottles you like" he offered nodding to the bag of snacks.

"Err lets not push it hun" you whined not sure wine at this altitude was a good idea.

You kept glancing at him still sniffing and giggleing unable to look from your ring for long.

"Gotcha, no wine"

"You look surprized i said yes?"you quipped needing to talk and take your mind off the fact your at the tippity top.

"I made you face one of your nightmares i thought you'd slap me silly when i ask" he scoffed pressing a kiss to your cheek unable to stop.

"Never love... but please never ever get on this thing again okay?" You pleaded fluttering your lashes at him pleading.

"I swear. Never again, but seeing as this is our one and only ride we should take a few selfies? Mark the occasion?" He said standing letting your feet hit the floor but never once did he let go.

"Absolutly, gotta show off my new fiancé" you hummed rising to share another kiss with him not really paying attention to the height you'd now reached, you had more important things to think about. Like sharing the rest of your life with this glorious man.

"My thoughts exactly" he grinned pulling out his phone aiming it at the two of you, makeing sure to have the hand that rested on his chest donning his ring in shot.

#henry cavill #henry cavill imagine #oh for fic sake headcannon #henry cavill x reader #henry cavill x you #henry cavill x y/n

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heytherejulietx · 3 years

Text

fever - reddie

read here on ao3

↳ requested by anon.

↳ content warnings - mentions of throwing up, being ill, swearing.

↳ 2.4k word count

↳ masterlists

@bucky-j-barnes join my tag list

richie leaned his head back against the headboard of his bed with a loud yawn, though he willed himself not to let his eyes close. he took a glance over at the digital clock on his bedside table and groaned quietly when seeing that it was almost three in the morning. himself and eddie had been up all night, trying to monitor their daughter who was ill. she hadn’t been too bad during the day - she had a stuffy nose and complained about being too cold, but overall she was okay. though since she had gone to bed she’d been up to the bathroom at least ten times, and as eddie was worrying more (although she insisted she was fine, a trait eddie insisted she got from richie) they had decided to just stay up until they knew she was asleep.

maggie (they had named her after richie’s mom, who had cried and refused to let eddie and richie go for at least five minutes when they had told her) had gotten up again around five minutes ago, and had been in the bathroom for that time. eddie was downstairs at the time, making himself and richie some coffee to try and stay awake. though richie was sat silently up in bed, listening for any sign that maggie needed him in there. he’d been trying to give her some space all night as she insisted that she was fine, but he was still worried. she usually slept through the night with no issues.

he could hear eddie cluttering around in the kitchen downstairs as the bedroom door was open, and continued to force his eyes open. soon enough he’d have caffeine in his system, he just had to hold on until then. richie was exhausted from work, and wanted nothing more than to bury underneath the sheets with his arm around eddie, but maggie was his top priority. he’d do anything for his little girl (though she was not so little anymore at fifteen years old) even if that included sacrificing his precious sleep.

though forcing his eyes open soon was the last of his worries, because after a few minutes he could hear a weak “dad?” from the bathroom before he could hear retching down the hallway, and richie couldn’t remember the last time he’d gotten up so quickly. his back protested with a click as he ran out of his and eddie’s bedroom though he ignored it, pushing the bathroom door open to crouch on the floor beside maggie.

she was leaning over the toilet bowl as she threw up and richie sighed softly. he gathered her hair up in one hand in a makeshift ponytail, and used his free hand to rub her back gently. her knuckles were white with how hard she gripped the edge of the toilet and he frowned. ever since she was a little kid she detested being sick.

“it’s okay sweetie, you’re okay.” he mumbled as he continued running his hand over her back, growing even more concerned when he noticed her shirt was damp with sweat. fuck. did she have a fever?

“eddie!” he leaned his head back to shout out of the doorway, as eddie hadn’t heard the commotion upstairs.

by the time eddie had joined them in the bathroom maggie had leaned away from the toilet with a groan, falling back against richie as she closed her eyes. her face was flushed red and sweaty, and when richie had covered her forehead with his palm she felt too warm.

“she’s really hot.” richie told eddie worriedly, looking up at his husband as he moved to crouch on maggie’s other side, checking her temperature himself.

“i think she’s got a fever,” eddie frowned, as he moved his hand from her forehead to gently rub her shoulder for a moment instead. “go get her in our room, i’m gonna grab her some water.” he squeezed richie’s shoulder for a moment before eddie stood up again, and after a moment richie could hear the stairs creaking under his weight as he went back downstairs.

maggie groaned quietly as richie went to move and she grabbed onto his shirt. “can’t we just stay here? i don’t wanna move.” she complained quietly, and richie chuckled as he shook his head.

“sorry kiddo, doctor’s orders,” he joked, glad to see the brief smile that flashed onto her face. “c’mon, you’ll be much comfier in our room.”

seeing as she didn’t move (he doubted she had too much energy in her) he hooked an arm underneath her knees and kept his other one underneath her back as he stood with a quiet groan, his back protesting again underneath the extra weight. she continued to grip onto his shirt as he carried her out of the bathroom, and carefully sat her down where he’d previously been five minutes ago on his side of the bed.

“i’ll be back in a second, okay?” he tucked the covers up to her waist before he dropped his head down to press a kiss to her forehead.

richie waited until she had nodded before he gently squeezed her shoulder and left the bedroom to go and quickly clean up the bathroom; flushing the toilet before he sprayed it and the floor with the antibacterial spray that eddie kept in there at all times.

by the time he had finished and gotten back into the bedroom eddie was perched on the edge of the bed beside her, and he passed her a glass of water off of a tray he had brought up.

richie moved to sit on the bed behind eddie, leaning over his shoulder to get closer to maggie with his arm around eddie. “don’t worry, chap, doctor k is gonna take good care of you and you’ll be tip-top shape in no time, good fellow.”

“stop doing the fuckin’ british guy.” eddie mumbled as he picked up a digital thermometer from the tray, though maggie giggled quietly at the stupid impression which made richie (and eddie, he could see from the corner of his eye) smile in relief. at least she could still be in a somewhat good mood despite being sick.

“sorry, doctor k, my father’s just trying to be jolly and supportive.” maggie piped in with her own british accent and richie snorted, giving her a high-five over eddie’s shoulder.

“you two are menaces.” eddie complained jokingly as he turned on the thermometer and gently turned maggie’s head to place the end of it in her ear, his free hand gently stroking through her hair to comfort her the best he could. maggie pulled a face as it was held in her ear for a moment, before it beeped and eddie pulled it away. richie leaned over eddie’s shoulder to see the results, and grimaced when he read 102°F.

“is it bad?” richie looked up as maggie spoke and frowned at the look on her face. he knew how much she hated being sick, and he just wanted her to feel better.

“just a little high, honey,” eddie gently rubbed her arm as he put the thermometer back on the tray. “it’ll go back down in no time,” maggie seemed a little relieved at that, and smiled slightly. “do you want something to eat?”

maggie shook her head as she pulled a face, though despite her answer eddie got up anyways and headed back downstairs, to get her something richie assumed.

richie scooted forwards to be where eddie was as maggie leaned back against the headboard and he gently took her hand, rubbing circles onto her knuckles with his thumb. she took another sip of her water before richie took it from her to put back on the tray, and when he looked back at her she was shivering slightly, despite her temperature reading. richie didn’t know if he could give her anything else to warm her up because of her fever and without eddie there in that moment to ask, he got her to shuffle up in the bed slightly before richie got in beside her and hooked his arm around her shoulders to hold her close to herself. he could feel her shivering against him as she leaned into his side, but he could feel her physically relax against him which made him a little relieved. her head was against his shoulder as she gently held onto him, and richie hoped she could get some sleep soon.

“dad?” she asked softly and richie hummed as he glanced down at her. “can we still go to aunt bev’s and uncle ben’s tomorrow?”

richie internally cursed at the question. bev and ben lived the closest to them out of all of the losers, so they often had dinners together. they were supposed to go over theirs the day after, though with the state maggie was in there was no way they could now. and even if richie wanted to, eddie wouldn’t let her step foot out of the door.

“i don’t know, sweetheart,” richie gently rubbed her arm, though sighed softly when he saw her frown. she was very close to bev, and loved being able to see her aunt all the time. “we’ll see if they can come here instead, okay? but only if you’re feeling up to it. your pa would have a fit if you were up doing something you can’t.” he told her and she nodded, satisfied with his answer.

eddie walked back into the room and held a plate in one hand and a bowl in the other. he placed the bowl down on the tray - which richie could see had ice water and two washcloths in - before he set the plate down in maggie’s lap, who frowned when she saw the toast sat in front of her.

“pa,” she whined quietly. since maggie was a toddler she had known that she had to refer to richie and eddie with different names, otherwise both of them came running when she called “daddy”. so she settled with calling richie “dad” and eddie “pa”, which all of them were happy with. “i feel too sick.”

“just eat what you can.” eddie gently touched her arm again, before he left the room for another moment. when he came back into the bedroom he carried a bucket and set it beside the bed. richie assumed it was for if she was going to be sick again so she didn’t have to get up.

maggie’s head lulled against richie’s shoulder again as she continued holding onto him, and richie kept up the gentle motion of moving his hand up and down her arm. she still felt too warm despite her shivering.

eddie picked the bowl up from the tray and perched on the edge of the bed. he took the washcloth out and rung it out so it wasn’t dripping before he leaned over to lay one across her forehead. maggie scrunched up her face at the coldness but didn’t complain that time.

“rich can you put one behind her neck?” eddie handed one to him as he nodded and carefully lifted her head enough to lay the cloth behind her neck before he settled her back against his shoulder once more. richie noticed her shivering get a little worse and frowned as he looked back at eddie.

“is she meant to be shaking?” he asked as he tucked the covers tighter around her and eddie nodded.

“yeah, it’s ‘cause of the fever. she’s fine.” eddie reassured him with a hand on his knee before he put the bowl down and moved to get in the bed on her other side once he had grabbed the controller for the tv that was mounted on the wall opposite the bed.

“hey, eat your food young lady,” richie gently nudged her arm and maggie groaned in complaint but picked up the toast and nibbled at the crust. good enough for him. “i know it’s not as good as if i made it, but pa tries his best.” he snickered at eddie’s glare though maggie smiled slightly at the joke.

eddie loaded netflix and put on the first sitcom that came up that he knew maggie liked. it wasn’t the best show out there, but it made maggie happy, and at that moment it was all that mattered. once the show was playing richie felt eddie’s hand on his arm which had stretched out behind maggie’s head and he smiled as he glanced over at his husband.

maggie had taken two bites of her toast but her head had dropped against richie’s shoulder again, and upon taking a glance at her face he could see that she was fighting to keep her eyes open. she let the toast drop back onto the plate and eddie moved the plate from her lap, which allowed her to curl up more into richie’s side. eddie lifted a hand to stroke through her hair, and that combined with richie’s hand on her arm was enough to let her eyes finally fall closed and she fell asleep.

“she’ll probably be up again soon,” eddie mumbled quietly. “it’s good she's getting sleep when she can.”

“what about us? it’s way past my bedtime too.” richie whispered with a joking pout and eddie scoffed.

“like you didn’t used to throw pillows at me at bill’s sleepovers when i wanted to sleep because i was being a boring dumbass.” eddie smirked slightly and richie rolled his eyes.

“yeah but we were like twelve. i’m old now. i’m practically wasting away into dust.” he sighed dramatically and eddie rolled his eyes, though richie could feel his fingers against his arm as they traced gentle patterns.

richie stretched out the best he could as maggie was curled against him with a quiet groan, before he reached over to pick up the toast that she clearly wasn’t going to eat and took a bite of it himself. his gaze was directed towards the sitcom on the tv though he was more focused on eddie’s fingers gently moving along his arm and the feeling of maggie pressed to his side, gently gripping his shirt in her sleep.

it was going to be a long night, he realised with a sigh, though he’d do it a thousand times if maggie needed them to, and he knew that eddie felt the same way.

#amber’s writing #reddie #reddie fluff #reddie fanfiction #reddie fic #domestic reddie #richie tozier #eddie kaspbrak #richie tozier x eddie kaspbrak #richie x eddie #it chapter 2 #it fanfiction #it fic

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dumdumsun · 3 years

Text

Of Starlight

A/N: Alright, this entire story has officially been written ❤️

Warnings: none that I’m aware of

Word Count: 3067

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Chapter 5: Extra Ordinary

Five years ago, Vanya Hargreeves began writing her autobiography, “Extra Ordinary: My Life as Number Seven”, less than two weeks before her sister’s novel, “One-Sided”, was announced in the papers. Those around who enjoyed her writing were buzzing with excitement, for it was the second book of her trilogy. (Y/N) was thrilled, herself, to be publishing her novel within the next month. Finally sharing her work with the world would have taken a tremendous weight off her shoulders, leaving her with only the weight on her bladder. While working herself nearly to death with her writing, she was with child for the second time, which added to her stress. Thankfully, she had a very supportive husband at the time to assist in anything she requested. It was in those times in which (Y/N) was grateful she decided to make something of herself rather than letting her past as Number Eight define her.

Once “One-Sided” was published, (Y/N) sent two copies out; one to Allison, one to Vanya. She figured her brothers wouldn’t want to read her romantic fantasy as much as her sisters, so she didn’t bother asking. Allison seemed ecstatic for the new addition, but she wasn’t too sure about Vanya, supposing it wouldn’t hurt to send it. If she didn’t want to read it, that was her decision. What she didn’t expect, however, was Vanya’s novel sent to her. After Jada was born, (Y/N) had taken time to read her sister’s autobiography. While Anthony was at work during the day, she’d multitask by reading and taking care of her newborn. She would quietly gasp at certain parts of the book before checking to make sure she hadn’t woken her daughter up. (Y/N) couldn’t believe some of the things her sister dared to put in that book. Some things she wrote were blatantly about (Y/N)’s own insecurities that she had trusted Vanya with knowing. Insecurities about her powers, her capability of being a suitable member of the Umbrella Academy. Vanya had compared it to her own doubts, stating that (Y/N) had no right to complain to her, of all people. Looking back now, (Y/N) could admit that it was a bit selfish to do that to her sister. Regardless, those had been personal and it was unloyal of Vanya to share that with anyone willing to read. Despite this, (Y/N) saw to promote “Extra Ordinary” along with her own work. Someone had to be the bigger person in this situation.

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Nostalgia wasn’t exactly what (Y/N) was overcome with when awaking in her childhood bed. In fact, she’d much rather have opened her eyes to the empty side of her king-sized mattress at home instead. She debated closing her eyes and pretending she had never drifted into consciousness, but sat up when remembering everything Five had told her the day before. If she remembered correctly, there were six remaining days leading up to the end of the world. She had promised Five to assist in preventing the apocalypse, and her drowsiness was not going to hold her back. So, she dragged herself out of bed and began looking for Five. She figured the first place to begin was his bedroom, so she stopped in front of his door and knocked. Hearing rustling on the other side, she asked, “Five, are you decent?”

“Decent enough. You can come in,” He called out, the door opening and (Y/N) stepping inside. He glanced at her over his shoulder as he fixed his white button up. “I take it you had a difficult time sleeping?”

“What makes you say that?” Her hand slid down her face, sarcasm in her tone. She didn’t need a mirror to know she had bags under her eyes. Five chuckled and moved to his vest and jacket, finishing with dressing himself. As he zipped his duffle bag closed, he glanced out the window.

“You tagging along today?”

“I plan to. I… suppose I have nothing to do.”

“Nothing, huh?” Suspicion hid amongst his words as he picked up his bag. “What is it you decided to do with your life, (Y/N)?” The question was simple, genuine, but the weight of it was suffocating. She really couldn’t go back to her normal, beautiful life after all.

“I… found my mother,” She slowly started out, carefully watching as Five curiously glanced up at her under his dark brows. “I became an author… and a mother.”

Suddenly, Five couldn’t breathe. He had anticipated this conversation, prepared himself for everything (Y/N) had accomplished while he was gone. But nothing could have prepared him for the stab in the heart at the mention of her having children. Children with someone who wasn’t him. It was stupidly selfish, he knew, to expect her to wait for him, to do anything else with her life except for the things he longed to do with her. Past the pain, however, he was happy for her. Something in him knew that (Y/N) would one day make a wonderful mother. She was patient, selfless, caring, and oh, how he wished he could’ve been the one. He didn’t even want to ask about the individual she had trusted enough to raise children with her.

His hesitancy to respond worried (Y/N) and suddenly she wanted to apologize. But for what? Her success, her marriage, her children? She had every right to those and she shouldn’t have to apologize. Her concern washed away when Five raised his brows in acknowledgement, opening the window. “Really? A mother? That’s great, Starlight…” God, that nickname… She thought. Why does everything feel so complicated now? Her feet moved her to follow him out of the window and down the fire escape. She thought it was best to not continue the conversation for now.

“Dammit, where’s Dad’s stuff?” The two heard an irritated groan on their way down. (Y/N) craned her neck to see Klaus digging through the dumpster. “Shut up! I’m trying to find whatever… priceless crap was in that priceless box so that Pogo will get off my ass!”

“I’d ask what you’re up to, Klaus, but then it occurred to me…,” Five turned to his brother. “I don’t care.” His useless comment earned an eye roll from (Y/N). Klaus glanced up at the two with a small laugh.

“Hey! You know there are easier ways out of the house, buddy? And bringing little (Y/N) along, too? Whatever could you two be up to?”

“This way of leaving involved the least amount of talking,” Five hopped off the ladder, helping (Y/N) down afterwards. “Or so I thought.”

“Klaus,” The eighth Hargreeves made her way closer to the dumpster. “Is Ben there?”

“Yes, dear, he says hi.” His hand waved in Ben’s supposed direction, (Y/N) softly smiling at her ghost brother. “So, hey, you two need any more company today? I could, uh… clear my schedule.” His eyes shifted to Five as he took a drink from his flask.

“Looks like you’ve got your hands full.” The boy falsely smiled.

“Oh, this? No, no. I can do this whenever. I’m just- I just misplaced something. That’s all.” He then fell into the trash as (Y/N) joined her traveling companion at his side. After a few seconds, Klaus reappeared with a bagel. “Oh! Found it! Thank god!” (Y/N) nearly gagged as he began to chew on it, muffling a ‘delicious’ in forced content.

“I’m done funding your drug habit.” Five spit out before walking away. She followed him and waved at Klaus, barely listening to him yelling after them as they climbed into a plumbing van.

“Why are we stealing a van?”

“Shush.”

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Once again, the two teenagers found themselves in front of Meritech Prosthetics. (Y/N) watched as Lance entered the building before sighing. “We’re really gonna sit here and spy on the man?”

“You got a better idea?” Five only kept his stare on him.

“I guess not… What’s the bag for, then?”

Five immediately turned his attention to the duffle bag he brought with them. “Oh, shit,” He muttered before unzipping it. “Hey,” He softly greeted before handing a bottle of alcohol to (Y/N). She blinked once, twice, thrice when he brought out the top half of a bald mannequin and set it between them. “Sorry you were in there for so long, Delores.”

“Wait,” (Y/N) choked. “That’s Delores?! The one you were with for over thirty years?!”

“Well, obviously,” Five frowned before turning back to ‘Delores’. “This is (Y/N), Delores. You know… the one I told you about.”

“You… talk about me to the mannequin? Should I be flattered or weirded out?”

“Oh, be quiet,” Five sighed and turned away. (Y/N) suddenly felt silly for being jealous last night. “No, I’m not drunk.”

“What?” (Y/N) frowned at the boy, who shook his head.

“Talking to Delores. She thinks I’m- Yes, it’s about the eye thing. This is the place it was made. Or… will be made,” His eyes moved up to his human friend. “We just have to wait…”

He’s actually talking to the mannequin, (Y/N) thought as she turned forward, eyes wide. So, that was what the apocalypse had done to him. She felt bad for him now. Initially, her heart warmed at the thought of Five finding someone to love, but knowing that his mind had gone somewhere far away enough for him to turn to a mannequin for comfort…

“So, (Y/N),” He started, his gaze once again trained on the building before them. “Your children… tell me about them.” Truth be told, Five wanted to know how much they had gotten from their mother. Were they just as humorous? Just as passionate? As wonderful? (Y/N) let out a heartfelt laugh as she closed her eyes.

“Where do I even begin? Michael, he’s… so intelligent. He has the highest reading level in his class and they’re thinking of letting him skip the first grade. He’s such a big help at home with his little sister… I swear, he’s a little man. He’s always trying to test my knowledge. Tries to get me to solve his ‘really hard’ math homework problems…,” She chuckled, Five looking at her with an unreadable expression. “And Jada… she’s such a character. No matter how many times I teach her the days of the week, she always gets them wrong… She wakes me up every morning, trying to guess. I say ‘Jada, if yesterday was Wednesday, what is today?’ and she just starts listing off every wrong answer… She’s a performer, too. I enrolled her into dance classes. Oh, it’s her favorite thing to do… And I’ll admit, she’s good at it. Don’t know where she got that from. Definitely not from me or her dad...”

Five tilted his head thoughtfully. “They sound… just like you. They think they know everything,” He joked with a small smile, (Y/N) playfully glaring at him. “Really, though… They sound like great kids… I’d like to meet them one day.”

“Yeah,” She smiled down at her lap. “I’d love for them to meet you… But I need to be an actual adult before I can face them again. Until then… It’s just checking up every once and awhile…”

“(Y/N), I’m so sorry,” Five frowned as he sat forward. “I- I’m going to figure this out. I promise.”

“I know you will,” She breathed and closed her eyes, her world slowly crashing down on her yet again. “Sorry, I need some air.” And with that, Five was in the car alone. Well, save for Delores. Outside, (Y/N) didn’t have much time to really be with her own thoughts before she heard Luther and Klaus’s voices nearing her. Turning to her right, she spotted the two walking side-by-side towards the van. Upon seeing her, Luther raised a hand.

“(Y/N), you need to get back to the Academy. We found something… and Grace might’ve had something to do with Dad’s death.” He gruffly explained, the young girl straightening to attention.

“Wait, what-”

“I can explain at the house, but we need both you and Five there for the family meeting. Is he in there?” He pointed to the vehicle their brother sat in.

“Yeah, but-”

“Great. Be right back.” Luther’s massive body brushed past her to get to Five, Klaus following behind to get in the back. Not waiting a second longer, she followed her junkie brother inside. When she entered the van again, Luther was trying his hardest to fit his body into the passenger seat as Klaus grabbed Delores, smirking at (Y/N) as he began to dance with the mannequin. She only watched him in disinterest. Once Luther was finally in, he turned to Five. “You okay?”

“You shouldn’t be… How did you find me?” Five’s question was answered when Luther turned to Klaus. With everyone’s attention on him, he looked up from Delores and dropped his smile.

“Hey, a little privacy, guys. We’re really hitting it off back here.” He began to caress Delores’s cheek before screaming when Five threw an object at him, Klaus using the mannequin to block. (Y/N) shook her head and moved closer to Five and Luther, the former fuming.

“Get out! You can’t be here! I’m in the middle of something.”

“Oh, but (Y/N) can be here?”

“Yes! We’re in the middle of something!” Five turned forward as Klaus joined (Y/N) at her side, poking her cheek gently.

“Any luck with your one-eyed man?” He asked her, receiving a head shake. Five sighed and turned to Luther.

“What do you want, Luther?”

Turning his attention away from the conversation between the two, Luther answered Five, “Um… So, Grace might’ve had something to do with Dad’s death. So I need you to come back to the Academy, alright? It’s important.” His request was met with silence for a split second before the time traveller shook his head.

“‘It’s important’. You have no concept of what’s important-”

“Hey!” Klaus interrupted, holding his sister at his side. “Did I ever tell you guys about the time I waxed my ass with chocolate pudding?”

And that was when (Y/N) tuned out the entire conversation between her family. She left Klaus’s side and pressed her back against the back of Luther’s seat, closing her eyes. She knew Five wasn’t going with Luther and Klaus to the house, and she didn’t need to listen to the bickering that would’ve led to that outcome. Her attention was eventually brought to Klaus swinging the back door open, huffing as he got out. She watched him slam the door closed and make his way towards the store across the street. Not trusting him in the slightest, she sent a clone after Klaus, telling it to “watch over him”. At this point, she was waiting for Luther to leave so her growing headache would subside, but it seemed the man wanted to talk some more.

“What the hell are you up to, Five?”

“Believe me, you wouldn’t understand.”

“Try me. Last I checked, I’m still the leader of this family.”

“Well, last I checked, I’m twenty-eight years older than you.” Five tightly smiled before (Y/N) snorted with laughter. The boy rolled his eyes and smiled fondly at her before Luther pulled his attention away.

“You know what your problem is?”

“Really hoping you’ll tell me.”

“You think you’re better than us,” Luther’s words wiped that sarcastic smile right off Five’s face. “You always have. Even when we were kids. But the truth is, you’re just as messed up as the rest of us. We’re all you have… and you know it.” Luther stared at his brother, as the boy slowly inhaled.

“I don’t think that I’m better than you, Number One. I know I am,” He hissed, Luther only chuckling. “I’ve done unimaginable things, things you couldn’t even comprehend.”

“Right...”

“Just to get back here and save you all…” Five stared out the window. (Y/N) sighed and grabbed Delores.

“Luther, out.” She ordered, her “big” brother turning to her with an offended look. “Five’s clearly not going with us. No use arguing with him either. So, just go and I’ll catch up-” She was cut off by the sound of a voice whooping in excitement. The three looked across the street to see Klaus running out of the store, arms full of stolen snacks, the clone following close behind.

“Hey, bitches!” He shouted as a cop chased after them, blowing his whistle. The clone turned to the officer and pushed him away with great force as Klaus was nearly hit by a car. Five’s head followed Klaus’s movement.

“I’m starting to wonder if that was the wisest decision…”

After Luther was sent out of the van, (Y/N) took over the passenger seat once again and set Delores down between them, Five quietly thanking her. “So… I’m going with the guys.”

“What? Why are you wasting your time, I thought you wanted to help me?”

“I do, and I will… But I don’t trust Luther to make decisions right now… I mean, if Mom really did have something to do with Dad’s death… Who knows what he’ll do? The least I can do is try to talk him out of it. I promise, when I’m done, I’ll come and find you.” She softly smiled, gently patting his hand. Five shook his head at her.

“You don’t have to promise me anything… I’m the one who owes you.”

“All you owe me is this,” She gently squeezed his hand. “You being here… That’s what I’ve wanted for so long. Now I have it. So, your debt is paid.” She chuckled. Five rested the back of his head against the seat as his eyes searched her face, trying to find anything that should worry him about her. But all he found was her warm smile and eyes that shone with affection. It suddenly felt inappropriate to have Delores around right now.

“Well, then, you should get going… You’ve gotta catch up with those idiots.”

“Alright. Don’t be out here forever, okay?” (Y/N) leaned in and pecked his cheek before getting out of the car and rushing after her brothers. As he watched her speed away, he tried to regulate his breathing, heartbeat increasing.

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Taglist: @melinda-hargreeves @43sparrows @sapphicsyn @m00n-sh @starcurrent @alexander-hamilhoe @youcandalekmyballs @wonderlandfandomkingdom @yrdadjstcallsmekatya

#the umbrella academy #umbrella academy x reader #tua fanfic #tua x reader #five hargreeves #five hargreeves x reader #five x reader #tua five #number five #number five x reader #of starlight #umbrella academy #tua

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infernwetrust · 3 years

Text

Eden’s Prodigal Son Part 1- To Find Solace In [Andy Dolan x Reader]

Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Summary: You weren't sure what kept you coming back to Andy Dolan. All you knew was that you kept coming back. And it only got worse before it got better.

Warnings: swearing, the smallest amount of domestic violence, almost smut, drug use, fluff, angst

WC: 1.8k

A/N: After finishing up Eden this past week, I thought maybe I could create some insight about a version of Andy Dolan before the extreme downward spiral. Don’t know how long I’ll make the series, though. Thank you for reading! -Juno

GIF by kissxmedeadly

“So now what?" you questioned as you stared into Andy's orbs underneath the Eden sunset.

"Now you go and explore all that Eden has to offer." he responded, moving a strand of hair out of your face and wiping away your tears. "I won't be away that long. I promise. This.. this might be the only chance I get you know... to be somebody."

You knew how much this meant to Andy. He wasn't in acting school for long before he was quickly pulled out of the crowd. And now he had a shot to run straight into it with the big boys and what type of friend would you of been to stop him?

"Los Angeles is kind of far, y'know?" You grabbed the hand the wiped away your tears, kissing him in his palm. "We've been together our whole lives Andy, I-,"

"Please don't, Y/N." His voice cracked. He threw his arms around you, engulfing you in a tight hug. The two of you swayed back and forth and you let the tears fall. "Only half a year. I promise."

"Half a year is too long, y'know?"

Andy chuckled, burying his face into the crook of your neck as he also let his tears flow. And that was the last image you would have of Andy Dolan, in person, for the next 6 months. You watched his life through social media. The increase in popularity came with the increase in distance. What became calls and video chats every day slowly became just quick check ins every couple of days. It was safe to say that you were missing Andy, but was he exactly missing you?

*** "Look what yesterday's storm brought in." Your best friend and basically your sister, pointed out to you. You looked over your shoulder and there he was. Andy Dolan, in the flesh, after 6 months, like he had promised. And it might of been the only promise he kept.

You were upset. Oh you were very upset. But for a moment, you pushed those feelings to the side and you stood up from the rock you were sitting on and you ran. You ran as fast as your legs would carry you and straight into Andy's arms.

"I hope half a year... wasn't too long." he spoke in your ear, wrapping his arms around your body and holding you up. He smelled strictly of bourbon cologne, with a slight hint of whiskey on his breath, the last two scents you smelled of Andy before the two of you went your separate ways.

"You're such a fucking asshole, Andy Dolan."

"There's my girl."

"You made-,"

"So many promises I didn't keep. I know. But I'm home now, yeah? Maybe you can stay with me for a while?"

"Stay with you?

*** "All this after 6 months?" you questioned as Andy walked you around his brand new luxury home. These were the things you and Andy would spend a lot of summer nights discussing. His warm smile and throaty laugh gave you comfort during those nights. You'd lay out underneath the stars in whatever random field you decided to take Andy to for the night. The conversations seemed endless and the jokes poured out of Andy like a running faucet. He was, your, safety zone. And while he would never admit it, you were his too.

"Ben had to pull a few extra strings, but yeah." He rocked back and forth on his heels, shoving his hands in his pockets, glancing you over before taking in the scene of his very open backyard. "All this after 6 months."

"Wow. Famous actor Andy Dolan wants me to stay with him in his big house, with his big back yard, and his personal attendants." you teased, sauntering back over to Andy, taking your time to fix his slightly messy shirt collar. He was beaming and you were proud of him.

"So I'm assuming that's a yes? You'll have your own room and-,"

"Hush, Andy Dolan." You brought your finger to his lips, ultimately silencing him. Taking his hand, you walked him out into the heart of his backyard, taking a seat in the grass and encouraging him to do the same. He was reluctant at first, but he finally took a seat, pulling one knee up to his chest.

"Remember when we would just-,"

"Sit underneath the sunrise, the sunset, and the stars." The both of you finished the sentence together.

"In nothing but absolute silence." Andy continued. "And we'd watch the birds go by or listen to the sound of the water crashing against the rocks or sand. Yeah, I do remember." Andy swallowed, looking down at his fingers idly. He remembers it all too well for his own comfort.

"Good. Because it's about that time."

*** "We can't..." you breathed out, wanting to get Andy's lips off of your neck, wanting to get him from between your legs. You wanted to pretend like you didn't want it, that you didn't want him, but that simply was just not the case. But underneath the circumstances, you knew it was wrong. Your legs, however, would not ease up their grip around his waist, furthering pressing him into you.

"Says who?" Andy slurred, his tongue sloppily tracing patterns over the hickey he had left on your neck.

"We're drunk Andy. And I won't remember. And I want to remember, Andy. I want to remember this." You raised his head up, giving him a few quick pecks on his lips that transitioned into a slow make out. "I really want to, but we both know that isn't the smartest decision right now." He nodded against your lips, settling for the kiss and a heavy ache between his legs.

"You alright in there, mate?" Ben asked, knocking loudly on the door over the loud party music. This caused Andy to groan, sighing as he pulled his lips away from yours, noses still touching as he slightly glanced towards the door.

"I'm fucking coming, mate!" Andy yelled back, slurring the entire sentence. "Just give me a fucking minute."

"Come on." You giggled, sitting up and helping Andy up. "Let's get situated and go back to your house warming party, hm?"

*** "Y/N." Ben began, as he lit the cigarette that was placed between Andy's lips. "She's something of a real beauty isn't she?"

The question made Andy's ears burn. He didn't even bother to turn his head to take a look at Ben. He stared straight out, past the handful of people in his pool. He was suppose to be having a good time at his house warming party, but all he could think about was you. He wanted to do his rounds and be social. He wanted to dance and to laugh, but he was only ever concerned about... you.

While Ben was a good agent, and an okay friend, more often than not he never knew when to stop talking. An already intoxicated Andy was already holding every one on thin ice. And of course Ben would be the first person of the night to put a crack in that ice.

"I don't really know what you're fucking expecting me to say to that, Ben." Andy spoke, bluntly, taking a drag of his cigarette. With every single word that Ben spoke, Andy's jaw clenched involuntarily.

"I'm just saying, yeah." he continued, missing Andy's social cue entirely. "Lucky to have a broad that's-,"

And that's all it took for Andy to snap. He gave it no second thoughts before he stood up, angling his body to punch Ben straight across his jaw. The feeling of blood splattering across his fist was cooling to his knuckles. He took one more drag of his cigarette, watching as Ben fell over and onto the floor before blowing the smoke out of his nose.

"You know, Ben." Andy spat, peering down at the man he's known for almost his entire life. "Things would really work out in your favor if you would just learn to shut the fuck up."

"Andy!" you shouted as you ran outside, just so happening to see from inside as you shared a drink with Hedwig. She followed close behind you, offering any support that she could.

Andy looked behind his shoulder at the both of you, tossing his cigarette into the pool and shaking the left over wet blood off of his hand. He didn't say anything, but instead began to walk away towards the hidden entry way to his backyard.

"Andy!" you called out for him again, chasing behind him. When you finally caught up to him, you grabbed him by his arm in an attempt to slow him down.

"Get the fuck off me." He growled, snatching his arm away from you. You were confused. One moment you were in his room coming to an agreement on why the two of you shouldn't have drunk sex and now he's flipped the script after punching Ben.

"Andy. Tell me what is wrong." you begged, not bothering to even try to create any distance between the two of you.

"I shouldn't have come back home. I shouldn't have let you stayed." he began, throwing his hands up in the air before resting them on the top of his head. He was sweating, pupils dilated, and his face was turning red and you automatically knew he wasn't in a good spot, physically or mentally. "I shouldn't have fucking kissed you. I'm going to do nothing, but hurt you Y/N." He started backing away, still facing you and Hedwig as he spoke.

Andy Dolan was falling faster for you than he wanted to, IF he ever wanted to. He took what Ben said, to heart and that drove him absolutely fucking insane. That's just not who Andy Dolan was. He didn't fall first. The girls fell for him. Of course he loved Y/N, but he didn't believe in "falling in love". But here he was, falling in love with the one person he told himself that was off limits from his childish behavior.

"An-... what? Andy what?"

"Just let me go.." he growled again. "Just fucking let me go." You reached out, grabbing him again, but without thinking he shoved you into the grass, just wanting to get away.

"Hey!" Fred's voice echoed throughout the backyard as he ran towards the commotion. Andy, realizing what he did, and although you understood, took the opportunity to take off like he was wanting. You called out for him again, wanting to get up and go after him, but Hedwig stopped you.

"Just let him go." she said, wrapping her arms around you as she sat you up, moving your hair out of your face.

"What the fuck was that?" Fred questioned Andy's actions, kneeling down beside you. "You alright?" But you couldn't speak. You shook intensely in your best friend's arms, tears flowing freely down your face. You thought everything was okay. You thought that maybe you and Andy could have something better. So what was the issue?

Solace (n): comfort or consolation in a time of distress or sadness

Taglist: @jimmason @angelicmichael @codyfernuk @9layerdevilfoodcake @xavierplympton @ferndolan @dorklydefined

#andy dolan imagine #andy dolan x reader #eden #andy dolan #cody fern

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yamithediaperdork · 3 years

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Welcome to baby land (Ben 10)

it was a tale as old as time, one that had happened before, would happen this day and despite the fall out from today's events would happen again in the future.

A young boy, fueled by fetish desires and spending hour after hour, day after day bringing himself to the peak as he looked at his chosen fetish, only to pull back last second.

Because the boy knows for what he wants, for what he's going to do.. he needs that desperate pent up denial of release to shut down his common sense. to make him nice and dumb.

His name was Ben Tennyson, and up until a short while ago he had been the hero of the universe and earth. But that was before the watch had been taken, and given to his cousin Gwen who had been picked as being a most reasonable hero. with cutting remarks that he would of never gotten the watch for as long as he had had it's marker realized who was wearing it, and being called to immature.. was it any wonder a bitter and dejected Ben cut himself off from his extended family and drove into the world of porn?

never mind he had beaten off a alien invasion, a 'pants peeing doofus' couldn't be trusted with the watch.

Fine. whatever. if they wanted to look at him as a stupid big baby.. that's what he'd become.

He didn't even like diapers at first when he started, but well.. porn has a way of warping a young boy's mind. Looking at picture after picture, caption after caption and reading the stories Ben for all intents and purposes turned himself in a diaper boy, and a humiliation junkie.

Taking birthday money he even found and brought a package of punishment diapers meant for shaming (though he got it at a discount as the shop was being put out of business) that were super thick, boasted how they could hold any mess.. and also claimed they didn't keep any stink from being contained and guaranteed diaper rash if used.

For a porn addicted loser like Ben, this was pure gold and since he paid for rush devilry he got a enema bag and a small bottle of little crampers, the enema for brats.

Ben knew what he wanted, total, public humiliation but he kept ruining it for himself with self pleasure driving the need out of his mind before he could do it.

finally, Mid October the little porn fueled loser decided enough was enough, he was gonna stop wasting his time and the diapers he'd paid for and set himself up to goon. For a week strait he subjected himself to it, and by the time he was done on Sunday night, Monday morning the little loser set himself up to fail.

waking up early, Ben used the whole bottle of little crampers even though it said to just mix 1/8 with a litlre bag for a enema kit, and groaned and whimpered as he used it, hot water and a dash of castor oil in the big enema bag, only his bulky white and black t-shirt hid the preggo belly he gave himself.

getting back to his bedroom and cramping, the soon to be ruined diaper loser looked at the pack of his punishment diapers and having not worn one till today, toyed with layering at first but they just looked too thick.

Settling on one of the bulky diapers with it sobbing crybaby design, he taped it on then tried the tapes, blushing as the package lived up to it's name.

Once taped on it would take 2 hours for the tapes to come back off, he was truly trapped. again a normal boy of Ben's age would of been panicking, realizing they had gone too fair but Ben just breathed fast, and smiled as he picked his baggiest pair of pants and was delighted that they still only JUST hid the diaper, if he bent over his padded shame would be CLEAR.

Getting down stairs and getting breakfast in himself, he was already seated as his parents came down and made small talk with them even as the delightful cramps started to build. (he'd never admit it, well at least before today's events unfolded but he'd grown to like pain, it made his heart beat fast and smile)

Still he couldn't help but squirm and groan a little bit, and got looks of concern from his parents as he finished his bowl of cereal.

"Benny you feeling alright?" His mother asked, coming over and putting a hand to his forehead. "You can stay home today if your not feeling good."

"N-No I'll be alright. just worried about a math test." Ben said, mixing truth with lies,then added: "Besides, you and dad said you were BOTH gonna be out all day today. who'd stay with me?"

"Heh, He's got a point there.. and good on you Ben. I'm proud your being mature enough not to try and get out of a test." His dad said, totally misunderstanding the happy giggle Ben let out.

His father might of thought it was Ben was so happy he was proud of him, But for diaper bitch Benny, the irony of the comment almost made him ruin the fun early.

If Ben's plan had one flaw (well one he'd admit to) it was the fact that he hadn't taken into account how much slower he'd be having to waddle his massive diaper butt to school with the added fun of having to stop 3 times to force himself not to spoil the fun early.

He'd even left a little sooner then normal, his parents had been quick with their breakfast and he 'accidentally' left his house key on the desk in his room and after making sure the front door was locked, went out the back door as you could lock it from the inside while the door was open.

'No getting out of this by running home!' Ben gleefully thought.

He barley made it into homeroom before the bell rang, though since he was known to be tardy from time to time it didn't raise too much attention, get getting a snide comment from his homeroom teacher about gracing them with his presence.

Even better, home was also his math class and that was going to be first period (which was a good thing for the ever so full little perv as his 'chocolate mud baby' wasn't going to stay in him much longer.)

Mr. Fillawick wasted little time in handing out the tests and after a standard warning that he'd tolerate NO cheating and there was going to be NO bathroom breaks, he offered anyone who had to go a chance to use the potty now.

'OK..this is it..your last chance.. you could just say you need to go, and sneak out the school.fill your diapers in the woods and get out of them once the tapes give up.' Ben thought to himself, biting his lip.

it wouldn't be destroying himself in class and getting him labeled stinky baby for the rest of the year, but it would land him in hot water with the school and his parents and he'd run the risk of being seen outside right?

He almost started to raise his hand when his inner pervert took over and he just turned it into brushing his hand though his hair.

"Alright, don't say I didn't warn you. you'll have a hour to do the test. good luck." Mr. Fillawick said and shrugged, going back to his desk and sitting down, doing whatever it was teachers did.

Five minutes later and Ben was in a mixture of heaven and hell. he was twitching and sweating a little bit, his pencil twitching in his hand even as he started to leak in little bursts against the front of his diapie.

the cramps were at the point of no return and even if Ben said fuck it and got up to run, he wouldn't of made it more then five steps.

all he'd managed to do so far was write his name on the test and the date, then the cramps had gone over board.

'Ok..Ok.. this was a mistake.. I've leaked enough boy milk to see that.. maybe.. maybe I can still just.. get out..of..' Ben thought, going white knuckled as he gripped the side of his desk with his left hand as a powerful cramp hit, a low rumbling fart coming out his backside though the sound was mostly muted.

the smell however was not as the diapers lived up to their claims and Kids around Ben wrinkled their noses and looked around looking for the source of the smell and eyes zeroing in on his as he was blushing.

"Mr. Fillawick? I think Ben needs to go to the bathroom." A redhead boy behind him said. "Or at Least can he be moved to the back of the classroom.

"Mr. Tennyson had his chance for that Mr. Randal. and I prefer he stay where I can keep a eye on him." Came the teachers amused answer.

even as the class giggled and laughed, two more rotten poots escaped and there was open cries of disgust.

"Gah, at least open a window!"

"What did you have to eat this morning, a skunk!?"

Ben whimpered and squirmed, he had the whole class basically looking at him now and the teasing and taunts had brought his pervert side back up to full power.

'It's now or never.' Ben thought, though he also knew wasn't really a option. it was more like Now or never if he wanted a semblance of control over the act.

it helped he was trembling lots now but Mr. Fillawick who'd never cared for Ben much since he was a rowdy student only watched with sadistic glee.

Ben's Pencil 'accidentally' shook out of his hand and rolled off the desk and onto the floor, and Ben made a show of just reaching into his desk to find anther one.

"Mr. Tennyson, whatever your habits in your own room may be, I run a clean Classroom." the smirking teacher said. "Bend down and point up that pencil."

"Uh..but..If I-" Ben started, putting the perfect crybaby whine in his voice.

"You'll what? fart? like you haven't been doing that already?" the teacher shot back.

Putting on a show of being embarrassed and scared (he was embarrassed but his heart was beating fast) Ben leaned over the right side of his desk and there was a gasp from the students behind him as one thing he hadn't planned on happened.

"BEN'S WEARING A DIAPER!" Hooted Crash.

"A BABY DIAPER!" a blond girl added.

"More like a BIG baby diaper!" Randal noted with amusement.

Somehow his pants must of lowered enough to flash off his embarrassing diaper! Oh god! for all of 2.4 seconds trued to stop what was about to happen but the act of leaning over had been the final trigger.

as the enema finally worked it's magic and the back of his diaper started to swell up Ben could only hear the roar of his mess and though tear filled eyes almost could swear he could see image of him in just diapers and a bib, tapping a shovel on a grave that had been filled in. the tombstone read:

RIP Ben's self respect.

as the force of the mess made Ben fall forward, landing face down and ass up, his pants failing down more so everyone could watch his diapers load up in the back (thankfully they wouldn't be able to tell what he was doing in the front!) The image of baby Ben came over and looked down with a grin at the real one.

"Welcome to baby land~ no going back now."

As Ben's life was ruined, and he was designed to never be able to get that 'excited' again unless he was crapping brains out(heck, he was going to be pulled from school and his parents would begin his new big baby life, treating him like the baby they thought he wanted to be, not knowing he was just a humiliation junkie) Charmcaster smirked in her jail cell.

Sure having to watch all the events unfold from sitting into of a toilet wasn't the way she'd hope to see the spell play out, not to mention it had been that bitch Gwen she had targeting, but this worked out in the end.

Gwen would suffer being the cousin of the big stinky baby and would likely end up having to change him and it wouldn't be too long now before her uncle broke her out. wincing as Ben started to baby babble though she did have one moment's regret.

'I mean, I'm evil and wanna take over the world but was making him a diaper perv too far?' She wondered, then smiled. 'Naaaah!'

The end

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