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#i hate hate HATE the rookie fbi but it was a good one
lovvelorrn · 1 year
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OKAY i finally got to watch the new rookie episode and !!!!!!
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pedritapascal · 7 months
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A good Agent, or a Good Fucker... to me
Chapter five - Decisions, decisions…
Pedro Pascal's character - Dave York - [DY] The Protector 2 / Equalizer 2
Dave York x Female Reader
Word Count: 5K
WARNINGS: {+18} Sex Language; SA; Fingers; Tongue; Nudity; Explicit Details;
A good Agent, or a Good Fucker... to me
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I woke up with the sound of the alarm on my cell phone, looked at the time… 06AM… I was waking up at the time I was used to sleeping, because the time zone in Holland was still messing me up. Even after a week here, I still couldn't get my sleep schedule in order.
The first week was getting to know the team handling the case and my new partner, Matthew Guerrit, who was only 3 years older than me, but had extensive experience in the US police and FBI, in the CIA he already had 5 years, and had been transferred to the Netherlands for 2 years. Always with a smile on his face, kind and not at all paranoid, a huge contrast to my old partner… The agency here was much smaller, with few people, there was Agent Lucas Raymond, Agent Jacob Dirk and Agent Brigitta Simon, who - as she said herself - liked to be called Brigg and thanked the heavens when I arrived at the agency and she was no longer the only woman here.
This was my new team, because unlike in the US, here we didn't only work in pairs, only when there was a need or in smaller cases, big cases like the one I was in, a whole team was responsible, and when I heard that, it was my turn to thank the heavens.
In a week here, I spoke to Dave three times, and on the day I left, he called me while I was at the airport to say goodbye and wish me luck.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there at the airport running and trying to stop you from traveling, I thought it was too cliché and I know how much you hate romantic comedies… and I also understand that you need to go… But I wish you all the best in this new phase of yours, and I hope you solve this case soon, so that maybe you can come back to me… to our case… in the case. Good luck"
And the other two times, he asked about the case, if I knew where any documents were or if I remembered anything relevant.
Apparently, during the week that I was away, the case slowed down, even with the arrest in Ohio, we didn't get any leads to follow up and get to Richard Bayle… but now that was no longer my problem. I had to focus on my new case, with my new partner and a new team.
The case here was about attacks, there was a terrorist and extremist cell that had been causing explosions in specific places all over Europe, and the US's concern about this? Simple, they didn't want these attacks to reach them, and of course, fucking NATO, which was charging the US for its collective defense regime.
I got to the office around 7:30 in the morning, slept badly, slept little, my mood was garbage, my head was exploding…
"Good morning Rookie, what a terrible face, still sleeping badly because of the time difference?" - Matthew asked
I just nodded as I massaged one of my temples…
"Here, see if this helps" - handing me a double espresso - "I also took a while to get used to the time zone, almost three months of bad nights, do you know what helped me?"
"Matthew, if you make any unfunny jokes I swear I'll shoot you…" He laughed
"No Rookie, biritas" - still laughing - "take a day to drink with us, Brigg would love to have you with us so you don't feel so out of place…"
"It's not a bad idea, but when I leave here all I want is my bed, I swear I'm not that boring, I'm just really tired" - yawning…
"Tell you what, we've got a game here, and I think it's about time you joined in, you're already part of the team…"
"Game? Matthew, I want you to know that I always won my fraternity's games in college and I don't accept losing, I'm even a terrible loser."
"Then that's all the more reason for you to take part" - Matthew said, taking a seat on the edge of my desk.
"Good morniiiiiing" - Brigg had just entered the office, always smiling, I never understood why she was in such a good mood, but she made the atmosphere light, and it was a good feeling…
"Hey Brigg, I'm talking here, put the Rookie in our game? What do you think? She says she's very competitive…"
"Good Rookie, you'll love it, and that's our way of saying, WELCOME TO THE TEAM" - Brigg said laughing…
"Ok Ok, I'm already curious" - I put the rest of the coffee on the table - "how does this work?"
"Simple" - said Matthew - "until the end of the week, the agent who manages to gather the most leads on the case gets a night of drinks paid for by the losing agents, plus bragging rights, of course, and" - he tapped the table in suspense - "gets an extra weekend off…" I get up and reach for some case files…
"So get your wallets ready, because on Friday the Rookie here will be drinking on your tab" - laughing
I sat down at my desk to get back to the case, Lucas and Jacob arrived and caught up on the game.
In those hours when I was concentrating on being part of the team, I didn't even remember him, and I didn't question whether I had done the right thing or not, but every time I remembered him, my chest burned.
"Hey Rookie" I heard a finger snap in front of me, and I snapped back to reality…
"Is everything okay?" Matthew asked - "You're more airy than usual…"
"Everything's fine, Agent, I was just thinking about some things in the US…"
"Are you missing it?"
"That's the problem, I don't know if what I'm missing is what I'm missing" - getting up to get other files.
"If you want to talk, Rookie, we'll have a coffee and you can get it off your chest…"
"No no, I don't talk about my personal life at work, Agent" - returning to my desk, I smiled at the irony of my sentence, I don't talk about my personal life at work but a few days ago, my personal life was in Dave's lap… I felt hypocritical for a moment, but new place, new life, right?
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Friday came and with it the end of the week's competition, and I was disgusted because Jacob had won by one more lane than me, it was unacceptable.
"Jacob stole that I know" - I grumbled
"Take it Rookie, and get ready, because I only drink drinks over 30 euros a shot…"
We left the office laughing and complaining about the amounts Jacob wanted to spend, getting into the elevator, I had forgotten how good it was to laugh and have fun with coworkers, even before Dave, I went out very few times, always very focused on what I wanted, who would have thought that I would only last a few months in the corporation in the USA…
Whenever I thought about it, or thought of Dave, my head flew, Dave hadn't texted me for days, and I didn't know whether to be grateful for that, or to miss him, he still confused me…
"Rookie"
I felt a tap on my shoulder bringing me back, it was Matthew, again…
"Shall we?" He was standing there holding the door of the elevator that I hadn't even seen reach the first floor
It was the first time I'd accompanied my team to this pub, I didn't even know it existed, let alone that it was at the back of the agency, pool tables, dartboards, people smoking, classic 80s rock playing in the background, wooden tables and high chairs, a dance floor with a few lights. I think I've finally found my place in this city…
They went straight to a table at the back, I just followed them, apparently it was their official table, I settled into one of the chairs and the waiter brought us each a shot of rum… it was going to be a fun night and I was really excited.
After 8 shots, Lucas got up to the jukebox and put on a classic from the 90s, one of my favorite songs, Even Flow by PEARL JAM… I felt Brigg taking me by the hand
"Let's dance, Rookie."
"But you can't dance to that song, Brigg" - I laughed a little, but followed her onto the dance floor, still holding my long neck of beer that I was mixing with the shots of rum.
"We just swing Rookie, and feel the music."
I wrapped one of my arms around Briggs' neck and the two of us sang along to my favorite song like two drunks, jumping on the guitar riffs and bobbing our heads like two teenagers, laughing…
"Wow, I don't think I've ever had this much fun, I thought it was a mistake, but it wasn't, I did the right thing…"
"What mistake, Rookie? What are you talking about? You've got me curious."
"Nothing, Brigg, it's just me, you wouldn't understand." She shrugged.
The song ended and I went back to the table, fixing my hair and clothes, I was sweating a bit, even more so because of the warm clothes I was wearing, my cheeks flushed. Matthew came up to me with another beer.
"Enjoying Rookie?"
"Very much Matthew, thank you for letting me in on this" - opening the beer
"I saw you needed a distraction, sometimes you get lost in your thoughts."
"Nothing much, just some unfinished business that I've left behind and I'm worried about whether it's going to be okay."
"Some issues with work, or with someone?"
"Work Matthew, I always work" - drinking beer.
"You didn't leave anyone behind?"
My eyes grew distant for a moment, I took another sip of beer "No" I replied dryly.
"Then that's good because…"
I signaled for him to wait a minute because my phone was ringing, I stood up, moving away from the table and the noise a little, my eyes were blurring because of the alcohol, it couldn't be him, was I already drunk? It's not possible…
"Ready?"
"Rookie?"
"Dave?" - my body shivered at his voice
"What's that noise, where are you?"
"What do you need Dave?"
"Now to know where you are? Isn't it 3 a.m. in Holland?"
"If you don't tell me what you need, I'll hang up and go back to what I was doing…"
"Actually, I need your eidetic memory, but I guess that's impossible now, isn't it?"
"Can it be tomorrow? I'm really busy right now…"
Dave took a deep breath on the other end of the line - I could even imagine him smoothing his forehead…
"Sure, sure…"
"Good evening, Dave…"
"Princess?"
My heart stopped for a few seconds when I heard his voice calling me princess after so long…
"Dave," I said, my voice breaking.
"I miss you…"
"Good night Dave" - and I hung up
I took a deep breath, scratched my head…
I went back to the table and announced that I was leaving…
"No, Rookie, it's early, we'll be here until the morning," said Lucas.
"I'm falling asleep, guys, I want to see you hold out at the office tomorrow."
"Not me" - said Jacob, stretching - "I'm off, I'm going sleep all day."
"I still think you stole it Jacob, I just don't have any way of proving it yet" - laughing as I grabbed my bag and threw my suit on my back.
"I'll drive you Rookie" - Matthew offered
"No need, I've already called an Uber, it's coming, don't bother, just take Briggs" - pointing to the dance floor where she was jumping around to some music - "This soul needs to be guided home…" I went to the dance floor
"Bye Briggs" - waving my hand
"ROOKIE" - she hugged me, I wanted to say it apparently, but she was really drunk - "I'm so, so happy you came to the agency, for more female agents like us…. YAY FOR US WOMEN UHUUL" - Raising her arm
I laughed at the situation and at how drunk she was and got into the mood, raised an arm and shouted YAY.
My Uber beeped and I ran out of there, I wanted my bed. … I got home and just took off my clothes and put on a baggy blouse, threw myself on the bed with my cell phone in my hand, stood there looking at the screen, thinking about his phone call…
"I miss you too Dave"
I sent it as a message… honestly, I think drunks should have their cell phones blocked to avoid this kind of embarrassment, but now it was gone… yes, I regretted it the second I sent it…
Not three minutes later, my cell phone vibrated in response.
"Where are you?"
"You don't care Dave, you're not my fucking owner…"
"I didn't ask, idiot, I wanted to see you, that's all…"
"You're an idiot, you asshole, I'm at home, in my bed… going to sleep"
"Do you really miss me, princess?"
"After that little chat, it's all over… I've just remembered what an asshole you are… good night '
I locked the phone screen and tossed it aside, my head spinning, I didn't need to drink the last two shots…
My phone started ringing.
VIDEO CALL
Maybe it would have been better not to answer it, but I wanted to see him so badly, I sat up in bed, leaning against the headboard, with just the light of the lamp, rubbed my face with both hands to try to make it better and answered it.
"Hi Dave…"
"Wow, what's with the face?" - he laughed
"I'm fucking drunk, nobody looks good like that, asshole"
Dave was shirtless, leaning against his sofa…
"You look beautiful" - he smiled in a corner
"Aff, stop, what do you want? I can't remember anything about the case right now Dave… my brain is soaked with alcohol and…"
"I want you" - Dave interrupted me, and I blushed at his blunt answer, cleared my throat…
"So, what about the case? Did it go ahead? Have you been given a new partner?" - I tried to deflect
"It hasn't, that's why I need your help, but tomorrow, and yes, they've sent me a new partner, it's strange, but you're getting used to it, the only sad thing is that you're much hotter…" - he smiled
I put my hand to my face with my head back and turned around, smiling…
"Dave, I… you… we're over 7,000 km away and…"
Dave threw his body forward, his elbows probably resting on his knees, still sitting on the sofa, his cell phone down, giving me the impression that he was looking up at me…
"FUCK DAVE", I thought and bit my lower lip…
"Are you trying to seduce me Agent York?" - I asked, smiling
"Never, why? Are you feeling seduced agent?"
I ran my hand over my red face, biting my lip… looking at Dave through that screen, that neck, that mouth that he always bit the corner of…
"Maybe…"
"Princess, will you take your shirt off for me?"
I was miles away from him, but I still surrendered just looking at him. I threw my cell phone on the bed and took off my shirt, then returned with the screen while I leaned more heavily on the headboard, but without showing anything, he could only see up my crossed arm in front of my breasts…
"Let me see you princess…"
I shook my head no, biting my lip - " hum hum…"
"You want me to beg, don't you?"
I shook my head yes - "hunrum"
Dave took a deep breath, biting his lips, and moved a little closer to the screen…
"Please" - he whispered
"No…"
"I need to see you…"
"No…"
Dave drew in a deep breath and let it out
"Princess… please, let me see you" - he smiled - "I really need to see you…"
I lowered the cell phone screen a little more, taking my arm away, Dave mumbled something I didn't hear, but it sounded PERFECT…
I moved my hand down to my breasts, squeezed one of them from bottom to top and let out a low moan. Dave snorted on the other end of the line as he watched me. I squeezed and lightly pinched the nipple as I ran my tongue over my lips
"That's it princess, do them like I do" - Dave leaned back on the sofa with his arm outstretched, filming himself sitting up from the bottom, he was wearing those gray shorts from his gym days, I saw his other hand stroking his erection over his clothes and heard him moan low - "You drive me crazy princess" - He gasped
"What do you want Dave, ask me…"
He drew air between his lips
"I want to see you completely, take off your panties"
"This one?" - I had already taken them off and showed them to him
"Good girl, now come down so I can see all of you"
" Hum hum, and I'm not going to see you? That's no good"
"But you're already seeing me" - he smiled dully
"Not the part I want…"
Dave threw his head back and ran his hand over his flushed face
" Fuck, princess, look what you're making me do" - with a red face
"You started it, now you want to stop? No sir Agent York, you can take those shorts off for me"
Dave laughed with his head down, and his image shook as he took off his shorts as I asked…
"Okay Princess" - turning the camera back to the previous angle where I could see him from below, in his black boxer shorts, I thought about telling him to take them off, but the view was so perfect, I pretended I'd forgotten to ask - Can I see you now? - He asked as he adjusted his cock in his underwear
I just stretched my arm up and slid the camera down so that he could see me, arched my legs up a little and positioned the camera in front of me, still holding the phone, but in a way that he could see me. Dave moaned lowly as he squeezed his erection harder over his underwear
I wet the tips of two fingers and ran them down my body " That's it, princess, let me see you touching yourself, will you?"
When I get to my entrance and feel them rubbing against my clit, I let out a louder moan, and automatically close my legs a little, start massaging it, putting pressure on it with my two fingers, go down wetting them on myself and press my clit again, on the other side, I hear Dave moaning, he's pulling his erection down and up over his underwear until he lowers it a little, holding his cock at the base and squeezing it lightly, just looking at him like that made my legs shake. The head of his cock was already wet with pre-cum…
"That's it princess, moan for me"
My moans became louder but still muffled, Dave began to touch himself faster as he moaned, his hand with the phone was shaking a little, but nothing that disturbed my vision. I kept circling my clit while Dave moaned at me
"Dave, I'm so close"
"Come to me, come princess…"
He whispered to me as I touched my right spot, riding my own hand. Hearing Dave York moaning my name from the other side as he jerked off feeling my pleasure for him, my orgasm came like a strong wave and I could only moan louder as I slowed down my fingers trying to remember how to breathe, I opened my eyes in time to see Dave moaning letting his head fall back on the sofa, his hand slowing down, his chest rising and falling with his panting breaths as he came on his cock and growled his pleasure through his teeth, I salivated for him at that moment as I watched his cum drip down his fingers and onto his chest and belly with a few droplets of sweat that had accumulated. Dave looked at me, returning to his breathing, while I looked at him, biting my lips… I admired the sight for a few more seconds.
"Just a minute, princess" - Dave put his cell phone down somewhere, as I could only see the ceiling for a few moments, and came back quickly, just in time for me to see him wipe himself down - "How good can it be with you away?"
"I have no idea, Dave" - I shrugged and turned on my side with the phone closer to my face - "it really was great… but…"
"But it would be better with me there with you, wouldn't it?"
"No Dave, it's BUT I have to sleep, I have to be at the office tomorrow at eight, and it's already five in the morning… but it's always better when you're there… only you understand that…"
"Yes, princess" - Dave looked away - "I'll let you sleep, tomorrow I'll call you to help me with the case, okay?"
"Yes, but a normal call, no video"
Dave laughed
"Good night princess…"
"Good night Agent York…"
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Even though I'd only been asleep for almost two hours, I woke up in a great mood… as I got out of the shower and brushed my teeth with a towel on my body and another in my hair, I rubbed the mirror to remove the fog left by the smoke from the hot shower, looked at myself for a moment remembering last night and laughed, just letting a short laugh escape my chest… I rinsed my mouth and put my hand to my forehead, thinking… wasn't the idea to stay away from him? Okay, technically I am away, but… I needed some time to think… Anyway, I had to get to the office.
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I arrived a little late, but my team had just arrived…
"GOOD DAAAAAAY"
A SSSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH echoed through the room on everyone's lips.
"No need to scream Rookie" - Brigg, still wearing sunglasses and holding his hand to his head
"I'm late because I've gone to buy coffee for all of us, double espresso" - placing the tray on the center table while they were already reaching for their cups.
In the mess of getting the coffees, Matthew ended up getting mine by mistake, and when he tasted it he grimaced
"Wow, what kind of coffee is that?" I saw that it had my name on it
"Hey my coffee" - picking it up for me
"How do you drink it, actually, what is it Rookie?" - Matthew asked laughing
"Shh, don't talk bad about my coffee, it's unsweetened, with milk and a pinch of cinnamon, a perfect combination"
I went back to my desk sipping my coffee, the day would be long, but in the afternoon, I would talk to him again, and that made me smile.
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As I was leaving the building's garage with the guys, Matthew insisted on taking me to the car, I really wanted to believe that he was just being nice.
"Rookie, I was wondering if you were free today, I don't know, to see a bit more of the country, go for a drive… I don't know" - Matthew asked with his hand on the open door of my car…
"Aaaan, who's going?"
"Me and you, I wanted to show you the city, you've only worked since you got here" - he looked away
"I can't today, I have an appointment"
"Very important?"
"Maybe, maybe not" - I got into the car - "See you on Monday Matthew" - I made a point of pulling the door shut and he got the message
"See you on Monday Rookie" - He stood there with his hands in his pockets while I started the car.
At home, I grabbed a coffee and sat down to read my book, which I hadn't been able to get to for three days, and waited for Dave's call. At around 7pm my phone rang with his call
"Ready"
"Rookie, what's up? I need to make this quick. Do you remember the arrest in Ohio?"
"Sure, what about it?"
"In the evidence we took, there was a list of the possible buyers of the women who were there, do you remember any names?"
"Of course I do, but why don't you just look at the list?"
"What names?" - Dave didn't answer
"Dave, is everything all right?"
"Rookie, I need as many names as you can think of, now."
"Write it down then, Aaron Delaney, Briella Wilson, Amatto Bianchi and Rizzo Zanetti"
" Fuck yeah, you're a genius princess, I need to go"
"Dave, what's going on?"
"I can't talk on the phone, I'll get back to you as soon as I can"
"Dave?"
He had already hung up, my heart squeezed, it wouldn't be a big deal would it? He's an experienced agent and very good in combat, and an impeccable marksman, he's never missed a shot from what they say, he's a tactical expert and always has his Beretta M9A1 - his suppression pistol - at his fingertips. I took a deep breath, he would be fine.
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Three weeks went by, I didn't speak to Dave, just a few messages that made us sure that they were both still alive, but this last week, he didn't give any sign and my mind was racing, I couldn't call US headquarters just to ask about him… I texted Maggs to ask for the news and she told me everything that was going on, except what I wanted to know, if he was okay, but I think that if something had happened, she would have told me, wouldn't she?
I had to be focused on the terrorist cell case, but as well as being worried, I was disgusted because I'd lost the clue competition to Matthew and Jacob, JACOB AGAIN, how he thought he was winning.
It was Friday again and the score was tight between me and Jacob, I didn't even go to lunch because by the time I left I was going to get something, I thought the competition was healthy, we had already managed to arrest some people, but mostly people who weren't relevant to getting to the focus of the cell.
Two more explosions had taken place, one in Holland and one in Germany. The point was that the cell could be worldwide, connected by the internet, so we could never predict where the next attack would be. I had been looking at the photos of the last two crime scenes for hours, my head was throbbing, there was something there, I could feel it.
I picked up the photo of the first attack to compare with the attack now and noticed a drawing near the center of the explosions, I ran to the table in the center of the room where the folders and photos were, and picked up all the crime scenes that had taken place, checking them one by one and Holy SHIT, I found it.
I lined up the photos in chronological order of the attacks, and went through them one by one to confirm that yes, they had a symbol, it was a waning moon cut in half.
"Guys, look what I found" - calling the team to the table, I passed around the photos and pointed.
"How did you spot that, Rookie? It's very imperceptible" - Brigg asked
"Don't ask me how my brain works, I just knew there was something I'd seen before, but I couldn't remember where, and it was in the photos. Now we just have to find out if this symbol is placed before or after, if it's before it's to mark the site of the attack, if it's after it's to assume that that explosion was their doing…"
"I'll give it to Sylas now and ask him to check the street cameras a few days before the explosion dates" - Matthew left with the evidence in hand, heading for Sylas' office.
I got up and headed for the team board, picking up the pilot to write on…
"Hey Jacob, looks like the Rookie here is going to bankrupt you today" - making my point
"Calm down Rookie, there's still half an hour to go, it could still turn…" "That smell" - sniffing the air - "I feel a smell of revolt in the air…"
Jacob just laughed. … We arrived at the pub as usual, I already knew everyone at the bar, the bartenders, and I went in saying
"Bartel, make that double drink for me because today THE ROOKIE HERE IS PARTYING"
"THE Rookie WON ONE LENNON" - Bartel shouted to the bartender at the back.
" Finally, Rookie" - Lennon smiled from the back.
We sat down at the table, Jacob looking terrible, and I made a little kiss to him, rubbing my eyes as if he was going to cry.
Matthew and Briggs laughed, and I had fun, I loved those moments when I could get him out of my head.
The night was great, we drank and danced on the dance floor, even Matthew dared to show off his dance moves, at the table Lucas was consoling his friend Jacob, I might not have known how to lose, but compared to Jacob? No way…
I was already pretty upset, and it was almost two in the morning when Briggs took me to the dance floor again, my feet were already hurting and I was only wearing the white tank top I was wearing under my dress shirt.
Briggs danced just two songs with me and went back to the table, and I stayed there dancing alone until I felt a hand grab me around the waist.
When I opened my eyes, it was Matthew who, seeing me alone on the dance floor, had come to join me. He started dancing with me, taking me by the hand and spinning me around, and I laughed
"This isn't a waltz Matthew"
His hand tightened around my waist and moved to my back, and he pulled me closer.
"Hey what are you doing Matthew?" - I asked a little harshly
"What I've been wanting to do for weeks and you pretend you don't understand" - he moved closer to me, trying to kiss me and I pulled away, he held my face, I put my hands on his chest and pushed him back.
"Matthew, NO"
When I turned to leave the dance floor, I couldn't believe what I saw, I was drunk, but not to the point of hallucinating, it couldn't be, Dave was standing in the middle of the bar, with his black overcoat and his hands on his hips looking at me with his face closed…
"Dave…" - I whispered
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The tag list (always in progress), please let me know if you want to be added or removed in my future fanfic posts.
@hannahkatharine @drewharrisonwriter @morallyinept @simp4nott @star017 @survivingandenduring @popcornforone @perotovar @untamedheart81 @missladym1981 @yorksgirl @welcometodrama @blondebarbiiemiinajlover-blog @labyrinthofheartagrams @perennialdoll247 @jensensational71 @mrspedropascal5683 @none-of-this-makes-any-sense @pedroswife69 @welcometodrama @pedropascalsgermangirl @paanchusblog @stevie75 @leosilke @friendswiththemonster78 @vivian-pascal
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Chapter Six - Connections
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bullet-prooflove · 9 days
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A quick round up of updates on the blog including new characters added to the ASK LIST and a list of fics that went out last week:
New characters were added to the ask list this week:
Sean Archer
Jack Reacher
Jack Hodgson
AJ Chegwidden
Carlton Lassiter
New Fics:
Chicago Med:
The Only One (NSFW) - You're the only woman Sean has been with sober.
Big Heart - How it starts between you and Mitch.
The Morning After - Mitch makes a decision after the two of you spend the night together.
Fuckable - You and Mitch were never just friends.
The Study Part One: Courting Disaster - Dean realises Jack is courting you.
Sleeping Late - You sleep late for the first time in years. (Jimmy Lanik x Reader)
Chicago PD:
Make Me Forget - Antonio is devastated when he catches up with you after the op.
CSI Vegas:
Something About You - Trey has never been able to figure out how he fell in love with you.
The Equalizer:
Watch Me (NSFW) - You want Harry to see everything he does to you.
FBI:
Little Changes - Stuart notices when you start to make little changes.
FBI International:
Live Stream - You recieve a lead on Damian's location.
Ravaged - You find Damian in a bad way.
FBI Most Wanted:
Attention - Remy realises you need a little extra attention.
Fire Country:
Sunday Mornings - Luke takes your advice and carves out some time for himself.
Haven:
Burden - Dwight carries the entire town's burdens on this shoulders.
All Night (NSFW) - Dwight spends the night with you.
Law & Order:
Pushy - Cyrus has forgotten how pushy you are.
How We Met - Nolan reflects on your relationship.
Happy Birthday - Nolan doesn't celebrate his birthday.
Distraction - You distract Nick from work.
Law & Order SVU:
Say My Name - Joe needs to hear you say his name.
Marvel:
The Day We Met - Frank reflects on the path the relationship has taken.
Mayans:
Future Building - Riz builts you a house.
The Musketeers:
Memories - You and Treville have a lot of history.
Duty - Treville is bound by his sense of duty, even at the cost of your life.
Rubies - Aramis spends a momeny alone with you.
Love You More (NSFW) - Athos hates that he loves you.
NCIS:
In The Night Hours - Alden reflects on your relationship and how far you've come
Nothing I Wouldn't Do - There is nothing you wouldn't do for Nick.
NCIS LA:
At His Best - AJ only wants you to have good memories of your time together.
For Better, For Worse - Your sister Sissy causes problems for you Nik.
Numb3rs:
Invaluable - Ian stays the night.
Psych:
Coffee - Carlton knows something wrong from the way you take your coffee that morning.
Reacher:
Not What I Expected - You aren't what Reacher expected.
The Rookie:
Out of Your League - John has always thought you were beautiful.
Scars - John loves you and all your scars.
The Rookie Feds:
Lifetime - Brendon is building a life with someone else.
Climax (NSFW) - You think about Brendon on the day of his wedding.
Silent Witness:
The Backseat - You and Jack have an unusual meet cute.
Cursed - Jack is sure his car is cursed.
SOA:
Worship (NSFW) - Tig worships you in the bedroom.
ATF!Series Part One: A Rabbit You Don't Want To Chase - Stahl makes an unwelcome return to David's life.
Triple Frontier:
Break (NSFW) - Frankie forces you to take a break.
Yellowstone:
Bluebelle - Walker sings you a very important song.
Stop Thinking, Start Listening - Ryan hates seeing you with another man.
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illmetkismet · 4 months
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I'm so sorry if you've talked about this before, but if not, i wanted to ask you what's your opinion on 4make Leon? Do you think he's still a bit like that 21 yr old rookie he was in Racoon City?
:)
Eeeeeee thank you for the ask!! I talked about the ways Leon changes between 2 and 4 a bit in this post (and specifically the second part in the reblog), but more in a general sense. To get more specific, I think re4r Leon still has the same core values he did when he was a baby boy rookie - he's kind, he's selfless, he wants to help people so badly - but Raccoon City made an open wound out of him, and the intervening years between then and when we meet him again in 4 have scabbed the wound over and then mangled him with emotional scar tissue.
Let's start with some good: re2r Leon had kind of a naive trust in authority figures that led him to do some shitty stuff. I'm thinking specifically not letting the reporter out of the holding cell, insisting he has to talk to Irons first, because there must be a reason he's in there, right? Even in the face of a zombie apocalypse, Rookie Leon was like, "The carceral system makes sense, actually." And I'm sure him helping Ada, and being so difficult to dissuade from doing so in the end, had to do not just with his crush on her, but also with her telling him she was FBI. The one time his easy trust of authority figures pays off is with Marvin, but let's not talk about that 🥺
Re4r, on the other hand, opens with Leon basically monologuing about how much he hates the government and then having an uneasy car ride with two cops. You get the distinct impression that he's trying to be civil but he finds the implication that they don't want to be there or help him kinda distasteful. He sees them for what they are: lazy country cops who don't take their duties seriously, and that ticks him off. So right off the bat we see a Leon who's kinda withdrawn (he spends most of the cutscene staring out the car window) and who hasn't retained that blind adoration of a police uniform.
Him meeting Luis and immediately clocking him as 'fishy' is another great character beat. In the OG he just takes Luis at his word about being a cop, but in the remake he asks Hunnigan to look into him, which not only shows us he's not as naive anymore, but actually helps advance their story and relationship in a way the OG never did. They get to have that confrontation later about Luis working for Umbrella, and then Leon has to work his way towards trusting Luis enough to rely on him for the medicine and for help getting to Ashley.
So he's less naive, which is the good, but the bad.... Oh man, the bad... Along with his naivete in 2, he was also kind of an optimist. That's been almost thoroughly beaten out of him by 4 - he's withdrawn, quiet, depressed, and traumatized. We see it so clearly because it stands in such stark contrast to his central motivation in the game: that this time it can be different. He hasn't fully given up on optimism; there's a tiny spark of it in his heart still, and all throughout 4 he's desperate to keep it alive by trying to save Ashley, to connect with Ada, to trust Luis, even in trying to talk Krauser down while they fight.
It feels like in 4 he's mourning the rookie he used to be. He's not as trusting or earnest or open. Instead, he's closed off and brooding, and he uses humour as a crutch, as a way to distance himself from the horror of the situation he's in. So he's clearly developed some unhealthy coping mechanisms to deal with his trauma.
I know you didn't ask about 6, but I think what they do with a 6 remake could be really interesting in how things go for Leon from here! 6, as it is now, and the way it segues into Vendetta, follows a through line of a Leon whose little flame of optimism pretty much gets extinguished. In re4 OG we don't get the ending cutscene of him and Ashley looking hopefully at the sunrise, and I think that could be the crux of things going differently for him. The 'things could be different' premise gets resolved in the remake - things ARE different this time! I really hope they carry that over to the rest of the remakes and don't take Leon down the same road of depression and alcoholism... That's a lot to hope for, since it seems like they intend for Vendetta to remain canon, but that's what I want to see, personally.
I want Leon to reclaim the positive aspects of the rookie he used to be, now that he's shed the negatives, and to fan that little flame of hope in his heart until he fucking burns with it!! Resi in general could use some hope, I think!! I'm just not a fan of where they left Leon at the end of Death Island, as this flippant, resigned guy who, ok, is not an alcoholic anymore, but now he's just a toy soldier. Same with Chris in 8, kinda, but that's a whole other can of worms!
Thank u for the ask again - I hope my Leon rambling answered your question 😅
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gaykarstaagforever · 6 months
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This is a list of scripted ABC shows from the last season. I haven't heard of most of them because I'm not 63 so I'm going to guess what they are about from the titles and then check and see how right I was. Or if my idea is better.
1. The Conners was that reboot / sequel of Roseanne. But then Roseanne was insane and racist in real life so they kicked her off of it. I assume it was retooled to now be about the family becoming private eyes and traveling from town to town in a gadget-loaded super RV, solving mysteries.
You should all note before I go on that most of what I know about network television comes from the 70s and 80s. Back when it was also cheap and lame, but at least fun.
2. Abbott Elementary. Probably just Community / The Office, but in an elementary school filled with a diverse cast of quirky characters who only seem to date each-other. I bet they do a lot of jokes about helicopter parents and people getting offended by seemingly innocuous things. There is probably a sassy brown person whose culture is played for light-hearted comic relief.
3. Station 19. Firefighter show, where all the firefighters look like soap opera actors. Most of the show is people having arguments and making out, then like 3 times a season stunt people in face-hiding fire gear fight a big fire inspired by some thing that happened in the news around the time they were filming the show. I bet the tag line is "And you thought the hottest action would be the fires!" Occasionally old actors from 80s movies will cameo as someone's parents. I am falling asleep just typing about it.
4. Grey's Anatomy. Oh my god. In real life these people would have retired from being bad doctors by now. Or be in jail.
5. The Rookie. I looked this one up due to the last post. Nathan Fillion plays a 50 year old rookie LAPD officer. Because they wanted to do a cop show with him but he's too old for that, without the premise. He probably has to learn about diversity and drugs or something. No one ever gets shot and they don't show LAPD white supremacist cop-gangs doing dog fights or anything. Wasted potential.
6. The Goldbergs. I've heard of this. It was some writer's Everybody Hates Chris about his 80s secular Jewish family. Obnoxious old people watched it to be reminded about how they just don't make good rock music like that anymore, man, because they are too old and lazy to go find new music they might like via streaming platforms. It has been cancelled. Good, if only to spare me that recurring conversation with people I don't like.
7. Home Economics. A rich white homemaker lady gets divorced and has to get a job as a home ec teacher at a public junior high to make ends meet? And she slowly learns to laugh and love again, while also coming to realize that poorer people are good for more than just mowing your lawn. There are hijinks about her wearing $600 shoes that get covered in cake batter. She has to rent part of her house out to an Indian immigrant family. Starring Delta Burke from 1995.
8. The Good Doctor. Ha ha ha. That show about an autistic doctor, except Hollywood doesn't know what autism actually is so he's just a deranged lunatic who gets away with shitty behavior because he's good at hearts.
But not in the fun, House MD, way.
9. The Rookie: Feds. This got cancelled so that means it was bad, even by low network TV cop show standards. I don't even know how to do that. Uh...some 50 year old TV actress I probably wouldn't recognize quits being a crime professor to become an FBI agent, after her son FBI agent goes missing under mysterious circumstances? And it ended in a cliffhanger when she got attacked by a polar bear in the middle of the jungle.
10. Not Dead Yet. My Name is Earl, but if Earl was a nice zombie. He has a best friend guardian angel played by Jaleel White.
...This actually just sounds like Highway to Heaven, if Michael Landon had been a zombie. And instead of brains he eats Jell-O, and he can take his limbs off and send them into air ducts and up drain pipes to help people, like trained rats.
...I'd watch a couple episodes of that, I guess.
11. Will Trent. Oh give me a break.
Okay. There is guy named Will Trent, who is on the run from the...CIA, because he was with them but then someone framed him for killing the Speaker of the House with a poisoned lapel pin. He now travels from town to town, helping average people and their sexy sisters out of jams, while also trying to figure out who framed him and what their master plan is, to clear his name.
The last season ended with it looking like the real villain is the First Lady, who belongs to some ill-defined anti-America cult.
It's probably based on a book series from the early 2000s that only the loudest uncles read.
12. Big Sky. Some cowboy thing, probably. Where all the cowboys are hunky stoic white men who are millionaire ranch owners. But you are still supposed to sympathize with all their "we gotta keep a-hold of this land at any cost" violent toxic male shit, because you are a postmenopausal my mother and want to have sex with these men.
It's one of those shows that just "accidentally" has zero POC cast members, who aren't one-shot drug-runners or coyotes or thugs hired by rival ranch owners.
One-shot because that is how all of their characters are killed.
It probably got cancelled when some writer got smart and tried to do a thinly-veiled anti-Trump allegory and all the Evangelicals turned on it. Tucker Carlson probably got mad about it for 3 minutes, before he interviewed some Russian politician about how the Ukrainians hate Jesus.
13. The Company You Keep. Black women try starting and running a bakery. It quickly devolved into a romantic melodrama. Black audiences never cared and white audiences wanted more sexy rich cowboys.
I don't know. It's ABC. Every seasonal lineup has at least a couple token shows starring POCs that get immediately cancelled after one season, because they aren't serious attempts at anything outside of the politics and so never connect with an audience.
Also all of them are still written by white men, so what chance could any of them have, really?
14. Alaska Daily. Northern Exposure, but the protagonist edits a news blog when not busy solving quirky small-town mysteries. The Janitor from Scrubs might be in it.
...Well. WAS in it.
This Twin Peaks thing is hard to pull off in a compelling way unless you are willing to go kookoo-bananas with it.
15. A Million Little Things. This one "ended," which means the cast wanted too much money after so many seasons, so "the producers had always planned from the beginning to wrap things up after 5 seasons."
It was probably one of those shows that just follows a "typical American family," which happens to have soap opera problems every week based on things the writers heard CNN say people in the Midwest are mad enough over to vote for Trump again.
It probably had a regular cast of like 16 people, and was on the giant TV in the showroom of every US car dealership at least once. Until someone changed it to that show which is just Kitchen Nightmares, but Gordon Ramsey has been replaced by a balding round man who lacks his charm and good heart and is just an asshole to struggling restaurateurs.
You know the one.
Or, at least, your parents do.
Update: The Conclusion
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hithelleth · 2 years
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What I've (Not) Watched Lately
I’ve meant to do another one of these for so long there’s quite a number of things I’ve watched or tried to watch. Under the cut because it will get long, but I need to get my feelings out, so I can move on.
I watched 3 episodes of La Brea and then gave up because by episode 3 I should care at least one character and I just didn’t. And plot-holes, lack-of-logic-wise it was worse than Revolution (and that says a LOT). How do people survive the fall and flashlights work but apparently no car does and all plane electronics go out?
I know I shouldn’t expect logic from TV shows, silly me. Anyway, it’s a shame because based on the premise this could have been the new Terra Nova (gah, I think I need a rewatch.) As if I don’t watch too many things already.
I tried Midnight Mass and quit after one episode after I asked a friend and checked doesthedogdie, because ep ending was a very nasty surprise and apparently that continues throughout the show and nope, dead cats and lots of blood & gore to follow etc. are not for me and that’s fine.
I watched two episodes of Moon Knight, but like with La Brea, just didn’t care about the characters (even though Osccar Issac is hot). The plot was at least better but not enough – and I wasn’t in the right space for the moral dilemmas (as in everyone being wrong in some way) it presented. I might give it another go some time, though.
I finally quit New Amsterdam after 4x8, because it got boring and I can’t stand Max (and Max and Helen – and to think I really shipped them in the beginning but the put it off at least a season too long and meh) and I hated the about re: hospital policy, because we can’t make non-capitalist ways work, can we?
I half watched No Time to Die. It was the worst of the Daniel Craig’s Bond movies, IMO. Madeline came out of nowhere and hence, again, I just didn’t care that much about her and everything. IDK how they couldn’t have better established the supposedly core motivation of the movie better in 2 and half hours, FFS. A minute or two less shooting would do the trick, I think.
I also watched Un peuple et son roi, because it was on national TV and it had been on my list. European production is always a nice change of tone and it was okay, but nothing special.
Now, on to more engaging things.
Speaking of European production, I watched Heartstopper and it was fluffy, light, and adorable, and I am looking forward to S2.
I’ve also watched a ton of currently airing shows (now ended/ending for the season.)
The Rookie was a pleasant time-killer, as always.
I need to quit 911 Lone Star. The only good thing I remember from this season was that short Tommy/Julius venture. So, yeah.
I only watched episode 1 of S7 of LoT and IDK if I’ll watch it through the end. Maybe just the ep(s) where Wentworth Miller was back? Otherwise I lost interest and it also got cancelled. So, depends on my mood/state of boredom.
I continued watching CPD, mainly for Tracy, of course, and it also was a nice way to kill time.
I also started Chicago Fire mid-season purely due to Brett Dalton guest-starring, but then got attached to a few other people (mostly Violet) and kept watching. And I was so satisfied with Brett’s character’s arc. It was a healing experience, nevermind the different show and all. I was happy.
I also continued watching Law and Order: SVU & Organized Crime (which I got into at the end of last summer) and these, too, are excellent time-killers. Although, for such an old show – and the same goes for the Chicago franchise – and big fandoms, the said fandoms are surely conservative AF. I guess if I want any content for random unconventional rare ships that pop into my mind, I’ll have to make it myself. If only I had the time & energy. Oh well, I guess it’ll just stay in my head.
The height of my weekly watching was the FBI franchise, as you may have noticed, in particularly the spin-offs, in particularly, the FBI: Most Wanted spin-off. I actually meta-d about those sporadically as I went along.
So in short, FBI is more or less boring and I hate them going back and forth with propping OA up for positive ‘representation’ just to then make him bow down to the ‘way the job is done’, ugh. But Shantel van Santen did bring a bit of fresh air to the show at the end of the season.
FBI: International is what it is and I wrote about it before, but I was satisfied with the season ending (I only caught up today) re: Scott’s mum and as I said before, I am invested in these characters, so I’ll keep watching.
The new boss on FBI: Most Wanted also brought in a lot of fresh-air and as you’ve probably noticed I also got invested to the point of starting giffing again (some of which I still have to do, but see: time and & energy).
Although I’ve just learned Ivan’s leaving the show, WTF. Going like that, this show will be worse than LoT; only two original characters remaining already in S4.
But, again, I’m invested in the rest of them – I also really like Kristin and Hana and Barnes – so I’ll tune in for the next season.
Oh, yeah, I’ve also been watching Stalker, because of reasons. I still have 4 episodes left, but It’s very good, too bad there was just one season.
Phew. I think that’s all. I watched a few other things I believe I talked about in separate posts already.
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pseudoneiiric · 1 year
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@deathwis​
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the profiler strides into the interrogation room with about as much grace as a newborn gazelle, with the appearance like they should grow into their legs but the reality still leaving something to be desired. at least norman doesn’t do anything stupid like trip over their feet or bump into a wall, but they still inwardly curse, keeping hands up to their lips like they’re uttering a silent prayer.
hell, maybe they are. it’s not like they’ve got years of experience under their belt. no, they’re just a rookie — just under twenty-one and only here to act as backup to agent bradley. it just so happened that the fbi couldn’t get more people to spare, so they’ve got their fledgling secretary to accompany the real agent over to bumfuck nowhere, arizona. all cause some twenty-somethings in over their head somehow got four cops killed, and then bradley mentioned something about national security? they’re not exactly sure what’s going on, but then since bradley caught wind of them wanting to be a real agent someday, he nudged them into the interrogation room to talk to tyler holt, the head honcho of the operation.
“we want a confession outta him,” bradley had insisted. “if we can pin it on him, this whole thing goes away.”
they’re still not really sure how all that works, and there’s an unsettling feeling prickling at their skin about how this whole thing is being handled. most of what they’re doing is the case reports, grunt work that the higher-ups hate doing. they’re good at it, too.
but that’s enough reminiscing about what’s going on, they figure. instead, they look up for the first time at their suspect, green eyes taking in the muscular guy in handcuffs before them. tyler holt, twenty-five. a solid four-and-a-bit years older than them, not that he needs to know that. still, they find their heart hammering away like a jackrabbit, wondering if they could take him in a fight if it came down to it. mind outta the gutter, norman, they remind themselves, and steady themselves. distantly aware of how they look, with their pressed suit that doesn’t quite fit them and the brown shoes that don’t really match. they probably look decently professional. and when they take a mental deep-dive into the criminal psychology they’ve studied, it strikes them that it’s probably a touch intimidating.
so when they open their mouth to put some theory into practice, they start with a soft voice, sliding gingerly into the chair across from tyler. “my name’s, uh...” norman, they want to say, but bradley had told them to introduce themselves as an agent despite not being one. “a-agent norman jayden, from the fbi.” the bostonian accent is thick on them, something they don’t really notice initially but can feel creeping over their skin. this sense of being a total outsider. “i’m not here to judge you — i just wanna go over what happened so we can get a better idea of the case.” they lay their file on the table, not well-versed enough in interrogation tactics to want to go all in. “y’see, i write the case reports and, uh, there’s not a lot that agent bradley lets me in on. but this report, it’s gonna go to the police, the judge... so whatever i write in here is gonna make or break your case.”
a nervous swallow. “so, uh... let’s start from the beginning. or wherever you wanna start. i know it’s been a... long couple’a days. you want water or something? i can ask someone to get you some.”
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quartfowl4 · 2 years
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How For Top Level Basketball Picks
In order to truly appreciate we have been of talent that Bill Walton was, you possess to again to the 1970's. He was quite "hippie" with regard to a success in professional sports. After graduating from UCLA, Walton let his wild red hair come to be a ponytail and he listened to bands much Grateful Middle. He dressed becoming a mountain man and lost the fight eating red meat. His diet ranged from rutabaga omelets to raw cucumbers. He even once called the FBI, "the enemy". Afterward he was brought looking for questioning after making those political cases. 9) Tyreke Evans--One of only four players in history to average at least 20 points, 5 rebounds and 5 assists component of his rookie campaign (Oscar Robertson, Michael Jordan and Lebron were another three). In order to understand see why he grabbed rookie on the year honors in the 2009-2010 interval. Gets to the rim whenever with a speedy first step and ends up. The tallest of all the guards on this list at 6'6, he or she can cause fits on the defensive end, when he wants which can. His inability to shoot the basketball consistently hurts him at times. Evans can also tend to lack of effort on the court and maturity from it, dropping him on the 9 spot. The graphics in video game is simply like horrible as being gameplay. Not one of the players be similar to their brick and mortar venues counterparts. Identifying a player can simply done by reading selected on the back of his uniform. Every intricate detail was phenomenal in NBA 2K8. Reduce even see the stitching along with on the uniforms for that game. Regrettably, NBA 08 does it is just come in order to the awareness to detail presented in NBA 2K8. I cannot think virtually any players are actually accurately represented in farmville. Maybe i thought this was a glitch, but I saw Kevin Garnett wearing pink hosiery. Later, the Bucks made their first trip towards the NBA Finals, just two seasons after acquiring Alcindor. They also added Oscar Robertson, an NBA player from the Cincinnati Royalty. Alcindor and Robertson complemented each other, leading the Bucks to an exceptional 66-16 checklist. In the playoffs, the Bucks disposed with the San Francisco Warriors (4-1), and the particular Los Angeles Lakers (4-1). In the NBA Finals, the Bucks trampled the Baltimore Bullets, sweeping them in four consecutive games. On certain days, alternatives here . only a few basketball games on the slate. Worth mentioning few games, there may be one or two NBA games may be televised nationally. Trouble with your car is the case, you'll be able to be positive that most belonging to the money bet in the NBA are usually bet on the nationally televised games. Examine the wire. Is the home team an underdog? It is well understood that NBA players give (at best) 70% effort during system that of the season, especially early as season. They'll however give maximum effort when they are aware of all eyes will be on these items. If you locate an instance where most of the attention becoming paid for that prime time game as well as the home team is an underdog, betting that underdog may perceived as good wager. If you are new to NBA basketball betting, start here. Don Nelson served in NBA as head coach for 20 years with Milwaukee, Golden State, New York & Dallas, tx. He served for 3 sessions as coach in 1982-83, 1984-85, and 1991-92. His club has recorded nine 50-plus wine seasons & seven divisional championships. I 'm going to declare that LeBron is my favorite player exactly why people dislike LeBron is puzzling in my experience. He never committed a crime or did anything to hurt anyone however he is either hated (which is really a vulgar word) or very disliked. 무료스포츠중계사이트 or she be arrogant at times but look in your mirror and identify you were never proud or arrogant about something in living. Can you throw the first material?
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7) Tony Parker--At number 7 on our list is Parker and eva longoria. As long as your company name isn't Longoria and tony parker or Brent Barry, you would love to this guy running the show. Three time NBA Champion and 2007 Finals MVP, Parker proved to us he can play the particular at a Championship position. He has a bonus gear, getting him in the paint, where he can score at a time best masters. His shooting ability is a little substandard and competitions years old he's the senior citizen of this list.
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thatgoblin · 3 years
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Chris Redfield and Leon Kennedy x Rookie Reader Headcannons
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Leon
At first you were in awe of your lead. THE Leon S. Kennedy was showing you the ropes and helping train you for the job you'd dreamed of. Hero worship was common in this line of work, but you did your best to keep it to a minimum. You didn't want to embarrass yourself after all.
In place of that hero worship came this insatiable need to make Leon proud. Whether it was memorizing and nailing every written exam or physical test, you wanted to earn his praise.
You worked hard, harder than almost everyone it seemed. Leon never saw you slacking and saw how serious you were about the job. Protecting people was what you had always wanted to do with your life.
So when the grades came back that you weren't doing so hot, you were mortified. How could you let this happen? You didn't slack off, you studied everything you could get your hands on, hell you watched instructional videos on YouTube before bed! But you still weren't making a passing grade.
You thought you would be okay with the physical part, but no matter how hard you trained, no matter the extra hours you put in, you just couldn't seem to get what everyone else did. The moves were simple, why couldn't you just grasp them?
The only thing you thought you had going for you was the firing range, but even that was less than acceptable. Every time you tried to do something the pressure got to you and you messed up. You were so busy trying to make sure you didn't fail Leon that you were failing yourself.
It was when you were called into your commanding officer's office to speak about your grades that you were sure you were done. You were given two weeks that were used for break to study and practice and retest. But you'd already had nearly four months and the best you could do was subpar.
You were in your room, packing your bags because you knew you were going to be kicked out of the program when Leon showed up.
"Hey, Kid, you leaving for break?" He asked as he leaned against the door frame of your dorm.
"Uh. . . No," you said, hanging your head in shame. "I'm flunking out. Figured that it would just be easier to pack my bag now than wait later till I was officially asked to leave."
"What? How are you flunking?" Leon asked, straightening up. "I watch you every day and you're one of the hardest working cadets I've seen."
"Hard work doesn't mean much when you can't apply it correctly," you said. "I can't get the fighting technique right, the written exams are all a bust, and I can't even shoot a gun right. I don't deserve to be here."
"Have you asked for help or for someone to tutor you? That's what I'm here for, you know," he said, moving into the room to sit on the bed next to you.
You stared at the floor as you took a deep breath, feeling all the insecurities come rushing through to the surface.
"I didn't want to disappoint you," you said. "I mean, I wanted to do it all myself without help. I wanted to make you proud that you were my lead. If I was always asking for help, what good does that do? It shows that I can't do something on my own and need my hand held like some baby."
Leon sighed as he folded his hands together between his knees.
"I get it. I do. Wanting to make your leader proud and show how good you are, but we're a team here. No one is by themselves. You're only so good as your team is and if you're not doing well then that's a reflection on us," he said.
"Oh god, are you guys getting in trouble because of me?" You asked, looking at him horrified that you were possibly making things hard for your team.
"No, no, I mean. . . We're a team for a reason. You have to lean on us and trust us so when we need to, we can lean on you and trust you. If you need help studying or practicing outside of classes, I'll help you. That's why I'm here. It can be hard to ask for help in any situation cause it means you're admitting to a weakness, but that's okay. That's how we get stronger as individuals and as a team," Leon said.
You nod with a sigh. "I have two weeks to get better before I officially am asked to leave. I don't know if I can do it on my own," you said. "Can you help me?"
"Of course. I've got your back, Kid," Leon said, giving you a soft smile.
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Chris
The B.S.A.A. was not for rookies, but they needed recruits so here you were. They provided training on weapons, protocol, how to work the gear, basically everything. Because they wanted everyone to be a well oiled machine out in the field, they made sure if you couldn't cut it that you didn't make it out of training. It was life and death and while they needed the hands, they weren't sending people out to die.
The trainers rotated to take classes of trainees. You were lucky enough to get the legendary Chris Redfield for your class leader. He would be teaching everything and making sure that everyone was ready. You had heard of him before, knowing that he was a weathered agent and could almost do anything was daunting.
Which was probably why you tried to avoid him at all costs in one on one situations. He wasn't mean or an ass, but he was intimidating. His stature and history were more than enough to show he knew exactly what he was talking about. You didn't want to feel stupid or embarrass yourself, so you kept him at a distance as you worked almost on your own.
Sure there were classes and work that you were trained in, but just the fear of being the weak link in front of others was hindering you. All of your tests and physical training was mediocre at best. Sure there were people that weren't going to cut it obviously, but you were much closer to their end of the spectrum than the other end that was running circles around you.
It wasn't that you couldn't do it. You could, but sometimes you froze up because your hands did something your mind didn't want to do or nerves made you stutter and stumble over your words. Everyone in the class at least had a background in the military or the police force or FBI or CIA or some other group that was similar to this.
You on the other hand did not. You came from a more technical background rather than a physical one. While you were miles ahead on the written tests, the physical ones were going to kill your career.
So when the notice went out that you were on the chopping block to be let go unless you could prove you were capable of being in the field, you weren't surprised.
Half of you wanted to keep trying, but the other half was telling you to pack up and go. You weren't unique or special, so why bother to continue to try?
It was when you were were working with one of the large guns by the shooting range, that Chris approached you. Before then, you two hadn't said a word to each other outside of the classes or even directly to each other.
So when his large frame took a seat across from you, folding his hands on the table after setting a file next to him, watching you with the gun, you weren't sure what to think.
"Hi," you said, freezing as you looked from the gun to him.
"Y/N, right?" He asked. You nodded as you set the pieces of gun on the table. "Why are you here?"
Oh Jesus, no. Why now? Why here?
"Uh," you said, blinking rapidly as your brain tried to come up with an answer. "Because I wanna help people."
"That's usually the answer I get," he said, sitting back to let his hands drop into his lap. "That or 'to kill bio weapons.' That's also a popular one."
"Yeah?" You said, unsure of what he was getting at.
"But I don't think it's why you're here," Chris said. "Because I think you don't know why you're here." Opening the file, you could see it was all information about you. Your background, schooling, family, credit score, even online usernames. They had everything. "When I was looking through the potential trainee's info, you struck me as odd. It's not exactly an every day thing that we get people who are more tech inclined rather than have a police or military background, but it happens. Usually they wash out though and end up in our research department."
"But I don't want to be in the research department," you said, frowning. Was he going to push you over to that section of the organization? You didn't want to be there though, otherwise you would have applied there.
"Every time I talk to someone and they have the chance to go to research after speaking to them about it, they take it," Chris said. "They figured out they can't cut doing the ground work so they move to a different field, but not you. I see you everyday in training, working your ass off to keep up with everyone and you almost make it. Not quite, but almost. Almost isn't going to cut it out on a mission."
"I know, I just. . . I'm working on it," you said, trying not to sound hateful or rude as your hands started to move on autopilot, putting your gun back together. "I'm really trying and I just can't get over this stupid hump that's holding me back."
"What's that? What's holding you back?" Chris asked.
"Me. I'm holding myself back," you said with a sigh. "I second guess everything because everyone around me has the experience that I don't, but I know I can do it. I just choke when it's time to act."
"I know you have some experience that they don't," Chris said. You nodded, understanding what he was talking about.
"I was a kid when it happened, I could barely call it working experience," you said, pushing the empty magazine into the gun.
"It was for Sherry Birkin," Chris said. "Raccoon City for a 9 year old isn't something to sniff at. From what the reports said, you were by yourself for three days before you made it out."
"Yeah," you said, nodding as you moved to the handgun next, disassembling it easily. "Hid in my apartment till I saw military trucks driving by then ran out."
"You lost your whole family to what we're training you to fight," Chris said, keeping his eyes on your hands as your fingers moved without faltering as you put the gun back together. "You were a kid when that happened. I say it still counts for experience that no one else really has. You know what you're doing with the infected and you know what it's like in the aftermath. We need people who know what it's like so that we can stop it from happening again."
"So what do you propose?" You asked, looking up as you finished putting the handgun back together. "After school training? Tutoring? Or do you want me to be counselor for survivors or shove me off to R and D?"
Chris chuckled as he closed the folder to look up at your face.
"I'm not gonna cut you," he said. "You know what you're doing and you're right. You're hang up is yourself. I'm gonna work with you to get over it. It's probably one the easiest things to work through really."
"You mean I can stay?" You asked, relaxing back into the chair, not even realizing you had grown so tense.
"Yeah. I just watched you take those weapons apart and put them back together in record time without even pausing," he said, pointing to the guns in front of you. "I want to work with you, Y/N. This isn't going to be an easy fight, but I really believe you have what it takes to be a good B.S.A.A. agent."
"Thank you, Sir," you said, smiling softly. "I appreciate that."
"You're welcome. We'll start some one on one combat training tomorrow before class. You're going to be working double what the others are, but it'll be for the best in the long run," he said.
"Whatever it takes, I'll do what I need to," you said.
"Glad to here it. Now, while we're here in the shooting range, let's test your aim."
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babbushka · 3 years
Note
Good morning from rainy old England again! 💙 First of all, I’m so excited for all the up coming pieces of work that are going to come from your sweet Husbands birthday session! Thank you so much for doing this for us 💙🥰 You’ve given us work like this before; but what would happen if one day Flip came home after a bad day of work and just needed some love from his wife? Nothing crazy, maybe just her asking if he needs and hug and him swan diving into her arms or something? Doesn’t have to be heavy or angsty, just our sweet old Mr and Mrs Zimmerman showing each other some love 🥺
Hello my dear friend! Thank you so much for sending this is! I hope you enjoy the fluff :)
1k, cw: mention of baby zimmerman, mostly just flip being a grouch lol
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You smell him, before you see him. The moment he opens the door, an unfamiliar waft of tobacco hits your nose, and for a split second, you panic that it might not be your husband at all, until you hear the familiar curse under his breath as he drops his keys, and you smile.
“Honey? I’m home.” Flip calls from the foyer in the way that he does every day when he arrives at a decent hour, but even still, right away you can sense something’s off.
And you’re right, because as you round the corner to greet your lumberjack, he looks more surly than usual. He’s got a scowl set deep into his forehead, his lips tugged down into a firm frown. With a soft smile, you extend a hand for him and he takes it happily, lets himself be tugged into the kitchen where something hot and fresh is waiting for him.
“Rough day?” You ask even though you know the answer is yes, “You look like you’re going to kill something.”
“I fuckin’ feel like I want to.” Flip groans a little, sees his son sitting happily in his high chair playing with cheerios on the little tray in front of him, and gets over himself. “Just a lot of bullshit, one stupid fuckin’ thing after another.”
Picking the baby up, the boy’s bright eyes crinkle at the corners when he bursts into happy giggles, the kind that Flip’s never sure whether or not the baby is making fun of him, or just glad to see him. You always tease that it’s both, but either way, he smooches the boy right on his dimples in greeting, and sets him back down on his chair.
“Want to tell me about it?” You watch the interaction fondly from the fridge where you hand him a beer, one that he takes gratefully.
Flip wasn’t much of a talker around other people, he was observant more than anything, preferred to sit and watch from the sidelines, absorbing information like a sponge. It’s what made him such a great detective – he was stoic, and composed, and more or less a fly on the wall.
Except for when he’s just around you, in which case you’d be hard pressed to get him to shut up.
“Well first of fuckin’ all, someone parked in my goddamn spot. I’ve had the same parking spot for seven years at this fuckin’ station and someone decided to park there. New kid, Jones? Rookie didn’t know any better so I let it go. But then, the guy used my mug – you know the one I keep in the rec room? So now the kid’s officially on my shit list.”
Flip rambles on and on, listing off the things that he can remember in the moment.
“I had a meeting with Trapp where he basically told me and Ron we’ve got to push harder with the case because the FBI is going to get involved which is always such a fucking pain in the ass and we need to finish our work before they take over and have jurisdiction. And on top of all of that, I’m out of fuckin’ cigarettes at the office.”
“Oh shit, why didn’t you call me I would’ve brought you some.” Eyes widening, you feel for him. You knew Flip has been a smoker since he was thirteen and had no plans to start quitting anytime soon, and you also knew how big of a bitch he could be when he has to go without them.
Flip scrubs a hand over his face and shrugs, “I didn’t want to bother you, I bummed a couple off of Jimmy but he smokes Marlboro and you know how much I fuckin’ hate Marlboro.”
“I did think you smelled off.” You tease then, wanting to try and get him in a lighter mood. “I got worried for a sec, thought you might be sneakin’ off to another woman.”
“As if you’re not too much to handle as it is!” Flip scoffs, before rounding the kitchen table and pulling you into a tight hug, attacking your throat with bites that have you squirming out of his grip with a grin.
“Bullshit, you like that I’m high maintenance.” You wink at him, dancing just out of his reach, making him hunt after you, long legs making that job easier.
“Yeah I do.” He catches you, eyes flicking down to your lips.
You get the hint, and loop your arms over his strong shoulders, hands carding through the hair at the nape of his neck, twisting and twirling it between your fingers as he calms down, asking, “Kiss me a little?”
Flip hopes that his son is still working on those cheerios as he tips your chin up and captures your mouth with his. Almost at once you can feel the tension slip out of his body, he sighs out a long held breath of relief, finally back in your arms. It really was the best place for him to be, for everyone’s sake.
As your tongues slide against one another, eyes closed, lashes brushing against your cheek as your noses bump together, somewhere in the back of your mind you feel bad for Flip’s coworkers – you can only imagine the state he had been in all day.
“Next time call me, I’ll bring you smokes.” You pat at his chest when the kiss ends, and Flip nods appreciatively.
“God what the fuck would I do without you?” Flip asks dreamily, pinching at your ass as you step away from him.
Flip follows you, because Flip doesn’t really do much else when he’s home other than follow you around and bug you all day long.
“Die probably.” You throw over your shoulder as you check to make sure the baby is okay.
“Yeah, probably.” He agrees with a knowing nod, which makes you laugh, which in turn makes the baby laughs, and Flip can’t help but think how fuckin’ glad he is to be home.
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I am once again taggin' some flip lovin' friends lol @mochabucky @sacklerscumrag @artsymaddie @bitchydecisions @direnightshade @reyloaddict55 @thembohux @kylorenswhxre @sunflowersinthesnow @babayagakeanu @safarigirlsp @steeevienicks @materialisthicc @hswritingrecs @han68000 @rosi3ba3z @chapterhappygirl @loverofallthings @groovetoob @bxnnywriting @glassbxttless @angel-bxby3 @smallgirlbigpersonality @lovelyyy-luna @2000andwhat @raddo1975 @cornmousequeen @metsienmenninkainen @caillea @painttheskylineforme @holding-on-to-starwars
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likesrandomstuff · 3 years
Text
Avalance Fic Recommendations Part 4
The final part of this series. Thanks to everyone who reblogged and liked, and a huge shout-out to @heywhereisperry who encouraged and motivated me into doing this.
As I said in Part 1, feel free to add any more stories you think should be recognised to any of these posts, and my ask box is open if you would like more detail on anything.
Part 1: Bite Sized
Part 2: Snacks
Part 3: Meals
Banquets (Over 75,000 words)
When you do not have anything you need to do in the next couple of days
You're My Miracle by bihexualmess
My tags: Ava is FBI, Sara is a Private Investigator, Rip brings Sara on for a case
This just got updated the other week and ruined multiple nights of sleep for me. At almost 350k words, still going, I don’t know how to explain without spoiling stuff that happens a long way in. There are so many layers to both Ava and Sara here, and the trauma, and the issues, and the fact they will not talk to each other about anything. I jumped on this a bit late, as the title and description didn’t grab me, but oh boy, I was missing out. I did get to read a heap of it in one go, but that doesn’t help the slow burn. I would start this even though it’s still a WIP, just because it will take you a while, to read, and also the storylines need time to settle in, because they are heavy, but just amazing. It is now the longest Avalance fic with the latest update.
this is the way that we love (like it's forever) by CoffeeAndArrows, moonlitprincess
My tags: College Avalance dated and broke up, five years later they meet again, Ava’s dating someone else
This fic had me crying in the lunchroom during my second week of work because I couldn’t not read during my lunch break, and it was hitting me so hard. That was after starting it at 10pm, reading to 2am, sleeping until 6am, reading until 11am a couple of days before. Warning for major character deaths; the funeral for one is alluded to in the description. If anyone says something bad about Jordan, I will not be happy; one of the best original characters I have ever read in a fic. Sara’s not in a great place initially, but she gets there. And there’s some cute flashbacks to college Legends too.
you make me smile (please stay for a while now) by CoffeeAndArrows, moonlitprincess
My tags: High School Rivals AU, Ava’s class president, Sara is the superstar soccer captain, they have more in common than they thought
I just looked at the word count for this, and it must be the first time I have, because wow! It is a journey! There’s a couple of prequel, sequel and interjection stories in this universe too. Ava has to deal with her family not being super supportive when she comes out. Sara has to deal with Laurel struggling and their mum having a clear favourite (Laurel). Most of the Legends have really great arcs in here as well. Ava’s family is great. I wanna hang out with her little sister. Don’t be like 2018 me who gives up after the first chapter because they are mad about what Laurel is going through. She’s fine, and there’s a heap of great Sara and Laurel moments. I recently re-read the last 10 chapters, and I still couldn’t stop myself from reading like it was the first time.
i am who you used to love (and you are just a memory) by justpalsbeingals
My tags: The Vow AU, but Ava makes some better choices early on, they’re married, Ava gets into an accident and loses all memory of Sara
I hate the movie this fic is based on. The movie’s fine, and it was a delight seeing Tatiana Maslany in it while I was watching Orphan Black, but basically it is my worst-case scenario, losing my memory. The fact that this fic kept me hooked despite that, is a testament to the quality. The fic itself says “light angst”, I say it’s much, much heavier than that, but that’s just me. Warning, there are some intense twists in here, and everyone is a bit OOC to me, memory loss being considered, which might not be your thing.
and i will stumble and fall (i'm still learning to love) by lucylikestowrite
My tags: SwanQueen kid fic AU, yes, I know go with me on this, Ava adopted Sara’s unexpected baby, said kid finds Sara years later
In general, as I’ve mentioned before, I don’t like kid fics. Fics with future children coming back to meet their parents, or the couple going into the future? Some of my favourites ever. This has no time travel, but I trust Lucy. This story is under 75k, but the sequel is almost as long, so combined they’re over. The sequel is a WIP. I didn’t watch Once Upon a Time, but it’s the plot of the start of that, except the gay actually happens. There are a lot of issues our girls have to work through here, but the kid is so cute.
and we could try by plinys
My tags: it’s a story mostly told on twitter through fake screen shots of social media, Sara drunk messages Ava, Ava doesn’t block her
I’m sure this format of storytelling is not for everyone, and that’s okay! I was so confused by it at first. I would recommend starting with the shorter one, I can be your hero (in Part 2), just to see if you like it, before jumping into this. I read this when the epilogue, the fic, was released, and I was up until 5am because I couldn’t stop. It became part of my personality. Story wise, Sara and Ava are on different coasts, but both know Nate, Ray and Nora. Ray and Nora get engaged, and Avalance have to deal with planning that wedding, and whatever is going on with them.
take my hands now by plinys
My tags: Another Social Media twitter AU, Sara is The Canary, Ava is trying to arrest vigilantes, Nate accidently gives Ava Sara’s number
Another brilliant twitter story. Some of our gang is trying to arrest the other half. Sara knows who Ava is, Ava doesn’t know that Sara is the person she’s chasing. Everyone has public twitter accounts. Sara actually gets [spoiler villain] to stop an attack by sending them money for a drink.
your eyes, they shine so bright by plinys
My tags: Social Media AU, everyone works for not Buzzfeed, a colab series is pitched, Sara and Ava’s teams have to work together
Ava makes factual videos, Sara does not, they are forced to work together. Nate is everyone’s boss technically, but they do what they want. Nate and Ava are non-biological siblings, and Satan Camp is a running gag. Oh, fake dating is in there too!
right to the top, don't hold back by SJAandDWfan
My tags: American Ninja Warrior AU, Sara’s a veteran and the Legends train together, Ava’s a rookie, rivals to training partners to friends to …
I re-read this every year when the new Australian season comes out. It’s so burned into my brain that when I was watching the speed climbing at the Olympics I genuinely thought “I wonder how Amaya would go in this?”. Amaya’s pre-Ninja experience is rock climbing in this fic. I learnt so much about Ninja Warrior and how the show (at least in this universe) works, and it’s fascinating. Would recommend watching some clips if you’re unfamiliar with the concept. The story goes pretty in detail about the courses. For recommendations, either Jessie Gaff, who was a S1 Supergirl stuntwoman, or Australia’s own Olivia Vivian, who is just stages better than our next female.
biding our time (until tomorrow) by TheTruthAboutLove
My tags: Period setting AU, Ava’s too noble for her own good, Oliver’s dad is the villain
This was a really cool experiment. Basically, told in lots of mini chapters like a soap opera. I do not know much about this period of American history, but it did not matter. A lot of different Arrow-verse peeps show up along the way. I’m sure I complained out loud “you’re allowed to want things Ava!” at some point. There’s an attempt for fake dating, and it’s not the homophobia but the second daughter problem that gets them.
Click here to see all the parts
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hotchley · 3 years
Text
strawberry cheesecake
BAM! IT’S HERE!!! BEFORE MIDNIGHT AS WELL!! It was 23:14 when I hit publish on ao3 and I really do need to go to sleep, but it’s here, with some level of accuracy because I googled what happened when someone has an allergic reaction.
Finally, I, the pioneer of Aaron Hotchner’s strawberry allergy, has written the fic where he eats strawberry cheesecake at an FBI function and has a reaction. It got unexpectedly dark, but we’re going with it.
As usual, I have not proofread it, and I kinda need you to suspend all belief about how the FBI works/is run because the function kinda doesn’t make much sense and yeah... you’ll see what I mean when you read... I’m really hoping this doesn’t suck because you guys actually looked forward to it??
Trigger/Content Warnings; food, referenced child death (most recent case), alcohol consumption, anaphylactic shock/allergic reactions, child abuse, hospitals and I think that’s everything
Word Count: 7669 (it got really out of hand...)
read on ao3!
If there was one thing David Rossi hated more than local press giving unsubs ridiculous names because they believed it would make a good headline, it would be FBI functions. And not just any type of FBI function. The FBI function where the Behavioural Analysis Unit- which nobody had believed in- would be mentioned so frequently that it felt like they were on a case.
It was just his luck that one was being held on the same day that he was supposed to be going to the ballet with one of the lovely women that worked in the White-Collar unit. Because despite the rumours that went flying around about him and his dating habits, he was not going to take advantage of his position and make rookies or anyone else uncomfortable. The woman he was supposed to be meeting had approached him and asked if he’d liked to go.
Hotchner had been watching him, looking slightly scandalised as she had placed her hand on his tie, and so Rossi had said yes. He’d even leant in slightly and asked if she would have a problem with him giving her a kiss on the cheek. When she said that she wouldn't, and would actually quite like that, he did and Hotchner had fallen off his chair.
Rossi had smirked, the lady had laughed and Hotchner had hit his head trying to get back up, gone an even brighter red and made something up about dropping his pen and needing to grab it. Rossi’s date had snickered, whilst Rossi had just raised an eyebrow.
Hotchner had excused himself to the bathroom.
As he ran out of their area, closely followed by Anya- she’d slipped Rossi a piece of paper with her name and number, Erin Strauss had walked in, holding two envelopes.
Rossi didn’t need to be a profiler to know what was in there.
“No,” was the first thing he said.
“David,” Strauss warned.
“Erin,” he mocked.
Strauss sighed. “Look, I know you hate these things, but the entire bureau is founded on politics and people-pleasing. If you come to this, then there may be less questions about what exactly it is you do all day, apart from ogling the other agents.”
“I do not ogle. And I guess it’s too much to hope that the other invitation is for Anya, isn’t it?”
Strauss nodded. “It’s for Aaron. Do try and get him to come, it’ll give us all something pleasant to look at whilst we slowly die inside.”
Dave stared at her.
She rolled her eyes. “Look, I’m not saying that I want to ruin his marriage or sleep with him, I’m just saying he’s objectively attractive. And I don’t know why you look so surprised, Jason told me about the women that flirt with him. And that you started calling him pretty boy, which hasn’t exactly gone unnoticed.”
“Right.”
“Just make an effort to actually attend. And please get Agent Hotchner there too,” she said.
Dave just nodded.
Aaron had returned from the bathroom.
“Agent Hotchner. I hope Dave hasn’t been making you feel too awkward with all of his comments,” she said. It was clear that she was just trying to see whether any had been made.
Aaron’s cheeks flushed again. “Not at all ma’am,” he said, holding the door open for her. She nodded and left, but not before turning to Dave one last time as she gave him an extremely pointed glare. He made a face at her, which caused her to laugh.
When Hotch had sat back down again, Dave finally acknowledged him.
“That trip to the bathroom seemed rather urgent,” he joked.
“I- well, so,” Hotch stuttered.
Dave shook his head. “It’s fine. And it doesn’t look like that date will be happening anyways, so it’s not a big deal.”
“Wait why won’t it be happening? You both seemed… excited at the prospect of going.”
In response, Dave threw the second envelope at his head. Aaron’s reflexes weren’t fast enough, so it just bounced off and landed on the floor. As he bent down to pick it up, Dave began to understand why Erin and the other agents thought of him as being something pleasant to look at. As in, Aaron had pretty eyes. And his hair was constantly falling in his face, which was endearing.
“That envelope is why it won’t be happening.”
Aaron stared at him and then opened it. “Oh.” He seemed even less enthusiastic than Dave did about attending. 
“I thought you would have been thrilled at the thought of going. It’ll be like all those balls you went to when you were just a young boy growing up in the good old South Virginia," Dave said. He knew he was toeing the line.
Aaron's silence about his childhood revealed more than his words ever could.
"First of all, I didn't attend balls when I was a young boy. The only dance I ever went to was my prom, and that was only because Haley basically forced me to go. And South Virginia isn't that good, that's just a stereotype that people have because people live in fancy houses with white picket fences," Aaron snapped. It was uncharacteristically sharp.
"Sorry," Dave said. And he meant it.
Aaron's eyes widened. "Sir, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have lashed out at you. You've not done anything wrong. I just-"
"It's okay. Do you want to talk about it? There's no pressure, it's just if you wanted to. That seemed like quite an extreme reaction to something so trivial." Why was he so bad at this? He could charm any woman he wanted, yet the moment he tried to speak to Hotchner about anything other than work and Haley, he sounded like an idiot.
"I left prosecution because it was always more about politics than actually helping people get justice for the terrible things that had happened to them. And now it just feels like nothing has changed and time that could be spent stopping someone from destroying lives is just going to go on people-pleasing," Aaron confessed. He wouldn't meet Dave's eyes.
Dave wanted to pull him in for a hug, but he knew it would most likely not be well received. He also knew that wasn't the whole truth, but it wasn't his place to push. Aaron felt things, more deeply than the rest of them, but he would never admit to anyone that there were certain cases that got under his skin.
Like the one they had just finished. A child wasn't going to be coming home, but the look on the mother's face when they informed her was not one of sorrow. It was one of relief. Aaron had asked to stay behind to speak to her for just one more moment. And when he returned, there was an anger written in the clench of his jaw that Dave had never seen before.
Jason had told everyone to give the kid space. Against his gut instinct, Dave had listened to him. Which he now very much regretted.
"Kid. We all have limits. Nobody can spend every hour of every day hunting down these guys. At the end of the day, we're all just human. I won't lie to you, it will be a lot of people-pleasing. However, it will also- if you let it- be a bit of fun. You're a good agent Hotchner. And an even better person. Let yourself breathe for once."
Aaron looked down. "Thanks Dave."
Dave just shrugged. It was only when Aaron left the room again did he let himself groan. Now he was going to have to pretend to enjoy himself at the function or else Hotchner would just be upset because of his ruined date.
Depending on how you looked at it, the members of the BAU were either lucky or unlucky when no cases turned up the morning of the event. Dave had been watching the fax machine intently, and Max had been looking through a suspicious number of case files the entire day. But in the end, there was nothing.
Which was how Dave found himself standing around, sipping a glass of champagne he thought tasted horrible, talking to strangers he couldn't care less about and silent seething at Hotch. He wasn't there yet, despite phoning Dave to say he would be there in half an hour about forty five minutes ago. 
The only reason he'd bothered to attend and not faked some form of emergency that would let him go on his date with Anya was because he wanted Hotch to have someone to keep him company and make him laugh as he suffered through conversations about being an ex-prosecutor and the change to the FBI.
He was looking round for a waiter so he could take yet another glass when Aaron appeared in the doorway, fiddling with his cuff links. His cheeks were slightly flushed and his hair was more ruffled than usual. As he entered, awkwardly greeting people and tripping over his own feet, Dave rolled his eyes.
How the kid had managed to pass all of his assessments and be the best shot in the entire building was still completely beyond him.
"Hi," Aaron greeted, a dopey grin on his face.
"It's lovely of you to join us," Dave remarked. He just couldn't help it. When Aaron's face fell slightly, he regretted it. He kept forgetting that Aaron took the things people said a bit too literally sometimes. Especially if it came from someone he looked up to.
"I'm sorry about your date being ruined," Hotch said. He was looking around at all the other people in their perfectly tailored suits and beautiful dresses. It made him- with his slightly too big shirt and undone bow tie- look even younger than he already was.
"Well barring any disasters, this should be over in time for me to make it. Anya said she could wait."
There was a slight silence, broken only by Dave rejecting what would have been his third glass of champagne and Aaron quickly accepting it. And then it became too much for him to bear.
"Kid, why is your tie undone?"
Hotch's eyes widened like he had only just realised. Rossi wouldn't have been surprised if that was true. For someone that was a profiler, he was quite oblivious sometimes. Not realising that if you took your vest off and then someone shot at you, you would suffer more than a few bruises, forgetting that his shirt collar wouldn't cover his entire neck, the list went on.
But this was something entirely different. Aaron Hotchner's tie was never undone.
Rossi raised an eyebrow when an entire minute passed without him explaining himself and the colour rose to his cheeks.
"Well, it took me a really long time to do it the first time and then Haley came into our room to grab her bag. And then she really likes it when I get all dressed up because I normally hate doing it- I mean I always hate it- so then she, you know and then I thought I had tied it properly but clearly I hadn't."
Rossi had never heard so many words spoken in a single breath. He did however, understand what the kid was trying to say. "Well at least one of us got to have some fun tonight," he joked.
"Is that why everyone's been staring at me?" Hotch asked, turning his back to Strauss. The woman simply raised an eyebrow, then raised her glass of champagne at Rossi, who glared at her, just because he could.
"Yes," he lied, because he was not about to be the one that explained to him that people were staring at him because he had been deemed the eye candy of the Quantico and therefore, everyone loved him.
"You're lying to me. I can tell! What's the truth?"
Not for the first time, Dave wondered what he'd been thinking when he saw the lead agent in Seattle run after a suspect without any sort of back-up, slip in poison ivy and then carry on running, even though everyone else had realised it wasn't the killer they were after and decided that he would make them into a profiler.
"Are you sure you want to know?" he said, making his voice as serious as he could in a vain attempt to make him change his mind.
"Yes. Because it's nowhere near as bad or as serious as you're making it out to be."
Damn him.
"Fine. But I did warn you. It's because you are- objectively- attractive. And apparently, your slightly repressed accent makes everyone swoon. Also Strauss thinks you have a nice ass," Dave said, completely nonchalant.
Hotch's cheeks went brighter than ever before and he spun round, searching for Erin. She had rather coincidentally turned her back to the two of them as she engaged in a very serious conversation with another Section Chief.
"I- I don't even want to know how you know that," Aaron muttered, stuffing his hands into his trouser pockets, looking like a petulant child.
"Oh I thought you would love it! You're basically a Southern Belle."
Dave was lucky he was immune to the Hotchner Glare as it came out in full force. "Don't call me a Southern Belle. Do you even know what that is?"
Dave shrugged. "I'm sure I could guess. Look, I'm sorry, I'm just being bitter. Come here."
Aaron regarded him suspiciously. "Why?"
If it had been anyone else, Dave would have told them it was a surprise. Or that they wouldn't know until they stepped forward. But Aaron wasn't anyone else, and Dave needed to remember that. There were certain things he just couldn't say.
"We're going to be here for a while. You can't just stand there with your bow tie undone."
Aaron narrowed his eyes, but stepped forward. When Dave reached forward and grabbed the ends, he tensed. To anyone else, it was too minute a gesture to be noticed. But Dave had spent more time reading people than he had with his second wife. He knew why Aaron was tensing. It was why he took as little time as possible tying it neatly, even though he wanted to take forever.
So that the other agents wouldn't be staring and making him self conscious. That was his only reason. It had nothing to do with the attachment he could feel himself forming, and it most definitely was not linked to his desire to help Aaron associate touch with love and comfort.
When he stepped away, Aaron seemed to relax slightly. "Thank you," he said, ever the gentleman.
Dave just shrugged. "You look better with it done properly. Speaking of, where is Haley?"
"What does Haley have to do with me looking better with my tie done properly?"
"Your tie wasn't done properly because of Haley. Come on Hotch, I thought you were meant to be an ex-prosecutor. And we both know the two of you are inseparable."
Hotch flushed, the way he always did when someone mentioned just how in love with Haley he was. Dave found it adorable, even though he hated himself for that. But he knew how important Haley must have been to Aaron's survival, so even though he wasn't her biggest fan, he begrudgingly respected her.
"She's out with her sister," he mumbled. "They made plans ages ago and they've been so excited for it that I couldn't ask her to cancel just to keep me company."
"That's kind of you. Most men probably wouldn't let their spouse just leave them when there's an event like this going on," Dave said. 
"If you want to go on your date I'll cover for you when Strauss comes calling," Aaron said, rather suddenly. 
Rossi frowned at him. Aaron had seemed excited at the thought of spending the evening together when he first arrived and for him to suddenly seem so willing to spend it apart, just so Dave could go on a date with someone who he was sure was lovely but he couldn't envision a future with, was more than a little unusual.
"Like I said, barring any disasters, I should be able to make it. Are you annoyed at me for bringing up Haley? I know that we had a bit of a rocky start when we first met, but I do respect her. And I like to think she appreciates the fact that I keep you alive."
"I'm not annoyed at you for bringing up Haley," Hotch said, huffing slightly. He was fiddling with his cufflinks. Dave wanted to comment on his behaviour, but did not want to be reminded of the no-profiling rule- which Hotch himself had implemented.
"Well you're annoyed at me for something and I would appreciate you telling me, instead of just bottling it up until we're on a case and something else happens."
"Dave, I am fine," Hotch snapped, tone mitigating his words.
"I'm sure you are," Rossi snapped back, turning away. Strauss was frowning at the two of them and he rolled his eyes. Screw etiquette, and screw the people that thought they were being unprofessional and causing a scene.
They were, but he wasn't going to admit it.
"Do you really think I would forbid my wife to do something as harmless as going out with her sister the same night that I have to attend quite possibly the most boring function known to man?" Hotch suddenly asked, tone laced with malice.
"Of course not Hotshot. I was joking," he said, softening his tone as the problem clicked.
"I wouldn't. I'm not her keeper. And I'm not-" he caught himself, shaking his head. "I just wouldn't."
"I know. I'm sorry, it was wrong of me to joke that like that," Dave said, catching Erin's eye. She nodded, clearly pleased that he had resolved something without resorting to violence or shouting.
He didn't acknowledge her. He wasn't an idiot, and he knew that resorting to violence or even raising his voice would lead to some sort of shut down from Aaron. And he did want the kid to enjoy himself, even though he did agree that playing politics whilst people were dying was stupid.
"The decoration is nice," Aaron commented, a few minutes later.
"It is, isn't it? It reminds me of this opera house I took Carolyn to, for one of our anniversaries. Actually, that opera house seems like the sort of place Haley would enjoy going to. I'll give you the name, you can surprise her," Dave said, deciding he would take the win and prod later.
Aaron choked on his champagne, colour rising to his cheeks when he realised people were watching him cough. He cleared his throat once more before turning to Dave, making absolutely no attempt to hide his shit-eating grin.
"What?" Dave said, hating himself for taking the bait.
"I have to tell Haley that you think she's the kind of person that would go and enjoy herself at an opera house."
"Is she not?"
"Dave, for our last anniversary, I took her to the local theatre because they were putting on Pirates of Penzance because that's what got us together. And the year before that, we both thought it was a week later than what it was, so her sister ended up taking us out."
Maybe Dave wasn't as good a profiler as he thought he was, because in his mind, he had a very specific image of Haley, and none of what had just been said fit with that image. He supposed that was what he got for making assumptions, having never actually met her in person.
"Oh, that's certainly interesting," Dave said.
"She's a very interesting woman," Hotch said, smiling so wide it physically hurt Rossi to see because he knew how the BAU burnt out love, and the strain it put on marriages. Hell, he had lived through it.
"Hold onto her Aaron," he said, without thinking.
Aaron frowned. "Of course I will. Dave, you've been acting weird the whole time we've been here. Are you okay?"
In all honesty, he wasn't. He always said he wasn't like Jason. He had no interest in being a mentor, or finding the next generation of profilers. That was never what he wanted. But there was something about Aaron, and his too large suits and his floppy hair that made him feel things he wasn't ready to confront. 
But if he said any of that, Aaron would probably run for the hills. Hell, he probably would too.
"Of course I am. Now loosen up and enjoy yourself. I can tell you want to," he said, smiling when Aaron's eyes sparkled.
"What do you think Strauss would do if I told her I know what she thinks about my butt?" he asked, the smirk on his face far too mischevious for anyone's comfort.
"You can find out now," Dave said, nodding as Strauss approached them.
"Dave. Aaron, you look very handsome," Erin said, looking him up and down once.
Whatever had possessed Aaron just a few moments before had clearly vanished, as his cheeks flushed and he awkwardly stuttered out something that nobody, not even the person speaking, understood.
"Thank you… Ma'am. You look very nice too," he eventually managed to say, sipping his champagne to distract from his failure at speaking.
"Is there something you need?" Dave said.
"No, just making sure you weren't too bitter about your date being cancelled. And also making sure that Agent Hotchner would save both of us a dance after dinner. I'm sure everyone from Quantico wants to know whether or not our Southern Belle can dance," Erin said.
Hotch downed the rest of his glass. "I'm not- it doesn't work like- I don't- I really don't think- fine. One dance. But that is it, and none of you are allowed to laugh if I mess up, because I'm not the dancer. Haley is."
Haley seemed to be a lot of things that Aaron wasn't. Maybe it was part of the reason they were so well-matched.
Erin nodded, smiled at them both, then went to mingle with different people.
"See, everyone thinks you're a Southern Belle!" Dave said, smirking.
"But why? I've done everything I can to repress my accent, and I have done since the day I started law school," Aaron said. He did not whine, because grown men that worked for the FBI do not whine. But if they did, his sentence would have definitely sounded like whining.
"I know, and most days, it's only the slightest thing. I don't really know how everyone worked it out, but they did. And that's fine!"
Hotch pouted.
"Look, if you really don't want to dance, you could always land yourself in the hospital with some kind of injury. I could take you, sneak off to my date, Haley would affectionately roll her eyes and then give you all the kisses you want…" Rossi said, smirking.
"No it's fine. I'm not going to fake an injury, that would be so embarrassing," Hotch replied.
"Then stop pouting, you look like a child. And go mingle with someone else, if you spend the entire time before dinner with me, what will people say?"
Hotch snorted, then schooled his face into a look of neutrality, before nodding and going off to speak to one of the other higher-ups. Rossi noticed, rather fondly, that it was the one person that actually cared about the people involved in their cases, as opposed to just the politics and the prestige.
About five minutes later, he realised he missed the kid. And then he started to panic. Because he didn't get attached to people. Especially not new agents that had too much hope and faith. Not new agents that were that nice. He didn't. He couldn't.
Him and Aaron ended up seated next to each other at the banquet table, because there genuinely was no other way to describe it. It was long, and grand, and every platter was filled to the brim with food of so many different types. Dave honestly could not remember what the function was actually for, but a part of him was tempted to comment that if part of the budget for these events went to the BAU then they'd probably be able to properly fund the unit.
He refrained, if only because Aaron looked so excited at the prospect of finally eating something. Dave had learnt long ago that you had to eat before you came to these events because people loved talking and more often than not, you'd drink the champagne just to get through their conversations, but clearly Aaron hadn't quite learnt that lesson yet.
"So where is that wife of yours?" Max asked, seemingly out of the blue.
Hotch tensed. "Out with her sister. Why?"
"I've only seen you smile like you are now when Haley is around, but I don't see her anywhere," he said, in that annoyingly patronising tone of his.
Hotch relaxed, but flushed. "I-oh. Yeah. She's out with Jessica because they had made plans a while back and they don't really see each other as much anymore because Haley's busy teaching and doing the school production, and Jessica's getting her Masters so," he trailed off.
"I think it's lovely, how much you love Haley," Erin added.
Dave snorted into his glass, not at the fact that Aaron looked so uncomfortable but at the fact that these people hunted down serial killers and criminals for a living, and yet the thing they got the most joy from was teasing a kid about his marriage.
"Right, that's enough being mean to the newbie. What about dessert?" Dave said.
Aaron flashed him a grateful smile. He just shook his head. He remembered when he’d turned up to his first event, Carolyn in awe of all the decorations and outfits, and everyone else had been ruthless with their teasing. He wasn’t about to let Hotch suffer that same fate. He’d probably faint with embarrassment.
Erin laughed at the two of them, and Jason smiled at Dave’s defensiveness over his new protege. One day. One day Jason would get Dave to admit that the way he felt towards Aaron was nothing short of paternal. Max just rolled his eyes, but the waiters came to clear their plates before he could make another biting comment.
Aaron excused himself to the bathroom, and then the dessert was brought out. Dave, being the saint he was, switched his and Aaron’s plates because he wasn’t getting younger and he knew he was meant to be cutting down on his sugar. So if Aaron had the bigger slice, then it would do them both a favour. And it had a whole strawberry to decorate it, not just the jam.
Erin was giving him one of his looks when their eyes met and he resisted the urge to stick his tongue out. He knew what that look meant. It meant Erin had an opinion on whatever he had just done, and it was one he wouldn’t like or approve of. 
“Look, it’s strawberry cheesecake!” Dave exclaimed, poking his fork in Aaron’s direction in an attempt to distract from Erin’s gaze.
The smile that had been plastered across Aaron’s face since they’d been sat down- and Dave really didn’t want to think that it was as a result of Erin’s comment about his butt, although it was the only thing that made sense- faded, and the colour seemed to drain from his face.
“What is it? Come on, you must love dessert, you’re the kid,” Dave said, slightly teasing.
Aaron opened his mouth, seemingly contemplating saying something that he thought would ruin the entire evening, but then he closed it and gave Dave a forced, tight-lipped smile. He almost pushed, but they had been having fun, so he just grinned back and urged Hotch to eat it.
If anyone noticed him wince as he swallowed each bite, or the fear that flickered in his eyes when he ate the strawberry, they didn’t comment. For that, he was grateful. He still had no idea what he was meant to do when the inevitable happened, but so long as nobody realised, he had time to work it out. All he needed was time.
He did really miss Haley though. If Haley had been there, she would have said something on his behalf because she would have known there was no way he would do it himself. It was too late to turn back now though. There was a tiny part of him that secretly hoped he’d outgrown it, but the moment he felt stomach cramps forming, he knew that was wishful thinking. Still, if he was lucky, nothing too serious would happen until he got home. Haley would panic, take him to the hospital and everything would be fine. Nobody else would have to know.
Or so he thought.
He’d gotten so good at not eating strawberries that he had completely forgotten just how badly, and quickly, the effects would hit him. He had forgotten just how allergic he was to the fruit. And he was aware of how stupid that sounded, but it was just one of those things.
Dave was staring. So was Erin. He cleared his throat, awkwardly looking down. When the waiters came out once more to clear the plates away, he smiled at them, hoping his cheeks didn’t seem flushed, or his palms too clammy.
“You promised me a dance,” Dave said, nudging his elbow.
“I did, didn’t I?” Aaron responded, hoping his voice didn’t sound too strained. When he stood up, his vision went slightly fuzzy and unfocused, and he found himself grabbing the table in order to stay upright.
He was going to be fine. All he had to do was make it through another few hours, and there was always a delay between his vision blurring and breathing becoming difficult, so with just a bit of luck, he could still do it.
Luck had never really been on his side.
Erin was standing, talking to Dave, and he couldn’t remember what he was meant to be doing, or why nobody was dancing. Maybe they had just been teasing him when they said he owed them both a dance. Or maybe they were waiting for him to do something. Either way, the confusion wasn’t helping him function.
“Kid, what’s happened to your hand?” Dave said suddenly. It reminded him of that time his cousin had eaten shellfish, but that didn’t make sense. There was no way Aaron had hit adulthood without realising he was allergic to the things they’d eaten.
Aaron stared at him.
Erin grabbed his wrist, the look that crossed her face one of fear and panic. “Aaron.” 
It couldn’t be. There was no way the ugly red rash forming on his hand as they watched him was being caused by an allergic reaction. It just couldn’t, because Hotchner may have been stupid and irresponsible, but there was no way he was that irresponsible.
He cleared his throat.
“Now would be a terrible time to tell you that I’m allergic to strawberries, wouldn’t it?” he rapsed.
Dave’s jaw dropped. “You’re what?”
Aaron Hotchner’s timing had never been good. It had actually always been abysmal. He was born early, in both senses of the word, met the girl he would end up marrying on the last day before a three month holiday which she would spend out of the state, and was generally just not smooth with the way he did things.
So as if on cue, he fell to the ground, completely losing consciousness. Clearly the delay between his vision growing blurry and his breathing becoming shallow was not the large space of time he thought it would be.
“Aaron!” Dave yelled.
Erin dropped to her knees by her side. “Dave, phone for an ambulance. Now.” 
Dave blinked a few times, then realised what she was asking him to do and ran out the room to find the phone. When he was patched through, he realised he had no idea if what Aaron was experiencing was just a reaction, or anaphylactic shock, but he just explained himself as best he could, only relaxing when they said it was likely everything would be fine and they would be there soon.
He re-entered the room only two minutes later, and Aaron was still in the recovery position.
“The idiot doesn’t have an EpiPen on him. I don’t know why, but he doesn’t, so now we literally have to wait until the ambulance gets here and hope for the best,” Erin said, some strange mix of angry and terrified.
“He doesn’t have his- what kind of- why not?” Dave said.
When he looked around the room, he realised it was suddenly startlingly empty. It was just Erin, him, Aaron- who still hadn’t come around- and Jason. Max was suspiciously absent. He figured that was for the best. If anyone would make the situation more awkward than it already was, it’d be Max.
“He managed to get everyone to go downstairs, then said he would stay with them. We figured the less people around when he woke up, the less embarrassed Hotchner would be,” Jason explained. “And on that note, I’ll go explain to the paramedics what happened,” he added, as sirens filled the air.
“Dave, when did our lives suddenly become co-parenting this mess of an adult if only so he gets home safe to Haley?” Erin suddenly asked.
“We don’t co-parent him. No. We just… look after him the way we would do with any other new agent that was his age,” Dave said, although he wasn’t even convincing himself. Erin didn’t respond, just looked at him with that glint in her eye.
He didn’t get the chance to carry on with his argument because Jason entered with the paramedics, and him and Erin moved away. It seemed like they had already been informed that Aaron didn’t have an EpiPen on him, because the first thing they did was inject him. There was one terrifying moment, in which Erin grabbed his wrist, where Dave thought they were too late, but they weren’t. 
Aaron opened his eyes, obviously disoriented and immediately after lifting his head, let it hit the floor again. He seemed far too pale, but nothing gave the impression that he was going to be sick, so Dave relaxed. When he and Erin were finally able to go over, Aaron was almost done answering their questions, some of the colour returning to his face in the form of flushed cheeks.
If he was capable of embarrassment, then everything was going to be fine.
“We’re going to need to take him to the hospital for observation and to make sure he doesn’t have a secondary reaction, but one of you is welcome to come. In fact, it would be preferred, wouldn’t it Aaron?” one of the paramedics said.
Aaron nodded, not quite meeting anyone’s eyes.
“Dave, you should go. Aaron, I don’t want to see you in the office until you’ve been cleared both by the doctors and by Haley to return. Do you understand me?” Erin chastised, sound every bit the mother Aaron had never had.
He nodded miserably, closing his eyes, and for a few moments, Dave felt terrible for him because so many pieces seemed to be falling into place now. And then he remembered that the whole thing had been caused by Aaron not saying he was allergic. He still felt terrible, but he also wondered what the hell he was meant to say to Haley.
“Come on kiddo,” he said as gently as he could, helping Aaron to his feet and into the elevator.
When he was safely sat in the ambulance, and they were well on their way to the hospital, he raised an eyebrow at Aaron who pulled a face.
“Don’t,” he protested weakly.
“So you’re allergic to strawberries,” Dave said. “How long have you been sitting on that piece of information for?”
“I’ve known since I was four and ended up in the hospital after I went strawberry picking with my mother and ate one of them.”
“Aaron, nobody was going to be offended. You could have just said something, it would have been okay. Really, you can’t judge someone just because they have an allergy, and everyone would have just moved on. You didn’t need to eat it.”
Aaron swallowed. “When I was eight, my father bought strawberry tarts for my mother and I, because he knew she had friends round and he wanted to seem like a dutiful husband. He didn’t- she’d kept the first time a secret from him because he’d been out of town. And when she tried to tell him, he said I was being difficult, then he made me eat it whilst she told her friends everything was fine. I only survived because she snuck in with my EpiPen.”
“Oh kid,” Dave said, chilled to the bone.
He shook his head. “I knew, realistically, that nobody would say anything, but I just couldn’t shake the memory of being told that if I was going to waste food, then I didn’t deserve it.”
“Aaron, that’s not-”
“I know that. Now at least. Thanks for not reacting weirdly. Or thinking less of me.”
“Agent Hotchner- are you still esquire, oh it doesn’t matter, esquire- nothing would ever make me think less of you. Especially not this. It wasn’t your fault. It was never your fault, and I know it’s easy for me to see, but I need you to know that.”
Aaron gave him a slight smile, eyes watering. “Thank you Dave.”
“I do have one question though. Where the fuck was your EpiPen?”
He made a sound, one that Dave was not going to dignify by actually naming in his head.
“That didn’t sound like an answer young man,” he teased.
Aaron sighed. “It- okay. My blazer pockets weren’t big enough to fit it, and I figured strawberries isn’t exactly a common thing, so it would be fine if I left it in the car, but then I didn’t want to say anything, and then I passed out before I could- oh.”
“What?”
“Did everyone see me collapse?”
Dave considered lying, but Aaron had bared his soul to him. He owed him this small piece of honesty. “Yes, but they also witnessed me running like a headless chicken to get to the phone and Erin completely freaking out, so it’s all okay. I promise.”
Aaron nodded, not fully convinced. “Thank you. For caring.”
And one day, Dave would teach him that caring was what people did for each other. That it wasn’t something he had to earn, or something that would be snatched away at the smallest transgression. He would teach him that the love he had always deserved but never been shown was going to come from more than just Haley. It was going to come from every single good person he knew.
But in that moment, he just leant over and ruffled his hair. And maybe the gesture was paternal, but he could live with that.
“Mrs Hotchner’s been waiting for you all to arrive,” the receptionist said the moment they came through the doors. Aaron relaxed at the mention of his wife.
“You can send her in as soon as we go in. He’s been treated, we’re just keeping him for observation,” the paramedic said. The receptionist nodded and turned to one of their colleagues, who immediately got up.
Dave hung around as they got him situated, wondering when would be an appropriate time to leave. He didn’t want to step on Haley’s toes, or make her feel like she wasn’t trusted, but he also didn’t really want to leave either of them. Not if the real timeline matched the one he’d created in his head. She would have just been a child too, but children always believed that they needed to save everyone and anything less was a failure. He didn’t know how to say that their job was to be a child, and it was on the adults to keep them safe without patronising the two of them.
So he sat instead, keeping Aaron company until he was no longer needed.
Haley came rushing in the moment she was allowed to, her eyes slightly red. They must have told her how severe the situation was, and Dave felt guilty for making her panic so much, when Aaron was doing much better already.
“Baby, they told me what happened. How are you feeling? Is your heartbeat erratic? Is there anything you need?” she asked, not even acknowledging Dave. He wasn’t offended though. The love Haley had for her husband was the most fierce thing he’d witnessed, and now he understood. She’d spent her entire life defending him and the love she had for him.
He shook his head, then grinned at her. “Kiss me?” he asked, and for a moment, he was just a normal man, so in love with his wife it physically hurt to witness.
“I shouldn’t- me and Jess had strawberry margaritas before we got the phone call. She’s coming round tomorrow to check on you herself by the way,” Haley said, brushing his hair off his head with a smile.
Aaron nodded. “I’d expect nothing less. Oh Haley, this is Dave. And Dave, this is Haley.”
“It’s lovely to meet you,” Dave said. 
“You too. So, what happened? Because you told me it was just a function, and then when I got home, there was a message from the hospital that you were being brought in for anaphylactic shock which doesn’t make any sense because you don’t eat strawberries anymore!” Haley said.
Aaron had the decency to look away. “I didn’t want to cause a scene so I ate this slice of strawberry cheesecake. And I thought it would be fine- well not fine, don’t look at me like that. I thought I’d be able to last till I got home. I’m sorry.”
“Baby, I’m not angry, don’t worry,” Haley said, taking his hand. “Just do what the doctors say, okay? And please don’t eat strawberries anymore just to be polite.”
“I’m afraid I may have made it worse,” Dave confessed, needing them to know, even though it had not been intentional, by any stretch of the imagination.
“What do you mean? How?” Haley asked. Aaron lifted his arm enough to signal that he had the same question.
“I switched our plates when they got given to us so Aaron had the bigger slice. It also had a whole strawberry on it, instead of just half a slice. Maybe if I hadn’t done that, his reaction would have been less severe. I’m sorry.”
Haley, in spite of, or maybe because of that single comment, started laughing. Aaron just watched her laugh with a smile on his face like he had never seen something so beautiful, and he probably never had. Dave watched them, confusion across his features.
“I’m sorry. It’s not funny. It’s just- Dave you have nothing to apologise for. He was always going to have a reaction. And given that he didn’t even have his EpiPen-”
“It was in the car,” Aaron said, not quite whining but definitely getting close.
“Didn’t have his EpiPen,” Haley said, like Aaron hadn’t even spoken, “it was probably always going to end like this. I’m just laughing because you sound like such a parent. Like switching slices is something my dad did for me and Jess when we were little. It’s cute.”
Aaron looked to Dave, fearful and hopeful all at once.
“What can I say? Erin and I need to make sure someone keeps an eye on him,” he said. There were a lot of things in his life he wasn’t proud of. There were lots of mistakes he had made. But this? Being considered Aaron’s parent? It would never be one of them.
Aaron smiled at him, the light in his eyes returning. Haley nodded her approval. When the nurse came in a few minutes later to check Aaron’s vitals, the silence felt comfortable and natural, as though they had already become attuned to the others’ needs.
“Are you two going to be okay?” Dave asked. Someone needed to tell Erin that he was okay, and he really wanted to go to bed. He realised that he hadn’t even considered trying to salvage his date with Anya. He supposed they could always reschedule. Besides, Aaron was more important now.
Haley nodded. “Yeah, I’ll drive us home, make sure he takes a bath and have him back and safe with you on Monday, don’t worry.”
Dave stood up and started heading towards the door. “Oh don’t worry too much about rushing back to us. I’m sure we’ll survive. His cute butt will be missed, but we’ll make it through.”
Haley snorted. “Aaron didn’t I say that there was no way people hadn’t noticed?”
Aaron did not reply, but he did glare at both of them.
Dave smiled. Just before he left, he hesitated for a moment, wondering whether or not it was the time and the place. But he just couldn’t resist. “So are there any other allergies we need to be aware of? Shellfish, pollen, nuts? Pretty ladies that want you to call them back?”
“Dave!” Aaron said, and this time it was definitely a whine.
He just smiled, leaving Aaron and Haley in the hospital room. Had it been a normal event? No. But he wouldn’t trade the night for anything in the world. After all, he had just found a whole new family. And he couldn’t wait for Haley to meet Erin. The two of them would definitely cause Hotcher a whole new level of embarrassment.
It was going to be the messiest and most random family to exist, but a family nonetheless.
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phantaloon-books · 3 years
Text
Alright I got a couple comments asking for a continuation so here's part 2 of neil finding out the feds were onto smth when they recommended witness protection program
part 1
(Also thank you so much, I genuinely didn't expect such a good reception, everything I write is purely self indulgent)
Andrew is gonna fucking lose it. It's been over three weeks and not a single word from Neil fucking Josten. He's never hated him more, and this time he means it when he says hate. Actually he's not sure he hates himself or Neil more, but he feels hatred and rage and that's what matters. But of course the rabbit just left. Once a rabbit, always a rabbit.
He wanted so desperately to believe that, that Neil chose to run, that he chose to leave him them and keep running because that's what he knows best. Even if believing Neil chose to leave hurts him more than he'll ever admit, it's the best thing to believe. It's best to believe that Neil left than to believe something happened. It's best to believe Neil grew tired and bored of him them than to listen to the worry and dread Andrew's been feeling for months. It's best to believe Neil didn't want him than to let himself think of worst case scenarios.
But he can't make himself think that Neil left willingly and because he wanted to (and not it's not because he wants to believe that Neil wouldn't leave him). Neil would never run without his things, not without his stupid binder and money and contacts, not without clothes or any resources. If he ran away he would do it properly. He wouldn't leave with running clothes and his stupid flip phone. And most importantly Andrew knows that Neil has been restless lately. He's seen the way Neil checks every corner or every place, observes the people, looks for threats. He'd left those habits behind, so something has to have happened. Neil didn't just leave him.
The best thing is the other foxes aren't convinced Neil would run either. He had no one to run from, and he had a family now. And even if he was feeling overwhelmed or anxious, he would have come back. He wouldn't have taken three weeks. So they know, they know, Neil didn't leave because he wanted or needed to. And they're all anxious as hell about that bc if he didn't leave where is he?
They narrow it down eventually, and conclude that he got in a fight and is dead in a ditch somewhere, he had an accident in a coma in a hospital somewhere, he somehow got lost and/or lost his memory, someone killed him accidentally or not and his body is buried somewhere far away, or he's been taken. And Andrew cannot take the stress that he doesn't know where the fuck Neil is any longer.
He almost killed Kevin and several federal agents when Neil went missing for a few hours. This time, he hasn't tried to kill anyone yet but that hasn't stopped him from tearing every dorm apart and the stadium and the police station and the hospital and getting in fights with the FBI. He's desperate enough that he called Browning, hell, he's desperate enough that he contacted the Moriyamas, which wasn't a pleasant experience, but Ichirou had promised Neil protection and this definitely called for mafia intervention. So far neither the FBI or the Moriyamas had helped - yes they had, they informed him regularly that they were looking for Neil, but they had nothing, no clues no trails, and Andrew couldn't believe their incompetence, like for fucks sake the Moriyamas were yakuza, they ought to know what could have happened to one of their most valuable assets. And anyway if he ran, and wasn't taken, they for sure would be behind him, looking to kill him of course, but they still couldn't find him.
Andrew hasn't tried to kill anyone yet but he will soon if he doesn't find Neil, and he's sure he will start with himself. He can't remember the last time he slept or ate well, or went to exy practice, but he doesn't care. He can't care until he knows something. The lack of knowledge is driving him crazy. At this point knowing that Neil is dead and has been rotting in the countryside of Poland would be better than not knowing anything.
He hates this so much. He hates Neil for disappearing. He hates whoever went and got him. He hates the Moriyamas for not being able to find him and not keeping him safe in the first place. He hates himself for becoming so attached. He should have known better. He knew better. He knew it was a bad idea to feel all the things he feels for Neil, especially because it's Neil, the unpredictable rabbit. But he fell for the fake hope that they would make it, that he wouldn't be hurt again, that Neil would stay. He knew letting someone in again could kill him. He knows that if they don't find him, it will. He can't keep going like this. He was stupid enough to feel hopeful, but he won't be able to live once the hope dies.
He's laying in Neil's bed. He knows it's pathetic, but frankly he doesn't care. Everyday is worse than the last one. He's slipping and when he falls it's game over, he's going to make sure of that. If Neil genuinely cared, he'd be pissed at Andrew for even thinking about this. No he'd be upset, but not pissed, about the fact that he's considering taking his life over this. But he opened the door to feelings, and he won't be able to cope with them and he won't be able to close that door again. He's giving up.
Faint buzzing interrumps his thoughts. Someone's calling him. He couldn't stomach the runaway song that matched with Neil's but he couldn't stomach changing it either, so he leaves in on vibrate now. He looks at his screen. It's an unknown number. Most likely the FBI or the Moriyamas or a random police station ready to take him out of his misery and just tell him they found Neil's body. The code says it's from Minnesota. He considers not answering, but he might as well get over it.
He flips the phone open, "I only care about this if you are from the FBI or the literal mafia, so if you aren't from either, feel free to hang up." The other line stays silent for a few seconds, but when he looks at his phone, it's still going. The person didn't hang up. He doesn't have the patience for this. "I'm just gonna hang up then-"
"Andrew, wait." It's barely a hesitant whisper. The voice is absolutely shattered, rough and hoarse and very painful-sounding. There's wheezing too and labored breaths. But god. No matter how wrecked he sounds, he'd recognize that voice anywhere. In half a second he's up and falling from the bed in his haste, alert at last. He can't believe it. He wants to but he doesn't want to believe the call is real.
"Neil? Neil is that you?" He hates how vulnerable he sounds, but the thought dies quickly. There's no way, no way this is real. A sob breaks through the line, and oh it sounds so full of pain and fear.
"Andrew, I-I need you to stay safe. I don't know if they're coming for you, for the foxes. I need you to find a place where you're safe. Call Browning or Ich- the little Lord and make sure they can protect you guys for a while."
Okay that's definitely Neil even if he didn't answer the question. And Andrew's heart is going a thousand miles an hour, he doesn't feel his body anymore.
"Neil where are you? I'm coming to get you, I'll call Browning but where are you?"
"'Drew," another sob, and this one manages to break Andrew's walls more than than the whispered 'Drew', "promise me you'll stay safe, don't come looking for me, you can't take them down, please don't come looking for me."
The exhaustion and terror in his voice doesn't sit well with Andrew. The Neil he knows is not this. "For fucks sake Neil just tell me where in Minnesota you are, I'm coming to get you."
"No- no you're not, I'm not calling you because I want you to come. I just need you to promise you'll be safe."
"Neil who took you? Where are you? I can send the FBI or the japanese shits over, I swear to god I can send them to come get you if you just tell me where you are and who took you. I'll - I'll try my best to keep the others safe, but who took you?"
"I'm sorry, Andrew, I- I didn't mean to, please believe I didn't mean to leave, they- some of the Butcher's pals found me, I'm so sorry- I put all of you in danger again."
"Okay, that's something we can work with, now where are you Neil?"
"Andrew-" his breath hitches, he gasps and whimpers, "I'm so sorry, I have to go, I need to leave Andrew. Please stay safe. Look I- I love you okay? I'm sorry I didn't say it earlier."
"Neil wait don't hang up-"
And the line goes dead.
The world is falling apart, collapsing all around Andrew. He's numb but he feels encompassing terror. He can't feel a thing, he can't think. He was so close. It feels like Neil just slipped past his fingers, like he just let go of Neil and let him fall to the darkness. He thinks he may be falling too. He needs to call Browning. He does it instinctively, he doesn't register he has his phone to his ear until the FBI agents voice is calling to him. He also goes with what he's gonna say with the same instinct he pulled in Baltimore, knowing he can't mention certain mafia.
"Neil just called me, I have no idea from where, I have no idea how he got a hold of me, he didn't say a thing, he refused to say a thing other than we're in danger, the foxes, and that whoever took him will come for us- oh and apparently it's someone involved with the Butcher."
How he managed to be as apathetic and unattached to everything he said is beyond him. But whatever he says and whatever Browning says, FBI agents are now guarding them in the locker room of the Foxhole Court, with mattresses and mats laid down on the floor. and he doesn't know how they got here and he's cuffed all over again, but this time to Renee even if he doesn't remember being violent. Even the stupid rookies are here, looking extremely panicked and terrified despite most of them not giving a fuck that Neil was gone just hours ago. The other foxes - Neil's family - are pressing Andrew for answers, but he can't deal with anything at the moment.
He needs to call Ichirou too. That's the call that matters, because that's the call that can bring Neil home because he can't do that himself while cuffed to Renee and being guarded by the fucking FBI. He somehow convinces the agent to let him make a call, to his therapist he says, to grant him privacy even if that's utter bullshit. He's dragging Renee into the eye of the storm but oh well, why did they cuff him to her in the first place, it's not his fault. He calls the Moriyama representative he's been dealing with and thank Renee's god the woman answers.
"I need to talk to- to Lord Ichirou, it's about Neil Josten's whereabouts, I got important information about him." He can feel both the condescension from the other end of the line and poorly veiled shock from Renee. "I know where he is, I know about who's got him, I need to talk to Lord Moriyama."
He isn't sure how he managed it. He doesn't know how he convinced them to let them talk to their mafia boss, or how he's able to keep his cool for long enough to actually talk to the man himself. He thinks having Renee there, who asks no questions and keeps her hand on top of Andrew's with no hesitation, is part of the solution but he's not admitting that. Either or, he talks to Ichirou (he can't deny he's not terrified of messing up with the man who keeps Neil alive, but he's not admitting that either), reminds him of how Neil is important to the Moriyamas, both as an exy player and as a Wesninski, and how Neil, Kevin and Jean are loyal to the Moriyamas, hints at how Ichirou promised protection. He has perfect memory, but he will never remember how he convinced Ichirou Moriyama to send people to Minnesota and look for him all over the state and surrounding states, all he knows is that Ichirou stuck to his promise, all is good, he didn't fuck up.
Weeks pass again, nothing happens. There's no news from the Moriyamas, the FBI keeps telling him they're doing what they can. Andrew is done. No one came looking for them at least, which is nice bc they didn't die but it doesn't feel worth it when Neil wasn't back. He feels stupid for hoping he would come back safe and alive. The Moriyamas might as well have killed him for being such an inconvenience. Things are going to hell. Andrew was an idiot for falling so hard for Neil Josten. It was a mistake. He should have known better.
His anger is gone, and numbness has settled. It was becoming a habit for him to remain lying down most of the day. It was also becoming a habit for the foxes to take care of him when he did this. He can't even bother to shower if someone doesn't remind him every day, or eat, or drink water for that matter. He's a mess and he would be incredibly embarrassed if he cared a little, but he's slipping and he doesn't mind falling. Nothing is fine. Until it is.
It comes in the form of a text one morning, while he's lying on the couch in the living room. An unknown number again, New York code, and it only reads, "Threat has been dealt with - I". And what the fuck does that mean. It tells him absolutely nothing. If Ichirou bothered to text him he could at least be clear as to what the fuck that meant. Was Neil even alive? There is a soft knock at the door. Of course, someone bothers him when no other fox is at the dorm. They couldn't ditch every class to make sure Andrew didn't combust spontaneously.
He truly doesn't want to get up. He doesn't want to go answer the door. It's too much a bother. If it's someone important they'll either knock again aor shout for him to open up. He curls up in bed. He honestly wants to disappear. There's another knock, a little harder than the first. But there's no voice, no demand, no nothing. Maybe it's a Moriyama. Maybe he'll feel so disrespected or whatever he's gonna barge in and end his misery. Whatever. "Fuck off", he shouts from the couch, hoping for the best. There's another knock, for fuck's sake, can they just walk in already? Another, and he's up. Pissed and going for the door.
"Fucking hell, what do you want?" His anger is back with a passion, and he's practically stomping to the door, throwing it wide open, "Just barge through the fucking door, and get it over with-"
He has to stop exploding when people don't answer to him right away. Maybe he should work on his patience. Because frankly it has been working against him at the worst times. No it's not his fault. It's the idiot's fault for appearing at out nowhere and stealing his breath away. Everything is Neil Josten's fault.
"Hey Drew," said idiot's voice is impossibly more hoarse than when he called him before. Andrew can't tell if his heart is beating too fast or not at all. He thought he was a mess, but Neil looks like he's been through hell and back. Well, he's been through hell and back too many times before, but he's never looked this bad, and he was a mess after Evermore. His face is beaten so badly, so swollen, if he didn't know him and those stupidly blue eyes so well. Even his eyes are different, there's no spark, they're dull and hazy. He's wearing a large hoodie and sweatpants, so Andrew can't see the damage beyon his face, but at least his hands remain okay, there's no new damage. "Looks like I still have it in me to leave you speechless, huh."
Andrew takes a deep breath and he sighs. And his heart breaks. Neil. Neil. Neil is here. Andrew wants to craddle him and hold him and never let him go again. He doesn't care if it's soft, Neil is here. He raises his hands, frames Neil's face like he has before. He presses a hand to Neil's neck, looking for a pulse, and he finds it. He's alive.
"Neil," he breathes, and he feels. He feels. "You're alive, I thought, you-"
They're both silent. Andrew doesn't notice when Neil raises his hands, framing his own face. They've been here before.
"I'm not leaving you, I promised right? You're not getting rid of me that easily. "
He hates feeling this much, "You've got some explaining to do, but- it can wait."
"That's good yeah, because I'm not sure how much longer I can remain conscious and the Moriyamas weren't the best at patching everything up, so I'd really appreciate it if you call Abby."
He doesn't trust himself to open his mouth, so he guides Neil inside, holding on to his hand like a tether. Neil deflates, he grimaces as Andrew helps him to the couch. He's obviously hiding something below the clothes. Andrew stands to call Abby, but Neil grips his hand tightly. When Andrew looks up, he sees the fear and exhaustion he heard on the call weeks ago. Neil isn't able to keep up the act of being okay for long.
"Stay, pl- just," he looks away, and Andrew doesn't know how to feel about the pause, he didn't say the word, "can you stay?"
And he does. Things aren't fine. Neil is a mess. So is Andrew. They have to work through stuff. Andrew clearly has to work on the apparent dependancy issues. But they'll have time now. Neil is safe. He's alive and safe. He lost consciousness not long after he sat down, but Abby, Wymack and the foxes are on their way. They're not fine. But Neil is lying next to him, and he isn't gonna let him go again. They'll be fine.
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prince-septimus · 3 years
Text
the capture
pairing : captain boomerang x FBI agent!reader
summary : the beginning of what will become your long history with captain boomerang.
word count : 1k
warnings : slight nsfw
static hearts series
“You think you can handle it, rookie?”
You scoff at your partner for this case, bumping his shoulder as you make your way up to the front doors of Central City bank. “Yeah, Murph, I think I’ll do fine.”
“Want me to hold your hand on the way in?”
Agent Murphy grabs the door, yanking it open and offering his other hand to you. He gives you a wink.
“Fuck off, Murph.”
It was supposed to be a simple case – in and out as you had been told when the case was offered to you. You knew that you were purposely being put on the easier cases, ones that didn’t have a high risk attached to them, but you were completely fine with that. You were still a rookie, and while everyone teased you for that – especially Murph – you knew you still needed to get your bearings before you were placed on anything bigger than “easy”.
The bank is littered with police, and you’re confused as to why there’s such a fuss all of a sudden.
“I thought they said they had already caught the culprits.” You look to Agent Murphy, who looks just as confused as you are.
“They did. They were all knocked out when the police arrived, and they’ve already been sent off.”
“So, what’s the problem?”
“The problem, Agent, is that the money is gone and we’re still missing one of the thieves.” A clean-cut looking officer steps towards you, holding out his hand. “Officer Carmine. We’re still on the lookout for the last guy. George Harkness. Goes by Captain Boomerang. He’s been a bit of a problem to say the least.”
“Why were all the others taken out, but not Harkness?” Murph asks, but you find your attention drifting elsewhere.
Faintly you hear Officer Carmine explain that it was this ‘Captain Boomerang’ that took out the rest of the thieves, choosing to take the rewards of their endeavors for himself as you make your way past the other Officer. There’s a hallway that no one seems to be lingering around, but you’re sure you saw something over that way.
“Agent,” you hear Murph call, “Where are you going?”
You wave your partner off, continuing towards the hallway. “Just checking the place out. Don’t worry about me.”
You reach the hall, turning to look down it. It seems empty. There’s a couple offices, and another hall that has a restroom sign pointing towards it. You don’t reach for your gun, but you become very aware of its presence on your hip.
The voices behind your become more distant with each step, and you’re becoming increasingly sure that it’s far too quiet for there to actually be anything concerning this way, but the thought quickly exits your mind when you reach the other hall and are immediately grabbed and slammed against the wall.
You let out a grunt, shutting your eyes at the brief pain that shoots through your back, but then they’re open again and you’re face to face with the man who the others are searching for.
“I see one of you was finally smart enough to check down here.”
He’s Australian, you note. A thick accent. His hair and beard are extremely unkept, and the smile he bears on his face matches the rest of his appearance.
“The FBI, huh?” He grabs at the uniform jacket you wear, pulling on it slightly. “You new? Haven’t seen you before.”
“You’re Harkness,” you spit out, “George Harkness.”
“Ah, love, call me Digger. Everyone does.”
“Okay, Digger,” you try to adjust your position against the wall, but he’s got you pinned. His arm comes up to rest against your head and you can’t help but think about how awfully close his face is to yours. “Why don’t you go ahead and walk down that hall there and surrender yourself?”
“Now, where’s the fun in that, eh?” You don’t like the way he smiles at you then. “Why do that when I’ve got you here, against this wall. I could do whatever I’d like.”
Your breath catches. Digger lets out a low laugh. He presses forward, his lips against your ear causing you to shiver.
“Could take you right here, y’know. Any of your officer friends could come down this hall and catch me fucking into you, and I wouldn’t even care about having to go back to prison. I’d be exactly where I wanna be. Taking you right here.”
You can feel him smile against your ear when you gasp, but you can’t find the words to say.
“You’d be gripping so tight onto me, leaving marks, begging me to stop, but I never would.” He pulls away just enough to meet your gaze. “Would you like that? Like me to fuck you right here where anyone could see us? What kind of reputation would that give you? Everyone would know you let a criminal fuck you and you would like it. Like knowing that I took total advantage of you”
You hate the way his words are making you feel. Hate the way he’s looking at you and grinning.
“So, how ‘bout it?”
“Agent?”
You jump at the sound of Murph, and then there are footsteps coming down the hall.
Digger doesn’t take his eyes off you. “Maybe next time, eh?”
“There won’t be a next time,” you manage to get out.
“You go on and believe that, love.” Digger gives you a wink. “Don’t forget to dream about me.”
With that, Digger pushes off the wall, leaving you there with the realization that his weight is no longer holding you down.
Digger moves where Murph can see him, his hands up in the air and that shit-eating grin still plastered across his face. “Officer Carmine, how lovely to see you again.”
“Harkness, you’re under arrest—”
You tune out Carmine’s voice, trying to catch your breath when Murph appears next to you. He’s got a hand on your shoulder, helping you stand properly on your feet.
“You okay? He didn’t try anything, did he?”
You let out a deep breath. “No, no. I’m fine. All good.”
“That was a lot for such an easy mission, huh?”
You try to smile as best you can. “Yeah. Definitely.”
You dream of Digger Harkness that night, and the following one. And his words fail to ever leave your thoughts.
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@spnwomenweek DAY 5 - NEW SCHOOL
The sign that heralded "Singer Auto and Body" has been knocked down for a while. So have the remains of the old house that burned down something like ten or so years ago. Jody said the owner had no next of kin, he was an old friend of hers named Bobby. Claire thought it's funny, when she first moved here a lifetime ago, barely an adult, she was called "Bobby 2.0". Maybe it was the same guy. She wondered what he must've been like, living among all these cars and... A massive cache of weapons in a cellar that hadn't been destroyed. With a devil's trap and walls of iron coated in salt. A hunter.
Gran didn't have much of an estate, and with Amelia being missing for ten or so years without financial activity, Dad being missing, because Cas finally made his own fake ID instead of using Jimmy's, and whatever odd jobs Claire and Kaia worked between hunts (and a small loan from Jody)... She'd managed to scrounge up enough to get a house built.
It was Kaia's idea, really. For obvious reasons, she never had the stomach for hunting. She had to do enough to survive while she was gone. She deserved her own place. The Mills' place. Novaks? Winchesters? Hanscums? They were still workshopping their last name. Yes, they've been married for almost five years. Whatever. If you're a hunter, what's on paper is a lie. That's something she'd come to know for a long time. Reality is what's in the dark, what's on the centuries old rare books or weird chat rooms with no credibility, and most importantly, what's in your heart.
Claire Novak is 28 and she has a wife and a house. An accomplishment, for a gen z kid. They have a table full of phones, neatly labeled, FBI, CIA, USFWS, BLM, Texas Rangers, and, when she's feeling fancy and has to work up north, RCMP.
Kaia's the one who answers them. Not just for her, but in the manner of both sets of Claire's adoptive parents, they ran into some hunters along the way, too. A lot are older than her, but Claire's been hunting since she was 18 and running from demons since she was 12. There's a grudging respect for seniority among hunters. Especially when you're the ones with a laminator in the office where the blade of one of the most elite of Heaven's warriors hangs over their head. Along with a smug reminder that she was 18 when she earned it.
There's a kid a couple years younger than her. Ben Braeden. Total rookie, but good heart. Stupidest aliases ever, though. And, of course, she hears from the old crew every so often.
Claire and Kaia are still close with Jody and Donna. Of course they are. Claire even attempts to make dinner for them once in a while. Kaia is definitely the cook in the relationship after she confused the cayenne pepper for the paprika, though. And, well, they're old enough that the mantle of "protector of Sioux Falls" has definitely been passed to the Mills-Hanscum-Winchester-Novaks. Cas and Dean have also decided that since Jack is ten now (God, Claire's getting old), he's allowed to just run around the house when they need a weekend off and Sam and Eileen are off traveling to Europe to find more lore or whatever." Kaia once again asks if they can go to Europe. Claire once again asks if she's okay spending weeks at sea with her because there's no way in hell she's flying. And there's that look between Dean and Cas. Ugh, she really is turning into her parents. Jesse and Cesar are retired. In Mexico. Plus, she only really knows them via the even smaller network in the hunter network of young gay hunters. So, it's really a shock when they show up at their door with presents.
"Uh, I think you're a few months early for Christmas," Kaia laughs as she brings them inside.
"It's five years, isn't it?" Jesse asks his husband.
"Yeah, Claire. Your blog post says it's five years."
Claire raises an eyebrow. "Okay, now you have me curious. I haven't touched that thing in months."
Kaia swears under her breath and laughs. "Ugh, trust the guy with the obsession with cicada monsters to remember dates." Kaia leans up a little and pecks Claire's lips. "Since I got out."
"Oh." Claire and Kaia both try to forget about it, about losing two years of their relationship to Kaia's other self and her spear.
"Plus, we have about eight years of presents from nice old ladies in town to regift."
"Ugh, I hate you," Claire says lightly. "My baby brother is God, you know. He can and will turn you into chickens."
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stxrrywildflower · 4 years
Text
out of the old (1)
pairing - spencer reid x reader
summary - you think about quitting the bau
warning - cursing, mentions of case
series masterlist
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everyone in the bau had their breaking point.
for some, such as former agents jason gideon and elle greenway, they snapped and left the organization as a whole. for others, such as emily prentiss and aaron hotchner, they had taken a leave of absence before returning and relying on their bau family.
but you, you had no idea where you were. all you knew is that you had reached your own personal breaking point.
ever since you were a little kid, you know that you wanted to be apart of the fbi. you knew the hard work it would take and personal strains of moving from california to washington d.c. but you had enrolled in the academy and gone from there.
director erin strauss had immediately taken a disliking to you. your superiors at the acadamy had only spoken good things about your work and strauss had to meet you in person. you almost wished you hadn’t agreed to seeing her because that’s where everything fell apart.
after meeting her, your superiors began to expect more from you and the pressure grew. you had ultimately discovered that strauss had told them to be harder on you, but not for good reasons. she wanted to see you crack as if you weren’t meant for the fbi.
once graduating top of your class, you were recruited onto the bau team. from there, you made fast friends and the team had taken a strong liking to you. they loved how you fit within the team and your personality as a whole.
erin strauss, however, was less than thrilled. every moment you messed up in the slightest, you were in her office being scolded. most of the time, you had received a warning. after a rookie cop had almost gotten you killed, you were the one being yelled at, not him. and finally, when strauss heard that you and spencer were dating back almost a year ago, she had pulled you into her office instead of spencer. he didn’t even get a look in his direction from her. she had threatened to suspend you if hotch hadn’t stepped in.
there was a strong bias against you by strauss and everyone on the team knew it.
the last case was the final straw for you. the team had been sent to pheonix and had remained there for almost two weeks. the outcome wasn’t exactly ideal but the positives outweighed the negatives.
it had come down to you and the final unsub. the others had been taken in as well as the victims saved. however, in the middle of you attempting to talk the unsub down, he had put his gun to his throat and pulled the trigger, killing himself instantly.
the whole ordeal had left you a little bit shocked, both at what you had witnessed and how you knew strauss would react. after a long flight, which everyone had slept on, the bau team made their way back to the office. everyone needed to get their stuff and paperwork before being allowed to go hone.
walking in, spencer held your hand tightly. you then let go and made your way to your desk, tossing your bag on the floor next to it. as you went to sit down, you heard a recognizable voice behind you.
“i would suggest you remain from sitting down, agent y/n. my office, now,” strauss demanded, her tone harsh. she walked out of the doors and you had no choice but to follow. you glanced back one more time at your team who all gave you pity looks.
once entering strauss’ office, you stood hands behind your back and looking straight on. strauss however, sat down out her desk and pulled it the most recent case file.
“i assume your know why you are here,” strauss started. you nodded to her words, trying not to give her the satisfaction of you looking scared. “i’m going to be a little nice here. i’ll let you go free tonight but know that i expect to see you in my office tomorrow morning at nine am sharp so we can discuss this,” she spoke, motioning to the graphic case photos. you once again nodded and turned around, walking out and back towards the bullpen.
on your way in, you encountered rossi and j.j. who were leaving to head home. you knew that j.j. was desperate to get home to see will and henry so you didn’t want to hold her up. however, rossi shot you a comforting smile as j.j. squeezed your shoulder.
spencer was there to greet you when you walked in. you shrugged his hand off of your shoulder and ignored derek and emily’s concerned looks. instead, you grabbed your bags and exited the building without another word.
strauss was making you hate your job and there wasn’t anything that could be done that would benefit you.
____
the following day, wednesday morning, you stepped into the bau. you first walked up to hotch’s office, tossing your report from the case on his desk with sad eyes.
“good luck,” hotch spoke to you as you walked out. you slightly smiled before making your way to strauss’ office.
this time, she motioned for you to sit down. you did just that and placed your hands in your lap.
“i don’t know what i’m going to do with you agent y/n. over the past few months you have made countless mistakes. you were placed in the bau team for a reason even if i was strongly against it. personally, i don’t think your profiling skills are up to par but you get one more chance. the next mistake you make, i will have no choice but to suspend you,” strauss informed you.
anger slowly bubbled up inside you. thankfully, you kept your shaking hands in your lap and kept yourself from lashing out. “suspend me? with all due respect ma’am, others on my team have made mistakes but they haven’t been called into your office,” you responded politely.
strauss suddenly threw the case file down and glared slightly at you. “oh so now you’re throwing your team under the bus? this further proves my suspicions of you not fitting in and not working well with them. don’t get me started on your relationship with dr. reid. furthermore, agent hotchner will be hearing about your behavior agent y/n. you are dismissed.”
with that you took a sharp breath and did everything in your power to not storm out of the office. the first thing you did when you re-entered the bullpen was go straight up to hotch’s office. the door was open so you entered and closed it behind you. your boss’s eyes looked to you, a concerned look forming when he saw your state.
“i can’t do it anymore hotch, i really can’t,” you spoke, voice incredibly shaky.
“do what?” hotch responded as he finished scribbling down a few things on a file. you rubbed your eyes as tears began to form.
“be on this team. next time i make the simplest mistake even if it’s suggesting the wrong thing, i’ll be suspended. i can’t remain on this team knowing that i’ll have to walk on eggshells for an unknown time. i know strauss doesn’t want me in the fbi anymore, she told me herself. i just can’t be here anymore,” you revealed, getting choked up in the end.
hotch stopped writing and placed his pen down. “she said that?” he asked. you nodded with a frown. “she told me that my profile skills are not up to par and i shouldn’t be at the bau.”
with that, you realized just how mentally exhausted you were. ever since you got to the bau, you’ve had to constantly prove yourself and after all this time you still seem to not do your job right. you just wanted it to stop.
“and there’s nothing i can do about strauss. so, i would like to request a resignation form,” you concluded.
hotch’s eyes widened at your request. “is there anyway i can convince you to take the rest of the week off to think about it? you can let me know monday morning,” your boss tried to convince you. you thought about it for a slight moment before agreeing.
“i’ll let you know monday morning,” you confirmed. once exiting the office, you noticed your entire team in the bullpen including garcia who was sitting with derek. you ignored them as you grabbed your work bag that had yet to be unpacked and your go bag. you pressed your lips together and rolled your eyes sarcastically as you looked at your name plate. ‘ssa y/n y/l/n’ it read. you flicked it down before leaving the building without another word. 
rossi, who had stepped out of his office just in time to see you leaving, looked at his team who were all sporting confused expressions. he then walked down the catwalk and into hotch’s office.
“what’s going on with y/n?” rossi asked.
hotch motioned to close the door and then sit down. rossi sat across the younger man who then sighed.
“she’s reached a breaking point with strauss’s harassment. and dave, from what she’s told me it’s never been this bad. she requested a resignation form,” hotch revealed causing rossi’s eyes to widen.
“she’s quitting?” he asked shocked.
hotch shook his head, “i managed to convince her to take the rest of the week off to think about it. i just don’t know where she’s going to go. and i mean what is there to do about strauss. nothing we could even discuss in a work setting.”
“we can do a team meeting at my house tonight. send a text using the personal numbers. oh and tell garcia to bring her computer,” rossi suggested before exiting to room to avoid suspicion.
spencer looked out confused as his girlfriend exited the bau abrubtly, bags in hand and tears in your eyes. he knew he could go after you but had realized you probably wanted to be alone.
a buzz from his personal phone broke him out of his thoughts. judging by the rest of the teams expressions, they had received one too. it was a simple message from hitch.
“team meeting at rossi’s at 7pm. do not mention it to anyone outside of the team. garcia bring your laptop.”
he looked towards emily who simply shrugged. they had no doubt that it was most likely about your sudden exit.
____
meanwhile, once exiting the bau, you quickly drove home as fast as traffic and the speed limit let you. you then stepped in your apartment, thankful at that moment that you didn’t share with anyone.
the first thing you did was pack your bags. you left your work bag at the table and packed a backpack with personal items such as a few books and electronics. then, you packed a suitcase full of clothes. finally, you changed out of your work attire and into sweatpants and a t-shirt which was obviously much more comfortable.
you sat on your couch, opening up your laptop to american airlines. after finding a flight that was leaving in an hour and a half, you booked it before putting your laptop back into your backpack and standing up.
before you left, you placed your gun on your table. this wasn’t a flight with the bau so you couldn’t bring your gun for obvious reasons. your badge remained in your coat pocket just in case. as you looked back at your apartment, you sighed.
there was only one thought that crossed your mind; spencer. your boyfriend obviously wouldn’t react well to you just getting up and leaving so suddenly. well, no one would, but, you didn’t want to leave him in the dust. you knew he would come to your apartment after work so a note was the easiest option. you quickly grabbed a piece of paper and a pen and began writing.
spencer,
“goodbyes are bittersweet. but it’s not the end, i’ll see your face again”
i know it’s cliche to put a song lyric but i figured it was fitting. i really just need to get away for awhile and clear my head. text me and let me know you’re alright, okay?
i love you,
y/n
you folded it up before neatly printing your boyfriends name on the front. with that, you were out your front door and on the way to the airport.
close to seven hours later, you arrived in san diego. the warm heat of the city welcomed you as you felt your nerves seemingly melt away. after taking a cab, you arrived to your families home.
you first knocked timidly on the door before stepping back. moments later, a figure appeared before the door swung open.
“hi mom,” you spoke with a small smile.
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