#if this happened to me i would simply have a good time. rip to arthur but im different | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ravengards-rogue · 2 months

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WHAT SET YOU FREE, BROUGHT YOU TO ME BABY.

rdr2 men + short blurbs about their favorite sex positions.

ft. arthur morgan, john marston, javier escuella, and charles smith.

✧ tags : SPOILER HEAVY, fem + afab!reader, unprotected sex, light angst (in the horny post is crazy im sorry fdkjjkds), very gendered language, javier says one thing in spanish (thank u @nanamimizz), a little sprinkle of plot with each (and some canon divergency), john co-parents w abigail, otherwise just horny. 18+

✧ wc : about 1.4-8k each (6.3k total)

✧ a/n : sorry for making a multi character post for the cowboy game its cooking me to death. my john bias is showing rip. title is from rebel yell by billy idol but i listen to the bvb cover

sorry about charles and javiers but if i edit this anymore im going to level an entire city using hollow purple technique. please rb if you enjoyed i worked kind of hard on whatever this is.

sorry for . the THIRD repost of this i promise i wont after this. its just really bugging me. PLEASE

.𖥔 ݁ ˖˚☽˚｡⋆ ARTHUR MORGAN + PRONE BONE ;

It’s an odd feelin’ for Arthur.

Wanting something, he means. Wanting anything as much as he wants you. He’s lived a less than quiet life up until now. And he ain’t the brightest, certainly, but living this kind of life teaches you many lessons. One of them being, it’s better not to covet anything. Coveting something you’re not entitled to, well—it’ll lead you places you wouldn’t want to go with a gun.

Arthur has made the mistake of coveting love before, dreamed of a future so completely out of his reach he almost convinced himself it was possible. Dreamed of it so foolishly he’d even go visit a woman he very well ought to forget. It’s his problem, his burden to bear - always desiring outcomes unsuited to him.

He’s just that sort of man he reckons. But he learned his lesson. He tries (tried?) to stay away from it after that. Tried not to pine too much for normalcy when such hopes had failed him twice. The loss of his child completely on his account and the loss of his love at the same fate.

So, wanting you - well, he feels like the world's dullest fool. Really. How is it that Arthur had fallen in love with someone again? It had all just happened so quickly. You were another woman he’d saved from the O’Driscolls, though it wasn’t like you were no damsel. A lot of those men were dead by the time they arrived. That sort of perseverance would stick with you while you traveled together. Much like Sadie, you didn’t take well to housework - you liked to earn your keep. Though you’re not nearly so trigger happy.

You’re quiet, thoughtful, well-read. Plus you’re good at making money. That’s why Dutch don't complain about you joining them, he figures.

(Arthur tries not to pry into it too much at first, but he eventually learns that you’re gambling. Which is how you’re able to make such a fast turn around. A prim little lady like you makes for a fine poker player, and you love to play men out of their money. He thinks it’s one of the funniest and most interesting things about you. He can’t help but love you a little more for it. )

When the feelings in him start to stir, Arthur tries to overlook it. Arthur convinces himself, time and time again - that there’s no way he’ll grow more tender about you. Eventually, it’ll die down. You’re a decent woman is all, a kind one - who’s easy for him to love and even easier for him to confide in. In your time together, you often come to Arthur and you always seem to have some profound wisdom he is so sorely lacking. Someone easy to love, who does not expect much from Arthur at all. It’s only natural a lonely, covetous man like him would start to dream about you. He tells himself, it will pass eventually. Should he simply let it run by him, it will pass. But Arthurs a fool, you’ll remember.

Of course, by the time he understood all that - he already loved you enough that he couldn’t bear it. It was already too late and it wasn’t going to change any time soon. Especially not while everything changed around him.

So, Arthur is undoubtedly a fool, but he’s lucky. He felt divinely blessed when you’d returned his feelings for him so politely. A coy little smile on your face, a laugh like you thought he was silly for being doubtful. Arthur tried to explain himself but you wouldn’t hear a word of it. Maybe that’s another thing he loves so much about you. There’s nothing he ever needs to explain.

In any case, all Arthur seems to do lately is want you. Wants you when it’s inconvenient. Wants you before he wants liquor or a cigarette or some other vice. Any time anything goes wrong, you’re the first thing his mind can conjure up for relief. That pretty smile and that self-assured way of living. It’s hard to get time alone in camp. And Arthur is a man in love, so any touch could be enough to set him on fire. Last week you hugged his waist a little before giving him a kiss goodbye and he had to listen to you laugh yourself into a fit as he waited for…little Arthur to settle down.

He don’t get many chances to be with you. Lay with you in that way that grown folk in love do. Though, if the two of you book it somewhere for a few days - the camp knows better not to ask where you’ve been. But it’s not often you get to really be together, where it’s peaceful to do that. Someone’s always hounding one of you to do something.

Arthur is a lucky man though, like he said. Today he had time. Today he’s alone with you in a beat up little saloon and today he gets to do as he likes. He gets to be greedy. And it’s an odd feeling for him, really, to want something so bad he disregards everything else in the world for a little while.

Feeling you, though - absolves the guilt for wanting. He’d be stupid to want you any less desperately.

Arthur’s favorite way to have you is on your stomach. Laid flat, just barely pushed up against him as he fucks you deep. You’ll fuck like rabbits for a little while and Arthur will wear you out just like this, maneuvering you until you’re pinned all underneath his weight. You lose any fight you might have, too exhausted to worry yourself with pleasing him - and when you’re like that, you let Arthur take care of you.

(He really ain’t talented at much, but he’s good with his hands. Being dexterous is part of being a talented shot. When Arthur has the time to spread you sweet in his lap and make you cum all over his fingers, he does so for as long as he can. At least until you beg him so sweetly otherwise. The same hands, soiled with gunsmoke, look so good so deep in you. At least in his eyes.)

Wet and pliable and helpless. Arthur loves you like that. He knows, he knows you’re anything but - but he’d be damned to pretend this don’t feel best. Tight, wet cunt so welcoming from all the pleasure he’s ripped out of you. Your bodies pressed together, your heartbeat pulsing through your skin. All sticky, honeyed need and animal desire as Arthur lets all of him sink on top of you. His heavy, lumbering form crushing you in - trapping you somewhere you can’t run from him. The curve of your spine pushed against his chest, ticklish.

Every inch of his body that so wholly wants for you, Arthur aches to make you feel. Burn it in you lest anything happens that risks your forgetting.

He can feel his hips meet your ass, backside squished against him - desperate for deeper friction. Whining. You’re whining to him so pretty, a pillow pushed underneath you to give friction to needy clit.

Arthur can feel how much you want more. Maybe Arthur is greedy, but he likes that look much better on you. Your pussy is sucking him in so tight, silken walls pulsing with every shallow little measured thrust. Arthur lets his arm wrap around your neck, your face pressing into his bicep. You moan again and he laughs.

“Arthur,” Your words come out in a messy slur. He lets his scruffy face press against your neck, a kiss behind your ear. He wants to kiss you all over. There’s not enough hours in the day. “Oh, god, Arthur,”

“Still feels good, then, I’m guessin’,”

“Shut up,” You huff and press your cheek into his arm. He doesn’t bother stifling his laugh. “Still feels…big. Stretchin’ me out—hicc—so much,”

You really don’t try to rile him up - but you do a damn good job of it anyway. He groans, grunts as he pulls back and pistons himself in you. A gesture half-way between a kiss and the warning shot of a gun. The sound of skin hitting skin echoes, noisy and vulgar. Arthur don’t pay it much mind. He laughs against your shoulder.

“One of these days, that moutha’ yours is gonna get me in real trouble.”

You giggle back at him

“What kinda trouble is that now?”

Even from your side glance, you’ve got that lovely little smile on you. Fuckdrunk and ingratiating, like you know he’s wrapped so tight around your fingers. And he is, like nothing else in the world could have him. A wave of possession curls up over Arthur, makes him press more of himself into you. Onto you. Another deep push of his cock, sliding against the tenderest parts of you. Staking some silent desire in you. He wants and wants and wants, and hopes that whatevers above him can forgive him for making the same mistake thrice.

“Dunno,” Arthur comments, teeth grazing your shoulder and kissing the indentations “Got our whole lives together to find out, I reckon.”

“I’ll hold you to it, Mister.”

Arthur laughs. “Hope you do, Miss.”

.𖥔 ݁ ˖˚☽˚｡⋆ JOHN MARSTON + COWGIRL ;

John doesn’t say that he loves you lightly.

Hardly a thing he says can be said that way. Could never afford too. In an alternate universe where nothing goes wrong in his life, maybe - but he has a hard time picturing what the hell that’d look like. A version of himself so untainted, without all of the violence and blood and gunsmoke? Foreign. John can’t picture it worth a damn.

Who John is without a deadbeat father and a dead Ma is somewhere far beyond his reach. Ain’t nothing about his life, at any point, lighthearted.

On top of all that mess, he’s got a boy at age four with a woman he ain’t married too. And that relationship is always on rocky waters, even though John’s decided to do right by his own flesh and blood sometime ago. Most things in the world he should feel good about he doesn’t, and most things he should understand render him clueless. He’s a mess on multiple accounts, and he still doesn’t know how exactly he’s meant to approach this life of his. He knows what he should do, but nothing about how to do it.

John doesn’t come to love you easily ‘cause he wouldn’t know easy love if it hit him in his face. Quickly and painfully, but not easily.

Your return to the gang was an odd one. You were an old presence and your disappearance was an even older story. John thought he’d never gonna see you again for sure. You’d been a part of the gang back long before all of the nonsense that took place in Blackwater and you left about the time Arthur’s boy died. John don’t remember why you left exactly. He thinks it was a fight with Hosea, of all things.

Dutch weren't too happy about it neither, but Dutch back then didn’t make a show.

So you left, and John buried every feeling he ever harbored. You found all them again up in Colter, where you’d been living out your days lately. According to you, in the middle of riding, you thought you’d heard Arthur. So, somewhat recklessly, you went chasing him. Didn’t matter if he was just something your mind conjured. According to you, if it was him, it was at least worth checking to make sure. You’d reunited with Arthur and after some tears, he rode with you back to camp.

Upon your return, the gang welcomed you with open arms.

You’d done a lot in your time alone.You spent most of that time just like that, a ghost wanderin’ the planes. You weren’t gonna stay with ‘em, but Arthur insisted and Hosea did too. That wasn’t enough to compel, so John was last to chip in. You should stay, at least until Valentine.

(Silently he thought, you should stay so John can trace memories of you. It was so long ago, he should’ve forgotten all of it. You were a year older than John and always on his ass but easy for him to talk to. Didn’t fuss over his failures. You just barely grew into your womanhood when you set your sights on running away. You wanted more than this life, and John never really forgave you for it. His first heartbreak, maybe - but it’s all too blurry for that.

You understood him though better than anyone, and one day you were gone. Nothing’s really the same.)

You changed tremendously and not at all. He missed you. God, did he ever. Missed you a long time. Didn’t realize how much until you came back and everything in him felt right again. Your return stirred up old feelings and everyone noticed. He wasn’t trying to keep it a secret, but he really wasn’t trying to fall back into anything with you. Not how he did.

Just like you did back then, you read John like an open book. And just like he did back then, he loved you all too helplessly for it. It was just all too easy again, to be with you.

You stayed out of the way at first, for the sake of his family.

But, John ain’t a half-decent man even when he’s trying to be. So he set himself on being with you. It wasn’t easy - most things with him aren’t as you’ll see. Having you around again straightened what was left of his common sense, at least. He told Abigail before telling you. He figured you wouldn’t even reply unless that was all out of the way. That turned out as well as you’d expect.

It was settled between the two of you thereafter. He’s lucky she didn’t toss him into the street.

Everything works out in a way. As best they can between broken people. You make peace with each other. His boy loves you like a third parent (you’re better with him than John is). Abigail commends you for straightening out such a worthless man though she’s a little melancholy. John just tries to stay out of the way. You’ll be together in the end. There’s a plan with the five of you.

But until it all falls apart, he doesn’t get all that much time with you.

There’s moments like tonight, though. Rare ones. Together out robbin’, cooped out some place in the woods where no one is around. A place so shaded by nightfall that John can absolve himself of every sin he’s ever committed in his life and pray at the altar between your hips. John is convinced he might find worship like he’s always hearing about there whenever he touches you, the marred skin of his hands and knuckles reading the scripture of your body with careful precision.

You might turn him into a literate man yet.

John glances up at you. Only the light of the fire and the moonlight there to accompany as he watches you over him. You’re beautiful. John couldn’t picture a single thing more perfect in his life.

Your hands against his bare chest, nails digging into the flesh as you lean forward. Your palm dug into the dirt, John finds his own hands rested at your hips. John looks at you awe-struck, cock twitching at the mere sight. His heart settles in his throat, but he’s calm all at the same time. With you, he forgets. All of it. The worst of himself.

Bare naked and so close, he watches your face as you strain. You feel soft. Every inch of you in comparison to him is. A bead of sweat slides down the valley of your breasts. John cranes his neck up to catch it with his tongue, licking a stripe up to your neck - letting his teeth sink into the space between your jaw and neck. You want to make it last and John doesn’t blame you. It’s so rare you get to have each other so unrestrained. John can feel all the ways you want him, can see it in your face - all pinched with need. You’re holding yourself back, trying to get it to last as long as the night will allow. It’s cute in a way.

It’s different than how he’s used to seein’ you, all cocky or otherwise. You’re needy like this. Just needy. His stomach turns with lust, jolting through him like a strike of lightning. His cock twitches against your folds, sliding against them. Pure admiration watching the sticky mess of his pre-cum and your own arousal mix together and smear on your mound. You make a soft noise in the back of your throat, faint and tender as you fall forward just a little. John laughs against your neck.

“Darlin’,” He says with a huff. Not malice. Something akin to bliss, where he can rarely afford it “Have I done something to piss you off today?”

You pick yourself up and look down at him and frown. John kisses the corner of your mouth, resisting some crude desire to fuck up into you.

“Just,” You grunt as the tip of his cock passes over your throbbing clit, your whole body wracking to a shiver. John looks awed. “Pent up. Goddamn it,”

John figures it out quickly after that. It’s this part of it he likes. The proximity. The closeness. Feeling the tremble in your hands as they struggle to keep up right, muscles strained in your forearms. Being able to hold you, to keep the pace or let you take the lead. The clear view of your face as pleasure travels up through your spine and melts into you. He grabs your hips, the fat dimpling underneath his fingers as he moves you along. He can’t wait. You don’t bother to protest seeing John can’t seem to bear it anymore. You collapse into his chest, your tits pushed flat against his pecs.

His cock throbs near painfully, sliding against your soft cunt before finding himself lined with you. He thinks to himself that it’s this he was looking for, as he tucks your face against his neck and lets his tip stretch you out slowly. Such a vice like grip, stretching - resisting him like your whole body can’t anticipate the sensation of fullness. You gasp against his throat.

“John,”

What a sweet sound from your mouth, even sweeter as he bucks himself up. Keeps you steady and lets his cock stretch you full, feel you deep. “That’s right, my angel. Didn’t think you’d remember my name when you’re all worked up like this.”

“You’re,” You gasp and John thrusts, thrusts hard until he’s buried to the hilt. You shudder, walls pulsing around him as he bottoms out and John laughs like the terrible man he is. He fucks you again, over and over - a wicked little smile watching “Awful. Just awful, John Marston,”

“Ain’t that the truth,” He hums against your mouth as his hand snakes between your bodies, thumb rubbing against your clit. “Wonder what kinda woman that makes you,”

“A foolish one,”

John laughs.

“I sure do love you for it,”

.𖥔 ݁ ˖˚☽˚｡⋆JAVIER ESCUELLA + SIDEWAYS ;

Javier hasn’t thought about much other than surviving.

It’s been like that. Been like that for a while, probably much longer than he cares to admit. He’s sure any sane man would suffer the same plight if they lead the same life. Anything but survival is little more than a pipe-dream, so Javier tries not to go for anything too strongly. In that aspect he’s like many of the members of the gang he’s in, perhaps that’s why he sticks to them. There’s that phrase Hosea’s always saying - that misery loves company. Javier will take any decent company he can get. He’s desperate for it just like he’s desperate for most things - inwardly, silently.

Some of that desperation may be symptomatic of who he is. After he killed a man in a crime of passion for a woman he loved and ran from a government who would sooner exile him than change, Javier decided to not dream anymore. Every revolutionary who dreams too hopefully pays the price in blood.

(Javier thinks there’s probably nothing in the world as true as this. A form of gospel. He remembers the first dream he ever had after his uncle passed. Not a nightmare but a dream. He remembers the exact feeling of waking up, cold and confused. What is a dream, except a memento of survivor's guilt that loyal people cling onto fruitlessly. When hope starts to feel like a debt he’s going to waste his life paying back, Javier loses sight of everything. The beginning of the end in some way.)

His mind doesn’t occupy itself with anything bigger than that. Since Dutch found him starving, there was never a desire to try and live off aspirations. He pays his penance with loyalty and honor. Practices some form of humility and tries, not too desperately, to carve a place for him to fit. All without drawing too much attention or caring too much. If you ignore the bleeding in his fingers, his penchant for knives over guns, and his refusal to talk too long about the place he comes from - it’s nearly believable that none of it matters.

Except loyalty. All Javier honors is that. It’s the only thing he has some part in choosing, so he choses it every time. Living like that didn’t make any difference to him. He was surrounded by mostly decent people. He didn’t hate the life he was living.

It wasn’t important. It didn’t matter. His directionless-ness, his floating. Hadn’t since he joined the gang. At least not to anyone but him. He didn’t know what he’s meant to do or if he was meant to proceed with this forever. He was (is) loyal to Dutch. To the gang.

He hadn’t thought much about what comes after.

And it didn’t matter until he met you

He’d sworn off love after seeing where it got him, at least until he could love more dispassionately. When the women bring you back from their outing from Valentine and beg Dutch to let you stay, Javier doesn’t think much of it all. He thinks you’re pretty, if it counts for anything. But he doesn’t let himself linger on you too long.

But that’s the sequence with you two, really. The whole time. He doesn’t linger until he does. It doesn't matter until it does. He doesn’t think about you until it’s all he can think about.

You go for him first. And it’s in little, unimportant ways that might not mean shit to you but mean a whole lot to him. You have some kind of tenderness about you that you wear deep, runs through your blood like love ran through his once long ago. Some softness he can’t really measure with his own. It’s not that that gets him. It’s that sometimes you look at Javier like he's … someone you want to see. He forgot what that was like all together. It felt foreign to him the first time it happened. Seeing how you light up when Javier is around.

You wanted to see him. You noticed that he’s gone. If he sang by the campfire - you’d sit by him and listen. If he was out in the trees keeping guard, he’d hear the soft call of your voice to Grimshaw ask Where’s Javier? And sometimes the girls will make fun of you - but you wouldn’t deny anything they said. It’s so small and ordinary. He would’ve never considered himself simple before meeting you. Nothing is simple. Nothing.

(But then, Javier thinks of the kinds of songs he sings and the way he takes care of himself and the clothes he wears and maybe Javier has some kind of affinity for preciousness that explains all of it.)

When Javier confesses his feelings for you - he finds the affair to be like most things between you. Ordinary love, not really between outlaws but people. It’s up against a tree while you share a drink and he’s looking at the curve of your mouth and the plum color Karen’s so kindly put on you. And his head fills with kissing you so he does. A breathless confession between alcohol stains and the feeling of your hands curled in the lapels of his suit.

From there, Javier is your lover. He’s not interested in the business of secrets, but he tries not to let it show too much. Not that he doesn’t want to. He wants to show you off more than anything - at least some part of him does. But the other part wants to keep you away from prying eyes, keep his love for you only where the both of you can see. If he could keep that pretty lovestruck face you make all to himself forever he would.

When he gets a chance to whisk you away from everything, Javier jumps at the chance. Not often, but Javier makes time for you. Makes time to indulge in love he thought he’d never find again.

That’s why he’s here with you in the middle of nowhere, a ghost town where no one knows you.. A reserved room with a bed and lowlights all to yourselves.

Javier can’t keep his hands to himself and he doubts you expect him too.

For Javier, this sense of proximity is what intoxicates him most. The warmth of your bare skin in the slivers of yourself exposed. Javier is fond of finding you like this after a long day of horse riding. Of sneaking touches to your waist as you push back against him to sleep, only to find his desire for you - laid clearly. He likes hearing you whimper feeling his length poke against your back, the embarrassment when it dawns on you that he wants you after all. Always surprised, even though Javier tells you it so often. Whispers it along your neck and shoulders whenever you’re at camp together.

You like the feeling of his hands so Javier always starts with them. He squeezes your hips. Planes his palms over your chest before squeezing your chest, pushing the fat between his fingers. You like the way they look when they grope you, his chin resting against your shoulder as you spoon. In the lowlights of a cheap hotel - Javier gets the perfect view of your silhouette. Your body is sensitive over the fabric of your gown, heat prickling through you.

Javier who is always so gentle with you, rouses so deep listening to your whining as he explores your body. The suffocating closeness of a single bed intoxicates him.

“Javier,” Your voice is sweet and thin. Plays in Javier’s head like music and makes his mouth curl up into a catlike grin as you push back on him. You look slightly over your shoulder, lips pushed into a pout. “Please,”

He tugs at the fabric of your nightgown. The top half pulls haphazard underneath your tits, nipples perky and sensitive to touch while the skirt pools at your waist. What gets Javier like this is the desperation. Wanting so much but not being able to look too long. A way for you to mirror him, it’s a matter of possession. In some stupid way. Bunching your clothes up, pushing the fabric of your panties to one side, letting his arm wrap around your waist to touch and tease. All of these are imprints of his longing, tucked faithful into your side as he whispers sweet nothings into your skin.

His cock twitches as it pushes past your folds with finality, your hands curling up at your sides. You whimper softly, let your cheek rest against the sheets as Javier takes you on your side. Terribly close, you fuss as you feel him slide every inch into you slow, your hands reaching back for purchase. It’s the fit of you against him so perfect, the silent strokes of intimacy, the hush-hush giggles between the sheets that Javier loves most about fucking you like this. Too enamored with you to look too closely, he lets his eyes flutter closed. He could get drunk just being in your space.

He carves out space for himself inside of you, feels your cunt accommodate for him like it loves him. A feverishness breaks out as his forehead rests on the space between your shoulders, an uncharacteristic whiny quality in his words.

“Ser mío,” Javier says - as a reflection of what he really wants, to belong only to you. “Belong to me.”

Darling as you always are, you nod softly.

“All yours, Javier,” You whimper, finding his hand. “Forever,”

.𖥔 ݁ ˖˚☽˚｡⋆ CHARLES SMITH + MATING PRESS ;

Wandering.

He’s been doing it his whole life. Not something he’s proud of. Or ashamed of either, really. Just how things have gone for him until now. Charles doesn’t think his life has been any better or any worse than anyone else's. At least not when he weighs it with the same kind of pragmatism he does most things. It’s been a hard life, and a miserable one in so many ways. Still, it’s not something Charles is too keen to dwell on.

There’s just something thematic about loss in Charles' life in a way he finds completely unpleasant. It’s more constant than anything. Loss of his home, loss of his mother, loss of his father in an attempt to find what’s best for him. It’s some overarching message that hangs over his head like a shadow. Everywhere he goes, trying to rectify his own solitude seems to come back to him. It doesn’t help that it’s an unfair world to start with, and would’ve been if he had just been black or just been native. But Charles is both, and has lived a life that reflects that specific injustice thoroughly.

There’s not really anything Charles can do about it, at its baseline. When he left his father, the name of the game had simply been survival. He was well-equipped enough for that at least. But after survival comes trying to live and trying to live isn’t something so simple. Jumping in and out of gangs who thought they could get away with slighting him or generally being surrounded by unpleasant people. Trying to find something in pages of book and scripture, or in the way water ripples when it rains.

He’s never felt any one way towards the gang. Even when he joined them all the way back in the Grizzlies. Lost in the cold, they’d crossed paths as Charles was out hunting. A lot of it feels like a blur. Of all the folks he’s met in his travels though, Dutch treats him fair and the rest of them (or most of them) are decent, honest folk. Charles stays in the Van Der Linde gang for such simple reasons as trying to stay alive and be somewhere that isn’t actively hostile towards him. He’s a good gunman, and a better fighter. The inner workings of gang politics and forging connection isn’t at the forefront of his mind, with the exception of the kindest few.

The Van Der Linde gang is just a place where he can figure out what his purpose is meant to be, even if he doesn’t find it there. He’s never expecting anything to come out from his loyalties to it.

Of all the things Charles expects of his life in the Van Der Linde gang, love is at the very bottom of the list.

Maybe it’s about time he stops being surprised by these things happening to him one or way another.

You were a member of the gang far before him, and someone Charles took to quickly. You’d joined the gang not too long after John from what Arthur tells him. Though the brunette speaks about you more fondly than he does his brother. A problem child at the start, according to Arthur - always getting into all sorts of trouble. Something you seemingly feel embarrassed about now and refuse to bring up. Charles has a hard time picturing it having only known you as you are.

The woman you’ve grown into is someone else completely, and Charles sees that in you all the time. Compassionate like Hosea but charismatic like Dutch, and clever. And you’re beautiful, too, though Charles feels a little shallow admitting that’s part of what drew you into him.

It wasn’t Charles that approached you first. You were the one who spoke to him, as often as you thought necessary but never in a way he found invasive. He doesn’t know what it is exactly about you that charms him near instantly. You’re enigmatic to a fault. It’s like you always know exactly what to say and exactly when to say it. Even more than that, you’re a terribly pleasant person to be around. Subtly warm and free of assumptions. When Charles talks to you about anything, you listen without making him feel like it’s any sort of burden to you. You don’t pry, don’t make missteps. Treat him fair, and then some.

It’s unbearably simple, just how quickly and how easily he comes to adore you. And, in some ways, Charles knows better than to believe that his purpose is loving someone. There’s more to it than that, surely - after everything.

But then, he’ll watch you do something. Watch you do some kind of menial work that he could do for you instead. Thinks of skinning animals for new clothes and chopping wood and rubbing the soap off of you and all of a sudden it makes him feel anchored. Everything he could do for you. You anchor Charles easily, with a wispy smile. Make him want to find purpose in life with you. He never wants to be somewhere you’re not.

He confesses it to you just like that, and like you do with most things - you accept and reciprocate without making too much of a fuss.

For Charles, making love is an extension of wanting to ground himself in you. A distant siren song - the intersection of lust and bone deep adoration. Like most things, you’re the one to approach first every time. A soft hand on his forearm, a whisper that you want him. It’s with ease that he draws you away. Drags from you camp during nightfall with his horse and blankets and picks a spot with the perfect view of the stars.

Charles watches you under the glow of moonlight, his vision adjusting to you easily. Naked underneath him, laid on your back with your legs folded at your knees - heaving deep breaths. He can see the sweat beading down your skin, your chest rising and falling - and the perfect view of your pussy. His hands and mouth are wet as you breathe out. He finds himself smiling at you, his own erection pressed against your thigh, pre-cum leaking out in a mesmerized haze.

You lift your hands up and he leans down, surprised as you wrap them around his neck and pull him closer to you. Your mouths meet like that, and Charles laughs against your lips as you kiss him so eagerly. You blink at him, pretty. You’re always prettier than he remembers you being the last time he looks.

“Charles,” You frown at him. “It’s impolite to keep a lady waiting,”

He kisses the corner of your mouth. “Sorry, my love. I don’t want to hurt you,”

“Well, I’m fine with it,” You repeat, almost petulant. Charles frowns. “‘Sides, it ain’t my first time taking you, you know?”

“Well, I’m not fine with it.”

You pout, looking at him all endeared. Charles couldn’t help but love you even if he tried. “You ain’t gonna hurt me. C’mon. Please?”

“Please, what?”

You look at him aghast before breaking out into a faux-scandalized giggle. “Now you—please fuck me. Pretty, please.”

Charles feels something tickling against his spine hearing you say it. He couldn’t imagine getting sick of you in his whole life. “Yeah, that’s good to hear.”

You make an indignant noise but it’s silenced quickly as Charles positions himself against your entrance. He has plenty of discipline when it comes to matters like these, but right now - he feels like he’s going to lose his mind. Not nearly enough patience to wait. He lets his hands go up underneath your knees just to have something to hold onto.

You make a little gasp as the tip of his cock pushes into you. Your walls are so soft, likely after all the orgasms he’d given you prior. You stop him in a shocked gasp, and Charles immediately readies himself to pull out. As if sensing his hesitance, you shake your head.

“Charles,” You gasp, the words caught in your throat and hoarse “Deep. Want it deep,”

His abdomen tightens, cocking twitching hard at your words. He agrees silently to your desires.

When it comes to sex, there’s very little Charles dislikes.

But this is his favorite. He’s simple but no other position lets him see you so close. He likes the way your eyes widen as he pushes up underneath your knees and folds you underneath his weight. How you look pinned down under him, the perfect view of your eyes rolling back into your head and the proximity from your face to his. He lets his cock stretch you out slowly, throbbing each time your nails dig desperately into arms trying to keep your composure. Fuck you feel so tight like that. Soft pussy, dripping and sticky. You suck him in relentlessly, and Charles groans as he bottoms out. You take every inch of him so well. So perfect like the rest of you.

Your eyes flutter open as he stays there, buried in you in complete bliss. You’re dazed.

“Kiss?”

Surprise followed by adoration, he abides by your request easily. Overwhelmed with it as he presses a chaste peck to your mouth, he laughs. “As many as you want.”

Anything you want, Charles thinks, he would give to you.

.𖥔 ݁ ˖˚☽˚｡⋆

#arthur morgan x reader #john marston x reader #javier escuella x reader #charles smith x reader #rdr2 x reader #rogues love letters #red dead redemption 2 x reader #THIS IS THE LAST TIME. THE LAST FUCKING TIME !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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onlyonetifosi · 2 years

Text

Why me? How you dare?

-> Word Count: 1950

->Author note: 2nd part? And I would appreciate some ideas to write . English is not my first language so sorry for mistakes

Pierre Galsy, love of my life or that what i tougth only a month ago . It's been a little over a month since Pierre and I broke up, and I still can't understand why it happened. My twin brother Arthur was the one who found out first. He came into my room, sat down on my bed, and just looked at me. I could tell something was wrong. "What is it?" I asked him. "Pierre broke up with you," he said simply showing me a letter.

I couldn't believe it. I had thought things were going so well between us. We had been together for almost two years, and I had never been happier. But apparently, Pierre didn't feel the same way. He told in the letter that he didn't think we were compatible anymore and that he needed some time to be alone. I was heartbroken. I cried for days and refused to leave my room.

My older brother Charles tried to comfort me, but I just couldn't seem to snap out of it. Finally, after about a week, I decided to get out of bed and face the world again. But even though I'm slowly moving on, I can't help but wonder what went wrong. Why did Pierre break up with me? Was there something I did wrong?

I spend my nights crying for him, we were so happy for years but he decided out of nothing to cut laces with me and he was gone when i came home from work one night. Its heartbreaking only knowing about him from his bestfriend, the problem is that his bestfriend is my older brother Charles, Charles Leclerc, the one that said years ago that his friends where forbidden, but i didn't listen to him and now im facing the consequences.

Why I had to be so stubborn, I wish I had listened to him.

-Allez princesse, lève-toi, on dîne avec maman- Charles says entering in my room and opening the curtains for the sun to enter in my room, I cover myself with my duvets but he rip them of me as I growl at him .

-Allez! Je sais que tu ne veux pas parler, mais on doit dîner avec ma femme- he says to me as I roll my eyes and groan in displeased, today im having dinner at Charles house with all our family and his girlfriend, Charlotte,don't get me wrong Ilike her a lot but Im not in the mood to talk to anyone. I dont know why Charles dragged me here, but it seems like he wants to talk to me about something. I go in the bathroom and brush my teeth while glancing myself in the mirror and i notice that im really skinny now that im not eating that much ever since Pierre left. "Im sorry for what happened two years ago" Charles says as he enters in the bathroom "I should have listened to you when you said no guy was allowed around here" I say as we sit down on the floor of my room while we watch TV. "Pierre is a good guy" he says as he changes the channel "You two were perfect for each other, you just need to let go and move on" he says as he changes the channel again. "Im sorry" I say as I look down. "How about a big plate of ice cream?" Charles says as he gets up from the floor. "No thank you, its alright" I say while keeping my head down. "I'm going to get one anyway" Charles says before he leaves my room.

I turn off the TV before laying down on my bed with my box of tissues. I take out a tissue before wiping some tears away and start looking at old pictures of Pierre and me when we were together for two years that were in a photo album that my mom gave to me after he left me. The first picture was taken on our first date when we went on a picnic at Central Park in New York City when it was warm outside but then it started to rain so we had to grab our stuff quickly and ran towards the street where we took a cab home since it was getting cold out . The second picture was taken on Valentine's Day last year where we went to an expensive restaurant for dinner then later walked around town a bit before heading back home.

Photos that remembered our good old days where we were so happy together, even though there were some days where things didnt seem right between us which happens sometimes between couples, not all days are perfect or happy days but what matters is how you make them right or happy again after feeling upset, unhappy or angry towards each other which is what we used to do when there were problems between us until Pierre broke up with over something so stupid that could have been fixed if only hed listen to me instead of running away, making me hate myself because I thought nothing was wrong between us at first thinking everything was fine like usual but then things started changing slowly over time which made my heart ache more knowing that id never be able to see him again.

I wasnt aware that Pierre was feeling miserable about us because I never gave him a chance to tell me what was wrong thinking he would just be able to talk to me about it at any second if something was wrong when usually we had no secrets between us but then he told me everything in a letter after breaking up with me explaining why he broke up with me and how unhappy he felt thinking I didnt care about him anymore since I was never home, that we stopped communicating like we used to because things got difficult between us over time.

But Pierre made the biggest mistake of his life by breaking up with me because he thought Id get over him easily which is far from it instead of getting over him id lost interest in guys since hes the only one I ever loved and dating someone else would feel weird knowing they are not Pierre, its been months without hearing from each other and without telling anyone about my breakup. If youre wondering how Im feeling now or how's my life going then I'm fine for now Im working on not thinking about Pierre every 5 minutes but its pretty hard considering how much Id loved him, how close we were and all the great times we had together as friends before dating and as couple.

-Maman, je ne veux pas aller demain, il sera là, je vais pleurer ou le tuer quand je le verrai (mum, i don't want to go tomorrow, he is gonna be there, i will cry or kill him)- I plead my mum, who came to visit me.

-Caroline Éve-Marie Leclerc, lève-toi maintenant même (get up now)- she forces me and I don't have another option than oblie her.

When we arrived to the Gasly's home, the one I had been so many times before in my childhood, I see my 2 older brothers and my twin brother alongside their girlfirends.

-Carla, I missed you- I hug my twin's girlfriend who I couldn't see for months.

-Allons tous à l'intérieur ils nous attendent (let's go in, they are waiting for us) - my mum says and we follow her.

When we enter to the house, I see him with a beautiful girl. -Oups désolée je ne savais pas que vous seriez là (oops, i'm sorry i didn't know you were going to be here) -says his girl who looks so many times like any model he was before I was with him- Well, I didn't know you would be here too -he retorts. We were about to start with this argument when my mum comes and says: -Arrêtez de faire l'idiot, tous les deux, c'est Noël après tout! (stop doing the idiot the 2 of you, its Christmas)- We shut up and go sit down at the table where the dinner was ready.

After eating and chatting for a while we started playing some games. I was playing Monopoly with my brothers and their girlfirends while my ex was flirting with that girl. I tried not to care but inside I felt hurt because he had chosen her over me even though I had been the one who loved him so much. When it got late, we all went to sleep in our rooms. The next morning, I woke up early and went downstairs to get something to eat. When I got there, I saw my ex and that girl kissing under the mistletoe. I couldn't help but feel jealous and hurt all over again. I went back upstairs and cried myself to sleep.

I enter into my brother room, he was there still in bed while his girlfriend was showering.

-Artie, why does it hurts so much, I hate him- I start crying. -It hurts because you still have feelings for him, after everything he did to you. You need to move on and stop thinking about him- he said. I nodded my head and went back to my room. I get ready, and I go down to see his mum and mine chatting and I decide to join them.

-Oh Carol, how pretty are you- his mum, Pascale tells me while sehe gets up to hug me- Do you want to make some Christmas cookies like we did when you were petitte?(little) -I would love to!- I say with a smile. After we made the cookies, we sat down and talked for a while. His mum told me that she was sorry for what happened between us and that she hoped we could be friends again. I told her that I forgave her and that I missed her too. Then there he was entering the kitchen kissing his girlfriend like a horny teenager. It hurted so much, his mum realised and hugged me.

-What are you doing?- the girl asks- Some cookies- i explain her trying not to be rude. He barely looked at me and i could see in his eyes that he still loved me. I wanted to leave but his mum insisted on us spending Christmas together like we used to.

Once they leave the kitchen, his mum made my sit with her. We talked a little bit before going to sleep and she told me that i should give him another chance because he was really miserable without me. I didn’t want to do that so i refused but she kept insisting. Later that night, he came over to my room and kissed me. I immediately pushed him away and told him that we were not together anymore. He screamed at me and left the room in a hurry. Next day, he didn’t even look at me and ignored my texts. I was devastated and his mother was mad at him for doing that. it killed me inside, like if i just ruined Christmas for them all. They never mentioned it again after that but i could tell they felt bad about it.

My brothers were there to support me along the way, and his mum was there too. She was angry at his son to doing that to me and she speek to him barely during the holidays. it wasn’t the best Christmas after all due to this. With all of it said, I still miss him and care about him.

Don't be a ghost even we are in halloween :)) Reblog, like or something <3

#pierre gasly imagine #pierre gasly smut #pierre gasly x reader #pierre gasly angst #f1 imagine #f1 fic #f1 fanfic #f1 drivers x reader

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lizard-shifter-noms · 1 year

Text

Broken Bloodlines Chapter 9

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Part 9!!!

we are now in the latter half of chapters!

this Story contains Vore, Dont like dont read.

CW; mentions of injuries, mentions of corpses, mentions of death.

have fun reading!

and as always reblogs are appreciated! (Also ASK’s are open so feel free to bother me!)

AO3 Link for those that prefer the layout there; https://archiveofourown.org/works/44627188

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Why was she coming with us? Did she also reject the title?

She smiled politely.

“Hello! I'm joining you for a few days! I realized i have no idea on what to do now and Rikaad offered to show me how to manage paperwork!”

I looked over to Rikaad who didn't look very happy about that.

Well, better than having her fuck up stuff and cause accidental suffering.

The ride back was spent with Robin talking to Amicia about the cat and Arthur hanging out the window again.

His Cousin did awkwardly pat his back in encouragement though.

Aside from that neither me nor Rikaad said anything, He was just staring out the window.

I decided to keep an eye on Arthur so that I could catch him in case he fell out.

Luckily he did not.

The way back seemed to drag on and on but eventually we got to the Castle.

Getting out of the carriage Rikaad wasted no time and immediately went to show Amicia on what to do even if his own knowledge on this was limited.

Arthur of course followed them which left me and Robin standing right behind the entrance gate.

This had been such a wild day and I was tired but there was also still some adrenaline in my system.

And a lot of worry as well, Fable had gotten injured then the chaos with Maringand and then Oakleys death.

I hoped the Winged man could rest in peace.

Maybe we could ask Barsen to arrange some flowers for him?

At the broken tower Oakley had almost fully moved into before he… got hit with a burning net.

I'd tell him to avoid flame colored ones for the sake of my sanity.

I turned to Robin.

“Do you know where Barsen is? I want to ask him something”

Robin shook his head.

“He was in the kitchen for a bit but then he said he had to check up on a part of the Garden and left, he didn't come back though”

Barsen simply disappearing wasn't new, he'd be around somewhere.

“Well lets ask the kitchen staff if he came back”

It was possible he had gone back to chat a little with the Kitchen staff as he did that regularly.

The Kitchen was not too far from the entrance anyway,

just around the left corner and there it was.

To avoid spooking anyone we politely knocked on the small Door that led outside.

Myril was the one to open it and she waved us inside again.

“What are you here for this time? More snacks?”

She had a tone of amusement in her voice and on any other day she would have been right.

But after everything that happened today i just didn't feel like eating anything.

Good thing I didn't have to.

I shook my head.

“Any other day sure, but we are actually looking for Barsen, Have you seen him?”

Myril seemed to think for a second before she answered.

“Well the last time I saw him Robin was also here, He said he had to check on something in the Garden.

He didn't come back but that's nothing new, the man is elusive on good days so he's probably just somewhere amidst the greenery, I swear sometimes it seems like he's one with it!”

One with the greenery eh? Yeah that sounded accurate.

Then again he did admit to us that his great grandma was a Dryad or something so the plants might just like him.

We Thanked Myril and left to go look for the Gardener.

We tried to think of where he usually was but could only come up with either the cliffside or the areas without trees as he kept ripping the dandelions out to avoid them taking over.

We searched the left side first as that one was way smaller due to the cliff ending there before we moved on to the right side.

Surprisingly we were joined then by Myril and the older Guard that had kept an eye on Rowley who was right behind.

Speaking of the little guy was awake again but still looked exhausted.

I sent him inside the castle to go ask for Medical help, proper one this time.

The Guard went with him to avoid getting Lost while Nea limped up to us just as he passed the door to the throne room.

“What are ya Lads doin?”

She asked cheerfully while leaning on her crutch, huh, she must have gotten Winton to talk then.

“We're looking for Barsen, i wanted to ask him something about plants”

She nodded still in a good mood.

“He probably has forgotten more about plants than anyone else ever knew, so if it's a plant Question he is tha man!

Ya know what imma join ya in lookin fer him, he lost his keys near the shed yer staying at”

She fished said keys out of her pocket and jingled them.

I could make out that the keychain only had four Keys on it, and one of those was way too big to belong to any of the castle doors.

Nea stuffed the keys back in her pocket and used both of her crutches to walk this time, one did look suspiciously bent though.

It wasn't too far off to assume she hit someone with it.

With four people now looking for him, even if I didn't know while the otherwise mostly busy Myril was helping,

It should be easy to find the Gardener.

Combing through the trees I avoided Oakleys tower as best as I could, I really didn't want to see the not quite finished thing for now.

So instead I ended up going alongside the inner Wall with Nea right next to me.

We had decided to not go alone in case any soldiers did manage to sneak into here.

We were almost at the Northmost side of the wall when my shirt got tangled in a thorny bush.

While Nea laughed I cursed the thing and tried as carefully as possible to remove my shirt.

I didn't want to rip this one or else I would have managed to destroy two in a day.

While I set onto getting the hem out of the plant without Damaging either Nea just kept walking, I would be able to quickly catch up again anyway seeing as she had crutches still.

It took me a good minute or so till I got it out just in time to hear a scream.

I didn't recognize the scream at first but then realized that it had been Nea's voice.

What on earth was capable of getting her to scream like that?

I wasn't the only one that heard it and as I sprinted toward the sound I was joined by some wall Guards that had just taken up their shifts again.

I had to duck under a branch and as I stood up again I could see what had been the cause of Nea’s scream.

There were about ten soldiers lying dead on the ground and in the middle of them kneeling and only held up by a tree sapling was Barsen.

He was Dead, there was no way he was Alive, not with at least seven swords stuck in his torso and a battle ax embedded in one of his legs.

There also was a hole in the castle wall right behind all of them, no doubt where the soldiers had gotten in.

My brain felt like it had been replaced by cotton and was stuck in slow motion, The entire scene before me was surreal.

The Soldiers hadn't even been killed with actual weapons, Instead there were various gardening tools stuck in whatever unprotected spot was possible.

It took a few more seconds to register that these guys were Wintons best and most devoted Soldiers, i had seen them before back in the Tower.

How did Barsen manage to take so many out?

Then things snapped back to normal when I heard a wail and a familiar redheaded form bumped into me.

He was crying and I realized there were other people, lots of them.

How did this happen?

I pulled Robin closer to me and he sobbed into my shirt.

As much as i wanted i couldn't look away from Barsen, like he'd get up any second and then try to mend the broken branches of the sapling he had fallen on.

But he would never get up again, the blood had stopped flowing from his wounds some time ago and he was just, there.

The most astounding thing was that aside from some trampled grass none of the plants had taken any damage, aside from the sapling that held Barsen.

Nobody did anything, most were just crying or staring in disbelief.

Even some of the Guards were crying.

Barsen really had been the most liked person in the castle.

At some point even more Guards showed up, half of which also did not do anything while the other half had to drag people away from the rather gruesome sight.

I shifted my arm to block Robin's view of it even if he had already seen it.

He was still just sobbing into my side while I stood there frozen as my brain refused to cooperate with me.

I was suddenly dragged away from where I stood with Robin still clinging to me, and through the wool in my head I could make out the words ‘shock’ and ‘infirmary’.

Time seemed to warp and suddenly I found myself in the infirmary on a bed next to Robin while a Nurse gave me something to drink.

It tasted bitter and I noticed that my shoulder was bleeding again but didn't feel it at all.

I tried to get up but was pushed back down again by a nurse.

I was told to stay still and rest.

After that i did not remember anything, The entire stress of the day took me out cold.

All in all it was a wonder I hadn't crumpled earlier from all that had happened in the span of just one day.

War, then there was Another Ardua, Oakley burned to death, Fable falling in the River, visiting Maringand and freeing Amicia.

Going back home and then finding Barsen dead in the middle of the Soldiers he fought.

It really was a miracle that my brain had kept working through all of that, well most of that.

Whatever they had given me ensured I would stay asleep for some time.

……………………………………………………………………………………...........................

I only woke up the next day around midday and I felt like I was missing entire chunks of my memory.

Looking to my left I could see Robin sleeping in the bed right next to me and curled up like a little cat.

Wait, this was the infirmary, how'd he get in here?

Wait, what was I doing in the infirmary?

Then I recalled what had happened yesterday.

Two people I had considered to be good friends were Dead, both having died in rather horrible ways.

At least Barsen had a body to bury, Oakley just fell apart into a heap of ash.

Now that I was calm again and had a somewhat clear mind I did question if he really had burned as fast as I had perceived it or if I just went into shock back then as well.

Wait, Oakleys claw gauntlet thingy should still be there, it would at least be something to bury.

I really hoped nobody had taken them, though they weren't really usable for anyone else.

I stood up as quietly as I could to not Disturb anyone else and tried to sneak out.

As soon as I opened the door however I was greeted by Nea, who did wear her helmet over her eyes for once and i suspected they were red and puffy, she appeared to have been standing Guard for a while now though.

At least if the chair next to her was anything to go by.

We stared at each other for a good fifteen seconds.

“Go on, get, just be back before dawn or i'll kick yer arse”

She said grimly and unhappily.

Right, she'd been good friends with Barsen as well, known him for way longer than I did too.

He'd been the only one she ever accepted help from without any sort of fuss, which was basically a miracle.

Sneaking out was surprisingly easy, Then again it seemed that now every Guard was stationed on the wall and there were signs that the area had been searched.

The garden looked, sad, for a lack of a better word.

Despite it being light out all of the flowers were closed like it was midnight, how strange.

I debated which way to go to try and get the Gauntlets when I heard rustling in one of the bushes.

I was startled at first but then realized whatever this was was way too small to be a person.

I carefully and slowly went over to inspect only to have the Cat stumble out of the bush.

She blinked at me once and then put her head back into the bush.

What was she doing?

I went closer just as she turned around again with a familiar item in her maw.

Oakleys Gauntlet! Or at least one of them.

She dropped in front of my feet and then dragged the second one out of the bush just as I lifted the first one from the ground.

“What the fuck? You really are something else Cat, also that must have taken you all day!”

“Mrow?”

She just gently brushed against my legs and then demanded to be picked up by trying to climb my knee.

I did have to admit that this was an impressive feature of intelligence and if the Kitchen staff hadn't attested to see her being Born i'd almost say a witch forgot her pet here.

But quite frankly I was way too drained to think too much about this.

Maybe she did have some magic and that made her intelligent?

I had heard of animals gaining intelligence through magic.

Well, she still did normal cat things so I really had no idea.

I picked her up like she demanded before she clawed through the bandages on my leg and held her like a baby.

She immediately began purring and closed her eyes.

Yeah, not a chance I could set her down in the next few minutes.

At least that made me feel a little less hollowed out for now.

I had the Gauntlets, so now what?

Should I bury them next to the tower?

It was where he lived, or at least wanted to.

Then I remembered that I had left that old book there anyway and if left there for who knew how long time would just damage it.

Rain was still a thing after all and Oakley did not get the roof done as far as I knew.

So i had to go there regardless, it would be stupid to let such an old one of a kind book rot there.

I'd just put it back in the Library then, maybe someone else would find it interesting.

The walk to the broken tower was short, and i could see that really all of the plants had closed their blossoms, it almost seemed like it was fall.

Without the smell of rotten leaves though, which made it all the more weird to cross through.

“Mrrp?”

The cat softly bapped at my chin before bonking her head against me.

“Im fine, i think, i'm still alive at least and have all my limbs, which is more than some other can say”

Why was I even talking to the cat like that?

Maybe it was just nice to say things without the worry of being judged or looked at weird.

Ducking under a branch I reached the small clearing that the tower was built in, yep, still looked like everything was okay here.

That really made me want to punch something, but I couldn't, One, because I was holding the Cat and two, none of this stuff was mine and I was not going to damage it!

Instead of burying the Gauntlets I decided to just leave them on a table, like he'd come home any moment even if I knew he wouldn't.

The Cat jumped out of my arms and went to sit in one of the unfinished windows right next to the old Oak Tree.

Man that thing had to be really old.

It was wider than I was tall and managed to tilt the entire tower a little.

I exited the tower since I technically didn't have any business being here, it really only made me sad seeing it stuffed full with things that now would never get used.

As I left through the doorway that only had a makeshift door I heard an awfull cracking sound.

Like splintering wood.

I looked around before the sound came again from above me.

Was the Oak tree losing some of its branches?

I'd better not stand directly under it then.

Before I could move too far away there was another even louder cracking sound and I looked up to the groove between the branches where Oakley had put up some sort of hammock.

Weird, despite the sound none of the branches appeared to be even a little damaged.

Wait, did something up there just move?

I was not mistaken as there was indeed something up there.

It had the same color as some of the barkless spots on the tree and appeared to be covered in tree sap.

What was that?

Now I wished I had a knife.

There was another cracking sound and whatever it was unfurled, revealing what looked to be a membrane and three fingers.

Wait that looked awfully familiar, but that couldn't be, there was no way.

At another cracking sound a second limb appeared, mirroring the other and just as much covered in tree sap.

I was rooted on the spot, transfixed by what was going on.

More noises of splintering and breaking wood sounded out and a vaguely humanoid shape heaved itself out of the old tree.

It grabbed the hammock from where it was and used it as a sort of old fashioned tunica.

There was a two pronged tail sticking out of it too, a very familiar and prehensile one.

“OAKLEY?!?”

He turned around and I could see that it was indeed the winged man I had seen burn to little more than ashes only a day prior.

Technically it had been around twenty four hours even.

He stumbled out of the tree, seemingly still unsure on his legs like a baby deer.

“Ah, hello Donovan! I hope I didn't scare you!”

Didn't scare me? Well kind of, but what the hell was happening?

“Oakley? What the FUCK! Is going on?”

He shook himself a little to get rid of the tree sap and used part of his hammock-turned-tunica to wipe the residue of his wings.

“Well, as you can surely tell im not human, far from it actually as there is no human at all in my ancestry!

I'm as Bastard as Bastard can be!

Well, in short im a fucked up magical creature that can’t actually die by normal means!

I just ‘resprout’ in the next best and oldest Oaktree!

But dying still hurts so I always do my best to avoid it!”

I just stared at the man, he couldn't die by normal means?

What the hell?

Also-

“What the fuck are you then that this is possible?”

I had known that Oakley was far from a normal being but this was just Wild.

He just shrugged, seemingly completely unbothered by having died the day before.

“I'm just Oakley, always have been, at some point my ancestry became so mixed that i am partially belonging to species that are now extinct”

So, he was a lot of different things mixed together which would explain the weird featherless wings and the two pronged tail.

And he had magic on top of that.

“Im not sure if i understand that correctly but in any case what the fuck?

Also you couldn't have said that BEFORE the battle???

I thought you really died!”

I was shaking now, the stress from the past days and the Death of Barsen, and the assumed death of Oakley had just been way too much.

And now Oakley was okay somehow?

He could have told people he'd be fine before the battle!

So we would have one less thing to worry about!

“Donovan, you're hyperventilating, calm down”

Calm down? How could i?

So much had happened! People died!

Right in front of my eyes too! Barsen was dead!

I unintentionally scared Fable and he was injured!

During the battle I was a coward because I didn't dare kill anyone!

There is Another Ardua here now too!

And if i had charged him any stronger he would have cracked his skull open! I could have killed him!

So much stuff that my brain was only now catching up on, like it had blocked out anything but the basic functions.

“-van? Donovan? Can you hear me? Hey!”

I looked up from where I was kneeling on the ground, When did that happen? And why did I have my hands over my ears?

Oakley sat down in front of me while I tried not to panic again.

His ears were pointed down and he did not look happy.

Then he suddenly pulled me into a hug.

“C’mere, sometimes i forget that you are all just children, eighteen isn't some magical number where you are suddenly a fully formed adult after all”

Any other time I would have been offended at being called a child but Oakley was right, of course he was, I had no idea what I was doing, I had no idea how to be an adult.

And there never had been anyone to teach me either.

Everything that had happened in the past week had just been chaotic and stressful and now I had no idea what to do.

So I cried for the first time in years.

At that moment I didn't even care that Oakley was there, or that he was still covered in tree sap.

I was just glad not to be alone, it was still hard to get used to the fact that I could ask for help, especially in things that were emotion related.

And that would take time, years of what i mistook for solitude instead of loneliness wouldn't go away in just a few weeks.

Oakley didn't say anything, just let me get all the negative emotions out while he softly ran his fingers through my hair in an attempt to comfort me.

It worked a little.

I had no idea how long I stayed like that but eventually I calmed down enough for Oakley to let go and make tea in his tower.

He noticed that I brought the gauntlets back and thanked me for it.

Now I was just sitting here with a steaming mug of tea, feeling strangely, relieved? Albeit empty.

Maybe I really should stop bottling up all of my negative emotions.

The Cat was still here surprisingly and jumped up on the askew Table.

She draped herself over my arm and started purring.

“Don't get any hairs in his tea!”

Oakley called from where he poured his own cup.

“Its fine, she's just trapping my arm but i don't mind, she's soft”

Oakley laughed gently.

“Have you found a name for her yet?”

I shook my head.

“Nah, me and Robin tried like two hundred though and it looks like she doesn't like any of them”

He sat across from me and reached a wing over to softly bap the Cats snout.

In doing so he accidentally knocked the book I had found in the Library to the floor.

He picked it up with a confused look in his eyes.

“Well that's not one of mine”

“Oh, i brought that one, i found it in the library and thought you might like it”

He stared at me for a second with something indecipherable in his eyes.

“This thing looks older than I am!

And for that the condition isn't too bad either”

Looked older than he was? How old was he?

No i wasn't gonna ask, that would just mess with my brain even more.

He flipped the first page open.

“Have you read it? You are right that this is something i find interesting”

He flipped through the book faster than I had read it, Then again he had more practice.

“Uh yeah i have read it, and i found it confusing, with those Creatures and all, also the places look like Maringand and Kamerasca.

Do you think that really happened?”

Oakley looked up for just one second.

“Well, it is very possible, The book is very old and seems to have been made as a means to retell what happened, a shame some pages are missing.

And from what i know of the area it seems accurate enough”

So that could have really happened? How long did Maringand and Kamerasca have a stupid feud for anyway?

“So Maringand and Kamerasca have always been on bad terms until now? Just because someone a few hundred or more years in the past fucked up?”

Oakley sighted at that and held up the Book.

“Look i have been alive for quite some time, and people always find a way to fuck things up, be it intentional or not.

“Everybody makes mistakes, that's perfectly normal after all.

But sometimes there are mistakes too great to move on from.

It is not their fault, but it was once, and it will be one day.

Always different people, burdening the consequences of a single mistake.

Of a single person they now have no resemblance with.

Some would call it Karma.

Others would call it unfair.

But perhaps ‘Hubris’ would be the better description for it.

To meddle with forces beyond your control and pay the price across all existence.

How terribly human.”

So, humans were doomed to repeat their mistakes across all of history?

“So no matter what we do it will all just happen again anyway?

Why do anything at all then?”

Oakey looked at me like I had flipped the table over.

Well he couldn't expect me to be happy after he said something like that!

Really! He made it sound like whatever we did was irrelevant!

Oakley then put the Book back on the Table,

out of reach of the cups and looked me right in the eyes.

“Because every tiny bit of effort could be what breaks that horrendous cycle, the people writing the book knew that.

That's why they left the story of what happened to them behind even after they were gone, so people could learn from it!

Most of the stupid and bloody battles that happen are because people don't learn from their history, sure, some say they do but then go and make exactly those Mistakes again.

Over and over again until finally someone ACTUALLY learns and does better!

But of course if the ones after that don't learn that progress is for naught.

But with every little bit of progress, Every story written and read the world can become a better place!

But that might take a long time”

I just stared at him, so there was a chance that one day things would not repeat? That it would be better for those after us?

“So should I read more books?”

Oakley launched at that, the weird bird-like caw ever present in his voice.

“Well that's one way of course, but that doesn't guarantee that you actually learn or understand, Besides, I think you are fine the way you are!

You already fought in a war, albeit a short one, without killing anyone! Thanks to that a lot of people got to go home!

No, you are fine! As long as you stay kind.

But i will warn you there are people that will take advantage of that, besides ,nobody in the world is a hundred percent good anyway”

So he basically just called me a pretty alright guy, At least that was how I understood it.

“Nobody is a hundred percent good? Are you sure? Not even Robin?”

Oakley cackled at that.

“When I say nobody I mean nobody!

Sure the little Ginger is a ray of sunshine, but he's only sixteen!

There's a whole life ahead of him with events that will change and shape his personality!”

That was not something I had thought of before, of course nobody would stay exactly the same throughout their life.

But we would stay friends regardless, I was sure of that, Besides, being a bit more mature couldn't hurt him.

“Yeah, you are right in that, still there are a lot of nice people in the castle, i doubt they would do that”

Oakley just shook his head at that, sighing.

“one of the most important things,

perhaps the most important thing I have learned in my stupidly long life is that nice people can fuck each other up in monstrous ways.

People can be bone deep, kind and loving and self reflective and still lash out under pressure.

People can be charitable and hospitable and generous and still find themselves in situations where they become selfish.

People can be well meaning and easygoing and hold deep seated opinions that turn them into vicious little bullies under the right conditions.

Nobody is just one thing, and nobody stays one way.

every person is a kaleidoscope and they will surprise you.

you will surprise yourself.”

At my surprised face he held up a hand to signal me to stay quiet.

“It's not a warning and it's not a judgment and it's not an excuse, and it's certainly not a reason to stop trying or to stop trusting.

it is just a fact. “

I wondered how long Oakley had been alive for to get all that wisdom.

“So no matter how nice i think someone is there's always a chance they will turn mean if i do or say the wrong thing?

Man, people are complicated!”

“Now you get it! Just remember, If it sounds too good to be true then it probably is!”

Well this talk with Oakley had somehow been both depressing and optimistic.

Which probably made it realistic i guessed.

I tried to move my arm a little as I was starting to get that pins and needles sensation from the cat laying on it.

She rolled off of it with a disappointed mewl.

“Sorry kitty but my arm is falling asleep”

She jumped from the table and went out the window.

Trough that i could see that the sky had been tinted a deep orange, oh fuck.

“What time is it? I told Nea I'd be back before Dawn!

She said she'd kick my ass if didn't come back by then!”

Oakley Cackled at that.

“With only one leg? I'd love to see that!”

I rolled my eyes at that.

“She could still hit me with her crutches, so id better go now, but thank you for-”

For what exactly? The tea? I hadn't even drunk half of it,

for letting me cry without judgment?

“-thanks for everything, i'll leave the Book here for now and then go to sleep, see you tomorrow?”

He nodded.

“See you tomorrow, by that time I'll have actual pants too!”

I couldn't help but laugh at his comment before carefully closing the ruddy door behind me.

After crying for who knew how long I felt tired, I just hoped that when I next woke up all of this hadn't been a dream.

At least the infirmary had comfortable beds, they weren't as stupidly soft as the ones in the room I had shared with Fable.

Fable! God, I was such an idiot! I should go check up on him!

Since he was an Elf he was likely moved to the Castles infirmary also.

I'd just ask a Nurse where he was to as if he was alright and then tell him goodnight.

Traversing the Garden at dawn made it look kinda eerie, but that was just because everything looked weirdly darker and more Orange.

At least the castle itself was bright enough to lead the way so finding it was no problem.

Going back to the infirmary I was greeted by Nea still in front of the door.

“Welcome back! One minute later and I woulda kicked yer arse!”

She swung one of her crutches at me but missed due to me being too far away.

“Yeah, sorry, it's been a weird day and I forgot to look at the time.

Also Oakley is somehow back, don't ask me i have no idea”

I went past the now extremely confused looking Nea into the infirmary where I was immediately scolded by a nurse for leaving without saying anything.

I let her finish talking before I asked her where Fable was.

She pointed to one of the curtains and I could indeed see his Rapier laying on the table outside of it.

Since I couldn't knock on a piece of fabric I just slowly slid it to the side.

The Curtain revealed only an empty bed.

“Fable?”

Maybe he'd gone to get something to drink?

But he could have asked a nurse for that.

Just to be sure he really wasn't there I looked under the covers and even under the bed itself.

Still nothing, where was he?

This really did not help my stress level, not after yesterday.

I alerted a Nurse to his disappearance who checked the rest of the room to try and find him.

Fable was tall and pale, he couldn't just have gotten out unnoticed, right?

I tried to think through this logically, he HAD to be somewhere, So where did he go?

He also had an injured foot so he couldn't have gone that far.

If he had tried to leave the defensive walls of the Castle someone would have stopped him.

Inside the castle itself there were too many people to go around unnoticed for long.

So that only left outside, in the Garden.

I just came back!

And now it was Dark, what on earth could he want there?

Well, only one way to find out.

Completely ignoring Nea as she asked what the fuck i meant by Oakley being back and where the hell i was going i went back outside again.

It was now almost completely dark, and the air had gotten a bit colder.

For once I was thankful that Fable was so pale, he'd stand out against the dark background at least.

But after what had happened I didn't want to go through the Garden, But I did need to find Fable.

So I stepped into the darkness, trying my best to avoid branches hitting my face and set out to go look for the taller man.

I looked along the wall, purposefully avoiding where Barsen had died, and slinked quietly next to Oakley tower.

I could even hear the winged man doing something with Fabric, likely new pants as he said.

I checked up on top of the trees even but there was no sign of him.

Where did he go? He couldn't just disappear!

I had now looked almost everywhere for Fable but just couldn't find him.

Maybe if I took a break and thought about where he could be I'd find him?

Besides I was a bit out of breath after all that had happened so sitting down for a minute wouldn't hurt.

Since I was near my favorite sunspot, I decided to go and rest there to think about where my Brother had gone.

His leg was busted so he couldn't be too far, right?

Emerging from the greenery I saw that the boulder was occupied by a now familiar white haired form.

Fable.

How the fuck he managed to get there was beyond me especially since he didn't have crutches anywhere near him.

He was staring up at the night sky and seemed calm, not the weird calm he exuded before but rather a calm that radiated peace.

I silently sat next to him and looked up too.

There wasn't really anything out of the ordinary aside from that it was a cloudless night and all the stars were perfectly visible now that it had gotten dark.

They were really pretty.

Maybe I should pay them more attention, at least sometime.

“There are less stars here”

I looked at Fable, what did he mean by that?

The sky was the same everywhere wasn't it?

“What?”

He answered without looking away from the stars.

“Do you know what light pollution is?”

Light pollution? The only pollution I knew of was when water was dirty, but that surely wasn't the case here.

“No, do you?”

He nodded briefly.

“Light Pollution is excessive, misdirected, artificial light.

Too much light pollution washes out starlight in the night sky making it harder to see the actual sky”

He pointed to a star to our right somewhere.

“Do you see that one?

That is Lafayah it translates to either ‘Lonely light’ or ‘Lonely Star’.

It is named that because there are no other stars near it but it still shines as bright as every other one.

I like it, it also always points North so if the sky is clear enough you can navigate with it.

Out of all the stars it is my favorite.”

I looked in the direction Fable had pointed at, there was indeed a star hanging alone in the firmament with no other stars even near it.

But it still shone brightly, i could see why he liked it, it was as lonely as he had been.

I moved to hug him, and this time instead of being so eerily puppet like he actually hugged back.

“I'm sorry for being such an idiot to you before, i should have explained things better, and i'm so Sorry for scaring you like that, i promise i'll never do it again”

“You don't have to apologize, thinking that the entirety of that madness came from your Elven side was only logical, and, somehow, it stopped me from thinking I was absolutely worthless like our Sire always told me I was.

I think now it is finally time to go and do the things i want, even if i don't know what that is yet.

Maybe i'll just have to go out there and look, im bound to find something after all”

“What do you mean by that?”

I tilted my head at him in confusion

“That means as soon as im well enough to travel i will leave this place and go see the world and all it has to offer”

He wanted to leave? But he'd only been here for like a week!

“Do you have to? You basically just got here, you could stay! i don't think anyone would mind”

He shook his head.

"I've only read about the world in books and even though i've traveled here i've seen so little of it, i want to see all i can, and i can't do that if i stay in one place”

He was right in that, if he wanted to see the world then he had to move of course.

“Promise you'll visit? After Rikaad is done with the paper stuff I can properly show you Kamerasca!”

He looked at me and smiled, a slightly crooked but genuine smile.

It was unlike the eerie puppet like one he had before.

“I promise i'll visit, who knows maybe i'll find some interesting trinkets for you”

Stuff from all over the world, having that in my shed sounded nice.

“That would be nice of you, but don't take anything heavy!

I don't want you to break your back!”

“I won't, don't worry, but maybe I'll also find more of the Ardua, or at least the Bracelets.

How many are there anyway? Well if i see any i will send them your way”

More Ardua, right, i thought my Bracelet was the only one but that didn't exactly make sense, there were bound to be more.

“No idea, a few at least, I'm pretty sure some got lost throughout time like mine did, but be careful! I don't want you to get injured.

Again”

Fable laughed, actually laughed and the sound reminded me of clear bells.

“I'll be fine, i'm not stupid, and now i know what the Bracelets can do!”

It wasn't the Bracelets though, it was me, I was the one with the freak anatomy.

I wondered if Fable was still scared, not of me but because of what I did.

“How are you? Aside from your foot i mean”

He tilted his head slightly at me, was he imitating me?

“I'm fine, why do you ask?”

“So… you're not scared?”

He blinked, making his poppy red eyes disappear for a moment.

“Donovan, are you still hung up on what happened in the river?

I can assure you i'm fine, and i'm not scared, not anymore”

Well yeah, he was out of the scary situation, there was no reason to anymore, but still.

“I just, i don't know, so much had happened and after i found the Bracelet i've been always nervous about people being scared of me.

I can turn into a huge Beast for some reason and i guess i just fear that people will hate me again for being something else than them”

I drew my knees up to my chest and rested my head on one.

“Donovan, are you afraid that I'll hate you after what happened?”

Well that hit the nail on the head, didn't it?

I did THAT thinking he already knew and was fine, and i didn't even ask!

I just LEFT him there for who even knew how long and let him think he was gonna die.

I was a horrible Brother.

“I think some part of me will always be afraid of what people think of me, i'm neither Elven nor Human and with the Bracelet i'm also an Ardua, i won't ever truly belong anywhere i guess”

From how I positioned my head I could only see half of Fable's face, but I could hear him well enough.

“I think I get at least half of what you mean, as an Albino im alway looked at strangely.

But I can promise you that I'm not afraid of you, I'll prove it if you want?”

I lifted my head back up again, prove how?

“Prove it? What do you mean? Wait, your not suggesting-”

“What if I am? If that's what it takes to show you that you are not scary then i'll do it”

So, he really just offered to go back in THERE to actually prove he was not afraid of me?

What the hell?

But looking at his face there was not even a trace of fear or doubt,

And he didn't have that puppet-like demeanor to hide it right now.

“I- are you sure? That's a rather, unusual, idea”

“Donovan, alone the fact that you are asking I am sure proves you are a good person, I think you don't have to worry as much as you do.

And yes, i'm sure, it's getting cooler out here anyway”

I sighed, Fable was odd, well so was I but it looked like he already had his mind set on that so if he wanted to prove that he wasn't scared then so be it.

I slowly stood up, motioning for Fable to keep sitting to keep any strain off his injured limb.

I went a few paces away and kneeled on the ground.

Since I was still bandaged and they wouldn't fit me as Ardua I opted to shift into a Giant instead, after all if my clothes stayed to scale then hopefully my bandages would too.

Just as I had hoped they did stay the same proportions compared to me, and since I was sitting down I didn't reach over the treeline.

I looked down at Fable, who was now so much smaller than me, and saw he was still sitting there relaxed.

“I was not aware you could be taller than me like this, though i'm sure the Bracelet counts as cheating”

I laughed at that, right, he'd only seen the fuzzy form and not this one.

But if he was making jokes about it then he was probably still alright.

“I guess so, but with all the bandages i can't exactly change shape on top of height too, not keen on bleeding all over the ground”

Fable nodded still as relaxed as ever.

“Well, the night won't last forever, and I'd rather not have anyone walk by now, we should move this along, don't you think?”

Right, I wasn't keen on having someone see, well all of this really.

“Okay, i'm going to lift you up now, if you want to back out anytime say so and i'll stop”

I gently extended my hand to him and he heaved himself up without hesitation by grabbing my thumb and using it as a handle.

Well that worked too.

I slowly lifted him up to face level and stopped for a few seconds to give him time to back out.

It was also kinda weird having the man that normally was a good head taller than me sitting in my palm now.

His paleness really gave a weird contrast against the night sky, He almost looked like a star himself.

When I didn't move for a few seconds he stared expectantly at me and I brought him closer to my face.

Opening my mouth I did my best to hide my teeth with my lips before gently sliding the lanky Elf inside.

I kept it open for a few more seconds in case he wanted to stop.

He did not tell me to stop, instead I felt him curiously brush his fingers over my palate.

Well now that felt weird.

“You have baby fangs”

What? My fangs were the same size as his!

Comparatively at least, why would he say that?

And since my mouth was full I couldn't even respond, so instead I slowly closed it, making sure none of his limbs were anywhere near my teeth.

Fable still made no motion of trying to get out or being in the slightest bit scared, he was just laying there.

He was also still poking at my palate since he was laying with his back on my tongue.

I slowly tipped my head farther back and he slid the tiniest amount before his feet dangled over my half closed throat.

Since he was so tall he filled my mouth almost completely so swallowing would be a hurdle.

At least he was lanky instead of buff.

There was still no protest from the pale man so I tipped my head back further and let him slide into my throat where I gave a tentative swallow.

Fable didn't fight it, just continued to be floppy like a tired cat.

In many ways it would have seemed similar to when I had to eat him in the River, but also somehow not.

This time he knew, had suggested it even, and he was actually calm and not the tense calm from last time.

Swallowing again he slid further down, Now he was somewhere between my lungs.

Another, last swallow had him spill into my pouch where he slid around a little.

“Fable?”

I waited with baited breath for his response.

———————————————————————

NEXT / PREVIOUS / OVERSIGHT

#SSTC #lizards writing #vore story #soft vore #v0re #g/t story #giant/tiny #g/t vore #extreme cuddling #sstc #sfw vore #Ardua #Barmea #Kamerasca #Maringand #Elf #Magic #mentions of death #character death

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kirklandsheartsecrets · 1 year

Note

hey! i just found your blog and i really like your writing! could i request the brothers having a bad day and starting a fight with their s/o because of their bad mood? maybe they even made s/o cry? but, pretty please with a happy ending/reconcilation? thank you so much and i hope you have a wonderful day!!

thank youuuu 🥰

i Hope you like it!

uk brothers || bad day, bad mood fights || headcanons

Northern Ireland

at the bus stop with you he was visibly irritated, upset with something.

The unusual frown on his face he worn staring at the time boards and the glares he was giving whilst looking at the other people waiting at the bus stop 😒

You poked his arm, trying to reason his attitude, whispering

"why are you glaring at them—"

He simply stopped staring at people, just looking straight in front of him

You tried to hold his hand in the bus and he just put closed his arms over his chest

You thought he was just tired so you said nothing

When you arrived at your stop he walked out like a madman

a woman in the bus told him to smile more

He just looked at her up and down disrespectfully

He was probably ready to spat back something

You did hit his arm so he would calm down

Back home he just locked himself in the bedroom

You came two times to check up on him

Second time he groaned and scold you to stop bothering him

You got mad

"Then alright, forget me for tonight" you slammed the door of the bedroom leaving

Immediate regrets

You called Ireland to pick you up so you wouldn’t spend the night around north’s current toxic behavior

North was hella worried

england

you two went shopping for groceries

arthur was weirdly silent

His face was suspiciously neutral

One minute inside the mall he started sighing all the time

He did not bother to make silent or

Big sighs while he is leaning tiredly over the cart

You were asking what kind of bread you should get because of his brother’s different tastes and—

"It doesn’t matter"

and he slightly pushed the cart away walking in the other direction 🚶

At first you were ??? But rapidly you got mad because of his constant attitude

" What’s with this behavior ? If you didn’t want to come you should’ve just stayed at home "

He kept walking away

You took your cart and kept on your shopping

If he wants to act like a teenager it’s not your problem, he’ll come back to the car after

When he came back to the car

" are you done with your fuss ?"

He was silent the whole ride

Scotland reasoned him out at diner for being disrespectful

Ireland

You received your sons report card from school

Ire, has been having a bad week overall and kind of neglected his son studies

He just overlooks it and trusts him blindly

You read the report card, the comments getting worse every line.

"Come here [sons name]"

The 15 year old walked in the living room, visibly obvious to what was gonna happen to him

Ire was just having a shot, « because he had a bad day »

Your ironically say

"Are you having a good time at school ?, or should I say the holiday camp activities ?! Because from this report card I don’t really know where you go in the mornings—"

Ireland groaned at you, defending I directly the teen.

" You’re the one who drops him at school everyday— do you even know if he goes ?" You point to the hours of missed class on the report card

Ireland sighs taking it and rips it

"Enough— I’m too tired for this, don’t bother him more it’s his problem—" he said walking out

Your son was just standing there 🧍‍♂️

When Ireland came back and found you asleep tears over your face he felt awful

You were just trying your best for your son and he was not doing much in return

he felt bad for complaining and acting this way so easily whilst you were also just as busy and tired and yet took the time for your son

Wales

when he tried to park the car underground and didn’t see the damn metal tube against the wall

Yeah the rear window

Suddenly crumbled entirely into small broken circles

His day was already shit enough

That damn broken rear window was too much

He literally put his head over the wheel and screamed

"Honey it’s f—"

"NO IT’S NOT FINE NOTHING IS FINE"

You just turned back to your front, silently

The way he just screamed back at you broke you inside

Slowly you shook your head, the tears falling off slowly

Dylan had the time to go out check the damage back and forth and get back in

You looked away the tears falling off from your face

When he got back in he was panting because of the screaming he was doing outside because of the car

When he finally calmed down he hugged you tightly

Patting your back again and again

Whispers non stop "sorry my love"

Scotland

"You didn’t put enough irn bru into the dish"

"Alistair— I put as usual one cup."

"You didn’ . It doesn’t taste like i’ "

He sighed, forcing in to eat.

He looked at the dish like you were lying

"You don’t have to be rude about it Al."

His tone grew louder, "I am not rude about i’ "

"You are"

He stood up, slammed his hands over the table

Took his unfinished plate and threw the food in the trash 🗑

You did flinched when he slammed the table, not expecting it

But the little act he was doing with throwing the food after barely eating left you speechless

He was the one complaining about being hungry and too exhausted to cook

He wanted to eat something really specific which you helped cook

Because he was "exhausted"

And now he is throwing it away after you spend a good hour standing up and preparing it

You were the one who should be mad

So you just cried at the table because of the shock

you head was screaming I should be the one mad and yet—

He came back to eat few hours later and you haven’t left the table, you were finishing work eating fruits

He silently walked to the kitchen looking for left overs

He didn’t found what he needed so he ended up having yoghurt silently in front of you at the table

"I’m sorry"

"Next time you’ll cook it by yourself."

Tried to hug you after for so long because he is too awkward

#uk brothers #hetalia headcanons #hetalia x reader #hetalia #aph wales #aph ireland #aph scotland #aph northern ireland #aph england #hws wales #hws scotland #hws northern ireland #hws ireland #hws england

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jaeyunsz · 2 years

Note

okay /cracks fingers

let's do this! GOOD BOYS GO TO HEAVEN REVIEW STARTS HERE

okay Jake being a good boy and excelling in academics is so on brand

sick of eating ramen? DOESN'T SOUND LIKE JAKKE SHDASHDAS help

"He wondered what your business was with the Jungwon kid" THE JUNGWON KID hshshs

THE WAY HE GOT FLUSTERED AT EYE CONTACT what a pure boi

"second, i wasn't staring" ALL MEN DO IS LIE

LISTEN the moment Jake started looking for Heeseung I HAD TO PAUSEE MY MUSIC BECAUSE IT FELT LIKE I WAS LOOKING TOO AHSDHASDHAS HELP THE SUSPENSE

how did they NOT FULLY CLOSE THE DOOR so irresponsible!??!?! or INTENTIONAL?

LUST! LET''S GAUR COMMIT SINSSS

"Jake wanted to be in Heeseung’s place so badly." that's just adorable tbh

"but this time, it wasn’t Heeseung but himself getting a taste of you. " NO BECAUSE I CAN SEE THIS AS A SCENE IN THE MOVIE like it's a dreamy scene/flashback of heeseung and y/n but then it glitches and it's JAKE and y/n omg amazing

"Why would he when it felt like drinking lemonade after a hot day out?" OOF LOVE THIS ANALOGY

"He turned his hand into a fist, knuckles turning white as he tried to hold himself back." I'M SORRY THIS REMINDED ME OF THE ARTHUR MEME

SHUT UP SHE CAUGHT HIM JERKING OFF?!?!@?!?@ I GUESS THEY'RE EVEN

‘’You won’t remember the existence of God by the time I finish playing with you.’’ ALEXA PLAY GOD IS A WOMAN BY ARIANA GRANDE

LUST AND ENVY WHAT A DEADLY COMBINATION

nah lowkey the way the boys talk about her makes me SLIGHTLY uncomfortable ngl

There was nothing more Jake wanted to do than punch Heeseung in the face. -- HONESTLY MOOD

He couldn’t foresee how silence could be painful. -- WAIT THIS LINE IS SO BEAUTIFUL

‘’And think about how good they would feel inside me.’’ -- now what man would not MELT at this sentence wow even i blushed

’Touch me more, puppy.’’ -- ALEXA PLAY SHE LOVES CONTROL BY CAMILA CABELLO

remembering the time when Sunghoon was talking about how he made this one girl cum by simply doing this. -- WE NEED AN ELABORATION, A NEW HOON FIC PLEASE

sorry i got cut off because of the paradoxxx invasion teaser ok where was i

HIM ASKING FOR CONSENT WE LOVE THIS

repeated mentions of HEAVEN makes me think of ariana grande's position like "heaven sent you to me" YESSS

wait proper orgasm so with heeseung y/n never got one? BURNNNN

ugh jake coming undone and y/n being so understanding about it I LOVE THIS COUPLE

JAKEY -- /combusts

You don’t have feelings for me. You have feelings for the idea of me. -- MY HEART BROKE

REUUNITED OH THANK GOD IT'S NOT A SAD ENDING

OKAY WOW THAT WAS SUCH A ROLLER COASTER FIRST THINGS FIRST THIS WAS WRITTEN SO WELL? the plot flows so nicely and the way everything is described in DETAIL (cough the Jake masturbating scene cough) I LOVE IT SO MUCH looking forward to your future releases!!! also do stop by my blog if you want to read some hee or jay fics!!! now i have to go to the bathroom to wash my face LMAOOOO

omgg vhdkls okay first of all yes yn did leave the door open in purpose, she had her eyes on jake and never on heeseung. SECOND yes yn had to fake an orgasm with heeseung rip yn <3 i mean he did make her feel good but the orgasm... better luck next time heeseung...

also i put my heart and soul into jake's solo scene, i still can't believe i wrote that filthy shit, it's so dirty i swear i didn't mean that scene to be so fucking nasty but shit happens u know <3

aaaand i will def read your stuff when i find some extra time!! i'll be adding them to my reading list!!

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR TAKING YOUR TIME TO WRITE THIS NANA!!!! i really appreciate it <3333

#nana <3 #replies

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abstractanalogue · 2 years

Text

The Audio Flâneur

This piece was included in the June/July issue of The Goo, a free listings magazine for Dublin.

With the resurgence of vinyl and even cassette, perhaps nostalgia for and a return to the iPod and the CD collecting and ripping culture that surrounded it is inevitable. As I'm one of life's late adopters anyway, this isn't so long ago for me because I only got my first and so far still functioning iPod just 10 years ago (pro tip: never update your iTunes). This turned out to be a very good thing for me and my huge collection of CDs and luckily by then they came with a 60 GB memory. I've had as many as 18,000 MP3s on it but could always do with more space. I filled it the slow way by burning as many of my CDs as I could from A to Z (nothing came from iTunes). At the start I was putting almost everything in but as I got closer to the limit I had to get more selective and even take things off (the eternal search for doubles!). The most important and breakthrough function for me was leaving it on 'shuffle'. I know that many have already written about this phenomenon before but taking that chaotic route through my lifetime's collection of music is what really allowed my CDs a second chance. The memories and surprises were constant, especially in those early days. One of the best things was hearing a song I didn't even recognise and checking to see who it was. It might turn out to be a track from a various artists free magazine CD, a CDR a friend burned me in the '90s I probably only listened to once or a band I simply hadn't listened to in 20 years. It was worth all the burning and popping in and out of discs I can tell you! With the now instant ease of locating certain songs I started to obsess (repeat play) over certain ones that previously I'd liked but hadn't struck me so powerfully before. These included Kirsty MacColl's 'New England' and The Dream Academy's 'Life in a Northern Town'. In this case both were artists I had previously been only vaguely aware of but now I was reading about them online and purchasing more of their music. As well as getting new CDs, I've always been someone who buys second-hand, including from charity shops and car boot sales. It remains something of a compulsion now that I can add them to the pool of music I'm constantly curating inside that deceptively small device. This digging for digital gold has itself come to resemble a kind of random shuffle as you never know what you will find next or where that search might take you. Some artists were even purchased because I knew I would be hearing them in the context of shuffle so I took chances on some popular artists I didn't previously like enough to actually own their music (eg. Madonna, Elton John). Surely one of their songs in isolation won't hurt me! I also decided I wanted to start collecting all the albums from certain artists I was now newly re-discovering (eg. Lambchop, Low, Laurie Anderson, Ann Scott and David Kitt). This meant I could use the individual artist shuffle and just wallow in as much of their music as I wanted. Another thing I thought was very good for my brain was jumping from genre to genre, from electronic to punk to traditional Irish music. This made me hunt out even more non-rock albums and it can lead to some quite hilarious sequences of music, it certainly grabs your attention when Micho Russell starts up a reel after some mutant disco from Arthur Russell! One of the most revelatory things that happened was seeing how some of the Irish bands could easily hold their own against more well known groups. Shuffle might be the ultimate test of any band! This directly led me to starting a website called Abstract Analogue, to initially write some in-depth pieces about mostly '90s bands such as The Last Post, Idiots, Dot Creek, The Sewing Room, The Wormholes, Deep Burial, Capratone, Decal and Sunbear. As I was struggling to track down certain albums I didn't get at the time I noticed that many were for sale from secondary sellers on Amazon for as little as 1 cent. It struck me that unless you were already familiar with the band, there was no other way for you to discover just how good these albums were (none of the groups I covered had yet been included in any 'great lost Irish albums' canon). If you are lucky there is a world of incredible and untapped digital music already sitting in your home and if not you will find it down the road in a charity shop or elsewhere for bargain prices. You could always raid the iTunes of friends but I prefer to keep it personal and more of a challenge. There is of course a world of exciting new music on platforms like Bandcamp that even I am getting used to. You can gradually refine what it is you like but keep adding to the pile is my advice (never throw your CDs away either if you can help it). The shuffle will test you at times but try not to skip or delete things straight away, I give everything a chance to grow on me, allowing the universal randomness of sound to lead the way. Soon you will be seeing life itself as one random shuffle after another. What will be next?

Stephen Rennicks

#ipod

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zaharya · 2 years

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Word find tag

@paintedpigeon1 tagged me to find the words light, happen, dark, and sigh in my WIPs. Thanks for the tag, love! Let's see then, shall we?

Light

The very beginning of my favourite WIP, actually: Gia's Story [working title].

It happened on a hunt. Merlin, for his part, was utterly unsurprised; something always happened on a hunt. He would have preferred to simply go home after they’d finished their patrol the previous day, but the knights loved their hunting and nobody listened to Merlin anyway. They’d stayed at a tavern overnight at least, which was an unusual luxury. It also meant that they had left their horses behind and were on foot, when a light flashed through the forest, bright enough to blind them all for a few seconds.

Happen

Yes, I could've taken the first line from the one above, but where's the fun in that? This is from one version (the fun version) of a Villain!Arthur AU waiting in my drafts

“He’s a nice guy, you know. Merlin. Has more sass than is probably healthy for him.” Arthur snorted. Of course Gwaine would find disrespect endearing. “You should talk to him some day,” said Gwaine. I want to talk to him, Arthur thought. But he would never admit such a thing, least of all to Gwaine. The problem was that Gwaine was right, Arthur should talk to Merlin. And yes, he knew all too well how much sass Merlin had. Because while Arthur had kept his distance, thank you very much, everyone else had not, and Arthur couldn’t help but listen in every now and then. Or all the time. But he had good reasons! Merlin was a prisoner, and seeing how Arthur’s men had all fallen for Merlin’s innocent insolence act, it fell to Arthur to keep an eye on him. The camera feed of the cell just so happened to provide audio as well. It wasn’t like Arthur was watching Merlin when he was sitting quietly by himself … much.

Dark

Once again from Gia's Story, this time with CW: violence/injury

“NO!” Arthur’s cry shook Merlin more than the blade sliding against his ribs. Why was everything so slow all of a sudden? The world dulled around Merlin, paling against the white hot pain flaring through him. And then Arthur was there, ramming into the burly bandit, pushing him off. The momentum ripped out the blade and Merlin screamed in pain, his vision going dark and sounds turning muffled. Arthur was still moving. Merlin tried his hardest to focus. Focus. Why focus? Focus on what? He forced his eyes open, looking down at himself. Blood. Pain. Right, focus because blood. He had survived worse, he was sure. Focus. “Merlin!” Arthur. He relaxed as he felt strong arms gripping him. Arthur was here.

Sigh

From my very slowly progressing "Merthur watches Heartstopper" roommates AU

He sat down without a word, while Merlin finished preparing his own cup. After over two years of living together, Arthur knew better than to try and talk to Merlin before coffee. A minute of comfortable silence later, Merlin gave a satisfied sigh as he took his first sip. “Morning.” “Mmh.” Arthur bit back a fond grin. He’d long since learnt to decipher Merlin’s quasi-nonverbal morning communication. “Slept well?” “M-hm.” Merlin took another long sip of coffee. “Mh?” — You? “Yeah, quite alright. Impressed my head doesn’t hurt worse.” “Mmh.” — Agreed. For a few minutes, both of them stayed silent as they drank their coffees. Then Arthur got to his feet. “Breakfast?” “God, yes,” Merlin finally spoke, his voice still rough from sleep.

I'll tag @lyskari, @tyalangand, @citharaposts, @mayapleiades, and anyone else who feels inclined! Your words are excuse, rude, more, and less.

#tag game #wip

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bitsandbobsofwriting · 3 years

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Something in the woods is stealing peoples’ Souls;

Merlin learns the hard way that he's a little more... fragmented, than normal people when he tries to solve the issue himself.

Part 2 (final part)

All of the Physicians in the town are being overrun.

Bodies keep showing up, still breathing, still perfectly functional, all seemingly unharmed... but they won’t wake up.

None of them will even twitch, as if, whilst the physical bodies were in perfect condition, there was something lacking somewhere, stopping any sort of higher brain function.

The King, his Knights, and even the Court Physician and his (newly titled) Co-Worker (as opposed to Apprentice), were baffled.

Medically, they had nothing to go on, all they could do was keep the bodies alive as best they could, and hope that some sort of solution could come about after some good old fashioned detective work.

Thankfully, it only took five days, and twelve comatose patients, for The King’s best Knights to realise that all of the... victims(?) had been found in a specific area of the woods just outside the city limits.

With such a distinct, and unexplainable issue, it was assumed (rightfully) that magic was involved somehow; whether it be some sort of creature, or yet another evil sorcerer hell-bent on revenge.

Which of course led to Merlin, one of the Court Physicians, and also (Secretly)TheMostPowerfulWarlockEver™, putting on his warmest clothes and sneaking out in the dead of night under the worried gaze of Gaius.

He did not come back.

Not that anyone but Gaius knew.

Early the next morning, King Arthur gathered his best Knights, Sirs Leon, Lancelot, Gwaine, Percival, and Elyan, to go and hunt down whatever it was that was rendering his people permanently unconscious.

Gaius and Merlin had explained the previous day, when these plans were conceived, that Merlin would have to stay behind; Camelot’s Physicians were so overwhelmed with not only normal patients, but now twelve comatose bodies as well; they needed every pair of hands they could get. For once, Arthur was happy to leave his manservant behind.

The man cared greatly for his people, and whilst he would love nothing more than to have Merlin at his side all day, every day, he knew that he was safer, and more needed, in the city.

It was meant to just be in case Merlin got injured and had to hide it, but Gaius did well to hide his worry when he waved them off, and didn’t mention that Merlin wasn’t even in the city, that they could be finding Merlin’s comatose body next.

It took the Gang barely half a day to get there, and they had supplies to last them a few days in the woods, if that’s what it came to, but they were all still tense.

They hadn't seen anything like this before. They had no idea what they were up against; there were no physical injuries to assess, no eye-witness accounts, nothing found in their blood or on their person. Just unconscious bodies that showed no sign of waking.

Thankfully, they found no more bodies as they methodically searched the forest, but they also found no sign of what was wrong.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary: nothing attacked them, there was no blood, no destroyed areas, not even a scrap of evidence that something had even happened.

They finally stopped to make camp at sundown, dejected. Their mood definitely worsening with Elyan’s terrible cooking.

Gwaine was, of course, the most talkative:

“I know he’s needed or whatever, but are we sure we can’t go back and get Merlin? I’ve eaten a lot of gross shit over the years, but I’m not sure if I can take this for four more days.”

Elyan grumbles in embarrassment as the others snort, amused, and he throws a twig at Gwaine. It snaps in two across the knight’s face with a satisfying crack.

Arthur ignores the childish behaviour (something he can’t believe he has to do in the first place), shaking his head as he replies:

“No. The health of the people comes before your stomach. If Gaius says he’s needed in the city, then he stays in the city. Though I was surprised that he wasn’t there to wave us off.”

Gwaine smirks knowingly, and Percival puts a warning hand on his shoulder, but it does nothing to deter the knight as he waggles his eyebrows at The King.

Arthur flushes slightly, but he covers it quickly, not having time to retort before Gwaine opens his mouth again:

“Missing him, are you? Perhaps next time you should request that he stand on the battlements in a dress, and wave a handkerchief at us as we heroically ride out?”

Arthur throws a much larger twig (it’s more of a branch, really) in Gwaine’s direction, and this one knocks him off his seat, but before anyone can even snigger at him, Arthur loudly announces the watches and tells everyone to get some sleep.

The next day went much the same.

That is, until late-afternoon.

The Knights were continuing their methodical search of the woods, once again finding themselves somehow tense and bored, when they came across a clearing that had clearly seen a gruesome battle.

Trees were uprooted, the ground was covered in deep holes and scorches, and there were even the occasional splashes of blood.

Which honestly raised more questions that it answered.

After thorough searching, they were hopeful. It looked like it had been some sort of fight between a sorcerer, and something... not human, some sort of creature. BUT, going by the tracks, the sorcerer had survived, and wandered off.

Was the sorcerer injured, or was the creature injured? If the sorcerer had walked off, injured or otherwise, where was the creature? Surely they should find the body of one or the other?

Another question that no one really wanted to ask: was this even related to the bodies?? Or had the Knights just stumbled onto something completely unrelated that they would inevitably get dragged into dealing with anyway?

Either way, they couldn’t ignore it, and with new-found motivation, they followed the tracks deeper into the woods, instead of setting up camp, like they had intended.

Whoever it was seemed to be wandering aimlessly. The blood trail slowly came to a stop, and it seemed that every step was stronger; as if whoever it were was gaining more energy from walking, as opposed to becoming more tired.

Still, whoever they found at the end of the tracks would be able to provide some sort of answer.

Eventually, after around two hours of diligently following the footsteps through the woods, Arthur signalled everyone to stop.

He wordlessly dismounts his horse, and gestures everyone to quietly do the same, before silently pointing ahead.

The knights look carefully to where he gestures, to see a man stood in the centre of a clearing, facing away from them.

They, still silent, draw their swords and sneak closer, but the man doesn’t move, doesn’t even twitch, and if it weren’t for the fact that he was stood upright, they would think him dead.

Arthur steps into the clearing, about twenty feet from the man, and furrows his brow. That looks like.... no... it can’t be, can it? He shakes the thoughts from his head, convinced that he’s just imagining things, but before he can make his presence known, the man turns around, as if he sensed them stood there.

All of them gasp and take a step back, immediately recognising Merlin.

But he’s... different.

He stands scarily still, unusual for a man who was constantly fidgeting or on the move.

His face is blank, and if he hadn’t been staring straight at them they would think he hadn’t noticed them at all, and whilst he stood as if uninjured, his tunic is ripped and blood-soaked.

But what draws everyone’s attention, was the bright golden glow of his eyes, highlighted especially by the quickly descending darkness of the evening.

Arthur brings his sword up slowly, taking a cautious step forward as he calls Merlin’s name.

Merlin simply tilts his head slightly, otherwise staying still, before stutteringly beginning to speak:

“Mer... lin... Merlin....... Merlin is... Merlin is...... Merlin is gone.”

It’s clear that something is deeply wrong with the manservant, but the way he spoke, as if he knew how but had never actually done it before, like he was still figuring it out, creeped the hell out of everyone.

His words as well, “Merlin is gone” do nothing but fill them with dread.

Lancelot steps forward quickly, moving to stand in front of Arthur, sword unsheathed but pointing at the ground. He was unsurprisingly less fearful of the golden irises, and recovered the quickest:

“What do you mean, “Merlin is gone”, gone where? Who are you?”

Merlin... or... not!Merlin, tilts his head further:

“Merlin is... gone. I... I... I want him... back.”

Lancelot gulps but before he can reply, Arthur breaks out of his stupor, and growls:

“What have you done with him?! Whatever you are, give him back!”

Merlin moves his gaze from Lancelot to Arthur, and takes a step forward, before bowing his head slightly, as if out of respect:

“You are... The Once and Future King... I want him back... you... you... you need him... back.”

The rest of the knights are fully freaked out now, but they hide it well, and gather slowly around Arthur. Lancelot scowls at them, holding a placating hand out. He really doesn’t want any of them to get jumpy and skewer Merlin. He takes another step towards the golden-eyed man:

“We all want Merlin back. The bodies, the same thing happened to you? Happened to Merlin?”

Not!Merlin nods slowly once again, looking back to Lancelot:

“It... took him... from me. I... I... I want him back.”

Lancelot returns his nod, letting out a deep breath:

“And who are you? What are you doing in Merlin’s body?”

Not!Merlin frowns slightly, as if confused, the first actual expression he’s pulled this whole time. It takes him a few moments to respond, and Lancelot is getting desperate; he can feel the knights behind him getting more and more jumpy, especially Arthur:

“I am... I... I have always been here... I am... I am... I am me. I am Merlin’s... and he is... mine... I want him... back. He is... mine.”

Lancelot tenses slightly. He has a feeling he knows what’s going on. Merlin talks about his magic sometimes, talks about it as if it’s... sentient. Described the way it’s always desperate to reach out to Arthur and the Knights and Gaius and Gwen, how it sometimes does things without his permission.

Lancelot gulps. This is bad. Merlin’s magic is walking around in his body without him there to control it. They were going to struggle to explain this away, as much as Merlin claimed Arthur was an idiot, it wasn’t completely true. Lancelot bit his lip, glancing back at the others as he re-sheaths his sword.

He knows there’s no way to get them to relax... unless... this might backfire terribly, but it also might be the only way to get them to calm down a little.

Lancelot frowns thoughtfully, and just before Arthur works up the nerve to say something else, he turns back to Not!Merlin:

“Do you mean us any harm?”

Not!Merlin once again tilts his head and frowns as if in confusion:

“No... Merlin is... Merlin is fond of... you. I.. I was made for... for The Once and Future King. I am... unable to hurt him.”

Lancelot nods, before saying slowly:

“Do you have any reason to lie to us?

The golden-eyed man shakes his head slowly, the glow seeming brighter as he replies:

“Why would I... I... lie? I could kill... you without a... second... second thought. I want Merlin... back.”

The knight nods one final time, looking back to the others to gauge their reactions. Their swords are still unsheathed, but lowered, their faces tense and concerned, but not angry. Lancelot supposes that’s the best he’s going to get at this point.

He lets out a rough sigh, running a hand through his hair as he looks back at the Warlock:

“You’re not Merlin. What do we call you, until we can get him back?”

Not!Merlin lets his gaze wonder to the knights, before finally landing on Arthur. His speech had been getting better with use, but he speaks slowly and keeps his stare on The King, as if curious to his reaction:

“I am... I am... I am part of him. I don’t... have a name. Call me... me... Emrys.”

Lancelot grits his teeth, and his eyes whip to Arthur, to see if he recognises the name.

With The King’s gasp, and widening eyes, Lancelot knows that he does recognise the name.

“You... you’re Emrys?? I thought Emrys was some all-powerful sorcerer, what are you doing in Merlin?”

Arthur is too distracted to notice Lancelot’s panic, but Leon, ever the observant one, is not, and frowns at the sudden fear on his fellow knight’s face.

Mer-... Emrys had already admitted that he wouldn’t lie, if Arthur keeps asking questions, he’ll figure it out. But before Lancelot can think of a solution, Emrys replies:

“Emrys is... is... our other... name. But I am not... Merlin. Not on my own. I want... want him back.”

Arthur looks taken aback, but before he can ask another question, Gwaine steps forward, giving Lancelot an unreadable look before:

“Right, well that’s all fine and dandy, but we need to set camp up and figure out what we’re going to do about... this.”

He gestures vaguely to Merlin’s body after sheathing his sword.

Arthur looks about ready to argue, but with another pointed look from Gwaine, Lancelot jumps into action:

“Gwaine’s right, we need to gather the horses and set up for the night. Here is probably alright, then we can come up with a plan to get Merlin back, and presumably, all of those other people.-”

He turns to Arthur, a sufficiently subservient expression on his face:

“-If you think that’s best, Sire?”

Gwaine rolls his eyes and scoffs at that, heading back to gather the horses from where they’d been left without further prompting. Arthur’s argumentative expression drops after a moment, and with one more mistrustful glance to Emrys, he nods, instructing the others to gather wood and get started on dinner.

Lancelot lets out a breath, but flushes slightly and tenses his jaw when he sees Leon giving him an inscrutable look. He turns away after a moment, under the pretence of helping Gwaine.

The moment Lancelot reaches Gwaine, a few metres into the treeline, the other knight quickly turns around and grabs his shoulders. He glances desperately back towards the clearing, and when he establishes that they’re the only two within earshot, roughly whispers:

“Please tell me you figured it out?? Because I’m not sure how the hell I’m going to keep Arthur from finding out on my own.”

Lancelot’s eyes widen, but his shock keeps him silent for only a few moments before Gwaine shakes his shoulders. He blinks away his surprise, whispering his response:

“You know?? Does Merlin know that you know?”

Gwaine shakes his head, finally letting go of Lance’s shoulders:

“No. I worked it out like twenty seconds ago, I’m sort of hoping that Arthur isn’t as quick as me. How long have you known?”

The other knight nods his head understandingly:

“About as long as I’ve known him, but I’ll explain later. This whole thing is... terrible. I don’t think our odds are good. Mer- Emrys won’t lie, and we won’t be able to stop Arthur from asking questions. He’s probably asking them now. We need to get the horses and get back.”

Gwaine nods roughly, and without another word, the two of them gather the reins of their six horses, and quickly make their way back to the clearing.

They had only been gone a few minutes, and in that time, firewood had been gathered and arranged. Elyan pulls a flint out of his pocket, and Lancelot widens his eyes as he sees Emrys tilt his head (still stood in the same place), moments before waving his hand casually.

The wood bursts into a roaring flame, and Emrys suddenly has four swords on him. Lancelot and Gwaine rush forward, standing in between Emrys and the other knights, holding their hands out as if in surrender. Gwaine speaks first:

“Hey! You might be freaked out by all of this, but that’s still Merlin’s body, and he needs it, so lets not poke holes in him, alright??”

Everyone bar Arthur lowers their swords, but before Gwaine can growl something out, Lancelot turns back to Emrys:

“Look, they’re all a little... unnerved, by magic, so maybe stop using it for now, yeah?”

Emrys tilts his head and furrows his brows again, and everyone stares at him in shock as he replies, not quite knowing what to make of his response:

“But I am magic. I am magic... incarnate. If I stop... I... I cease to exist. And Merlin... Merlin needs me. He needs me like... like... like humans need to breath. I can not just... stop. He would... would... we would die.”

Lancelot tightly shuts his eyes. There is officially NO way to explain this one away. Gods, Merlin is going to be so scared when he finds out.

After a few moments of shocked silence, Arthur finally squeaks out a:

“What??”

Gwaine quickly responds, before Emrys can reveal anymore:

“No. It's cruel to take Merlin’s secrets from him when he isn’t even here. We find Merlin, then you can ask your questions.-”

Arthur looks angry, like he wants to argue, but Gwaine takes a threatening step towards him, resting his hand on his sword at his hip as Lancelot and the other knights look on the scene with panic in their eyes. Gwaine growls out:

“-I said no, Princess. Everyone here knows I’m more loyal to Merlin than you, and that doesn’t stop just because he’s not here and you’re about to throw a temper tantrum.”

Arthur huffs, but lowers his sword as Gwaine glares at him, and Lancelot lets out a breath. The other knights follows The King’s lead, sheathing their swords and settling tensely around the fire.

Lancelot goes back to the horses, tying them down and removing saddlebags, with Leon’s help (and constant stare, which was an odd mix of concern and suspicion).

Gwaine points Emrys to a spot on the floor, and tells him to sit. The knight settles next to him protectively, his sword across his lap as he glares at Arthur on the other side of the fire.

The evening passes awkwardly, food being cooked and eaten in silence, no one quite sure what to say.

Arthur spends the whole time with a pinched look of frustration on his face, but the knights look to him as he takes a deep breath, his expression morphing into an odd mix of concern and accusation in the blink of an eye:

“How do we even know that the... Merlin, part of... part of you is alive? What happened to hi- to you? How do we get him back?”

Lancelot wants to be annoyed at his tone, but he poses valid questions. They still had no idea what actually happened or why or how they fixed it.

Emrys tilts his head, aiming his golden stare at Arthur:

“It is one of... of the Manducan, or The Eating Ones. They... are very rare, they steal... steal souls. Bodies can survive a short while.... a short while without them. Hence your... comatose patients. I am... we are, a little more... fragmented... than most. I contain too... too much power, so The Manducan took... only the human... human part.”

Everyone looks extremely worried at that, but Arthur’s face turns desperate as he rushes out:

“What do you mean, human?? What are you??”

They all stare at the raven-haired man as he speaks, his eyes focused on the King:

“We do not... know. Some call us a Lord, or a King. Others call us... call us... a God. In moments... of power, we... we hear prayers. It can be... disconcerting.”

The camp is silent for a while after that, everyone processing what had been said. Merlin heard people praying to him... not even Lancelot knew that, Merlin had never told him.

After around half a candle-mark, Leon breaks the silence to ask the questions that had been pushed to that back of their minds:

“How do we kill this creature, and what happens if we do? Can we get the souls back, undamaged?”

Emrys turns his golden gaze to the curly-haired knight as he replies:

“It is already... weakened. The Forever King needs to... strike... strike it with Excalibur. They hibernate for.... for centuries... and only return to this plane of existence to... collect food. If you... if you... if you kill it before it leaves, the souls will... will return...naturally.”

The knights all let out breaths of relief, but Arthur looks at his sword oddly, before muttering:

“What’s so special about my sword? And why do you keep calling me strange titles?”

Lancelot gulps, and Emrys tilts his head:

“You know of Emrys, but not of the... the prophecies?”

Arthur nods his head slowly, but Lancelot interrupts before Emrys can start the complicated process of explaining his and Arthur’s destinies:

“Perhaps that’s a... story, for when we have Merlin back in one piece. How do we track the creature?”

Arthur gives him a glare, before lowly saying:

“Do not think I do not notice you avoiding the subject, Sir Lancelot. You know of these prophecies?”

Lancelot grits his teeth, but gives a slow nod:

“Bits and pieces. Merlin isn’t fond of talking about it.-”

He raises a challenging eyebrow, still staring Arthur in the face, and everyone is take aback. Lancelot was never anything but respectful and polite to his King; this defiant look shocked them all:

“-You see, he’s spent his entire life in Camelot absolutely terrified that someone will overhear him, and have him burnt.”

Arthur took in a deep breath, hiding his guilt behind a blank façade, but before anyone can say anything, their gazes are drawn back to Emrys, who looks almost... mournful?

He nods his head slightly, and the sad look on his... on Merlin’s face, looks so out of place for someone so normally upbeat:

“He is... we, are constantly frightened. It is exhausting. I try to... to reassure us but... Merlin is... is... is always so scared, despite our power. We used to... to love flames, fire. Now it is... terrifying to us.”

Lancelot had kept his gaze on Arthur, and when The King looks back at him, his despair badly hidden, the knight simply shrugs one shoulder and nods slightly.

Arthur lets out a breath, and looks to his lap, whispering so quietly that the group barely hears him:

“He’s scared of... of me.”

Gwaine growls out an “Of course he is, you’re a Pen-.”, but he’s interrupted by Emrys:

“No. He would allow you to... to kill us. But we couldn’t bear to... to lose you.-”

He finishes his statement quietly, and Arthur looks up at him, tears in his eyes:

“-We don’t want to be sent away. Camelot is... is... is frightening. But it is also our... home.”

“I would never send you away. When we get Merlin back, you... you tell him that. Tell him he’s safe with me, with us, and always will be.”

Emrys tilts his head yet again:

“And my people? Will we be an... exception? Will you make us watch you... continue to persecute our people, whom we... we... we should be protecting? Merlin does... does not want to make a... hypocrite out of you.”

The knights look at him expectantly, and he blanches slightly as he looks away. The King gulps, before taking a deep breath and looking back, straightening his spine and looking confident:

“The laws will change. Crimes committed with magic will be judged the same as crimes committed without; it’s about time I faced the cruelties of my father.”

The corner of Emrys’ mouth tilts up briefly as he nods, but says nothing. Gwaine smirks, Leon and Lancelot give The King proud smiles, and Percival and Elyan look taken aback, before they relax into fond smiles of their own.

The evening had passed quickly, and with all of them exhausted, it’s decided that any further discussion on how to track this... Manducan, would happen in the morning.

All of the knights fall asleep quickly, finding the protective golden glow of Emrys’ unsleeping eyes both comforting and unsettling.

They all woke the next morning oddly refreshed, but the relaxed atmosphere didn’t last long when, one by one, the knights noticed Emrys sat unnervingly still, in the exact same spot as last night.

Only the occasional blink and shallow breathing proved that he was in fact alive, and not some sort of incredibly life-like statue.

Food was eaten, and camp broken quickly; the golden eyed not-quite-a-servant staying in his spot the whole time.

Despite Emrys saying that the souls would be fine as long as they got there in time, they were still full of nervous energy, and wanted to get this over and done with as soon as possible. Not least of all because they had a lot, and I mean a LOT, of questions for Merlin... or... all of Merlin.

Emrys was pointed to Lancelot’s horse, and once he mounted in front of the knight, everyone looked at him expectantly. He simply tilted his head, and Arthur huffed:

“Well? How do we find this... creature? Can’t you-”

He waves his hand vaguely, and Leon is the only knight able to hide his snort at The King’s impression of magic.

Emrys nods in understanding, and extends his hand in front of him. A thin stream of light, like a glowing string floating in the air, extends from his palm, snaking through the trees.

He nods, this time in the direction of the light, and the knights urge their horses to begin a quick paced journey.

Conversation is sparse, but eventually the question on all of their minds is asked by Percival:

“If you could do that the whole time, track the Manducan I mean, why didn’t you?”

Emrys doesn’t look towards him, but the horses noticeably slow as everyone bunches together, curious about his answer:

“They are of a different... different plane. Magic can harm them but... but... but not kill. I was waiting for The Once and Future King to bring... bring Excalibur.”

Percival nods in understanding, but Leon frowns:

“Well... what about us? Will we not be able to harm it with our swords?”

Everyone copies his frown at that. They’re valid questions, and Arthur is silently grateful that Leon had the tactical mind to think of them:

“No. It will be safer for... for... for you to... wait. I can distract and injure it further until... The Once and Future King can... kill it.”

The knights looks worried at that, but Elyan is the first one to pipe up:

“We’re meant to just stand back and watch? Can’t we set a trap, or help distract it?”

Emrys shakes his head:

“It can not be trapped. Being too close would... would have adverse effects on... on... on your souls.”

Arthur looks back from his position at the head of the group with a frown on his face:

“Well what about my soul? I’m presumably going to have to get close to it in order to stab it?”

Emrys fixes his golden stare on The King, and tilts his head slightly in confusion:

“Your soul was forged through magic, it is marginally... immune. It will take a little... longer for... for... for your soul to react badly.”

Arthur nods, looking back to the front, muttering something about “having a time limit before my soul implodes or whatever. Great.”

Once the knights finish snickering at Arthur, Gwaine asks:

“Wait wait, if Excalibur is the only thing able to kill it, what are you doing out here?”

Emrys tilts his head, looking back to the knights:

“We were... unaware of that at the... the time. We only figured out what... it was, when we fought it.”

Everyone nods, all of them wondering just how many times Merlin had snuck out to take care of something, with none of them knowing about it. The list of questions they had for when Merlin was back in one piece was getting longer and longer, and no part of this conversation was helping the anxiety swirling in Lancelot’s stomach.

After another hour or so of silence, Elyan pipes up:

“I’m surprised no one has asked yet but... what does this thing look like? I know we’re following a trail or whatever, but what are we actually going to find at the end of it?”

“They shift sizes, though they always take... the form of a thick-”

Emrys is interrupted by Arthur pulling his horse to a sudden stop, and pointing through the trees ahead of his, harshly whispering:

“Black shadow??”

Everyone stops behind him and their gazes dart quickly to where Arthur gestures. Through the trees they see a large mass of deep black smoke.

The black tendrils seem to writhe in the air, and the knights can see vague impressions of limbs tipped with impossibly sharp claws darting out occasionally before retreating back into the fog.

The creature looks like evil in semi-corporeal form, and the usually strong-willed warriors take in stuttering breaths at the overwhelming instincts of “Unnatural, run run RUN!” screaming at them with every passing second.

The shadow doesn’t seem to have any front or back; being in a constantly shifting state, sometimes seeming to freeze, sometimes darting through the trees in a blur.

The knights have lost all colour in their faces, and their breath comes shallowly and quickly. Arthur gulps, tightening his grip on his sword as he whispers:

“Horse, or on foot?”

The sound of Emrys’ feet softly thudding on the undergrowth gives The King his answer, and he dismounts his horse slowly, trying to stop the shaking in his hands and legs.

He takes a deep breath as Emrys moves to stand behind him. His voice is shaking and desperate, as if he were a child reaching for help after a nightmare:

“How do I... what do I do, Merlin?”

Emrys tilts his head, but doesn’t say anything of the The King’s mistake:

“You need only get close enough to... deeply slice it. It is fragile in this... this realm. Cover your eyes when you... you do so, the light will be blinding. Do not let it... touch you. I am reluctant to admit that, after what it did to... to... to our soul, I do not know what it will... do to yours.”

Arthur takes another deep breath, and clears his throat slightly as he gives a firm nod. Time to be brave now, for his people, for Merlin.

The King can hear his knights dismount behind him and tie up the horses, ready to jump in and help at a moment’s notice, in spite of... whatever will happen to their souls. None of them are really sure they want to know, so none of them ask for details, and Arthur is unendingly grateful for their silent loyalty and bravery.

Emrys walks forward, past Arthur, and towards the creature. The King gulps before silently slipping off to the side; he doesn’t know how the creature sees (not having a head, or even eyes, as far as he can tell), but Emrys said he would distract it so... splitting up makes the most sense?

The knights can tell the exact moment the creature notices Emrys walking towards it.

The tendrils of shadow seem to writhe even more frantically, and the fog bulges and retreats again, somehow giving the impression of anger, fear.

Emrys plants his feet strongly and raises a hand, summoning vines and roots from the ground with nought but a gesture; Arthur only gives himself a second to be distracted by the sight of Merlin so effortlessly doing magic before focussing back on the creature.

Everyone bar Emrys winces, and covers their ears as the beast lets out an ear piercing screech, moving judderingly towards the Warlock. The trees shake with the noise, and a few of Emrys’ magical attacks disintegrate into the air. He summons more, and snarls in concentration as the beast whips towards him.

Emrys rushes forward to meet the beast, and they clash in a burst of golden light and black shadow, each trying to take over the other. The shadows try to sneak around the Warlock, reaching towards the knights behind him, but they’re quickly halted in their tracks as cracks open in the ground, swallowing the fog before it can do any damage.

The golden light emanating from Emrys pulses brightly, and the creature is pushed back, the edges of its smoke disintegrating slowly into the air. It lets out another high pitched screech, and Arthur takes that as his cue; rushing silently forward, on the opposite side of the creature to Emrys, and swiping down precisely with Excalibur.

The knights see his attack coming, and step even further back, heeding Emrys’ warning and covering their eyes, Arthur doing so with his free hand as he brings the sword down.

Excalibur cuts through the shadow with no resistance; the screech getting impossibly louder as the blade leaves a blindingly golden trail in it’s wake.

Emrys simply stands back to watch, but the pitch of the beast’s screech forces the knights to the floor, eyes tightly shut, and hands clamped over their ears.

Suddenly, the noise stops, and the shadows of the creature seem to disintegrate into nothing as the golden light of the wound takes over. The light recedes in on itself, before exploding outwards and fragmenting into pieces. The bulk of the fragments fly in the direction of Camelot, golden blurs through the trees, but one, the smallest and dullest (due to being only part of a soul, they assume) flies with speed straight towards Emrys.

The knights and their King finally look up, feeling oddly exhausted, to see Emrys take a staggered step back and grimace in pain as the light forces it’s way down his throat.

He falls to the floor, and the knights rush towards him as his muscles spasm and he begins to scream. His eyes are shut tightly and Lancelot quickly lunges forward to grab his wrists as his hands go to yank at his hair.

Everyone gathers around him, Lancelot yelling for them to hold him so he doesn’t hurt himself. They can only hope that Merlin is an exception, and this isn’t happening to the other victims back in Camelot. Lancelot keeps a hold of his wrists, and Arthur discards Excalibur in favour of holding down Merlin’s shoulders, whilst Elyan, Leon, and Gwaine hold down his hips and legs, and Percival wordlessly stands guard.

Merlin’s screaming dies down, and he stops thrashing so much (but stays tense), but the knights don’t let go just yet. He opens his bleary eyes, and whispers, so faintly they barely hear it:

“... Lance?”

The knight lets go of Merlin’s now limp wrists gently, and strokes a hand through the man’s raven hair:

“Yeah, I’m here Merlin. All back in once piece?

Merlin closes his eyes again, and goes fully slack as the others let go of him fully, nodding slowly as he gulps before groaning:

“Yeah, that fucking... hurt.”

Lancelot huffs out a gentle laugh, but before he can reply, Merlin gasps and quickly sits up. When his wide, panicked eyes land on the rest of the knights huddled around him, his breath deepens and he scrambles back frantically, only to run into Arthur, who grabs his shoulders.

Merlin whips his head around and rips himself from The King’s grip, stumbling to his feet and rushing back, away from the knights and into a tree.

His ears are deaf to everyone’s gentle reassurances that he was safe, and his eyes are blind to the hands held up in soft surrender. He sinks to the floor as his breathing gets even more frenzied and tears gather in his eyes, but before he can process that he was safe, the mix of memories triggers a blinding pain behind his eyes.

He gives a pained yelp and shuts his eyes tightly, bringing his hands to grip the sides of his head as he curls up on the floor. Merlin begins to groan again, and Lancelot desperately gestures for everyone to stay back as he kneels by Merlin’s side, pulling his hands away from his head again:

“You’re safe Merlin, no one’s going to hurt you, do you remember? We said that to the bit of you that was left.-”

Merlin doesn’t seem to hear him, but squeezes Lancelot’s hands painfully tight as he continues to groan, arching his spine:

“-Ok, ok, what’s wrong Merlin? Your head? We can’t help you if we don’t know what’s wrong. Is it your... your soul?”

Merlin shakes his head slightly, groaning dying down, but still struggling to draw breath, still gripping Lance’s hands:

“Your magic?”

Another shake of the head has Lancelot beginning to panic a little; none of them have dealt with anything like this before, and he doesn’t know what’s wrong with his friend. He continues to try and comfort Merlin as he struggles to think of what else it could be, when Merlin begins forcing himself to take deep breaths, and stuttering out:

“Mem... memories.”

Lancelot takes a fortifying breath, and the others crowd a little closer, panicking for their friend:

“Memories? Ok, which ones? Memories from the bit of you that was wandering around, or memories from the bit of you that was in the creature?”

Thankfully, Merlin’s pain seems to be dying down slightly. His breath comes easier, but his eyes stay tightly shut and his muscles still spasm periodically as he grinds out:

“Both. Two sets of memories from... from the same time. Hurts. My. Brain.”

Lancelot huffs out another gentle laugh, rubbing his thumbs softly over the back of Merlin’s hands, and the others relax at the sight of Merlin’s pain lessening. Gwaine kneels down next to Lancelot, and quietly announces himself before beginning to run a gentle hand through Merlin’s hair.

This goes on for a few more minutes; the servant’s pain dwindling and his breathing evening out as his mind sorts the two sets of clashing memories and stitches the two pieces of his soul back together, Lancelot and Gwaine not stopping their soft ministrations for even a moment.

He finally relaxes fully, opening his eyes but not moving from his position on the floor as he gazes tiredly up at Arthur’s worried face, over Lancelot’s shoulder. His words comes out timidly, and Arthur has to stop himself flinching at the hint of fear in his voice:

“Did you mean it? Am I... safe?”

Arthur forces a soft smile on his face, hiding his worry, and gives Merlin a firm nod:

“I promise Merlin, you’re safe. None of us will hurt you.-”

Merlin smiles back at him, before nodding, and closing his eyes, drained from the ordeals of the last few days:

“-though you need to make sure your head is on straight at your earliest convenience, I’ll need your help to write that repeal.”

Arthur says it with a weak, teary grin, and Merlin chuckles slightly, nodding softly once more before drifting into a deep sleep, exhausted.

Lancelot mutters that he’s asleep, and the smile drops from Arthur’s face, his brow furrowing in worry as he crouches between his two knights, putting a hand to Merlin’s forehead:

“Will he be alright?”

Lancelot shrugs, biting his lip, and sporting a similar expression to The King as he replies:

“I’ve no clue. His soul was split in two, his magic was pushed to the limit in that fight, and his body didn’t rest at all or eat much for at least a day; he’s probably just exhausted, but we should get him back to Gaius.”

Elyan, Leon, and Percival move back to gather the horses without prompting, and within minutes the gang is racing back towards the city, Merlin’s unconscious form being held protectively in front of Arthur (his excuse being that Lancelot’s horse had already held the extra weight for half a day, and he’s The King, so he can do what he wants).

Thankfully, the creature had been between their camp and the city, so it only takes them around a day to get back. They took few breaks, and ate whilst they rode to save time. Despite not waking up the entire journey, Merlin’s breathing stayed alright, and he occasionally mumbled nonsense to himself, so the knights weren’t panicking too much.

They didn’t stop when night fell, and so finally pulled into the castle courtyard at around midnight. A guard was immediately sent to wake Gaius, and Percival wordlessly took Merlin from Arthur’s horse, only after The King had given him a short nod of approvable.

They got to the Physician’s chambers to see Gaius wide awake and bustling around the room, clearing a cot and gathering various potions and ingredients.

Percival gently set the manservant on the cot, and Gaius firmly demands that they all leave the room to give him space to work, choosing to ignore the fact that he had told them that Merlin was in the city, and that they definitely shouldn’t have come back with his exhausted, unconscious body.

Arthur notes that Gaius doesn’t react at all when Lancelot stays behind, but has to temper his frustration (and jealousy) when the Physician shoots the knight a concerned look when Arthur himself also refuses to leave.

Lancelot sighs, but gives Gaius a reassuring smile:

“It’s fine, Gaius, they all know about Merlin’s magic, he’s safe. We said we’d explain when we got Merlin back in one piece.”

Gaius sends The King a curious look, hiding his concern well before he seems to catch up on what Lancelot said:

“Back in one piece?”

Arthur moves closer as Lancelot nods and begins to speak, content to let the knight explain as long as he got to stand near Merlin:

“He said it was Manducan?-”

Gaius widens his eyes in surprise, but nods, continuing to mix together various herbs as he listens:

“-Apparently, Merlin’s power was too much for it to handle, so it took the non-magical part of his soul. We found Merlin’s body being controlled by his magic. It was... odd. He was still Merlin, you could hear it in the way he spoke, or the words he chose, but it wasn’t... all of him. Just the magic part. He wouldn’t lie to us, and was desperate to get the “Merlin” part of his soul back. Unless we spoke to him he just... sat there, blankly.”

Gaius hums thoughtfully, and he and Lancelot politely pretend not to notice Arthur reaching out to gently grab Merlin’s hand.

Finally, the physician finishes mixing his potion, and gently pours it into Merlin’s mouth, holding his nose shut and massaging his throat so it goes down properly. He sits back on his chair, glancing at Arthur quickly, before looking back to Lancelot:

“The other victims began to wake just under a day ago, so I’m assuming that the creature was... dealt with?-”

At Lancelot’s nod, he continues:

“-Did Merlin wake at all when his soul came together?”

Lancelot nods again, speaking quietly, feeling oddly like he doesn’t want to disturb Arthur softly rubbing his thumb over Merlin’s hand:

“Hmm. Briefly. He screamed for a while, whilst his soul... I don’t know, stitched itself back together? Then he panicked, because he knew his magic had been outed, then he was in pain again. He said having two sets of memories from the same time hurt. Then he was just exhausted, he passed out a few moments after the pain stopped.”

Gaius nods, and Arthur finally looks up, knowing that the explanation was over, and a conversation was about to happen. The Physician speaks:

“Humans are not made for that, it would have been painful for his mind to try to comprehend and organise two separate sets of simultaneous memories.”

Arthur speaks, his voice quiet, but obviously worried:

“Will he be alright? How long until he wakes?”

Gaius looks to him once more, giving The King an assessing gaze. When he spies no anger or deception in Arthur’s face, he relaxes his shoulders slightly, and sighs:

“He will be alright, he just needs rest. Both his body and his soul have been through a great deal, it will take a few days to a week for him to fully recover physically, though I can’t speak for his mental state.”

Arthur looks panicked, and Lancelot worries his lip between his teeth as Arthur asks:

“His mental state??”

Gaius finds himself sighing yet again as he asks:

“How lucid was he, between the bouts of pain?”

Lancelot rushes to answer:

“Very. He understood what I was saying, I think, he asked a question and understood our answer. He just seemed tired.”

Gaius gives the two men an exhausted smile, before softly saying:

“Then I imagine he will be fine. Go and get some rest, I will send for you if anything changes, though it’s unlikely that he’ll wake up at any point in the next two days or so.”

Lancelot nods, and moves towards the door, but Arthur stays put. Gaius raises an eyebrow, but moves forward and puts a comforting hand on his shoulder:

“He will be fine, Sire. And... everything he has done, every lie he has told, has been to keep you safe. He couldn’t bare to lose you.”

Arthur nods absentmindedly, before looking up to the Physician, and whispering:

“I couldn’t bare to lose him either. You... you promise he’ll be alright?”

Gaius nods and smiles, noting with relief the tearful desperation on The King’s face:

“I promise.”

Lancelot smiles fondly from his place stood at the door, but wipes it from his face as Arthur turns towards him. The two men leave out of the room, Gaius’ assessing eyes following them all the way.

The door shuts behind them softly, and Gaius lets out a breath he hadn’t even realised he had been holding, before running a hand gently through Merlin’s hair, and moving to settle in his own cot.

Of all the ways Arthur could find out about Merlin’s magic, out of Merlin’s control, Gaius never saw this coming, and though the pain Merlin felt was regretful, The Physician is grateful, that it went so well.

End of Part 1!!

Part two is already almost finished. It’s much shorter than this, and will be out at some point in the next few days!! Sorry this took so long lads, I’ve been really busy atm.

EDIT: I’ve actually just finished writing part 2!! It’s queued to be published at 12:30PM GMT tomorrow (09/05/21)

EDIT 2.0: PART 2 IS UP!!

Also I couldn’t find any mythical creatures that fit what I wanted, so I straight up just made one up ✌️

Head over to This List to let me know what you want me to work on next! :)

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mayihavethisdanse · 3 years

Text

“What is this, the Dark Ages?”

Or, Arthurian themes and allusions in the Brotherhood of Steel mythos as seen in Fallout 4. (But that’s a lot of words.)

Yep. We're doing this.

First, some obligatory caveats: there is no single Arthurian canon, just 1500 years of assorted fanfic based on the whims of whoever was writing at the time. For this extremely highbrow Tumblr meta, I have ignored most of it and drawn on my favorites. Also Wikipedia.

Also, I am not an expert in Arthurian literature (or Fallout lore, come to that), and I preemptively beg the pardon of anyone who is.

Finally, in no way am I claiming that all these parallels and thematic echoes are deliberate or even significant. In fact, I'd break it down into:

Clearly deliberate allusions, whether in or out of universe;

Probably coincidence, but could be someone deliberately capitalizing on a coincidental similarity;

Almost certainly coincidence, but fun to speculate about; annnnd

Blatant Monty Python references. (Because of course there are.)

I'll start with the big one.

Arthur Maxson, boy king and unifier

(source)

So across all the retellings and variations of King Arthur’s life story, there are a few consistent elements, particularly in his early life and rise to power. Some of these threads are echoed in the Fallout universe, specifically (and unsurprisingly) in the person of Arthur Maxson.

Both the legendary King Arthur and Arthur Maxson were born with a claim to power lying in their ancestry, both were fostered away from their families, and both proved themselves in combat at a young age.

King Arthur united the warring kingdoms of Britain into a single entity, making them stronger against outsiders and receiving general admiration and acclaim. Arthur Maxson united the divided factions of the BoS after the events of Fallout 3 and is held in similarly high regard by his men.

The name Prydwen is a reference to the ship of the original King Arthur. Presumably, Arthur Maxson (or someone in the BoS who anticipated his promotion) christened the airship in a deliberate homage to the Arthurian myth.

King Arthur is associated with his legendary sword. I think it’s notable that Maxson’s legend is associated with a bladed weapon, too. ("He killed a DEATHCLAW with a COMBAT KNIFE!”)

Probably coincidence, but fun: the historical emperor Magnus Maximus, who pops up a lot in early Arthurian legend, was known in Welsh as... Macsen. (⌐■_■)

Round Table, but make it dieselpunk

(Continued under the cut.)

Moving away from obvious allusions and into some looser parallels:

Like the Round Table, the Brotherhood is an exclusive knightly order with its leader being the one able to open it up to his chosen few.

Like the Round Table, the BoS sees itself as defending human civilization against forces of chaos. (I’ll touch on their tech-hoarding tendencies when I get to the Grail stuff.) This idea of civilization in the face of chaos goes back to the BoS’s founding, even though the level of isolationism we see in most of the Fallout franchise is not exactly what founder Roger Maxson had in mind: “Notably, Maxson's ultimate intention was to establish the Brotherhood as an organization that works closely with people outside of the Brotherhood, as guardians of civilizations, not its gatekeepers.” (source) In a lot of ways, Arthur Maxson represents a return to his ancestor’s original ideals.

Renegade knights? Internal politics? Traitors within? We gotchu.

In both the medieval legends and in all chapters of the BoS we’ve seen, there’s a big focus on bloodlines (ew). Ironically, it’s probably Arthur Maxson’s unquestionable ancestry that allows him to be more progressive than either of his East Coast predecessors when it comes to boosting Brotherhood numbers by recruitment (even though you can still see a clear division between “born Brotherhood” and recruited soldiers, but that’s a topic for another day). Maxson sees himself as an Elder who "cares for the people"—however misguided and patronizing that attitude might be—and whatever else you might say about the guy, you can't say he doesn't believe he has a duty. Which brings us to…

Know Your Enemy: Danse as Gawain

Before I start this section, an acknowledgement of authorial bias:

Gawain, as portrayed in the Middle English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, is my very favorite of King Arthur’s knights. (Other stories aren't always as flattering, but like I said at the outset: I'm sticking to the ones I like.)

That poem is my very favorite piece of medieval Arthurian literature. In this section, I'll refer to the modern English translation by Simon Armitage.

...that’s it, I have no other biases to disclose.

What? 👀

(Art: Clive Hicks-Jenkins)

All right. So in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, you’ve got this himbo loyal knight of Arthur’s who finds himself caught up in... you know what, let me just paste in the Wikipedia summary. (The Toast, RIP, also did a pretty entertaining and more-or-less accurate recap.)

It describes how Sir Gawain, a knight of King Arthur's Round Table, accepts a challenge from a mysterious "Green Knight" who dares any knight to strike him with his axe if he will take a return blow in a year and a day. Gawain accepts and beheads him with his blow, at which the Green Knight stands up, picks up his head and reminds Gawain of the appointed time. In his struggles to keep his bargain, Gawain demonstrates chivalry and loyalty until his honour is called into question by a test involving the lord and the lady of the castle where he is a guest.

Don’t worry too much about the plot details, though; for this post, I’m more interested in the thematic parallels. The Green Knight story is full of contrasts: order vs. chaos, civilization vs. wilderness, mortal man vs. Other... but let’s start with Gawain himself.

Some stuff to know about Gawain:

He was "as good as the purest gold, devoid of vices but virtuous and loyal". Gawain took his principles more seriously even than the rest of Arthur’s knights, not out of pride but out of humility: "I would rather drop dead than default from duty," he says.

He’s faithful and honorable and never even tempted to betray an oath, even when offered every variety of seduction and riches, except for a single moment of weakness in a desperate desire not to be executed for random shit by powerful forces for reasons he doesn't understand.

Even though he doesn’t really understand why he needs to die, he sticks to his oath. Gawain's one weakness is a moment of desperate, private, human desire for survival. He'll submit to the headsman’s axe if he has to, but he'd still rather live.

Above all, Gawain is the ideal of a human man: he might be the bravest and loyal man there is, but he’s still fundamentally human.

You can probably see where I'm going with this.

A few more fun facts about Gawain that resonate with Paladin Danse’s story:

He’s got a bunch of really shitty brothers. (No comment.)

Gawain (SPOILERS!) doesn't actually end up beheaded, but he does willingly kneel for his execution and gets a cut on the throat as a reminder of his sin. And, uh, Danse can also get his throat cut! It doesn’t end as nicely but it’s, you know, a thing that can happen.

Gawain might be a really good guy, and he tries really hard to be one, but in the end he’s nothing more than that: there’s nothing supernatural about him, he has no special powers beyond his own principles and devotion. He’s just a dude doing his Best.

Wait, why not Danselot?

Oh, that guy? Here’s the thing.

Lancelot personifies the continental ideals of courtly love that became popular in the High Middle Ages. Central to his story is the prioritization of personal relationships and romantic feelings in a way that you don’t really see in Gawain's, at least in the Green Knight tale. (Later stories hook Gawain up with an extremely delightful lady, but even that is a different flavor of romance than Lancelot's and has more to do with Gawain honoring his word and his egalitarian treatment of women (hell yeah). In the poem, Gawain is impressed by Bertilak's wife but resists her temptation; in fact, the biggest risk is not that he'll yield to her advances but that he'll be discourteous to her, i.e., violate his principles and cause dishonor to his king and his host.)

Lancelot is driven by passions over principles in a way that Gawain never really is (at least in the stories I’m talking about; later writers have committed character assassination to various degrees). Yes, you could argue that both Gawain and Lancelot betray their oaths, but Lancelot’s betrayal is never, um, blind. He knows what he’s doing and makes a deliberate choice to prioritize his love for the queen over his love for the king. It doesn’t make him a bad guy—he too is an ideal knight with one fatal flaw—but his character isn’t as comparable to Paladin Danse.

Yeah, Gawain is (in most stories) a prince and a kinsman of Arthur’s, but he’s ultimately a native boy who doesn’t break the mold of a Knight of the Round Table. Likewise, Danse is portrayed as competent and valuable to the BoS, but not exceptional or breaking the mold of what a BoS soldier should be: he simply represents the ideal. Meanwhile, Lancelot is a foreign prince who was marked from childhood as special and fancy, and his storyline goes alllll over the place. (Much like this post.)

For example, Lancelot goes to absolutely absurd extremes to prove his devotion for no other reason than to prove it. (“I’ll do any useless humiliating thing you want. I’ll betray every oath except the one I made to you. That’s what love is!”) Gawain would never. Danse would never.

Ultimately, Gawain's tests are of his character and not of his love. And like Gawain, Danse’s devotion is to service and his principles, not to another person—even Arthur Maxson.

All that said, there are some similarities: both are beloved by Arthur, both are held up as the ideal of what a knight should be. And even if their fatal flaws are different, both make the point that no matter how good and brave and loyal they might be, no human being can be perfect.

(Except Galahad. Who is, as a result, very boring.)

I’ll conclude this section with a quote from someone else’s take on the Greek Knight poem:

I like Gawain. He’s not perfect, but he’s trying his best which is all any of us can do. He’s not like the other knights in the Arthurian legends who occasionally ‘accidentally’ kill women on their little adventures and then feel hard done by when they have to deal with the consequences of that. Gawain holds himself to a high standard – higher, it seems, than Arthur and his knights hold him to considering how hard they laugh when Gawain tells them how bad he feels about the whole thing.

I think Gawain is very relatable in this story. We all want to be better than we actually are.

And that, more than anything else, is Danse.

The Grail myth

What’s that? Lost relics of power? Better send some large armed men after ‘em!

The parallels to the BoS’s tech-hoarding ways are obvious enough that the games themselves lampshade them (albeit by way of Monty Python). But it also ties into the larger themes of “purity” versus “corruption” and the BoS’s self-image as a bastion between civilization and chaos. (See Maxson's line in response to the Sole Survivor’s quip about the Dark Ages: “Judging from the state of the world, it wouldn't be a stretch to say we're living in that era again.”)

But the ultimate futility of the Grail mission is also worthy of note. The BoS might want the power of prewar tech on their side, but they’re no more to be trusted with it than any other group of human beings. No matter how they try, the “corruption” of humanity can’t be overcome as long as they’re striving to harness power for their own ends. You can only achieve power by surrendering control of it.

The death of Arthur

The nature of gameplay being what it is, it's not guaranteed that the Arthur figure will be fatally betrayed, bringing Camelot down with him—but it's not unlikely, either.

Awkward.

Some final spitballing:

Outside the Brotherhood, there are some fun parallels of the Arthur myth with the rest of Fallout 4. Betrayal by one’s own son, for example.

The key difference between the BoS and the legendary Round Table: King Arthur’s knights, for all their flaws and human weaknesses, are usually presented as unambiguous Good Guys. The BoS is... a little more ambiguous...

...but damn if they don’t think they're the good guys.

A-ad victoriam, fellas!

#fallout #fallout 4 #brotherhood of steel #arthur maxson #paladin danse #sir gawain and the green knight #sir gawain #gawain #knights of the round table #king arthur #elder maxson #fallout 3 #fallout lore #maxson #roger maxson #look mom I did a meta

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charliedawn · 3 years

Text

How would they escape ?

You were organizing some paperwork when you hear a loud crash and multiple screams. You run to the window to see..Arthur ?! He had just jumped out of the window and crashed on a car. You run outside to see Arthur surrounded by the hospital's guards.

" Hands up, Joker ! You're going back to your cell !"

You try to make your way through the heavily armed guards to check on Arthur, but a whistle makes you turn around to see Five with..

" Oh no.."

A remote. And not any remote, the one controlling the anti-powers system.

" Be careful, Five..You don't know what you would release.."

You warn him, but he only grins widely before playing with the remote in his hand.

" That little thing ? I'm sorry, Y/N. But, you see, I already activated it the moment Arthur jumped to make a distraction. It is too late. The monsters are out now."

You hear a low growl behind you and turn around to see Penny. You know what is to follow and the soldiers seem to understand as well as they immediately draw their weapons out to fire. However, Five gives the order with a sadistic smirk.

" Penny..Attack."

In a moment, Penny is on the soldiers, opening his mouth wide and ripping the them into shreds to your utter horror. Some run away, while some continue shooting as you get down on the ground. You see Five running away, but to your horror, one of the soldiers spot him and shoots him. You hesitate, should you go and help him ? You look at him and you know. You know that you can't leave him. You run towards him and take a piece of your uniform to apply on the wound.

" Why did you do that ?! Why now ?! I don't understand !"

You ask while wiping your tears, your hands drenched in blood as you trie to think of anything to stop the bleeding.

" I..I had to do something.."

He simply answers as you hold his head on your knees, trying to make him stay awake.

You hear the loud screech of a car and look up to see the rest of the slashers in a car. They stop just next to you and Jason gets out of the car to grab Five.

"Stop !"

You shout and, to your surprise, Jason obeys you. He stops and faces you. His face is unreadable, but you know that he is listening to you.

" Five won't survive if you take him now ! Please, come back in with me ! And we can help him !"

You can see that he is hesitating. You extend your hand towards him, hoping he would take it. He looks at your hand and is about to take it when his eyes darken and he shields Five. You don't understand until you see a new set of guards arrive that open fire at Jason.

" Stop ! What are you doing ?! Stop !"

You shout, but they don't listen to you and only push you out of the way before resuming shooting. You sob as Jason kneels on the ground. The shooting stops, the soldiers thinking that they had finally gotten Jason. But, to the astonishment of all, Jason stands up again and turns towards you, cribled with bullets but still alive.

" I'm sorry, Y/N..I really thought you would be the one to save us."

He finally says to you, his hands covered in blood before he jumps in the car that starts again. The soldiers start shooting again as the car tries to dodge the bullets. Penny is getting rid of most of the soldiers, biting their heads off and ripping their limbs. You know that if you stay here, the same fate awaits you. You want to escape as well, when one of the soldiers takes you by the arm and digs the end of his gun against your temple. Penny suddenly stops to look at the two of you with wide eyes, dropping whoever's body he had been feasting on.

" One more step, and the nurse gets it !"

Penny nods in understanding, his chin covered in blood and raises his hands in surrender.

" Let her go.."

The soldier is shaking, but doesn't seem to want to let you go any time soon.

" Not a chance ! She's my ticket out of here !"

You both step back as his eyes are fixed on Penny that stares at him with animosity and glances at you with a glimpse of worry. You smile through your tears and try to reassure him, even though you had seen what he could do.

" It's okay, Penny. Everything is going to be alright.."

However, before you could make one more step, the soldier is transpierced by something: very sharp blades. He lets you go and you see that it's Freddy that came to your rescue. He winks at you before tilting his head towards the car to Penny, signaling him to get in the car. Penny nods understandingly and jumps on the top of it. Freddy then looks at you and extends his hand towards you. You close your eyes tight, thinking that he would kill you as well, but you only feel his fingers softly wrapping themselves around your wrist. You open your eyes to see a certain tenderness in Freddy's eyes as he smiles at you.

" I'm not gonna hurt you, nurse. You're the only good thing that happened to us in that asylum. This is why I'll give you a choice. Do you want to come with us or not ?"

Your eyes widen in surprise at his proposition. You look at the car and him repeatedly, hesitating. Finally, you open your mouth to give him an answer when someone else does.

" You're both not going anywhere."

Suddenly, someone shoots at him, and this time ? It's with a grappling hook. Both you and Freddy are surprised as he coughs blood and falls to his knees. Suddenly, he is dragged forward, not able to grab anything as he is dragged harshly through the snow. You turn around to see new soldiers, different from the earlier ones as they are covered in black and their weapons seem more unusual. They get a hold of Freddy that tries to get away, but seems unable too. Freddy understands that he will not be able to get away, so he looks up at the other slashers in the car and yells through gritted teeths.

" What the f*ck are you waiting for ?! Get out of here ! Do it !"

Pennywise gets out of the car, his eyes glowing yellow in the dark. He is about to come try to free Freddy, but Freddy shakes his head negatively. They both stare at each other until Freddy forces himself to yell at him.

" What are you doing, you dumb f*ck ?! I said f*cking go !"

Freddy is harshly punched as a result and Pennywise stops dead in his tracks and looks at Freddy that spits blood. A harsh contrast in the white snow. Pennywise's hands clench into fists and he growls menacingly at the soldiers. But Freddy stands up bravely and Pennywise stares at him with pain in his eyes. Freddy's eyes are filled with tears as he yells again.

" Do it !"

As he doesn't move, you decide to act as well and shout.

" Run !"

At that, Pennywise seems to snap out of it and returns in the car. They drive away and you sigh in relief. Your relief is short-lived as one of the strange soldiers punch you hard in the stomach, cutting your breath out of your lungs.

" Let her go, you f*ckers ! You got me ! Let her go ! She is just a nurse !"

One of the soldiers who seem to be the leader nods at the soldiers holding you that throw you in the snow. You take a moment to get your breath back before standing up again. You see them entering in two black cars and Freddy smiles reassuringly one last time at you before being shoved into the car. You feel a lump in your throat and run towards the cars, but they drive away as well and you fall in the snow again. You feel angry and scream so loud that it becomes painful. You then stare at the hospital with tears in your eyes and curse the day you had first entered those walls. After a while, some of the nurses come out to get your shivering form back inside.

Inside the car, as Five is the only one besides Freddy that knows how to drive, he forces himself to stay awake and brings the slashers to the address he was given. He gets numerous shocked stares from other drivers and finally shouts at one of them.

" What are you looking at, donkey ?! Yes. I'm a kid driving a car. Get over it."

However, he knows he is losing blood and needs medical care, fast. He parks in front of the appointed building and the slashers get out of the car. The building is a very gloomy tall greyish hotel that seems to have been taken straight out of an old horror movie. They are then greeted by a man that Five knows all too well.

" Hello gentlemen. Welcome to the Redemption."

But before anyone could reply, Five collapses on the ground.

#fandoms #imagine #fanfic #pennywise 1990 x y/n x pennywise 2017 #pennywise 1990 #pennywise 2017 #pennywise x reader #brahms heelsire x reader #jason voorhees x reader #michael myers x reader #freddy krueger x reader #number five x reader #the joker x reader #arthur fleck

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twinklelilstarkey · 3 years

Text

Stopping You [Part 10] - Michael Gray

Words: 8.9k+

Summary: Y/N’s recovery from both her feelings and her wound takes a step back after a specific night.

Warnings: Female!Reader. Mentions of wounds, a lot of blood, death and night terrors. Emotional cheating. Self-hate (discrediting their own sadness and feelings; hateful inner voice).

Prologue Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11

It has been a total of 24 hours.

Yesterday was a bad day. Both mentally and physically.

Polly tried her best into bringing your mood up, which worked in some way. She eased your mind by telling you that what you were feeling is completely normal, but as soon as you were alone, it was like the whole world was crashing on you.

Over crying so much as hateful questions filled your mind, you were sore at the end of the night. You contracted your muscles so much while sobbing that you could feel your wound pulsate against your skin in pain.

You questioned almost everything about your life before and after Michael left and when he reappeared. Things have changed, not just around his family, but also around you. And that seems to be one of the most confusing matters.

You never cared too much about this, but you can’t help but think about how so many things have changed since Michael came back. From your behaviors to how you function. Everything has changed in some way.

You’ve always suffered with night terrors in your life, ever since your parents left, but they were almost never about Michael. The exception being when the whole Italian/New York mafia situation went down, and Michael got injured. But other than that, it was always you, or anybody else close, that would die.

Never Michael.

You want to know what could’ve possibly awaken those thoughts and that part of your brain that makes you think like that. Could it be because you now connect him to something bad in your life? Or that when he came back, he had-

No, you’re not going there. It’s useless. It will cost you nothing pain, and it won’t grant you any answers. Might as well push that away and live your life.

Or at least try.

You bring your hot mug back to your lips and take another sip of your tea, letting your eyes fall to the ground.

Polly believes you could talk to him. Tell him about how you’ve been feeling lately. But, honestly, for what? To say that you’re falling right back in love with him just to later be thrown in the face that he does not love or feel anything for you anymore.

He. Is. Getting. Married.

It would just be simply ridiculous to do such a thing.

He doesn’t feel anything for you and that’s okay. All he feels is pity and maybe he got a little scared over you being shot, but that’s it. There are no feelings attached, no romance. No nothing. Just simply… a connection through pain, which awoke lost and forbidden memories.

Maybe this could just be your pride talking over your heart but, you just can’t believe that you’re letting yourself fall so easily. After so long of crying over him and overworking yourself to become a Peaky Blinder and just- not worry about anything in your demolished love life. All of it going to the trash because… You caught feelings for him again?

It’s disappointing to say the least.

Today, you awoke as soon as the sun made its way into the living room and since then, you haven’t done much. You walked back to your room after getting yourself a warm drink and sat by the window staring at the green grass of the neighbors’ house like it’s the most entertaining thing in the world.

A book is resting beside you. You have read a few good pages, but you can’t bring yourself to read more than 20 at a time.

Your mind is too heavy.

Voices coming from downstairs make you look away from the window and up to your door. You try your best to identify them as soon as you find them familiar.

You can hear voices and the laugher of Lizzie and Arthur. Which is awfully strange.

You scowl at the sound, and the soft patter of quick feet running around the house squeezes your heart. The kids are here too.

You rise from your seat and walk across your bedroom to the door. You open it softly and the sound of everyone’s voices is now louder. Confusion is the most prominent emotion you can feel right now, but you can’t help but welcome it better than any other one you’ve been feeling lately.

While walking down the main stairs silently, a soft gasp is heard over the loud voices. Ruby’s.

You smile at her as she spots you walking down the stairs and she quickly let’s go of her mother’s hand to run towards you.

As you’re distracted swallowing down the jab of pain at your middle while leaning down to grab her, Polly’s eyes meet you. The smile in your face is almost like a warm hug in the winter. She could get used to this sight forever.

“Look who came back from war,” Ada jokes as she spots you.

She walks towards you and her arms wrap around you as soon as you’re close enough. You lean towards her, even with Ruby on your hip, and she squeezes you in closer.

“I was so worried,” She tells you, “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

You pull away from the hug with a small smile and she gives you a wide one in return. It’s been a few weeks since you last saw her. She had left back for London not long before the whole event happened. You honestly didn’t expect to see her this soon.

As Ada moves back, everyone’s attention goes over to you. Everyone, or at least, almost everyone pulls you into a hug, sharing their words of how grateful they are from knowing that you’re still breathing.

You know they had visited you back at the hospital when you were still asleep, but nothing compares to actually seeing you move like nothing had happened. Arthur’s words, not yours.

Talking about Arthur. He was awfully apologetic while you two hugged it out. You believe he must have blamed himself for what happened, but you were quick to take that idea off his head.

You’re not about to see anybody else beating themselves for something out of their reach. Unless that’s you, of course.

Tommy and Arthur, not even 20 minutes into stepping in Polly’s home, excuse themselves and leave off to work.

The crowd in the living room doesn’t consist in much more people. Both Ada and Lizzie, and of course the kids, stayed behind and took a seat on the couch. The kids surrounded you as soon as you all sat down, while the women in front of you were distracted on talking about whatever, or rather, whoever worth of gossiping.

You listen to some of their words while being continuously pulled into conversation by Charlie as you let Ruby sit next to you, leaning to your side.

Karl is sitting closer to his mother, but looking at you and joining the conversations, nonetheless.

“What about you, Y/N?” Ada asks as she sips her tea.

“What about me?” You ask confused, obviously having no clue on what she’s on about.

“We were talking about weddings,” Lizzie explains, “Sharing our opinions on what is the best wedding. And Ada asked if you have anyone in your mind as your future husband?”

Her tone is playful more than anything. Both Lizzie and Ada expect a disgusted scowl or a roll of your eyes as an answer, but Polly can’t help but tense up against her seat at the question.

As innocent as this conversation was, it was more than powerful to push you back into your inner darkness.

“Not that I know of.” You answer, trying to mimic Lizzie’s tone.

“Oh, come on. You don’t find any man attractive?” Ada asks, putting her cup down beside her, “Not even one?”

You shake your head slowly and she stares at you with half closed eyes, almost as if she has a suspicion of some sort about your feelings towards any male presences.

“There has to be someone,” Lizzie agrees with Ada, “It’s been… what? 3 years?”

You shrug, fighting your urge to correct her since it won’t do you any justice, and the two women share a look as Polly watches all the action unfold.

“What about Finn?”

Oh god, you almost gagged right here.

Ada laughs under her breath at your disgusted yet shocked look and shakes her thoughts of that couple even be slightly real, away.

“God.” Polly scoffs out loud, making every woman rip a slight smile.

“What’s so wrong about my baby brother?” Polly asks, hands over her hips, playful grin on her face.

“Nothing is wrong,” Polly explains, “They would just be the most chaotic couple to existence. Can you imagine?”

You chuckle at her words and shake your head.

“They would burn down the church right at their wedding,” Polly jokes making both Lizzie and Ada laugh, “Probably even when saying their vows.”

There’re a few seconds of silence as the women let their giggles die down.

“Where is Finn?” Lizzie asks curious.

“Oh, Tommy has been making the boy work double the shifts now, for some reason.” Polly answers, “I don’t understand why, but they changed a lot of his shifts since their last meeting.”

“There was a meeting?” You ask confused.

Polly looks over at you.

“Yes, there was. It was only between Tommy and some of the men.” She answers with a short nod, “Nothing too important was talked about, I’m sure.”

You nod at her a little bit unsure and Charlie is quick to grab your attention back to him. He pulls you by your sleeve to look at him and he starts showing you his new toy horse, again.

You feel like you’ve seen that horse a thousand times, now.

Another conversation restarts between the women and you lean back on the couch, letting Ruby continue to play with your gold necklaces as Charlie talks his heart out about the horse that his dad gave him.

Your mind is constantly somewhere else. But this time, it focused on work. Mainly, on what the meeting could’ve possibly been about. As if any meeting with just the men was ‘not important’. They always have the most interesting meetings.

And with that train of thought, hours go by.

You were so distracted by listening to the women beside you laugh and talk, or just with looking down at the kids, that you didn’t even notice the time pass.

Your mind is still on that damned meeting, but you don’t let it get the best of you. You’re sure that the information will eventually reach you. In one way or another.

Three knocks are heard from the front door, and only Polly stands to open it. Nobody thinks too much of it. Everyone knew that eventually someone would come and pick up Ada, Lizzie and the kids.

It’s soon to be dark out, they must be almost leaving now.

“I’m sorry that we’re late.” A familiar voice sounds from the door.

Ada freezes and at the same time she looks up at you, you look up at the door. Not even 5 seconds later, Michael enters the house, followed by, of course, Gina. His blue eyes travel to the couch in the living room, and as he finds you, you’re already looking down at Charlie.

Your hand rests against Charlies’ head, smoothing his soft hair between your fingers, detangling it softly.

He forces his gaze to go back to the blonde behind him and his mother closes the front door behind them.

“Go sit. Make yourself comfortable. I’ll go make more tea.” Polly says, voice strong, not as soft as it was previously.

Ada’s and Lizzie’s eyes stay on both Michael and Gina as the couple stands in silence. They don’t find the women’s gaze as nothing more than their way to look at guests before exchanging some welcoming words, so, the tense air and shock just came unnoticed.

“Oh, hi Michael” Ada says, standing on her feet. “Didn’t expect to see you today.”

She gives her cousin a quick hug, in which he hugs back, but her eyes quickly fall on the blonde.

“And who are you?” Ada asks softly.

“Michael’s fiancée, Gina” She says with her American accent, extending her hand towards the other family member she hasn’t heard of before.

Ada shakes her hand, feeling slightly confused and shocked with her words, but, just like anyone else in this room, she’s quick to hide her emotions.

“Please, sit. I don’t want you standing all night.” Polly says to the new guests, from the kitchen door.

Michael is the first one to move towards the couches. You don’t dare to look up at him and he notices, fighting his own urge to start a conversation.

Your heart quickens the closer he gets to you and Charlie looks up at him, probably recognizing his face somewhere.

“Charlie, honey, scoot over a little.” Lizzie tells the boy.

The boy in front of you nods in response and takes his eyes off Michael. He stands on the couch and carefully steps over your lap and sits on your other side, by the arm of the couch.

Michael takes his seat next to you and you hold in your breath as your arms rest completely against one another. Lizzie moves a bit to the side and Gina sits beside her fiancée, who has his attention somewhere else.

“How are you?” Michael whispers down at you and you still don’t look up.

“Good.”

Your tone is cold and distant, which he finds extremely strange and awfully uncomfortable.

The couch is surely not large enough for 4 people, but you and Michael are having it worse than anyone else seated down on it. Lizzie and Gina have at least a few inches between themselves, while you and Michael are almost completely leaning against one another, trapped between Gina and Charlie.

Michael’s hands rest over his lap as he hears the awfully awkward conversation between the women start, not finding it at all surprising that you are paying them no absolute attention.

Ruby lets go of your necklaces for the first time and looks down at your hands.

They’re slightly sweaty over the presence of the man beside you but she pays them no mind, grabbing onto them as she eyes the expensive jewelry, surely something she loves a lot about you.

Polly comes back not too long after, and she’s quick to serve everyone another cup of tea.

You refuse any more, since you feel like you’ve already drank too much and explode your own bladder if you keep on going. And as your hand lifts to dismiss the tea from Polly, Ruby catches it.

You smile a bit at her and Michael grins slightly at the sight of the small girl being so interested in your hand. You let her twist the rings on your fingers and her gaze moves up at Michael.

His grin seems awfully contagious to her since she ends up smiling shyly at him as she continues to hold your hand up. As they do their staring contest, you look over at Charlie, who entertains himself and his mind with his new, and very loved, horse.

You sigh softly as your heart continues to beat quickly against your rib cage and you can’t tell if it’s just because you’re anxious about Michael or is it just his presence that is making you react like this.

“Have you taken your pain meds?” Polly asks.

You look up quickly as you notice that the question must be for you and a shiver runs past you as everyone’s eyes fall on you, even Gina’s.

“I will when I go to sleep.”

She gives you a disapproving look and you give her a grin in return.

“It helps me sleep.” You justify, and she sits back in her chair.

Michael grins at the exchange of words and your stubbornness and Ada notices it before continuing with her conversation.

Ruby rests your palm against hers and starts comparing both sizes.

You chuckle at her and as your body jumps at the laugh beside Michael, he looks down at Ruby to see what made you react. The small girl looks up when sensing his eyes on her and as Gina joins the conversation between the other women, Ruby extends her other hand at Michael, holding it upright.

He looks at her confused and you notice.

“She wants to compare your hand to hers.” You explain in a low whisper.

He takes his hand from his lap and extends it to her. His hands are surely bigger than yours, and that seemed to shock the small girl.

You smile as she lays her hand over his with widen eyes and Polly looks up from her tea at you, mind still on the conversation she started.

Her heart swells up at the sight. You and Michael smiling down at the girl sitting on your lap as she holds your hands up and compares them to hers. She can’t hear what you say over the loud voices and from being across the room, but she sees you saying something to Ruby, making her nod.

Michael’s smile widens at the small girl and you look up at him quickly, stealing a look before you get caught, which you don’t, not by him at least. Polly surely did, but she doesn’t say or do anything.

It’s so obvious that you still feel something for him, at least for her. But Michael seems to be unreadable, sometimes. It’s hard to figure anything out.

Gina stares at Polly while grinning at what Ada says and finds her staring at her son, she follows her gaze and clenches her jaw. The urge to roll her eyes feels stronger than her, but her bottled up rage triples at sight of you smiling.

Ruby takes her hands off yours quickly, shyly putting them close to her chest. You continue to smile down at her and as you and Michael try to retreat your own hands, she holds on to them.

Her actions are innocent, purely curious on the size of your hands, but she still leans both of your palms together, still holding them upright.

You and Michael don’t give that much of a reaction as Ruby tries to align them perfectly at the base of your palms and see the size difference from the top of your fingers.

An idea pops in your mind as your hand rests against Michael’s, and as Ruby pulls back to check the difference after so much adjusting, you slide your palm against Michael’s, so your fingers align right at the same height.

Michael chuckles at the confused look on Ruby’s face and she smiles at the contagious sound.

But as soon as the small girl notices what you’ve done, she sends you a glare, making the two of you laugh at her.

Your conjoined laughs catch everyone’s attention for a quick second and Gina doesn’t even care to take a second look. Ada smiles as she sees Ruby readjusting your palms, and, this time, it’s Michael who moves his hand, almost making his fingers only lay over half of your palm.

Ruby glares at him too and you two laugh, again.

“Alright, we’ll stop.” You tell her.

Ruby retries, but this time she has a tactic. As she makes sure that you are aligned perfectly, she holds both your and Michael’s thumb and force them to rest against the other’s back of the hand.

She leans back and stares at the difference between your hands, now happy with her achievement.

You two let her stare at the size difference with her big wide eyes, but something interrupts the sweet moment.

“Michael, honey.” Gina calls out as the conversation between everyone restarts, “Can you pass me that cup?”

Michael takes his hand off yours and you can’t help but feel disappointed at the loss of his touch. He leans forward on the couch and grabs the cup of tea for Gina from the center table, something she could easily get it herself.

You let your hand fall back to your lap and you take a sharp deep inhale, not wanting to be sitting on this couch for any longer.

You let some minutes pass, so you don’t seem like a total bitch, and when feeling ready, you lean forward on the couch, wincing in pain as your body shows to have grown sore over the lack of painkillers and from not moving at all for the past few hours.

Polly’s eyes go over to you at the sound only her seemed to notice, and you look back at her.

“I’m going to bed, I think.” You explain, making everybody get silent and look at you, “I feel exhausted.”

“Need help to find your meds?” She asks, already starting to get up, and you shake your head.

“No, no.” You hold your hand up stopping her, “Stay here. I’ll find them.”

You make sure to sit Ruby on the couch comfortably before forcing yourself up from the low couch. You fight off any sound of pain as you stand on your feet, but your face made it quite obvious.

You really should’ve taken those meds earlier.

You walk to the kitchen, trying not to show any other expression of pain, and everyone’s eyes are on you. Gina stares as you lean against the doorframe to regain your strength, yet she doesn’t feel anything in return. Not even an ounce of pity.

You stumble into the kitchen and look at the main counter, expecting the meds to be sitting right in the middle, just like you left them. But this wouldn’t be Polly’s house if they were.

Your feet get dragged as you take your time walking around to the kitchen.

You start opening every cabinet and drawer that could possibly have your meds, but there are too many to find them right away. Maybe going to bed without your meds wouldn’t be that bad.

You just need to lay down, now.

“Need help?”

You turn on your heels to find Michael by the doorway, already in the kitchen. You look away quickly back to all the drawers and try to hide any type of emotion towards his sudden appearance.

“No, I think I got it.” You answer back.

You continue to look through the many drawers and only after 2 minutes of seeing you struggle; Michael decides to move. He walks towards you and you stand still as he does so.

As he passes between you and the counter behind you, he holds onto your shoulders to make you stand back a little and let him pass. Something that surely made your skin react, but, thankfully, it all came unnoticed to him.

He opens a drawer slightly away from you and pulls out exactly what you’re looking for.

“How did you know?” You ask, curious.

“This is where she would put my meds after I got shot. It’s her drawer from stronger meds.” He explains.

How the hell did you not know that?

You walk towards him as he opens the small paper bag, taking your medicine out and handing it over to you. You take it from his hands carefully and put it down on the counter beside you.

“Thank you” You whisper at him.

You take your medicine in silence as the conversation restarts in the living room, and you try not to cringe at anything that you’re taking. Why is everything so bitter?

Whenever you’re done with one of the meds, Michael grabs them slowly and puts them back on the bag without saying anything.

He slides the drawers closed when done and you start taking the jewelry off your hands, just to start and get your way to the bed way quicker.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” He asks and you look up at him.

“No. But I’ll be.” You say sincerely before looking away and taking a step away from him, “That’s what matters.”

Michael notices your hesitation into continuing some sort of conversation, just like your slight cold tone, but he tries his best to ignore it.

“I’m going to bed,” You announce while turning your back to him and making your way out of kitchen.

“Good night.” He says as you reach the doorway.

You send him a tight-lipped smile and walk out, back into the living room. Polly is, of course, the first one to notice you.

“Did you find it?” She asks.

“Michael did.” You answer.

You walk over to her and once close, lean over and kiss her cheek. The rest of the family distracted with something else or some other type of conversation.

Michael walks out of the kitchen and you reach the stairs, after saying a quick good night, loud enough for everyone else to hear.

You jump up the steps with your rings in your hands as you bring your cold and clammy hands to your neck to try and unclasp your necklaces. Your eyes land on Michael’s as you reach the top floor and he’s staring back.

Gina calls his name in a whisper and he looks at her, breaking your eye contact. And as soon as his eyes reach Gina’s, he doesn’t hesitate into giving her a sweet smile.

As he looks back up while walking around the couch, his eyes meet nothing but some painting on the wall.

You’re not there anymore.

(…)

The sound of birds surrounds you, their soft and energized tweeting coming from the trees far away from you and some branches above you, as the warm summer wind hits your body like a warm hug.

You shift your position on the ground, laying on your stomach and looking up at the sky between the branches high up, far, far away from you.

Solitary clouds float over the bright blue sky, almost not shielding any land from the sunlight.

Your exposed back is warm, erupting into chills whenever Michael moves his hand. You close your eyes again and let yourself relax again.

A hand touches the side of your head softly and slowly you feel its fingers start to trace your hairline. You open your eyes, blinking the sunlight away, and look up at Michael.

His hand falls to your cheek as you move and a small smile spreads over his lips.

“Let me sleep,” You whine, and he finally gives you a full smile.

“Alright,” He answers in a whisper, “Sorry.”

You sigh and hold yourself up with your hands, you push your body up on his torso and his hands go to your waist. Not caring over only wearing a dress, you lay yours legs over his hips, straddling his lap while pulling yourself up.

“I forgive you.” You whisper back playfully.

You snuggle into the crook of his neck and his smell hits you like an embrace. The small bit of communication pulled you away from your sleepy thoughts and movements, but you still felt just as clingy and slow.

As you lay back against him, his arms wrap around you, pulling you close to him with everything in him. You snuggle in to welcome his tight hold and one of his hands stretches over your skin of your back.

You’re wearing a simple black dress, baggy from your waist down, but completely backless.

“Can we lay here for, like…” You pause, “Forever?”

Michael chuckles from under you and leans his head to the side to rest it against yours.

“We’ll get hungry eventually.” He answers, and you smile.

“I’m sure there’s some animals around here.” You continue to play around, smile prominent in your voice.

“I hope you know how to make a fire, then.”

You giggle into Michael’s neck and pull away slightly. His hold loosens slightly so you can move a bit and you look down at him.

“Don’t you know how to make a fire?” You ask and he frowns.

“Why would I?”

“I don’t know” You shrug, “Weren’t you like a country boy or something?”

With that, Michael lets out the biggest belly laugh ever, leaving you to smile as he cackles away at your words. Your tone had been obviously playful, but it still made it just as funny for him.

“I lived at a farm. I wasn’t a cave man!” He exclaims, tilting his head to look at you better.

“Sounds the same to me.”

He smiles at you and you bring one of your hands to his cheek, caressing it with your thumb. You lean in and give him the softest peck you could. When pulling away, you look at him in the eyes as he tries to pull you into another kiss. You let him, letting your lips rest over the softness of his as you too fall into the pit of slow and lovingly making out.

He sits up in the middle of the kiss and you sit over his legs as he does it. His hands travel effortlessly down your waist to your legs, lifting your skirt enough to slither in his hands underneath.

You pull away and look down at him as you stand on your knees, adjusting your seating on his thighs. You peck his lips multiple times before sitting back and eyeing him.

“I love you” He confesses in a whisper, eyes staring back onto yours, “so much”

“Really?” You ask, serious, leaning a little back and he frowns.

“Yeah…?”

He’s confused, but soon your playful smile reappears.

“How much, again?”

“A lot.”

“How much is ‘a lot’?” You keep going. “Like, ‘a lot’ like the size of a mountain or ‘a lot’ as in…” You think for a second, but he interrupts.

“How old are you again?” He teases about your childish words and you force your smile to disappear, just so you can scowl at him.

“Oh, fuck off” You say to him, “I was trying to be cute here, no need to ruin the moment for us.”

“Alright, keep going then” He says, “The size of a mountain or…?”

“Uhm… The size of…” You try to think, mind completely blank over any ideas. “The size of… the ocean?”

He chuckles at your final words and you grin.

“The ocean.” He says, sure of his words, no hesitation.

You stay silent for a bit.

“Which one?”

“Oh, come on!” He says, completely bored out of this conversation, making you laugh at him, “The biggest one you can think of”

“Really?”

“Yes. Now, can you please” He emphasizes the word comically, dragging it, “for the love of God, just tell me that you love me back?”

You kiss his lips over his frown.

“You’re so romantic.” You comment sarcastically.

“I know.”

You smile at him and decide not to give in just yet. The boy can suffer for a bit.

Telling him that you loved him now or in 5 minutes won’t exactly make that much of a difference.

You stand up on your feet, away from his lap, and he stares up at you while letting out a sigh.

“You gotta earn it.” You say with a playful look, making his frown break slightly.

“Oh really?”

“Yes.” You nod.

You take a step back as he stands up and your smile doesn’t disappear at all as you move away from him. Every step forward from Michael is a step back for you, making his urge to get to you bigger.

And soon, the running around starts.

You laugh as you run from him, sometimes feeling his fingers graze over your arms, making your heart beat faster with the adrenaline.

The tall weeds slap the skin of your exposed legs softly, tickling you as you ran away from your boyfriend. The scenery in front of you motivates into keeping on running, the summery flowers all open and colorfully staring up at the sky.

All you hear is your soft steps over the plants and the birds, it gives you peace. You can still hear Michael running behind you.

You let out a giggle as he’s about to touch you and out of nowhere, it stops.

The warm breeze lifts into a cold one and you look around confused.

You know that the weather can be unpredictable, but this is too radical for it to make sense.

Your hands start getting cold rapidly and soon your body is enveloped into complete body chills, your dress being nothing but useless when it comes to make you stay warm.

The breeze goes from cold to freezing in the matter of seconds, leaving you nothing but panicked.

You feel lightheaded and short of breath and as you try to warm yourself up with your own arms, soon you realize… You can’t feel your own palms touching your skin.

The sunlight fades as clouds fly their way in to color the skies a dark grey and you stare up.

You’re in a dream.

You’re dreaming.

You look over your shoulder at Michael to find him just as confused just a few steps away. He must have stopped running right as you did. But his skin, is not reacting like yours. His exposed arms, from the folded sleeves are not reacting to the cold in chills. It’s like it’s not affecting him.

He’s not the real Michael.

“What’s happening?” He asks you.

“I don’t know” You lie. You know exactly what’s happening.

Your dream is becoming a nightmare.

You look around as the wind gets harsher and your heart starts to beat more violently, just like your shortness of breath forces you into panting your way to find your peace again.

You step closer to Michael and cup his face.

He stares back at you still with his confused eyes and you kiss him. Your lips touch his and his hands come to rest over your waist as the wind continues to come at full force towards you.

Your hands feel numb, not being able to feel the texture of his suit, just like you had felt a few minutes prior. But you feel his hands, the way they rest on your waist, warming your skin under the violent and freezing wind.

“I love you,” You tell him as you pull away.

You open your eyes and you’re met with Michael’s pale face. His eyes are empty, with absolutely no light or sign of life.

You caress his cold cheeks with your thumbs, and you notice blood over his bottom lip. His hands had fallen a second ago from your waist, and you already miss his familiar warmth.

You bring your finger to wipe the blood away carefully and notice that it’s all over his mouth, coloring his white bottom teeth.

A small trail of blood starts falling off his nose and soon from his ears as well, slowly coloring your hands into the color red.

Red, hands completely filled with deep red, now that you try and wipe it.

Michael falls onto his knees and you do the same, holding him close to you even though it’s just his corpse. He’s cold and his hold is not even there anymore. His arms are by his sides as his head rests over your shoulder.

You wrap your arms around him, and the wind becomes more and more violent.

You force your eyes closed and let it take you too.

You open your eyes, and a loud gasp escapes your mouth. You’re not panting anymore, but your heart is beating quickly.

You try to sit up, but a sudden jab of pain hits you. You gasp and wince in pain but still bring yourself to do it. A sob escapes your mouth too right as you’re able to sit upright.

Your face feels wet and cold in the air of the room. You must have been crying before you woke up.

You whine in pain as you bring yourself to turn on the light beside you and as the warm yellow light illuminates the room, all you see is blood.

Your own blood, spread around your white shirt and white sheets, painting your hands just like in your dream.

“Pol-” You try to call out, but your voice breaks in a sob as pain runs through you.

You sob into the empty and silent air and try it again.

“Polly!” You sob out loud, hoping that that was enough to awake her if it’s late enough for that.

You wait a few long seconds for any sound coming from the hallway or stairs, but nothing.

“Polly!” You try to scream louder.

Polly holds her hand up to shut up Gina and the room falls silent. Michael leans forward from the railing of the stairs and looks at his mom confused; arms still crossed over his chest.

“Poll-” You cough.

Michael, before Polly could even get up, makes his way up the stairs and runs down the hall, trying his best to be fast enough to get to your room.

Your door swings open and you continue to sob as the lights are turned on.

“I don’t know what I did wrong.” You sob to whoever is at the door, staring down at your hands, “I-I, I woke up and…”

Michael shakes his shock away at the sight of your bed all bloodied, just like your hands, and walks towards you. His eyes fall to your shirt and notices from where your blood is coming from, your wound.

“Mom!” Michael shouts while looking up at the door.

Your ears start to buzz as panic starts to set in in your system and two hands move yours away from your eyes.

“You’re okay, you’re okay.” The voice repeats and you sob helplessly.

Michael sits in front of you in the bed and brings you close to him, ignoring that he’s now being covered in blood as well.

He makes you rest your hands on his shoulders so that they’re away from your eyes and starts to unbutton some of the buttons of your shirt.

Polly finally gets to the door and the sight is absolutely terrifying.

“She ripped stitches. I think.”

Polly forces herself to walk to the bed and to help Michael check your wound. He continues to unbutton your shirt with one hand only and he’s quick to rip the bandage off.

You sob in pain as he does it and both him and Polly try to look past the blood and ignore your sobs to see what happened to your wound. It opened, maybe 3 of the 9 stitches ripped.

“I’ll call the doctor.” Polly says.

Michael nods and holds you closer to him, not wanting you to move too far away. Your side rests against his chest and he wraps an arm around your shoulders, while one of his hands grabs the sheets and holds them over the wound.

You sob silently while leaning closer to him and he looks up at your face.

“Hey. You’re okay, look at me.” He whispers at you and you do it, “You’re okay. It’s not too bad. You’re safe. I promise.”

You stare at him in the eyes and he leans his forehead against yours.

“You’re okay” He whispers lower.

You nod as tears continue to roll down your face and he nods with you. Your breathing starts to slow down, and he presses a kiss over your wet cheek.

“I got you.” He whispers against your skin.

(…)

Michael sighs loudly as he walks into the kitchen and he feels exhausted.

“Is the doctor finished?” Polly asks him and he just nods, “And her?”

“Passed out before he could even start” He answers, “The doctor said to just let her sleep.”

He walks towards the sink and he turns on the water, holding his bloody hands under it. The two women standing in the kitchen are silent, watching him wash his hands carelessly while staring at the wall.

“I’ll go get you a clean shirt.” Polly says.

His mom walks out of the kitchen and he turns off the water, turning around to face Gina.

“Are we going to the hotel after this?” She asks softly.

“I can drive you there, but I’m staying here, tonight.”

She takes a deep breath and brings her hands to her head, annoyed.

“Why? She’s asleep. You can visit her tomorrow.” She tries.

“I’ll sleep better here.”

She scoffs.

“You’re fucking unbelievable.”

“I’m unbelievable?” Michael answers, bringing his hand up to point at his own chest.

“Yes!” She almost screams, “You are unbelievable! And you want to know why?” She asks, “Because no matter what I fucking do or fucking say, you will always put her before me.”

“Always, Gina? Are you serious?” Michael asks in disbelief, “You’ve been my fucking priority ever since we met, and now because I show some sort of affection towards a girl that is fucking bleeding and crying her lungs out, I’m supposedly putting her before you?”

“Yes! I don’t even know what you had with her before me!” She shouts, “Ever since I step foot into this shit hole I’ve been listening to her name and seeing her over and over again. Do you really think I believe that she’s simply a ‘family friend’?” She air-quotes.

“You want the truth?” He asks, no shouting needed, but he sounds mad.

“Yes.”

“We dated for 4 years, almost 5. I ended our relationship when in America.” He answers and Gina stands silent, “See? I can tell you the truth when you ask nicely.”

“And if you broke up why do you still like her?” She asks, ignoring his hateful tease at the end of his sentence.

“You have to be joking-”

“Are you going to say that that’s a lie?” She asks, crossing her arms over her chest, “Let me give you some of my truth, Michael. I honestly don’t give a shit about what you two went through, or if you were in a good relationship or not when with her, but you broke up. I don’t care why, but you did. And there was a time when you chose me over her. That’s why you proposed, right?”

Michael doesn’t answer her.

“So, please, for the love of God, stop being a child and move on with your life. You’ve been mopping around her, touching her all the time as if you’re dying to do it at every second of the day… Even if she does still like you, you are with me now, not her.” She spits at him, “Move. On. She’s not yours anymore, Michael. I am.”

He swallows hard at her words and looks at her emptily.

Polly makes her way back inside the kitchen, acting as if she didn’t hear a thing, but that seems to not scare off Gina from continuing.

“Are you even listening to m-?”

“I am.”

“Then say something, Michael.” She scolds, “Is it not true, what I’m saying?”

Polly looks between them as if waiting for it to evolve in any way, and simply extends her hand towards Michael, so he can grab the clean shirt.

“Is she your priority or no-”

“Yes.” Michael answers, “Y/N is my priority.” He nods, sure of himself and his words. “Yes, I’m engaged to you, Gina, but I care for her, and she will always be my priority.”

Gina bites her tongue and looks at Michael.

It honestly comes to no surprise. She had just thrown these words at him not that long ago, at lunch. He had just never confirmed it for her, and now… he did. But ‘always’? You will always be his priority? Now, that, doesn’t sit right with her.

They stand in silence and Michael leans back on the counter, finally taking the shirt from his mom’s hands. He thanks her with a look but to no avail because her eyes are not even on him.

“You’re serious?” Gina comments in slight disbelief.

“I am.” Michael confirms.

“What does that mean for us, then?” She asks.

Michael stays silent and the blonde slides off the highchair she has been sitting on, standing on her heels. Her eyes stay on him as tears threaten to swell up at her eyes.

“I’m not sure.” Michael answers truthfully.

She nods at his words and brings her eyes to the ground. She feels disappointed but mostly betrayed. Her eyes are good to show that emotion, but soon, it evolves into something else. Pure anger. Anger over the betraying words and truth, the one that just got thrown around as if it was nothing.

And Polly notices it.

“I think it’s better if you leave, Gina.”

Michael takes his eyes off his fiancée to stare at his mother, who just opened her mouth. He didn’t expect her to get herself involved in his worries, but she did.

“What?” Gina asks, bringing her head back up to stare at Polly.

“You heard me.”

Her eyes travel to Michael in hopes that he would defend her, but nothing. He’s just staring back at her, almost holding the same look as his mother.

He doesn’t want her here. He wants her to leave.

She shakes her head, overcome with emotion, and forces her feet to move. Her palms tingle with the idea of hitting something, or rather, someone, but her eyes fill with tears.

How could have she been so stupid?

She slams the front door shut behind her and the Gray family stand in the kitchen unphased.

“Rather dramatic that one, uh?” Polly asks her son.

Michael doesn’t answer her venomous comment, but that didn’t seem to surprise her. His mother walks around the counter and grabs the cup Gina used for her whiskey, bringing it to the sink so she can wash it.

It’s like this conversation didn’t affect her a slight bit.

Michael feels weird. He doesn’t regret telling Gina anything but the look she gave him spoke more than any of her words could. She felt betrayed by him, and she was holding back so many emotions and words.

He knows that if it wasn’t for his mom, Gina would be screaming at him, maybe even throwing stuff at the walls. Just like she usually does when she’s upset. But she didn’t do anything, she decided to contain herself and not scream or even curse him out.

And honestly, Michael doesn’t know what’s worse. The fact that she could be destroying his mom’s kitchen or the fact that she’s bottling up all her frustration and anger.

He thought he knew Gina before coming back home, but the trip only made him and her show their true colors. One can’t stop comparing his newfound love to his old one, and the other obsesses over the idea of power and desperately wanting to overthrow anyone in her way.

Quite a pair, that’s for sure.

(…)

You open your eyes as the lights burns your eyelids open and an involuntary groan runs off your mouth as you’re hit with the morning light right in the face. You turn your head to the side, but you’re met with another window with the curtains open.

“Fuck.” You curse out loud.

You sit up and another sound escapes your mouth, but this time, a whimper of pain.

It takes you a few seconds to connect the dots and you finally remember why you’re in pain in the first place.

“Jesus Christ.” You comment to yourself, again.

Your bloody sheets are set to the side, right next to your door, and before your mind could even try to process it, you push any thoughts of your nightmare away from you.

You pull yourself up carefully and try to ignore the tightness that you feel over your wound. You’re not quite sure what happened after the doctor appeared, but if you’re still at Polly’s house, it could only mean one thing…

It’s not as bad as it looked.

You walk to the bathroom and the sight that meets your eyes is, just, great.

Your shirt is mostly unbuttoned, bloodied, just like your bra. Some of your skin has been cleaned, but not all. Your face as some blood smeared on it, but it doesn’t surprise you. You remember moving so much when you woke up, it would be a miracle it your feet would be clean.

You throw the clothes into the bin and start cleaning yourself off. You can’t exactly bath over having to make the wound be dry at all times. But you have been able to manage quite nicely. With weird positions, for sure, but you’re able to wash your body and hair quite nicely.

You put on some washed clothes on and make your way out of the bedroom. It must be really early since the house is more than silent.

Before you walk down the stairs, you walk over to the guest’s room just to check. Finn is laying on his back over the large bed, mouth partly open as some light snores escape his lips, making you smile at him.

You take a step back and close the door back up. He must’ve gotten here after the doctor.

You make your way down the stairs easily, and as soon as your eyes land on the couch, you see Michael.

He’s awake with a mug on his hands, eyes on the carpet as he is completely lost in thought. He has a scowl over his face, hiding any kind of emotion from anyone’s eyes, and as your feet finally meet the last step, he looks up.

His scowl disappears and a slight grin appears over his lips.

“Good morning.” You say before he could.

“Good morning.” He answers back.

You walk towards him and he watches you as you carry yourself with ease over to the couch. You take a seat next to him and notice that his mug is still filled with warm coffee.

He extends the mug your way when noticing your interest and you smile, taking it.

“Thank you.” You whisper.

The hot mug burns your cold palms, and you welcome the almost uncomfortable heat into your skin. You bring it to your lips and take a small sip of the dark liquid.

You’re sitting close to Michael, sitting on top of one of your legs as you sit looking at him. You’re not wearing much more than a shirt, exposing your legs to him and to anyone in the house, but you don’t seem uncomfortable with your lack of clothing.

“Are you feeling okay?” He asks and you bring the mug down from your mouth, licking your lips at the same time.

“Yeah” You nod.

You give him back his mug after taking your generous sips and he takes it back onto his hands.

“When did Finn get here?” You ask him, curious.

“About half an hour after the doctor left.” He answers, leaning forward to put down the burning mug on the coffee table, finding it impossible to drink from how hot it is, still.

You nod at as his answer and while you’re thinking about what else to ask, he speaks again.

“You scared the living shit out of us last night.” He says, making you look back at him.

His eyes are back on the carpet and your chest tightens at the sight.

“I’m sorry.” You apologize.

“Don’t.” He says, finally looking back up, “It’s not your fault.”

He leans back on the couch and both of you continue to look at each other. The air is not thick as it usually is, it’s light and easy to breathe in. Your looks are both familiar, always taking your minds back in time for a quick second.

Your mind takes you to your dream and soon his pale face reappears in your mind. You shake the thoughts away, right as Michael opens his mouth to talk.

“Are you hungry?” He asks, “I can make you something to eat.”

You smile widely at him and bring your hands to your lap.

“Are you finally proving yourself useful around the house?” You tease, making him smile back, “I must be in a dream. Since when do you-”

“I’ve always been able to cook” He defends himself.

“Yeah, right.”

“It’s true!”

“Michael, you couldn’t even cook potatoes!”

“Couldn’t!” He says to you, leaning forward to be right in front of you, “Things have changed in my kitchen.”

A laugh escapes your lips as he smiles down at you and he stands from the couch. He gives you his hand and as soon as your palms touch, he pulls you up from the couch.

“Come on, I’ll show you my experienced cooking.” He encourages as you take small, demotivated steps his way, “Do you want me to make you potatoes, just so I can prove my point?”

“No.” You giggle, “Just- Do whatever.”

He turns around and starts walking to the kitchen, letting your hand fall from his as you stay a little behind.

“You know what?” You ask him as you get in the kitchen, making him look back at you, “Maybe you’re not as insufferable as I thought you were”

Michael laughs at your words as you say them, and he nods.

“Oh, why, thank you!” He says enthusiastically, “Aren’t you lovely right as the sun rises?”

You let out a loud laugh and he moves over behind the island counter, looking around the cabinets to look for something to cook for you.

You stare at the back of his head as he walks around and take a seat on one of the chairs.

One could get used to this.

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#michael gray x reader #michael gray #michael gray imagine #michael gray imagines #michael gray fic #michael gray fanfic #peaky blinders #peaky blinders imagine #peaky blinders imagines #finn cole #finn cole x reader #finn cole imagine #finn cole imagines

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fuckingthefictional · 3 years

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Red Stained Dress

Request: “I hope you’re having a wonderful day/evening/afternoon/night! May I request Reader being a cousin to the Shelby’s (mother’s side) and being very very like lady-like, clean, expensive clothes. And one of the boys gets blood on her dress? If that’s alright? Thanks in advance.”

A/N: I made this entirely too angsty for my own good, either way hope you enjoy!

Warning: Graphic descriptions of violence, swearing, blood.

“Mummy what is falling in love like?”

“My darling, it is one of the best things in life. It is special and sacred. It makes life worth living, it makes the world that little bit brighter.”

“When will that happen to me?”

“Time will tell my sweet girl, but be patient- love is always lurking around corner, where you least expect it.”

Your mother was right. It did lurk around the corner and it caught your heart in its grasp and lead you to love. To your husband.

At the age of 20 you went from Y/N Strong to Y/N Massey. Wife of James Massey. You were happy, at peace.

But your mother had failed to explain the complexities of love. That it didn’t come easy. There was darkness and rockiness. And love didn’t always last.

For you it broke in front of you. When your husband was taken on the battlefield- somewhere in France.

And suddenly you were a widow, you were alone.

Your mother and husband had passed. The only person left was your father (if you could even call him that)- Charlie Strong.

On her deathbed your mother had begged you to go and make amends with him. Even going as far to write down his address on a piece of paper for you to keep.

But you hadn’t plucked the courage to do that yet. To you your father was just a man who ran from his wife and child at the first moment he could.

There was only one trait that you shared with that man. And that was your love of horses. You had always had a connection with animals. Horses and dogs in particular would just flock to you- who knew maybe it was in your blood.

“Ms Massey?” A quiet voice interrupted your heavy stream of thought, looking up you saw one of the many maids that worked at the house standing in the entry way to the library.

“Is everything alright Mary?” You asked.

“Ms Carleton has just arrived for you ma’am, she’s waiting for you by the car.”

You nodded, rising from your armchair and taking one last glance at his armchair before you left for the day.

May and yourself were going to a horse auction, you’d been looking forward to it for weeks.

You were both looking for some new horses to take on and train, as well as some new potential clients.

“Stop dallying Y/N!” Your friend’s familiar voice rang out, “The auction starts soon, we’ll miss out at this rate!”

You rolled your eyes towards May, silently dismissing her joking jabs at you.

“We won’t be late May,” You reprimanded, “stop fretting.”

“The clock says otherwise.”

“Ladies like us are never late,” You waves your hands to prove your point, “everyone else is simply early.”

May giggles in response, “if you say so Y/N/N.”

You swatted at your close friend jokingly, you were hoping for a successful, calm day- but trouble always did seem to follow you every place you went.

“Ladies and Gents we will start our bidding at 50 pounds.”

The horse auction was surprisingly crowded, it seemed that quite a few people had come to see what breeds could be found at the auction house that afternoon.

It was dwindling down to the last few stallions and the occasional mare. All in all you had been successful in purchasing two stallions and a mare of your own.

The last horse on auction in question was beautiful, it was a stallion- dark and shiny in colour, its legs were long but muscled. A perfect contender for you to train for the races.

You raised your hand in interest.

“50 pounds here,” the auctioneer spoke, looking around at everyone else, “Going once, twice-“

“150 pounds.”

Your head whipped round, looking for the man who was trying to outbid you.

“300” you spoke again.

“500” A murmur rippled through the crowd.

You weighed up your options, it was a lot of money for a single horse- you didn’t want to blow through every single penny you had to your name.

“Going once, going twice-“

“1500 pounds.” A new voice had cut out, there were shocked murmurs erupting throughout the stands of people.

The gavel banged on the table, signifying the final action of the day, as people began to disperse from the auction house- you could finally see the man that had snatched the last horse up.

You knew who it in an instant- it was Thomas Shelby. Your cousin Thomas.

Swallowing a lump in your throat, you began to make your way down the stairs with May. Silently you found yourself praying that he hadn’t taken any notice of your presence.

God didn’t listen of course.

“Y/N?”

You took a deep inhale, as you rushed down the stairs to try and escape.

“Y/N!”

Fuck, there was no chance of outrunning them.

You quickly murmered that you would catch up to your friend, before you slipped through the doors arena like stage.

The doors itself open and closed behind you, before it was repeated again.

Here goes nothing I suppose.

You breathed in a shuddering breath as you turned to face your estranged family members.

They were all there. Thomas, John, Arthur, as well as another two men that you didn’t recognise. Not to mention the man that you had long since called your father.

You put on a polite smile, which probably looked far too forced, “Good Afternoon Thomas.”

“What are you-“

“What are you doing ‘ere ‘ey?” Your father cut Tommy off, questioning your motives as his piercing eyes stared into your similar ones.

The action only caused a swell of anger to swirl in her belly.

“I assume the same reason that you are- business.” You spoke simply, biting down on your tongue to keep any more words at bay.

“And what ‘business’ do you have here Hmm?” Tommy’s gruff voice asked.

“Jesus I’m just here to purchase any horses that look good enough to ride professionally- what is your probl-“

“Mr Shelby.”

Everything that happened next, happened all too quickly. Because before you could even register what was happening there was a yell coming from one of your cousins.

“Get down!” John’s voice had cut of your own with a loud yell, as you were suddenly tackled to the floor.

A loud crack rippled through the air as the wooden banister above you splintered into two, a bullet lodging itself in the wall behind it.

You peeled up behind the curtain of hair that had fallen in front of your eyes, “What the fuck?” You screamed in fear, shock melting into every nerve and muscle in your body.

Another gunshot pierced out, as it shattered the large window close by into thousands of shards.

A part of you didn’t want to believe that this was happening- surely it was just a dream? A terrible, horrific nightmare?

Another crack of a bullet being launched sounded close to you, peeping up from behind your quivering hands you saw that it was Thomas who had fired it.

Thomas who had fired a fatal shot into another man’s head. Thomas who had caused the death of a man, who may have had a wife, or a child or a family.

But nothing could’ve prepared you for the sight that was to come next. The sight of your eldest cousin brutally throwing punch after punch after punch at another man’s face.

The sickening sounds of flesh hitting flesh and bones shifting and cracking under the weight of Arthur’s meaty fists continued to echo around the room.

The man’s face slowly becoming mangled into mush, the sand below him becoming stained with crimson blood - you knew you couldn’t take it for a moment longer.

Swallowing your fear, you jumped off of the ground, screaming desperately for Arthur to stop.

You tried to pull him off, only to be knocked backwards onto your back. You felt the air leave your body as you collided with the ground.

You shifted back onto your feet, ignoring the pain surging through your spine. Watching as your father, Tommy and another man ripped Arthur away from the scene.

Crawling over you to the motionless body, you lifted two fingers to his neck. Frantically searching for a pulse. After a few seconds you found one, “He’s still alive- but his pulse is weak, he needs-“

Once again you were cut off by your father, “John take Y/N to the car.”

“What? No!” You protested, “did you not hear me- that man is dying he needs a doctor now.”

Within seconds you felt your body lift off the ground and over someone’s shoulder.

“Stop! You can’t do this!” You were screaming desperately, you voice becoming hoarse “What is wrong with you?”

The feeling of tears running down your face, alerted you to just how upset you felt. You just watched your family kill- like they were predators.

A few short minutes later, you felt your feet finally hit the floor. Looking around you grasped onto the nearest solid object that you could find.

The car was cool to touch and it calmed your raging thoughts for a second before a swell of nausea hit. You wanted to be sick, to cleanse the memories of what you had just witnessed away.

“Y/N...” John’s voice held care, like he was tiptoeing around what had just happened, “About what you just saw.”

“You didn’t see anything.”

You’re head shot up angrily, Tommy stood in front of you, with the rest of the group of men behind him.

“Really because the blood on my fucking dress says otherwise,” you fined, lYou’re fucking insane- you just killed two men, two men who may have had families that will never see them again.” Tears welled up in your eyes, “You should feel ashamed.”

Tommy rolled his eyes, “If we didn’t kill them, they would have killed us.”

“We all have a part to play in this world Tommy- you don’t get to decide who lives, who dies and who tells the story. You’re just a selfish coward who shoots first and asks questions later.”

“Y/N you can’t say that- he’s your family.”

Your head whipped around, quick enough that you swore you could’ve gotten whiplash. It was your father who had spoken those words.

“You don’t get to say anything to me- you do not have that right anymore, you lost that a long time ago,” You jabbed a finger into his scrawny chest, “Family Hm? You lot stopped being my family years ago. None of you came to my wedding, none of your cared when my husband was killed, and you ‘dad’ disowned me before I could walk- so don’t you dare lecture me about family.”

“You’re still apart of this family Y/N.”

You rolled your eyes, “Well if that,” you pointed back over to the auction center, “is what being apart of this family is then I have no fucking interest in being apart of it.”

Family isn’t always to do with fucking blood- it is what you make it.

#peakyfookinblinder #peaky blinders x reader #peaky blinders imagine #peakyblinder #peaky blinders #peakyblinders #requested #tommy shelby x sister!oc #tommy shelby x sister!reader #tommy shelby x reader

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writingwithacupoftea · 4 years

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A family reunited

Summary: Shelby family dinners always bring some drama with them...but none of the brothers expected their sister, Y/N, to join them. After all, she had been missing for 5 years.

Word Count: 3147

A/N: First time writing a fic with a word count over 3000, baby!!! All of the brothers are actually in this but, let’s be honest, Tommy always gets more attention in my writing than anyone else. Let me know what you think of this one, and enjoy!

Part 2

Sometimes you can be better off not knowing the truth. Because the knowing the truth can make your worst nightmares an inescapable reality. A reality that can bring everything crashing down around you.

And that's how the Shelby clan felt about knowing the fate of their sister, Y/N.

Y/N Shelby was 23 when the war began, one year Tommy's junior. Before her brothers left for France, she left them with the promise of having their Mother's favourite sponge cake waiting on the table for them when they got back. She would have to save her money and actually figure out how to make it, but Y/N swore that she'd do it (somehow, even if it did turn out to be an atrocity).

But when the boys stepped through the door of the Shelby residence again in 1918, there was no cake waiting for them. It had been four years, they reasoned, maybe she'd forgotten. Even that didn't seem to sit right with the brothers, however - Y/N always kept her promises, no matter when they were made.

It was like a dark cloud was looming over the house, but none of them could see what had caused it. Something wasn't right at number 6 Watery Lane.

After embracing Polly and Ada, who had tears flowing down their faces at the mere sight of them, Tommy immediately asked where Y/N was. Their silence had told him everything. Not waiting for an explanation, Tommy stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind him.

It was no secret that Y/N and Tommy shared a close bond; they always had each other's backs and always made time for each other. Despite there only being one year between them, Tommy was especially protective over Y/N, as he didn't want anything to happen that might risk her leaving him alone. He couldn't cope without her, for Y/N was both his rock and his light, even though she carried her own darkness with her.

It was dusk when Tommy finally returned, wanting answers. Polly simply presented him with the letter that had been left for herself and Ada on the night that Y/N vanished, for that was all she knew. It said that she had to go away for a while, to not tell Tommy, John or Arthur as she didn't want to worry them, and that she'd be back home as soon as she could. The letter was dated back to 1916. Two years ago. And no one had heard anything from her since.

Tommy refused to look up at his family after reading the letter over and over again, not wanting them to see the tears that glazed his cold blue eyes. He grabbed his bag (effectively hiding the shaking that had taken over his hands) and mumbled something about going to unpack, before retreating straight up to his bedroom, actively avoiding the pitiful looks being sent his way.

The only other time the family saw Tommy that night was when he walked through the parlour and back out of the front door again. They assumed that he was going down to Charlie's yard, where Y/N and Tommy always went together to talk. It was their special place, for they both possessed a deep-rooted love for horses and always found themselves wandering back to their Gypsy roots. When they were both younger, the siblings would be out for days on end riding in the open air. What a distant memory that was now.

According to their uncle, Tommy didn't leave the yard until the sun was fully risen the next morning.

***

Y/N Shelby had been well known to the Birmingham Police from a young age: she had a, quite frankly, remarkable ability to escape the officers no matter how tight of a spot she had managed to get herself into. She was a listener, and had an impressive memory for information that could be of use at some point in the future. Her brain, in combination with her physical abilities to slip away from or outrun trouble, made her an absolute nightmare for the coppers of Small Heath.

She built up such an impressive reputation that, during the war, she had been asked to put her talents to good use. Y/N was recruited as a spy by British Intelligence, and went undercover in Germany to retrieve vital information which ultimately helped the Allies to win the war.

It was an opportunity that she would never have been able to resist. Her brothers had always treated her as an equal when it came to the family business (although Tommy was sometimes unwilling for her to take part in certain activities); it had annoyed her immensely when they went away to fight and she couldn't do anything to help.

(She had tried to become a nurse with Ada, but was also kicked out because she couldn't stop laughing when her sister had started laughing).

But this was her way around it and, as far as she was aware at the time, her brothers would never have to know about her dangerous escapades.

However, not even Y/N Shelby was the perfect criminal or spy. In the March of 1918, she had been on the verge of completing her latest mission when the plan had gone awry. Instead of using her limited time to escape, she had ensured that the information she had gained was communicated properly to her associate. This decision left her with an open police case in Germany, and Y/N was forced to go into hiding.

As that fact hit her, only one word came to mind: shit.

***

For a year after returning home Tommy searched for Y/N, and turned up nothing. She seemed to have disappeared without a trace. His desperation fuelled his ambition: Tommy wanted to make it big, not just for money but for status and connections. This, he hoped, would provide the opportunities to dig deeper and give him access to speak to the right people, so that he could find out where his younger sister was.

Because despite the slight shadows that lurked in the back of his mind, he clutched onto his conviction that Y/N was still alive somewhere. He didn't believe in much these days, but he would always believe in his sister.

But in 1920, even Tommy was starting to have his doubts, though he refused to admit them or accept them. His search was beginning to become futile and none of his fucking contacts had been able to turn up everything.

And so Tommy began to spiral further and further downwards, for Y/N wasn't there to stop it and he didn't have the strength to do it alone.

By the time 1921 had rolled around, the family had pretty much given up all hope that their sister was still alive. However, none of them wanted to be told that harsh truth. What they didn't realise, though, was that it couldn't be further from the truth.

***

Polly Gray wasn't a woman to be easily shocked. She had seen and done too much in her time for that.

Having been settled in her new house (courtesy of Thomas) for a few weeks now, she knew exactly who had her new address – she had only given it to the people that she actually wanted to hear from and knew that they weren't a threat. So, when she didn't immediately recognise the writing on the front of an envelope, worry took over her. However, upon closer inspection of the handwriting, she stopped. Polly knew that writing, but she couldn't believe what she was seeing. She ripped the envelope open, and what was contained in that letter shocked her more than anything that had happened over the last three years:

Polly,

DO NOT SHOW THIS LETTER TO ANYONE OR TELL ANYONE ABOUT WHAT IT CONTAINS. It's not sensitive or anything, I just want to keep it a surprise. A secret between us girls, just like the old days (I've written to Ada as well).

As you can probably tell, it's Y/N, and I'm alive and well. I'll explain more when I get home - I'm on my way back to Birmingham now.

By the time you get this, I'll be arriving in two days' time. I'll come to the address that I posted this to, I know that's your fancy new home. Then, how about we organise a little family get together? You know I've always been one for the dramatics (although I promise me disappearing off for 5 years wasn't completely intentional).

I can't wait to see you again soon; I've missed you all so much.

All my love,

Y/N Shelby xxx

(P.S. in case you don't believe that I am who I say I am, I've enclosed my Mother's necklace that Tommy gave to me on my 16th birthday, to prove my identity.)

And there the necklace was, sat at the bottom of the envelope. Silent tears began to roll down Polly's face and a smile, as big as the day that Michael returned to her, brightened her features.

Y/N Shelby was coming home. And, boy, were those two going to have some fun telling her brothers...

***

The day that the 30-year-old turned up on Polly's doorstep was a blur of tears, hugs and gin.

Y/N had been introduced to Michael, who they couldn't really avoid because he lived there, but who was more than happy to keep their secret. Just being with Polly again made her realise that she was finally home.

Whilst Y/N already knew a lot about what had happened since she left, having kept tabs on the family through her various contacts while she was away, the next day Polly helped to fill in some of the gaps in her knowledge. Polly also told her about how torn up Tommy still was about her absence, and it was enough to nearly send Y/N running straight to him. But then her aunt reasoned that it was probably better for Thomas to pass out in shock in her home, where they could set up lots of cushions as a crash pad, as oppose to on the hard streets of Birmingham.

And so the planning commenced. It was decided that Polly would host a dinner for the whole family, telling everyone that she needed to put her new house to good use, and that they could combine it with a proper welcome for Michael.

As the day drew nearer, Y/N could feel butterflies in her stomach constantly. Her excitement at seeing her whole family again was almost overwhelming. Yet she dreaded having to tell them all the truth about her prolonged disappearance.

But, honestly, the excitement won over her nerves every time.

***

When Y/N heard her brothers' voices booming through the house, she had never been more grateful that she was running late in getting ready (as usual) and didn't have her makeup on yet. She hadn't been able to stop the tears falling from her blue eyes as the familiar sounds of her family's squabbling travelled up the stairs like music to her ears.

Everything was ready for the night that she had dreamed of for nearly three full years.

Fuck, I'm still in my pyjamas, Y/N realised, and hurried about getting ready.

Having memorised where the creaky steps were earlier that day, Y/N creeped down the stairs silently, clad in the most gorgeous midnight blue dress that she had ever seen. When she looked in the mirror, with her makeup on and hair done, she had realised how much she had grown up since she last saw her family.

But she had no time to think about that now, for it was nearly her moment.

Lingering in the doorway with a glass of champagne, and sending Polly a wink, she felt her heart rate shoot up as her aunt stood up with her own glass.

"Now, before we have dessert, I'd like to make a toast." She paused, looking around the table, her own happiness threatening to overflow. "To family."

"To family!" The brothers and Michael chorused.

Stepping into the light and leaning against the doorframe, completely unnoticed by her siblings, Y/N waited until the noise had died down before gently repeating the toast: "To family."

***

It felt like time had stood still.

Arthur, John and Finn's heads whipped around to see where the voice came from. Tommy had frozen completely, tensing up as he heard his sister's voice for the first time in seven years.

"Y/N/N?" Arthur whispered, not believing his eyes.

"Hello boys," Y/N said with a smile and a teasing glint in her eye. "Did you miss me?"

John stood up slowly and made his way towards her, and Y/N stretched her hand out towards him after putting her glass down. Her little brother tentatively placed his hand in hers, and she squeezed it, reassuring him that she was really there. She saw a couple of tears form in his eyes, though he refused to let them fall. John started to laugh, wrapped his arms around her waist and lifted Y/N up, spinning her in circles and hugging her tightly. Still laughing, he exclaimed "Oh my fucking God!" and placed her down on the ground.

Y/N was next almost knocked flying with a hug from Finn, who buried his head into the crook of her neck as he cried silently. "Look at you, eh! Almost as big as me now, aren't you?" Y/N placed a soft kiss on the top of her youngest brother's head and rubbed his back soothingly. Over Finn's shoulder, she saw Arthur approaching her, seemingly lost for words. His hand cupped her cheek as he ran his thumb over it, before finally saying "Now what sort of time do you call this, young lady?" Y/N collapsed into giggles as Arthur placed a rough kiss to her forehead.

As Finn and Arthur pulled away, Y/N's eyes found the only brother who hadn't yet greeted her and who she was the most anxious to see. Tommy still hadn't moved, his eyes fixed firmly on the table in front of him, but Y/N could tell that they were cold.

"Tom?"

There was silence. After what felt to Y/N like a lifetime, Tommy spoke quietly and slowly. "I don't want to look up and find that you're not really here. That this is all in my head. I don't think I could bear it." His voice cracked slightly as he uttered the last sentence and, for the first time since the war, the family saw their brother's vulnerability as clear as day. It was a stark contrast to the Tommy Shelby that they'd gotten so used to being around.

Y/N cautiously walked over to her beloved elder brother, as if he were a spooked horse, and lowered herself into the seat beside him. She observed his eyes flit over to her as the chair creaked, so quickly that if she had blinked at the wrong moment she would have missed it. She smiled gently at Tommy. "Well I'm afraid you're going to be stuck with me for a while now, Tom, so you'd better start getting used to having me around again."

As Y/N gently placed her hand on top of his, Tommy's entire body relaxed and at the same time something ignited in him. He felt alive for the first time since the war, and yet so at peace at the same time.

Suddenly, Tommy grabbed her hand in his, pulled Y/N to her feet with him and brought her into a bone-crushing hug. A thousand emotions and lost words were communicated in that one embrace, in that one moment, even. Tommy clung to his sister like she would vanish again if he loosened his grip. It was only when she whispered "I'm here now, Tom" in his ear as he stroked her hair that he relinquished his hold on her.

Tommy pulled away only slightly from Y/N and held her face gently in his hands. "My sweet girl," he breathed, a small smile gracing his lips. Y/N brought her hand up to his and held it there, the sibling simply enjoying the moment of being together again, tear tracks staining both of their faces.

The silence was broken by Arthur, who gruffly announced: "I need another fucking drink." The whole family started to laugh, the reality of the event finally sinking in.

"Yeah, you pour us all another drink, Artie, while I go and get your pudding." Y/N skipped towards the door.

"Y/N/N we don't fucking care about pudding now, you dick, just get back here now," John shouted after her.

"Bloody hell, no need to shout, John boy, I'm only going round the corner." She leaned around the doorframe, making sure to keep one hand on it to reassure Tommy. "Anyway," Y/N continued, "I've got to give you three your coming home present!"

"Our coming home present?" Arthur chortled.

"Yes," Y/N replied, matter-of-factly. "I believed I promised you lot cake" and she entered holding a cake exactly like their Mother used to make.

The three eldest brothers simply smiled fondly at their sister, shaking their heads.

***

An hour later, the family were all crowded into Polly's living room, having consumed the entire dessert. The gramophone was gently playing music in the background, as no one had bothered to take the record off once Arthur and John had finished dancing with their sister (they had claimed that they needed their toes stepping on to bring them back to reality).

The Shelbys and Grays spent some rare time together as a family that evening. No fighting, no arguing, no business: just talking and reminiscing and laughing.

But now the night was drawing to a close. Finn had fallen asleep, the overwhelming emotions of the evening having finally caught up to him. Arthur and John were drunkenly singing in the corner of the room, yet they occasionally looked over at their sister, wanting to check that she was still there. Tommy simply felt complete again. For once his silence did not come from an attempt to conceal his true emotions, there was no point in trying that again tonight; he was just cherishing the moment, wanting it to last forever.

As for Y/N herself, she couldn't remember ever feeling so content before. She felt like she was on cloud nine, curled up to Tommy's side as they sat on the sofa together, watching the flames dance around in the hearth. His arm was around her shoulders, holding her close to him, and every now and again Y/N felt him place a soft kiss on the top of her head.

She knew that she had a lot of explaining to do. But that could wait until the morning. For now, they were a family reunited, and none of them could wish for anything more.

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