#i love this fic you guys don't understand. i can't abandon her. | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

buckyseddie · 1 year

Text

tragic endings

pairings — logan (james) howlett x fem!human!reader

summary — in which, after she takes in a young, troubled mutant in and vows to protect her from all dangers that she seems to be in, she meets the famously-brooding wolverine, who unexpectedly changes her life.

word count — 16.2k.

warnings — mentions of reader suffering through parental neglect and abuse as a child and having LOADS of trauma (LOTS of heavy hints of ptsd too!), mentions of reader taking some lives in order to protect laura and carrying a LOT of guilt, ANGST (obviously, because this isn't a happy ending type of fic), some fluff in it though, reader's in her early twenties, character death and self-sacrifice, equal pining, kisses, use of pet-names [kid, sweetheart, doll], mentions of the reader being depressed and having anxiety and also being suicidal / wanting to die, also a little bit of logan and the reader posing as laura's parents, reader has abandonment and codependency issues, reader also has raging anger issues.

notes — i have one word to describe this fic: long. it is going to be VERY long. also, i love that i finally finish this right as i find out that my grandma passed away... we love grief! gif and divider creds to owner!

p.s., feedback is very much encouraged and appreciated <3.

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IT'S SORT OF... COMPLICATED. ALL she knows, is that she feels something — something she can't quite explain — for the little girl that has suffered through so much pain and loss.

how could someone who suffered through so much pain at the hands of her own parents could become a motherly figure to a misunderstood little girl? well, maybe it's just because she couldn't help it.

she may have had a rough childhood, but [y/n] could just feel it in her heart that laura needed someone to show her that she mattered — that she was worth the hard journey of making it out of everything alive.

so, is it really that hard to see why she would do anything to get her safe? even go to the older, grumpy — clearly retired — wolverine for help?

"look, kid. you seem like you've got good intentions. but, i can't afford to have anymore trouble by helping you and the girl out." logan grumbles, after laura had arrived to knock out the asshole that dared try to mess shit up for him, charles, and caliban.

[y/n] sighs, trying to keep an eye on laura, who has just now begun to walk over to charles. "i can't say i don't get it. because... i do," she sympathetically states, understanding that he just wants to be left alone from all the danger that being a mutant brings.

with another sigh, she watches the young girl interact with charles with a sense of comfort, before turning back to face the older man, who's been watching her warily. "look, i know she's not my daughter — not by blood. but, i love her like she's my own. and she doesn't deserve to be hunted down and killed like a monster. she's done nothing wrong."

"so, i'm only asking you to get us somewhere safe, where we can travel away from on our own. i'll pay you whatever and however much you want. but, i'm not abandoning her — i'm going to protect her with everything i have, for as long as possible."

there's a moment of silence as he doesn't say anything. but, after realizing that his silence is his answer, [y/n] nods wordlessly, trying not to get emotional over the fact that she and laura are on their own to find somewhere safe for them to go.

"right. like i said, i get it." she mumbles, sighing.

an unexpected look of regret flashes in logan's eyes, but [y/n] doesn't see it, due to motioning for laura to come over to her.

a look of disappointment takes over the little girl's expression as [y/n] turns back to face the wolverine. "look, i'm sorry for bothering you about this. clearly... this was both a mistake and a waste of time." she murmurs as laura comes up from behind her and grabs her hand.

"and i hope these guys," she stops to point to the unconscious man still lying on the ground. "don't give you any more trouble."

he sighs and nods, still watching her warily as he begins to wonder why a human would risk so much — and her life — just to protect this little girl that he's been growing more curious about by every passing second.

he also finds her a little bit annoying, but nevertheless, it's all the same amount.

with no other words being said between them, [y/n] gives him a forced and fake smile, hoping that she doesn't make him feel guilty for not being able to help them, as she gently tugs on laura's hand to tell her that it's time for them to go.

as they walk further away, logan begins to wonder if he made a mistake — for not agreeing to help them.

after all, it's always been a first instinct and part of his nature to help and protect people. or at least, when he had been part of the x-men team.

—————

THE NEXT TIME THEY MEET, it's a few days later — after logan, charles, and caliban had been attacked by the group called alkali-transigen for the second time.

caliban had been captured by this group, while logan and charles were able to escape in logan's crappy limo-like car.

the two men had found laura and [y/n] sitting in an alley. laura was fast asleep, lying her head on the older woman's shoulder.

[y/n] shivers, tugging the tiny blanket further over laura's sleeping form as the sound of the limo pulls up near the entrance.

worried that they're found again by the cruel men that just wouldn't leave them alone, [y/n] cautiously pops open an eye, brows furrowing. she leans forward, trying to get a better look.

but, she stops suddenly as she notices logan stepping out of his car, confusion filled on his face. "logan? w—what are you doing here?"

"kid, why didn't you tell me that you guys didn't have anywhere else to go?" he asks her once he gets to the actual entrance of the alley.

she shrugs, sitting up now as she tries to ignore the cold weather. "i could tell you didn't want to be bothered. i thought it would've just been easier if i lied." she murmurs, stopping completely as laura begins to stir a bit in her sleep.

once the young girl has stopped moving in her sleep completely, [y/n] impulsively decides to move to stand up, in order to give the young girl all the room she needs.

so, within a few cautious and quiet seconds, she slowly moves herself away and moves laura to the side, before placing her jacket under her head to use as a pillow.

with a prolonged, nervous sigh, [y/n] then takes in a relieved inhale as the little girl falls right back to sleep without any further disturbance.

"you know, if i knew you guys had nowhere else to go... " logan trails off when she turns to finally face him.

with another sigh leaving her, [y/n] lightly grabs onto his arm — in which, who flinches for more than a second — before leading him over to the front of his parked car.

"look, logan. we both know that you probably would have still said no." she murmurs, making sure to keep an eye on laura every few seconds while speaking with him.

logan sighs, knowing that she is right — no matter how many times he wishes to believe otherwise.

but, there's also another part of him that knows that he would probably help her and laura in a heartbeat, if he weren't growing slowly weak every day. but, he is — it both slows him down and makes it hard for him to help them to his full potential.

he opens his mouth to say something, but charles, who'd rolled down his window from inside the car before and heard the twos' conversation, interrupts him, "logan, they need our help — we should help them."

with a small smile almost curving onto her lips, [y/n] sighs. she knows that she can't just drag him and logan into this. it just wouldn't be fair.

"no, please. it's really alright. i don't want to put you guys in this complicated situation." she murmurs, just as laura stirs again in her sleep.

charles shrugs his shoulder, as if he wouldn't mind if they got dragged into it. but, then again, he's never been one to turn down the chance to help others when they need it.

"really, guys... it's okay. laura and i will manage on our own." she murmurs as she turns to walk back over to the little girl and gently and carefully pick her up.

as she faces them and walks back over to logan with laura still in her arms, covered up in both [y/n]'s jacket and blanket, logan furrows his brows. "are you sure?"

the concern in his voice shocks her, but she waves it off as him just trying to be polite. "y—yeah. we'll be fine." she nods, gulping down her pride as she lies through her teeth, once again.

in a way, she's grateful that he'd said earlier that he couldn't help her and the girl. i mean, [y/n] is the type of person to deal with her own issues and problems by herself, instead of choosing to burden people with them — her words, not mine.

her going to logan for help was really just a moment of weakness. she was desperate — only wanting to do whatever she could to try every possibility that would protect laura and get them anywhere safe.

truthfully, the main reason why she's lying to them about really needing their help, is the fact that she feels guilty — it's already obvious that logan feels regretful that he didn't agree to help them.

and guilt-tripping them — mostly logan — that was never her intention. so, if she has to lie to make him feel better about the situation, then that's what she's going to do.

"you don't have to lie, [y/n]. there's nothing wrong with admitting when you need help." charles tells her from his side of the open window.

the young woman mentally slaps her hand to her forehead in irritation over forgetting that the extremely older man is psychic.

she stutters, hating that she can't hide the truth from them. "i... i just don't want to be a burden. and... i don't know what i'd do if either of you got seriously hurt because you guys decided to help us — everyone gets hurt when they get involved with me."

with a relentless sigh, logan simply nods to the car. "we'll figure it out, okay? just get in."

she hesitates for a moment, wondering if dragging them into this mess is really the right answer.

after all, she knows that if either of them gets hurt — in any way — because of her, she'll never forgive herself.

but, as laura recklessly jumps down from [y/n]'s arms, causing a shocked gasp to leave her, and runs over to the other door opposite of the one charles is sitting behind, she sighs.

both [y/n] and logan share a look of a tiny bit of amusement.

with a tired yawn, she shrugs her shoulder, knowing that she won't be able to change the little girl's mind now as she opens the door and slides in.

"i... guess laura would like to take you guys up on that offer. so, i'm not really in a place to say no now." she mutters as logan leads her to the front of the car.

if only they had known all the bigger trouble they'd all have to endure in the future, all because they allowed the possibility of helping them become a reality.

—————

AFTER MANY DIFFERENT NIGHTS OF passing through different towns, logan finally stops at a gas station that's in the middle of nowhere.

[y/n] follows laura over to one of the electric horses, while logan and charles stay back in the car. as she leads laura up and over the horse to sit down, [y/n] places some quarters into the machine.

"there you go," she murmurs, giving the younger girl a warm smile. "now, i'm going inside to use the bathroom. i'll be back in a few minutes, okay?"

the girl silently nods as [y/n] hesitates to leave her alone.

but, nevertheless, after realizing that, not only are they all in the clear — for now — but logan and charles will surely watch her for a few minutes, while she's in the bathroom.

with the positive thoughts swirling around in her head, [y/n] finally walks over to the door, before walking inside.

after asking the person at the front of the store where the bathroom is, he points in the direction of where it is, and [y/n] races off in that direction in a hurry as she really needs to use the bathroom.

the young woman tries to pee as fast as she can, considering that they're all still on the run and practically fugitives at this point.

then, as she walks over to the sink, she rinses off and washes her hands. but, as she sees all the blood — from the previous days of running into trouble with the group that had started all of this — dried up on both her hands, arms, and face, panic begins to quickly sink in.

to protect laura, [y/n] had to take extra precautions and do whatever she could, to do just that.

not only had she been injured, but she had also had to do two things she'd always said she'd never do — learn how to shoot guns and really any other weapons, all the while also having to take some lives.

it was self-defense, of course. but, still.

the guilt and trauma she's endured because of the fact that she's killed some people... well, it's taken too much of a toll on her.

all she kept thinking was, how can i live with myself, after all the things i've done?

she still thinks this as she tensely and harshly tries to scrub all the blood away.

[y/n] has always dealt with self-image issues and her internal hatred for herself — especially, with growing up in the toxic household that she had as a kid. but, this? it's extra new and multiplied now.

shaky breaths and unshed tears escape her as she looks up at herself in the mirror this time.

but, just before the negative thoughts can become any worse, there's a knock on the bathroom door.

[y/n]'s head snaps up in the direction of the door, more panic filling her. "just a minute!" she yells to the person on the other side of the door as she tries to scrub harder to get the blood off.

her breaths become more panicked as logan's voice speaks up from outside. "[y/n], i'm coming in."

her eyes widen in both surprise and shock. as the door slowly opens, she panics and turns around, so that she's leaning against the sink and is hiding her hands behind her back.

just as he walks inside, [y/n] lets out a shaky, "h—hey. is everyone... ready to go?"

however, logan doesn't reply to her. he only steps closer to her as he crosses his arms over his chest with confusion swirling around in his eyes. "what's going on? did something happen?"

she abruptly shakes her head, dipping her head down to avoid showing any weakness. "everything's f—fine."

"don't lie to me. what's going on?" he asks her once more, stepping even closer to her, to the point of them only being a few inches away from each other.

with a sigh of defeat, [y/n] shakily pulls her hands out from behind her back. "i... i can't get the blood off — their blood. it won't come off." she whispers shakily.

he frowns, stepping even closer to her.

the young woman's breath catches in her throat as the space between them decreases by every passing second.

though, the concerned look in his eyes scares [y/n].

as someone who's never experienced someone worrying about her and her well-being in her entire life, just the thought of someone actually taking care of her, terrifies her, to be completely honest.

they stare at each other for a long moment, before logan slowly reaches for a paper towel and moves over closer to one of the sinks and turns it on to run the paper towel through some water. then, he brings the towel back to her and starts to gently scrub her hands and arms.

within a few minutes, he has successfully gotten the blood off of her hands, arms, and face. as he throws the paper towel away, her gaze softens as he steps away from her to give her her space.

"t—thank you." she murmurs raspily, trying to act as if she hadn't let him see her in such a vulnerable state.

he simply nods hesitantly, now stuck in his thoughts.

when they had first met, he — no matter how many times he's tried to ignore it — had become just slightly curious about her.

but, now? he can't help but find himself completely consumed with the feeling of concern and curiosity over her.

after another long moment of them just looking at one another, [y/n] finally snaps herself out of her daze, shaking her head in silent embarrassment. "i... i think i'm going to find laura and get back to the car. i think i've been in here long enough, right?" she tries to crack a joke, desperately needing to change the subject.

logan nods once more, before motioning to the door as he waits for her to leave first.

once she's officially out of the bathroom and through the hall, he follows after her.

though, before either of them can actually leave the building, both adults find them watching a very shocking scene playing before them.

laura has her claws grown out of her skin, and she holds down the current worker of the small gas station, an angry look placed on her face.

"oh, god..." [y/n] trails off, sharing a similar expression with logan.

as the young girl yells out, [y/n] snaps her head towards that direction and her eyes widen in shock and surprise.

then, she races over to the two of them, and gently pulls laura away from the man. her grasp immediately falls away from the man's when [y/n]'s gentle touch connects with her body.

"laura!" she murmurs in a slight lecturing tone, though it's still gentle. "you can't do stuff like that. you can't hurt innocent people, okay? you understand me?"

after a moment, the little girl finally nods and in a matter of seconds, her claws retract back into the skin of her knuckles.

[y/n] sighs in relief, before leading her back to the car, while logan stays inside for a few more minutes.

later that night, they arrive at a hotel. both [y/n] and laura fall fast asleep the second they reach their bed.

logan, however, struggles to stay asleep.

—————

SHE WAKES UP IN THE middle of the night, breathless gasps and hyperventilating breaths leaving her.

as she continues to struggle to breathe, she notices the little girl, who’s lying beside her, is still fast asleep.

she runs a shaky hand through her slightly knotted up and greasy hair as her heart begins to beat faster than ever and her breaths become much more panicked.

if only she didn’t have that nightmare — of all the lives she’s taken to protect laura. it’s a relentless, repetitive terrifying dream that she has been having almost every night, ever since it happened.

with another moment of her panicking state becoming much more worse, she shakily and quietly — as much as she can — takes off her blanket and rushes off in the direction of the bathroom.

too buried deep in her panicked thoughts and the flashbacks that the nightmare has provided for her, she doesn’t even notice the wolverine sitting in the other room that leads to the bathroom.

she only stumbles into the bathroom and quietly shuts the door.

as she slides down the door, she doesn’t even realize that the light is still off. she’s only focused on trying to not go into full panic mode, or worse, slip off of the edge and begin to have a panic attack.

but, it’s quite too late for that.

she’s already slipping and losing all of her control over her breathing. another painful and breathless sob leaves her lips and her head falls to lean against the door as she clenches her eyes shut.

the tears fall carelessly down her cheeks and she cries out in frustration. god, she hates crying. it has always made her feel weak.

she shakily stands up as she quickly flicks the light switch on. but, as she looks into the mirror and sees her wrecked appearance, another shaky breath escapes her lips.

[y/n]’s brows furrow and more tears cloud her eyes.

then, out of nowhere, she slams her hands down onto the counter repeatedly. the loathing hatred she feels for herself grows and grows by every passing second.

more tears blur her vision, the shaky breaths still leaving her lips.

though, before she can panic even more, there’s a light knock on the other side of the door.

“kid? everything okay in there?” logan’s voice calls out through the door and it — fortunately — snaps [y/n] out of her panicked daze. at least, for the moment.

“w—what?” she stutters out in an answer to his question. she holds her breath as she waits for him to say what he wants to.

“are you okay?”

the tone of concern shocks [y/n] as she chokes on her answer, “y—yeah, i’m… uh, i’m fine.”

there’s only silence for the first few minutes. but then, suddenly, the door knob is being turned and logan is slowly entering.

he shuts the door behind him as he turns to face her with crossed arms and a look as if to say, 'i know you’re not fine'.

“i know you’re lying. why can’t you sleep?”

she stays silent, eyes falling to the floor as she leans against the counter.

“well?” he asks, causing her to snap her head back up at him.

“it’s nothing… i—” she abruptly cuts herself off, inhaling deeply. she dips her head down in shame as she tries to calm herself down.

"i just... had another nightmare. that's all." she mumbles as she lifts her head back up to look at him.

he sighs with a nod. "do you wanna talk about it?" he asks, not being able to help but feel a little worried about her.

as she notices this look on his face, something in her brings her butterflies. [y/n] gulps nervously, before shaking her head.

despite, trusting him now — a bit more than she had before — she just can't let him in, yet. and she knows that he can understand that more than anyone else.

he nods.

silence fills the room as they stare at each other with different emotions consuming them.

while logan still feels a bit worried about her well-being, [y/n] watches him with a wary expression, trying to figure him out.

"well, um... thank you — for checking in on me. but, i promise, i'm okay," she murmurs, anxiously running a hand through her tangled-up hair. "i'm always okay."

despite, [y/n] sounding really genuine, logan doesn't believe her for a second. but, he doesn't say anything about it.

after another moment of complete silence, [y/n] clears her throat. "well... i should go back to bed." she says, nodding to the door, causing logan to snap out of his own concerned thoughts.

he nods and drops his arms from his chest, before moving to twist the doorknob and pulls the door open.

he lets her pass him as she hurries back to her and laura's bed.

though, as she lies back down and stares at the hotel room’s ceiling, a soft smile finds it's way to her lips as she remembers how concerned about her he's been acting lately.

she may not still completely trust him.

but, for him to grow concerned for her? that's quite a big development on his part.

[y/n] falls asleep with that same smile on her lips.

—————

SHE SLEEPS A LOT BETTER. so much so that she sleeps through the entirety of the next day.

the only time where she actually wakes up, is when — while logan went off to find a better car for them, since the limo's already been seriously damaged — a few men, who were sent from the psychopath that's been hunting both [y/n] and laura in the first place, showed up at the hotel room.

unfortunately, right when she does wake up, charles begins to have a seizure. it not only stops the bad men from harming laura, but it also does the same for everyone else.

the entire process is especially more harmful to [y/n], considering that she's only human, after all.

lucky for her, logan arrives soon after, taking care of some of the men, before laura assists with giving him charles' shot that's supposed to help with the seizures.

once charles has officially calmed down, [y/n] takes in a deep breath.

but, as she stands up, she loses her balance, when her legs give out, taking much more of a hit than anyone could've anticipated.

she lets out a groan as she clutches her head in pain, suddenly being hit with a wave of throbbing pain.

as she continues to struggle to deal with the pain, both laura and logan watch her in worry.

while logan turns to face charles, who wears a very regretful expression, and gives him a pointed glance, laura races over to [y/n] and silently worries about her.

as she tries to breathe through the pain, she notices the little girl's presence near her and decides to place her now sweaty hands over hers, in order to calm her down.

"it's... okay — i'm okay. i promise." her voice comes out in a croaky whisper as she begins to slowly stand up.

surprise flashes in her eyes as she notices the crazy amount of concern and worry in logan's eyes.

he steps forward to help her, but she holds up a hand, before he can get any closer.

"don't worry about me. i'm fine." she murmurs, trying to ignore the pain that is still consuming her body.

logan raises a single brow at her, challenging her to tell the truth as he notices her wince in further-more pain. "you sure about that? because you don't look like you're okay." he steps forward once more.

before she can answer him, her head throbs, once more.

it causes her to stop completely and dip her head down in pain as she presses her hand to her forehead.

"[y/n]?" he calls out as he steps closer her, the rest of the people in the room becoming much more concerned for her as she sighs shakily.

"i..." she trails off breathlessly as she begins to feel so much more light-headed and becomes a bit nauseous. "i don't understand why it's like this... "

"like what?"

"why it hurts so much..." she whispers as her legs finally give out and everything goes dark.

—————

THE MOMENT SHE WAKES, SHE notices that she's no longer inside the hotel room they were in before she'd passed out.

she begins to panic after realizing that she doesn't recognize the room she's been currently sleeping in for god knows how long.

her heart beat picks up in a fast pace as she looks around in confusion and stress.

though, before she can actually find herself in a worse panicking state, the door of the room slowly opens.

as soon as she realizes that it's logan, [y/n] sighs in relief. "thank god." she whispers to herself as he slowly shuts the door behind him, before walking over to the bed she's currently lying on.

"you alright? you know, you look really stressed right now." he asks as he sits down on the edge of the bed, eyebrows already furrowing together in concern.

she sputters once more, glancing around the room again, before turning back to face him.

"w—where are we? i don't recognize this room... and it's honestly stressing me out. especially, since the last time i was awake, it was inside the hotel room and now i'm here — where i don't recognize anything." she rambles, furrowing her brows as she tries to catch her breath from talking so much.

he chuckles in amusement, before shaking his head at her in response.

"doll, you don't need to worry or stress about that. the explanation is pretty simple," he states as she waits for him to go on.

"after you passed out from what happened in the hotel room with charles and all those men, we had to leave to ensure that that group didn't get to you and laura. so, we left and ended up helping this family and they've offered to let us stay here for the night. we'll be leaving early in the morning, alright?"

after hearing his explanation, she sighs in relief. “oh… okay. that makes sense.”

he nods, staying silent as he stares at her with an expression filled with worry and concern — something that’s become a very familiar look lately. especially, when it comes to her.

in the past — maybe today, even — he would've told anyone that he would never fall in love again, or even, in this situation, at least, grow genuine, protective instincts and to care for another person.

and when you have the type of haunting past — like he does — it's understandable.

[y/n], sensing his eyes on her, looks up, brows furrowing.

she tilts her head to the side in confusion, suddenly feeling self-conscious.

"w—what?" she stutters out nervously, quickly beginning to wonder what's going on inside of his troubled head.

logan tries his best to shake the feelings and new — for him, anyways — thoughts away. "nothing." he mumbles, clearing his throat and cutting off the new moment between them.

it's quiet for a moment, before the door opens, only to reveal both laura and charles.

once laura realizes that the older woman is now awake, relief floods to her face, before she's racing over to the bed and crushing [y/n] into a bone-tight hug.

"oof!" she lets out, trying to ignore just how tight the little girl is hugging her as she hugs her back.

after a second, she laughs in a form of appreciation — she's never felt so loved before, considering how she was treated as a growing child.

"i promise i'm okay. and i will be for a very long time — you never have to worry about losing me. okay?" she murmurs quietly, before the younger girl finally pulls away from her with a protective look shining in her eyes.

"she was quite worried for you." charles says from his place, sat in his wheelchair.

[y/n] nods, feeling guilty for making her worry as a frown takes over the place on her lips.

"and... i'm terribly sorry for putting you in that situation and putting your life in danger." he continues, his facial expression obviously filled with only regret and guilt.

the young woman's face quickly becomes confused.

"oh, charles... that wasn't your fault. and i don't blame you for it." she states in a soft voice, sending him an appreciative smile.

the wolverine scoffs, as if he doesn't quite share the same opinion as her.

his tone of voice is bitter as he speaks again, making how he feels known, "maybe you should."

[y/n] tilts her head to the side in further confusion. "what? how could this be his fault? it can't be his fault, if he can't control when it happens." she says, quickly coming to the eldest man's defense.

"i mean... you can't possibly believe that he wants to hurt anyone. and having these moments of out-of-control seizures can hurt them."

logan only rolls his eyes. "whatever." he mutters, not wanting to argue with her, before he glances towards the door.

"we should go check and see if they've finished making dinner yet." he mumbles as laura hurries to help [y/n] out of the bed.

she chuckles, before shaking her head.

"it's okay, sweetheart. i'm okay to walk." she murmurs softly as the little girl simply nods silently in understanding.

as [y/n] makes her way over to the door, limping and wincing every few seconds, logan, charles, and laura watch in clear concern, but she only ignores it.

she doesn't want to be any more of a victim — not anymore.

her only fate is to be able to protect laura and get her across the border — that's all she's going to be.

logan backs up, pulling charles with him as he keeps a good grip on the handles of the chair, while [y/n] slowly and eventually pulls the door open.

with an excited smile, she turns to them with a hand motioning towards the open doorway and backs away, in order for them to get through. "here we go!"

laura claps excitedly as logan pushes the old telepath through.

as soon as they're out and making their way into the kitchen, [y/n] and laura walk through the doorway and follow after them.

laura lets go of [y/n]'s hand as soon as she gets to her chair, practically throwing herself into it in pure excitement.

the older woman inhales nervously, becoming a little anxious about meeting these seemingly nice folks for the first time.

she lifts her hand up and into the air, giving them a small wave.

"hi. um, i'm [y/n]," she nervously says, nodding towards laura.

"i'm laura's mother." she explains further as the brunette woman laughs and waves her shyness off.

"it's so nice to officially meet you — laura's spoken so highly of you. i'm glad you're doing a lot better than before." she kindly says, nodding to an empty seat, the one next to where logan is now sitting.

[y/n] takes in a deep breath as logan still continues to watch her every move in clear worry, before she takes the seat and sends the much older woman a warm smile.

"thank you. yes, i'm doing and feeling a lot better now."

after the family says their grace, logan and [y/n] glance at one another, not even realizing how much they seem to be looking at each other.

as laura begins to eat — quite messily, too, might i add — logan steps in with a frown and a glare.

he reaches over with his hand and taps her shoulder to get her attention.

then, he gives her her fork, quickly motioning for her to use it properly.

seeing this herself, [y/n] giggles, only finding amusement in watching her.

"i'm... so sorry about laura. as you can clearly see, we're still trying to teach her how to have proper manners."

hearing the 'we' part of her statement, logan gives a gruff agreement, quickly realizing that the woman is going for the wife-and-husband-with-their-daughter cover.

though, it's quite obvious that both adults are their own versions of flushed over the idea of them actually being together — or being a couple.

the older couple simply waves it off, not being ones to judge.

after all, all families are different, right?

though, as laura starts pouring big, big loads of food onto her plate, logan has to interfere, obviously. again.

"there's plenty more, if she'd like some more." katherine offers, nodding over to the younger girl, who's now glaring and pouting at logan.

he shakes his head, mumbling that she's had more than enough.

[y/n] can't help but let a small laugh escape her.

but, after realizing how childish she must seem in the moment, her eyes widen in shock over her own impulsive action, and then clasps her hands over her mouth to keep anything else from escaping.

the famous wolverine stops frowning at laura, only to turn to look over at [y/n] with a raised brow as a response to her childishness.

she laughs again, at the look placed on his face.

after all the time they've spent together — and obviously, the feelings that have shifted between them — she can't take him seriously. not anymore, at least.

although he looks like he's just about ready to lecture her, she knows deep down that he couldn't get mad at her over something so minor.

and another part of her just hopes that maybe he feels the same about her that she feels for him and that he couldn't bear to be angry at her for that long.

logan glares at her once more, though it's more playful than anything else.

as she notices everyone watching their seemingly normal exchange, [y/n] clears her throat as her face instantly turns beat-red at the attention they're receiving.

"uh, sorry." she genuinely apologizes to katherine and her husband.

katherine laughs herself as laura and charles join in. "there's no need to apologize. i think you and james make quite the couple."

[y/n]'s face heats up, once more, at the compliment. "o—oh, thank you." she stutters nervously, tucking a stray strand of her hair behind her ear as logan's gaze catches hers.

this time, though, their eye contact is very much different than any of the others they've shared — this one gives off both admiration and genuine care over the other.

charles, however, decides to cut the moment short, after noticing the pair of adults' undeniable connection, when he accidentally hears both of their own thoughts.

[y/n] is not only flushed on the outside, but also on the inside — she wonders anxiously if anything could ever happen between them, or if it's just her that feels this way.

and logan? well, he's trying to act like she doesn't have a single effect on him at all — he's trying to stay professional about this all and fight against how he truly feels.

a small smirk tugs at the psychic's lips, before he breaks the silence, "yes, my son and [y/n] truly do make quite a great couple — they're actually quite perfect for each other."

[y/n]'s face turns even redder — if that's even possible — while logan glares at the side of charles' face.

but, after a moment, both logan and [y/n] realize that the rest of the family — and charles and laura — are watching them carefully and closely.

"yeah, we are perfect for each other. i'm just happy to be with him and to have laura and charles — this family means everything to me." the young woman states, no lies evident in her tone of voice — she speaks the truth in her words, even if it's all just for a cover that won't be permament.

something in logan changes when he hears her truthful words, a small smile — a grateful one — appearing on his lips as he stares at only her with a gentle look in his eyes.

without another thought, he nods and says his own version of the truth, despite the fact that he hasn't wanted to get attached to either her or laura, in the first place, "you know i feel the same, sweetheart."

his tone of voice comes out gruff, but [y/n] senses the truth in it and smile at him as she places one of her hands over his.

they both fall into the moment, completely forgetting about everyone else, almost as if the entire world falls away, when it's just them.

katherine smiles at them with admiration.

"you know how i know you two are truly perfect for each other?" she asks, breaking the moment between them as they glance over at her in confusion.

"you look at each other like you're the other's world — and that's true love." she continues as [y/n] laughs nervously, before murmuring a 'thanks'.

logan watches her once more, before katherine's husband asks where they're heading after this.

he snaps himself out of his daze as both he and charles reply with completely different locations.

"uh," logan starts, but [y/n] laughs and cuts the two men off, "sorry. apparently, there's been some miscommunication!" she laughs once more, trying to make a joke out of it.

katherine laughs with her.

"are you guys going on some kind of extended-vacation?"

after a moment, [y/n] nods, choosing to just go with it. "we're going to be going to both oregon and south dakota."

charles nods along with her.

"yes, it's a very long overdue vacation," he pauses as both logan and [y/n] nod in agreement. "we're city folk — always wanted to see the country. and meet the people in it."

logan watches the exchange, noticing how comfortable both charles and [y/n] are about speaking about a vacation.

needless to say, they all deserve a vacation — away from all the complicated situations they've been in lately.

"that's lovely." katherine nods in agreement as everyone continues to eat.

"i've been trying to get will here to take a vacation for years—"

will interrupts, quickly bringing up that they'd not be able to take care of their property, if they went on vacation.

katherine replies to this by telling him they need to sell the property.

[y/n] laughs at their interaction, never before seeing an actual healthy couple before — her parents, after all, didn't have a healthy relationship at all.

they continue to argue, before their son interrupts them, "i could drop out of school!"

"let's not go that far." katherine says to him seriously as he just laughs it off.

"i mean, i'll do it."

"no."

"why not?"

something in logan's face changes as he watches the normal family exchange between them all.

his gaze goes over to laura, something changing immediately.

[y/n] notices this and smiles, hoping that he truly does care about her and laura, like she hopes he does.

"now, why would you want to do that, nate?" charles asks genuinely and [y/n] can't help it as she lets out a giggle.

"you might want to be careful with answering that question, nate. charles here, was a professor that ran a very important school." she announces in an amused tone of voice.

"a lot of years, right, charles?" logan asks, finding some entertainment in this topic of conversation, as well.

charles waves him off, trying not to make a big deal out of it.

though, just as he begins to agree politely, [y/n] begins to experience some more sharp pains in her head.

this time, though, it's much more extreme than before.

then, she's suddenly pushing back from the chair as she stands up, catching everyone's now concerned looks.

"i... i'm sorry. i think... i need to lie down — it seems that i'm still having some headaches." she murmurs in an embarrassed tone as she starts to sway slightly and her eyesight gets blurry and splotchy.

logan immediately stands up, becoming much more worried than before.

he places a hand over her back and the other on her shoulder as she begins to groan in pain — she's never felt headaches this bad before.

"i'm going to help her get back upstairs." he announces, not caring if he seems rude, his attention completely on the young woman in pain.

"yes, you should," katherine agrees, after standing up and placing her hand up to [y/n]'s forehead.

she frowns at how warm she is. "she's burning up. she really should lie down — maybe, just for a little bit, or until y'all leave tomorrow morning."

logan doesn't say anything in response. though, he understands what she's saying and is mentally agreeing himself.

[y/n] gulps guiltily, both feeling bad for all of the issues her health is causing and because she really doesn't understand why she's been in so much pain recently.

for only a moment, she leans her head against logan's chest, the sudden nausea becoming way too much for her in the moment.

logan, not quite expecting such an open and vulnerable action from her, breathes in a deep breath as he allows the physical contact. only because it's her.

"alright," he suddenly says, wrapping one of his arms around her waist and turning to face katherine.

"i'll be back to help laura and charles to bed." he states, nodding to them, who've both stopped their eating to watch [y/n] in further concern — they all know that she's only been acting like she's fine, but they didn't expect everything to get worse for her.

[y/n] barely acknowledges anything after that — the pain she feels is just too distracting for her to hear the worry in logan's voice, or to see the concern everyone in the room holds for her.

though, as logan brings her into his arms — bridal style — and walks them up the stairs, she lets out a barely containable cry.

this causes his eyebrows to furrow together in both concern and confusion. "what's wrong, doll?"

she cries again, hating how worried he is for her.

"i... i hate this... " she says through her heavy breaths that match with her small cries.

"hate what?"

"this — being so pathetic and weak of a human being that i can't even make it through the night." she mumbles, but he hears her completely, considering of how close they are.

"sweetheart—" he begins to say, knowing where this conversation is going, just as they reach the doorway of the room that she'd slept in before.

but, she interrupts him, "—no."

as her voice comes out in emotional stutters, she forces herself out of his arms as carefully as she can.

as soon as she's standing, she begins to feel light-headed again.

"[y/n]—" he says again as he notices that same sick-to-her-stomach expression on her face.

"no... i can't do this." she whispers shakily as a bunch of strands of her hair falls over her face.

though, honestly? this small little detail is something that she could care less about.

logan frowns, not sure of what she means. "what do you mean by that? can't do what?"

she lets out a slightly unhinged laugh as she shakes her head.

"i can't help laura... if i can't even survive," she mutters, taking in a deep breath as she leans against the doorway.

logan tilts his head to the side in concern for her.

he waits for her to continue, knowing that she's not going to stop until she gets what she needs to say out.

"i mean, this behavior isn't fucking normal for me! i have never had these types of issues before, when it comes to my health. this is all happening so suddenly, and i can't understand why."

"you know it could easily just be stress. you've been so worried about the kid and charles lately. i'm sure everything is fine." logan says, stepping forward to help her into the room.

she doesn't budge for a moment, not ready to accept that this is her life now.

she ducks her head down as he places a hand over her shoulder, her bottom lip quickly becoming harshly pulled in between her teeth. her eyebrows raise as tears blur her eyesight very quickly.

"c'mon. let's get you to bed, alright?" he murmurs, trying to stay patient with her, knowing that she's been going through an awful lot in the past few weeks — maybe, even longer.

i mean, logan can't know for sure how many months she's been with laura. or if she's been going through all this trauma, long before she ever met the little girl.

and it's not like he's forgotten about the guilt and anxiety she's been experiencing lately because of the people she's had to kill, in order to protect laura, who she's grown to love and see as her own daughter.

"logan... " she trails off as she finally, finally looks him in the eye with fear in her eyes for the first time ever.

"what if i can't protect her? w—what happens... if something happens to me and i can't keep her safe?" she whispers tremblingly, some of the tears escaping her eyes and sliding down to her cheeks.

normally, she'd be embarrassed to let anyone see her like this — like she's pathetic or weak.

but, this is logan.

he's been much more vulnerable than anyone she's ever known.

also, the fact that he could never judge her for being terrified when he's felt so much worse than her.

this time, though, he stops in place. he no longer tries to get her to the bed.

especially, when he sees the scared look placed on her face, and just how vulnerable she's allowing herself to be with him — even though, she'd never do that with anyone else.

"what are you saying?"

"let's just face it, logan. i'm... obviously getting sick — or something. i don't know what it is, but something is happening to me. and i don't think i'll survive it. which means... " she trails off as she takes in a deep inhale of shaky breaths, trying to accept what she's saying — she needs to make peace with it.

"which means what?" he questions her in a harsh tone of voice, obviously not liking where this conversation is heading.

"it means that i don't have long. and we've barely even gotten to where we need to be, in order for laura to cross the border. i can't help her if i'm dead, logan — you know that." she finally spits out what she's been secretly thinking.

a dark look fills his eyes as he shakes his head, jaw clenching impossibly hard.

"no. i don't know that — we don't know that. you don't know that you're going to die." his statement is spit out in a negative tone of voice, showing that he refuses to believe that it's true.

maybe, it's because he has found himself growing to care for her — way more than he ever planned to.

after all, she and laura aren't strangers to him — not anymore.

"logan, i know... t—that you don't want to hear this." she starts, still leaning against the doorway, clenching her eyes shut and taking in a deep breath at the thought of what she has to say next.

"i know how much pain and loss you've experienced. and i wish and hope that you don't have to experience it... ever again. but, we have to face the facts."

now, she opens her eyes and looks up at him again with more tears spilling.

"and the fact is... i might die. and if i do — whether that's from what my body is experiencing right now, or getting myself killed — i need you to promise me that you'll do right by laura."

he grunts, growing more frustrated and annoyed by the second.

it's obvious — and understandable — that he does not want to have this conversation right now.

or ever, actually.

"she's your daughter — whether you can accept it or not. you are her parent. maybe... even more than i am. after all, i'm just a woman who cares for her and sees her as my child — even when she isn't. but, you, logan... you are her father — you both share the same dna and pain."

he stays silent after hearing this, however.

even if he has so many things to say to her, he doesn't say it, because he knows that she has more she wants to say.

"you have a chance with her. she's not too far gone — she can be better. and you can teach her how to be. but, you have to protect her and get to that border — no matter what happens. she needs a normal and healthy life, where she isn't treated like a weapon." she says, gulping down her pride as she readies herself to say her next choice of words.

"and... of course i want nothing more than to be right there with you guys, when she gets to have the better life she deserves," she states, pausing as that life flashes in the back of her mind.

but, as it disappears, just as fast as it came, she sighs and blinks away the tears. "but, that might not happen. no matter how much i want that future, i have to accept that it might not happen. and... i need you to give her that, okay? she needs a different life than this. she is only a child — one that doesn't deserve to be hunted down like an animal and killed because they think they can't control her. she deserves better than that."

[y/n] forces a smile to her lips.

"she needs you, logan. and i need you to promise me that you'll do what i ask of you — for her sake." she finishes as more tears fall.

he's silent for a moment. but, the anger and denial is quite clear and evident on his face.

noticing this, she steps forward, despite the nausea and pounding of her head that she still feels. "loga—"

"no!" he yells suddenly as his eyes meet hers.

she jumps slightly, worry filling her as she notices the raw emotions swirling around in his eyes.

"no. we're not having this conversation, alright? you're not dying. so, stop with this damn martyr act." he tells her harshly, trying to ignore her hurt expression.

it's a few moments, filled with complete silence and tension slowly building up in the air.

though, logan doesn't care.

or maybe, that's just what he wants it to seem like as he gently grabs onto her waist and side again, silently helping her over to the bed.

they don't exchange any words as he helps her get under the covers, before walking over to the door.

though, before he can shut the door behind him and leave her to her overwhelming emotions and thoughts, she calls out to him, "logan."

he turns to face her, keeping his face stoic as he looks at her in question.

"i want her to sleep in here — just this once." she mumbles shakily, refusing to look him in the eyes.

he silently nods, before walking out and shutting the door, needing to get out of there before he suffocates in that room with her extremely hurt expression.

—————

SHE WAKES UP TO SCREAMS of terror filling the entire house.

[y/n] immediately throws her body up as she lets out a gasp, searching the dark room.

but, she knows that scream — laura.

with a protective instinct towards the little girl, the slightly weak woman stumbles out of the bed and continues to struggle to get out of the room.

once she has the door open, she races into the hall, following the sounds of laura's whimpers and screams, only to find her lying down on the floor of the room that charles had recently fallen asleep in.

"laura? what's going o—?" she starts to question, not quite seeing the full scene of the bedroom.

but, when she does, she sputters and gasps as she takes in the bloody scene before her and the robot-like man that looks way too familiar for her liking.

laura races over to [y/n], hiding behind her as the older woman continues to watch in shock and hurt as charles continues to lose more and more blood by every passing second.

"charles... " [y/n] whispers as tears fall down to her cheeks, not wanting to leave him to bleed out, but also needing to protect laura, who's shaking in fear from behind her.

"it's okay, darling. get laura somewhere safe."

"what? i—" [y/n] wants to say no, but the murderous glint in the enemy's eyes causes her to slowly back away, before turning to laura and kneeling down.

"sweetheart, go find logan. tell him what happened and you tell him to take you with him and get the hell away from here, okay?" she tells her hurriedly, ignoring the pang in her heart at the fact that this is going to be the last time they will ever see each other.

laura cries out, shaking her head and refusing to leave her as tears flood her face. "n—no. i can't leave!"

despite, not saying it, it's clear to [y/n] that what laura's trying to tell her is that she can't leave her behind.

she nods, her cries barely containable as she dips her head as she struggles with her emotions.

but, when she hears his footsteps nearing them and she glances back to see him getting closer and closer to them, she pulls herself together and pushes her away from her.

"laura, go! i'll be fine — i promise." she tells her, despite the fact that she's only lying to protect her.

as the older woman begs her to go with just her pleading eyes, laura hesitates.

but, as [y/n] stands up and turns to face the monster behind them, laura hesitates once more, before turning and running down the steps and races out the front door that's wide open.

as soon as she realizes that the girl is safe and away from the violence, [y/n] spits in his face.

"you're not touching her, you psychotic bastard!" she yells, pulling out her knife — the one she always keeps hidden in a strap she has wrapped around her waist.

he only yells angrily and slaps her to the ground.

she cries out, before she looks back up at him, noticing that he's not done with her yet.

as she winces and pushes herself back further down the hall, he pulls out a needle connected to a tube with some type of scary-looking liquid inside of it.

then, he pulls her closer to him by one of her ankles and injects it into her neck, causing her to groan through the pain, before her body quickly becomes to grow weak.

in the next few moments, all she wants to do is close her eyes. she's just so damn cold and tired.

but, as he assumes that she's about to pass out and begins walking down the stairs in search of laura, [y/n] carefully — and struggles to — get up and stumbles her way down, determined to protect laura.

just as logan walks back and closer to the house from walking around with will — and encountering some complicated trouble — he finds laura, running out of the house with a look of terror swirling around in her eyes.

she heaves in a bunch of breaths as he stops her from running past him. "hey, hey. what's going on, kid?"

she simply shakes her head hurriedly, tears beginning to cloud up in her eyes. "charles, dead. [y/n] sacrificed herself." she bluntly says with an edge of fear, still not able to say complete sentences.

"dammit!" he mutters, realizing what she means and putting it all together, before he looks back down at her with his eyebrows knitted together in worry.

"where? where exactly?" he exclaims in question, trying to not take it out on her as fear and immense concern begins to fill his entire body.

laura only points back to the house. "upstairs."

without any hesitation, logan turns to will.

"watch her for me, will you? make sure she stays safe." he tells him, who nods in agreement — though, he's a little confused too — before he races inside and makes it to the stairs.

though, what he finds before him leaves him completely and utterly speechless; blood is trailing the floor of where charles was last, and [y/n] struggles to stand as she tries to fight the man that strangely looks exactly like logan.

"stay... the hell... away from her!" the young woman yells at him, her speech slightly slurred as she struggles to stay awake, trying — and failing — to fight him off.

after all, this is a stronger and much more powerful version of the famous wovlerine.

"[y/n]!" logan yells as he sees the obvious pain she's in, along with all of the injuries she now has — thanks to that lovely injection she's just started to experience.

she becomes distracted for a moment, her terrified and worried eyes catching his.

after she heard his voice call out for her, all she could think about is that this is the last time they'll see each other.

because she knows that she can't fight this very scary version of him, and logan just has to take laura and get the hell out of here, before either of them gets captured and killed — at least, that's what she knows.

but, the evil version of logan takes this moment of distraction to get the upper-hand on her; his claws grow out of in between his knuckles and forcefully thrusts them into her stomach.

blood spurts out of her mouth as it becomes even more extremely hard for her to stay awake.

not only is she currently fighting whatever the hell that syringe was that just got jammed into her neck, but now, she's being practically impaled by the evil-logan's claws.

more blood spills from her mouth and lips as she chokes on the air, trying to fight the pain she feels over all of this — she's only human, after all.

"[y/n]!" logan yells her name again. this time, though, both anger and worry is evident in his voice.

though, something in her makes her stop fighting the other logan — she knows that she’s going to die.

that's why her gaze finds logan's, who's just about ready to kick the other him's ass for hurting her — charles as well, too, obviously.

"get h—her... out of here. now... " she sputters, more blood spurting out of her mouth.

"please... she... s—she needs you!" she yells, trying to keep the evil logan-spawn distracted for as long as possible.

though, logan shakes his head, not being able to let her go.

"no. we're going to get out of this — i'm not letting you die."

but, evil-logan could care less about this romantic exchange between them as he kicks her body back to the ground and his claws slide out of her now wounded body.

then, without another word, he walks down the steps, giving the real logan a challenging look — trying to size him up, i suppose.

[y/n]'s vision goes blurry and soon enough, her eyes slowly close.

everything goes dark as she — this time — can't stay awake anymore. her body's just too damn tired.

—————

"I'M SORRY. THERE'S NOT MUCH i can do. whatever it was that was injected into her body... it's taking effect quite fast. i can't delay it, and i can't fix it." an unfamiliar voice says, waking the injured young woman from her long, long sleep.

"what do you mean you can't fix it? you're a doctor! this is what you do — you're supposed to save lives! why can't you save her?!" that familiar angry voice that she knows so well yells in utter frustration.

there's a pause, before the stranger speaks again, "i'm sorry. if this was a normal injury, sure, i could treat it. but, it's not," he states, as an annoyed grunt comes from logan, quickly causing him to continue. "frankly, i don't know how she's survived this long — she should've died the second she was injected with that mysterious liquid. but, what i can tell you, is that she's strong."

a sigh is heard, before he speaks again, his voice now filled with pity. "all you can do right now, is enjoy your time with her and make peace with the fact that she doesn't have much time left — before she's going to die."

hearing all of this isn't new to [y/n].

she suspected something else was going on — something that could very much result in killing her.

but, hearing the heartache and pain in logan's voice brings tears to her closed eyelids.

the doctor apologizes once more, before he leaves the room and shuts the door behind him.

after another moment of silence, logan talks to the younger girl in the room, "it's okay — she's going to be okay. she's strong. she'll get through this."

though, the fact that he's lying to laura, in order to keep her from breaking down, doesn't sit well with [y/n].

"don't lie to her. she doesn't need things to be sugar-coated." she croaks out as she slowly opens her eyes.

she flinches from the bright light that hangs from the ceiling, before moving to sit up.

as she looks over to them, she notices the worry displayed on both of their faces.

but, the tear-stained cheeks of laura's concerns her the most.

laura doesn't need to tell [y/n] what she's feeling because she feels it just as much.

she nods in silent agreement, before opening her arms. "i know, baby. i know. c'mere." she murmurs, tears blurring her eyesight.

the little girl lets out a breathless sob and races into the older woman's arms, hugging her so tight, as if she's afraid that if she lets go, [y/n]'s going to disappear.

[y/n] sighs in relief, happy to have the girl near her, once again — she really did think that she was going to die on the munson property.

though, thinking back on that whole entire situation, [y/n] pulls away and looks over at logan for the first time.

she turns back to laura, giving her a sad smile.

"hey, why don't you go out to the waiting room, yeah? i need to talk to logan." she murmurs, her gaze finding his again, not being able to look away from him.

laura wordlessly nods and walks out, sensing that the two adults need some time alone.

as soon as she's gone, [y/n] clears her throat as she begins to dread asking the question that's been on her mind since she woke, just seconds ago.

though, before she can quite ask what she desperately feels that she needs to, he clears his throat as he steps closer to her.

"how are you feeling?" his voice comes out gruff, but also, filled with worry and hesitation.

"logan, that doesn't matter right now." she gulps as he rolls his eyes and throws his hands up in the air in clear frustration.

"of course it does! why do you always do this?" he questions, jaw clenched as he watches her flinch.

"do what?" she asks in a meek voice, trying to ignore the pang in her heart over how much he cares about her.

he sighs, regretting how harsh he was — he's acting just like he had that night, before everything had gotten worse.

"why do you treat yourself like you're expendable?"

[y/n] slumps in defeat, pulling her bottom lip in between her teeth — like she's been doing repeatedly — and knawing over it in anxious nerves.

logan crosses his arms over his chest, raising a brow at her as he waits for her to answer him.

though, it doesn't come.

she simply stays silent, not sure of how to answer him.

i mean... how do you even answer a question like that?

it's hard to explain why she acts the way she does — especially, when it's tied to how she acts with herself — when it's all she's ever known, her entire life.

[y/n] has always been hard on herself, as well as being reckless with her life.

though, when she met laura, that all changed — she knows that she has to stay alive, in order to protect her.

but, that doesn't mean that she doesn't hate herself or have really unhealthy coping mechanisms. because she does — thanks to her family, of course.

"[y/n]." logan calls out, snapping her out of her dark thoughts.

her eyes snap up to meet his, shock filling them — she'd forgotten where she was for a mere moment.

"i... i—i don't know, okay? i'm just used to being this way." she stutters, not sure she wants to have this conversation with him anymore.

finally making up her mind, she stands up from the table she'd been lying on, minutes before.

she sways a bit, catching logan's attention further-more, but she shakes it off as she starts to walk past him.

"we don't need to talk about this right now, logan. we need to get laura across that border." she states shakily, though she tries to hide it, as she almost makes it past him.

but, logan, having been too worried about her for so long, grunts annoyedly and gently grasps her arm, just as she's about to brush past him.

"we're not going anywhere, until we talk about this." he states seriously as she freezes in place at his words.

she sighs, wishing he just didn't care this much in the moment.

"why? logan, laura is the most important thing right now — not having a therapy session." she mutters, not daring to turn around and look at him, fearing that she will break down and spill everything to him, once she looks him in the eyes.

"you need to talk about this, sweetheart. if you don't, it's going to get you killed. and you can't afford that when you need to be there for laura."

she rolls her eyes, lowly scoffing.

hearing him talk about her mental health like this makes her mad.

how can he talk about this — like this — when he doesn't even believe the same for himself?

she whips around to face him, her face full of obvious irritation.

"really, logan? you really want to talk about this with me? when you can't even do the same for yourself?" she exclaims, finding it so damn aggravating that he's being such a hypocrite.

his eyes widen in shock, having not expected her to snap at him like this — she's usually so calm and collected.

if only he knew just how much she struggles with the anger issues she gets from her family.

"excuse me?" he asks incredulously, snapping himself out of his shocked state and quickly going back to his cold act.

"you heard me! you're trying to tell me to try to talk about my issues and try to see that i have a good life ahead of me, when you can't even do that yourself! you don't want to live, do you?" she exclaims, throwing her own hands up in the air.

she scoffs as a dark look takes over his face, jaw ticking as he tilts his head to the side.

"you really wanna do this right now, doll?" his voice almost comes out in a growl, while [y/n] refuses to let it scare her — she knows that he'd never hurt her, especially when he's just acting this tough, most likely to push her away.

"yes, because i don't need you to act like you care about me this much!" she spits out, not taking a moment to realize what she just said.

he barks out a laugh, tossing his head back in sarcastic disbelief.

"really? you think i don't care about you?"

her entire body goes weak at his question.

she didn't even realize she said it. but, there's no taking it back — not now.

with a relentless sigh, she bites down on her bottom lip and stays silent as she ducks her head down to hide the obvious tears that are just about to spill — she doesn't want him to see what kind of effect he has on her.

"well?" he asks again — much more harshly, might i add.

"yes." she whispers weakly, knowing that she only blurted out the truth.

because, sure, she'd hoped that he cared about her, but there's been some other side of her that kept telling her that he could care less about her and just couldn't wait to finally be rid of her and laura.

"you seriously fucking think i don't give a damn about you and you're well-being — along with the kid, too — at all?" he questions further, still not fully calmed down in the moment.

in fact, it seems that he's only getting more frustrated by every passing second.

without another word, she nods.

shame fills her at the thought of losing him, all because she couldn't keep her damn mouth shut.

that, and the fact that she's used to everyone leaving her.

though, she also feels hatred towards herself — she hates growing attached and dependent on others.

and losing logan? well, that scares her shitless.

especially, since people hurting and leaving her, is all that was ever done to her.

anytime she grows to care for someone and begins to trust them, they leave her all alone, only with the heartaching conclusion that she did something wrong to make them abandon her.

that, or she assumes there's something wrong with her that is so terrible that they couldn't stand her anymore.

something snaps inside of logan, not understanding how she could be so blind.

"if i didn't care about you, why would i be refusing to accept the fact that you're dying? or the fact that i care about you so much that i'm willing to give the kid a chance?" he asks as he steps closer to her, causing her breath to catch in her throat at how close they're getting to each other.

"logan—" she says hesitantly, starting to really regret this entire conversation, all together.

he shakes his head in frustration. "no. don't. we're going to have this conversation. whether you like it or not." he says in a dark voice, his facial expression becoming something of a mix between anger and bewilderness.

"i don't know where the fuck you got the idea that i don't care about you. because you're wrong. why would i change my mind about helping you and laura, if i didn't give a shit about you? why would i be protecting you this entire time, if i didn't care? or calm you down from a panic attack, or help you feel better about the blood that's now on your hands? or take care of you and make sure that you're safe?" he yells this time, completely frustrated at her for thinking for just one second that he doesn't care for her at all.

though, you'd think that a man like logan wouldn't admit to caring for her. especially, with everything he's been through, and all of the people he's lost.

i mean, the man has practically lost everything.

"i didn't want any of this. i just wanted to take care of charles and protect caliban and get through the time i have left, before everything would be going to shit, once again, like it always does." he says seriously, not taking notice of the tears flooding [y/n]'s eyes, or the trembling of her bottom lip.

he's far too overwhelmed with the current conversation.

though, it's barely even a conversation at this point — it's just him yelling and raising his voice at her.

"i didn't want any part of it. but, then you came into my life and i found myself wanting something more than the miserable fucking life i was living before. and along the ride, the more i got to know you and the kid, i've grown to see things differently — i saw you differently." he says, this time his voice becoming much more genuine and gentle.

[y/n] swears that her heart stops and the whole world disappears.

"w—what do you mean?"

"i mean that you've changed me. and i'm not going to fucking stand around, while you risk your life repeatedly, with no regards of the fact that we need you."

tears spill to her cheeks as her heartbeat quickens at his admission.

"we?" she asks in barely a whisper, wondering if she just misheard him.

"yes, we." he states with no hesitation, before suddenly walking all the way over to her.

he hesitates on his next actions, hoping to god that he hasn't read too much into the situation.

god, the thoughts running through his head is making him feel like a love-sick teenaged boy.

but, something changes when she looks up at him with both hopeful and shocked eyes. "logan—"

she stops herself, wondering if she's getting the right signs.

does he really want to kiss her, or is she just an idiot?

"doll, i can't fucking take it anymore. i can't be around you, without doing this before i regret it." he mutters as he brings his fingers up to her face, wiping away the tears on her face.

her eyebrows knit together in confusion as she looks up at him. "what do you mean? do what?"

"this." he simply says, placing his hands over her cheeks and then slams his lips onto hers.

a shocked sound comes from her, it now becoming a smothered breath as they both close their eyes and melt into it.

logan smiles into the kiss as [y/n] presses her body closer to his and wraps her arms around his neck.

then, as she opens her mouth just slightly to let out a content sigh, he takes the moment to bring the kiss to become more heated as their tongues meet together.

when they pull away, [y/n] places her hands over his chest as she takes a deep breath, heaving for air to get back into her lungs.

"wow. that was... " she trails off in a murmur, still very much speechless.

"yeah, i know." he mumbles, a small hint of a smile on his lips.

"did you really mean all of that? what you said?" she asks in a soft voice, after they stand in a few minutes of comfortable silence.

he nods. "yeah. i had to get through to you that i do care." he murmurs as they both pull away from each other.

after a few more minutes of silence, [y/n] asks the question she's been wanting to ask since she first woke up, "so, you gonna tell me where charles is yet?"

but, the answer she receives — along with the distraught expression that takes over logan's face — tells her all that she needs to know.

—————

SOMETHING IN HER KNEW THAT everything that'd happen the next day would end with only blood and innocent kids getting hurt.

but, she didn't question how she knew that.

she only knew that she'd die to protect laura and those kids. no matter what — even if things had shifted between her and logan and she wanted to try to stay alive for him.

maybe it was the fact that finding out about charles' death had more of an effect on her than anyone anticipated.

or the fact that the munson family had experienced so much pain and loss because of them.

really, it doesn't matter.

but, she wouldn't dare let transigen take laura or those kids and put them through more hell — she needed to put an end to that psychotic group.

the worst part was leaving logan while he was asleep.

she hadn't said goodbye — she only gave him a long lasting look with a sad smile, before leaving with the kids.

and laura had only assumed that [y/n] wanted to make sure they got across safely.

technically, that's not a lie. but, she hadn't exactly told anyone the full truth.

and she was right.

somehow transigen had found out where they were headed and ambushed them in the woods.

and of course, the young woman decided to stay behind to fight the men off — to protect the kids.

with a yell to them to 'get out of here, now', [y/n] struggled to fight the men — her pain in her body was only getting worse, thanks to the other stronger version of logan — but, succeeded in distracting them.

that was until one of them stabbed her in one of her legs and tied her to a tree while she was distracted.

and as they leave to hunt down the kids — one by one — something in [y/n] snaps.

she's never felt so much gut-wrenching pain over the thought of losing a child that was never truly hers in the first place.

but, the thought of those kids — those innocent children, who only want freedom and normalcy — being brutally murdered for being born and having the powers that they do, changes something in her.

her blood runs cold as a shiver runs through her body at the thought of finding their bodies.

scorching, hot tears spill from her eyes and she just can't help it as she lets out the loudest, most pain-filled scream.

the kids hear this, and it makes them stop for a moment.

but, this distracts them for too long as some of the men have found them and begin to capture some of them.

though, another yell — one that belongs to a very familiar, protective man — distracts some of the men and laura helps the rest of the kids break free.

[y/n], now exhausted from that one scream and the agonizing pain filling her entire body, she helplessly sobs in both emotional and physical pain. she feels so weak.

but, before she can fall further into that negative and dark mindset, a pair of heavy footsteps makes her freeze in her place.

though, as she looks up, she realizes that it's only logan.

as he kneels down in front of her, his face filled with worry for her, she lets out a cry of relief. "logan?"

he musters up a soft smile — one that's only recently been reserved for her — and tears the ropes free of her hands.

"hey, sweetheart. you didn't think you'd be doing this alone, did ya?" he asks, trying to lighten the mood as he rips off a piece of flannel off of his shirt and wraps it around her leg that's currently bleeding out.

tears find their way to her eyes again as her bottom lip trembles.

"they're going to kill them, logan." she cries out, not being able to think about anything else.

a look of both anger and worry for laura and the other kids finds its way to his face as he helps her up, before placing one of her arms over his shoulder.

"don't worry. we're going to help them."

"promise?" she asks in a whisper.

he nods as he begins to walk further into the woods, in the direction of the screaming kids.

"i promise. we're not leaving until they're safe. alright?" he tells her as she starts to walk on her own, ignoring the pain.

she nods, agreeing with him. "good. because i had the same idea." she mumbles as they get to the entrance of the field that the children are being dragged to.

ultimately, with some hesitation, the couple decides to split up.

though, logan hands her some weapons to help her, before placing a loving kiss to her temple and murmuring a 'be safe'.

then, they're both sneaking around trying to scope the area out, and trying to find an opening to get this shit done without too much blood and death.

worry and confusion fills [y/n] as logan hurries right into the middle of the field, obviously going for the confrontation approach as she finds laura.

the girl hides behind her by a tree as they both watch the scene playing out before them.

"oh, look who it is!" one of them sarcastically exclaims, before slamming the end of his gun into a boy's head, immediately knocking him out.

the doctor and logan talk; the doctor tries to play nice, while logan is just not having it.

while there's nothing much happening, [y/n] kneels down and faces laura.

"you think you can go to your friends without getting caught? i gotta help logan get the bad guys, okay?"

laura nods, silent worry evident on her face, but she doesn't say anything as she sneaks back towards the nearest vehicle, which is where the rest of the other kids are being held by.

[y/n] takes a deep breath as she begins to sneak closer, making sure if a fight happens, she'll be able to step in — even if she is only human.

but then, suddenly, logan shoots both donald and the doctor in pure anger.

donald yells in pain, holding his now destroyed hand and runs over to one of the other vehicles closest to him.

the fighting starts as laura attacks some of the men, near the rest of the children.

one of the other kids being held uses their powers to electrecute the men sitting inside the vehicle.

[y/n] takes the moment to step forward and shoot two of the men in the head, shocking the kids.

then, she turns to laura. "get you and your friends out of here. logan and i will handle the rest."

laura wordlessly nods as she helps the kids get up and get out of their handcuffs.

but, as logan follows the asshole that no longer has a hand anymore, the other version of the wolverine — the evil one — appears behind one of the doors of the vehicle and shoves him back with pure rage.

"logan!" [y/n] yells, stepping forward in distress as she completely forgets about the kids that are getting ready to run.

the two wolverines continue to fight each other — the evil version having more of an upper-hand.

laura takes out the rest of the men as [y/n] steps forward when the evil wolverine stabs logan in the back and throws him into the air, far away from him.

something dark swirls around in her gut — some of it is just her being protective of logan, and the other is something that she's never felt before in her entire life.

"get the hell away from him, you fucking piece of shit!" she screams as she steps in front of logan protectively and starts shooting her gun.

this, though — no matter how many times or where she shoots her gun at him — only makes him more angry.

becoming a little nervous, [y/n] backs up as she pulls out one of her daggers.

just as he gets close enough to her to hurt her, she thrusts the weapon into his side.

but, this has no effect on him as he shoves his claws into her gut — repeating history.

a shocked gasp leaves her as she tries to keep the whimpers of pain shoved deep inside of her.

logan growls as he watches the evil version of him find satisfaction in hurting her.

then, as he stands up, [y/n] slowly backs up — despite all of the pain she feels — as the claws pull themselves out of her stomach.

the evil wolverine prepares to strike her again, but logan isn't about to let that happen; he rushes forward and shoves her behind him as he uses all of his strength to throw the much more powerful monster away from them.

then, he grabs a broken door off of the ground and tries to take out his head from his neck with it.

but, it doesn't help that when the monstrous version of logan sees the doctor dead on the ground.

there's also donald deciding to motivate him by telling him that logan killed him — this obviously brings him to fight back against logan and shove him and the door to the ground.

he growls angrily as [y/n] runs over to help logan get up.

but, then, donald shoots a graveling hook into one of logan's legs.

[y/n] yells out in pure irritation as she turns to shoot him in the head.

he lets out a shocked breath as he falls to the ground.

[y/n]'s not sure if that killed him or not, but at least he'll be done for — at least, for a few minutes.

while both [y/n] and laura are busy trying to fight different people, logan angrily rips the hook out of his leg, yelling in beyond-imaginable pain.

more of the kids appear to drown donald in the nature of the grass, which eventually kills him.

as the evil wolverine goes for laura, logan and [y/n] share a look, before she's running to get the little girl to stay behind her, while logan stays to fight the other version of him.

"stay behind me, okay? this isn't your fight."

laura — for the first time in a while — sends her mother-figure a terrified look.

[y/n] sighs regretfully. "it's okay. he's not going to touch you." she says, before facing the evil logan before them.

as she notices that the kid that donald had with him, is trying to lift up a heavy truck near them, [y/n] grabs laura's hand and shoves her in logan's direction.

"you guys need to get out of here."

"no! not without you!" laura yells, tears filling her eyes as logan pulls her close and hesitantly keeps her behind him.

[y/n] gulps down her pride as she allows a few tears to escape. "i know. but, you have to. logan will protect you — i promise. but, you have to go. now!" she yells, before the monster in front of them comes to notice them all very quickly.

laura hesitates, but stays with logan.

"sweetheart—" logan begins to say, but [y/n] refuses to look him in the eyes as she steps forward and tries to fight off the evil version of him — she can't look him in the eyes as she realizes that there's only one way this is going to end.

and if it's going to be up to her, she'll do just about anything to make sure he and laura — and the other kids that remain — get out of there safely, and alive.

as she fights the monster once more, [y/n] yells to the real logan, not turning to look at him, "get yourselves out of here! i didn't survive all of this, just for you to die on my watch. go!"

the pain in her body becomes even much more hard to bear as she pushes the evil logan back, just as the other kid is able to make it so that the truck lands directly on top of him.

with a sigh of relief, logan and laura start walking towards [y/n], but, she's not willing to risk that monster surviving this and killing them and everyone else.

"no! you guys have to go!"

but, it's too late.

just as she turns back to face the vehicle, one side lifts itself up, before falling back down — he's still alive.

the thought of having to watch them die brings back the searing, hot tears as she runs over to them and pushes them further away.

"go, please!" she cries out, needing to do anything to keep them safe.

the evil wolverine eventually escapes from under the truck and when he's standing — quite angrily and vengeful, might i add — he runs straight for her.

though, instead of running in the other direction, [y/n] clutches her dagger and runs straight at him.

once she reaches him, she swallows down her fear and slams the tip of the dagger straight into the side of his head as she kicks him back, his back hitting the edge of one of the many vehicles.

this only makes him more angry, though; in a fit of more intensified rage, he slams his claws into her stomach — for the second time that day — before dragging her to a broken stump with sharp edges surrounding it.

as body meets sharpness and wood, laura screams out as the blood spurts out of [y/n]'s lips.

she chokes as she struggles to breath — even more so, this time — body wracking with breathless sobs.

her eyes meet logan's.

his face is utterly torn. tears — something he never has let happen in a very long, long time — have spilled to his cheeks.

"p—please... " she cries out in between the blood that's repeatedly falling from her lips and the struggle to breathe as the evil logan mercilessly shoves her back against the sharp edges of wood, before stabbing her with his claws once, twice...

"g—get her out... of h—here!" she finishes, just before laura has had enough and snaps, grabbing one of the guns off of the ground and shoots the monster straight in the head.

this destroys half of his face, before he limply falls to the ground, unmoving.

both logan and laura run over to [y/n] as she lets out a choked sigh of relief, grateful that she doesn't have to endure any more new injuries.

though, she's still growing more and more weak by every passing second.

the little girl sobs loudly as she drops the gun to the ground beside them.

without another thought, she lies her head on [y/n]'s chest.

she moves her very shaky hand up to hold laura's as she tries to stay awake — just for a bit longer.

her breaths become much more hollow as logan falls to his knees, right in front of her, on the other side of her.

his face is filled with so many different emotions; love, fear, guilt, worry.

"you know... m—meeting you, james," she pauses, gulping in pain as she tries to find the words she needs to say before it's too late, while logan's heart almost stops beating at the realization that she just called him by his real name.

"it... was the best thing that ever happened to me... " she trails off as an extremely pain-filled cough with more blood falling from her lips escapes her.

laura cries once more, not wanting to lose the woman who's only ever protected and loved her, despite all the bad things she was forced to do.

"don't go... " she lets out as her tears fall onto [y/n]'s weaker-by-the-minute-body.

[y/n] chokes on her own cries as she clutches the little girl's hand in a tighter grasp.

"i—i'm so sorry." she cries out as her heart pangs at what her possible death is doing to both laura and logan.

he clenches his jaw angrily as he bites down on his bottom lip in frustration.

"why didn't you just let me take care of this?" he asks in a tight tone of voice, trying to ignore the extra tears swirling around in his eyes.

she gives him a sad smile, her heart breaking completely. "because... it had to be me." she croaks out as another coughing fit begins to escape her.

"and because i... i couldn't lose you guys... because i—i love you," she whispers, starting to hate the fact that right when the three of them had just started to feel like a real family, something like this tears them apart — forever.

"b—both of you." she finishes, more blood trailing around her lips and sliding down to her chin.

hearing those words leave her lips allows logan to feel so much pain that the tears finally spill.

he ducks his head down, trying to hide his emotions.

[y/n] frowns as she notices this.

"it's... okay. i wouldn't have this any other way," she states as she cups his cheek with her other bloody hand. "dying for the man i love, and... the little girl that's become like my d—daughter? it... s—sounds kinda like a pe—perfect ending to a great story." she murmurs, trying to hide how much she wishes to just stay with them.

but, on another hand, she's also made peace with it — that she's going to die.

because — deep down — despite how much she didn't want to accept it, she knew that sacrificing herself for the people she loves dearly, is the only way she wanted to go out.

"logan... " she coughs, once more, as her breaths becomes much more shallow — death is almost about to knock on her door.

he looks at her, waiting for her to tell him what she needs to.

"p—please... be happy. don't... d—don't let my death be the end of the happiness and the good life you both deserve."

as those words sink into his head, he desperately wants to tell her that there is no happiness or life without her — she's become like home to him.

for the first time, in a very long time, he's grown to want the life he's tried to avoid having — he's been punishing himself for so long that meeting her was the one exception to actually wanting that life. but, with her.

but, before he can say anything — and tell her this — she turns to laura, who hasn’t pulled away from her as she tries to desperately wipe away her tears.

"laur, baby, everything's going to be alright, okay? i know that you're scared. and you have every r—right to... to be. but, logan's gonna protect you and take care of you, o—okay?" she murmurs in stutters, trying to hold on for as long as she can, starting to feel how slow her heart is beating now.

laura cries harder as [y/n] takes one deep breath. "do—don't... don't be the m—monster they made... made you i—into — be b—better." she whispers as her breaths slows now.

before the last beat of her heart hits her body, she sighs with a content, happy smile, despite dying so fast. "take care of e—each o—other... for m—me, o—okay?"

then, as that last beat hits her body and heart, the light slowly leaves her eyes and her face begins to relax as both of her hands drop to the ground, limp and unmoving.

"no!" laura yells in anger and fear as the emotions quickly escape her, now realizing that she's gone.

logan, not being able to handle his own grief, stands up and walks over to laura, without saying anything as he kneels down beside her.

laura jumps into his arms and lets everything out.

they both stand there for god knows how long, only drowning in their grief, with the other kids standing behind them, feeling pity and sympathy for them.

[y/n] may have only known them for a small amount of time, but still, she made an impression on them, for the better.

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maxislvt · 1 year

Note

thank u for the most recent wanda x spider reader i love it so much thank u😭😭😭more please its so good

warnings: very brief mentions of arguing, brief injury

I'm considering making it a full fic but some headcanons for now!!!

When you guys first start dating, she catches you at really bad times. your identity is a secret so you have to keep explaining to her how you somehow escaped the bank that almost got robbed safely via an alleyway that doesn't connect to the other side of the street

Wanda can tell you're lying but can't really figure out why for a while. It makes her a little nervous so maybe she peaks into your mind and that's how she finds out you're Spider-Punk. For a long while she doesn't say anything. One, because she feels bad for not trusting you. Two, because now that she knows it's really obvious and she's embarrassed that she didn't catch on sooner

It's not that you don't do a good job of hiding your identity from the public, you're just really bad at lying to Wanda. Even small things like if you had breakfast or not make you crack under pressure

After a few months of dating, you do come clean and tell Wanda. She tries to act shocked but she's really bad at it, so Wanda just tells you she already knew but didn't want to tell

Despite the awkwardness of the confession, it makes things a lot easier but can be the cause of some arguments.

Sometimes you come home and look like shit cause some guy with super strength slammed a car into your body or you somehow a building collapsed on you and Wanda can't stand seeing you like that. Of course you understand but it's upsetting because she's always trying to convince you to take a break or even step down after rough fights but you never stop her from being an avenger. Even when she's gone for weeks at a time. Even on the worst days you two still love each other and sleep in the same bed. Maybe it takes a while, but you two will be fine again

Despite her concerns, or maybe because she'll never stop being concerned, she takes pride in being the one to patch you up. Wanda would never really do anything to stop you from being Spider-Punk, but she can at least stop you from getting some nasty infection. There's an odd calmness in it. It's late, you're both tired, and want nothing more to snuggle into each other and not worry

As you two get older and enter more committed stages of your relationship, I do see Wanda trying to convince you to become an Avenger. You're apprehensive at first. Your priority has always been the city. It wasn't that you didn't care about other worldly threats, but you're not willing to abandon the place you grew up in. Eventually you settle on being a part time avenger. Not having to build your stuff in the garage certainly aided that choice

Wanda hoards all your little sketchbooks. She doesn't understand most of the math or chemistry scribbled into but they have so much of your personality in them she can't help but love them. Everything from the coffee stains to the doodles of what you wanted for lunch that day.

Oh and she definitely cashes in on all the official merch you get once you become an avenger. All the little plushies, bandaids, and posters??? Oh she's buying all of it. There's something so ironic about you having to prompt a non-stick skillet despite being an absolute menace in the kitchen .

#panther speaks #anon #panthers headcanons #wanda x reader #wanda maximoff x reader #wanda maximoff imagine #wanda maximoff headcanons #wanda maximoff fluff #wanda maximoff #spiderpunk!r

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hillbilly---man · 6 months

Text

A list of my works on AO3

(they're all Saiki K fics at the moment but I'll add fandom categories to this post if I ever get a new interest lol)

It doesn't fit my plans; it's something I don't understand

Published July 11, 2021

Summary: Saiki is fascinated by Satou Hiroshi, and the people around him start to see that this might be more than just a platonic curiosity.

What is this feeling called love?

[Notes: Bittersweet ending. Nobody gets together. My insistence on theming these early fics after songs is pretty embarrassing now. I'm not proud of my writing here but the story is ok. I might rewrite it someday. Not bad for my first fic since like 2003 though]

Something Changed

Published August 11, 2021

Summary: Aiura wrote a letter to her soulmate the night before they were supposed to meet.

She's predicted a lot of things... how could she have gotten this one wrong?

[Notes: Another sad ending. The format of this is almost entirely an excited letter about the future Aiura imagined that would never come to pass. Not really much of a story happening here tbh]

Won't it be strange when we're all fully grown?

Published August 28, 2021 (INCOMPLETE)

Summary: With graduation quickly approaching, the psychics of PK Academy (and Akechi) worry that they'll drift apart. Luckily, they come up with an idea.

"Let's all meet up in the year 2030!"

A lot can change in a decade.

[Notes: Kind of like a psychicker class reunion where they're all adults with jobs and everything catching up. Future chapters were going to have almost a Scooby Doo vibe (with a twist reveal at the end about Aiura's husband!) I abandoned it because I posted some art and someone called my art creepy and it made the whole fic feel bad to think about. Maybe I'll get back to it someday. It's cool to see how quickly my writing improved. I was also super proud of how well I wrote Akechi's dialogue here]

Hotel Valentine

Published September 24, 2021

Summary: Toritsuka Reita is a pretty lucky guy. He somehow managed to not get expelled from PK Academy, he graduated, and he's avoided creeping on any living girls for a few months. To celebrate, the PK Psychics paid for a one-night stay in the fanciest hotel in Tokyo so Reita can creep on the ghost girl of his dreams. Pretty lucky, right?

Too bad things aren't going his way. He's being ignored by the staff, he's bored out of his mind, and he can't find the ghost girl anywhere. Some vacation, huh?

[Notes: Spoiler: Toritsuka's a ghost stuck in a nice hotel. This is based on a concept album that most of you have never heard but hear me out! It really has nothing to do with the Cibo Matto album of the same title except that the chapters are named after the songs and there are fun Easter eggs for fans of the album. Another slightly sad ending but not too bad]

Coffee & TV

Published August 27th, 2022

Summary: The new silence in her house felt heavy on Kumi's shoulders. Everything reminded her of Kumagoro... especially her grandson Kusuo, who has been coming to visit more often than ever before.

[Notes: this is my least popular finished fic and I understand why. It's about grief and the loss of a grandparent. It's about the unique pain that a psychic would have after failing to prevent that death. There's a sad twist that TBH I think I was a little too subtle with. One of my favorites]

Friendly Fire

Published January 8, 2023

Summary: Being an adult is great until the Problems start. Good grief.

30-year-old Kusuo's psychic powers have been pretty well controlled for over a decade. Why are things starting to go haywire all of a sudden?

[Notes: Friendly Fire my fucking beloved!! In this fic, Saiki gets essentially psychic multiple sclerosis and has to deal with some complicated emotions. I don't think it's a masterpiece or anything but it was cathartic to write and I'm in love with the versions of these characters that I wrote here. So much so that I'm writing a sequel just so I can write more of them. Also, FINALLY a happy ending!!]

Ramen Ikouze?

Published April 28, 2023

Summary: After being dragged to get ramen with Nendou every week, Kusuo starts to realize that it's not so bad after all.

[Notes: I love Nendou, he's so good. This fic is very cute and about their friendship. A couple of fun twists]

Saiki has Plans?

Published May 2, 2023

Summary: Saiki mentions having plans after school, and the overactive imaginations at PK Academy work themselves into a fuss trying to imagine what he could be doing.

[Notes: This fic follows around a bunch of Saiki's classmates as they gossip and snoop to find out what he's up to. It's my most popular fic for some reason]

A Bright Flash

Published May 13, 2023

Summary: Saiki develops an annoying new ability, and through some comedy series logic is forced to tell Teruhashi about it. She tries to be a good ally to her "newly psychic" crush.

[Notes: Teruhashi accidentally finds out about Saiki's new power and he's like "fine. I'm a psychic. But it's just this one power and nothing else."]

Heat Wave

Published June 6, 2023

Summary: There's a historic heat wave in Hidariwakibara, and some of our favorite PK Academy students end up running into each other while taking refuge from the hot weather.

A series of four standalone (but connected) stories taking place at the same time:

Aiura has a vision of disaster, and she and Nendou try to stop it

Yumehara gives Toritsuka some advice to improve his game

Akechi meets Teruhashi's brother

Saiki really wants some shaved ice from the kakigori stand where Mera is working

[Notes: The summary explains it well but also I weaved so many connections between the chapters (that are all happening at roughly the same time). It was also a lot of fun writing interactions between characters that didn't get much in canon. Also you can tell it was hot as hell when I wrote it because I definitely gave Saiki some kind of psychic heat intolerance lol]

Immunity

Published July 6, 2023

Summary: She didn't know why, but Kokomi was finally able to see the truth.

Why Saiki seemed to appear and disappear without explanation. Why it seemed like he always knew what she was planning. Why he wore those weird hairpins.

It was all so obvious now.

Saiki had psychic powers.

[Notes: The veil is lifted suddenly and all the truths that Saiki kept locked behind his mind control were revealed to Teruhashi. He and Aiura have a chat with her about it. Also this was the first fic of mine that an IRL friend read (to my knowledge) and his comment was something like "I don't know anything about your boy but he sounds autistic and gnc" and I took that as a fucking compliment! You know you've written Saiki right when people can see that shit from space]

The Disastrous Financial Situation of Saiki K

Published August 9, 2023 (IN PROGRESS)

Summary: Adjusting to his new limitations has been annoying, and now Kusuo (age 31) needs a car to get around.

Unfortunately, taking time off work has drained his savings.

How is he going to get the money for a car now?

[Notes: This is my sequel to Friendly Fire but it's a lot lighter in nature. 100-Yen-Man goes around doing stuff for Saiki's friends. There are mentions of his disability from Friendly Fire and it's plot relevant but I think you can catch on even if you didn't read the original. I haven't updated in a while but I am actively working on it!! A Yumehara and Makino chapter next and then a Toritsuka chapter after that. TBH this isn't my best work and it's pretty unpopular but I'm having fun and that's all that counts)

#i got my work done so as i promised.. this is my reward #this is for organization purposes and to get me thinking about the things I've written again #my fics #saiki

26 notes · View notes

dedfa · 7 months

Note

Hi there this may be inappropriate to ask and please understand I only ask this because I really love this story. But I was wondering if you are the individual who wrote it's a small universe. If so I just wanted to express my gratitude because Mike and mickal and Jane and hunu and even unnamed octopus guy are some of my most favorite characters ever and the story you wrote despite being short is one of my favorite stories I have red. ever. Period. I reread a chapter or two every month and on nights I can't sleep I'll reread the whole thing. I have also made countless fan arts of all the characters! But to get to the point I was wondering if it is abandoned? I understand that fics get abandoned all the time and that's fine I was just hoping for a definitive conclusion on that. If it is I was hoping if it would be ok to ask for one small favor. I want to know how mikes mom reacted to her new grandbabies. If it's not abandoned and is just on a indefinite hiatus then AWESOME! You have at least one obsessed fan ready for the moment you post a new chapter! I totally understand not wanting to work on something for a long time. I ask you this now because ordinarily I just leave the fic open as a tab on my phone and computer but I recently got a new phone and I had to look for it way harder and noticed it has a lock which makes me a bit worried haha! I'm sorry about my rant and hopefully you are the right person if not I'm sorry for sending this but if you are than I just wanted you to know how much I love this story and how much it has impacted me. Thanks!

I am the one who wrote it! It makes me so happy how much people have loved this story. Unfortunately I don't know if I'll ever get back to it, life has been so crazy for me sometimes looking back at it feels like I was someone else completely when I wrote it

(It got locked because of the AI scraping)

Mike's mother was ecstatic to meet her grandchildren and travels out to meet up with them to do the most over the top photo shoots with costumes and props. She carries the pictures everywhere that she will whip out of her wallet to show anyone if they so much as make eye contact too long. She has also face punched several people who made comments about their species in a negative way because she's 'old enough to get away with it'.

She's really proud of her children and the weird alien messes they get into and has her own entry in the human guide as an illustration about how human mothers without juvenile offspring tend to aggressively care for anyone and anything that looks mildly sad around them.

#humans are space orcs #i hope this helps #its a small universe

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levis-coffeecup · 8 months

Text

chapter 20| Through the Storm

WC-4.9k

Summary

The underground is filthy and dark. Dim lights, dull alleys, and desperate hearts. A place Levi knows as well as the back of his hand, and a place he would do anything to get out of.

Chapters of life roll by and with the turn of a page, things drastically change. In front of him is the opportunity to live on the surface. And the flimsy bridge that he has to cross. From an uncivil criminal to a disciplined soldier.

But life on the surface seems tougher amidst all the mockery, civilities, and the gaping hole left in his heart, after the demise of his dear friends Isabel and Farlan.

Content/Warnings

canon- compliant, canon-typical violence, spoilers for No Regrets OVA, descriptions of PTSD, grief, depression, heavy angst and themes, strong language, self-hate, physical assault.

Author’s Note

Hi guys!

It's been long. And I am incredibly sorry for promising to publish chapter by Sunday, yet doing that today. I feel incredibly guilty, like I've been taking everyone who reads this story for granted.

I've genuinely been quite busy. I have my college, my part time job and I also have to cook and clean for myself. And in all honesty, I've also lost my interest in completing this fic. So i have to push myself, rather than actually looking forward to writing it. But I'm not giving up on it yet, I've promised a few people that I will get it finished, and so I will.

@musumusuhasi a huge reason for one of the scenes in the chapter is because you told me Mae was always very cutesy, and never strong. I hope I've made that better, and if not please do let me know! (And if you don't read the fic anymore, then that's understandable too:)

Also since I've posted after a long time and if you've forgotten what happened in the previous chapter; here's a recap. Mae and Levi attend Ivan's wedding. Mr. Mendes is still mad at Mae and yells at her about Levi being a bad decision (ends up revealing that Levi is an underground thug.) Mae feels defeated because Levi didn't tell her this and starts losing faith in their relationship. She talks to Ivan, and Ivan comforts her, and lets her know that Levi still loves her, and their love for each other is pure.

Song for this chapter is I can't help falling in love with you.

Chapters

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22

Masterlist | Playlist | Other Works

JAN 847

The wind growls, as it blows harshly. The morning sunlight barely reaches the ground.

In the stroke of a night, the rain has turned into snow. The first snow of Mitras, but it seems more like a storm. And Mae is not prepared at all.

Her fingertips have gone numb, and the ache in her head seems never ending. Her dress is wet from all the snowfall. And she shudders as she walks through the snow covered ground.

It feels like death is close. Her entire body shivers, almost violently. But a certain fire inside her keeps her going, despite the odds.

The world seems abandoned, people stay cooped in the warmth of their houses. And pellets of snow hit her head, as she walks ahead. It’s been hours since she’s been on the road. And she swears she wants to cry tears of joy when she finally spots the two-storey building with the Military Police symbol painted on it.

Her pace fastens, and with the last of her energy she pushes past the gate.

And everyone at the police station looks up, as they see a young lady on their door. Drenched from head to toe, turning blue from all the cold.

“I-I h-have a missing c-complaint to file,” Mae speaks in between shudders, leaning against the doorframe, tired enough to collapse at the moment.

And the officer in front gets up. He decides he doesn’t think too highly of her. For one it's way too risky walking out in the snow so underdressed. She could have died in some corner, and no one would have even noticed.

Nevertheless, he takes one of the coats hung on the wall and offers it to her. “Here, you’ll die in the cold if you dress up this way, miss.”

And Mae still shivers from the cold, But her eyes are resolute.

“Sir Ellias, “ she reads the badge attached to his shirt. “I have a missing complaint to file.”

And Ellias gawks back at her, sizing her up.

He doesn’t understand what brings her here. Wearing no gloves and a light jacket in a fucking snowstorm.

And so he wraps the coat around her trembling shoulders, and leads her towards his desk.

“Levi… his name is Levi.” Her voice comes out raw and vulnerable.

Levi has disappeared. She has checked everywhere. He wasn’t in their hotel room. He wasn’t anywhere near the wedding location. And he wasn’t even around all the popular tea shops in Mitras.

His wallet lays on their hotel bed, long forgotten. And the suitcase, packed with half his clothes, remains untouched too.

It's been 8 hours since Mae’s talk with Ivan, and there is still no sight of Levi. She has waited for him the entire night, and now the snow on the ground is at least a foot high.

It's too late… She worries something must have happened to him.

A young lady places a tray of warm tea on the table. Its smell wafts through the air, and Mae’s eyes well up. The drink warms both her throat and her heart.

She just hopes Levi is alright wherever he is.

“The name is Levi you said?” Elias reconfirms as he puts it down on paper.

“Mhm,” she nods vigorously. “He is quite short but his build is strong. His skin is pale and his eyebags are really big and prominent. His hair is black and he works in the Survey Corps… He also has-”

Elias stops writing. Face morphing into one of confusion. ”Wait…” he cuts her off. “Are you talking about Humanity’s Strongest? Captain Levi? Or is this someone e-”

“Yes.” Mae answers, exasperated. “It's him, he’s gone missing.”

Hope glimmers in her eyes.

People know Levi, and she’s one step closer to finding him.

But disbelief settles in Elias’s.

Slowly it shifts to mirth. A beat of silence passes by, and then a soft chuckle escapes his lips.

“What the hell, why are you laughing?” Mae scoffs, eyebrows scrunching in disapproval. ”This is a serious matter.”

Her words only makes him laugh louder. It adds to Mae’s temper.

“EXCUSE ME.” She bangs her fist on the table and gets up. And even though exhaustion is heavy in her voice, her eyes burn bright red.

“Have you ever seen that guy? Is this some sort of a prank?.” He speaks in between laughs. “Even death would be scared of him.”

“So you are telling me he couldn’t have been caught up in this snow storm and might need help?”

“He is fully capable of protecting himself… you’d know that if you’d met him.”

And Mae’s lips tremble as she remembers the last time she saw him.

He wasn’t even able to meet her gaze. He looked so vulnerable… Like a kitten left astray.

“He’s not made of stone.” her voice comes out as a whimper.

“But he’s got a heart of stone,” Ellias rebuttals as he crumbles the missing form and tosses it towards the bin.” Humanity’s strongest can look after himself… There’s a reason why he’s Humanity’s Strongest…”

And Mae gapes. Her head throbs, with the texture of pain. Her body aches for a minute's rest. But somehow she finds the energy to create a scene.

And she leans forward towards Elias, with her hands placed on the table and her arms stretched straight

“EXCUSE ME…” she sneers. “I’m here to file a missing complaint and it's your duty to look into it. Instead you’re telling me that I’m lying... Just because you’re a lazy bum who can’t get himself to work… people like yo-”

The door is yanked open with a bang, Mae flinches and Elias looks towards it.

Out comes a tall - middle-aged man, wearing a large black overcoat and a… bowler hat even though he’s indoors.

His jet black hair is gelled to the black. And his face sports a pronounced scowl. “OI!” He calls out. “What’s all this ruckus this early in the morning?”

The atmosphere suddenly changes, and Ellias straightens himself. Slightly scared.

“Sir…” his voice trails off, a lump forming in his throat.

“I have a missing complaint to file, I’m afraid it’s not being taken seriously.” Mae beats him to it, as she pushes her chair back..

“He doesn’t work in that department,” Ellias pokes in, but Mae moves ahead regardless

And Kenny smirks in glee at the sight of her.

Missing complaints are not something he concerns himself with. He’s here to work for the King,, not to solve some minor civil problems and save some damsel in distress.

But he’s bored, and she’s a wreck. It will be good entertainment.

“Sir… Captain Levi has been missing for the past 8 hours, and we all know how harsh the snow storm is.” Mae explains , hoping she receives the help she’s here for her.

And Kenny’s eyes blow wide, more with concern than surprise.

Captain Levi. The title sounds pleasant to his ears.

Now he can’t help but stay.

“See, I told you she is crazy” Elias sputters to cover up. “I think the cold has gotten to her head or something… which maniac walks out in the cold like that.”

“THE COLD HAS NOT GOTTEN TO MY HEAD.” Mae’s eyes flash dangerously at Elias, and she shifts her attention towards Kenny. Deeming him more competent.

But Kenny only lets out a snicker. “He’s strong, he can take care of himself very well.”

I’ve made sure of it. He wants to add. But some things are better left unsaid.

“AND HOW CAN YOU SAY THAT? YOU DON’T KNOW HIM? HAVE YOU EVER EVEN MET HIM?” She yells, absolutely appalled at the insensitivity of these men.

And Kenny takes a step towards her too, towering a foot above her. His nostrils flare in anger, and he glares at her, his aura almost threatening. Not a lot of people have had the audacity to speak to him in such a way. “Who are you to him?” he seethes through clenched teeth.

But Mae doesn’t back away either.

“I’m his lover.” she spills out, without an ounce of hesitance.

Sheer surprise flashes in Kenny’s eyes for a second. Slowly it fades and the creases under his eyes melt into that of laughter. “Aah, that runt grew up finally.” he chortles

And Mae looks at him, appalled and disgusted. “And who are you to him?” She counters . Half in mockery. Half in contempt. He doesn’t even wear a badge that tells his name. She’d be surprised if she’d find even one reliable officer in this damned place.

And Kenny falls silent for a millisecond, face conflicted.

“….Nothing.” He lets out a weak laugh. “Just go back home, you’ll find him there.”

And then he takes a step back in resignation. A little emotional, a little exhausted. “Take good care of him.” he mutters under his breath, before he coops back into his cabin.

—--------------------------------------------

A heavy sigh falls from Levi’s lips as he steps into the premises of the Survey Corps headquarters. The midnight moon shines over. And the stone walls embrace him, it's cold grays have never seemed so inviting.

It’s been an entire day on horseback. Nevertheless he should be grateful the stable manager at Mitras recognised him, and rented him a horse, free of cost.

And as glad as he is to be here, there’s also a heaviness in his heart that he can’t shake off.

It's the kind of pain that only Mae is capable of causing.

She isn’t next to him.

He left without a thought. Running away from the haunting unhappiness in her eyes. And now he’s left with only his feelings to keep him company. Cold and empty.

He wonders if the marriage went out as planned? Were the celebrations as grand as the decorations? And was the buffet as large as they were setting it up to be?

Most of all he wonders if Mae is okay? He wonders, if just like Kenny, that was the last time he saw her as well?

Memories of yesterday trickle into his mind. The disappointment in her eyes, and the complaints in her mind. And he sighs, exhausted. Wondering if the heaviness in his chest will alleviate.

He needs tea, he tells himself.

The torches on the walls flicker, dimmed by the constant breeze. Winter is just around the corner and darkness engulfs the hallways.

And Levi relaxes a tad bit. Finding solace in his darkness, it’s what is familiar to him.

He rounds the corner and enters the kitchen. Sadly for him, a familiar brunette is already seated on the dining table next to the kitchen.

Hange. His features twist into a scowl.

They are the worst person he could possibly find at this time.

And Hange swivels as the sound of his footsteps reaches their ear.

“Levi!” They exclaim. “You’re back early.”

And Levi looks at them coldly, completely ignoring their existence.

He was so close to sulking. But now he looks emotionless again. It's like something has shifted in his head. And now the person next to him will only face his anger, never his sadness.

He makes his way to the kettle. And he prays that Hange stays put in their chair.

But Hange is relentless as usual. Hyperactive, and curious. They spring up from their seat and follow Levi into the open kitchen. Ready with their barrage of questions.

“So how was the wedding?” Where is Mae?” It's probably the dim candlelights that impairs them from seeing the scowl on Levi’s face. A few moments more and he will snap. Hopefully in a tame way.

“Don’t tell me you dropped her back home, this late at night?” They wiggle their brows suggestively, as they linger behind him. Watching him boil the water from over his shoulder.

And Levi doesn’t even turn to look back at them, as he puts his hand on their shoulder and pushes them backwards. “Fuck off, “ he threatens

Hange’s lips part. Usually with Levi, they can never tell when he’s mad, because he always looks mad. But tonight, the anger in his voice is primal.

And they can only head back to the table, and shove their head back into their research books. Looking over occasionally to give Levi a onceover.

He looks at the pot of boiling water a little too hard. His jaw is clenched tight, and his footsteps are a little too loud.

His hands shuffle through the cabinets. Banging the shelf doors shut. And Hange doesn’t understand how Levi doesn’t recall the spot he’s specifically designated to his beloved tea. None of the other Survey Corps seniors are even allowed to touch it.

Frustration fills him up, and he curses, rather loudly.

And the Levi in front of Hange, is completely unlike the Levi they’ve always known.

The Levi in front of them is messy and unorganized. Grabbing a hot vessel bare hand, and then hissing at the burn.

The flipping of their pages stops, and all they see in front of them is a problem to be solved.

There’s an obvious tension in the air that drowns in all the quiet. And Levi finds himself falling into the endless pit of sadness inside of him, again.

He tries to forget the disappointment that he saw in her eyes. He tries to forget the things that Mr.Mendes said about him, harsh but so true, they still make his heart hurt. But its all too recent, all too fresh in his memory.

Mae was close to crying back then, he could tell by the way her lips shuddered.

He doesn’t understand why he still feels so sad. After all he knew that things between them were bound to end. He doesn’t understand why he always gets his hopes up, when he has a habit of losing people left and right.

And he doesn’t understand why he sits on the same table as Hange, taking the farthest chair from them. When he can easily take his tea to his quarters.

Maybe it's the fact that he’s been left alone again. And being in the vicinity of someone, even if it's someone as annoying as Hange, seems comforting.

Even if that comfort is temporary.

He’s so much of a disappointment.

Sometimes he wonders why Erwin and Hange keep up with him?

It's probably because of his strength.

The smell of tea floats through the air, but Levi doesn’t touch it.

And Hange notices. “I can’t wait for the day when you’ll marry Mae as well.” They chirp out of nowhere. Hoping to make him feel better.

And Levi does manage to throw one of the harshest stares at them, before he winces.

“She found out.” The words slip out of his mouth. Accidently, perhaps. It's one of the rare times where his emotions run so wild, they can’t help but take charge.

“She found out what?” Hange repeats. Their ears practically flying over.

Slowly they shift to the chair next to him.

And Levi sits rigid, holding his head where it hurts, it feels like the walls in his brain are caving in.

And yet, he fights.

He fights Hange’s company.

He fights his needs, his desires.

He fights himself. Adding fuel to his own struggle.

It’s what he has done his entire life.

It has left him worn out.

To the point where he doesn’t have the strength to resist anymore.

The walls around his heart are slowly crumbling down.

He’s lost her. His world feels dark.

“She found out that I’m an underground thug.” His voice comes out weak… barely above a whisper. The position life has put him in is hard to believe. Because here he sits, opening up to Hange of all people.

Kenny would disapprove so much of the emotional bastard he still is. Losing hope by a mere person leaving him behind.

But he does it for Mae, he tells himself.

And Hange’s eyes widen, surprised that Mae didn’t already know about this. It's abnormal, and unhealthy. They were pretty sure Mae was the person he was closest to.

A silence spreads, its claws fatal.

Levi takes Hange’s silence for judgment, and decides to go back into his invulnerable shell. “Doesn’t matter, things were going to end anyways,” he mutters coldly, and then he loudly slurps his tea.

And Hange still sits in shock. She found out, his words echo in their head. Which means he didn’t even tell her himself. “LEVI!,” They urge, breaking out of their stupor “Till when were you going to keep this hidden from her!”

Forever if possible he thinks to himself. He can always keep a few parts of him hidden.

And his silence tells.

“You weren’t planning to tell her, were you?” They question, but they know it's true.

The quake of his heel never fades , and his shoulders still slouch. They’ve never seen him look so defeated. He’s too afraid of disappointing. He’s too afraid of being abandoned. And he’s too afraid to voice out that he didn’t want Mae to know, because he was afraid she’d leave him.

“Why would you not tell her Levi….? Hange racks through the potential possibilities. “Was it because you were treated harshly by the soldiers when you first came in….”

Everything comes off as a surprise to them. They could have never guessed that all the taunts thrown his way were something that bothered him. Not by the look on his face anyway. Guess he’s a little more sensitive than they had anticipated.

“You were discriminated against in the Survey Corps, because it's the military and rules are important here. You broke the order, you broke the regulations so obviously people didn’t like it. Also your first impression was HORRIBLE…And just because everyone in the military condemned you, doesn’t mean Mae will too… You can’t pretend to be someone else and hide parts of yourself from someone who is in a sense your life partner Levi?”

There is a stiffness in the air that constricts. And Levi feels like he’s being put on the spot, when he’s caught vulnerable. He feels angry, he wants to yell, he wants to push Hange away… or maybe– or maybe he’s just scared.

And he sits there forcing his eyes shut as Hange’s words sink in. He’s repeated this mistake before, fitting himself into the likes and standards of Kenny, just to please him. So much so that sometimes he doesn’t even recognise the softer, more emotional parts of him.

“To love, means to accept the person for what they are…” Hange places an arm on his shoulder, and he looks at them, his gaze tender. “And if she doesn’t… then good for you. At least you know she wasn’t the one.”

And Levi does find Hange’s thoughts beautiful. But he also knows that no one will go to such lengths for him. He knows that he’ll be abandoned by the Survey Corps as well, if one day he wakes up weak.

He tears his gaze away from them. Knowing that if he looks too long, Hange will see through all his imperfections.

They have a habit of not keeping their nose in everyone’s shit anyways.

But Hange’s mind is already working at a speed that he should be afraid of. And they almost jump from their chair, as a realization strikes. “This is the problem isn’t it Levi!... The thought that she might leave you…. You ignored her because you knew she was bound to leave you or be disappointed in you in some way... You thought she was better off with Ivan, then you taking the pain of losing her.”

Levi’s eyes widen. They are threateningly close to knowing him.

“HOW DO YOU KNOW EVERYTHING?”, he seethes as he grits his teeth. Half embarrassed that Hange knows about his pitiful behavior with Mae when Ivan was here.

“I… I have assumptions,” they gulp. Fearful for once

The clock ticks, and slowly his features soften “Mae told you everything, didn’t she?” he sighs, as he pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Well but I’m always open to hear your perspective as well.’

“Oh fuck off Hange.” He sneers as he gulps his tea down, and pushes the cup to the side.

He feels horrible, so out of character, and vulnerable. But he doesn’t feel unsafe.

And he has a shit ton of problems that he knows he can’t solve by himself. Especially when it comes to Mae.

And what's the point hesitating now, when his pride has already been tossed into the bin.

“I don’t know how to keep her Happy Hange… It's not the same anymore, she’s unhappier, doesn’t talk with me too much.” He looks down, his voice somber.

“Says you Levi… the person she used to smile just at the sight of?” Hange’s voice is soft, their eyes full of genuine concern.

And despite his uneasiness with discussing his personal life out loud, and getting his behavioral patterns dissected by none other than Hange, he settles into his chair.

The night is long and Hange seems welcoming,

—--------------------------------------------

Heavy gray clouds conceal the midnight sky. The rains are relentless, boisterous with thunder. And fog wraps around the tall trees like a blanket.

The winds blow fast, Levi can hear it rattle against the glass windows.

His quarters are warm though, fire crackles in the hearth, casting an orange tint. And his cloak is leisurely draped over his shoulders.

Scented candles are lined up on his window sill.

And lavender tea he brewed for himself has now run cold. Halfway finished

It's something Mae made him do, when sleeping was becoming difficult.

She crafted a whole ass routine for him, to help him relax and sleep longer.

He drums his fingers on the table, sitting idle, Frustrated that he’s done with all his paperwork.

It feels so damn lonely. Like those days, when she’d quit her job from the Survey Corp and he was haunted with thoughts of her..

The sound of thunder fills up the space.

The temperature has dropped all of a sudden. Surely it must be snowing in the interior. And Levi feels guilty for leaving Mae behind so thoughtlessly.

None of them were prepared for snow.

Another round of thunder reverberates around. Lightning strikes and Levi shivers. The night is uncannily similar to the night when he lost Farlan and Isabel.

Just another testament of how he is not made for happy endings.

And he can only watch as every second painfully passes away.

Tick-tock, tick-tock

The fire cackles

Tick-tock, tick-tock

The wind whistles.

Tick-tock, tick-tock

The lightning feels blinding.

Tick-tock, tick-tock

A distant sound adds to the mix. It's rushed and heavy, pounding closer to his gates.

And Levi is pulled out of his reverie, as then the door barges open

In front of him stands Mae, with her hair partially drenched, and her dress splattered with mud.

The closed umbrella in her hand, makes a pool of water on the floor. Dripping wet.

His eyes widen.

And so do hers.

“Levi,” his name slips past her lips. And for once she didn't overthink. The umbrella in her hand drops to the floor, and the door behind shuts close, as she leaves everything behind and darts towards him.

She doesn’t hesitate, as she sits on his lap, and throws her arms around his frame. Surrendering to the intensity of emotions in her heart..

Levi's body tenses at instinct. His heartbeat picks up the pace and the butterflies in his stomach come alive once again.

It's just been 4 days, but he’s missed her so damn much. For a moment he wonders if he’s still daydreaming

And it's only when he feels her shivering against his chest, that he gives in. “Y-you’r-re c-cold,” he stutters, as he wraps his cloak around her. His hands splay over her back, rubbing it to warm her up quickly.

And she too, huddles closer to his warmth. The sound of his low baritone, brings her so much comfort, and she shuts her eyes close, to pause this moment.

Their breaths mingle, hearts beating in sync, together.

In this moment they are so vulnerable.

She cries, into his chest. And he’s made sure that nothing in his life is important enough to make him cry. But for god's sake does his heart sob with joy.

He looks at the messy trail of mud her shoes have left behind. And her fingernails that are dirty with grime. He looks at her shuddering shoulders and her hair, wet and cold.

She’s traveled through the storm for him.

She’s come back to him. Despite everything

And he doesn’t know what the future holds for them, or even if she'll be alive the next day. But he does know that no matter how cruel and brutal this world gets, his heart will forever be labeled hers.

Her hands leave his chest, before they slowly come up to his cheeks. She cups his face, as she pulls back and looks at him. Silence stretches between them. Or maybe it's the pause one takes to admire something beautiful.

And fresh tears fill up her eyes as she strokes his cheek.“Why do you make me worry so much? Couldn’t you have told me that you were leaving? I-I was so scared something happened to you.”

His knees feel weak at the thought. Like he’ll shatter to the ground, if not for her holding him so close.

And his breath shudders, sodden with emotions. “I-I’m s-sorry.” he gulps. Voice heavy with guilt. “I-I thought you would be u-upset. Wouldn’t w-want to n-near me anymore.”

“I would have wanted to hear about your past from you. I was more disappointed in the fact that you didn’t tell me, when everyone else knew about it... I am your lover Levi… I consider you my better half, then why is it that I know so little about you?”

In her questions, Levi feels a kind of reassurance. Perhaps it's the fact that she’s still making an effort to stay with him.

It's a feeling he can't put into words.

As if his sun-burned body has finally found the cooling shade of a tree.

As if his directionless quest has finally found a destination.

There is such a prickle in this moment, and the way she holds him, tightly, yet with gentleness. It makes him question all the nasty thoughts he has had about himself.

Because he was convinced that he was way too crooked for anyone to find any beauty in him. And yet she dares to sit on his lap, so close to him. Cradling him as if he’s something precious.

Words fail him. And he can’t help but think if he could just kiss her, and pour all his love into it. If he could kiss her and express all that his speech never could. They all seem so beautiful in the romance novels he reads.

If only he could kiss her and not succumb to his overthinking head.

And so he brings her hand closer to lips. His heart hammers, almost violently in his chest. And his hand shudders with nervousness. Yet he dares to take her knuckles and kiss it.

Hoping it conveys everything he can’t spout out loud.

That he’ll fight for her. Even if it's parts of himself that he’s up against. “I;m s-sorry…I’m s-sorry, I thought you’d h-hate me”

And Mae smiles as she looks at him. The first genuine smile she’s given him in months. “We’ve got to work on a lot of things to make this work,” Her words are blunt, but the way she delivers them is so gentle.

And Levi blinks up at her. Grateful that she has not given up on him yet. “We do…” he hums.

There’s fear in both of their eyes. The fear of messing up. The fear of losing one another. So many things still remain unexpressed. So many fears, desires, wishes. If only they were given a voice. Both Levi and Mae would know that their love for each other is boundless.

“You promise you’ll tell me everything and we’ll talk about us tomorrow?” Mae says as she tries getting out of his lap. Desperate in need of a shower

Surprisingly, his grip around her waist tightens. He holds her there, listening to the sound of her breath.

And despite the wreck Mae is, she finally feels so wanted. The butterflies in her stomach tumble. And she can barely contain her happiness.

“I will… “Levi presses a kiss on her forehead. “Now go take a shower, I’ll set up the bed for you.”

“Will you sleep on the bed, next to me?” she asks on her way to the shower.

And Levi never sleeps on the bed.

Because Levi lives every moment with the unsurety of whether he’ll make it to the next. He lives every moment considering the possibility that the titans might break in.

Yet now as he looks into her warm brown eyes, he can’t help but wonder if for one night he just lets loose.

The worst thing that could happen is that the titans breach the wall, and he ends up dying with her.

Indeed that sounds like a soft epilogue. To die in each other’s arms, to not die alone.

Everyone comes to this world on their own, and they die on their own, because inherently everyone is alone. And yet to hold on to each other, as they take their last breaths. To have a moment of bliss before death separates them.

“Levi!” Mae prods again. A brow raised in question. “Will you sleep on the bed with me?”

And his lips quirk up a tiny bit, as he timidly nods a yes.

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s-trawberryv-eins · 2 years

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It's You I Dream Of

This was inspired by Summer Rain by Belinda Carlisle but it honestly ended up going in an entirely different direction. I think it's cute? It's also my first ST fic. Be kind <3

Steve Harrington x fem!reader

Summary: The aftermath of 18 months radio silence. Steve had taken off across the globe to search for an answer to the mirror dimension that lived beneath their feet. He'd left behind his friends and family, his home; and a girl.

Warnings: angsty angst. fluffy fluff. Also not beta read at all. I barely read it

Word count? Somewhere around 2.5K

———

The Garden had been quiet all morning, save for a few deliveries and a visit from a baby faced teen buying a bouquet of lilies for his mother's birthday. It wasn't unusual for a Tuesday morning, but the boredom sat heavy on Y/N's shoulder's none the less. Chrysanthemums and coneflowers lay scattered on the surface in front of her, cut stems littering the floor around her feet.

She heard the gaggle of teens approaching the shop before they'd even made it to the door; loud laughter and the dragging of their sneakers across the tarmac gave them away before the bell could announce their arrival. The group of six barged into the small space with abandon, still too deeply engrossed in their conversations to even noticed they'd arrived at their destination.

A minute passed by, Y/Ns eyes flitting over the children in turn, a fond smile on her face. Schooling her expression, she raised an eyebrow and cleared her throat to remind the Party that she was there and waiting to hear about whatever world-ending drama had encroached on their free time today.

"Oh! Y/N!"

"Why do you sound surprised to see me, Dustin? You've come to my store. That I own. That doubles as my house."

"Shhh. Don't get bogged down with things like that. Listen-"

"He's back!" Max had cut Dustin off, already bored of his theatrics. "Hopper saw him driving in at like, 4am."

The boredom she'd previously cursed fled the room at Max's words. A thousand other emotions were left in its place, manifesting themselves in the form of debilitating nausea.

"What? What do you mean? I don-..I don't know-…I didn't realise, I mean. That he was back. That he was coming back." Six pairs of eyes found hers as she stuttered through her sentence.

"He didn't tell you?" Lucas' confused tone mirrored the looks on their faces.

"We haven't spoken. Not since.." Y/N trailed off, hoping the Party wouldn't need much more of an explanation.

"Y/N/N, I don't understand. It's been over a year. You haven't spoken since he left?" It was Mike who spoke up this time, an unfamiliar melancholy lacing his words as if it was incomprehensible. Which wasn't untrue. It was incomprehensible. When the news broke that Steve Harrington had taken off to Europe leaving his girlfriend and his pseudo children in the dust, it had been the talk of the town for weeks. It also wasn't quite the full story.

"It's not as simple as that, Mike. It's not - it's all just…it's complicated. I can't take you, guys. Ask Robs. Or Nance. I'm not-". Inhaling sharply through clenched teeth, Y/N forced down the sob that was building in her throat. "I'm busy."

"You know he'll come here, right? If we don't show up. If we show up without you. He'll come looking for you. He said he was going to pr-"

Y/N cut the Henderson boy off before he could finish, already knowing what he was going to say.

"I know! I know what he said. I was there. He said it to me. But that was months and months and months ago. I'm not foolish enough to assume that it's still true. He's been gone."

"You don't really think he's coming back with the intention of doing anything else, do you? I know we're barely 18 but c'mon. Even we can see it." Will spoke up for the first time since entering the flower shop. His voice was quiet, but assured. Matured from his trauma, as they all were, but it touched Will differently. He clung to that which made him happiest. He didn't make new friends out west because he loved fiercely the ones he'd left in Hawkins. He forgave the rifts and the bumps in his relationships because he'd known nothing but loss for years.

He'd been there that day at the train station - they all had. Watching as Y/N's heart fell through her open chest to the concrete beneath her toes; cracking and shattering as Steve boarded the train, promises lingering in the air around him. He'd helped her into the car, and he'd called Jonathan for help when she couldn't drive. He'd checked on her a few times a week every week since Harrington left. Dustin had all but moved in with her, but wasn't quite as emotionally intelligent as Will the Wise.

18 Months Earlier

"Stevie-" her words came out in short gasps as her sobs worked to suffocate her. "-I can't do it without you, Stevie. Come back t-to me, St-evie."

"No tears for me, pretty girl. C'mon, baby! Think about all the things you'll be doing now I'm outta your way!" Steve's words were intended to cheer her up, but his heart broke as she only cried harder.

"Stop it, Steve, don't say horrid things like that." Y/N forced herself further into Steve's space, her face pressed deep into his neck as she wept for him. His hands snaked around her body, heart pounding against his ribcage as he struggled to keep himself composed. He didn't want to leave - he had to. He wanted a life with Y/N, with the kids, without the fear of the Upside-Down casting a dark cloud over every happy moment. So, when Hopper and Owens presented him with the opportunity to do just that, he all but jumped at the chance. "You come back to me, Steve Harrington."

The boy looked down at his girlfriend who stood slumped in his arms, a soft smile pushing at the corners of his mouth. The tear tracks on his face mirrored her own, but he made no effort to dry them. Instead, he focused his energy on conveying his love for the girl beside him before he had to leave.

"Well, I can't make you Mrs Harrington half way across the planet, now can I?"

Present Day

The drive over to Steve's house was almost silent, save for the whisperings and hushed conversations of the teens in the back seats. Will was riding shotgun after Max nominated him as the least likely to further upset Y/N. Nobody disagreed with the assessment, and they took their seats without complaint.

"Does anyone copy? This is Robin, over." The static-broken crackle of the walkie sounded, and Dustin wasted no time in responding.

"Yes, we copy, over."

"He's back. He got back at like 3am. Has anybody told Y/N because they haven't talked and she's gonna lose her shit-" Dustin scrambled to switch the walkie-talkie off as soon as Robin had her first few words out, but in a typical nervous fashion, the simple task turned into chaos as Dustin fumbled and dropped it into the foot-well. Numerous limbs shot after it, resulting in nobody getting in, and Robin's chatter continued.

"I'm on my way to his house now. What do I say about her? What if he's with somebody? What if he's brought someone with him?! What if she doesn't want to see him? What if HE doesn't want to see HER? Is she at work? She's at the store, right?" The silence that followed was deafening. Nobody moved, stuck in a state of disbelief at both Robin's rambling and Dustin's butter fingers. "Hello? Dustin, do you copy? Over."

When Henderson made no movements to grab the walkie, Y/N reached behind the passenger seat and collected it herself, keeping her eyes on the road the best she could.

"Yes, Robin. We copy. Over."

A beat.

Then two.

Then a static-y crackle. "Shit."

"We're a few streets away. Over and out." Y/N handed the walkie to Byers, who shut it off before Robin had the chance to dig herself any deeper into the grave she'd created.

Robin's questions flew around Y/N's mind at speed. Nothing she hadn't thought of herself, but it stung none the less to know that her worry wasn't entirely unjustified. The closer they drew to their destination, the more her heart raced. Her skin itched in anticipation, and the aching feeling in her chest only grew. Truth be told, she'd thought of nothing but this moment since the day Steve had boarded his train with her heart in his pocket. Nausea rocked her stomach once more, the mixture of emotions like a violent storm at sea.

It wasn't until Eleven appeared at her open door that she realised they'd arrived, and Y/N cursed herself for letting her mind wander so far when she had a car full of her family. "We're here, Y/N. C'mon." Eleven offered Y/N a hand, squeezing softly as she moved from the car to join the rest of the gang. The sound of footsteps caught her attention, and she turned to see Robin Buckley hurtling down the street in a manner that was sure the send her flying.

"Y/N! I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry! You know what I'm like and I didn't realise the kids had already got to you and I definitely didn’t mean to let my mouth run as quickly as it did!"

"That was a Buckley special if I've ever seen one." Mike's sarcastic response saved the wreck of a girl from having to answer Robin herself, instead allowing her to focus on reducing the ache in her chest that had grown tenfold upon arriving outside Harrington's door.

From there, time passed in a blur. Y/N didn't register Lucas knocking on the door, nor did she notice Will's hand reaching for her own. The increased chatter around her didn't faze her, and despite the presence of someone new appearing in her peripheral vision, she stayed frozen, stuck in the endless cycle of thoughts that had convinced her she was about to have her heart broken.

Her brain was thick with fog, but after what seemed like a lifetime, Steve Harrington's voice cut through the haze, "-hear me? Baby, can you look at me? C'mon, honey." His voice was soft - softer than she'd remembered. The ghost of his touch traced her forearm, and all at once the air returned to her lungs. "There you go, baby. You're doing so good."

"Stevie." His name came out as a relief filled sigh, and he smiled brightly in response.

"Yeah, baby. I'm here."

"Mine?" It was the best she could do, but Steve didn't mind one bit.

"Completely yours." Reality hit her like a hammer. Tearing herself away from Will, Y/N launched herself into Harrington's arms. He wasted no time in pulling the girl up to him, guiding her legs around his wait as they clung to each other like a lifeline. Moments passed but they didn't move; they remained as they were, breathing the other in, giving their hearts and minds time to catch up. Sweet nothings were exchanged between tear-stained kisses, each one an effort to demonstrate the love held for the other.

When the two finally parted, their cheeks flushed red, but Steve couldn't bring himself to feel remotely embarrassed that their friends had been witness to their reunion. "Dustin!" Steve hollered to his curly haired protégé, "there's a bag of gifts in the hall. Grab em, will you?"

Dustin nodded dutifully, an excited shine in his eyes. It doesn’t take him long before he's back outside the front door, dishing out the contents according to the name Steve had messily scrawled on the label. Y/N wasn't paying attention to anything but Steve, but if she'd have let her eyes wander for just a moment, she'd have noticed the change in the scene around her. Quiet excitement seemed to bubble between the kids, hushed whispers exchanged and giggles stifled as Henderson approached Steve.

They seemed in no rush to open the things they'd received from Steve - not after Dustin had showed them what sat at the bottom of the bag. "Uh - think this one's for you, Steve."

"Thanks, dude. You're a good kid. The best." The Henderson boy flushed at the compliment, but made no retort, deciding to let Steve have his moment. He'd get on him about it later. After handing Steve the bag, he fell back in line with his friends, watching the scene in front of him play out.

"What you got, Stevie?" A few stray tears still ran down Y/N's face, the overwhelming mix of emotions not yet having passed.

"Made you a promise, honey. You remember?" Harrington dipped his hand into the duffle bag in his hand, retrieving what he needed before letting the bag fall to the pavement. "Said to you that you were it for me. Said I had to come home, cos I had something to do? You remember what I said?"

Y/N's eyes blew wide open, the smile on her lips dropping completely as her brain put the pieces together instantly. Her eyes blurred with tears as Steve flipped open the lid of a black velvet box, revealing a ring holding a thousand promises of love. He dropped to one knee before her, and held her hand tightly with his free one, love staining his features as he looked to her as if she was the sun.

"Told you I'd have to come back to make you my wife, baby. Will ya do it? Will y'be my wife, honey? Will you marry me?"

Not even an hour ago, Y/N Y/L/N didn't even know Steve Harrington was home. She'd spent days agonising over him - heartbroken, inconsolable, riddled with fear and feelings of abandonment. He'd done the same, of course, but she didn't know that. What she did know, however, what that she never wanted to be apart from Steve again. Never wanted to long for him the way she had, through the long days and the longer nights, unsure when she'd see him again. If she'd see him again.

So, really, his question wasn't much of a question at all.

Tears poured down Y/N's face, her features screwed up with emotion as she nodded her head desperately, hands reaching for him once more.

"Yes, Stevie. A thousand times yes.

- Fin.

#steve harrington #steve harrington x reader #stranger things #steve harrington angst #steve harrington fluff #hawkins #stranger things 4 #steve harrington x you

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clarenecessities · 4 months

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ummmm what about. uhhh those women from the supergirl show. now that i type that im pretty sure one of them is supergirl

oh, buddy. yes, one of them is supergirl.

disclaimer: i have never and will never watch the cw's supergirl, bc i love myself

What made you ship it?

well it TURNS OUT that there's a lot of overlap in Supercorp shippers and Catradora shippers, for some reason. can't imagine why! [puts a blanket over my venn diagram's cage]

so i went a little insane after she-ra came out (you remember) and read about 6k fics, just scrolling through the tag with some filters on & clicking on anything that looked interesting. it was a very interesting time in our lives. a lot of me going "huh? whah?" in call. birth of the scorpia disclaimer.

but eventually i ran out of she-ra fics. and i like... i couldn't stop, you know? and it turns out that some of the best she-ra authors have written a lot of supergirl fics. so it kept coming up when i was on author-specific binges. and i got curious! i'm a curious guy!

and then it turns out they're really cute >:( they're adorable, damn it.

ik i'm never gonna be able to drag you into this hole with me, since you already have a designated CW trainwreck, but if you're ever feeling bored the first one i ever read was really fucking funny and requires zero knowledge of canon. i didn't know alex's pronouns until halfway through bc i'd never heard of her (literally supergirl's sister). initially i clicked on it bc "superhero pretends to date her civilian identity" sounded hysterical but like... kara is so sweet, and so socially inept. and lena is a human disaster who just wants to help. and they both have crippling abandonment issues and no chill whatsoever

What are your favorite things about the ship?

i like that they appreciate each other. the version of them that i've constructed piecemeal from other people's opinions is such that like... they've both been pretty miserable, right? lena watched her mom die when she was like 4 years old and then got adopted by the luthors, kara watched her planet explode & pawned off by clark (who was like 30 years older than he was supposed to be bc of DC bullshit) on some human family and had to pretend to be normal for a decade or so.

and they both hide that pretty well, kara with kindness and lena with unapproachable businesswoman...ness... but they're both immediately fascinated by each other. and they're both sort of genuine with each other, even when they're in 'nice but bumbling civilian' or 'ruthless luthor' mode. so where it gets interesting for me is those moments they reach a mutual understanding of something, or where they trust each other in spite of Every Other Thing.

in like their first meeting lena says she's just a woman trying to make a name for herself outside of her family & asks if they can understand and kara is like "🥺 yeah..." and like they were just kind of fucked from there. sigh. you don't know how good you have it with riverdale polycule man. fuckin CW.

Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

i have many but the one that comes up most often isn't an opinion, it's a fact.

“khap zhao rrip” is fucking nonsense. it does not mean 'i love you'. it's SVO instead of VSO and zhao is a noun why are you even including kyrptahniuo if you're just going to find-and-replace random words.

listen. listen to me. zhaoivodh khap rrip. it is literally easier than french. nobody fucking does it right logan it makes me feel insane

#answers #hungry-bug #supergirl

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assorted-fics · 6 months

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Fics of the Month

Marvel

Infinite Coffee and Protection Detail by MusingsOnBuckyBarnes & Owlet First Fic: The mission resets abruptly, from objective: kill to objective: protect

Average Avengers Local Chapter 7 of New York City by hetrez

Steve and Tony accidentally start a national do-gooders association and fall in love.

Changing Fate by melWinter

Loki was supposed to go back to Asgard to assume control of the throne after saving Thor on Svartalfheim. He was supposed to be the portent for Ragnarok...too bad fate didn't ask for his opinion. After all, fate didn't plan for Loki to find an abandoned baby elf. Nor did Loki plan to discover how intriguing Jane Foster can be. And what the heck do the Avengers and his trickster of a daughter have to do with any of this? Loki makes a different choice. But can Loki truly escape the fate that has been his since the beginning? Can the trickster learn to love? With Thanos rising and the infinity war looming, the universe may come to an end if the nine realms can't reconcile with the prince it once rejected. Eventual Jane/Loki. Warning: Loki and Hela snarkiness, Tony cockiness, Thor cluelessness, and random cuteness of Loki dealing with being a dad.

secret keeper by jilliancares

Ellie stares at the new arrival, gaping. All the evidence points to one obvious answer, but this guy looks nothing like the Spider-Man Ellie recognizes — mostly because he isn’t wearing the suit. “Crappy day to get kidnapped, amirite?” he says, crouching next to Ellie and deftly untying her restraints. “Looks like these guys were amateurs, though. They didn��t even lock the windows.” In which Ellie accidentally becomes the one person who knows Spider-Man's identity. She doesn't tell her dad.

Harry Potter

Of a Linear Circle (series) by flamethrower

First Fic: In September of 1971, Severus Snape finds a forgotten portrait of the Slytherin family in a dark corner of the Slytherin Common Room. At the time, he has no idea that talking portrait will affect the rest of his life.

When It Returns by academicdisaster

‘You’re late, layabout,’ Malfoy drawled, pushing the whiskey over to him. ‘I’ll have you know that I am very busy maintaining a whole house and garden by myself now.’ ‘Oooh, the dead husband card. Before any alcohol. Is that a record?’ Harry's husband is dead, and Malfoy is the only one who gets it. Or, the one where they drink at a straight man pub, renovate a house, and learn how to find joy again.

Percy Weasley and the Prefect Job That Isn’t A Vanity Role by adiduck (book_people) and joisbishmyoga

In Which Prefects Have Very Specific Training And Delineated Duties, Namely Handling Exactly One (1) Dormful Of Kids -OR- Percy Is Dorm Mom To Five Boys And No One Else -OR- In Which McGonagall Pictured Prefect Oliver Wood For Two Minutes, Turned Green, And Gave Percy The Badge Despite The Sheer Number Of Responsibilities He Already Had, And It Did Not End In Disaster The Notes For A Fic That Will Not Be Written No, Really, It Won't, Please Don't Ask A Place on Earth by louisfake "Right," Draco said, rolling his eyes. "I'm supposed to believe that the Gryffindor war hero caught the former Death Eater singing Muggle pop like a lunatic in his dormitory and didn't immediately share the news with his pack of admirers?" Harry couldn't help it, he snorted a little. "As if they would ever believe me, Draco." Draco drew himself up, ready to launch into some other tirade, so Harry held up a hand; "What would I even say? I saw Draco Malfoy being joyful and free. How is that a joke?"

Merlin

Next to You (It’s the Rule) by LunaMyLove

Arthur and Merlin have a special relationship. They always have, even when they were prince and servant. While many question it when first noticing, eventually it becomes an understanding in Camelot—and even among some other countries—that where there is Arthur, there is Merlin. And, where there is Merlin, there is Arthur. Or Arthur and Merlin's relationship as witnessed and explained by others. Also, or Five times someone realizes that Merlin is the Queen, one time Merlin realizes it himself, and one time he owns it.

The Hunt for Red Emrys by Darkbluedark

King Arthur sets out to keep his promise to the spirit of the Druid boy by repealing his father's ban on magic. Unfortunately, this is easier said than done, for reasons including but not limited to the following: (1) He can't change the law until he understands magic better, but no sorcerer is willing to explain magic to him until he changes the law; (2) The sorcerers all have some strange obsession with Merlin, which is awakening all sorts of feelings in Arthur that he really doesn't fancy examining too closely; (3) He is starting to feel like the butt of some Druid-population-wide inside joke involving the mysterious phenomenon called Emrys; and (4) Oh yeah, Morgana is still trying to kill him. Thus he embarks on a journey of discovery, diplomacy, accountability, and self-improvement, and maybe even falls in love along the way.

Open Eyes by N16

After Merlin experiences abuse at the hands of a visiting lord, Arthur decides his manservant needs to learn how to defend himself. But Merlin is unimpressed with Arthur's solution, and Arthur is forced to confront some unpleasant truths about what happens right under his nose. How can he protect a kingdom when he can't even protect those inside his castle? One-shot.

Descendants

till death do us part by RottenKidNextDoor (Portal of Words)

"the first time jay killed carlos, they were sitting in the foyer of hell hall and carlos was worried about the blood on the floor." or jay and carlos have an agreement to kill each other to exploit the magic barrier's healing ability when things go too far. killing for mercy isn't as easy as it sounds.

death came to visit me so sweetly by tobiko

Do you know what it feels like to die? The Isle kids do. It's not something that they like to talk about.

#fics of the week #fanfiction rec list #Ao3 #marvel #marvel fic recs #merlin #merlin fic recs #harry potter #Harry Potter fic recs #harry potter fanfiction #descendants #descendants fic recs #fics of the month

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natalie-the-writer · 2 years

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Hiya! So this is another Ugly Dolls Lou story because I can't run from this obsession and, frankly, don't want to. The guy got such a bad hand that I feel the need to fix it.

Anyway, this fic does comply with most my other oneshots, mainly 'Nap Time' as it contains some heavier elements toward that. You don't need it to fully understand the story, but it would help. Here's the link:

On with the story! (Which may have two parts eventually.)

You Can Take A Sick Day (Let Us Help You)

'Does it have to be morning all ready?' Lou thought with a silent groan, squinting against the dim light coming through the blinds he forgot to close. It bathed his room in happy sunlight, but Lou felt not one bit of that joy. His head pounded against his skull, rocks rolling around in his brain, and the lights burned his eyes. Weakly, he yanked the blankets over his head, screwing his eyes shut as he hoped the pain would go away. It was hot under the blankets, but if he exposed any part of his skin to the outside world, it froze.

'I have to get up,' he urged himself, forcing his eyes open. 'I have a class to teach.' Ever since he got semi-back in the good books with the people due to his newfound friends and willingness to improve in every area he could - including opening up to people and trying to drop the perfect standard for himself. It was easy to drop it for other dolls, but not when it came to who he was supposed to be. The perfect mold. The prototype. The definition of perfection. 'I can't let them down. They're looking at me to teach.' The robots were boring and monotonous, so when he came into class, the news dolls had straightened up, excited yet anxious glimmers in their eyes after having no doubt heard stories of him, but also tired of robots and teachings that made it hard to get engaged to learn.

They didn't use the wash anymore. That machine could be stripped of parts for all he cared. He focused on teaching everything from his manuals and inner programming, but in a different light. He remembered when the first doll raised her hand to hesitantly answer a question and beamed when she got it right. He himself had smiled, happy tears building up behind his eyes as he fell into the excitement of teaching - an excitement he hadn't felt since Ox was around the first time. Hands flew up to answer questions when he prompted. He slowed down when he saw or heard confusion. When there was a mistake in an answer, he gently explained what was wrong and watched as the student's face lit up with realization. Lou's smile never left unless he was thinking hard about something.

It was a breath of fresh hair to not have perfection breathing down his neck, demanding every doll be perfect. He was supposed to recycle more dolls than he ever had in his life - the company wasn't supposed to let any physical imperfections out - and it was amazing to know that thought was no longer there. The factory's programming had been changed. UglyDolls and PrettyDolls were the biggest hits on the market. He could teach them how to survive in the big world, to embrace imperfection without worrying they'd be killed for it. It was freeing.

It didn't feel like an hour had passed when the bell wrung for recess. He'd grabbed his new satchel and started to say goodbye, only to be asked for extra teaching. Their eyes were so pleading that he had to give in, letting the class go on for another half hour. It had been like that every day for the last two months, exciting every time. His students weren't afraid to sit in their seats or ask questions. Word was spreading through the town of how he was. Dolls smiled instead of glared. He was living his happiest life, with real affection and love. The life he'd always wanted.

A stupid headache and cold chills weren't about to stop him now. He would teach his class. He wouldn't abandon them. Not when they were so close to getting to the big world. Not when they were on schedule to run the Gauntlet in three days to test both compassion and skill. They needed to review. He promised a review and after lunch lessons for anyone who wanted to stay. They weren't about to fail because he felt too weak to get out of bed. Because he was being weak.

'Get it together,' he told himself, pulling down the covers and blinking dazedly at the early morning light. He didn't sleep much, his head too dizzy and in so much pain, and hadn't consumed much in the way of food. He felt weird yesterday with only the beginnings of a headache in the middle of class, but had brushed it off. His apparent migraine took vengeance over night, likely tired of being ignored. 'Can't blame it,' he thought bitterly, slowly rising and swinging his legs over the side of his bed. The dizziness was immediate, and he had to press a hand to the wall to stop from swaying, blinking out the stars in his vision.

"Come on, Lou," he whispered, voice scratchy. He'd have to drink some water before class. "You've got to teach." With a forced burst of strength, he tried to stand, only to have to fall back onto bed again as his legs collapsed. "That was not the plan.." He waited a moment for the dizziness and shaking to subside, then tried again. This time, he managed to stay standing on the cold hardwood floor.

Lou managed to make his way unsteadily to his closet, grabbing a random black tux. It was hard to move. His body protested against the small strain of raising his arms to put them in his suit jacket, hating his silk pajamas being replaced by a stiffer if still smooth outfit. Once upon a time, he wouldn't have noticed the difference because he'd only worn suits: another unspoken rule by the factory that his friends convinced him to break by making him pajamas.

He tugged on his shoes and made his way unsteadily toward his nightstand where his school bag lay. The bed was too tempting to his exhausted body and he sat down, relishing in the minor comfort of having his weight supported. All he wanted to do was get back in bed, hide up under the weighted blankets, and wait until this nightmare ended.

Bringing his knees to his chest, he put the heels of his palms to his eyes. "What is wrong with you?" He asked himself angrily. It wasn't just directed toward whatever physical ailment plagued him now. He'd powered through worse than this - migraines that had him on the bathroom floor between classes, illnesses that he had to power through, eye bags from another sleepless night that he had to conceal with make-up - the list went on. This wasn't any worse than all those times, so what was making it so hard to get it together? He was sure he could. He was trained in perfection. Absolute perfection.

'It's because you have friends.' The thought was a whisper in his mind, possibly his inner conciousness trying to be merciful on the headache. Subconsciously, he wrapped his arms around himself in a hug, trying to replicate one he'd get from a friend. It felt hollow. 'You could just call or text them. They'd cancel your class or take over for you. Bring you something nice to eat that wouldn't make you nauseous and hug you as long as you wanted. They'd let you sleep. Mandy would mess with your hair. Nolan would fret over every little detail. Ox would assure you everything was alright and field any questions about your disappearance. Moxy would do her best to make you smile. Lucky Dog would..." The list kept going. He found himself thinking about a bowl of Wage's chicken noodle soup and warmth, getting so sucked up in his inner thoughts that he laid down on the bed, practically curled in a ball to keep the heat in.

Lou dragged his tired, half lidded eyes to look at the clock. 6:20. Classes started at 7:00. He always went early to greet his students but maybe he could lay here another ten minutes. Pretend he was surrounded by friends and warmth, not cold chills and relentless pain. Not bothering with the blankets, his head snuggled further down into the pillow. As much as he told himself not to fall asleep, he slipped into a drifting doze, unaware of time passing by with his friends and beloved students growing increasingly worried for his disappearance.

_______________

Lou was pulled out of his slumber by gentle hands touching him. He could hear several different voices, but couldn't differentiate any of them. His head felt like a rattling boulder, too heavy for his body to hold, and he was far too cold. One of those hands pressed against his forehead, and the tone of the nearest voice changed to an increasingly worried one. Instantly, his heart lurched, wanting to soothe that doll, that friend, who was so worried for his sake, but his mouth was cotton and he could hardly feel anything beyond the pain and cold.

He was lifted by steady, soft arms. His shoes were tugged off his feet, followed by his jacket and button up. A soft layer of clothing replaced it, and then he was placed back onto another soft, horizontal thing. A bed. Was he just there? Blankets were pulled over his body and a hand settled in his hair, followed by something cold draping across his forehead. His face scrunched up on its own accord. Why was he being warned and chilled? It didn't make sense to his fogged, sleepless mind, so he tried to pull his eyelids open. Make sense of it all because he needed things to make sense. What was he doing before? Why did he have the vague feeling he was late for something? Forgetting something?

When he managed to get his eyes open a slither, he couldn't see overly well. His pain left him with more squinted vision, but the lights from before were blocked out by the dolls surrounding him and closed shades. "Wha..." he couldn't get his question out, trying to blink the dark shapes into focus.

"Just go back to sleep, Lou. We're right here." The hand moved through his hair as the feminine voice reached his ears. Mandy. It could only be Mandy. The mattress shifted and she was sitting beside him. Lou thought he saw Nolan right behind her, other colorful forms either lining his bed or making mad dashes in and out the room. "We just wish you knew that."

His eyes closed on their own violation. The pain in his head was slowly decreasing, leaving him drowsy. Sleep wrapped around him like a blanket, tugging him down into sweet sleep oblivion so fast that he almost didn't hear her next words.

"We'll be there to catch you if you fall, Lou. We always will."

#lou uglydolls #fanfiction #fanfic #friendship #sick fanfic #sickfic #uglydolls

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maximumphilosopheranchor · 2 years

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Do you think Philip marrying Elizabeth could've ever happened? Like I'm reading this Armada book and the guys saying basically it was happening since she really liked him as much as he liked her and got in trouble with Mary. But then she like wanted him to win her over more and wait but he took it as rejection so married another woman, but that it would've been real but idk politics got in the way I guess

I'm intrigued - could you tell me which Armada book you are reading?

The problem with them marrying was that Elizabeth could marry Philip only on his conditions, he required her conversion to Catholicism and England remaining Catholic (not only because of his personal faith and conviction but also because without these conditions there was no chance for him to get a dispensation from the pope to marry her which he needed because Elizabeth was his sister-in-law). These two moments were non-negotiable and at the existing conjuncture they were unacceptable to Elizabeth, as she famously put it to Feria, I can't marry your king because I'm a heretic.

The thing you mention about her wanting him to wait longer - I think I understand where it comes from. When Elizabeth found out about Philip's engagement to Elisabeth of Valois she commented to Feria that Philip:

could not have been so much in love with her as I had said, as you had not had patience to wait four months for her ; and many things of the same sort, as if she was not at all pleased at the decision adopted by your Majesty.

(See Feria to Philip, London, 11th April 1559. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/simancas/vol1/pp46-64)

This passage sometimes is interpreted exactly as you said, but it's far more likely that Elizabeth as other English was not pleased by this turn of events because they were worried about the prospect of alliance between France and Spain against England, let's remember that France championed the rights of Mary Queen of Scots (the daughter-in-law of Henri II, the French king) to the throne of England. Elizabeth knew about France-Spain antagonism and counted on the fact that Mary Queen of Scots becoming queen of England was an unacceptable scenario to Philip. On her accession and afterwards the situation was Elizabeth and Philip against France, Philip had supported her accession. Now, with Philip marrying Elisabeth of Valois and becoming son-in-law to Henri II, it seemed in England that Philip was abandoning his alliance with England, and him turning against England allied with France was the worst nightmare to the English. I can tell you that their concerns were not unfounded because Henri II indeed offered to Philip to go to fight England together but he rejected these offers. So he really didn't abandon Elizabeth even when married to Elisabeth of Valois (my boy!).

If Elizabeth had had a sudden change of heart that winter and had said like "hey whatever, I agree to be a Catholic" and married Philip, her Protestant friends, followers, supporters would have perceived it as a betrayal and probably she would have lost their support. But I don't think she would have lost her throne or power because a) England still was a Catholic country where Protestants were in minority; b) although Philip had become more unpopular due to the loss of Calais he had brains and resources to improve English opinion of him; c) there were actually people like English merchants in the Netherlands who supported this match.

And I think in certain circumstances Elizabeth may have married Philip, like if their marriage were arranged by their parents when they were in their teens (explored in this excellent AU fic) or if Philip and Mary had had a living child but Mary had died and Philip proposed to Elizabeth.

#ask #anonymous #Elizabeth I #Philip II #Philip II of Spain

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tanyatakaishi · 1 year

Text

Spoiling my own fic, but had too much fun writing my headcanon of the Motomiya fam that I created all the way back in Innocent Games.

Excerpt from in-progress Ch. 7 of the sequel, Remember:

...

His parents had turned his room into an office.

Which is why Davis was now lying on a flower comforter with a poster of Matt Ishida staring at him.

It was sort of crazy that his room was no longer in existence while Jun’s had been kept like a time capsule since she’d finished high school.

Guess he knew which one of them was the favorite.

“You were so ready to get out of here and start living your dream,” his mom had explained, folding the clothes from his duffle bag to put in Jun’s old dresser. “Your room hardly had anything left in it.”

Meanwhile Jun’s seemed to accumulate more things, making it impossible to completely unpack.

Ken had offered to share his one bedroom apartment but Davis declined.

“You’re still on my blacklist," he had said, earning a Ken smile while the two of them stacked the rest of his things into storage. "Consider this your probationary period, removal pending. Plus, I’m pretty sure Yolei’ll fight me for custody if I keep hoggin you.”

Ken didn’t find that funny. Davis hadn’t either, since he wasn’t really sure he’d been joking.

He turned away from the Teenage Wolves poster and tossed a footbag into the air for Veemon to catch.

“Matt’s judging me.”

“That’s just his resting face,” Veemon lisped, sending the bag back.

Davis caught it and did a quick sit up, glaring at the wall of boy-bands. “I’m gonna take him down.”

He was standing on the bed, fingers deep in prying down the poster, when his dad appeared.

“I see you’re keeping yourself busy.”

Davis gave the poster a firm rip. “Just makin the rooms even.”

Tadashi Motomiya took a seat on the bed beside him, grabbing the abandoned footbag and tossing it to Veemon. “How about we go get a drink? Scope out the ladies?”

Davis stopped ripping the Teenage Wolves poster in order to shoot his father a glare.

“Not for me," Tadashi laughed. "I’m still happily married.”

The poster floated in pieces onto Jun’s old flower bedspread and Davis sunk down, sprawling over a pillow.

“Come on," Tadashi coaxed. "Don't be so doom and gloom. You’re still a catch. All these modern women are probably dying to not have to cook for their families.”

“Dad,” Davis groaned.

“Don’t let living at home stop you.” Tadashi ground a knuckle into his son’s hair.

“How are you so…not passively passive aggressive?” grumbled Davis.

“You mean aggressive aggressive?”

“I guess.”

“Just trying to help my little mama’s boy become a man.”

Frowning, Davis snatched the footbag Veemon was tossing up and down from the air. “I think I’m gonna quit drinking."

“Interesting timing,” said Tadashi, rubbing his hands on his knees before standing back to his feet. “So guy’s night out is a bust, huh?”

Davis was caught by surprise at the disappointment in his voice. “Yeah, maybe some other time?”

“You cooking tonight?”

“Planning to.”

“Good. Ramen?”

“I was thinking of tryin my hand at some okonomiyaki. Been awhile since I made it.”

“I love okonomiyaki,” sighed Veemon.

Tadashi chuckled. “I’m sure it’ll be great. Can’t understand why you haven’t been getting enough business.”

Davis shrugged.

“They’ll come around. And if not, well, that’s their loss.” Tadashi gave his son’s shoulder a firm squeeze before quickly leaving the room.

Davis stood up to close the door. He turned to Veemon. "That was weird."

“Maybe we should go,” Veemon said.

"And listen to his terrible advice all night?" Davis went back to tearing the posters from the wall.

He still remembered the start of his last year of high school, when his Dad had given him unsolicited relationship advice.

"Maybe you should start thinking about seeing other girls," he had said.

"What? Why?"

"Well, you know how college is."

Davis had stared at him, blank.

"Yolei is going to want to experiment, live life a little. You can't expect her to stay with her high school boyfriend the whole time."

But he had expected it. Until his dad has put the thought in his head, spurring on break up number two.

Davis dug his fingers under a movie poster, releasing it from the wall with a loud rip.

"Do you think Jun will be upset you tore up her pictures?" asked Veemon.

"Ask me if I care."

"Do you care?"

Davis rolled his eyes and proceeded to the next. Then, out of nowhere, an unwrapped tampon emerged, its string jammed between the poster and the door trim.

A burst of laughter came out of his nose.

"How many of these did I put in here?" he cackled. "Hand me my phone. "

Veemon obeyed and, still chuckling to himself, Davis snapped a picture. On auto-pilot, he opened his texts to Yolei. Then, upon seeing their last exchange, he immediately felt the humor fizzle out of him.

He sent the picture to Ken instead.

What is that? Ken texted back.

Davis gave a long, low sigh and wrote back.

This is why you can't keep a girlfriend.

#digimon fanfiction #my fanfiction #remember #innocent games #daiyako #daisuke motomiya #motomiya fam #DUB LIFE

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wildernessuntothemselves · 2 years

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Last chapter I was all like omg ruthless lord taehyun might not be that sexy I'm scared af but nowww I see things coming to light 🤔🤔🤔 Now we know his motives and I feel like I understand him more... he won me back I'm soft hearted like that 😭 I loved every scene he had with reader, I think he would be so good to her if they do get to be together ❤️ I'm rooting for them

I see that reader might be in such a troubled and worried state of mind she had that nightmare and that line "I told you I'd come for you. I'll always find you" girl I'd be scared to death !! Also they say that dreams are messages/desires of the subconscious and that would make sense because she got so compliant to him even if she was very needy after being thwarted by lord taehyun but i was like no girl stop and think about the situation for a second ✋️ or could it be that she would really let the same happen in real life..? And honestly that forced impregnation thing felt like something beomgyu would do...

Now, that last scene was something to think about.....I don't think jaeyun is working for beomgyu and is gonna kidnap her, I think it's something else (I don't know what tho..) but it's cause we've been told we were getting some spicy scenes with Lord taehyun in chapter 7 so I think reader will stay in the castle 👀 but also I knew this chapter we were going to get a scene with gyu and I was like howw is that possible 😪 alright now I know, things can get really unexpected so who knows

I didn't even realize that it was supposed to be months of reader being in taehyun's castle, maybe cause I thought beomgyu would get desperate enough to try something a bit crazy within a few days to get to her. But now it makes me think if maybe he's had some time to plan something great (greatly horrifying) and is acting discreetly. But idk actually at this point of the story it's hard for me to predict something and I also have no idea of how things will end, I think it would be a surprise for me either way. I'm sooo invested in this fic! Absolutely fantastic 👏 You must have a billion dollar worth of a mind to be able to write something so good like that ❤️❤️

also it doesn't hurt that he had his sweet moments. it's always heart fluttering to see the tsundere character be soft for you 🥺

gyu is always on her mind and she feels guilty for considering the marriage proposal even if she knows she should accept it but she can't just abandon the love of her life that easily. a marriage would just be setting in stone that she really won't go back to him and that's hard on her. plus yeah she is pretty horny AND he keeps sending her threatening messages so it's a wonderful cocktail that lead her there

yeah like i could have something up my sleeve where she gets kidnapped AND gets to have sex with tyun too so you never know after that dream sequence. but you guys are overlooking one important detail. y'all have guessed some things so accurately it's freaky (one that i never even hinted at and i'm usually so obvious with my hints lmao) so i'm surprised. i guess now you're gonna figure it out lol

yeah i kept going back on forth about the duration of her stay in the castle and originally her and tyun were supposed to get married while on the run and have sex there there where gyu finds them 😵 but i decided to give oc some time so she can get to know tyun and make a well informed decision and also give tyun time to see if she is who he thinks she is so yeah.

gyu definitely tried to do a lot to get her back from the beginning you just didn't hear about it because it was all thwarted by the king and this story is from oc's POV and he definitely has something cooking up his sleeve and that's why it's taking so long

#thank you babe ❤️#mort talks #yamqn

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smurphyse · 2 years

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the fic ask game, 20, 18, 9 and 4!

20: Which fic have you put the most work into? Which fic have you put the least work into?

Uhhh, I would have to say Over Your Shoulder. I've been writing it for about 2 years now! I'm getting close to the end and it's made me sad so it's writing is on hold until I can pull myself together lmao. I've also put a shit ton of work into The Arrangement, my Loki fic. Did a lot of research into dresses, court life, Norse mythos, and lots of other details that are in that story!

I've put the least amount of work into my oneshots, I think. I know this is probably geared more toward long fics, but I put a lot of effort into all of those. With my oneshots they tend to just burst forth in a 30-45 minute writing flurry.

18: Do you feel like your work gets enough recognition? What kind of feedback do you like to receive?

I mean, what is enough recognition? It does bother me, on probably some elitist selfish level, that my smut gets a lot more recognition than my plots do. I think I've grown a lot in building and executing plots, storylines, character arcs, etc, and it tends to be the P in the V that anyone cares about.

The feedback I like to receive that is my favorite are those people who analyze stories, but I totally get that not everyone is like that. I love when people tell me they loved the chapter, especially when they pick out a line or plot line and call that out in their specific view point of it. I like to see how you all perceive my stories, because it's not always the way I would've interpreted it. It's nice to know that my POV can still be interpreted to be meaningful in other people's way of seeing the world.

9: Are there any fics you’d love to see but don’t want to write yourself? What are they?

I love fantasy AUs, even though when they're based off reality rooted shows it can be jarring to read. @andiebeaword has a lot of awesome fantasy-based fics and ideas that are so unique and amazing and I love reading each new one she comes up with!

4: Tell me about one of your abandoned WIPs. Why did you abandon it?

I have a disabled veteran!Reader x Spencer fic that I have been writing for a long time. The premise is that she is a drunk and struggling, and she witnesses a serial killer in action one night while stumbling home with her service dog, Daisy. She scares him off and initially the BAU thinks she could be the killer, but they let her go when they see that she's suffering from PTSS, not a threat. The killer shows up in her apartment so she can't identify him and tries to kill her, and it prompts them sending Spencer in as her undercover boyfriend to keep watch over her until the guy is caught or comes back.

I abandoned it because it was really similar to Mutual Irritation and not a lot of people seem to be interested in my BAMF reader stories. I don't understand why people prefer reading my ones where the reader isn't muscular or has bad habits. I think those character details are great to read about and watch them be navigated. I am still working on it, I just don't know if I'll ever post it.

Thank you! <3 I love questions like this! :)

Fic Ask Game

#fic ask game #ask game #ask smurph #smurph answers

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hexxalite-hecate · 2 years

Note

I see Cullen x Amell or Cullen x Surana a lot in the Cullen tags, I'm a Cullen x Lavellan shipper and I haven't played Origins, what is the deal with him and the mage warden? Some people say he was obsessed and stalked her, I don't wanna believe that bc I love him but I'm confused about what's canon. I know some people hc they had a relationship but I can't seem to get a straight answer what actually happened in canon? Sorry for random ask 🦁

Hi! I love asks ❤️ And this is a good question!

From what I've seen, this topic can get a bit spicy because people have opinions on Cullen's history with Amell/Surana (hereby referred to as f!mage because I'm lazy). I'm active on the Dragon Age subreddits and I've had a lot of discussions with people who genuinely believe that Cullen is an abusive, stalking rapist, and Bioware did a lazy retcon on his history to turn him into a whitebread vanilla love interest for DAI.

I’ll put my cards on the table: Amell was my first playthrough and subsequently canon Warden, I got attached to Cullen early on, and I love me a bit of Cullen x f!mage fic and art, though my preference is post-Inquisition reunion. I don't agree he’s been retconned from an abusive stalker into a poor little meow meow (and I'll be going into a detailed breakdown of why in a minute). HOWEVER, despite my personal bias I’m going to try and present information fairly so people can draw their own conclusions, and I can definitely see how the less flattering opinions of Cullen wrt f!mage ended up being formed.

There are several explanations for the, ahem, strong views on Cullen’s relationship with f!mage during their time at Kinloch Hold, some entirely reasonable and some less reasonable. Some examples of the range I’ve encountered:

1. People have difficulty emotionally separating the character of Cullen from his VA, who holds some utterly loathsome alt-right stances and has historically used the character to try and spread those disgusting views. (Can't really blame anyone for this, fuck that guy.)

2. People haven't actually played through Origins as f!mage and only have second-hand knowledge of his canon interactions, going off hearsay that gets escalated and distorted like a Thedosian game of telephone. Well, lucky for you I gathered every single interaction between them into this post, so now you have the facts to make an informed decision.

3. Information from abandoned writing concepts and dev interviews often conflicts with what’s actually presented in the game itself, muddying the waters with regard to Cullen’s character vision. (This one is genuinely complicated, but I'll try and present everything fairly for your consideration.)

4. A lot of fans understandably started disliking Cullen based on the choices he makes and the viewpoints he espouses in DA2. This doesn't directly affect his relationship with f!mage at the Tower, since all their interactions happened before that point. However, some people argue that his behaviour during DA2 indicates tendencies that he would have had from the beginning, including during their time at Kinloch Hold together. It also affects his post-Circle opinions of her, which is relevant to whether or not he could be termed as obsessive. This, too, is complicated, and I'll try to be as fair and unbiased as possible.

I'm going to tackle your ask by breaking it down into two main parts. Firstly, what is the canon evidence of exactly how involved Cullen and f!mage were at the Ferelden Circle? And secondly, what canon evidence is there that this involvement was characterised by obsessive/predatory/stalker behaviour, and in what way does that behaviour develop through later games?

Buckle up, this turned out long.

1. What canon evidence is there of f!mage and Cullen’s relationship at Kinloch Hold?

Let's take this from the beginning, based directly on what f!mage encounters in the game. On waking from your Harrowing, you are immediately greeted by this ambient conversation from two gossiping apprentices:

If you walk around spam clicking other apprentices, one will also volunteer this information:

So, we are immediately given evidence that whoever Cullen is, his feelings for you are obvious enough to be a general subject of gossip. Interesting! But it doesn’t say anything about your character’s feelings for him. Are we in a forbidden relationship? Or is my character only just finding out about this? Would she react with ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) or ಠ_ಠ? Ok, let's go talk to the guy himself and find out what the deal is.

(Forgive the cut and pasted dialogue; I just centred it over his head so I don’t have to post full size screenshots.)

Straight away, we can see that Cullen is a stuttering, bumbling wreck. He stumbles over his words and clumsily tries to make conversation. We are presented with a range of options in response to his greeting:

As you can see from these options, f!mage seems to know who Cullen is. There’s no “Uh, who are you again?” dialogue. However, she doesn’t appear to know him very well. They’re unfamiliar enough that when he tries to compliment her, he has to obfuscate:

If they had any sort of relationship, whether simple friendship or more, Cullen wouldn’t need to hide that he’s familiar with an apparently key part of her personality - that she’s confident. To me, that reads that they’ve hardly interacted outside the occasional nod in the hallways, or at the very most a brief conversation.

I suppose you could argue that they’ve been having purely physical trysts that account for them having a ‘relationship’ without him knowing her personality very well, but his bumbling awkwardness seems utterly contradictory to that theory. And then, as the nail in the coffin, we get this:

F!mage can suggest such a tryst herself, picking up on his attraction and showing reciprocation. Cullen reacts first with confusion, then stunned realisation... then absolute rejection.

Then he automatically ends the conversation and literally runs away from you.

Despite his obvious attraction - described as love, no less, by random NPCs - he doesn’t even entertain the idea of acting on his desires. We’ll come back to this conversation in the second part, because Cullen’s language reveals a lot about why he rejects you. But for now, the important thing is that he does, and nothing about this exchange indicates that there have been previous, non-rejected encounters.

So, the definitive answer to the question did Cullen and f!mage have a romantic or sexual relationship at the Tower?

No. Through their canon interactions, we can deduce that they were both aware of the other’s existence, and f!mage’s opinion of him is anything from dismissive to neutral to flirty depending on your dialogue choices. However, these canon interactions completely contradict the idea of them having any kind of established romantic or sexual relationship - or even just friendship, given Cullen’s hasty “or so I’ve heard” correction, or f!mage’s offer that “we should get to know each other”. Obviously players can headcanon anything they like - I’m partial to friends with mutual unspoken crushes - but it’s not canon.

So that’s that. Now on to the second, less clear-cut, messier question...

2. Did Cullen ever behave in an obsessive/predatory/stalkerish way towards f!mage?

Oh man. There is a LOT of ground to cover here.

Let’s take this in chronological order. Firstly, let’s examine their actual relationship at Kinloch Hold, using all the canon evidence above. It’s clear from their interactions that this relationship - such as it is - is weighted more towards one side. Cullen’s feelings are so obvious that everyone and their dog is gossiping about them. It’s also evident through your conversation with him that he and f!mage don’t actually know each other very well, so regardless of whether or not your character chooses to shock him by actually showing interest in return, Cullen’s feelings up until that point must have been born of watching and admiring her from afar. So yes, there’s scope to interpret such behaviour anywhere on the spectrum from youthful crush to obsessive, and there isn’t much primary source information to confirm one way or the other. But predatory? I don’t believe the canon information supports that Cullen ever behaved in a predatory way towards f!mage during her apprenticeship in the Ferelden Circle, and here’s why.

To set the scene, we have already been shown that Cullen is young and idealistic. He’s 19, and very clearly inexperienced in terms of navigating social situations. (F!Mage’s age is flexible, but since Harrowings are not generally taken until 18/19, she and Cullen are either contemporaries or f!mage is actually older than him, which neutralises that particular facet of imbalance). Every writing choice made for Cullen during the mage origin intro highlights that he is simply naïve, unable to conceal his crush and unaware of how revealing his statements are. Look at this; he can’t even stop telling on himself while he’s actually talking to you, let alone with anyone else:

These are very stark writing choices which make the character of Cullen seem as awkward, bumbling, nonthreatening and - dare I say it - cute as possible. This was intended to be endearing. Take a look at the VO direction for Cullen’s voice acting, taken from this post of @soularia discussing the same topic:

Sincere and sweet is the clincher for me. There’s no way to reconcile that with predatory. Even if you personally disagree that the overall effect was endearing rather than creepy, the directorial intent was clearly to evoke the former.

However, even if Cullen’s attentions at the Ferelden Circle can be characterised as an innocent crush, the next hurdle to clear is the inherent imbalance of power between Templar and mage, which is one of the major issues people have with his romantic fixation. Despite his youth and inexperience, Cullen is still in a position of authority over f!mage, and as such any relationship between them would be inherently exploitative. But as you can see from his rejection dialogue, the person who is most cognizant and serious about that imbalance is Cullen himself. When Cullen turns f!mage down, the language he uses is very revealing - he doesn’t say “No, we’ll get in trouble” or even “No, your kind and mine shouldn’t mix” (which you might expect from his stance in DA2). He says “it would be really inappropriate.” You’re offering him everything he wants on a silver platter, and he won’t take it because he’s the one who’s concerned about power imbalances. That speaks of responsibility and duty of care, not predation. If his behaviour was narratively intended to be read as predatory, this would have been the perfect place to hammer that point home. You could even do it in a soft-touch morally grey way - “oh we shouldn’t, but I just can’t help it!” But instead, pains are taken to ensure the player sees Cullen acting in a respectful and principled manner.

So it’s perfectly understandable for fans to dislike the Cullen/f!mage dynamic because of the inherent power balance. However, I think it’s unfair to term Cullen himself as predatory because of it. The imbalance is not of his making, and despite his feelings, he does the exact opposite of exploiting it.

I think it’s interesting that Cullen isn’t present alongside the other Templars in the scene outside the repository when f!mage and Jowan are confronted by Greagoir and Irving, and as such we have no chance to see what side he would pick in that scenario. If you pursue the relevant dialogue options during your earlier conversation, he regretfully declares that should you have been possessed by a demon during your Harrowing, he would have followed protocol and helped the rest of the Templars put you down, despite his personal feelings on the matter:

Ouch. This tracks with the ‘duty first’ mentality that causes him to reject your proposition, even though it’s presumably all he dreams about. This topic of conversation makes Cullen visibly uncomfortable in both voice and mannerisms - because it’s fucked up and he seems painfully aware of that - and he moves on as soon as possible. But I think it’s interesting to note that in the one situation where his devotion to duty could have been proven - at the confrontation outside the repository - Cullen is conspicuously absent. It’s possible there’s nothing narratively meaningful about his exclusion from this scene, but part of me wonders whether it was intentionally kept ambiguous whether he really would have been able to attack f!mage if Greagoir ordered him to. This one is up for individual interpretation, however, and I’m aware that it’s another major reason the Cullen x f!mage pairing leaves a sour taste in some fans’ mouths. If nothing else, it’s consistent with his character presentation so far.

(As an aside, it’s interesting to note that the one time we do see Cullen presented with this choice - in the final act of DA2 - he chooses to stand with Hawke against the rest of the Templars. And that’s during his worst phase of mage prejudice. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.)

Cullen and f!mage next cross paths where all the non-mage PCs meet him for the first time: during the Broken Circle quest, where he’s been tortured, starved, assaulted and abused for days by a Desire Demon wearing the shape of none other than f!mage. This is where we get definitive proof of Cullen’s feelings, in the form of a delirious confession:

(NB: the fact that one of your dialogue options here is basically “so who the fuck were you, again?” is both hilarious and sad. Poor Cullen.)

There’s some epic Greek-tragedy-cum-extreme-Catholic-guilt here, and let me tell you this shit was like catnip to the angst sluts when DAO first came out. You have to understand that female players were typically NOT catered to in the gaming scene of 2009, especially in terms of fanservice, and having this himbo pour out his agonised forbidden desire for your character hit a LOT of people’s targets. There’s a reason Cullen was a breakout favourite. (I’m aware that mores have changed since then and this particular trope might be recieved less favourably in a more recent game. This was 2009. We had to take what we could get.)

Anyhow, regardless of all this, Cullen insists that the ordeal he’s been subjected to has destroyed whatever tender boyish regard he may once have nurtured, and says some pretty jaded and upsetting things to back it up:

What we’re seeing here is the genesis of Cullen’s radicalisation, which is hale and flourishing by DA2. I won’t go into detail about this here because it’s getting off topic, but one interesting thing to note is a line which serves as evidence against the theory that Cullen held his DA2-era radical opinions before his ordeal at the Tower:

This seems to indicate that prior to Uldred’s rebellion, Cullen was a mage sympathiser in the mould of Ser Thrask. (This was later confimed in a messageboard comment by his writer - we’ll get to that bit later.) Food for thought - however, we’re straying from our intended path.

The fact that the easiest way for the Desire Demon to break Cullen is to use his feelings for f!mage is very telling. Remember, Desire Demons are not simply about sex, despite how much boob-fondling Bioware insisted on programming into their models. The Desire Demon who possessed Connor in Redcliffe played on his wish for his father to be healed. Cullen could have had plenty of things for the demon to work with - he might have been hungry to prove himself as a devoted Templar, or conversely been dissatisfied with his life choices and yearned to see more the world - but no, it’s his feelings for f!mage that the demon focuses on like a laser beam. This trick, again? Cullen says when you find him outside the Harrowing Chamber. Still here? But that’s always worked before! I close my eyes, but when I open them you are still here! “Again”; “always” - this was more than once. The demon has been using the f!mage doppelganger technique over and over. Such insistence on this tactic by the demon - who can see directly into Cullen’s head - seems to indicate that Cullen’s feelings have moved beyond mere crush into something potent enough to be used to break his spirit entirely. How might Cullen have been affected in the time between f!mage leaving the Tower with Duncan, and miraculously returning as the prodigal daughter during Broken Circle? Remember, the news from Ostagar was that everyone but Loghain’s unit was dead. Until her reappearance in Broken Circle, Cullen was likely under the impression that his crush had died a horrific and violent death at the hands of monsters. What does that do to a lovelorn teenager? Well, it’s possible that grief and lack of a healthy emotional outlet turned those innocent feelings into an obsession. As we’ll see later, Cullen makes some curious remarks indicating that he has pedastalised f!mage in his memories. But this is moving into the realm of speculation again, and we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

This scene marks the end of Cullen and f!mage’s canon interactions in the Ferelden Circle. Despite being present during the post-battle discussion with Greagoir (and Irving, if he survives), Cullen does not address f!mage again directly, and this is his last on-screen appearance in DAO. However, he is one of the few characters who returns in all three games. So what can we glean about Cullen’s ongoing feelings from his appearances in the later instalments of the DA series?

Let’s look at Cullen’s attitude towards Amell/Surana post-Origins - how long can you nurse a crush before it becomes unhealthy?

Before we move on from DAO, let’s squeeze in a last little bit of piping hot tea from our favourite Kinloch Hold gossip girls:

This takes place during your return to the Tower in the expansion Witch Hunt, set roughly two years after the Blight. Apparently Cullen’s crush was such a juicy topic that it’s still being brought up, even though neither of he nor f!mage have been at the Ferelden Circle for literal years now. However, the question of whether he’s still holding that torch doesn’t get an answer from Kristen Bell over there, and since Cullen himself isn’t present to confirm or deny it, there’s no further information to be had here. To get the update from the lion’s mouth, we need to spin on to DA2.

There’s a lot to be said about Cullen’s decisions, viewpoints and state of mind during DA2, and I could write an entire separate post about the toxic behaviour that can result from extreme trauma, PTSD and radicalisation (and probably will; just give me a week with my psychotherapy textbooks and I’ll post another thesis-length meta). While Cullen’s fragile and toxic state of mind during DA2 does have a bearing on this discussion, I’m going to try and keep things focused on the topic of the ask, just to stop this post from tipping over into magnum opus territory.

The comment Cullen makes to Hawke in DA2 is specifically directed towards f!Amell, since you can only trigger it by bringing up Hawke’s family connection to the Hero of Ferelden - but we can reasonably assume he’d have the same opinion of Surana if asked. When congratulating Hawke on restoring the status of the Amells in Kirkwall, Cullen will make this statement, entirely unprompted and unsolicited:

This is completely contradictory to every sentiment Cullen expresses regarding mages for the entirety of DA2, and entirely conflicts with the manner of his parting with Amell after the Broken Circle quest. He’s been tortured, abused, traumatised and radicalised, and he spends the 7 years of DA2 unequivocally paying it forward. Every word he speaks about mages in this game is about damage control, and how their human rights must be balanced with the dangers they present to society. Whether you agree with this or not (I don’t, obviously), it’s inescapably part of his ideology in Kirkwall. Arguably the starkest and hardest-to-handwave nadir of his character arc is when he insists to Hawke that “mages aren’t people like you and me”. Cullen can’t see past his fear and trauma to even consider mages human.

And yet this comment about Amell, a mage who was (unwittingly and unwillingly) central to the abuse he endured? No caveats at all. Not “she was special, for a mage”. He doesn’t mention the fevered accusations he threw at her in the wake of the disaster at the Tower, when he claimed he was beyond caring what she thought of him, and accused her of dooming them all with her ‘compassion’ if she chose to spare the mages. There are no qualifiers to his wistful statement, and it remains the same regardless of what story choices you made in DAO - Amell could have left the village of Redcliffe to burn, killed a ten year old boy, joined a crime syndicate and robbed Denerim blind, defiled the Urn of Sacred Ashes and been an honest-to-god blood mage, and Cullen’s still reminiscing like she’s a milkmaid he had a summer fling with. He completely disregards the complex and negative circumstances in which they parted, and explicitly separates her from other mages (because she’s not like them, apparently).

Now, you could argue that Cullen has simply accepted that his torture by a Desire Demon hiding behind a lifesize Amell cutout was not in fact the real Amell’s fault, that he regrets his hasty chastisement of her, and has peaceably and healthily decided to move on without malice. But his baseline indictment of literally every other mage ever is not compatible with this reading. He can’t healthily and fondly reminisce about Amell while also hating and fearing all other mages. You could argue that Cullen’s use of “special” and “never met her like again” could simply refer to her saintly status as Hero of Ferelden, but keep in mind that this dialogue is only in the game to be an easter egg for Amell DAO players. The writers were explicitly throwing a bone to existing Cullen fans, who at this point were overwhelmingly mage origin players who’d experienced Cullen crushing on their character and got attached to him as a result. In this orchestrated context, Cullen’s reminiscences are intentionally and directly linked to his romantic feelings, and his mental separation of her from mages et al actually denote that Cullen has put Amell on a pedestal, and is idolising his memories of her.

Considering the context and implications of this exchange, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for players to infer at this point that Cullen has unrealistic and possibly obsessive tendencies towards the mage Warden.

That’s the only mention of f!mage we get in DA2, despite the wealth of character insight the game gives us into Cullen’s 7-year annus horribilis. But what about during DAI, after Cullen has undergone his so-called ‘retcon’ into an acceptable human being? How does he feel about f!mage a full 10 years after their last canon interaction, now he’s left the Tempalr order and been deradicalised of his least palatable opinions?

Yet again, the writers are generous with the bones they throw to those original mage Warden DAO players. We, as Inquisitor, get the opportunity to probe Cullen when the topic of the Hero of Ferelden comes up. Not having managed to play through DAI with the correct worldstate yet, I have none of my own dialogue screenshots on hand, and will have to direct you to a youtube video of the exchange (keep in mind that this conversation is with a ROMANCED Inquisitor):

Inquisitor: If you don’t mind my asking... the Hero of Ferelden was a Circle mage. Did you know her?

Cullen: I attended her Harrowing, actually. She was a lovely woman.

Inquisitor: ...“Lovely?”

Cullen: There was some... youthful infatuation on my part. A feeling I had forsaken until recently.

Inquisitor: You never acted on it?

Cullen: She was one of my charges. Even if she felt the same, it would have been... inappropriate. I saw her once, after she became a Warden. She freed the Tower during the Blight - I would be dead or mad if not for her. I was in a sorry state when she found me. The things I said were... unkind. Untoward. I regret them now. I wish she knew that.

This exchange is a cornucopia of hidden gems. Cullen’s tone is wistful, fond, a little sad. In general, I really do agree that Cullen sounds like he has a sane and stable handle on his historic trauma by this point in the series, and his evaluation of the way he and f!mage parted is self-aware and fair. His use of the words infatuation and inappropriate echo his language from DAO and give legitimacy and consistency to his character arc. But it does amuse me that he’s still throwing out unsolicited compliments like “she was a lovely woman”, and to his CURRENT GIRLFRIEND at that. And what’s this about “a feeling I had forsaken until recently”? Is he actually implying that he’s had no romantic feelings for anyone between f!mage stealing his heart and getting together with the Inquisitor? No dates? No relationships? Not even any interest in anyone else at all for 10 freaking years? That’s really not helping the ‘not obsessive’ meter. It’s also eerily similar to his pedestalling “never met her like again” comment from DA2.

Then we have a snippet of banter around the War Table which only occurs if you imported a worldstate where Leliana romanced the f!mage Warden. Again, I will have to rely on the kindness of others and direct you to a video that isn’t mine:

Cullen: So you and, er...

Leliana: Yes?

Cullen: Was she - I mean, did she ever...

Leliana: Are you asking for details?

Cullen: I-ah - no! That would be... inappropriate.

Of course, f!mage is never mentioned by name, but by the use of the running joke inappropriate coupled with Cullen’s stuttering, stumbling speech which echoes his earliest DAO introduction, it’s clear what we’re meant to infer. Did she ever... what? Ask about Cullen? Bring him up? Discuss her memories of the Tower? Want to see him again? Bioware knew exactly what they were doing with this snippet. Those who know, know. Those who don’t, don’t. But it does indicate that even though 10 years have passed, Cullen is still preoccupied with f!mage, and is noticeably concerned about her opinion of him. As before, he reacts appropriately (heh) by dropping the subject... but he just couldn’t help but ask, the same way he couldn’t help but tell on himself all those years ago.

(Of course, if f!mage died fighting the Archdemon in your particular canon, it adds a different and very sad facet to his wistful musings. Cullen’s last memory of her would be that terrible interaction after the disaster at the Tower, and consequently there will never be a chance for him to gain closure, leaving him full of grief and regret. That sort of thing can really mess a person up - and incidentally, it’s much easier to pedastalise a dead person than a living one. No wonder he was too traumatised to love again for a decade. Honestly this possibility is just tragic.)

This juncture seems the opportune place to bring up the controversial subject of decanonised or canon-adjacent material, which often paints a darker interpretation of Cullen. Sheryl Chee, who wrote for Cullen in DAO, made the following statements about her vision of the character in a messageboard discussion with fans after DAO’s release (relevant comments on pages 2 - 7):

I’d say he starts out tragically oppressed with some tendencies towards creepy stalker (I think you’d have to be, to be a templar). He ends up, I believe, completely broken mentally and emotionally and hates both himself and the femMagePC. I think nothing, not even love, can redeem him. He’s too far gone. Of course, that’s not canon, it’s just my take on it, and I revel in the angst and the pain.

Despite Sheryl’s own assertion that her comments aren’t canon, obviously opinions from the writer herself hold a lot of weight, and it’s important to realise that this quote was a strong influence on fandom’s divided opinions on Cullen. If this was where Sheryl was coming from during development, however, I do feel like something must have got a little lost in translation between her initial writing of the character and Cullen’s VO direction and in-game depiction. Maybe it’s my bias, and you’re free to draw your own conclusions based on the facts presented, but in my opinion her description bears no resemblance to the Cullen we actually experience, in-game, during the mage origin of DAO. You can’t claim that a romance between Cullen and f!mage would be “very quick, very violent, and only undertaken as a way to get her out of his system” alongside a voice acting direction that describes him as “sincere and sweet”. Make your mind up! No wonder people got mixed messages and everyone’s arguing with each other!

Sheryl’s further posts regarding the matter also contradict herself:

I did imagine him to be a young, fairly normal kid torn between his hormones and his duty. Like a more serious Alistair. Later on we decided we needed a templar survivor in the post-Uldred tower, and since people seem to enjoy it when they see people from their past, I decided to make it Cullen. In the beginning, he is sympathetic to the mages, but he comes away very changed by the things Uldred and the demons do to him.

As for the creepy stalker tendencies--er... I think that may have been started by David Gaider's little Cullen Romance snippet. I never imagined him as a creepy stalker.

Given this clarification, I feel we ought to take her initial comments with a sizeable grain of salt - but people do use these quotes to justify the darker reading of Cullen, so I think it’s important to note that not even Sheryl herself was serious or consistent about it.

I think the problem here is that there was undoubtedly some playing around with Cullen’s trajectory in the writers room, and those aborted arcs have been set free on the internet and absorbed into people’s interpretation of the main canon (not helped by Cullen’s legitimate spiral into radicalisation during DA2). Sheryl Chee’s darker vision was echoed in the infamous (and latterly decanonised as ‘false rumours’) DAO epilogue that claims Cullen had a psychotic break and slaughtered three apprentices:

The young templar Cullen never quite recovered from his ordeal. After months of attempting to convince his superiors that the tower was still a danger, he finally snapped and killed three apprentices before being stopped by his fellow templars. Eventually, Cullen escaped from prison, a madman and a threat to any mage he encountered.

Again, it was decanonised. But again, it does add fuel to the fire.

Then we have a datamined line of voice acting from DAI here (timestamp 1:57) which has Leliana angrily reacting to a messenger bringing news of what appears to be Cullen nagging for details about the mage Warden, similar to their earlier and much more restrained War Table banter. No names are mentioned, but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume we’re covering the same old ground here:

Leliana: I thought this obsession was over! Has he been drinking?

Agent: I don’t know; I’m just the messenger.

Leliana: Tell him to drop it! I am not going to discuss what she was like!

Welp, she actually uses the word obsession. Again, this was presumably cut for a reason, and I guess it’s because it didn’t gel with Cullen’s deradicalised and softer character trajectory.

However, these abandoned arcs do indicate that there was a lot of concept-stage (and even development stage) flirting with the darker depictions of Cullen, and that’s undoubtedly where the arguments stem from. A lot of these concepts have filtered into the fandom consciousness, especially now DAO is a 12-year-old game that not everyone wants to actually play to see for themselves what’s true and what’s false. In that respect, I really can’t fault anyone for using these secondary-source snippets in their character interpretation of Cullen, since you could argue there’s plenty of evidence in the actual gameplay that dovetails with it.

So, my answer to the ask? No, it’s canon that there was no discernable relationship between Cullen and f!mage at the Tower, regardless of whether your character flirts with him, and his behaviour during that time indicates responsibility more than predation. As to whether Cullen exhibits obsessive behaviour to the female mage Warden after their separation? Well... this one’s trickier. I think it’s clear that whatever feelings he once held were exploited and warped through severe trauma and abuse, and that he did unrealistically romanticise his memory of her while he was going through his most fragile mental period in DA2. However, I think it’s also clear that his grasp of the situation is far more realistic and grounded by the time DAI rolls around, though he still holds a harmless torch for an old flame.

Those are my conclusions, though. My parting words are that it’s up to your own interpretation. You now have all the facts, canon, canon-adjacent or decanonised, and you can conclude from them what you wish.

Typical. Four and a half thousand words just to say that.

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watermelonlovershigh · 3 years

Text

Day in the Life of a Single Dad with a 2 Yr Old

This was requested by this anon.

AN: let me know if you guys like fluff fics & i'll try to write them as frequent as my smut & sicfics. also couldn't come up with a better title so... yeah the title is a lil iffy.

Things to help you understand this story better:

(Harry is a single parent/Harry is 25/Harry is a healthy eater/Loves his daughter so much)

Harry is peacefully sleeping in his bed alone. Covers to his chin, curled up on his side. That is until his beautiful two year old daughter comes barging in there to wake her daddy up. He shouldn't be asleep she thinks. It's too late. In reality its only 7 am on a Saturday, but to an early riser like her, he should be awake and playing with her. Or making her breakfast.

Her little feet pad over to her daddy's side of the bed. She can barley reach him due to the height of his bed, but manages to stretch her little arms up and taps on Harrys face. "Daddy, wake up." she speaks in her little British accent. Harry slowly opens his eyes and immediately squeezes them shut because of the sunlight coming from the window blinding him. "Daddy!!" his daughter says a little louder.

If his daughter was any older, Harry might tell her to wait a few minutes or go back to bed because it's too early, but he knows she's only 2. So he forces his eyes open again and reaches down to hook his hands in her tiny arm pits to lift her on the bed. "Why are you awake so early babe." he asks in a gravely voice, while placing her on his bare chest.

"I hungry." her tiny voice replies.

"Mhmm what would you like?" Harry mumbles sleepily.

"Sweets." she says innocently.

"I don't think so love. We don't eat sweets for breakfast. It will give you a tummy ache. What about a healthy fruit salad. We have some Watermelon and Strawberries in the fridge." he replies to his daughter who's straddling his chest.

"NO, I WANT SWEETS! I WANT SWEETS!" she yells back with angry tears threatening to escape.

"D/n, we do not yell!" her father speaks firmly. "We can't have sweets but we can have something other than a fruit salad if you want. Lets go down and see what we have." With a tight grip on his upset daughter, Harry gets out of bed and makes his way down the spiral staircase and into the kitchen.

This wasn't something new to him. Ever since his daughter turned 2 in August, she's been acting up a lot more than previously. You could say it was the terrible twos everyone talks about. Harry tries his hardest to teach her the proper ways to behave but it's been proven to be a lot more difficult than anticipated. Especially hard when he's busy all the time and isn't with her 24/7 like stay-at-home mums are or stay-at-home dads were. He's a musician. Not a so called musician that gets excited to book a Friday night at the local pub. No, Harry is a international pop star.

When he ended up getting a one-night stand pregnant, he told them they could do what they wanted as far keeping the baby or not. Harry has always been one to agree that its a women's choice. But his one-night stand wanted to have the baby. Honestly, you'd think Harry would get angry that she decided to keep it, but he wasn't. Maybe it wasn't the ideal situation to have a baby from a one-night stand that he had on tour, but he being the loving Harry everyone seems to know and love, of course tried to look at it as a positive thing. But when his daughter was born, his one-night stand got her minute of fame by saying she had Harry Styles baby and left. Abandoned her own blood. Harry had to get full custody of his daughter and ever since then she's been living with her daddy.

It was really hard the first few months of her life. A baby needs their mothers comfort and warmth and she had none of that. She never got the opportunity to breast feed or feel the love of her mother, and Harry feels sick just thinking about it. So Harry put his career on hold for a few months to take care of his daughter and show her that someone cares for her. He never wanted her to feel unloved. It was his biggest fear. That's why every day since the day she was born, he tells her how much he loves her. Shows her how much he loves her.

He did all her nightly feedings with warmed up formula in bottles. He changed her diapers at all hours of the day. He gave her baths every day to make sure she smelled nice and clean. And when she turned 1 years old and was getting more active, he took her to the studio with him and let her play her toys.

Just because Harry is a single parent doesn't mean he doesn't have help or support. He has a lot of help when it comes to taking care of his daughter. His sister Gemma babysits all the time for him when he's got something very important to do at the studio where he'd prefer if his daughter wasn't there. Harry's mum watches his daughter frequently when he has a interview he needs to attend. Even some of Harry's friends watch or take care of her when needed. Especially some of his ex bandmates that have kids of their own now. Harry's daughter has playdates with Bear, Liam's son about once a month. They're about the same age and their dads are friends so it works out great. His daughter has even played with Freddie, Louis's son. Not as much because Freddie lives in America but when he comes to England to spend time with his father they hang out. Freddie and Harry's daughter are quite similar. They were both created due to a one-night stand. The only difference is Freddie's mum wanted him. Didn't abandon him. So he has a relationship with both parents. Needless to say, besides all the things a mother can give to their child, his daughter has a good life. People love her, and once again that's all Harry could ask for. People and himself to love his daughter.

After fighting with his daughter about what to eat for breakfast, she finally settles for some Strawberry pancakes as long as they have chocolate syrup on top. Harry gives in and allows a little chocolate for her to have with breakfast. She sits in her high chair munching on the pancakes while Harry cleans the mess from cooking. Like washing the pan and wiping the stove off. When he's finished cleaning, he notices his daughter has stopped eating and is just making a mess with her food at this point.

Walking up to her high chair, Harry bends down and lifts her sticky body up and says, "Alright, time to give you a bath little one."

"No bath daddy! Me no want a bath!" she yells and attempts to kick her fathers legs but Harry grabs ahold of them in his big hand and stops her movements which makes her small body more angry. She screams very loud in his ear and pounds her baby fist in his shoulders, expressing her anger. Harry really wants to get upset. But what he's read in parenting books is that if you ignore their behavior and act like you don't see their tantrums, it will make it better and they'll give up on trying so hard to show their anger. Because most toddlers have tantrums to try and get attention from their parent(s). By ignoring it, you're not feeding into it.

"I'm sorry but you have chocolate all over you love. Need to get you clean because I need to take you to the studio for a few hours with me today. How does that sound?" trying to make bath time and going to the studio sound fun.

After fighting with Darcy to get in the bath, Harry finally got her in the tub. He struggled to wash her curly hair due to the fact she wouldn't sit still, even after he gave her a rubber ducky to play with. Once he's washed her hair and chocolate covered body, Harry picks her up and wraps her in a big fluffy towel, then takes her to her room to get changed. He manages to get a pull up on her, (still trying to potty train), and puts a lovely red track suit on her with some Gucci shoes. Then he carries her in front of the bathroom mirror to brush her hair.

"Be good for daddy and let me brush your hair." Harry tells his daughter in a gentle manner.

As soon as he passes the brush in her hair, his daughter screams, "Owww, it hurts daddy!"

10 minutes later, Harry has brushed her locks and put her hair into some cute pigtails. With his 2 year old crying in the process. He's pretty good at doing hair because he used to have longer hair himself. Then he picks her up off the counter and places her on the ground, walking her to his bedroom.

"Can you lay in my bed while I get ready? I'll put on your favorite show." he questions calmly.

"Peppa Pig, Peppa Pig, Peppa Pig!" is daughter chants.

"Alright, alright." He picks up his baby girl and sets her in the middle of his bed. Then he grabs the remote to turn his wall mounted tv on. He scrolls on Netflix and finds Peppa Pig to keep her occupied. Then goes to his bathroom to get dressed and ready to head to the studio.

When he exits his bathroom fully dressed and ready to leave, he finds a sleeping toddler on his bed, snuggled into his pillow. Her perfectly outlined lips slightly parted. Harry can't help but smile. He loves his baby girl with his entirety and seeing her peaceful like this makes him so happy. He turns the tv off and carefully picks her up into his arms and heads down the stairs to his car in the garage. But not before stopping by her room to pick up her mini backpack that holds extra pullups and a sippy cup full of juice, with some of her toys as well. Her tiny face is stuffed into her daddy's neck and Harry can feel light puffs of air hitting his skin. He puts his daughter in her car seat and buckles her up properly. Then gets in himself to drive to the studio.

About 5 minutes away from the studio, Darcy wakes up from her late morning nap and whines out, "Me wanna go home and play with you!"

"I'm sorry but I have to work for a little bit. I'll play with you when we get home later. How does that sound Hmm?" She was not satisfied with her fathers answer and starts wailing. Hot salty tears run down her little cheeks and she makes exaggerated sounds to emphasize her crying. She kicks at the seat in front of her and balls her fist up as if she's going to hit something but unfortunately to her, she can't reach a single thing due to her seat belt. Once again, Harry just ignores her cries of anger and turns the radio on loud to block it out.

By the time they arrive at the studio, Harry's daughter has calmed down. She's still upset but at least she isn't crying and that's progress in Harry's eyes. He parks his car in a secluded area to hide from potential paparazzi and unbuckles her. Then shields her face form potential cameras and make their way into the music studio. Harry has to record some audio for his newest album so that's why he needed to come in today. They enter the studio where the rest of his solo band is. He prefers to record the instruments live instead of manufactured drums and guitars.

At some point when he was getting ready in his home bathroom, Harry had called his assistant and told her he needed to bring his daughter in to the studio with him so she could watch her while he's busy. She agreed but being Harry Styles assistant, it wasn't really an option. Not that Harry would force her but she's an assistant for a reason. To do jobs Harry assigns her. In this case babysit his toddler while he records a song. He doesn't have anyone else today and unfortunately can't leave her at home with a mummy like many other fathers can. He's just happy his job allows his daughter to be somewhat a part of it. Not in the spotlight because he keeps his daughters identity a secret from the public for her protection, but as far as her going to the studio with him or when she gets older, she can come on tour with him.

Harry's assistant takes his toddler and her mini backpack full of her essentials. They hang out in the open area, out of the way from his band and he himself so he can get what he needs to get done so they can wrap everything up for the album. Harry's daughter actually loves his assistant. They have grown quite close over the 2 years of her life. But because she's going through her terrible twos, the toddler didn't want to behave for anyone today.

About an hour into Harry's work, he's interrupted with a frantic assistant that has a screaming toddler in her arms. "I'm sorry Harry but she's been crying for about 30 minutes and I've done everything I know to do to get her to calm down." Harry isn't upset his assistant came to him for help with his baby. That's not the type of guy he is.

Harry takes off his headphones and walks over to them. He picks his little girl up into his tattooed arms and questions, "Love, why are you upset for? If you keep crying, you'll end up with a tummy ache."

She just hugs around her fathers neck with her little arms and says, "Want you daddy." Those words almost breaks his heart. Harry doesn't know where this sudden want for him has came from.

"You can have me all you want when I'm finished working, alright. I'll be done shortly." He struggles to pass her back over to his assistant, but finally manages. "Maybe she's hungry. I'll give you a few pounds to take her through drive thru at McDonalds. Would you like McDonalds d/n?" She just nods her pigtailed head. He would suggest for them to go inside, but the public knows what his assistant looks like so they'd know that was his daughter. The daughter that has her identity secret for now. His assistant takes the toddler to the McDonalds drive thru and orders her some chicken nuggets. Even through Harrys pescatarian, he still allows his daughter to eat meats. Then Harry goes back to work in the studio.

Around 2 in the afternoon, Harry and the two year old make it back home. The rest of the evening was a little hectic with a few tantrums here and there. Harry cooked them a nice meal for dinner at about 6 and played dolls with her in the short period of time she wasn't upset. Then comes the dreaded bedtime.

Harry changes her into some pjs and helps her brush her teeth. Then when he went to put her in bed, she started crying for the 100th time today. "Me sleep with you daddy." she cries out. There's a part of him that wants to say yes and cave in, but the parent part of him is saying no. She needs to learn to be a big girl. Harry really doesn't understand why she wants to sleep with him all the sudden. She normally has no problem sleeping by herself.

"No baby. You need to be a big girl and sleep in your bed sweetheart. I'm right next door if you need me though okay." His daughter clings to his body and cries fat tears. Harry decides to stay in her room until she falls asleep. So that's what he does. When she subsumes to sleep, he lays her down in her bed and pulls the covers up over her frail body. Then exits her room quietly.

Harry changes into some comfier clothes himself and goes down stairs to get himself a glass of wine. Then he sits on the sofa and turns a series on to watch before bed. Times like now is when he wishes he had a wife. He'd even take a girlfriend. Just someone to hold him late at night and cuddle with him. Even have some type of intimacy. Ever since he found out about his daughter, Harrys game of sleeping around stopped. He didn't want to keep sleeping with random girls when he was becoming a dad. He was raised better than that. So needless to say he was lonely. In every way possible. Mentally, and physically.

Whilst in the middle of the show he's watching, Harry is brought back to reality when he hears a blood-curdling scream from up the stairs. He rushes to set his wine down on the coffee table and runs to his daughters room. When he walks in there, his heart sinks. The toddler is crying so hard she's gasping for air. It's a different cry that he's seen through-out the day. Unlike her terrible twos tantrums, this cry sounds like she's scared. Harry runs to her and picks her up. "Hey what's wrong my love? Tell daddy what's wrong." he asks of his child, soothing her to his chest.

As her tears slow down in the comfort of her daddy's arms, she mumbles, "You left me." Once again Harrys confused because she never acts like this.

Harry walks out her bedroom and goes to sit with her on the sofa downstairs. Then he turns her around on his lap to look at her face more clearly. "Baby, you need to tell daddy why you got scared or why you want me all the sudden."

The little 2 year old takes a deep breath and speaks in her little accent, "On Peppa Pig, they...they said kids like me are supposed to have a mummy AND a daddy. They said daddies can't love their babies like mummy's can. Me was scared you don't love me anymore." Her voice cracked saying the last bit with fresh tears running down her face and Harry has glossy eyes looking down at his distressed but beautiful mini twin. That's right. They look almost exactly alike. He thanks God every day for that because he doesn't want to look at his daughter and be reminded of a one-night stand that's a piece of shit of a mother.

"Look at me d/n. I love you so so so much. I will NEVER stop loving you." at this point he has to take a deep breath so compose his emotions, "And not all kids have mummies. There are a lot of kids who just have a daddy or some just have a mummy. But it doesn't mean I love you any less. Okay?! Don't listen to what they said in Peppa Pig. They were wrong." Finishing his speech, Harry pulls her tiny body forward and hugs her to his warm chest. He has silent tears running down his face. Both hands spread over her boney back. He thinks tonight is appropriate enough to allow her to sleep with him. She needs comfort. "Would you still like to sleep with me?" he asks in a whisper.

"Pleaseee." she responds while crying. Harry stands form the couch, turning the television off and abandoning his barley touched wine glass, and goes to his bedroom. The turns the overhead light off and walks over to the bed. Peeling the covers back, Harry and his daughter, whose on his chest, slide under the warm blankets together. Now she has just about stopped crying. Just little whimpers leaving her body, along with a few hiccups. Harry reaches over to turn the lamp off, leaving the room completely dark. He shushes his baby until her eyes slowly close and she falls asleep with her face burred in his neck and arms around his neck. Her short legs lay limp over his stomach.

Harry has a difficult time falling asleep that night. He feels sorry for his baby girl because he worries that movies and shows with two parents will make her sad and left out because she doesn't have a mummy. He just prays she will see all she'll ever need is her daddy to protect her and love her for the rest of eternity.

MASTERLIST & My Favorite Harry Styles Fics MASTERLIST

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